Lucky Stiff Read Online Free PDF Page B

“Here you go,” I say, handing it to Hurley.
    Wearing a huge, little-boy smile, he takes my gift and shakes it. “It’s big, but light,” he says. “Interesting.” He starts to rip at the paper, but he stops and says, “You first.”
    “Okay.” I settle onto the couch and undo the wrappings. Inside I find a woolen scarf done in varying shades of blue and gray. “Wow, it’s beautiful,” I say. “Thank you.”
    “It’s handmade,” Hurley says. “A lady I know in Chicago makes them. I thought the colors would go nicely with your eyes.”
    I wrap the scarf around my neck, flipping one end of it over my shoulder with a bit of Hollywood flair. “How does it look?” I say, posing.
    Hurley doesn’t answer right away. Instead, he just stares at me with a warm look in his eyes, which makes my nether regions tingle. “I like what I see,” he says finally.
    I swallow hard; and after clearing my throat, I say, “Okay, now it’s your turn.”
    Hurley finishes tearing off the wrapping paper on his gift, revealing a large box. He rips the box open and pulls out tons of shredded paper packing before he reaches the envelope at the bottom. He looks at me with a goofy grin and a puzzled expression before opening the envelope. Then his expression changes to one of awe. “Are these for real?”
    “Very much so. Two open tickets to a Green Bay Packers game, with seats on the fifty-yard line.”
    “How did you manage this?”
    “I know someone,” I say cryptically. Actually, it’s Izzy who knows someone, a plastic surgeon with season tickets who is currently doing a two-month stint in Chechnya for Doctors Without Borders.
    “Thank you.”
    “You’re welcome. But there is a small catch. They’re only good for this season, so you’ll have to use them sometime in the next couple of weeks.”
    “Not a problem.” Hurley stuffs the tickets into his wallet.
    After I clean up the gift aftermath, we give Hoover one last pat on the head and head out. I’m wearing my new scarf, even though the outside temperature doesn’t warrant it.
     
     
    Since it’s a half-hour drive to the casino, there is plenty of time to talk. Hurley fills me in on what he discovered after leaving the morgue.
    “I spoke with Jack Allen’s girlfriend. She’s coming to the station at eight-fifteen tomorrow morning to talk to us.”
    “Why are you having her come to the station? I thought you preferred going to people’s houses to get a better feel for what they’re about.”
    “I do, but Catherine Albright doesn’t have one. She was bunking at Jack’s place most of the time. Now that that’s out of the question, she’s renting a room at the Sorenson Motel.”
    “She sounds like a freeloader.”
    “She might be a lot more than that. I did some digging into her background. A little over four years ago, she married a well-to-do widower up near Duluth, who was twenty years older than she was. He died six months after the wedding, conveniently leaving Catherine all his money. Based on what the cops up there told me, Catherine went to work spending her inheritance as quickly as she could. She moved to Chicago, bought a million-dollar penthouse suite and a brand new Ferrari, ate out at the fanciest restaurants, got fitted with expensive new clothes, and took several trips abroad.”
    “Must be nice,” I mutter. “Anything suspicious about the husband’s death?”
    “Possibly. The cops in Duluth said he died from injuries sustained in a fall down some stairs in his home. Catherine had an ironclad alibi and wasn’t even in town when it happened, but the cops couldn’t rule out a hired gun. Unfortunately, they couldn’t come up with any evidence to support one, either.”
    “Interesting.”
    “And it gets more so. Turns out Catherine filed for bankruptcy two months ago. Apparently, she blew through nearly two million bucks in a year and a half, and ran up a staggering load of debt. She had to sell off the penthouse and the Ferrari,