In A Lowly Place, Reed Ferguson Private Investigator Mysteries: Book 21

Sample Chapter

CHAPTER ONE

“Where is he?”

Michelle Farley looked around the Starbucks, then her gaze settled back on me. She picked up her latte, took a sip, and put the cup down with a small shrug. “I told him four o’clock.”

It was a gloomy August afternoon, the earlier heat of the day yielding to threatening storms in the west. We were sitting outside the Starbucks on Sixteenth and Arapahoe, a place I – Reed Ferguson, private eye extraordinaire – often choose to meet potential clients. Michelle had called me the previous day to say that she’d wanted to hire me to help her brother, Dennis Mowery. She hadn’t said what was going on, but that she and her brother would meet me here today. I watched people approach the Starbucks as we talked.

“I can’t believe I’m talking to a private investigator,” Michelle said. She appeared to be in her late forties, with shoulder-length pale blond hair and a thin face. I was drawn to her hazel eyes – same color as mine. She was petite and looked small sitting in the chair. I waited and she went on. “You probably think I’m crazy.”

“Not at all.” I leaned forward and smiled. “What’s going on?”

“Look for a guy with curly dark hair and a goatee.” She looked up and down the mall and scowled. Then she finally said, “I want your help with Dennis.”

“For?”

She bit her lip. “Dennis is my younger brother, by three years. Then there’s our brother, Isaac. He’s two years younger than Dennis. We all work at a trucking company – Mowery Transportation – that our father started. Scratch that, Isaac and I work there. Dennis used to work with us, but not anymore.”

I took a sip of my macchiato. “Why not?”

She let out a sigh that held a lot of angst in it. “That’s why I’m coming to you.” She thought for a second. “Let me back up. Everything seemed to be going fine with all of us, and with the business, until about three years ago. Believe it or not, the trucking business isn’t as straightforward as you might assume. It can be tricky. There are affiliate agreements with trucking companies, and there’s lots of competition, but we’ve worked with some great partners. But things changed, and it affected our business. It took some time to get things running smoothly again. About that time, Dennis went off the deep end.” A quick breeze wafted her perfume in my direction. She touched at her hair. “Dennis was our accountant and oversaw finances. I handle the scheduling department, and Isaac manages the in-house diesel technicians and the big rigs. Our father’s in charge of the whole operation. Anyway, as we hit that rough patch, something happened with Dennis. He had always been a happy guy. Nothing seemed to bother him. But then he changed. He was edgy a lot, and he would snap at you. The family used to see him a lot after work and on the weekends, but that stopped. I didn’t understand the change in behavior.”

“I’m assuming you asked him about it?”

She nodded. “Yes, of course. He would either deny that anything was wrong, or he’d say there was something going on at home. But that didn’t seem plausible.”

“What didn’t seem plausible? Either of those, or both?”

“Both. Dennis was never in any trouble, even as a teenager. He kept to the straight and narrow, went to college in Florida, worked at an accounting firm for a while so that he felt he knew the ropes before he came to work at Dad’s trucking company. And at least at the beginning, there weren’t any problems with his wife, Kim. I know her pretty well, and we’ve gotten along over the years. I asked her several times about Dennis’s strange behavior, and she said things were okay.”

In my time as an investigator, I’ve learned not to trust everything I hear. I knew that just because she thought things were okay with her brother didn’t mean that was the case. Even as the words were coming out of her mouth, I knew that if I took this case, I would need to talk to Kim herself to get her take on her relationship with Dennis.

“What did your brother Isaac think about Dennis?” I asked.

She looked to the mall again, searching for Dennis, then took a drink. “Isaac was as mystified as I was. He told me he tried to talk to Dennis, but Dennis wouldn’t talk to him. You should talk to Isaac to see what he thinks.”

I knew I would do that as well – again, if I took the case. “You mentioned some problems at the company. Would any of that factor into Dennis’s change of behavior?”

“I don’t know. We managed to get through the tough times, get things back on track. I know there was some stress for Dennis. There usually is when you’re working for a family business, and when the finances were strained, that got to him. But we all told him it wasn’t his fault. I wouldn’t have thought that the financial problems would’ve sent him over the edge.”

“What changes did you see in Dennis?”

“He began drinking heavily, which was already unusual, because he was never much of a drinker. He couldn’t control it. It all happened very fast, and after about a year of his erratic behavior, Kim threw him out. Dennis seemed to be a lost cause. At first, he lived in a motel, and he wasn’t reliable at work, was making mistakes. Kim couldn’t take it anymore, and she filed for divorce.” She frowned. “I wish she’d have given it a little more time, but I don’t blame her. At that point, Dennis had nothing, and he was living in his car. Dad finally couldn’t take the crazy behavior, and he fired Dennis. Then we lost touch with Dennis for about a year. I had no idea where he was or what he was doing. Then, just like that,” she snapped her fingers, “a few months ago, he called me out of the blue. He told me he was clean and sober, and that he was living at Step Recovery. It’s a halfway house here in Denver for hard-core street people to get back on their feet. He apologized for everything he’d done and said he wanted to try to make things right.”

“Sorry for the drinking?” I wondered if there was more that Dennis needed to apologize for, that she wasn’t saying.

She nodded. “The drinking, and for disappearing without a word. When he disappeared, we were all devastated and worried sick. I couldn’t believe he called, and we got together for lunch. It was so great to see him, to know that he was alive.” Her eyes crinkled sadly. “He’d changed, though, and physically he didn’t look that great. It broke my heart to see him like that, but I was just so relieved, I didn’t care what he looked like. We’ve been talking since then. He’s been a bit distant, like he’s embarrassed. I’ve only seen him a handful of times.”

“What had he been doing the whole time he was out of touch?”

“He’d been living in his car, and even at times, he wouldn’t know where his car was and he’d be on the streets. I asked him how he paid for things, and he said he sold his car, then worked odd jobs and begged for money.” Her tone was a mix of grief and embarrassment. “It was sad to think he’d sunk so low. Then he said that one morning he woke up under a bridge lying in his own vomit, and something snapped in him, and he realized he didn’t want to live like that anymore. He knew a guy who was at Step Recovery, and Dennis went there. He worked hard to clean himself up, and he’s working on staying sober. I told him that we would be there to help him, that we could consider having him work at the company again, if he stays clean. For now, he says that’s not what he wants. He needs to know that he can stay clean and sober before he thinks about working for Mowery Transportation again.”

There was something about what she said that didn’t quite sit right with me. I could understand the embarrassment Dennis must’ve felt, but was that enough to keep him from jumping at the chance for a better job, a better position?

“Do Dennis and Kim have any kids?”

She shook her head. “No, they don’t. They had trouble conceiving, and I think they were considering adoption, but then all this started happening with Dennis and they didn’t.”

“You and Isaac got along with Dennis?”

“I do. Isaac and Dennis generally got along, although they fought sometimes. They’re different personalities. Dennis is quiet and reserved. Isaac is outgoing and he can be brash.”

I again got the feeling there was more than she was telling me. I glanced up and down the mall. It was fifteen minutes after Dennis was supposed to meet us. He was clearly a no-show. I looked at Michelle.

“What is it exactly that you want me to do?”

She pursed her lips. “As I said before, this may sound crazy, but I was hoping you would befriend Dennis, talk to him. Something happened a few years ago that sent him on this path. When we’ve talked recently, I’ve asked him about it, and he won’t tell me. Call it a sister’s intuition, but I’m certain something happened that made him start drinking and lose control of his life. I pushed him about it, but he’s just so evasive. He keeps telling me that the past is the past, and he needs to move forward. But even I know how AA works, how you have your twelve steps, and how you need to make amends to people. He’s been doing some of that, reaching out to people to apologize. But there’s something more there, and I’m worried that if it isn’t resolved, Dennis may start drinking again. I figured if he wouldn’t talk to me, maybe he would tell you.”

I thought about that for a moment. “Don’t you think that’s a stretch? Why would he tell a stranger what he wouldn’t tell you?”

“Yes, it may be. But if he won’t talk to you, can you do some poking around, see if you can find out what happened?”

I finished my macchiato while I mulled over her proposal. My best friend, Cal Whitmore, always addresses me as “Great Detective.” But at the moment, I wasn’t feeling very “great,” certainly not “in demand.” I’d just wrapped up a case for a small insurance company where I’d investigated a false injury claim. It had been an easy job, and it certainly didn’t skirt any greatness. I could use the work, that was for sure. But what Michelle proposed didn’t sound like the type of thing I could help with, and I told her so. “I’m sorry, but if Dennis isn’t going to talk to his own family – which I get that he might not want to – I don’t see how he’d want to talk to me, either.”

She blinked at me, disappointment passing across her face. Then she dabbed at her eyes. “I guess I see your point, and maybe it was silly of me to even think this might work. I so badly want Dennis to succeed, to get back on his feet. I don’t want to see anything threaten his sobriety. If he starts drinking again, I don’t know if my parents could take it. They love us all, but they dote on Dennis. They couldn’t believe it when he started drinking like he did, and that his life would get so out of control. They’ve been ecstatic to see him again, even though he doesn’t look that great. They have their estranged son back.” She took her cup, started to take a drink, then set it down with disinterest. She locked eyes with me. “There’s no way I could change your mind?”

I thought for a moment and shook my head. “I’m sorry, but I think it would be a waste of time.” I looked at the people hustling about the mall. “Maybe if I’d had a chance to talk to Dennis, but he didn’t show up. It doesn’t seem like he wanted to talk to you or me today. I think that tells us what we need to know.”

“Yes, I think you’re right.” She was suddenly very matter-of-fact. She pushed back from the table and stood up. “I’m sorry I wasted your time.” She spilled her latte on the table as she snatched up her cup. She gave me a quick smile, threw the cup in a trash can, and whirled around and walked onto the mall. I waited until she disappeared in the crowd, then grabbed a napkin and wiped the table.

 

This book kept my attention from start to finish. It had twists and turns that were unexpected and kept me engrossed!! Loved the characters and the interactions that had the pages turning! Loved this book! ~Reader review