STATE OF BETRAYAL: A Virgil Jones Mystery (Detective Virgil Jones Mystery Series Book 2) by Thomas Scott

Anyway, my guys found
this when they moved the sofa. It’s some sort of code.”
    Once Mimi explained it, Miles could
see it right away. It was a long series of numbers. The sequence read: 102120103157123
“Is it written in blood?”
    “It sure is,” Mimi said. “Looks
like your victim was trying to tell you something.”
    Rosencrantz stepped closer and took
another look at the photo. “Trying to tell us what?”
    Mimi let her eyes do a little half
roll before they landed on Rosencrantz. “Me and my crew? We just process the
scene. You guys are supposed to be the crack investigators. My guess is your
victim was trying to tell you who let him bleed out all over the floor. It’d
take some balls to write a message in your own blood.”
    When Mimi said the word ‘balls’
Rosencrantz and Miles made a point not to look at each other. “I’ll want a copy
of that as soon as you can get it to me,” Miles said.
    Mimi handed him the photo. “You can
have this one now. I’ll email the digital ones to you when they’re ready.”
    Miles took the Polaroid from Mimi.
“Do that,” he said. “I’ve got to figure out what to do about my car.” He stuck
the photo in his pocket and walked away.
    Rosencrantz and Mimi stood there
and watched him go. “What was that bit about Checkers and Chess?”
    “Apparently, it’s Mexican slang for
pot.” Rosie said. “I’d never heard of it until I spoke with Mrs. Ibarra.”

 
     
     
    7
    __________
     
    S hortly
after his father passed, Virgil’s family attorney called and informed him his
father’s will stipulated that if his mother preceded him in death—which
she did—most all of his possessions were to be bequeathed solely to
Virgil, save two. He left the majority of his half of the bar in certain
percentages to three people. Of them, two were employees; Delroy, their bar manager,
and Robert, their chef. Delroy and Robert were Jamaicans who had been working
for Virgil and Mason almost as long as they had been in business. Virgil met
them both by chance a number of years ago while on vacation in their hometown
of Lucea, a small town about halfway between the tourist destinations of
Montego Bay and Negril. They ran a roadside stand that served Red Stripe beer
and homemade Jerk chicken to tourists just like Virgil. He’d picked up a nail
in the road and the tire went flat almost immediately. When he pulled into
their lot to change it out for the spare, Delroy and Robert fixed it for him
while he ate their chicken and drank their beer. A friendship developed and when
they came to the states to work for Virgil and Mason they transformed what
would have been just another downtown bar into a one-of-a-kind Jamaican
experience for anyone who walked through the door. Mason’s will stipulated that
Delroy and Robert were to each receive fifteen percent ownership in the bar,
while nineteen percent went to Murton, who had been a part of Virgil’s family
since childhood. The remaining one percent went to Virgil.
    When Virgil walked through the back
door of the bar and into the kitchen, Robert handed him a plate of chicken
pulled from the bone and covered with his homemade Jerk sauce. “Hey, look who
here. It part-time. Good to see you, you. Eat dat chicken. Heal you right up,
mon.”
    Virgil carried his plate from the
kitchen and sat down at the end of the bar. Delroy was doing what had become
known as the Jamaican shuffle. He was mixing two different types of drinks in
separate blenders, pulling a pitcher of Red Stripe from the tap as he washed
dirty glasses in the sink, all as he flirted with two female customers who hung
on his every word.
    Delroy finished the blended drinks
for the women then insisted he receive a kiss on the cheek from them both
before he would allow them to return to their table. The ladies obliged him as
if the idea were their own. Then he reached into the cooler, opened a bottle of
Mountain Dew—the kind in the glass bottles you don’t see much
anymore—and