Every Crooked Nanny Read online

  Every Crooked Nanny

  Kathy Hogan Trocheck

  BOOKS BY KATHY HOGAN TROCHECK

  Every Crooked Nanny

  To Live & Die in Dixie

  Homemade Sin

  Happy Never After*

  Available from HarperPaperbacks

  *Coming Soon

  HarperPaperbacks

  A Division of HarperCollinsPublishers

  This is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents, and dialogues are products of the author's imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  HarperPaperbacks

  A Division of HarperCollinsPublisbers

  10 East 53rd Street, New York, N.Y. 10022

  Copyright © 1992 by Kathy Hogan Trocheck

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

  A hardcover edition of this book was published in 1992 by HarperCollinsPublishers.

  Cover illustration by Jenny Tylden-Wright

  First HarperPaperbacks printing: December 1993

  Printed in the United States of America

  HarperPaperbacks and colophon are trademarks of HarperCollinsPublishers

  10987654

  For my family with love, especially Tom, Katie and Andy, and all the rest of the Hogans and Trochecks

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  The author wishes to thank all those she bugged, questioned, nagged, verbally assaulted or otherwise contacted for assistance in writing this book. Any mistakes or missteps here are my own and not theirs. Those who gave legal advice include Elizabeth Belden, Warren Davis, Bill Hankins, Jerry McCumber, Leslie Fuller Secrest and Janet Ward. Major Timothy J. Buckley of the Marietta (Georgia) Police Department contributed Irish wit and valuable advice on police procedure. Richard Hansen, M.D., and Susan Hogan, R.N., gave medical advice. Other technical assistance was rendered by Paul Kelman of Central Atlanta Progress, Atlanta Pretrial Detention Center Director Tom Pocock, J. H. Matthews, security chief of downtown Rich's Department Store, Lynne Jackson, who explained the LDS lifestyle for me, and Thomas W. Trocheck, my resident engineer, development specialist and computer repairman. Thanks are due also to my literary agent, Sallie Gouverneur, who took on a neophyte despite her better judgement. I am grateful also to my former colleagues at the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, who advised, critiqued, and encouraged. A special thanks is due to a very special lady, Celestine Sibley, who opened the door and showed me the way.

  Although some streets, locations, and neighborhoods referred to in this novel are authentic, the author has occasionally rearranged Atlanta geography to suit her own purposes. This is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents, and dialogue are the product of the author's imagination, and resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  A DIRTY BUSINESS

  After ten years of cleaning up Atlanta's streets, former cop Callahan Garrity trades in her badge for a broom and buys herself a housekeeping business. She's on the job when her clients discover that their pretty nineteen-year-old Mormon nanny has disappeared...along with jewelry, silver, and a few rather sensitive real estate documents.

  Soon Callahan is involved with a job messier than any she's ever encountered while wearing an apron. Illicit love triangles crooked business deals, long-distance scams, a dead body...it's going to require some industrial-strength sleuthing on Callahan's part if she wants to solve—and survive—this one.

  1

  I KNEW IT WAS GOING TO BE A BAD DAY when Neva Jean called that early in the morning. "Callahan?" she said hesitantly. "What is it now, Neva Jean?" She's one of the best housecleaners I have working for me, but you wouldn't believe the shit that happens in her personal life.

  Neva Jean hesitated again. "No use lying. You'll find out anyway. Me and Swanelle were on our way to Valdosta Friday night when we got in a big fight. You know Swanelle's temper. Well, he got so mad at me he pulled into a Waffle House outside Macon, put me out of the truck, and took off and left me standing there. Me with nothin' but a bottle of Mountain Dew in one hand and the Danielle Steel paperback I was readin' in the other. Left me standing there in the middle of the parking lot wearing my house shoes."

  I sighed, loudly. "Where are you now, Neva Jean? And how much money do you need to get back here right away? I've got you scheduled to work every day this week, and two of the other girls are already out sick."

  There was extended throat-clearing at the other end of the phone. "I'm still in Macon, honey," she wailed. "Some of the girls working at the Waffle House have been taking turns putting me up, and they let me clean up there in return for meals, but my purse is in Swanelle's truck, and if I know him, he's gone off on a toot. You reckon you could wire me bus fare back to Atlanta? You know I'm good for it."

  I scrabbled on the kitchen table and found my checkbook. My balance had been lower, but not much. "Will twenty-five dollars do it, Neva Jean?"

  "I reckon it'll have to," she said resignedly.

  "Fine," I snapped. "Get somebody to give you a ride to Western Union, and I'll have Edna wire it to you. Make sure you're here by eight A.M. tomorrow. You've got the Mahaffeys and the Greenbergs, and you know they don't like anybody but you in their houses."

  Just as I banged the phone down—hard—the front door slammed. Into my kitchen, which also serves as office and headquarters for the House Mouse, Atlanta Central Division, a cloud of cigarette smoke preceded a five-foot-two-inch woman in her early sixties. The blue hair was teased and tormented into an unnatural-looking winged creation I call her Hadassah do. It was Edna Mae Garrity, my live-in office manager and three-pack-a-day mother.

  She set the morning paper down on the old oak kitchen table we share as a desk and sniffed the air.

  "No coffee made?"

  "I thought that was your job," I said, pointedly waving away the smoke she blew in my direction.

  She deliberately shot a stream toward me, then turned toward the coffeepot. "You wanna tell me why you've got your panties in a wad so early on a Monday morning?"

  I flipped open the daily appointment book and showed her a full day's worth of bookings penciled there in her own rounded, looping handwriting.

  "We've got a full day's work, one big new client, and Jackie and Ruby are out sick. On top of that, Neva Jean just called; she's stuck in Macon with no money and can't possibly get back until tonight at the earliest."

  Maybe I should explain here about the House Mouse. Jesus I hate that name. It's a cleaning service, actually. After I left the Atlanta Police Department last year, I had the hot idea of becoming a private detective. Lots of guys I know have done it after leaving the department. It seemed like a good idea at the time, but I overlooked one thing—my sex. Once I got my license, I found out fast that unless you're a man and latch on to one of those high-priced corporate-security consulting gigs, most private detective work is just nickel-and-dime skip-tracing and divorce work. Which I detest.

  About then, Edna talked me into buying this cleaning service. Easy money, she'd said. She could get her longtime cleaning lady, Ruby, and some of Ruby's friends to come to work for us. And with all her contacts, neighbors, and friends, people she knew from the beauty parlor she'd managed for twenty years, we'd be in high cotton. She kicked in some money she'd been putting aside, and I took ten thousand out of my police pension fund and bought the business.

  And since the stationery, brochures, and even the pink Chevy minivan that came with the deal all said HOUSE MOUSE, it was cheaper to keep the old name. Which I hate.r />
  We operate out of my little bungalow in Candler Park, a nice tree-shaded neighborhood here in Atlanta. The business has grown steadily, I'll have to admit. I had no idea how many yuppies there were in this town who can't bring themselves to scrub their own toilets but who would gladly pay me or my girls $75 a half day to do it for them.

  The downside is that every week some fresh disaster strikes. Either a heavy-duty vacuum cleaner burns out a motor, or one of the girls (most of whom are at least fifty) throws out her back, or some old biddy calls to complain we waxed her no-wax floor. Kind of makes you long for a nice clean Friday-night domestic knifing.

  The disaster du jour on this particular Monday was three clients who expected the House Mouse to show up this morning, and there I was with most of my mice out of commission.

  Edna pulled the appointment book away from me and squinted at it through her bifocals. She's too vain to admit she needs glasses, so she makes do with these $4.99 K-mart specials. She tapped a pencil against her teeth, a sign of deep thought.

  "OK, look, Jules," she said patiently. (She knows I hate to be called that.) "The Eshelmanns and the Browers can be switched to Wednesday. I'll call them and explain and offer to throw in a free window-washing for their trouble." (We usually charge $25 extra for windows.) "We can move Dr. Zimmerman too.

  "But now these new people, the Beemishes, I hate to disappoint. Florence Foster recommended us to them. He's that big developer, you know, and their place over on Paces Ferry is huge. I quoted Mrs. Beemish one hundred seventy-five a week for the heavy cleaning, since they have a maid who does the light stuff, and she didn't bat an eyelash. If they like the House Mouse, they could set us up with a lot of those rich Northside clients, and then we could quit dicking around with these penny-ante fifty-dollar condo jobs."

  I shot her a look for her dirty language, but she ignored it. Twenty years in a beauty parlor, and you pick up some amazing expressions. Anyway, even before my dad died and she went to work, Edna was never what you'd call a Southern Magnolia.

  "Well, who do you suggest we get to do the Beemishes?" I asked.

  She stared at me and sipped her coffee. "I'd go myself," she said, "but you know how my arthritis is. And they have stairs. Two flights. That's why I jacked the price up so high."

  "I guess that leaves the head mouse."

  "I guess it does," she agreed, pushing an appointment sheet across the table at me. "Here's our contract, with all the specifics on it and the address. Better take an antihistamine before you go; the place is thick with dust. And remember, this time vacuum the refrigerator vents and clean the tile grout in all the bathrooms. The last time we sent you out you forgot to do it, and Ruby had to go out the next day to finish up."

  I glared at her, but she was busily filling out the crossword puzzle in the paper and didn't look up. I grabbed the assignment sheet, and she lifted her head and swept her eyes over my torn T-shirt and jeans.

  "You're not going to the Beemishes like that, I hope," she said. "The uniform service delivered some clean smocks and pants on Friday. And don't forget to put on a pair of white shoes. These rich people like to have the help dress like help."

  2

  As I pulled onto Paces Ferry Road, I suddenly snapped out of the coma I usually fall into when I drive. Ten years as a cop in Atlanta, and in some parts of town I automatically go on autopilot. Buckhead was one of those places. I'd been a patrol officer in Zone 2 for four years, so the billowing white dogwoods, rolling green lawns, high wrought-iron fences, and Italianate mansions were ancient history to me. I sniffed the air for a whiff of my favorite spring scent, new-mown grass. Instead I got a lungful of eau de carbon monoxide. Glancing in the rearview mirror I saw black smoke roiling from the van's tailpipe.

  Damn. I had no clue what was wrong. Since I'd bought the van along with the other House Mouse equipment three months ago—it was an '85—I'd already put $800 into it. Now the thing probably needed a ring job or some other faintly sexual-sounding and equally expensive repair. We'd need at least two or three decent new accounts to pay for that smoke.

  The fence in front of the Beemishes' house was actually a pink stucco wall with an elaborate wrought-iron gate set into it. I pulled off the street and stopped at a contraption that looked like an old speaker from the Twilight Drive-in. A red button glowed and a static-broken voice said, "May I help you?"

  I suppressed the urge to order a double Wendy's with chocolate shake, no fries. The gate swung open noiselessly. I noticed the wrought-iron curlicues actually formed interlocking B's. In the corners, iron bumblebees hovered over dogwood blossoms. Nice.

  As the van chugged down the driveway, I saw the smoke getting thicker, and now I heard a clunking noise coming from under the hood. Excellent. Now I could not only act like poor white trash, I could look the part.

  It was a short but scenic trip to the front of the house. Spanish Revival from the '20s, I'd guess, with graceful balconies on the second story and a massive carved wooden front door. The drive circled around the front of the house, past a round rose garden in full bloom. A slim blond woman dressed in tennis whites was deep in discussion with an ancient black man in a straw pith helmet. I followed the drive around to the side, where a worn pickup truck was parked beside a vintage Cadillac. The help's cars, I guessed. A pink stucco garage held a white Mercedes station wagon with a vanity tag that read PEACH.

  I pulled into a slot beside the pickup, shut off the ignition, and winced as the engine continued knocking.

  The blonde rounded the corner, trailed by her gardener. She was like any other woman you might see bounding around the courts of the Piedmont Driving Club on a spring day. About 5 foot 7, the hair artfully teased and sprayed into the artificial windblown look uniformly adopted by that genus and species known around Atlanta as "Buckhead bitch." She was deeply tanned, her thin arms sprinkled with freckles. The shirt was white cotton, tucked neatly into a little white pleated skirt that reminded me of a high school cheerleader uniform. I'd bet she wore lace-trimmed spanky pants under it. The outfit was finished off with brand-new white Avias.

  This had to be Mrs. Beemish's tennis outfit for gardening. In Buckhead, casual wear means tennis wear. The women have tennis outfits for shopping at the A&P, tennis outfits for driving carpool to Westminster Academy, the tony private school where they send their kids, even tennis outfits for tennis.

  She stopped in front of me, put her hands on her hips, cocked her head, and let out a tinkling laugh.

  I put out my hand. "Mrs. Beemish. I'm—"

  She shook her head and laughed again. "Julia Garrity, what on earth are you doing working for a cleaning service? Is this some kind of undercover operation?"

  OK, she knew me from before, obviously from college days, when I still used my first name instead of my more businesslike middle name, which I'd adopted in the training academy.

  "Actually, no, I'm no longer with the police department," I said coldly. "I own the House Mouse. Look, do we know each other?"

  She laughed that laugh again. It did have a familiar ring, come to think of it. Then she held out the hem of her short skirt and did a little pirouette. "Take a good look. Think fifteen years younger, forty pounds fatter, dishwater-brown hair, and the Tri Delt House at Georgia."

  Christ on a crutch! "Oh, my God," I blurted out. "Lilah Rose Ledbetter! I never would have known you. Don't tell me you're Mrs. DuBose Beemish?"

  She grabbed my hand and tucked it under her arm. "None other. Mama always said it was just as easy to fall in love with a rich man as with a poor one. So I shopped around until I met Bo at a Temptations concert at Chastain Park. We've been married eight years now. Wait until you see my two precious children!

  "What about you, Julia, you never did get married, did you?" She didn't wait for an answer. Didn't need one obviously. The old Tri Delt hotline had probably already informed her of my long-term spinsterhood.

  All this time, Lilah Rose was walking me around toward the front. Before going inside,
she turned to the gardener, who was still trailing us.

  "Cut about a dozen more of those Pink Perfections, Lester, then bring them around to the kitchen and put them in a bucket of warm water, OK? I want them to open up before the luncheon tomorrow."

  She went through the front door of the house. The floors of the wide hallway were pale pink marble, the walls painted the same pale pink shade. A mammoth crystal chandelier hung overhead. On one wall a gold-leaf console table was topped with a large Venetian glass mirror. The other wall was dotted with a collection of third-rate English landscape oils. (OK, I took art appreciation in college. I wasn't born a cleaning lady.)

  We made a sharp right turn into a room that obviously served as the study. The walls were lined with pickled pine bookshelves loaded with the kind of leatherbound books interior designers buy by the inch instead of the title. There was a fireplace with a mantel of the same pickled wood and two huge overstuffed sofas covered with a black flowered chintz. The tables were littered with little snuffboxes, jade figurines, and silver picture frames. I hope Edna planned to charge the Beemishes extra for all the dusting we'd have to do.

  Overhead was a huge brass chandelier, each candle arm topped with a tiny black lampshade. I could see the cobwebs from where I stood, and I didn't much like the idea of hauling a ladder in there to clean the damn things. This house was going to be a bitch. And even worse was the idea of cleaning toilets for a former sorority sister. Oh, she'd pay, all right.

  Lilah Rose plunked down in one of the sofas and pointed to the one opposite. "Sit down, Julia. Let's catch up on old times before we get down to business, all right?"

  Actually, I didn't have many fond memories of old times with Lilah Rose Ledbetter. I hadn't much liked her when she was homely back in college, and I liked her a damn sight less now that she was skinny, blond, and rich. She was part of a phase of my life that I found amusing and totally inexplicable: the sorority house, the rush parties, the whole thing. I'd joined because my favorite aunt had begged me to and insisted on paying for it. And, as Edna had pointed out, the Tri Delt house was a far nicer place to live and eat than anywhere she and Dad could have afforded. So I'd done the Greek thing for four years, and at the end I'd walked out of that life and into another one. That was all there was to it.