Case #7: Past Grievances
Date: May 2, 2002
Location: Logjam, CA


I always knew my past would catch up with me someday. Only thing, it turned out to be my other past.

Five years I worked for the Mob. First in Jersey, fronting a numbers racket, then I hightailed it to Miami when things got a little dicey. Sort of like the movie, Some Like It Hot, but without the dress. Then, just to save my hide, my Uncle Joey turned up the heat on me all along the Eastern Seaboard, and the next thing I knew, I was on the midnight bus to Los Angeles.

Things changed when I got to the West Coast. First my name. Then my career. I buried Johnny Cassini and gave birth to Johnny Casino. It wasn't as painful as it sounds. My new line of work: Private Detective. I used my last official criminal act to buy that new identity from a guy I knew who faked passports for actors and artists fleeing communist countries back in the Eighties.

Years of scraping like an alley cat earned me a fairly good reputation as a P.I. around town. It also got me better clients and a much better office right off the freeway in Encino.

I was close enough to middle class homes in the Valley and all those unhappy housewives who wanted to see if their no-good husbands were cheating on them with the secretary. It was also a discreet drive from pricier digs in Bel Air, Beverly Hills, and Malibu, for those well-heeled, soon-to-be ex-wives who wanted me to get incriminating info on their errant husband's next possible trophy wife. The new office was just a question of logistics. Or as they say in the real estate business: Location. Location. Location.

After fifteen years of sticking my nose in where it didn't belong, a grateful client left me big bucks in her will and I retired. That didn't last long. The money did. It was a lot of money. But the retirement ended when somebody made me an offer I couldn't refuse. Oh sure, technically, I could have refused. I enjoyed my retirement. Sitting on my butt watching old movies was becoming my hobby. But looking through other people's garbage had been my life, and I missed it. I jumped back into the business with both feet.

I had just wrapped up a case in Los Angeles and was heading back to my cabin in Logjam, a small mountain burg two and a half hours away. It was May 2nd. It must have rained overnight because everything smelled fresh and green, not like in Jersey where anything growing and green was called mold.

My stomach started growling halfway up the mountain, and the only thing I had in the glove compartment was a roll of nickels and a flashlight. I decided to stop off at my favorite restaurant on the outskirts of town for something more substantial.

Rusty's Diner was nearly empty, just a quartet of truck drivers clustered near the bar. Knotty pine paneling, checkered tablecloths, and Rudolph's head mounted on the wall were the sole nods to atmosphere at the diner. Rusty's never had a band on Thursday nights, just the jukebox regurgitating great old '60s songs.

I grabbed my usual table and looked for Bonnie. I hadn't been gone that long, but I missed the way her red hair shined and those hazel eyes sparkled. We had been sort of an item around town since I moved up here three years ago. I could always count on her to go with me to the only theater in the area when they were showing an old movie. And she helped me clean the fish I caught in the lake, if I caught any. Good Ol' Bonnie. I liked to watch her sashay across the wood floor with plates of food for the diners without dropping anything.

I got a whiff of home cooking. Thursday's special was meatloaf. But my mouth watered for a big plate of Irish Spaghetti: meat sauce over mashed potatoes. I could almost taste it. Bonnie's Irish eyes talked me into the mashed potato part a few years ago. She was pretty enough to talk me into lots of things, but my Italian upbringing and independent streak insisted on the spaghetti sauce. I licked my lips while I listened to Mel Carter belt out "Hold Me, Thrill Me, Kiss Me."

I wondered why Bonnie hadn't come rushing out to greet me when I walked in. I knew she worked Thursdays. She usually had a cold glass of beer on the table thirty seconds after I sat down. If I didn't have anything better to do, I'd have most of my meals at Rusty's. I hate to cook.

While checking out the room to see if anything had changed while I was away, movement caught my eye. I saw it before I saw her coming toward me. It was sparkling on her finger. One solitary stone, but it carried a lot of weight.
"Hi, Johnny. I… I got myself engaged," Bonnie said kind of fast, looking at the ring and not me, letting the diamond do the explaining.

"Congratulations, Sweetheart… Bonnie. Who… who's the lucky guy?"

"Charlie Shaw."

"Shaw's Auto Repair?"

"Yeah. He's been fixin' that ol' junker of mine for so long, he decided he better marry me before I bought a new one."

"Good ol' Charlie. Great mechanic… and a great guy."

I stopped looking at her. It felt like I was taking advantage if I stared too long. For three years I was hooked on that hair and the way she could gut a fish. What did I miss?

"I know it was kind of sudden, Johnny, but I've known Charlie longer than I've known you. He's been a good friend and… and I wanted to settle down."

"Gee, Bonnie. I didn't know you wanted to get married."

"You never asked me, Johnny." She stopped chewing her gum and it looked like she was waiting for me to say something.

"Uh… things kept coming up. You know me, I never--"

My cell phone rang.

"Irish spaghetti?" she asked, pulling the pencil from behind her ear.

I nodded while reaching in my pocket for my phone. By the time I looked up, Bonnie had gone back to the kitchen.

"Hello?"

Whoever it was hung up. That had been happening a lot lately.



Two days later, I found myself at Charlie's Auto Repair. The hard way.

I planned to meet a potential client for dinner in L.A., so I headed out early that morning. Most of the recent April blizzard had melted into puddles on our side of the mountain, so I figured it would be an easy jaunt into the big city.

I almost made the trip in record time, if careening off a cliff could be considered a shortcut. I felt the SUV gathering speed as it took the first long hill out of town. The road clung to the side of the mountain at a steep angle until it leveled off near the biker bar at the third major turn-off.

Usually, I liked sailing past the tattooed crowd at high speed just to show the boys in leather my SUV had muscle. But instead of the boost of testosterone I expected, I was getting that adrenalin rush I used to get as a teenager whenever the cops were right behind the stolen car I just happened to be driving. I tapped the brakes slightly just to shave off a few MPHs, but nothing happened. I hit the brakes again, but I had zip. I reached for the handbrake. It rocked back and forth in my fist, useless.

I considered swerving into the parking lot packed with Harleys, just to slow down, but it was full of people and I didn't want to kill anybody. I wrestled with the wheel, trying to stay on the road, but my front tire bit into the dirt, sending a spray of gravel into the air over their shaved heads.

That ripped it. A dozen guys mounted their bikes and kick-started their engines. They were hauling ass after me, and all I could do was hang onto the wheel and look for a soft place to land.

The highway went into another death spiral past the bar as we tore up the pavement. The shear rock face of the mountain flashed past the side window and all I could hear was the high-pitched scream of tires.

The bikers finally gave up after a mile and a half of asphalt tobogganing. One guy who screeched to a halt on the pavement raised his hand in the beginning of a gesture, but I was around another bend before his middle digit reached full height.

It was too early that Saturday morning for traffic to be coming up the mountain, so when my Land Cruiser swung across the yellow line, I didn't end up in somebody's lap. I careened around one more curve and saw something sparkle along the narrow dirt shoulder on my right. Standing water. I hoped it was deep enough to slow me down. Sometimes those erosions were enough to break an axle.

I aimed for the water and let the right front tire hit the pool first. The car dropped violently as it dipped a good six inches. The back tire hit the same spot a second later. The car slowed just enough to allow me to sideswipe the rugged rock facing and scrape to a terrifying halt right before a jagged outcropping could shear off the hood and rip me out of the seat.

I staggered out of the SUV and thought about passing out. That's when I realized I was mistaken about all those bikers calling it a day. The meanest motorcycle I had ever seen slid to a stop next to me. I looked at the rider and he stared back. He had a face covered with bright, red fur, and all I could think was Eric the Red was going to tear my arms off and beat me with them. He un-strapped the Nazi helmet jammed down over his ears as I tried backing away. My butt hit the car door as my right hand went toward the .38 caliber equalizer under my left armpit. I kept my eyes on "Eric" as he got this huge grin on his face.



.....Continued.



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