windar
Teller of Tales
“Barb, you’ve gone BATS!” Stan exclaimed as he watched his former detective partner and now life partner pacing back and forth across their living room.
She stopped. “Burned at the stake?” she asked, looking shocked.
“Heaven forbid, Moore! You know I like my steaks medium rare.”
She glared at him. “Not funny, Goldman. But then you rarely are as funny as you think you are. Sorta like your pal Seinfeld.”
“Whatever,” he replied nonchalantly. “But I mean you’re batty, like the birds.”
“They’re not birds, Stan. They’re mammals. Flying mammals. And they’re where that nasty virus came from. And a bunch of other nasty viruses, too.”
“Yeah, I know all that. But your idea of going to China to look into the beginnings of the outbreak is batty, Barb.”
“Why not, Stan? We’re detectives after all. We solve mysteries. We can write a book afterwards and make some money, which we could use, by the way.”
“We don’t know anything about virology, Barb. And we don’t speak Chinese.”
“We were in Wuhan a few years ago,” she replied. “On that book tour for the Crux Murders book. Have you forgotten? Do we need to up the dose of those jellyfish pills?”
“Yes, Barb, I remember. We spent maybe 24 hours there. They took us to that great seafood restaurant in the market, we signed books at a bookstore and then we flew to Shanghai. That hardly qualifies us as experts. Let’s leave it to Fauci. He’s a Brooklyn boy like yours truly, only way smarter.”
“A rock is way smarter than you, Goldman,” she said.
“Very funny, Moore. But what exactly would you do there in Wuhan?”
Barb struck a sexy pose. “What I do everywhere, Stan. Use my feminine wiles. Conduct a little sexpionage.”
“Sexpionage? What the fuck is that?”
“You know, maybe seduce someone from that Virology Institute there. Get the inside dope.”
“I seem to recall that the head there is a woman. They call her ‘The Bat Lady’. Not that that would stop you, I suppose.” Stan knew that Barb played for both teams and that didn’t bother him. It kind of turned him on in fact, though he had still not had the threesome with Barb and another woman that he dreamed of.
“Yeah and those skills of mine were very useful in that case of the suicide hanging cult.”
“True,” Stan admitted. “And in busting that sex ring in the prison.”
Barb smiled as she always did when Stan admitted she might have a point. “So, we go over to China and poke around. Maybe we find out something, maybe we don’t. We’re both vaccinated and people are travelling again, but we’re still sitting here like a couple of stick-in-the-muds.”
“I don’t mind travelling, Barb. A nice quiet island in the Caribbean could be just the ticket. Sun, sand, bikinis…”
“It’s hurricane season now, Goldman.”
“So, there should be some great deals down there. I saw an ad for some place called Providencia that I never heard of before. It looked lovely.”
“Let’s save it for the winter, Goldman.”
“Sure, darling, whatever you say. Just come and sit down,” Stan said, patting the seat on the sofa beside where he sat. “Your pacing is making me nuts. I’ll tell you about the first case I ever worked on-The Gotham Goth Girl.”
“OK, Stan, but let me get a glass of Reisling.”
“Fine. And bring me a beer while you’re in there, would you?”
Soon, Barb was nestled beside Stan on the sofa. He had to admit that her hair smelled nice. As did the rest of her. He laid his hand on her bare thigh, her shorts having ridden up as she plunked her tight little on the couch.
“Save the monkey business for later, Goldman,” Barb told him, removing his hand and placing it on the cushion next to her leg. “I want to hear your story in all its gory details.”
Stan took a sip of his beer and began. “I was a newly minted detective. Out of plainclothes for about a week, when the call came in. A young female was found in an alleyway in the South Bronx, not too far from the Temple.” The Temple was what Stan called Yankee Stadium, home of his beloved team, though the way they were playing this year, “Dumpster Fire Pit” might be more appropriate.
He continued. “Our Chief back then was an old-school Irish cop type, Patrick McGinty. Nothing like Reggie.”
“Not too many like Reggie in the NYPD,” Barb said. Reggie was Reginald Jones, the Chief of Detectives during the time Stan and Barb had worked together on the Force.
“Certainly not back then,” Stan added. They had both respected Reggie immensely. After all, he had saved their lives when those Russian sex traffickers had kidnapped them and were going to kill Stan and throw him overboard and sell Barb into slavery in the Middle East.
“Anyway, McGinty had called out, ‘Goldman, Croce! This one is right up your alley!’ Croce was my partner back then, before I was paired with Dick Leary. Benedetto Croce, or Benny as we called him.”
“Hmm!“ Barb said, looking a bit doubtful. “I seem to remember that name from one of my college courses. You aren’t making all this up, Stan, are you? ”
“I swear on my mother’s grave, Barb. But, Benny would always say whenever anybody asked him , ‘I’m no relation to the famous Benedetto Croce.’”
Barb drained her glass and went to the kitchen for a refill. “I have a feeling this will be a two glass story,” she said when she returned. Stan’s beer glass was still half full. Or maybe half empty. Who can say?
“Maybe even a three glass one,” Stan said. “So we pull up to the alley. There are about five or six uniforms there, surrounding the body of a young woman. Late teens, maybe early twenties, by the look of her.”
“Don’t tell me. She was naked, right?”
“Such a dirty mind, Moore,” Stan said. “We’ll have to deal with that later. But actually, she was fully clothed. In Goth regalia. All black. A sort of Victorian dress with lace cuffs and a lace collar. Full length, with very little skin showing. Combat-type boots. Her face was heavily made up with piercings all over-ears, nose, cheeks, tongue. Just like you, Moore.”
Barb punched Stan in the arm. “Asshole! You know I can’t stand piercings. Nor tats either. Even in prison, I didn’t get any.”
“I know that. Just yankin’ your chain, which is like taking candy from a baby,” Stan replied. “Did you ever know any Goths?”
“Yeah, there were some in my high school in Minnesota, but I didn’t hang out with them,” Barb replied.
“Of course not. You were in the library studying, Moore. I was in high school before that time. We had just the beginnings of punk. The Ramones, you ever hear of them?”
“Vaguely,” Barb replied. “They were before my time.”
“They sort of started punk, along with a few others. They were from Queens, but I forgive them. Songs like ‘Rock ‘n’ Roll High School ‘, ‘I Wanna Be Sedated’ and ‘Sheena Is a Punk Rocker’. Which is interesting because that turned out to be the victim’s name, though it took us a hell of a lot of work to find that out.”
“So this girl was a Goth. Was that relevant to the murder?”
“Actually, it was,” Stan replied. “But let’s not get ahead of the story. The first thought was accidental drug overdose. Then Benny saw the marks on her neck.”
“That was observant of him,” Barb said. “You, of course, missed them. Were you concentrating too hard on your donut?”
“Very funny, Moore. I saw them, too. Benny just got the words out before I did. Anyway, the ME was clear the death was from strangulation. Surprisingly, the girl had no drugs on the tox screen.”
“And this wasn’t a suicide like our Amanda Berger? One where she had some help.”
“Nope,” Stan replied, cryptically. “But I’m getting hungry. What do you want for dinner? And if you say ‘burnt steak’ we’ll be paying a visit to the basement for a tenderizing of your tight little.”
Barb looked at Stan with a mix of fear and desire. “How about Chinese?” she said.
“As long as it’s within 10 miles of here and not in Wuhan, you’re on. I’ll continue the story after.”
She stopped. “Burned at the stake?” she asked, looking shocked.
“Heaven forbid, Moore! You know I like my steaks medium rare.”
She glared at him. “Not funny, Goldman. But then you rarely are as funny as you think you are. Sorta like your pal Seinfeld.”
“Whatever,” he replied nonchalantly. “But I mean you’re batty, like the birds.”
“They’re not birds, Stan. They’re mammals. Flying mammals. And they’re where that nasty virus came from. And a bunch of other nasty viruses, too.”
“Yeah, I know all that. But your idea of going to China to look into the beginnings of the outbreak is batty, Barb.”
“Why not, Stan? We’re detectives after all. We solve mysteries. We can write a book afterwards and make some money, which we could use, by the way.”
“We don’t know anything about virology, Barb. And we don’t speak Chinese.”
“We were in Wuhan a few years ago,” she replied. “On that book tour for the Crux Murders book. Have you forgotten? Do we need to up the dose of those jellyfish pills?”
“Yes, Barb, I remember. We spent maybe 24 hours there. They took us to that great seafood restaurant in the market, we signed books at a bookstore and then we flew to Shanghai. That hardly qualifies us as experts. Let’s leave it to Fauci. He’s a Brooklyn boy like yours truly, only way smarter.”
“A rock is way smarter than you, Goldman,” she said.
“Very funny, Moore. But what exactly would you do there in Wuhan?”
Barb struck a sexy pose. “What I do everywhere, Stan. Use my feminine wiles. Conduct a little sexpionage.”
“Sexpionage? What the fuck is that?”
“You know, maybe seduce someone from that Virology Institute there. Get the inside dope.”
“I seem to recall that the head there is a woman. They call her ‘The Bat Lady’. Not that that would stop you, I suppose.” Stan knew that Barb played for both teams and that didn’t bother him. It kind of turned him on in fact, though he had still not had the threesome with Barb and another woman that he dreamed of.
“Yeah and those skills of mine were very useful in that case of the suicide hanging cult.”
“True,” Stan admitted. “And in busting that sex ring in the prison.”
Barb smiled as she always did when Stan admitted she might have a point. “So, we go over to China and poke around. Maybe we find out something, maybe we don’t. We’re both vaccinated and people are travelling again, but we’re still sitting here like a couple of stick-in-the-muds.”
“I don’t mind travelling, Barb. A nice quiet island in the Caribbean could be just the ticket. Sun, sand, bikinis…”
“It’s hurricane season now, Goldman.”
“So, there should be some great deals down there. I saw an ad for some place called Providencia that I never heard of before. It looked lovely.”
“Let’s save it for the winter, Goldman.”
“Sure, darling, whatever you say. Just come and sit down,” Stan said, patting the seat on the sofa beside where he sat. “Your pacing is making me nuts. I’ll tell you about the first case I ever worked on-The Gotham Goth Girl.”
“OK, Stan, but let me get a glass of Reisling.”
“Fine. And bring me a beer while you’re in there, would you?”
***
Soon, Barb was nestled beside Stan on the sofa. He had to admit that her hair smelled nice. As did the rest of her. He laid his hand on her bare thigh, her shorts having ridden up as she plunked her tight little on the couch.
“Save the monkey business for later, Goldman,” Barb told him, removing his hand and placing it on the cushion next to her leg. “I want to hear your story in all its gory details.”
Stan took a sip of his beer and began. “I was a newly minted detective. Out of plainclothes for about a week, when the call came in. A young female was found in an alleyway in the South Bronx, not too far from the Temple.” The Temple was what Stan called Yankee Stadium, home of his beloved team, though the way they were playing this year, “Dumpster Fire Pit” might be more appropriate.
He continued. “Our Chief back then was an old-school Irish cop type, Patrick McGinty. Nothing like Reggie.”
“Not too many like Reggie in the NYPD,” Barb said. Reggie was Reginald Jones, the Chief of Detectives during the time Stan and Barb had worked together on the Force.
“Certainly not back then,” Stan added. They had both respected Reggie immensely. After all, he had saved their lives when those Russian sex traffickers had kidnapped them and were going to kill Stan and throw him overboard and sell Barb into slavery in the Middle East.
“Anyway, McGinty had called out, ‘Goldman, Croce! This one is right up your alley!’ Croce was my partner back then, before I was paired with Dick Leary. Benedetto Croce, or Benny as we called him.”
“Hmm!“ Barb said, looking a bit doubtful. “I seem to remember that name from one of my college courses. You aren’t making all this up, Stan, are you? ”
“I swear on my mother’s grave, Barb. But, Benny would always say whenever anybody asked him , ‘I’m no relation to the famous Benedetto Croce.’”
Barb drained her glass and went to the kitchen for a refill. “I have a feeling this will be a two glass story,” she said when she returned. Stan’s beer glass was still half full. Or maybe half empty. Who can say?
“Maybe even a three glass one,” Stan said. “So we pull up to the alley. There are about five or six uniforms there, surrounding the body of a young woman. Late teens, maybe early twenties, by the look of her.”
“Don’t tell me. She was naked, right?”
“Such a dirty mind, Moore,” Stan said. “We’ll have to deal with that later. But actually, she was fully clothed. In Goth regalia. All black. A sort of Victorian dress with lace cuffs and a lace collar. Full length, with very little skin showing. Combat-type boots. Her face was heavily made up with piercings all over-ears, nose, cheeks, tongue. Just like you, Moore.”
Barb punched Stan in the arm. “Asshole! You know I can’t stand piercings. Nor tats either. Even in prison, I didn’t get any.”
“I know that. Just yankin’ your chain, which is like taking candy from a baby,” Stan replied. “Did you ever know any Goths?”
“Yeah, there were some in my high school in Minnesota, but I didn’t hang out with them,” Barb replied.
“Of course not. You were in the library studying, Moore. I was in high school before that time. We had just the beginnings of punk. The Ramones, you ever hear of them?”
“Vaguely,” Barb replied. “They were before my time.”
“They sort of started punk, along with a few others. They were from Queens, but I forgive them. Songs like ‘Rock ‘n’ Roll High School ‘, ‘I Wanna Be Sedated’ and ‘Sheena Is a Punk Rocker’. Which is interesting because that turned out to be the victim’s name, though it took us a hell of a lot of work to find that out.”
“So this girl was a Goth. Was that relevant to the murder?”
“Actually, it was,” Stan replied. “But let’s not get ahead of the story. The first thought was accidental drug overdose. Then Benny saw the marks on her neck.”
“That was observant of him,” Barb said. “You, of course, missed them. Were you concentrating too hard on your donut?”
“Very funny, Moore. I saw them, too. Benny just got the words out before I did. Anyway, the ME was clear the death was from strangulation. Surprisingly, the girl had no drugs on the tox screen.”
“And this wasn’t a suicide like our Amanda Berger? One where she had some help.”
“Nope,” Stan replied, cryptically. “But I’m getting hungry. What do you want for dinner? And if you say ‘burnt steak’ we’ll be paying a visit to the basement for a tenderizing of your tight little.”
Barb looked at Stan with a mix of fear and desire. “How about Chinese?” she said.
“As long as it’s within 10 miles of here and not in Wuhan, you’re on. I’ll continue the story after.”
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