The Master Plan (2009) (4 page)

"These are real potatoes," Dana said. "They're just in a
more convenient form."

Bruno helped her carry the serving dishes to the table and
filled the water glasses. Dana turned down the lights and lit
the candles.

Since their last dispute, they had made a pact not to talk
about murder and investigations during dinner. Actually they
were always making that pact and breaking it, but tonight Dana made sure the conversation centered around other
things.

Once the dinner dishes were cleared and Bruno had finished his second piece of pie, Dana read the look of contentment on his face and broached the subject of Casey.

"Casey is engaged," she said quickly. "Surprised us at
the staff meeting today with the announcement."

"Who is she marrying?"

"A guy named Tony Hunter."

"Don't know him."

"No, and I'm afraid Casey doesn't know him either."

"Come on, sweets. Casey is a big girl and a trained investigator. I'm sure she probably checked him out"

"She did, but couldn't come up with anything farther back
than two years ago when he moved to Crescent Hills."

"Is this one of the `who's' you want me to give you a little information on?"

19"Yes.

"No.

"That's not an acceptable answer."

Bruno laughed and shrugged. "That's what you always say
the first time I tell you no. Then comes the arguing, then the
pleading, and finally a suitable bribe. Let's fast-forward to
the last item."

"You've already had the last item," Dana responded. "A
home-cooked dinner and two pieces of pie. That's it, buster."

"Okay, Dana, but I'm going to need more than the guy's
name. Tony Hunter sounds like a name a movie studio makes
up for one of their actors. Get me his fingerprints and I'll run
him through the department's database and find out if he's a criminal. I assume you and Casey have already tried tracking
him by his date of birth and Social Security number."

Dana nodded. "We came up with zilch, but he seems to
have plenty of money. She met him at the Crescent Hills
Country Club on the golf course"

"Whoa! Wait a minute here," Bruno said. "How did Casey
get to play golf there?"

"Bob asked her the same thing today. She said she had an
unexpected windfall and used it to join the country club."

"So Casey is rich now?"

"I don't think so. She's still working for me"

"Honey, you have to have big bucks to get into that club."

"Look, Bruno, I'm not sure how Casey got in and I don't
care. I'm just worried that this Hunter guy isn't what he appears to be. He could be one of those mob guys in the Witness Protection Program, which would explain why his
background begins and ends two years ago"

"Which would make it impossible for me to find out anything, either. The feds would have wiped him out of the computer database when he got his new identity."

"You went to school with that FBI guy in the Chicago
office. I was thinking you could bypass the usual channels
and ask him for help."

"I've seen Barry once in ten years. We're not exactly buddies anymore. I think you'd better start from the beginning
and tell me why you and Casey were suspicious of this guy
to begin with."

Dana sighed and sat back in her chair. "It all started about
three months ago. I knew that something was up with Casey
because she suddenly decided to let Marianne arrange a makeover for her. Bob got all excited and thought she was
ready to get fixed up with one of his single friends, but she
turned him down flat. She looks great with the new hairdo
and clothes."

"Really. I haven't seen her or maybe I have and didn't
recognize her."

"Anyway, a few weeks later, she told me about joining the
country club, but she didn't give me any real details about
how or why she did it. She really just wanted to talk about
meeting Tony Hunter."

Bruno nodded and refilled his coffee cup with the insulated decanter still on the table. "So, she joined the country
club, met this guy on the golf course, and fell in love with
him. Sounds like every young girl's dream, except for you,
of course"

Dana ignored the remark and continued with her story.
"Casey said that a few weeks into their relationship she
started picking up little things about Tony that seemed odd.
He paid for everything with cash and said he didn't believe
in credit cards or checking accounts. Tony claimed to have
an engineering degree and said he did freelance work for a
firm in Chicago, but when Casey tried to check on the company, she learned they had been out of business for years"

"How did she get his Social Security number?"

"She went to the bank with him one day to get something
out of his safety deposit box. He had to show two forms of
ID to the clerk and Casey got the number while the girl was
writing it down. She can read upside down, you know, and
she also has a terrific memory, almost photographic."

"Okay. What else?"

"Well, once she had the Social Security number, she ran a check on him and when she discovered the information
only went back two years, she began to worry. That's when
we had lunch and she asked for my help, but I couldn't find
out any more than she did."

"If he claims to have an engineering degree, he must have
gone to college. What has he said about that?"

"Casey asked him about school, and he said he was educated by the army when he was in the service and went to
school overseas"

"Clever. Harder to check"

"Then you think there is something wrong here?"

"I do. I think it's very wrong that Casey has only known
this guy two months and is going to marry him, when you and
I have been together for more than two years and you won't
even discuss the possibility of marriage with me"

Dana stood up quickly and brought the lights up in the dining room, then blew out the candles that had already burned
halfway down. She took her chair again and stared at Bruno.
"Maybe the reason I don't talk about marriage with you is
because when I turn to you for help and advice you give me
a hard time."

Bruno reached over and grabbed her hand. "I'd never give
you a hard time if you were my wife."

"That's a lie and you know it."

Bruno nodded. "It's more like a promise I'd try to keep"

"What about Tony Hunter? Are you going to help me or
not?"

"I don't think you need to worry about him. Casey must
have decided he's okay if she agreed to marry him."

"Maybe she just decided to ignore the problem. Women
in love do that, you know."

"Okay, you win. Invite Casey and her boyfriend out for
dinner this week at Marsella's. I'll arrange for my pal, Vince,
to wait on us and he can nab a glass with Hunter's fingerprints."

"That's brilliant," Dana told him, breaking into a smile.
"I'll ask Casey tomorrow."

"Are you happy now?"

"Yes, but I have another favor to ask"

Bruno groaned. "Okay, let's hear it"

"Who do you know in missing persons?"

"Glenn Harrison"

"If this woman I'm going to meet tomorrow has filed a report on her husband, can you get Glenn to talk to me about
it? Her name is Judy Porter."

"I'll do my best," Bruno promised.

"That was too easy," Dana said suspiciously. "You didn't
even ask any questions."

Bruno's cell phone rang. He looked at the caller ID and
got up and went into the kitchen to answer it. That meant it
was the station calling with police business.

Dana stood up and stacked up the cups and saucers and
carried them into the kitchen. She could only hear Bruno's
side of the conversation, but it sounded like he was being
called to a crime scene. She set the dishes down on the counter
over the dishwasher and waited for Bruno to finish his call.

"Have to run, honey," Bruno said when he hung up.

"What's up?"

"A corpse just floated to the surface in Crescent Lake."

"I'll walk you to the door."

Bruno and Dana walked to the front door and she watched while Bruno donned his coat. He pulled her into his arms
and kissed her.

"I'll call you tomorrow. Thanks for dinner."

"Thank you for agreeing to help me with my two who's,"
Dana said.

"You're welcome." He kissed her once more and then
opened the door and stepped into the hallway.

Dana stood in the doorway as he headed for the stairs.
"Be careful out there," she said.

"Iwill.,,

Bruno went down three stairs and Dana was about to close
the door when he turned around and came back. "One more
thing," he said pleasantly.

"What's that?"

"My mother is coming to visit me around Valentine's
Day. She'll be here at least a week, so clear your calendar."

Dana's hazel eyes widened and she tried to reach out and
grab Bruno's coat, but he was already bolting down the stairs.

Bruno's mother lived in Chicago and ran the lives of her
two daughters, their husbands, and their children with a firm
hand. She also volunteered at a local homeless shelter and
played Bingo three nights a week. Dana had met her three
times in the last two years and fortunately those meetings
had been brief because Angelina Bruno was even more determined than her only son to change Dana from a career
woman to a housewife.

Judy Porter's apartment was in one of the original neighborhoods in Crescent Hills. The area consisted mostly of
warehouses and small businesses with buildings of wirecut red brick.

Dana parked her car at the curb and glanced at the pizza
parlor that occupied the first floor of the building. It was 9
a.m. and a sign in the window said the restaurant opened at
11. There was a wooden door next to the pizza parlor's entrance that accessed the apartments on the second and third
floors of the building. When Dana had talked to Judy on
the telephone the previous night, the artist told her to push the
bell for apartment 2 and she would buzz her into the stairway.

As Dana pushed the bell and waited for the buzzer to
sound, she noted that like her own building this one housed
four apartments.

Within seconds the buzzer sounded allowing Dana to open the downstairs door so she could climb the steep stairs that
lead to Porter's apartment. When she arrived on the landing,
Judy Porter was standing in her open doorway waiting for
Dana.

"Hi," Judy said. "The place is a total mess, but come on
in."

"Thanks," Dana replied, stepping past the artist and entering the apartment.

Judy hadn't exaggerated; the place was more than a little
messy.

"I made some coffee. Do you want some?" Judy asked.

Dana accepted the offer and followed Judy through a cluttered living room into the kitchen. The appliances and furnishing were old and worn and the small sink was loaded
with dirty pots and pans and dishes.

Removing her coat and scarf, Dana smiled and sat down
on a wobbly wooden chair at a scarred wooden table wondering if Judy Porter would be able to find a clean cup to
serve the coffee in.

Judy sighed and went to the sink. She pulled out two coffee mugs and quickly squirted dishwashing liquid into them
and then rinsed them. She filled the mugs with coffee from a
sleek automatic drip pot. The coffeemaker and a small microwave oven were set on the tiled counter next to the sink
and looked very out of place in the old-fashioned kitchen.

"I have sugar, but the milk went bad," Judy said.

"That's okay. I drink it black," Dana replied. "Sit down
and talk to me"

When Dana met the artist at the gallery a few months back,
she had been impressed by her energy and vitality. She was
an attractive girl with long blond hair that had been parted down the middle, worked into two neat braids and pinned to
the top of her head. She had worn a floor-length black dress
with slits up the sides that showed a lot of her shapely legs,
but the first thing one noticed about the girl were her light
blue eyes. They sparkled with humor and delight as she
talked about her work and the opportunities she might find as
Del's protegee. Dana had been very impressed by her and the
one lovely painting that was displayed that evening.

This morning, as Judy placed the mugs on the table and
sat down across from Dana, her eyes were dull and lifeless.
Her hair hung straight and limp around a face that would
have been completely colorless if not for the fading bruise
that extended from her left eye down to her jawline. She was
wearing a pair of sweatpants and a man's white dress shirt
with the sleeves rolled up to her elbows.

Dana studied her for a time before speaking. Then she
smiled, trying to make the girl more comfortable. "I was so
sorry to hear about your husband. Have you had any word on
him?"

Judy shook her head in a negative reply.

"Have you filed a missing person's report with the police?"

"Yes. I called the morning after Lucas disappeared, but
the police said he had to be missing twenty-four hours before
I could file a report. So I waited until the next day, hoping
he'd show up on his own. When he didn't I went to the station and filed the report. I talked to a Detective Harrison. He
was very nice, but when he saw the bruise on my face, he told
me maybe I was better off not finding Lucas. I knew then that
he wasn't going to look too hard for him"