Regarding Anna Read Online Free PDF Page B

on the bus?”
    “I asked that question too, but her friend didn’t think to ask her that.”
    “What else did Erma tell her?”
    “Just that one of her half-brothers gave her some money to look for their father and told her if she found him to let them know.”
    “Do you know where he is?”
    “The last I heard he was in jail, but that was some years ago. I’m sure he’s out by now.”
    “Well, I can check that out. In jail in Detroit?”
    “I can only assume that because that’s where he’s from and where he went after we parted ways. I know it’s not here in Chicago, because I have a sister who works at the County Clerk’s Office, and she checked that out for me. Flora. You interviewed her when you first took my case.”
    “Yes, I remember her. The County Clerk’s Office, you say?”
    “Yes. She’s been there for years.”
    “It would be nice to have an inside contact there. Sometimes—”
    “Say no more. I’ll talk to her.”
    Louise gave me more information about her ex-husband before leaving.
    I went upstairs with visions of a long bath and a glass or two of Mad Dog, the only wine I could afford. Weighing heavily on my mind was how I was going to manage to continue the search for Erma Fincutter if she was in Detroit looking for her ex-con father.

FIVE
    That Was No Poker Game
    I wasn’t in my office five minutes, hadn’t even gotten my coat off, when the phone rang. I couldn’t imagine who would be calling before eight o’clock. The sun was barely up.
    The man introduced himself as Jeff Porter. He suspected his daughter’s husband was “shady” and wanted a background check on him. He said he’d bring the retainer check over shortly. He sounded anxious. I named this case Shady Lane.
    Since I’d started the business four months earlier, my workload had consisted of mostly skip traces, public record searches, and process serving. A background check would be a nice change of pace, and it paid more.
    The tinkling bell told me someone had just walked in the front door. Too early for Elmer. I should have locked the door until we officially opened at nine.
    “May I help you?”
    A middle-aged woman dressed to the nines and a foot taller than me held out her gloved hand. “Lucie Barnett.” She glanced at the NSU sign behind the reception desk. “Are you with NSU?” she asked.
    Her handshake was so soft, it was barely noticeable. I introduced myself and led the way into my office. She closed the door behind us.
    “I need your services.”
    “Okay. What is it you need?”
    “I want to know where my husband Nathan goes on Thursday nights.”
    I explained my retainer fee, and before I could finish she had her wallet open.
    I spent the next twenty minutes asking Mrs. Barnett questions about her husband and his suspicious behavior: Had he suddenly started taking better care of himself? Was he using different cologne? Was she getting hang-up calls at the house? Had he been working late? Had he been less interested in…“intimacy”?
    She answered no to all of them.
    She told me she wanted answers immediately and was willing to pay extra for it. Christmas was a month away, and she wanted to have just the right gift for him—new golf clubs if he’d been a good boy and divorce papers if he hadn’t.
    I named this one Thursdays Out.
    Between Shady Lane, Thursdays Out, process-serving, and skip traces, I had a full caseload. My next visit to Minnie would have to wait until after the New Year. In the meantime, I thought I’d send her a little thank-you note and tell her I looked forward to chatting with her again...soon.
    When Elmer came in, he brought with him Danny Davis, someone for me to consider taking along on jobs when I didn’t feel comfortable going it alone. From a purely physical standpoint, he was perfect—over six feet tall, built like a sumo wrestler, with a face only a mother could love.
    I spent an hour with Danny discussing my business and his background, all the while trying to