Trash Course Read online

  “A few.”

  “A few like you?”

  Silence, and a little wave of memory washed over me. My husband, gray and dead in a drawer. Three men pouncing on me in my kitchen. Ms. Hawk blurring into action. Then I recovered myself and laughed. “You’ve got me,” I said. “Yes, I was originally one of Ms. Hawk’s clients. Now I work for her, though that wasn’t the favor she called in.”

  “What favor did she call in?”

  “She hasn’t yet,” I said. “I still owe her.”

  “What did she do for you?”

  I raised a finger in mock admonishment. “Now that would be breaking confidentiality. Would you like me to draw up a contract?”

  “Please,” she said with a small smile.

  I called up a contract boilerplate on the computer and entered Belinda’s information. She wrote Hawk Enterprises a retainer check for two thousand bucks and didn’t bat an eye when she did it. Ms. Hawk has done some cases for a pittance and at least two for the favors alone, but Belinda obviously wasn’t worried much about the money.

  We were just finishing up when Ms. Hawk emerged from her office. She had changed into khaki slacks, a long-sleeved khaki shirt, and steel-toed boots. Her hair was twisted into a knot at the back of her head. Even in explorer gear she looked cool and elegant.

  “You might want to change clothes, too, Terry,” she said. “If the house is everything Ms. Harris says it is, we might get grubby.”

  “Yes, Ms. Hawk.” I keep a couple changes of clothes in the conference room closet for exactly this reason. Once I had changed into an outfit similar to Ms. Hawk’s, the three of us headed outside. The August heat hit like a liquid gold hammer, and I was sweating before we made it off the front porch. Belinda took a hit from her inhaler.

  Our office building was on Catherine Street near downtown Ann Arbor. The city is home to the University of Michigan, and a few years ago one of the swankier business magazines listed our fair town as the hot place for yuppies looking to relocate. We got flooded with newcomers. They pushed up housing prices, created tentacles of urban sprawl, and sucked up the few remaining parking spaces. Even the economic implosion didn’t have an impact—Ann Arbor has the lowest unemployment rate in the state, thanks to the University. Today, every inch of curb space on the street was occupied. Hawk Enterprises is allotted a single parking space in the office’s tiny lot, and that goes to Ms. Hawk’s mid-sized green Plymouth. I have to walk from a parking structure. Belinda told us her car was about three blocks away, and she had tried to take the walk too fast, triggering an asthma attack.

  “We’ll all go in my car,” Ms. Hawk said, leading the way. Then she halted. On the public sidewalk ahead of us stood a tall, sturdy woman in a wine-red dress and black pantyhose. She wore three-inch heels that made her taller than most men, which, I happened to know, was the way she liked it. Her hair lay in a dark, curly tail down her back, and her lipstick was just a little too red for mid-day. An insulated lunch bag dangled from one hand. The bag was mine, and the woman was my best friend, Slava Cherenko.

  “You! Theresa!” she bellowed, as if I were leaning out an upstairs window instead of standing right in front of her. “You forget your lunch this morning. I bring it for you.”

  I blushed a little and shot a glance at Ms. Hawk to see if she’d noticed. She made no indication she had. It was well past two o’clock and I was well aware that I’d forgotten my lunch. I’d grabbed a ham sandwich, corn chips and pop from the party store up the street, savored every mayonnaise-drenched, cholesterol-laden mouthful, and felt virtuous because the soda had been diet.

  “Thanks, Slava.” I took the bag from her, figuring I could use it tomorrow. “But you didn’t have to come all the way down here just to bring me my lunch.”

  Slava shrugged and gave Ms. Hawk a brief nod. “I cancel office hours today, so I have time. Besides, my mother always say, ‘If you don’t eat lunch, you get very hungry.’”

  I smiled. Slava is a professor of Eastern European studies at the University. Her family fled the Chernobyl disaster when she was nine, spent several years wandering Europe as refugees, and finally ended up in the United States. Slava’s written English is flawless, and she can speak the language perfectly well—when she wants to. She usually doesn’t bother. Instead, she prefers to bulldoze her way through grammar and pronunciation like a developer plowing through virgin woodland.

  “I also come to say I e-mail translation of Romanian documents to you, Ms. Hawk,” Slava continued. “Everything is finished.”

  “Excellent, Dr. Cherenko,” Ms. Hawk said. “I look forward to reading them.”

  “Who is this?” she demanded, gesturing at Belinda.

  “A client,” I said. “We’re on our way out.”

  “Where are you from?” Belinda asked politely.

  “Ukraine,” she said. “Where are you from?”

  “Missoura.”

  “Ah. You are foreigner like me.”

  Belinda laughed. “It sure feels that way sometimes.”

  The sun was getting hotter by the second. Ms. Hawk was already moving toward her car. I edged that way myself, hoping Slava would take the hint. She didn’t.

  “You have problem for Theresa and Ms. Hawk to fix,” she said. “It is good you come to them. They always know what to do.”

  “I hope so,” Belinda said.

  “Perhaps I come with you, give more help, yes?”

  “No,” I said firmly.

  “Why not?” Slava shot back. “I make good investigator. I grow up under KGB, you know.”

  “No,” I said again. Although Ms. Hawk hires Slava on a regular basis whenever we need help with anything Eastern European, she’s been reluctant to use Slava for field work. Hawk Enterprises requires a certain…subtlety. Slava is about as subtle as a Molotov cocktail.

  Slava sniffed and turned back to Belinda. “What problem do you bring? I look at you and think it must be huge, yes?”

  “Slava,” I warned. “Ms. Harris doesn’t want to—”

  “It’s all right,” Belinda said. “The more I think about it, the more I realize it’s silly to be embarrassed. We’re going to check on my uncles.” And to my astonishment, she gave Slava a thumbnail sketch of the problem.

  Slava nodded sagely and drew a pack of cigarettes from her shoulder bag. “I know this house. My students sometimes talk of it, and I wonder how these old men survive alone. It is good to have family check up on you. You are very nice to come all this way to help them, and I commend you.”

  “Why, thank you,” Belinda said, looking both surprised and gratified.

  “Now you go,” Slava said, lighting her cigarette. “You have uncles to save and I have boring papers to grade.”

  Ms. Hawk, meanwhile, was backing her car down the narrow driveway, and we climbed in with a final wave to Slava. Belinda took shotgun, and I took the back, feeling a little like a kid out with Mom and Grandma. Although her car isn’t flashy or particularly new—anonymous-looking wheels are an asset in our line of work—Ms. Hawk has it detailed regularly, and the interior keeps that new-car smell. Mine always smells like Fritos.

  Ms. Hawk pulled smoothly out of the lot and Belinda gave directions. We headed through downtown and turned west on Liberty, driving until the business buildings faded into a residential district. Western Ann Arbor is peppered with aging bungalows and Victorian mansions left over from the lumber baron days. Most of them have been broken up into student apartments, but a few hang on as single-family dwellings. Ms. Hawk followed Belinda’s directions down a series of side-streets until she came to the end of a cul-de-sac, where a three-story mansion struggled to stay above knee-deep grass like a mammoth caught in quicksand. Huge maple trees dominated the lawn, and unkempt bushes clung to the sides of the house in suffocating swaths of green. A rickety split-rail fence ran around the boundary, marking off a triple-sized lot. Two neighboring houses tried to keep their distance, and a thick stripe of woodland formed a backdrop around them all. Ms.
Hawk pulled into the gravel driveway with caution.

  The house itself was done in the blocky Greek Revival style popular in Ann Arbor during the eighteen-hundreds. Two-story front porch, tall columns, square corners, flat walls. And absolutely enormous. It looked like it would be more comfortable somewhere in the deep South. Several of the windows had been boarded up, as if the house had shut its eyes. A mailbox stood on post like a sentry at the front of the driveway, and Belinda got out to check it. Empty.

  “See?” she said, scooting back into the car. A wave of heat and humidity came in with her, overpowering the AC for a moment.

  “Someone’s picking up the mail,” Belinda continued. “The police said this was more evidence that my uncles had simply stopped writing me and there was no reason for them to break into the house.”

  “Hm,” Ms. Hawk said, and I would have given a lot to know what she was thinking. The hawk pendant at her throat flashed in a bit of sunlight. Gravel pokked and pinged against the underside of the car like popcorn in a covered pan. Once we were alongside the house, I could see the driveway continued around back, though Ms. Hawk braked to a halt out front.

  “Let’s see what we can do,” she said, and all three of us climbed out of the car.

  Chapter Three

  The heat wasn’t so bad near the house, where maple trees provided leafy shade. Something rustled in the tall grass, and two rabbits sprinted away. A cracked and broken sidewalk wandered up to the front door, so the three of us followed it. My clunky tool belt dragged at my hips, and I resisted the urge to hitch it up—that never helped. Ms. Hawk wore one like it, though on her it look stylish. Both of us were equipped with flashlight, extra batteries, water bottle, camera, pepper spray, and cell phone. The trunk held more equipment—advanced first aid kit, flares, night vision goggles, and more stuff I hoped we wouldn’t need.

  A short flight of steps led up to a pillared front porch. Boards shifted and creaked beneath my feet. Ms. Hawk pressed the doorbell and rapped sharply on the wood. No response. She tried the knob. Locked.

  “Worth a try,” she muttered. “Terry, you go that way—” she gestured to the right, “—while Ms. Harris and I go this way. Check for other ways in.”

  “If you don’t mind,” Belinda put in, “I’d rather stay near the car. I’m not sure how long I can last out here, even in the shade. Bad asthma day, you understand.”

  “Of course,” Ms. Hawk said, and handed Belinda the keys. “I should have realized. Don’t hesitate to start it up if you need the air conditioning.”

  I, meanwhile, followed the house wall past two boarded-up windows to the end of the porch at the corner. There was no wall or rail, so I simply stepped down into the long grass, then paused to look up at the tall, flat expanse of wall above me. Vigorous vines and bushes were climbing for the roof. The second- and third-story windows were gray with grime, and bare wood showed through peeling paint. I wondered what kind of people could let such a grand house fall into ruin.

  The shrubbery made a tall, scratchy barrier between me and the outer wall of the house. I walked slowly around the house, pushing into the bushes every so often to look for a window or an overgrown door. My chest felt a little tight with nervousness. Working solo always makes me uneasy—no backup. But it was either that or admit to my boss that I couldn’t handle this alone. I comforted myself with the fact that Ms. Hawk was within easy shouting distance and kept going.

  Half a block later, I found a window that wasn’t boarded up and stood on tiptoe to peep inside. I only saw a few vague shapes and no movement. What the hell was in there? I made a mental note of the spot—we could break the glass to get in, if necessary—and kept going. A few minutes later, I found a side door behind some bushes. Leaves and twigs prickled against my sides and face as I tried the knob, expecting resistance. It turned easily in my hand. The door moved about an inch, then stopped dead. I leaned hard against it, but it refused to budge. Of course. Belinda had mentioned this. I pressed my eye to the crack and tried to peer inside. Pitch blackness. A breath of damp air wafted past my face and I smelled mold, dust, and something…rotten. Garbage? Human flesh? I couldn’t tell. I pressed my mouth to the crack and hallooed into the interior. No response.

  By now my vision had adjusted a little, and I could make out boxy shapes packed around the door. Someone had deliberately blocked it up. Ooookay. I shoved the door one more time just for the hell of it, but whatever was on the other side weighed more than a stack of anvils. I pulled it shut again and continued on my way. August humidity moved in for the kill, and I felt my hair head for the frizzy zone. A few brown tendrils escaped from my scrunchie, and I could almost hear them go boing.

  I looked in another window, but couldn’t see anything. This whole thing was getting weirder and weirder.

  I rounded the corner into the back yard. Fewer trees stood guard back here, and large patches of sunlight did their best to fry the tall grass. It smelled like drying hay. The neighboring houses weren’t visible, though I could hear traffic noises beyond the thick tree line that stretched across the rear boundary of the property. Sweat trickled between my breasts and soaked my sports bra. Great. When I got home, I’d have to peel it off. Why had I wanted to come out here again?

  I shoved through more prickly bushes to check another window—no luck—then caught sight of Ms. Hawk coming around the other corner. I waved to her, started to step around the shrubbery—

  —and fell. The world blurred into green leaves and hard stone. My right elbow cracked against something and I lost all feeling in that arm. Yelping and cursing, I crashed down a lumpy, slanted surface until I fetched up flat on my back. I lay there, and for a second I was married to Noel again, my head aching from one of his ringing slaps.

  “Shit!” I said, then said it again just to make sure I’d gotten it right. My arm throbbed. Gingerly I reached up to feel my head. No lumps or tender spots. Well, Mom had always said I had a head like granite.

  Ms. Hawk’s head poked through the leafy canopy above me. “Are you all right?”

  I felt like an idiot, lying at her feet. “Still assessing the damage,” I said, then sat up and looked around. I was sitting at the bottom of a short flight of flagstone steps sunk into the ground. Bushes had grown around the top of the stairs, hiding them from view. Behind me was a wooden door that probably led into the cellar of the house. “What happened?”

  “You took a step and disappeared. It looked like the bushes swallowed you up.” The greenery parted, and Ms. Hawk descended the stairs gracefully as a queen. I was glad to see her. She offered me a hand and hauled me upright with easy strength.

  “Fun,” I said, brushing myself down. A few scrapes and bruises—no major damage. “But I don’t think Disney World will offer it as a ride.”

  Ms. Hawk gave a thin smile, then pulled out her flashlight. It was gloomy down here, and cooler. She shined the light at the door, then at the area just in front of it. “No debris,” she said. “And that door appears to be in better repair than the others. This must be how the uncles have been getting in and out.”

  I examined it with my own flashlight. The doorknob wasn’t more than a few years old. Fresh scratches marked the area around the lock. “Oopsie. Looks like someone lost his key.”

  “Did the intruder manage to open it?” Ms. Hawk asked.

  I tried the door, and it opened easily on silent hinges. The basement beyond exhaled damp, musty air that smelled of old stone. I pointed my flashlight inside. The area just inside the door was clear, but beyond that was a wall of…well, a wall of junk. A whole bunch of shoeboxes jumbled up with a rusty rake, three shovels, and an ancient rototiller. A stack of old-style oil cans were piled near a mass of broken lawn chairs that looked like shattered skeletons in the bad light. Flowerpots, half bags of peat moss, more chairs. Stuff that any normal person would have tossed on the trash heap years ago, and all of it piled to the ceiling beams.

  “This is something else,” I said, stepping inside. “Maybe
we should—”

  And then everything happened very, very fast. Something caught my ankle at the exact moment Ms. Hawk grabbed the back of my shirt and yanked me backward. My flashlight went flying. I heard an explosive crash, and a cloud of dust billowed up. I landed hard against Ms. Hawk, and we both went down. The ground vibrated, then everything went still. Dust clogged my mouth and nose. I lay there, a little dazed, until I realized I was still on top of Ms. Hawk. I rolled free, coughing, and helped her up.

  “What the hell—?” I said.

  Ms. Hawk, also coughing, pointed at the door. The dust cloud cleared a bit, and beneath the haze, I could see a shin-high pile of cinder blocks occupying the space I had been standing in a moment before. I swallowed and my legs went shaky.

  “We almost had the ingredients to a Terry Faye pancake,” I said, and my voice would have done credit to Minnie Mouse.

  Ms. Hawk nodded. “Ms. Harris did say something about booby traps. I saw the wire half a second before you tripped it.”

  I looked at the bricky pile. The handle of my flashlight stuck out from under one of the blocks, and I tried to tug it free without success. One more piece of junk for the basement.

  “I suppose,” Ms. Hawk continued, “we should tell Ms. Harris we’ve found a way in.”

  Back at the car, Belinda expressed cautious optimism about our news. We led her around back and down the steps. By now, the dust had settled, but Belinda reached the doorway and stopped dead.

  “Oh dear,” she muttered.

  “What’s wrong?” I asked.

  “Mold. Dust. Mildew. I can smell it from here. If I go into that house, I’ll land in the hospital.” Her mouth twisted. “I’ve been like this my whole life, you understand. My brother used to call me ‘limp lungs’ until Dad took a strap to him. Couldn’t play outside for half the year, and the other half I had to keep an inhaler handy. It’s like being in prison, except there’s no parole.”

  Her words were flat and her face was hard. I wondered what it would be like to live with that and took an unobtrusive deep breath of my own. Air flowed freely, easy to take for granted.