Lethal Trust Read online

  Only two days later Mason took out the hidden pouch of more pills. Ten of them. There could be no harm, but he should wait and would use them sparingly. They were there for him when he needed them.

  He popped one. Just because.

  Hungry, and with his wits about him, he drove to the street vendor cart that offered the best of the famous Tucson Sonoran hot dogs. He ordered two, then decided maybe he didn’t have his mind totally engaged. He drove home as he ate, spilling yellow mustard, red chili, and a few jalapeno slices down his shirt.

  Hunter sat stretched out on Mason’s front porch. As Mason approached with intrepid slow steps Hunter spoke.

  “I saw you all clean-shaven and spiffy for the matriarch of our so-called family but I also saw the signs. I brought you some more, Bro. Just in case. I’m guessing you’re out and I know they make you feel good,” Hunter said.

  Mason continued to the front door with a slight shake of his head as he unlocked the door. Hunter followed.

  Entering the kitchen, Hunter took no time. He placed another plastic bag of more pills on the kitchen’s stainless steel island counter.

  His hand shaky, Mason reached for it.

  Hunter slammed his hand onto Mason’s.

  “Not so fast. These little bitches are expensive, but here’s ten more and they’re yours, on me, this last time. If you want more, next time you pay.”

  “How much?” Mason asked.

  “It’s not like you can’t afford them, but if you want I can hook you up with something much cheaper and way better.

  “Do you have any decent booze in this house?” he asked.

  Mason, unsure what the hell to do about this uninvited guest, nodded toward a modest mesquite wood bar.

  It didn’t take Hunter long to procure the good stuff. A bottle of The Macallan scotch.

  After he helped himself to two glasses and made the pours, Hunter pulled out his phone and checked the time.

  Mason thought about it. At least the jerk isn’t checking texts, Twitter, or the price of gold. What’s he so eager to learn about out there in the world?

  “Here’s the deal. We each take two pills and chase it with the hooch, and then I have to hit the road.”

  He unopened the plastic bag with a grimace and a stare.

  Gullible? A gobemouche? Buying into the offer from his so called Bro?

  Hell, yes.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  OVER FIFTY-SIX THOUSAND fans flooded the stadium. A record for the new franchise. The Tucson Scorpions had been the joke of the NFL from their inception. Now, they were in the playoffs.

  It wasn’t their day. The final on the scoreboard read forty-nine to ten. The Scorpions were eliminated and not without a smack of humiliation. The devastated fans began to slink back to their cars. The owner of the team, Paul Childs, stood up in his sky booth, smiled, and waved his hands in the air to celebrate the victory. He grabbed the microphone and praised his team’s great win. He then proceeded to wish everyone a happy Thanksgiving.

  It was an embarrassing loss, and the calendar read January.

  Nick and Manny pulled their father back from the open window and deep into the interior of the box. Too late. The image and audio, captured by all of the media and astonished fans, dictated that the gig was up. The family could no longer hide the fact that Paul Childs suffered from Alzheimer’s. He would never be seen in public again.

  The family tried to keep Childs comfortable in his own home that he had helped design floor by floor, with an architect from Phoenix. An interior designer, contracted to renovate the main floor, received payment for her time but they would not proceed with the project or any orders. Claudia Childs canceled the agreement, citing she wanted the interior to remain familiar to her husband.

  Designed to keep Paul Childs safe and on his property, Claudia ordered construction of a winding walkway that ran one-hundred yards long. At the furthest point, the authentic field goal posts might ease his frustration of not being at the stadium while the lit pathways all would lead him back to the house should he wander. She had become well versed in the behavior of most Alzheimer’s patients. They tend to wander, anywhere and everywhere.

  Three months later the siblings, Stacie, Taylor, and Manny agreed to help out with their father and his needs. Nick had a cold and didn’t dare come by the house. The twenty-four hour nurse, also a long-time housekeeper and friend, fell ill and she had no back-up that day. The three children all concurred that Claudia Childs needed a break from the hell that had become this home.

  “Putting on a little weight, hey sis?” Taylor teased Stacie.

  “And your own brain is shrinking,” Stacie replied.

  “Ladies, let’s be civil,” Manny said. “We have more to do than your squabbles.”

  “Look at us,” Taylor giggled. “Not one of us has the same two parents and yet we have all joined forces. This will be fun.”

  Manny, who had been present almost every day for any heavy lifting that needed to be done around the house and with his father, reeled around on his heels. “How long has it been since you’ve last visited Dad?” he asked of Taylor.

  “Unfair. I had that trip to Malta planned months ago and I wasn’t about to cancel it,” Taylor whined.

  “And how long have you been back in the country?” Stacie asked.

  “I admit I’ve been a bit lax with the jet-lag and all. It just hit me extra hard this time.” She flitted her hands in the air and said she was happy to help out for the day. “Let’s go play house with Daddy.”

  Manny grabbed her arm. “Wait a minute. You haven’t seen him in a couple of months and things have deteriorated. Fast. Check your expectations at the door. For the record, your brother, Nick, has been here at least once a week.”

  Inside the home, a neighbor had been recruited to help out until the family arrived. She had her keys in her hand, ready to leave at first sight of seeing the cars pull up the drive.

  “I’m sorry,” she said, but I’m no nurse and I have the strength of a titmouse.” She pointed to Childs sitting on his favorite recliner. “He’s soiled himself. I tried to get him up but I couldn’t. I’m leaving you with a real mess. And he hasn’t eaten.”

  Stacie thanked the neighbor. Taylor recoiled from the stench of fresh feces. Manny went to his dad and got him up on his feet and to the bathroom, yelling at Taylor to go get clean underwear and pants.

  After moving his father to the leather sofa, Manny said, “He’s growing more violent.”

  “Because he’s frustrated somewhere inside of that mind of his,” Stacie said.

  “No. I mean dangerously violent.”

  Manny led Stacie into the guest bath where he had cleaned up his father. Two holes were punched into a wall.

  “I looked at his knuckles, Stacie. They’re raw.”

  Claudia Childs arrived back to her home to face three of the children ready to confront her with the facts.

  In a symphony of concerned words, they all expressed that the welfare of their father had now become compromised.

  Claudia backed up behind the kitchen counter. “Wow. Tell me how you really feel.”

  “I took him to the bathroom only to clean him up after he had defecated all over himself. Damn. He needs to be in a qualified memory care center,” Manny said.

  “We all saw the holes punched into the wall, Mom,” Stacie added.

  “Your father is acting upon his fears. He doesn’t get it. He doesn’t know why he’s feeling stuck in a body with that failing brain of his. It’s nothing we can’t handle here, at home.”

  “We can comfort him. We can be patient and stay with him and read to him or walk with him, or whatever he wants, but we can’t handle his outbursts when he becomes physical. If we wouldn’t have showed up today, even if the help could have stayed Dad would have been sitting in soiled pants for hours because she couldn’t have lifted him. And we’re scared, too. We’re scared for Dad and you,” Stacie said, bracing her arms against the island counter.<
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  Claudia poured a glass of water from the chilled pitcher. Infused with cucumbers and strawberries. She always insisted upon infused water. She looked over at her husband now slumped against the arm of a sofa, his eyes wide open. “I admit that your father is a big man. He’s still at his fighting football weight in spite of this insidious disease.”

  Three weeks later, Paul Childs was moved to the most highly regarded memory care center in Tucson.

  CHAPTER NINE

  NICHOLAS CHILDS, THE SON of Claudia, and Manny Childs, the son of Paul, met at Aunt Mamie’s Bakery. Except for forced family events, the inevitably mandatory press-control meetings, and the football games, the two rarely encountered one another but they knew they shared a love for pie as a breakfast of champions.

  Nick had extended the invitation for the impromptu meeting. He arrived twenty minutes early.

  Manny arrived fifteen minutes early.

  “Thanks for meeting me eye-to-eye and away from the public eye,” Nick said to Manny.

  “Love this place. Love the pies and we don’t have to agree on a flavor here, do we?”

  “True. It’s a slice of rhubarb for me,” Nick said.

  Manny stuck his thumb in his mouth. “I’m down for apple blueberry. Now, outside of the outstanding sweets, why are we here? You had my curiosity up and my mind engaged when you said this had to do with our father. Nothing looking good on that front.”

  “My mother invites us over for a family meeting and she tells us nothing about something. The family trust. What’s that about?” Nick said.

  “Maybe she just likes our company, but my bet is that she wants to position herself in control, as usual, or she likes to see us spin around in circles.”

  Now sipping the Italian coffee, Nick said, “I’ll cut to the chase. You and I both know what’s at stake here. The Scorpions will need a new daddy. Maybe a mommy and maybe an hierarchy of ownership. The way I see it, you and I have the best odds at taking over. Excellent educations, no public scars, and a love and knowledge of the game. Manny, you hold an MBA from Vanderbilt. And your passion for the game? You and I are the two that make almost every Scorpions game, home or away.”

  “I agree,” Manny said as his fork dove into the apple blueberry dessert. “What’s your point? You hold equal education credentials and the love of football. You want to go into a side partnership with me to take control, no matter who takes it?”

  Nick shook his head. “You’re jumping ahead, here. But, I do have a question and it has to be just between the two of us.”

  Manny shrugged with a nod. “I have no one to talk to these days. My wife could care less about this legal tribulation.”

  Nick put his fork down, also nodding. “Well, okay then. Let’s take inventory. Have you noticed anything strange around your house, your car, your office? Anything out of the ordinary ever since the big family meeting?”

  Manny shoved another bite of pie into his mouth and chased it with his coffee. “That’s a weird question. What’s going on with you?”

  “I’m not quite sure. I feel like someone’s following me. I’m a regular guy. I have the same office hours every day and I take the same streets. I go to the gym three days a week before work. I bike on Saturdays. I sometimes take different paths for my own enjoyment but they all originate from my home at about the same time in the morning.”

  “I’m not doubting you, but have you seen a car? Do you have a license plate? Are they on foot?” Manny said.

  “No. I have nothing. But, it’s more than just a feeling. I found a dead packrat right behind my rear tire the other morning when I left for work,” Nick said.

  “Come on, dude. Be glad the wretched thing was dead.”

  “And another one, behind the same tire, at my office when I left for the day. And, one more. When I got out of the gym. Same tire.”

  “You either have a magic exterminating tire we should take to market or you have a stalker. A sick stalker. I get your point.”

  “I’m being paranoid, I’m sure. I guess I just have packrats I wish were dead,” Nick admitted.

  “Dead, dying or moving. Honestly, the only objects left around my house are cigarette butts, and no one I know smokes. My gardener picks them up and brings them for me to see his haul. Probably just kids. The house is pretty secluded. I’ve even caught a couple of kids behind the house with their pants off and about to do the dirty.

  “You know, Nick, you’re divorced with no kids. You’re good looking and educated and you’re from a wealthy family. I bet you have a stalker of the female variety,” Manny offered.

  Nick tilted his head and grimaced, forcing another bite of rhubarb pie into his mouth so that he didn’t have to reply. A woman and dead packrats? Some kind of stalker.

  The conversation drifted toward the weather and golf and of course, football. When the check came the two men, wealthy in their own right and related by marriage, haggled over the bill.

  Approaching their cars, Manny yelled back, “Don’t worry. I won’t spread the rumor that you’re a delusional paranoid packrat nutcase. Not yet, anyway. Maybe we’ll still be partners, after all.”

  On his drive home Manny tried to wrap his head around dead packrats and stupid cigarette butts. So many butts, and they were always around the perimeter of the house.

  Dumb ass kids.

  CHAPTER TEN

  THE NEWS FLOODED every media site, not only in the state and in the industry, but nationally. Paul Childs, owner of the NFL franchise the Tucson Scorpions, passed away at three in the morning from Alzheimer’s Disease.

  I had caught clips of the lead story while on a boring late-night surveillance routine. With the case I had taken on with the maid and maybe thief and maybe mistress now dead, it wasn’t much of a case. Like, the woman that hired me had fired me. So why did I care?

  I streamed the news stories to pass the time. In the matter of a few days, speculation ran rampant as to the fate of the Tucson Scorpions. There was very little regard given to the nature of the horrid disease. Maybe that would come after the media ran their more sensational tabloid reportings in hopes of a surge in ratings.

  I was on track. Intuition on full throttle. I would be involved with the Childs family. Learning about their deceased maid may or may not get me on track.

  AN UNUSUALLY CHILLY night for early May, the night air forced me to bring one of my patio heaters closer over to the lounge chairs and yet Breecie and I still pulled up Mom’s afghans tight against our chests as she sipped on the warmed Courvoisier, and I, a large mug of hot cocoa.

  “I’m really glad you’re hanging around this evening. It’s been too long,” I said.

  Breecie was my college chum, and now my neighbor in that she had bought my guest house.

  “I think I have another grim situation for you to take a look at, Cassie.”

  “Well, that’s why we’re good partners. I’m a private investigator. You’re a lawyer. I get bad slime, you get bad slime, and somehow we try to make sense of it and make the world less slimy.”

  I knew not to push her. Her words would come, although her eyes focused on mine with rapt attention. We continued to sip our beverages and gazed upon a full moon that cast its light across the cacti, causing their spines to look like Christmas tinsel.

  Breecie sat up, Indian style, and wrestled the afghan tighter across her arms. “I’ve let go of a new client that thinks she has a problem. A looming legal issue.”

  “That’s sounds like prudent action on the person’s part. What has you concerned and why involve me?”

  “It revolves around a family trust. An heir apparent wanted to retain me. My conflict of interest interceded. The patriarch that created this trust turned to me to make it happen, and I backed away. I didn’t like it then and I don’t like it now.”

  “So?”

  “So, if you saw today’s news, Paul Childs, the owner of the Tucson Scorpions, died overnight. It’s a bad situation, Cassidy. Like, it involves well over a two
billion dollar franchise and the family trust is brutal. One of his children came to me for representation. I had to decline, but that doesn’t mean she can’t get some help from you.”

  I heard nothing but one word.

  “Childs? The football team owner? That’s interesting.”

  “That’s him. Did you know him?” she asked, bracing her arms on the sides of her lounge chair and studying my face. “Your eyes are as big as billiard balls.”

  “I just turned a case over to one of my girls. I didn’t know what fascinated me about the gig and why I did the first stakeout myself, but now I do. The name Childs came up. Something about their maid.”

  “I never doubt your intuition thing. As a normal person, that tells me you’ll be up to your billiard eyeballs with this case.”

  I pulled my legs up underneath me to feel the conversation’s turn. “What do you want me to do?”

  “I gave her your name. She’ll be calling you. I’m just warning you that this is a legal deep-shit quagmire and she’s going to need all the help she can get.”

  “Will she retain another lawyer?”

  “Honestly, I don’t think so. Not for now. She’s more into saving her life.”

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  THE CREMATION OF Paul Childs’ body took place two days after his death.

  Claudia imagined her husband encased in a steel vault and entombed in ice for those long hours. She then visualized him in the cremator. The heat. The stench that would induce most witnesses to vomit after inhaling a dust of burnt blood and skin, no matter how the operators of the death love may try to conceal it. The confines of the chamber that conducted nothing but extreme temperatures and flames. The aftermath whereby the cremains were raked through for assorted remaining bones. While viewing was optional from an exterior window, Claudia preferred to be notified by text in the comfort of her own home after the cremation occurred. She had selected an urn of gold and brown stripes. The Scorpion’s colors. That urn would be delivered to her door.