Night of the Litigatory Dead: A Mike Dodge Mystery

“So what’s he supposed to be?” Curtis inquired. “Game of Thrones Guy?”

“Nandor,” I supplied. Reluctantly. Detective Mead regarded me like I’d scrupulously avoided regarding Nandor when he synopsized the latest season of What We Do in the Shadows for me. I was a reporter for 33 years, and the Countenance of Benign Validation had become my key superpower.

Curtis Mead was a cop, and Nandor was dead, the object of ridicule for a collection of malevolently smirking jack-o-lanterns, so amenities were now pretty much out the window.

“He’s like a vampire,” I added. Reluctantly.

“Uh huh. And what might be his day job?”

“Rick’s a DUI lawyer, so in truth…” then I clamped it. De mortuis nil nisi bonum, I reminded myself. It was the first time my seventh grade decision to opt Latin over a live human language had ever come in handy.

And the truth is, never kick a man when he’s down, particularly when he’s down sporting a man bun and an embroidered black cape Rick Glaetz clearly had not scored from the Spirit Halloween where the Macy’s used to be, down the way from where the Penney’s used to be. We had count-‘em five local microbreweries, a dozen “underground”/popup pizza or taco or vegan pizza or taco joints that appeared to have no fixed address or even geophysical coordinates, and a new restaurant row near the airport I would never have known existed had I not got lost looking for where my auto agent had moved. We had a Walmart where you could find a pair of dress-y slacks or a Target if you were hoity.

Rick (“Caught drunk? You’re not sunk!”) Glaetz had weathered our recession/boom nicely, as more kids roamed off-campus for craft IPAs and those caught between min-wage servitude and white-collar affluence turned increasingly to the liquor superstore where the Circuit City used to be. Rick was one of those ambivalent citizens, jeered when hawking due process during the Jeopardy/Wheel hour, cheered after endowing a new scoreboard for the MHS Wildhawks (the thought process after the Tomahawks mascot was decommissioned hadn’t exactly been of Brookings Institution caliber). I suspected Rick shopped both trial wear and capes on The Magnificent Mile, though he had commented favorably on my Batman ’66 tee. As we say in the community philanthropy game, it’s all about the kids.

Who, fortunately, were still snarfing donated pizza and subs in the meeting hall. Counselor Glaetz had been alone with a dozen embalmed-and-engraved pumpkins when I’d returned to the park center’s Activities Lab to retrieve one of the tot’s Paw Patrol snack bags for a beleaguered dad. I’d still had my pepperoni slice in hand when I’d found Zandor, AKA Rick, slumped over the work table, his face submerged in vegetative pulp. It was only after I’d leaned in to check for signs of life (nope) that I spotted the glistening patch below the left waistcoat lapel and called 9-1-1, before as calmly as possible pulling Wanda Maximoff, AKA Scarlet Witch, AKA West Millington Children’s Association Director Gina Reddings away from the three dozen or so K-6ers, parents, and volunteers in attendance this Oct. 31. Per Curtis’ en route instructions, she locked the meeting room down, and after quashing a few millennial grumbles the way she customarily shut down fourth-grade divas and pre-adolescent tough guys, the party was going full throttle.

“Not much blood, gotta say,” Curtis mumbled, apparently to the newly arrived woman dressed like a bargain budget CSI extra. It wasn’t a costume.

The tech grunted, focused her mini-mag at the wound while I swallowed back on some grease and garlic. “Thin, narrow blade. Looks to be serrated.”

And three sets of eyes moved immediately to the work table, full of seeds and slime and a half dozen pumpkins with varying expressions of malevolence, glee, alarm, and, at the victim’s place, catatonic, asymmetrical boredom. Nobody was getting that Chicago Art Institute scholarship tonight. Rick’s carving tool – cheapie dollar store model well within MWCA’s budget parameters -- was still in his rigored right paw, hanging at his side. Six jack-o-lanterns. Five thin-bladed, serrated pumpkin knives.

 “Killer probably had to know just where to shove it in,” Curtis said to the space between us. “Between the ribs, right into the heart.”

“Or it was just plain stupid luck,” the tech suggested.

“Narrowed that right down,” Curtis chirped.

**

Millington clearly has a drinking problem.

“He kept me outta prison, and got me into AA besides,” a chunky Cruella deVille told Curtis, hugging two squirming Dalmatians within the folds of a faux-canine faux fur.

“It was my third DUI, and Rick said the judge might go easy if I went to meetings,” a millennial mom related, one eye on her Baby Yoda slapping his playmates with his pizza. I admittedly was only half-listening to Mom — the outsized glasses, the straight red wig, and the little black dress had me somewhat buffaloed. “Ricky came to the first couple meetings with me, which I thought was kinda cool, ‘til I realized he was hitting on the other women there. Turns out he doesn’t even drink – told me he can’t.”

“Anna Delvey,” I finally blurted. The petite mom nodded. Curtis frowned.

“Inventing Anna Anna,” she corrected. “I’m pretending to be Julia Garner pretending to be Anna Sorokin pretending to be Anna Delvey pretending to be a rich German, so it’s kind of a costume within a costume within a costume.”

“A literal Russian nesting egg,” I quipped. The eyes behind the glasses went dead -- she was killing the role.

“I know you hear this all the time, but it really was just a glass of wine,” Burger Lady sighed. It may have lacked creativity, but I gave her bright red uniform points for functional simplicity. Her junior fireman, four or five, glanced up curiously as he sipped a box of almond milk and nibbled at an apple. “My cousin had her wedding shower at the Crowne Plaza near the airport, and on the way home, I buzzed a stop sign.”

“Gonna stop you now,” Curtis murmured. “I’m less concerned about past history, unless it has a bearing on Mr. Glaetz’ death. Were you satisfied with how he handled your case?”

Burger Lady ruffled her son’s hair. “The whole thing played havoc with my life, my career, my family, and I’m still paying for that one misjudgment. But I’d known Rick in high school, and he did everything he could to get the court to cut me a break.”

“You knew him, maybe he shared about any clients who weren’t quite so happy?”

“Oh, sure. There were threats, even.” Her eyes darted across the room, and I tracked them. A couple of dads were holding down a table – a lumberjack and a Raggedy Andy whose juvenile Annie was trading the evening’s swag with a Little Pony and mini-Lady Gaga.

“The woodsman?” Curtis inquired.

Burger Lady’s fingers froze above her firefighter’s helmeted head. “He burst into Rick’s office one day while I was signing some papers and started yelling how he’d lost his job because Rick got his license revoked. Rick very quietly explained how lucky the guy was not to be in Pontiac or Joliet, and the guy knocked over a chair and stormed out. I don’t know if they even saw each other tonight.”

“Think I’ll find out,” Curtis said, rising.

**

“I mean, who doesn’t like pizza?” Raggedy Andy demanded. “Not to mention free pizza, right? Only some hack TV lawyer would hate pizza.”

“You have some experience with hack TV lawyers?” I asked.

“Just the bastard who represented my wife and got me THIS as my holiday with Dana,” Andy groused. Then he turned abruptly to the human ragdoll filling a plate with cookies. “Baby, what did we say about sharing? Excuse me, guys.”

“Later, bro,” Curtis grunted.

“He didn’t hate pizza,” Lumberjack growled. “He (deleted) well knew he better keep away from me.”

Curtis nodded. He was scanning his phone, but he knew inattention could be as unnerving as bad cop intensity. “But if the mood hit, he was only a room away, right, Paul Bunyan?”

“Who?? Derek, man. Derek Lewis. I’m going to waste the mother in the middle of a crowded party? Hard enough to get time with my baby with my fu—, with my license permanently yanked. Good thing I live two blocks away.”

“Which one’s yours?” I asked.

Derek blinked, then softened. “Little angel with the grease stains over there? No, I mean an actual angel. Her mom found Jesus after I got busted, and the lawyer SHE got me threw me under the bus.”

“Under the bus meaning five years probation, 300 hours community service, restitution, and counseling,” Curtis clarified. “For a third offense with an injured pedestrian and $10,000 in property damage.”

“Ricky half-assed the whole thing. Shit, when I went to, ah, to contest my sentence, he was giving some (deleted) some (adjective deleted) about custody. I mean, he’s supposed to do just DUI — that’s what he says on TV. And I could tell she was good and pissed. Ask her — she’s right over there. Hey, she try to say I killed Ricky? Trying to throw—?”

“Throw you under the bus? You lean heavy on that public transit metaphor, don’t you? Guess you gotta. Hang tight, Derek — you and Raggedly Ass Andy can discuss the failings of the American legal system.”

“She’s ador—“ I began, and Curtis made an unpleasant noise. I almost collided as he stopped short. The tech was in the doorway, motioning anxiously.

Down the hall, the coroner’s folks were prepping Nandor for transport. “It was under the body,” the tech explained, tapping the work table with a gloved finger. The stiff plastic sheet was crusted with pumpkin entrails and three bloody smears.

“It’s an alphabet stencil,” Chris said. “You use it to carve… Sorry, forgot you got kids.”

“Always appreciate a solid forensic analysis. So, you think he did this?”

“K…P…,” she recited. “Then it looks like he was trying for a third letter. Look at the fingertip impressions over the letters. The one over the ‘P’ was a firm impression, but the ‘K’ spot’s weaker. He was bleeding out, internally, and you can see the skips in this third horizontal streak.”

“PK,” Curtis muttered.

“Pumpkin knife?” the tech ventured. “He wanted to tell us how he got killed?”

“You know…” I started.

“Why you always do that?” Curtis complained. “Finish your thought.”

“What do you always get when you have dozens of cute kids in adorable costumes and a group of helicopter moms and slutty witches and divorced dads?”

“We already got a warrant for every phone in the joint, and that Anna Delray character even did a TikTok.”

“Delvey. Look, those photos MIGHT help you narrow down who left the party long enough to kill Glaetz, but I want to know who never came back.”

“Took a headcount,” Curtis interrupted. “Every kid has a parent accounted for.”

“Some have two.”

“Your friend Gina told me cause of COVID, it’s one parent per family.”

“One parent at a time. Look at the photos,” I advised. “I’m hitting the pizza before it’s gone.”

**

Happily, the little fireman was squealing and ripping around the room, pursued by and pursuing a cabal of trademarked superheroes, dubious celebs, and paranormal and Lucas-licensed entities. I could see the tail now, wagging involuntarily, and nodded in self-satisfaction.

The woman in the cherry-red uniform with the dancing burger looked tired, but she followed her son’s gleeful rampage with a broad, serene smile.

“I actually thought that was a costume, Meghan,” I admitted as I consulted her name badge and took the next folding chair.

Meghan laughed. “The DUI, the divorce, losing my job with the city after the fallout from the DUI and the divorce, I’m working two jobs to keep on top of things.”

“And your boy.”

The smile disappeared. “Ethan,” she finally uttered. “You’re not a cop.”

“The shirt’s deceptive. Nah, I’m volunteering tonight, though I think Gina thinks I dropped the ball. All I did was fetch a snack bag for a dad and discover a body.” The first item brought Meghan straight in her chair. “Glad to see somebody brought you the bag. Ethan’s dad was concerned, and in the heat of, well, things, I almost forgot about it. I’m sorry — that could have been a disaster.”

“Ethan never complains about getting left out when it comes to the pizza or cake or the burgers. So who told you? I only put it out to teachers and the few parents who aren’t either too scared of Ethan coming to their kids’ birthday. Or worse, me coming with him.”

“A wise doll-man once asked me, who doesn’t like pizza? How about if it could kill you? I didn’t get the significance of Ethan’s costume, either, since he was sitting on his tail. Now, of course, it could have been ANY kid’s Paw Patrol bag, but there are only two other dads on the scene, and both of those dads have daughters who had pizza. Divorced dads doing Halloween duty. This was the handoff, right? You came here straight from work to relieve your ex.”

“Kevin,” Meghan stated.

“Kevin sent me for Ethan’s snacks so I’d find Rick Glaetz’ body before you even arrived on the scene.”

Meghan’s jaw tightened. “He met me in the parking lot. I gave him shit for leaving Ethan alone, and he told me Ethan had already eaten. So that son of a bitch murdered Rick.”

“When’d he catch on?”

“Couple years ago. We’d caught Ethan’s condition about six months after he was born. It affected his development, but we corrected his diet immediately, and he’s doing OK. But the special food isn’t cheap, and Kevin resented having a special needs child. I told him it was my family, my genetics, but he began checking around, asking my dumb sister questions.”

“And realized Glaetz was Ethan’s real dad.”

“Like I said, Rick and I were old friends. As Kevin got more stressed and ‘aggressive’ about the DUI, Rick and I just sort of drifted together. When I got pregnant, I still kind of hoped Ethan was Kevin’s. Then, after Ethan was diagnosed, I remembered Rick’s issues back in school. How did YOU know?”

“Lumberjack Dude over there, said he walked — stormed — in on you and Glaetz talking about custody. He assumed you were talking about Kevin, but it was about Glaetz and Ethan. Was he going after partial custody?”

“Quite the opposite. After the divorce, with Ethan’s expenses and Kevin shirking on his support, I went to see if Rick could help me get the court to make Kevin comply. But then I wound up pushing him to help with Ethan, to be there for him, I guess. Rick shut me down.”

“Think maybe he was having second thoughts. Derek the Lumberjack thought Rick stayed away from the pizza party to avoid a fight. I assumed he wanted to log his charity points without a mob of noisy brats. But he didn’t stay behind to check his voicemails— Rick was working quite diligently on a jack-o-lantern. I’m guessing Ethan’s. I did some half-ass Googling, and I wonder if Ethan has a little more trouble with activities than some of the others.”

“He has a few deficits, but I’ve looked into a therapist who might help him catch up.”

“Good,” I said. “In a little bit, my buddy Curtis will be out to talk to you. You tell him all about Kevin and your relationship with Glaetz. And get a new lawyer to order a DNA test on Rick before they put him in the ground. You demonstrate paternity, and you might have a claim to Glaetz’ estate.”

“Rick didn’t want—”

“This is what Rick wanted. He left a message as he was dying — ‘PK.’ My wife’s cousin has two kids with celiac’s, and it got me thinking about the doll-man’s challenge. Who doesn’t like pizza? Or a good stiff drink after a day of lawyering? Maybe somebody with phenoketonuria, Did I say that right?”

“Close enough.”

“PKU, then. Amino acid deficiency — Rick and Ethan have to avoid proteins like mozzarella and pepperoni, and Wiki says liquor is a definite no-no. Glaetz must have been skilled at masking his PKU for clients and colleagues.

“But as he’s bleeding out, Rick isn’t interested in IDing his killer. Instead, he wanted everyone to know about the PKU. Why? So they’d test him postmortem, so they could identify his PKU and demonstrate he was Ethan’s dad.”

Meghan shook her head. “Takes him dying to finally step up. Kevin tries to protect me from a murder, but leaves his son to fend for himself in a roomful of stuff that could kill him. Men.”

I shrugged. “Well, yeah.”

**

Gina the Scarlet Witch and I were making the last of the pizza boxes and cake debris disappear when Curtis returned from his Halloween outing.

“Kevin’s sitting in the dark in his underwear watching Jamie Lee Curtis Duke it out with Hockey Mask Guy when we showed. Left his Darth Vader costume crumpled in a corner — he’d got rid of the pumpkin knife, but we found a bloodstain on his intergalactic cloak and a blood pattern in his jeans pocket that should fit the pumpkin blade. Like Chris said, hitting Slick Rick in the homicidal sweet spot was just stupid luck.

“And, yeah, I asked the coroner to save a sample or two for Meghan Colton’s lawyer. God bless us everyone, right, Batman?” Curtis glanced down at the stack of boxes in my arms. “Want some help with that?”

I extended the armful. Detective Mead flipped the top box open, selected the largest of the surviving slices, and turned for the exit.

“Trick or treat,” Curtis called as he walked out of sight.