Slots. Plots. Murder.: A Sherlock Jones Novel

By Wlliam J. Palmer

The gambling worlds of L.A. and Las Vegas converge in this third "Sherlock Jones" novel. Sherlock and his WDGA (Wednesday Drunken Golfers Association) "Disreputables" head to Las Vegas to search for the murderer of the primary investor in a major Santa Monica beachfront Casino/Resort Project. That investor's

• Language: English
• Publisher: Palmetto Publishing
• Release date: Apr 3, 2023
• ISBN: 9798822912328

Wlliam J. Palmer

William J. Palmer is a Professor Emeritus from the Department of English at Purdue University. This is his 13th novel and the third novel of his "The Sherlock Jones Novels" series of hardboiled detective novels. He splits his time between Indiana and Southern California. For more information on the author see:Wjpalmernovelist.wordpress.comWikipediaAmazon Author Page

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Chapter 1

Bad News

Wednesday. WDGA day. We didn’t all usually tee off until about four when everybody got off work. Except for me who didn’t have a real job. It wasn’t unusual for me to get to the Venice Public bar early. I’d have a couple of beers before the guys started to show up, get a head start on Fresh and Panda and Clay-boy and Doc, plus Frash depending on his shift, and Cone, the new guy. A discarded L.A. Times was sitting on the table next to mine. I grabbed it to help me pass the time until my Disreputables staggered in. One of the headlines, streamed across the right three columns in bold black letters, BILLIONAIRE KILLED IN CHINATOWN, mildly stirred my curiosity. But then the lead paragraph just beneath sat me straight up in my chair and bent me over the newspaper story in shock.

Parker Werge, CEO of a Real Estate empire in the San Fernando Valley, was found dead yesterday morning in Chinatown of a single stab wound as confirmed by the LAPD. He was the victim of what the police suspect was an attempted robbery.

The next few paragraphs gave some biographical background on poor dead Parker, described how he had inherited a vast expanse of subdividable land and already subdivided land upon his father’s death. Little boxes on the hillside to quote Woody Guthrie’s theme from Weeds. I read all the way down and, being a Private Detective myself, the last paragraph, a description of the crime scene, restirred my interest.

Werge’s body was found in an alley off a side street, Norwich Street, between Alameda Street and Broadway by a man walking his dog in the early morning.

That’s right in the middle of Chinatown, I thought. What the hell was Parker doing in there?

Other than the single stab wound and the police assumption of robbery as the motive, the Times didn’t offer any further information. In shock, I read the article through again. Then just sat there staring at the newspaper, not really seeing it, frozen in thought thinking about Parker Werge. I had known him since high school in Beverly Hills. We were two spoiled rich kids, but we ran with different crowds because he was a hell of a lot richer than me and I was a hell of a lot better athlete than him. My father is a lawyer. His was the richest developer in Southern California. He went on to inherit his father’s megabucks while I went on to the Marine Corps and the life of a half-ass P.I. But then, and this is where it gets interesting, Parker popped up in the middle of my Briarwood C.C. murder case. Thinking back on that case and my surveillance of him then, it suddenly didn’t seem such a stretch for Parker to be out and about in Chinatown in the middle of the night. It wouldn’t be the first time he went sex-shopping on the dark side.

I immediately clicked Sasha on my cell. She is not only my lover, but also my new partner in Archer Investigations. But back almost three years she had been one of the principal murder suspects in the Briarwood case, and Parker Werge’s personal Dominatrix, a role she played to the hilt. I think she really enjoyed dressing up in leather, metal studs, an ornamental dog collar, and boots so high she had to take them off to pee.

Sasha and I had become business partners right after the Mandy Troy affair, and then, awhile after that, we moved in together. Hell, we slept in each other’s bed pretty much every night anyway. Believe me, it was not a difficult decision for me to give up my disgusting one-bedroom hovel for her pure white condo that I suspected had been bought and paid for by her guardian cum uncle maybe father Alex Karg. My one-bedroom hovel was closer to the beach, but it was also decorated with dirty dishes piled high in the sink, beer bottles under the bed, golf clubs in different stages of adaptation (new shafts, new grips, lead tape on the heads), and books piled twenty volumes high against the walls. Sasha’s condo was interior designed all in white and always immaculate. My crap went in her storage locker.

Anyway, she picked up on about the third ring. When I told her the news about Parker, she lapsed into a sudden silence that lasted longer than it took water to boil. In Sasha’s case it boiled over into shuddering sobs that kept her off the line for long minutes while she struggled to get them under control.

Oh my god, he’s dead? For real? Oh my god. Her voice was quaking when she came back on the line. I can’t believe it.

Believe it, I assured her. Look, I’ll be home after golf and we’ll talk about it. Nothing we can do. The poor bastard is dead.

He wasn’t so bad. He didn’t have any friends.

He was pretty bad. He didn’t have any friends because he was a bi-sexual, sado-masochistic, arrogant drunk, I guess on the spur of the moment I decided not to sugar-coat it for her.

I know. I know, she sobbed into the phone. But I felt sorry for him.

Yeah, but he paid you well to indulge his sick perversions.

I know. I know, her tears for Parker starting to calm.

Look, I’m gonna go play golf, I’ll see you tonight.

An hour and a half later we were on the seventh hole when she called me again. It was unusual because she knew I didn’t like to be disturbed when I was on the golf course. Even after an interval of seven holes, Sasha was still sort of breathless. I answered Hello and that was it for me. Her voice was racing, her words revving up like an accelerator floored in neutral.

I talked to my uncle. He already knew Parker was dead. He called me.

Karg? I stupidly stated the obvious.

Yes. He wants to talk to you, meet with you, ASAP, Her tongue still locked on the verbal accelerator.

I didn’t know what to say right away, so I put her on a golfer’s version of HOLD. Hold on a minute. I need to hit a shot. I hit a pretty decent seven iron to the right side of the green. OK, I got back to her, I’ll be done here in half an hour. We’ll talk when I get home.

When I came in, she was sitting in her white bathrobe on her white love seat, in her all-white living room, waiting impatiently for me. As soon as I came through the door, she jumped up and launched herself into my arms, her whole body still on mega-RPMs, vibrating with urgency. Oh Nicky, I can’t believe he’s dead. My uncle asked me to ask you to come and see him, about Parker’s murder, tomorrow morning, as early as you can. He seemed really shook. He insisted that you come.

I hugged her tightly in my arms, tried to calm her with my body. After long minutes it seemed to work. Her desperate motor slowed to an idle. When she stopped being a crazy person, I sat her down on the love seat and tried to talk to her. What does your uncle, your . . . whatever he is . . . want? What does he have to do with Parker’s murder?

I don’t know Nicky. He just seemed really upset. Sasha knew that I wasn’t a big fan of Alex Karg. Hell, twice he had offered me a high paying job as his security chief riding herd on his two moron nephews, Sergai and Igor, and I had turned him down both times. So, I just figured he wanted to hire me again and he was using Sasha to intercede for him. But then I realized that it was probably more complicated than just that. I had forgotten that Alex Karg and Parker Werge were business partners. Of course, Karg’s urgent phone call had to be directly related to Parker’s murder. I was starting to have a bad feeling about this. It was getting complicated and complicated was something I always wanted to avoid.

I wanted to tell Sasha to tell Karg that I wanted nothing to do with this Parker Werge murder. I wanted to tell her to tell him that I couldn’t make his urgent morning meeting. I wanted to tell her that Parker Werge was history and not our problem. I wanted to tell her that all I wanted to do was play golf. But, of course, I didn’t tell her any of that. Like every other pussy-whipped boyfriend in America I told her I’d do it even though I felt the complications piling up on me like bogey’s when you’re shanking.

As Sasha was calling Karg back and setting up this meeting, it occurred to me that writing these murder cases down, creating weird obscure similes like that last one, had become an entertaining game for me, a balance to golf, my other entertaining game. Funny how each of my cases, my murder books, seem to begin at the golf course. I guess that pretty quickly people figure out where they have the best chance of finding me.

Chapter Two

The Unwelcome Client

Driving crosstown on the 10 and the 405 to Century City wasn’t too bad. Despite Karg’s insistence that I get there as early as possible, I waited for the Thursday rush hour traffic to clear. It was almost ten o’clock when Sasha and I got in the car to go meet with Karg. As I drove, Sasha tried her seductive best to prep me for the meeting, charm me into a receptive mood. I was a less than enthusiastic recipient of her cajoling. Hell, she was lightly rubbing my thigh as I drove, a move she had used a number of times before when she wanted something.

Nicky, please listen to him, don’t just blow him off. Her phrasing struck me as funny. She should talk about blowing someone off, I thought, and a small grin crossed my face. She caught me doing it. What? she asked. What’s so funny?

OK. OK. I ignored her questions. I’ll listen. But what do you think he wants?

I don’t know. But whatever it is he’s deadly serious about it. I could hear it in his voice. I think he wants to hire you, us maybe, I don’t know. Her voice had turned into serious pleading.

He’s tried to hire me before, for the last year, during the Pandemic. I was trying to play hard to get, but I knew I was fighting a losing battle. Her hand was still moving on my leg.

Please Nicky, talk to him, listen. Do it for me. There it was! Naturally, I caved like a QB under a 300-pound defensive tackle.

When we got to Century City, she directed me to pull into the underground parking garage and take the elevator up to Karg’s office on the 15th floor.

Why all the spy craft? I asked as we were getting out of the car. I felt like I was walking into the middle of one of my John LeCarre novels that was molding away in her storage locker.

I think he’s a bit paranoid. I think he doesn’t want anyone to know you are working for him.

I’m not working for him. I don’t even know what is going on.

Look, hon, her voice got oppressively insistent, if he offers a job, I want you to take it.

OK, why? We were standing waiting for the elevator and I still felt like I was being pushed into something I didn’t really want. The elevator doors opened, but she grabbed me by both elbows, turned me to facing her straight on, gave me her most serious face, and used her most Dominatrix voice. The elevator door closed and it left.

Look, Nick, I want you to take the job. Because I’m your partner and he is a close relative. He’s very important to me. And he can and will pay us very well. Listen to him. Take what he offers. That was it. The elevator doors opened again and we got on. God only knows what I was getting myself into.

Alex Karg’s offices, aka Janowitz Investments, Janowitz long dead, Karg sole owner and proprietor, was a sleek, plush, very professional looking set of offices with an impressive Century City address serving as an elaborate front for diverting rich investors’ money out of their pockets and into his. It had been two and one-half years since I had first met Alex Karg and his two thug nephews, Sergai and Igor. In that interim Karg had twice offered me a pretty high-paying job as Janowitz Investment’s Security Chief. Both times I had turned him down, afraid that it would seriously cut into my golf and beer-drinking time. Karg had taken a liking to me when I solved that Briarwood murder case in which he and his so-called niece, my Sasha, had been major suspects. My solving of that case had cleared both him and her, although she was the only one I cared about. I then found out that Karg was not only her employer, but also maybe her mother’s lover, her uncle perhaps, possibly even her father.

We were ushered into Karg’s spacious office by his receptionist in her small librarianesque glasses, her short, tight, black hookeresque skirt, and her white button-down, tucked-in, manish, dress shirt with two buttons open at the top. You had to hand it to Karg. He certainly knew how to attractively furnish his office. He was parked behind a waxed shiny mahogany desk about as long as the flight deck of an aircraft carrier. His desk was flanked by two leather chairs, both brown, complimenting the mahogany. Two of his office walls were all glass looking out over the roofs of L.A. all the way to the ocean. His desk, large as it is, was sparsely furnished. Front and center sat a mahogany plaque with Alex Karg, President embossed in gold on it. To the right of the name-plaque lurked a dangerous looking letter-opener and to the right of that squatted a fat chrome cigarette lighter. To the left of the plaque was a Picasso-esque "objet de art" that resembled a small pile of rusted automobile parts. And to the left of that was a flat, multi-buttoned, intercom box. It was quite the successful business executive’s desk.

But by far the most interesting piece of furniture in Karg’s office was the large flat table upon which a scale-model of a Resort Hotel and Casino sat.