hat and sunglasses, and used a washcloth to remove the extra sunscreen. Hell, I ought to buy stock in Coppertone. Soon the kids were hard at work saving our world from Haloes and had lapsed into a rare and unsettling silence. Perhaps it was the quiet before the storm.
My only appointment for the day was right on time, and since I work from home, I showed him to my office in the back. His name was Kingsley Fulcrum and he sat across from me in a client chair, filling it to capacity. He was tall and broad shouldered and wore his tailored suit well. His thick black hair, speckled with gray, was jauntily disheveled and worn long over his collar. Kingsley was a striking man and would have been the poster boy for dashing rogues if not for the two scars on his face. Then again, maybe poster boys for rogue did have scars on their faces. Anyway, one was on his left cheek and the other was on his forehead, just above his left eye. Both were round and puffy. And both were recent.
He caught me staring at the scars. I looked away, embarrassed. “How can I help you, Mr. Fulcrum?”
“How long have you been a private investigator, Mrs. Moon?” he asked.
“Six years,” I said.
“What did you do before that?”
“I was a federal agent.”
He didn’t say anything, and I could feel his eyes on me. God, I hate when I can feel eyes on me. The silence hung for longer than I was comfortable with and I answered his unspoken question. “I had an accident and was forced to work at home.”
“May I ask what kind of accident?”
“No.”
He raised his eyebrows and nodded. He might have turned a pale shade of red. “Do you have a list of references?”
“Of course.”
I turned to my computer, brought up the reference file and printed him out the list. He took it and scanned the names briefly. “Mayor Hartley?” he asked.
“Yes,” I said.
“He hired you?”
“He did. I believe that’s the direct line to his personal assistant.”
“Can I ask what sort of help you gave the mayor?”
“No.”
“I understand. Of course you can’t divulge that kind of information.”
“How exactly can I help you, Mr. Fulcrum?” I asked again.
“I need you to find someone.”
“Who?”
“The man who shot me,” he said. “Five times.”
3.
The furious sounds of my kids erupting into an argument suddenly came through my closed office door. In particular, Anthony’s high-pitched shriek. Sigh. The storm broke.
I gave Kingsley an embarrassed smile. “Could you please hold on?”
“Duty calls,” he said, smiling. Nice smile.
I marched through my single story home and into the small bedroom my children shared. Anthony was on top of Tammy. Tammy was holding the remote control away from her body with one hand and fending off her little brother with the other. I came in just in time to witness him sinking his teeth into her hand. She yelped and bopped him over the ear with the remote control. He had just gathered himself to make a full-scale leap onto her back, when I stepped into the room and grabbed each by their collar and separated them. I felt as if I had separated two ravenous wolverines. Anthony’s fingers clawed for his sister’s throat. I wondered if they realized they were both hovering a few inches off the floor. When they had both calmed down, I set them down on their feet. Their collars were ruined.
“Anthony, we do not bite in this household. Tammy, give me the remote control.”
“But mom,” said Anthony, in that shriekingly high-pitched voice that he used to irritate me. “I was watching ‘Pokemon’ and she turned the channel.”
“We each get one half hour after school,” Tammy said smugly. “And you were well into my half hour.”
“But you were on the phone talking to Richaaard.”
“Tammy, give your brother the remote control. He gets to finish his TV show. You lost your dibs by talking to Richaaard.” They both laughed. “I have a client in my office. If I hear any more loud voices, you will both be auctioned off on eBay. I could use the extra money.”
I left them and headed back to the office. Kingsley was perusing my bookshelves. He looked at me before I had a chance to say anything and raised his eyebrows.
“You have an interest in the occult,” he said, fingering a hardback book. “In particular, vampirism.”
“Yeah, well, we all need a hobby,” I said.
“An interesting hobby, that,” he said.
I sat behind my desk. It was time to change the subject. “So you want me to find the man who shot you five times. Anything else?”
He moved away from my book shelves and sat across from me again. He raised a fairly bushy eyebrow. On him, the bushy eyebrow somehow worked.
“Anything else?” he asked, grinning. “No, I think that will be quite enough.”
And then it hit me. I thought I recognized the name and face. “You were on the news a few months back,” I said suddenly.
He nodded once. “Aye, that was me. Shot five times in the head for all the world to see. Not my proudest moment.”
Did he just say aye? I had a strange sense that I had suddenly gone back in time. How far back, I didn’t know, but further enough back where men said aye.
“You were ambushed and shot. I can’t imagine it would have been anyone’s proudest moment. But you survived, and that’s all that matters, right?”
“For now,” he said. “Next on the list would be to find the man who shot me.” He sat forward. “Everything you need is at your disposal. Nothing of mine is off limits. Speak to anyone you need to, although I ask you to be discreet.”
“Discretion is sometimes not possible.”
“Then I trust you to use your best judgment.”
Good answer. He took out a business card and wrote something on the back. “That’s my cell number. Please call me if you need anything.” He wrote something under his number. “And that’s the name and number of the acting homicide detective working my case. His name is Sherbet, and although I found him to be forthcoming and professional, I didn’t like his conclusions.”
“Which were?”
“He tends to think my attack was nothing but a random shooting.”
“And you disagree?”
“Wholeheartedly.”
We discussed my retainer and he wrote me a check. The check was bigger than we discussed.
“I don’t mean to be rude,” said Kingsley as he stood and tucked his expensive fountain pen inside his expensive jacket, “but are you ill?”
I’ve heard the question a thousand times.
“No, why?” I asked brightly.
“You seem pale.”
“Oh, that’s my Irish complexion, lad,” I said, and winked.
He stared at me a moment longer, and then returned my wink and left.
