Mr. Smith and the Roach

By J.J. DiBenedetto

John Smith has a problem. He’s a retired cop whose pension just got wiped out, and he doesn’t know why or how. Now he needs to find a roommate to help pay the bills.

Sam has a problem. He’s a six-foot-tall talking cockroach and he doesn’t know who created him, or why, or how. Now he needs a place to live.

Thrown together as roommates and amateur detectives, Mr. Smith and the Roach realize their problems might be related.

But those problems are far more complicated than they imagined, and before all is said and done, they’ll run afoul of a Russian gangster, an imprisoned Mafia don, a crooked Wall Street banker, a mad scientist and, maybe worst of all, Mr. Smith’s baby sister.

Can they get to the bottom of an unbelievable plot before someone exterminates the Roach – and Mr. Smith – for good?

• Language: English
• Publisher: J.J. DiBenedetto
• Release date: Nov 26, 2018
• ISBN: 9780463755976

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Copyright © 2018 James J. DiBenedetto

All Rights Reserved. This book contains material protected under International and Federal Copyright Laws and Treaties. Any unauthorized reprint or use of this material is prohibited. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system without express written permission from the author.

Any references to historical events, real people, or real places are used factiously. Names, characters and places are products of the author’s imagination.

Cover design by: Jeff Brown (www.jeffbrowngraphics.com)

Book design by: Colleen Sheehan (www.ampersandbookinteriors.com)

Printed by: Amazon

First printing:

Writing Dreams

Arlington, Virginia

www.jjdibenedetto.com

Table of Contents

Title Page

Copyright

Also From The Author

Prologue

One: A Man and a Roach Walk Into a Bar

Two: Bugging Me, Bugging You

Three: Mr. and Miss Smith

Four: The Roach Who Knew Too Much

Five: Walk Like An Entomologist

Interlude: Brooks and Brothers

Six: The Courtship of Jeannie's Uncle

Seven: Mr. Smith Goes to Town

Interlude: The Roach's Analyst

Eight: The Roach Who Fell to Earth

Nine: Dr. Brooks, or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Roach

Interlude: The Bartender Always Rings Twice

Ten: Roach Among the Pigeons

Eleven: Birth of a Roach

Interlude: Sunday in the Park With Jeannie

Twelve: Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (Square Park)

Thirteen: The Roach, The Thief, His (ex) Wife and Her Lover

Fourteen: The Bartender Diaries

Interlude: Two Girls and an Entomologist

Fifteen: Roach Trip

Sixteen: No More Mr. Nice Roach

Seventeen: Jeannie's Game

Interlude: Our Man Brooks

Eighteen: Interview With the Roach

Interlude: Jeannie Through the Looking Glass

Nineteen: Abby Get Your Gun

Twenty: The Roach Who Saw Tomorrow

Also From The Authors

Author's Note & Acknowledgements

About the Author

The Dream Doctor Mysteries

Dream Student

Dream Doctor

Dream Child

Dream Family

Waking Dream

Dream Reunion

Dream Home

Dream Vacation

Fever Dream

Dream Wedding

Dream Fragments: Stories from the Dream Doctor Mysteries

Betty & Howard’s Excellent Adventure

A Box of Dreams: the collected Dream Doctor Mysteries (books 1-5)

Dream Sequence (the Dream Doctor Mysteries, books 1-3)

The Jane Barnaby Adventures

Finders Keepers

Losers Weepers

Her Brother’s Keeper

The Jane Barnaby Adventures Box Set

Welcome to Romance

Finding Dori

All available in paperback and Audiobook

All available at:

www.jjdibenedetto.com

In his sixty-one years of life, Detective John Wilkes Smith, NYPD (retired) had witnessed many things that he would never have believed possible had he not seen them with his own eyes.

Partly, that was because he was not, and never had been, a terribly imaginative man. But even the most fanciful mind could hardly have dreamed up the scene taking place right now in what was formerly John’s home office, now pressed into service as a second bedroom.

John’s brand new roommate was getting ready for bed. The sudden need for a roommate to help pay the rent had been an unwelcome surprise, although it probably shouldn’t have been. But, as he and his former coworkers in the homicide division often remarked, what was done was done.

There was no undoing the financial disaster that had befallen John, and there was no undoing the arrangement that had brought a much-oversized member of the species periplaneta Americana into his home.

No, until today, John would never have believed, and he doubted very much that anyone else would have, either, that he would be sharing his apartment tonight with a walking, talking, trenchcoat-wearing six-foot-tall cockroach.

The day had begun like every other day since his retirement. John awoke at seven AM and reached over the pile of unopened mail stacked high on his bedside table to silence the alarm clock.

Unlike every other day, he was clumsy, and knocked the top two or three inches of the pile onto the floor. He sighed as he climbed out of bed and bent over to retrieve the envelopes that had fallen. Before he put them back, to be ignored for another day, something made him look more closely at them, specifically the envelope from his bank.

He recalled receiving it the day before. He’d assumed it was his monthly statement, although now he thought about it, those usually arrived the first week of the month. Yesterday was the 22nd of October. And the envelope was lighter than the ones that usually carried his statements.

It was not a statement. Instead, it was something John hadn’t received in nearly forty years: an overdraft notice. The last time – the only time – he’d bounced a check, Jimmy Carter was President, and the original Star Wars was still a month away from premiering in theaters.

He didn’t understand. It was impossible. His pension was deposited on the 15th of the month, every month, like clockwork. There was over $7,000 in his checking account, even after the criminally high bill from the auto body shop, and the charge for his new glasses.

Except, obviously, there wasn’t $7,000 in his account, was there?

There wouldn’t be a human being available to call, or even one of the replicants that staffed most call centers, at this uncivilized hour. Anyway, he’d be far better equipped to deal with whatever had happened after a hot shower and a cup of coffee or three.

None of that helped, however, when he called the bank at 8:30 AM. John navigated his way through the various phone menus until he reached a live person, and it took Zelda in the Charleston call center less than thirty seconds to discover the problem.

There had been a deposit on the 15th. But it was not for the usual amount of $6,105.23. It was for only $1,200. Zelda had no explanation for the discrepancy; she confirmed that every other detail was the same as previous payments, except for the amount. Zelda sounded apologetic, but explained that there was nothing more she could tell him. That’s all the information I have, Mr. Smith. You’ll have to talk to the pension people.

I intend to, he told her, in a tone of voice that he’d mostly reserved for use in the interrogation room, back before his retirement.

Zelda wished him good luck and a good day, and John hung up the phone. He turned his attention to the pile of mail. Before he took the matter up with someone at the investment firm of Gardner, Temple & Rhodes, the company that managed his pension, it would be best to check if they’d sent him a letter that might explain what had happened.

Sure enough, there was. It was buried another six inches down in the pile of mail, and postmarked September 13th. John tore the envelope open and pulled out a very long letter – eight pages, double-sided, and, except for the very first page, single-spaced and written in the sort of tiny font usually reserved for the listing of medical risks at the bottom of pharmaceutical ads.

Even that double-spaced first page was difficult to read, owing to the circuitous and overly-legalistic language, but John got the point quickly enough. The value of his pension fund had decreased, apparently overnight, by a little over eighty percent. There was no explanation as to how or why this had occurred, only repeated assertions that the performance of the fund was, of course, not guaranteed, and that Gardner, Temple & Rhodes had no liability whatsoever for any losses the fund might experience. All those single-spaced pages expanded on those two points in eye-watering detail, citing myriad statutes and regulations to support their position.

A phone call was clearly not going to resolve the situation. A visit to the firm’s offices was in order, although John suspected that without a lawyer at his side, it was unlikely to accomplish much more than a call would. And thanks to his distressingly low bank balance, hiring a lawyer wasn’t a realistic option. At least he’d have the chance to look someone in the eye, though, and express his displeasure in person. Besides, as a retired detective, he could legally carry his gun, and, if nothing else, the sight of it might instill a little bit of fear into whomever he talked to. That would be worth something. You had to take your small victories where you could; if his career as a homicide detective had taught him nothing else, it had certainly taught him that.

John had been right. This visit wasn’t going to accomplish anything, other than raising his blood pressure. He’d been ushered into an empty conference room and left to wait for half an hour, without even being offered a cup of coffee. Then a young man entered, introduced himself as Jack Travis, investor relations, shook his hand with a grip that was limp, bordering on pathetic, sat down and launched into a monologue that recapped all the same points the letter had made.

John wasn’t sure what irritated him most about the man sitting across from him. It was hard to pick between his expensive and yet ill-fitting suit, his inadequately shaven face, the way he refused to meet John’s eyes, or his squeaky yet smug, self-assured tone of voice.

The young man was just now winding up the prepared portion of his speech. He – finally – made eye contact with John, just for a moment, and tried to insert a note of what John assumed was meant to be sympathy into his voice. No one regrets what’s happened more than I, he said, and the question of what most irritated John was instantly settled.

John stood up quickly, his left hand pulling back his weatherbeaten leather jacket just enough to give the young man a glimpse of his weapon. It was a well-practiced gesture, and almost always effective. It certainly had an impact here; the man’s eyes went wide with fear, and he scooted back a good three feet.

I doubt very much that you regret this more than I do, Jack. The gun was no longer visible, but John noted with some satisfaction that the man’s eyes were fixed on the spot where it was, all the same. But intimidating him, as much as it temporarily lifted his mood, wasn’t going to get his money back. And, honestly, it was beneath him. It was fine to scare a potential witness holding out on the information that would help close a homicide investigation, but those days were long past. But that’s neither here nor there. I don’t want to talk about regrets, I want to talk about where all my money went.

I can’t tell you anything more, Mr. Smith, the young man said, his voice shaking.

John wasn’t surprised. He asked to speak to his manager, and he was equally unsurprised when she was equally unhelpful. The third time, however, was the charm. Mr. Fraylington, the Assistant Director for Client Resources, had a bit of useful information. Mr. Fraylington was older than either of his predecessors, definitely north of fifty, which put John at ease. And rather than a laptop or tablet, he carried an actual notebook, with actual paper, and consulted it for several minutes, muttering and nodding to himself, before speaking.

Yes, I see. Right here, he said. Your account was one of the ones overseen by Mr. Frankenhurst.

John had long ago learned not to react to surprising information, to project a poker face regardless of what shocking thing a witness might blurt out. Frankenhurst? I used to know a Frankenhurst. What was his first name? He said it casually, off-handedly, as though he were asking about the weather or the score of last night’s Yankee game. Either he hit the right tone, or Mr. Fraylington was as good an actor as John was, because he didn’t visibly react to the question.

Paul. Good man. It was such a shame, when we lost him. Paul Frankenhurst. That was the name of his brother-in-law. Ex-brother-in-law, anyway. Two husbands ago, for his sister. Or was it three? It was so hard to keep up with Abby’s messy love life. Paul Frankenhurst had also been a financial advisor, and he’d urged John to sign up for the pilot program to allow retired NYPD officers to put their pensions under private management.

There are safeguards in place, Paul had told him. Worst case, you see a five percent dip in your monthly payment, and even that’s unlikely. But the upside is through the roof. You’d be an idiot not to do it.

John had done some research, and as far as he’d been able to tell, which in hindsight was clearly not far enough, Paul had been telling the truth. And Paul had at least appeared respectable, which was more than he’d been able to say for Abby’s first two husbands. In the interest of family peace, he’d taken the man’s advice.

It seemed beyond belief that his Paul Frankenhurst, and the Paul Frankenhurst who worked for this firm, were not the same person. John did believe in coincidences, but this was not one of them. Especially with that mention about losing him. What happened to him?

Terrible business. You remember that helicopter accident, the one on the East River, four years ago? There was confirmation, as if John had needed any.

That was him? John remembered it. There’d been a closed casket at the funeral, and Abby had ended up engaged to one of the pallbearers two months later. How long did he work here, before it happened?

Mr. Fraylington was lost in recollection for a moment. Years. Twelve or thirteen, if memory serves. Never saw a better salesman than Paul, it hasn’t been the same since the accident.

A salesman, and a world-class con artist. Of course his sister had been drawn to him. But what had a world-class con artist seen in Abby?

John laughed. It was the only response, when he realized what the answer had to be. He was what Paul Frankenhurst had seen, he and his fellow officers. Or, more to the point, all the money in their pension funds. Abby was Paul’s way in, and John hadn’t had an inkling. I’m sorry, John said, sighing deeply. I was just remembering something. Obviously none of this is funny.

On the actual question at hand – what had happened to John’s pension – Mr. Fraylington was apologetic, but unable to provide any answers. John no longer needed them, though. It was clear what had happened. It had all been a scam, right from the start. Paul had, presumably, been scamming his employer as well as his clients. Maybe it had been a pyramid scheme. That’s how the whole Bernie Madoff thing had worked, hadn’t it? And hadn’t that gone on for years, before it finally unraveled?

John took his leave of the firm of Gardner, Temple & Rhodes, thoroughly depressed. He saw no possibility of getting his money back, not even a portion of it. He had no legal recourse against the firm itself. And the person who had actually ripped him off was dead, so there wasn’t even the chance of obtaining whatever satisfaction might have been gained by avenging himself upon Paul Frankenhurst.

There was only one place to go: In Vino Veritas.

In the absence of any actual solutions to his financial problems, he could at least be assured of a sympathetic ear, and maybe even a glass or two on the house. Once upon a time, John might have walked all the way from the Wall Street offices of the investment firm to the wine bar on the Upper West Side, only a block from his apartment. But those days were gone, and, anyway, he needed a drink a lot more than he needed the exercise.

Two trains, thirteen stops and forty minutes later, John emerged from the 86th St station and made his way over to the bar. John saw the trademark sign – a red and blue neon parrot perched atop a gold neon wineglass – when he turned the corner onto West 88th St. It had been the bar’s trademark for the last two years, anyway, ever since he’d helped the owner liberate the neon bird from the dumpster in the alley that the bar shared with the Center for Avian and Exotic Medicine next door. As far as John knew, there’d been no complaints from the bird doctors about the repurposing of their sign.

He walked in and saw a mass of dirty blonde hair poking out from behind the bar. After a moment, the rest of the bar’s owner appeared, and took stock of him. You look like hell, John. What happened?

Hello to you, too, Hilary. There was no point pretending with her. He’d known Hilary Jackson for thirty years, and to call their history complicated would be the very definition of understatement. Just start pouring, and I’ll tell you when to stop.

She gestured to a table in the corner, dimly-lit and well away from any other patrons, not that there were many at this hour, and then joined him there, bottle and glasses in hand. It was a halfway-decent California merlot, which was empty by the time John finished his tale. He didn’t leave out the parts that illustrated his own carelessness, inattention or outright stupidity. That was the blessing, and the curse, of letting someone know you as well as Hilary knew him. If he had tried to make himself sound like less of a fool, she wouldn’t even have had to call him on it. A hard stare would have been enough, and John had never met anyone with a harder stare than Hilary. Which, considering the sort of people he’d met in his career as a homicide detective, was a little unnerving.

I’d tell you that you should have known better, she said, when he was done, but there’s not much point, is there? Instead, she got up, disappeared behind the bar, and returned again, this time with a far better vintage.

Isn’t this backwards? I thought you were supposed to start with the good stuff, and then bring out the vinegar once the customers are too drunk to notice.

Mock anger flashed in her blue eyes. Let’s get something straight, John. I don’t serve anything I wouldn’t drink myself, so you can just can it with the vinegar comments. He didn’t bother to apologize; this routine went way back, and she knew all the lines just as well as he did. But you’re right. And if I’d known how crappy things were, I would have brought this one out first.

He hadn’t even gotten to the really crappy part yet. If he could only count on $1,200 a month from his pension, he wouldn’t be able to pay his rent – among many other things. Thanks, he said.