Tender Is the Bite Page 3

  Bernie got out and went inside to order. A black and white pulled into the lot and parked beside us cop-style, driver’s-side door to driver’s-side door. Rick Torres—our buddy in Missing Persons, as I may have mentioned already, and a particular buddy of mine since I’d lived at his place when Bernie was in the hospital, a terrible time that followed the terrible ending of the stolen saguaro case, a case I’ve tried and tried to forget but can’t, even though I’m a champ at forgetting—leaned toward me. By that time, I’d shifted over to Bernie’s seat.

  “Morning, Chet,” Rick said. “Finally canned him?”

  Who could he have been talking about? I had no idea. But it was nice to see Rick. We had things in common—for example, a love of Slim Jims. He took one from his pocket, bit it in two, and tossed half to me. I snapped it out of the air and made quick work of it. More? Was there more?

  Rick held up both hands, empty.

  More? Was there more?

  Rick laughed. He reached across and scratched between my ears, not quite as perfectly as Bernie, but close. His hand slowed and the expression on his face changed. “Tell you the truth,” he said. “I love my job. It’s not that. But I’ve got ambitions. Who wants to be a lieutenant forever?” He shook his head. “Sorry to whine at you, Chet. But the bastards made Ellis a captain! Can you believe that? I wanted—”

  Bernie came back with a cardboard tray, stood between the cars, gave us a look and then a second one. He handed Rick coffee and a cruller, took a sausage croissant off the tray, and handed it to—but no. Instead, he flicked it right past my nose and onto the shotgun seat. We were playing fetch in the car? That was new. My Bernie. The next thing I knew I was sitting on the shotgun seat, happily chowing down on a sausage croissant that was even better than yesterday’s, and Bernie was behind the wheel, sipping coffee.

  Bernie has a real casual voice he sometimes uses for asking about things he doesn’t seem to care much about. I’m not sure what that’s all about, but it was the voice he was using now.

  “What were you guys talking about?” he said.

  “Cats,” said Rick.

  Cats? Had cats come up? When cats come up, I always get a bit … tense. Well, not tense, but more like … not quite tip-top. And I felt tip-top or even better. So therefore cats had not come up. Whoa! Had I just done a so-therefore? So-therefores were Bernie’s department. I knew immediately that I wanted no part of them ever again. Why? Because if cats hadn’t come up, why had Rick said they had? Rick was our buddy. This was confusing. Does a buddy bring up cats when there are no cats? I might have even started panting except for the fact of the sausage croissant in my mouth. I’ve been lucky pretty much my whole life, and for sure since we got together, me and Bernie. And—wait for it—a cat was involved that day! Life really is beyond belief, whatever that means, exactly.

  Rick took a bite of his cruller. “Get what you wanted off that plate number?” he said, or something like that, hard to tell on account of his mouth being full.

  Bernie shook his head. “Any chance that car’s been reported stolen?”

  “Search me.”

  Bernie glanced at him. “Having a bad day?”

  Rick looked down. “Give me the plate number again.”

  Bernie told him the plate number. Rick got busy on his screen.

  “Nope,” he said.

  “Can you run the owner?”

  Rick nodded and went back to the screen. He took another bite of the cruller. Bernie sipped his coffee. I polished off the sausage croissant and felt nice and full. But it didn’t last.

  “Johnnie Lee Goetz is down for two traffic violations, none moving. No criminal record.” Rick tapped at his screen. “She did take out a restraining order last month.”

  “On who?”

  Rick checked the screen, wrote on his coffee cup lid, and spun it over to Bernie.

  Bernie caught the lid the way he catches everything, his hand folding softly around it. He glanced at the writing. “Mickey Rottoni, a PO box in South Pedroia. You’re sending restraining orders to PO boxes?”

  Rick raised his voice. That was a first. “Like I’m in charge of the whole stupid setup?”

  Bernie looked surprised. His eyebrows usually take care of the surprised look, and they’re great at it. “Whoa,” he said. “You know I didn’t mean you personally.”

  Rick glared at Bernie. Bernie glared right back. It hit me then that maybe they weren’t getting along. That didn’t make sense. Rick was a buddy. I barked a bark I use for letting people know in no uncertain terms.

  They both turned my way real quick.

  “Oh my god,” Rick said, a hand to his chest. “What’s with him?”

  Bernie gave me a close look. “I think he wants another sausage croissant.”

  No! I did not. That was not at all what I wanted. And then … and then it was! And nothing else mattered. How do you like that?

  Meanwhile, Rick was working at his screen. “The restraining order was served by Sergeant Weatherly Wauneka. Say thanks.”

  “Thanks,” Bernie said.

  “You should meet her.”

  “Why?”

  Rick shrugged. “Just a feeling.”

  * * *

  Not much later, Rick had driven away, and I was chowing down on a fresh sausage croissant, right out of the oven. Mrs. Borbon brought it over personally.

  “Don’t you just love someone who appreciates good food?” she said.

  “Appreciates is an understatement,” said Bernie.

  Mrs. Borbon laughed. Laughing made her jiggle a bit. It was easy to like Mrs. Borbon, and I did.

  “Can I ask you a question?” she said.

  “As many as you like,” said Bernie.

  “You’re a good customer,” Mrs. Borbon said. “I look out for good customers.” She took a quick scan of the parking lot. “Did anything unusual happen after you left yesterday?”

  “Why do you ask?” Bernie said.

  “Well, Mr. Bernie, I know what you do for a living.”

  “Oh?”

  “Of course. In the kitchen, they call you el cazador.”

  “The hunter?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “What about Chet?”

  “He’s el jefe.”

  Sometimes Bernie has this real quick inner look, there and gone, which I saw now. I think it means he’s seeing something in a new way, but don’t take that to the bank, certainly not our bank, where there’d recently been an unpleasant discussion with Ms. Mendez, the manager.

  “My question,” Mrs. Borbon went on, “is what happens if the hunter is hunted. I don’t know the answer. But a woman drove in first thing yesterday morning, parked over in that back corner, and just sat there. After a while, she came inside and ordered a macchiato with extra sugar. I served her myself, a pretty young woman—beautiful, really, with a ponytail. I’d never seen her before. And while I was serving her, I happened to notice—over her shoulder, if you understand…?”

  Bernie nodded.

  “—an unusual thing. A van pulled up beside the woman’s car, and a man jumped out. He unlocked her trunk, dropped something inside, and drove away. I thought, should I speak up to the woman? But maybe he was her husband and she’d forgotten her phone, something simple like that?”

  “Then why the trunk?” Bernie said.

  Mrs. Borbon hung her head slightly, a human thing when they disappoint themselves. I didn’t like to see that from such a nice person as Mrs. Borbon, and neither did Bernie. He touched her arm and said, “But you might be right. Are you sure it was a phone?”

  “Or some sort of gadget, from the size and shape,” Mrs. Borbon said. “Then the woman went back to her car. You and Chet came soon after that, and she watched you the whole time you were here. When you left, she followed. It was no coincidence. I saw her face through the windshield. It had a sneaky look.”

  Was this a worrisome story? I was wondering about that when Bernie smiled, and I stopped worrying at once, even if I
hadn’t quite started. “You’d be a good investigator,” he said.

  “Is there any money in it?” said Mrs. Borbon.

  Bernie laughed. What was funny? No humor that I could see, absolutely zip.

  “I’m assuming you’d never seen the man before,” Bernie said.

  “That’s right.”

  “Can you describe him?”

  “Kind of big. Shaved head. I—I was more interested in what he was doing than in how he looked.”

  “I know that one,” Bernie said. “What about his van?”

  “White, like all those white vans you see.”

  “Any writing on it?”

  Mrs. Borbon shook her head. “And if you’re going to ask about my video system, when the temperature hits one ten it gets—what’s the word?”

  “Wonky?”

  “Exactly. So there’s no video since last Tuesday. I apologize.”

  “Nothing to apologize for—you’ve been very helpful.”

  “So there’s meaning to all this? Maybe you know the woman?”

  “We’re getting to know her,” Bernie said.

  “And?” said Mrs. Borbon.

  “Too soon to tell.” Bernie handed her some money.

  “What’s this?”

  “For the croissant.”

  “It’s too much.”

  “Plus a tip.”

  “You don’t tip the owner, Mr. Bernie.”

  “That’s what my mother always said.”

  “Is she still alive?”

  “Oh yes.”

  “She must be proud of you.”

  Bernie’s mom—a piece of work—was suddenly in the conversation? She lived in Florida but had visited us last Christmas, bringing her new husband. He wore a white leather belt and said that bad times were the best times for making money. Bernie’s mom had told Bernie to give that some thought. The subject of being proud of him hadn’t come up.

  * * *

  Back on the road, Bernie was very quiet for a while, and then he said, “Do we find ourselves at the edge of the dark forest?”

  Not from where I sat. We were actually in one of the most treeless parts of the Valley, where the Automile went on forever.

  “So easy to lose the straightforward pathway,” he went on.

  I gave him a close look. The Automile was as straight as it comes, nice and wide, pretty much impossible to get lost on. Plus anyone traveling with me can never be lost. My nose will always get you home. Maybe Bernie was dehydrated. He had that problem in the heat. I leaned down and pawed at a water bottle on the floor.

  “Thirsty, big guy?”

  No. Not me. You. What was the best way to get him to drink? I still hadn’t figured it out when he said, “How about we settle for the most obvious step? Let’s look into that restraining order.”

  * * *

  We walked up to the door at 1429E Aztec Creek Road. Before Bernie could knock, the door opened, and out came a round little dude carrying a mop and a bucket.

  “Uh, yeah?” he said.

  “Hi,” said Bernie. “Is Johnnie Lee around?”

  “Nope.”

  “When will she be back?”

  “Never.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “She vacated the premises.”

  “You work for the landlord?”

  The round little guy stood as tall as he could. “I am the landlord.”

  “Ah,” said Bernie. “This must be a headache for you.”

  “Not really,” the landlord said. “She was paid till the end of next month.”

  “Any idea why she left?”

  “Nope. But it was in a hurry. That goddamn ferret got loose when she was packing the car, and she didn’t even stick around to find him.”

  Interesting. I wandered off to the trash can enclosure at the side of the building. The plywood door was slightly open, and in the doorway stood Griffie, holding the remains of a pizza slice in his cute little paws. Random pizza slices found here and there are mine as a rule. First, I made sure that Griffie would be aware of that from here on in, and then I escorted him nice and gently around to the front.

  “The name Mickey Rottoni mean anything to you?” Bernie was saying.

  “Nope,” said the landlord. “When it comes to the tenants, I keep my nose—”

  Then they were both staring at me, so I never found out about where the landlord kept his nose, which actually seemed to be in the normal place.

  “Chet?” said Bernie. “What you got there?”

  Four

  Have I mentioned the usual seating arrangement in the Porsche? Bernie’s behind the wheel, I’m in the shotgun seat, and once in a while someone has to be on the little shelf in back. Suzie, for example, and Charlie after T-ball practice. I turned out to be quite talented at certain aspects of T-ball, but no time for that now. There’s even been a perp or two on the shelf, including a former basketball player name of Stilts Wilton, who’d shaved points in arenas on every continent, wherever those were, and hadn’t been at his happiest with our seating arrangement. The truth was that no one was happy on the shelf, not until now.

  Bernie glanced back. “Looks mighty content back there, doesn’t he, Chet?”

  I did not glance back. I could smell Griffie perfectly well, and even hear his tiny breaths going in and out, and the even fainter sound of those tiny breezes ruffling his tiny whiskers. Why did we have Griffie? Where were we taking him? Someplace close by, I hoped, where he would be dropped off and never seen again. Meanwhile, he breathed his tiny breezes and ruffled his tiny whiskers. I knew he was doing it just to annoy me, and he knew that I knew, and I knew that he knew that—

  “Chet!”

  If any barking had been going on, a matter of doubt in my own mind, it stopped. Perhaps a member of the nation within was shut inside one of the houses we were passing and wanted out. I checked the neighborhood, not very good, and suddenly recognized Cooler Heads, a barbershop not far from our self-storage, where we keep the Hawaiian pants, meaning we were in South Pedroia. Bernie pulled over and parked between a rust bucket up on blocks and a pile of trash. A messy neighborhood, except for right in front of Cooler Heads, where a nice clean bench stood against the wall and the sidewalk was spotless.

  We hopped out, me actually hopping, but Bernie not, on account of his leg wound from back in the war. Griffie’s eyes snapped open, and he sat up straight on the shelf, looked like he might be forming some sort of plan.

  “This is when a roof would come in handy.”

  A roof for the Porsche? I didn’t see why. It hadn’t rained in ages, and besides, what was better than the wind in your face? Meanwhile, Bernie was fishing around under the seats. He found an old bungee cord—left over from a case involving cave-dwelling arsonists that I never wanted to think about again—clipped one end to the gearshift and the other to Griffie’s velvet collar.

  “There’s a good little fella,” Bernie said.

  Griffie looked at him with—what was this? Adoring eyes?—and lay back down like a team player. I knew with every little bit of me that Griffie was not a team player. For no particular reason, I wondered whether I could chew right through a bungee cord should the need arise.

  “Chet? Something on your mind?”

  No. Nothing at all. We walked into Cooler Heads, where we hadn’t been in a while, Bernie currently getting his hair cut by the inmates in the job-training program at Central State Correctional on account of some bet he’d lost, the details not coming to me.

  “Well, well, well,” said our buddy Earl Adamokoh. “Look what the cat dragged in.” He dropped what he was doing and hurried over, slipping me a rawhide chew on the fly.

  Here’s a good place to stop and back up a bit, maybe straighten things out. First, Earl didn’t actually drop anything. That would have been a bad move, since what he had in his hand was a straight-edge razor. Earl’s the best barber in town, and he was shaving a jowly-faced customer with a cigar in his mouth. Second—what the cat dragged
in? You heard that from time to time, but what could it possibly mean? Where was the cat who could drag in me and Bernie? Plus I know first thing when people have a cat in their lives—that’s basic—and Earl did not.

  Back to the live action, as they say on TV. Live action is always best. There’s no action whatsoever from the dead. That’s the kind of unhappy thing you learn in a job like mine. For live action, we had Earl hugging Bernie and pounding him on the back, although not with the razor-holding hand.

  “Sight for sore eyes,” he said. He stepped away, gave Bernie a close look. “Except for your hair. When are you coming back to me?”

  The jowly-faced man turned to watch, some of his jowls covered in shaving cream, some not, the cigar smoking between his lips. He was an interesting sight, and I was enjoying this visit very much. Then I thought, Are we actually on a case? If so, who was paying? And I began enjoying it a little less.

  “Soon,” Bernie said. “The program ends next month—budget cuts.”

  Earl turned to the jowly-faced man. “Hear that? State’s falling apart. That’s why I’m voting for Erlanger.”

  “Wray all the way,” said the jowly-faced man. “Erlanger’s a phony.”

  Or something like that, hard to tell what with the stogie in his mouth. Whatever it was, Earl didn’t like it.

  “That’s a goddamn—what is it, Bernie? Bold-faced or bald-faced? I never get it right.”

  “Um, I think they’re pretty close,” Bernie said. “Bold-faced would be kind of brazen, whereas bald—”

  Earl made an impatient gesture with the razor, somewhat alarming from my point of view. “Bold-faced and bald-faced lie,” he told the jowly-faced man. By now, of course, I was completely lost. Bold-faced, bald-faced, and jowly-faced were all in play?

  “Tell him, Bernie. Tell him Erlanger’s no phony.”

  “Well,” Bernie said, “I don’t follow these things too closely and—”

  “What’s your excuse for that?” The jowly-faced dude waved his cigar at Bernie. “You don’t care about this country?”