Frank rattled off the digits as Dez punched them into his keypad and buzzed him back. “Now you’ve got mine too,” Dez said. “Give me a shout if you need anything. This job is all about connections, Frank. It’s knowing who to call when you don’t know where to turn. Vic used to be like that, but now he’s out there in the wilderness somewhere.”
Vic came up to stand at his side as they both watched Dez get into his car and drive off. “Promise me something,” Vic said. “If he tries to sleep with you, say no.”
“Okay,” Frank said. “It shouldn’t be that hard. He’s not my type.”
Vic stepped into the street, timing the passing of a large truck, “That’s what they all say. Next thing you know, I’m losing another partner.”
Frank hurried behind him, “Does that mean I’m your partner now?”
“Just get in the car.” Vic reached for his keys and felt his pocket buzz. He frowned as he read the name on the screen and held the phone up to his ear. “Go ahead, Chief. We’re in Philly, meeting with the FBI. Yes it pertains to something in our town. I’ll explain later.” He stopped talking and listened for a moment. “Oh,” he said. “Okay. We’ll get right there.”
They pulled back onto the highway and Vic said, “Did you ever meet Joe Hector’s step-dad, Al Charon?”
“Yeah. Why?”
“He’s dead.”
Officer Iolaus was waiting by the apartment’s front door holding a yellow legal pad. He smiled when he saw Vic and Frank coming up the stairs. “Thank God, now I can get the hell out of here.”
A foul-tinged whiff of air blew from under the closed door and Frank recoiled. Vic put his hands on his hips, “How bad is it?”
Iolaus shrugged and said, “No clue. I got here, saw him swinging, and shut the door. That’s why we have you guys.”
“Who found him?”
“Maintenance. They went in to change the batteries on the smoke detectors and saw him hanging there and called 911. The coroner’s been notified. Should be here in twenty minutes.” Iolaus shook his head sadly and said, “Poor bastard. Him and Heck were always tight. I guess he couldn’t take it.”
Vic nudged the door open with his elbow and looked around the apartment. A countertop island separated the living room and kitchen, stacked with colored envelopes with sympathy cards. Behind the island, the body of an elderly man hanged by a rope suspended from the ceiling. “We’ve got this,” Vic said.
They went into the apartment and closed the door behind them, blocking the view from passing neighbors but sealing in the stench. Frank opened all of the windows in the living room as Vic went around the island and stopped in front of the body. There was a two-by-four set above the cabinets on either side of the kitchen with a rope tied around the wood on one end and pulled tight around Al Charon’s neck on the other. The neck had started to stretch. Lengthening under the weight of the body to something unnaturally long and thin like taffy.
There was a chair kicked over near the kitchen entrance, close to Al’s dangling feet. As Frank reached down to move it, Vic said, “Don’t touch anything. Not yet.” There was a handwritten letter stuck to the refrigerator by a heart-shaped magnet, written to Andi and the Kids. “Who’s Andi?”
“Heck’s wife,” Frank said. He leaned forward to read the letter but Vic snatched it off of the fridge and crushed it between his hands. “What the hell are you doing?”
“I remember him. You selfish, stupid, son of a bitch,” he muttered. He looked around the kitchen and cursed.
“Hey,” Frank said, pulling on his shoulder. “I’m lost here.”
“Heck’s mom died less than two years ago. I remember talking to this dickhead at her funeral and he said he hoped he died next. He told me he took out a big life insurance policy in hopes that when he passed, Heck and his family would be all set.”
“So?”
“So life insurance policies don’t cover suicides, Frank.”
“How do you know?”
“Because I have one and if it was covered by suicide, Danni would have made me eat a bullet years ago to collect.” The two men looked at one another and then back at the body. It swung side to side, the old man’s bare feet two inches off the ground. “He was a widower, right?” Vic said softly.
“Yeah.”
“Stay put.” He walked into the kitchen, moving carefully around the body. He looked up at the corpse and said, “It’s for a good cause, Al. I’m sure you don’t mind wherever you’re at anyway.” He reached for Al’s belt and fumbled with the buckle.
“What in the fuck are you doing?”
“Shhh!” Vic hissed. He quickly undid the belt and worked the button and fly on the old man’s pants. “Step back and hold your breath.”
Frank covered his face as Vic yanked down the corpse’s pants and boxer shorts, spilling a pile of excrement and bodily fluids onto the linoleum below. “This is more disgusting than the babyshit diapers,” Frank whined.
Vic backed into the corner, desperately trying to keep his shoes out of the spreading puddle of fluids. “Listen, go find me his stash.”
“What stash? You think he was doing drugs?”
“Not that kind of stash, retard, his porno stash. Go find me a magazine.”
Frank disappeared into the back bedroom and started rooting around in the nightstand. “There’s nothing here but medications and a bible, for Christssakes!”
“Keep looking!”
“He’s an old man. He wasn’t into that stuff anymore!”
“Find me something, Frank,” Vic said. He looked at his watch, “Hurry up before we get company.”
Frank’s voice was muffled and there was the sound of “This is the stupidest fucking thing you’ve ever had me do, and we’ve done some really stupid shit together, Vic. I can’t find any pornography. There’s nothing… wait a second.”
He came back to the kitchen holding a balled up piece of white fabric. “I think I know what you’re up to, and this is all I could find.” He unraveled the ball to reveal an enormous pair of satin granny panties. “It was in a box in the back of the closet. I’m guessing Mrs. Charon was a big lady.”
Vic held out his hand and said, “It will do. Throw it to me.”
Frank tossed the panties across the kitchen and Vic nearly lost his balance catching them. He caught himself against the refrigerator before stepping into the wide circle of yellow fluids. There was more distance between him and body than he could reach by leaning. “The things I do for people,” he said.
Vic stepped lightly into the murky water and winced, watching his brown shoes turn dark and wet. “It’s soaking through my shoes.”
Frank covered his face and said, “I can’t believe you’re doing this.”
Vic lifted the corpse’s shriveled penis and wrapped the pair of panties around it. He grabbed Charon’s stiff right arm and forced it to bend toward its crotch. He managed to get the hand to stay close enough that the panties stretched from its penis to its curled up fingers just as there was a knock at the front door.
Chief Midas looked at them in disbelief. Vic was wearing his dress shirt and tie with a pair of Al Charon’s sweatpants and flip-flops on his feet. “The Coroner said he died jerking off?”
Vic shrugged and said, “That’s what he said. One of those auto-erotic something-or-others.”
“Like the guy from Kung-Fu?” the Chief said.
“Exactly,” Vic nodded.
“I never tried that.”
“Apparently it’s more common than you’d think,” Vic said. “The restricted blood flow makes an orgasm ten times more powerful. At least, that’s what Frank told me.”