For Whom the Minivan Rolls: An Aaron Tucker Mystery - By Jeffrey Cohen Page 0,95

romantic comedy screenplay I’d been struggling with, and started work on a murder mystery. They say “write what you know.”

Gary Beckwirth actually called me later that day, his voice almost robotic. He said he wanted to apologize, and for the life of me, I couldn’t imagine why.

“For sending those men to follow you in the minivan,” he said. “They had Madlyn under surveillance, but they panicked when they saw her outside that night, and look what. . .” He couldn’t finish the sentence.

“Forget it, Gary,” I said. “Until you just mentioned it, I had.”

“Well, Milton said you were upset,” Gary said. “It wasn’t my intention to upset you.”

I didn’t know how to answer that, so I asked, “How are you holding up?”

“Oh, I’m fine,” Beckwirth said. “Really.” I wasn’t sure if he’d be facing any criminal charges, but I never thought for a moment he’d spend a night in jail. Sad to say, it wouldn’t surprise me if he killed himself within the year.

Barry Dutton asked me to come to his office and give a full statement in the presence of Colette Jackson and a videographer, and I did, explaining what I knew and how I knew it. It took quite some time, but when it was over, I managed to pull Barry to one side.

“Okay, what’s the latest?” I asked him.

“It’s okay,” Barry said. “I can talk in front of this crowd. The killer’s been found.”

“Yeah, and he was a fourteen-year-old kid. Jesus!”

“The interesting ones are the Barlows. Or, at least, Martin and Rachel. Renting a car to drive the kid to the casino. Suggesting he kill his own, um, stepmother?”

“I’ll bet they say it wasn’t them,” I said.

“Are you kidding? According to them, they never heard of Joel Beckwirth, much less gave him a gun. They don’t drive cars, they’ve never been to Atlantic City, and, I’m guessing, they probably never met Madlyn Beckwirth in their lives. And all this because they were afraid Rachel would lose the election.”

“At least you don’t have to worry she’ll fire you.”

“You never know,” he said seriously.

They held the primary election the following Tuesday, and sure enough, Sam Olszowy managed to beat the accused conspirator to homicide by a neat thirty-five votes. Maybe if Sam had been convicted of a sex crime, the margin of victory would have been wider. Rachel, from her jail cell, vowed to call for a recount.

I was going to ignore the election entirely, but decided instead that I’d use my vote as a protest against a system that makes us choose between an old, bigoted moron and a homicidal, scheming moron. I punched the little key that allows for a write-in vote and very carefully recorded my choice for the job of Midland Heights mayor—Abigail Stein. I was crushed when she lost.

Margot the Agent continued to call every Wednesday, presumably out of boredom, and I continued to tell her I was writing a mystery. She maintained that there is no market for them. I asked how that would be different from anything else I’d ever written, and Margot suddenly remembered a veterinarian appointment for her Pekinese.

I hadn’t actually indulged in a full-blown midlife crisis yet, but I was getting concerned about my way of making a living. I’ve seen fifty-year-old freelancers, and they’re a sorry lot—begging editors half their age for jobs, and showing up at press junkets strictly for the free food. It’s not the kind of thing one sees as an attractive Golden Years option.

Even so, it took me by surprise when at dinner one night, after the kids had retreated to the living room to watch Kablam!—it’s an animated TV comedy —my wife said, “you know, you turned out to be a pretty good detective after all.”

“Oh, I dunno,” I said. “If the murder victim and the murderer hadn’t actually come looking for me, I probably would have slept through the whole thing.”

Abby started clearing dishes from the table, and I got up to help. I opened the dishwasher, which was full, but hadn’t yet run. Typical.

“Yeah, but you maneuvered the killer into coming after you. And the victim called because you were doing too good a job. Not to mention, you solved the mystery of the barbecue sauce obscenity all by yourself,” she said.

Bending to get the dishwasher detergent from under the sink, I stopped. “Now, how did you find out about that last little item?” I asked.

“Ethan told me.”

Shaking my head, I poured the liquid into the little holes in the dishwasher