* * *
The offices of K.P. Investigations.
Larry Kessler was in his office in Richmond sitting at his partners’ desk, he was sifting through the vast amount of scattered paperwork that was unsystematically lying there; including some on the floor. Larry was forty-years-old with very short dark brown hair, six-feet-two in height and had a thin face with a square chin, which made him look younger than his years and rather handsome.
His partner, Greggorrio Pierroni or Gregg as he was known, was a thirty-eight-year-old Italian who had lived in America since his parents moved there thirty years earlier. He wasn’t as tall as Larry only standing at five-feet-ten, but he certainly had the looks and always charmed the ladies.
Gregg and Larry had been working on the case of a missing teenager, a black girl by the name of Alicia Vincent. Alicia was last seen a week ago and had been the ninth teenage girl to go missing in Richmond in the last two months. The local police were doing what they could, but Alicias’ Mother wanted that little extra help, so she called the number she had been given by a police officer she knew and hired Larry and Gregg to investigate her daughters’ disappearance.
As far as Larry was concerned Gregg was following up a lead on the missing girl when he himself suddenly went missing. Larry and Gregg were both ex-policemen and for the last two years had run their own very successful detective agency, “K.P. Investigations.”
Brenda Wise their secretary opened the door to the main office and leaning against the post she looked at her watch.
Larry looked up from Gregg’s desk. ‘Jeez Bren, you still here? I thought you went home hours ago!’ he exclaimed.
Brenda was five-foot six-inches tall, thirty-seven years old, slim with piercing green eyes and shoulder length black hair, which ensconced her small and very pretty oval face. She wore a black skirt, just above the knee, and a bright red V-neck pullover which enhanced the appearance of her already ample breasts.
Brenda had worked for them for the past eighteen months since leaving her job as a legal secretary due to unwanted advances from some male members of the staff there. Her knowledge of the legal system, and the fact that Larry and Gregg were useless with computers were two of the reasons she had landed the job. Plus the fact that Gregg thought she was very hot.
‘My cars in the garage, remember? You said you’d drop me!’ she sighed.
‘Ahh, shit. Sorry Bren… got tangled up in all this.’ he said holding out his arms over Gregg’s desk.
‘Leave that to Gregg, only he knows his own filing system.’ she said.
‘I would, if I knew where he was.’
‘Still no word eh?’
‘No,’ said Larry still looking through the paperwork. ‘He left at nine this morning for a place called Lynchburg, where ever that is. He got a call from some old lady, said he was going out there to check it out. Told me he’d call if he found anything, or return if he didn’t. So far he’s been gone over sixteen hours, and Gregg said it was only three hours there three hours back, that so far has given him at least ten hours checking his lead.’
‘This might be a stupid question,’ said Brenda moving closer to the desk. ‘but have you tried his cell-phone?’
‘At least five times in the last hour,’ he said still rummaging through the papers. ‘It’s ringing but he’s not answering, then it goes onto voice-mail.’
‘So, he may have lost it.’ she said lifting her shoulders.
‘But if that was the case Bren, why hasn’t he used a public phone?’ said Larry knocking even more papers onto the floor.
Brenda bent to pick them up ‘Well who’s this mysterious old lady then?’
‘That’s what I’m looking for, care to lend a hand?’
Brenda picked up the half dozen sheets of paper Larry had knocked to the floor and the few others that were already there. She thumbed through them and then passed one to Larry. ‘Could this be her?’ she said smiling.
The sheet of paper had a name and address on it but no phone number. Brenda thought she recognised the name but couldn’t think from where.
Celia Brontrose,
2 Lilac Lane,
Lynchburg.
Larry and Brenda locked up the office and walked around to the parking lot behind the building. Larrys’ car was an old but tidy looking red 1974 Triumph Spitfire, he bought it as scrap and spent three years and three and a half grand getting it back on the road. The office was in Montrose Heights, Richmond; Brenda lived in Highland Springs an elite part of the neighbourhood in west Richmond.
Larry drove along Williamsburg rd taking the 60 past Richmond International Airport and on to the 33 up to Highland Springs. They reached Brendas’ apartment block after about fifteen minutes, it was a four story brick building built seventy years ago as a clothing mill and since turned into forty high priced apartments.
Brenda got out and leant into the open door of the car. ‘Wanna come up for a coffee?’ she asked knowing he would say no, he always did. But wishing that just once, just this once he would say yes.
Perhaps it’s because of the late hour. She told herself.
‘Nah Bren, gonna head home, grab a sandwich and hit the sack. Need to be at Celia Brontroses’ early tomorrow, maybe next time eh!’
‘Yeah, Maybe.’ she thought and turned heading for the main door.
Larry lit a cigarette as he watched Brenda enter her apartment block and close the door. He then drove off along Nine Mile rd over to his house in Church Hill. Larrys’ house wasn’t a large one but it was big enough for his needs. A small front and rear garden, two rooms and a kitchen downstairs and three bedrooms and a bathroom upstairs.
Twelve years ago he and his wife Samantha bought the place on a shoestring. Larry was on the average cops wage and Samantha was a nurse at Maymont Park Hospital, where the work was hard and the money was harder earned. Six years ago Samantha was working overtime one evening in late fall when a young boy was admitted with a gunshot wound.
The boys name was Michael Maddison, he was only eleven-years-old, apparently a drugstore robbery had gone awry and the little boy was in the store and was hit in the neck by a stray bullet.
While he was in theatre being operated on his older brother Nathaniel aged eighteen arrived at the hospital and demanded to see him. The staff refused him access to the O. R. and that’s when he pulled out a gun and demanded once again to be taken to his little brother. One security guard and a doctor tackled the youth to the ground and during the mayhem the gun was discharged once.
The bullet had hit Samantha in her chest and sent her to the floor, Larry was told she had died instantly, and the one month old foetus that he knew nothing of had also perished. Since then Larry hadn’t bothered with dating, although Gregg had tried to set him up a few times with women he was acquainted with, but Larry would last for an hour or two then make his excuses for leaving and return home.
Michael Maddison subsequently died from his injury, but the sad part about Michael being shot was it turned out his older brother was the one robbing the drugstore, he had taken Michael along as a look-out. Michael had apparently come running into the shop when he heard the owner shouting. He saw the man holding Nathaniel by his shirt front and shaking him violently.
Two shots went off, one hitting the store owner in his right arm and the other hitting the cash register and ricocheting off hitting Michael in the neck. Nathaniel is currently serving a thirty-year sentence for armed robbery, Samanthas’ murder, the attempted murder of the store owner, and the manslaughter of his eleven-year-old baby brother.
Larry threw together a ham and cheese sandwich, opened a bottle of Budweiser and sat on a chair in front of the TV. He looked at his watch, it was 2.12 am. He decided to try Gregg’s cell-phone one more time. He punched in his number and waited for the ringing tone, it rang at least a dozen times before it went to voicemail.
A few minutes later he tried again, it rang four or five times then it suddenly went dead, and an annoying little voice said… “The cell-phone you are calling, maybe switched off.’ he then switched on the TV and watched a re-run of Bonanza on Cable.
