Goose in the Pond - Earlene Fowler [67]
A muscle in Gabe’s jaw twitched. “I’ll believe that when I see it.”
I punched my feather pillow irritably. “You’re impossible.”
“So you’ve told me once or twice.” He flashed a smile that could rival Sam’s on the devastation meter. “Kiss me good night anyway?”
I bared my teeth at him, and he laughed. His lightheartedness made me feel a little more hopeful. Maybe there was a chance for him and Sam to reconcile yet.
“Anything new on Nora’s case?” I asked after we’d turned out the light.
“Benni—”
“I know, I know, not my business. So what else is going on among the criminal element of San Celina? What about that underwear bandit those two bimbos were telling you about Sunday?”
“Caught him with the goods, so to speak. A security guard at Mountain Meadows Apartments saw a man behaving suspiciously in the laundry room and called us. Once we got him down to the station, he confessed to all the thefts.”
“What was he doing that tipped the security guard off?”
Gabe’s soft laughter filled our small bedroom. “Had his jeans off and was pulling on a pair of Victoria’s Secret lace panties he swiped from the dryer. In a very attractive shade of teal blue, I’m told.”
“That’s gross,” I moaned.
“You asked. Oh, one more thing you might be interested in. As a matter of fact, I brought you something.”
“What?”
“You know that homeless guy who sits out in front of Blind Harry’s all the time? The one Elvia feeds?”
“Sure, we call him the Datebook Bum. What about him?”
“Found him dead in a storm drain over by the Von’s grocery store on Ryman Avenue. I brought you his diary. Thought you and Elvia might like to look through it.”
I felt my throat constrict. “How did he die?”
“They’ll do a quickie autopsy tomorrow. Probably some infection or pneumonia, like it usually is with street people. We didn’t find any identification. We’ll try running his prints through the FBI, but most likely he’ll be buried as a John Doe.” He shifted next to me. “We went through the canvas bag we found with him. Nothing but junk. Neat junk, but just junk. He was clean. No needles or drug paraphernalia.”
“He’s been around here a couple of years,” I said. “He just showed up one day. We tried to help him, but he never wanted—” My voice cracked; tears started flowing before I could stop them. “What about his family? What if they’re looking for him?”
“Querida, don’t cry.” He pulled me to him. “We’ll do our best to find them, but you know a lot of these homeless people don’t even have families.”
“Oh, Gabe, that’s even sadder.”
He hugged me tightly. “I should have waited until tomorrow to tell you. I didn’t realize it was going to upset you like this.”
“I’m okay. It’s just all the emotional stuff that’s happened the last few days. I guess this was just the icing on the cake. You know, even as irritating as our families can be, we’re lucky to have them.”
“I suppose,” he said, his voice neutral in the darkness.
9
FOR A CHANGE, I beat everyone getting dressed. While Gabe was still shaving, I was pulling on my denim jacket.
“The homeless man’s business diary is in my briefcase,” he said when I kissed him good-bye.
“Do you need it back?” I asked.
“No, we’ll probably just toss the rest of his stuff. I flipped through it. He was apparently a pretty sharp guy at one time. Very organized.”
“I won’t be home for dinner tonight,” I said. “Have a final meeting at Angelo’s with the festival committee. I’m treating them to pizza in hopes of bringing a little harmony to the group.”
He looked at me with concern, his face half-covered with shaving cream. “Are you all right?”
I kissed the clean side of his face. It was slightly wet and soapy tasting. “I’m fine. Just got a little emotional last night. It’s so easy to see the homeless as an ambiguous social issue. It’s different when it’s someone you know. I wish now I’d tried a little harder to find out more about him. Maybe I could have helped him