Down and Dirty (Mercy Watts Mysteries Book 9) Read online

  There was a loud banging and glass shattering. I put Patrick in the chair. “Stay here and don’t come out until I tell you to.”

  “Don’t do it,” he said. “You’ll get more stalkers.”

  Dammit.

  “I know.” I ran out and the screaming was recognizable. It was Beth Babcock of the Mission Hill Babcocks, not to be confused with the Babcocks of Conway’s Fork. Beth was a long-time patient and a long-time pain in the butt. Shawna had said something about laying down the law with Beth at some point and I guess today was that point.

  “Beth, I’m going to have to call the police,” said Steve as I rounded the corner and got a load of Beth the Berserker standing in front of the desk, holding a chair aloft.

  “Call ‘em, you gay motherfucker,” yelled Beth. “I’ve got rights.”

  Shawna picked up the phone. “You have no right to insult my staff and wreck the clinic. Leave.”

  “Health care is a right! You have to see me!”

  “Pay your co-pay.”

  “That’s bullshit!”

  “You owe 700 dollars, Beth,” said Steve. “We’re asking you to pay fifty.”

  Beth lifted the chair higher, revealing her bellybutton ring with its diamond stud. “I have a sore throat. You have to test for strep.”

  “You have to make a payment on your account,” said Steve.

  “I have bills to pay!” she screamed.

  “So do I!” Shawna yelled back and began dialing 911.

  Beth hauled back to crash the chair over the desk onto Steve’s head. She was a tall woman. She could’ve done it, but I dashed over and wrenched the chair out of her grasp.

  “Take a hike, Beth,” I said, slamming the chair to the floor.

  “I’ll burn this fucker down!” With that, Beth of the Mission Hill Babcocks marched out.

  “Good job, Mercy,” said Mr. DeCandido, waiting patiently for his stitches to be removed. “But you haven’t heard the last of her. Tobin Babcock just got arrested for taking pot shots at Jerry Ford’s truck after he tried to collect on a plumbing job. That Mission Hill bunch thinks everything should be free.”

  Shawna was still holding the phone. “You think I should still call?”

  “Mr. DeCandido is right. Call and get it over with,” I said.

  Steve smiled at me. “Maybe Chuck will take the call. I wouldn’t mind saying hello.”

  “He’s got a girlfriend,” I said, grinning back. “Me.”

  “Minds have been known to change.”

  “Trust me. His won’t.”

  Steve sighed. His dating prospects in rural Illinois weren’t lively. “If you know anyone?”

  “I’ll keep an eye out.”

  Shawna put her hand over the phone. “Do you hear something?”

  “Oh crap,” said Steve. “That’s a truck revving.”

  We ran to the window and I gasped before yelling at our waiting patients. “Get out the back. She’s going to ram us. Go! Go! Go!”

  Steve sprang into action, picking up a pair of toddlers and pushing Mrs. McGinty’s wheelchair with one hand. Shawna gathered up a couple of pregnant moms and I ran out the door. They didn’t need me. Shawna was nothing if not good in a crisis.

  Beth Babcock was crazy in a crisis and getting crazier by the moment. She pulled her brand-new enormous Ram 4WD Crew Cab around, sideswiping two Nissans and Shawna’s decrepit minivan and was now facing our front steps, revving her engine and screaming about health care rights.

  I ran down the steps, waving my arms and screaming, “We’ve got kids in there! Stop!”

  Robert Babcock of the Conway’s Fork Babcocks ran across the Jiffy Stop parking lot, yelling, “God dammit, Beth! You’re making us look bad!”

  “You want to pay my bill?” she screamed at him.

  “Shut up and pay your own bill, you crazy bitch!”

  Now you don’t say the B-word to a Mission Hill Babcock or the C-word, F-word, D-word. Really, it’s best to say no words at all, especially if you happen to be a Conway’s Fork Babcock, they of the nicely mowed lawns and paid bills.

  Beth howled in rage and, for a moment, just one blissful moment, I thought she might get out and try to beat up Robert. She’d beat up men before, but none ever pressed charges. It wasn’t cool to be beat up by a woman, even if it was Beth the Berserker Babcock.

  Robert was more than a match for Beth. I could see her calculating the odds and she chose me. Robert launched himself at her open window as she stomped on the gas. I dove out of the way. I felt the bumper brush my toe before I face-planted into Shawna’s beloved fall squash display. There was a huge crash, splinters and God knows what rained down on me. So much screaming pierced the air, for a second, I thought I was screaming. I wasn’t, but everyone within a mile radius was.

  Beth’s truck was rammed halfway in our lobby and she was still gunning the engine. The tires were spinning and spewing vile smoke that billowed out like there was a four-alarm fire going on.

  I sat up in a daze and watched Beth screaming until she kicked open her door, yelling, “You ruined my truck!” Then she ran to the back and flipped herself over the side into the bed. I probably should’ve done something, but honestly, I wanted to see what was going to happen. She had a gun rack, but it was in the cab. That’s right. Beth the Berserker had a license. Apparently, everyone in the tri-state area knowing you’re batshit crazy isn’t a deterrent to gun ownership.

  But Beth, probably because she’s barking mad, didn’t go for the semi-auto she had displayed. She went for the gas can she had in the truck bed.

  “I’ll burn this fucker down!” she screamed and leapt out of the truck like a lynx, pulled out a lighter, and ran up to the clinic.

  Fan-freaking-tastic!

  I jumped up and tackled the nut job as she was unscrewing the lid of the gas can. When I hit her, it popped off, spewing gas everywhere as we rolled off the porch, down the decorative embankment into the drainage ditch. Beth screamed the entire time and kept trying to light the lighter. I guess it didn’t dawn on her that she was covered in gas. Or maybe it did. It’s hard to say with the insane.

  “Stop that!” I yelled.

  “I’m burning this fucker down!” She kept flicking that lighter and I swear I heard a spark. So I bit her and not a little nip either. I chomped down like she was one of my friend Aaron’s butter and herb-basted steaks. She screamed bloody murder and when the cops dove into the ditch, they had to pry my jaws apart.

  I want to say it wasn’t my finest moment, but I can’t. I bit a Mission Hill Babcock and lived to tell the tale. I was kinda bad ass. At least, I felt bad ass until I looked up and found more than a dozen cellphones recording. One of them was held by none other than my latest stalker, Jimmy Elbert. He was recording and yelling, “I love you.” Half the cameras were recording him. I was so getting on the evening news.

  “Mercy Watts, my God,” said Jordan Alsop, local cop and pizzeria owner. “Why?”

  “I didn’t do it,” I said, spitting out a glob of something best left unnamed.

  He sighed and gave me a hand up. “You’re in this ditch.”

  “Tackling Beth. Didn’t you hear? She’s going to burn this fucker down.”

  The other cop, Carrie King, was struggling to cuff Beth and getting spit on in the process.

  “You know, I was a half hour to the end of my shift. Now I’ve got to write a report and book Beth. I’ll be late for the afternoon shift.”

  “My heart bleeds for you,” I said.

  Beth hawked a loogie at Carrie’s face and it spattered her cheek.

  “You want to help your partner?” I asked.

  “Are you kidding?” asked Jordan. “Carrie’ll spit on me. Besides, she’s been aching to cuff Beth for six months.”

  “Any particular reason, I mean, other than the obvious?”

  “Beth keyed her husband’s car after he parked in the handicapped spot she wanted,” said John.

  “Isn’t Carrie’s husband a paraplegic
?” I asked.

  “He is, but Beth thought she ought to park there being that she likes the extra space for that behemoth of hers.”

  “I’m thinking about biting her again.”

  “Word to the wise. I’d watch your back. The Mission Hill Babcocks don’t take kindly to anyone fighting back. Tobin’s out on bail.”

  Swell.

  “I’ll remember that.”

  Carrie finally got Beth cuffed. Excessive force may or may not have been used. I saw nothing that I’m willing to remember.

  Helpful bystanders hauled Beth out of the ditch, but only after she was cuffed. Wusses. Then two pairs of feet walked up and a young man’s hand reached down for me.

  “I didn’t wait for you,” said Patrick.

  “I see that and you’re forgiven.”

  He hauled me out and then we helped Jordan, who looked like a wet cat and was just as mad. “I’m off to a huge hassle. If any of those Babcocks show their face in your vicinity, give me a call.”

  I said I would, but I wouldn’t. What was Jordan going to do? Give them a ticket? I’d rather hire Fats Licata to follow me around and beat up Babcocks.

  “So…” said Joanna Smart, wringing her hands. “I hate to bother you.”

  Why? Everyone else does.

  “No problem,” I said.

  “Patrick says you have something to tell me.”

  I took a breath and pushed my smelly, wet hair out of my face. “Yes, and given what just occurred here, I hope you’ll be calm about it.”

  “Oh my God,” she said. “Oh my God.”

  “That’s not calm, Joanna.”

  “Sorry. He’s just my boy. My beautiful baby boy.” Joanna got all teary-eyed. Motherhood. It was a disease of the heartstrings.

  “He’s fine. Absolutely fine. Only you can make it really bad.”

  “Me?”

  “You.”

  Joanna promised to stay calm and to my amazement, she did. She found out in one fell swoop that her beautiful baby boy was both having sex and had an STD. She took it well, probably because he kept saying he was going to college and thought she was the best mom in the world.

  “He has to get a test, right?” she asked

  “Yes, but, at least, we can avoid the bad one these days. It will take a couple of days to get the results.”

  Patrick gasped. “A couple of days? I can’t wait that long. It freaking hurts.”

  “Shawna might be willing to write you a script since your symptoms are consistent. You still have to test though.”

  Joanna ran off between EMTs and newly arrived cops, calling for Shawna.

  “I can do the bad test,” said Patrick, puffing up and looking almost tough.

  “You don’t want that test.”

  “I did this and I can take that test.”

  “It involves me sticking a Q-tip up your penis,” I said.

  “Never mind.”

  “That’s what I thought,” I said, wringing out my scrub top.

  Patrick took off his hoodie and handed it to me. “You better put this on.”

  “It’s not that cold.”

  “You’re wearing a polka-dot bra.”

  I put on the hoodie, but it was already too late. Me and my non-matching underwear was up on YouTube getting views. I could feel the humiliation.

  “Your life really sucks,” said Patrick.

  “Not all the time,” I said, smiling for the local news crew. Grin and bear it. It’s a motto for a reason.

  “Is your stalker here?”

  I pointed at Jimmy Elbert. He looked up from his phone and gave me a finger wave.

  “What a loser. He didn’t even help you.”

  “They never help. Well, there’s been a notable exception here and there, but mostly never.”

  Patrick yelled at Jimmy, “Hey, you’re a douchebag!”

  Jimmy went stiff and then turned tail and ran. He really was a douchebag.

  Chapter Two

  NOBODY GOT HURT. That’s what Shawna kept saying for the next five hours. And it was true. Sort of. Robert Babcock was pretty banged up and had a broken collarbone from being thrown from Beth’s truck. Every exposed area on my body was covered in scratches and Beth had whiplash and anger issues. That last one wasn’t new, but I have to say it did seem to be worse. She wouldn’t give the cops her new address and Jordan had to call us to get it. I dug through the debris to find the latest address we had for her. Since Beth was all about not paying her bill I doubted she gave us the real one.

  Given that the clinic was worse for wear, none of our patients got hurt and we kept every appointment, I felt pretty decent but a bit stinky from the ditch water. Patrick peed in a cup and got his prescription. Sara came in with her mother and I gave her the news. I think the destruction around us helped me out. It’s easier to keep an STD in perspective when your boyfriend could’ve been flattened by a Mission Hill Babcock. The fact that I looked like I’d been through a thresher didn’t hurt either. Sara blamed the appropriate party, and the moms commiserated over their children’s disease. Bonding can happen over the most unlikely events.

  I reported Barrett Smith to the CDC for spreading an STD, refused sixteen interviews with the local news jackals, and headed for my truck at half past six. I think Shawna wanted me to do an interview, but she was too nice to demand it. She said I was a hero, but I wasn’t falling for that. Patrick told me I was already a meme. He seemed to think that was a good thing. It wasn’t. Being posted all over Snapchat, Facebook, and Instagram would not turn out well. Eventually, some douche would take the picture of me climbing out of the drainage ditch and make me naked. My mom still hadn’t recovered from the pictures in Honduras. She didn’t need this.

  I slid into my truck and it rumbled to life. The purr of the 1958 engine made me yawn. I couldn’t wait to get home and take a real shower. Forty-five minutes of boiling hot water might make me feel clean. I’d washed my hair in the clinic’s utility sink and took what my dad called a sea shower, but wiping myself down in a broom closet wasn’t doing the trick. I couldn’t get the oily stink out of my hair and it had dried badly, making me look like Medusa on crack.

  Before I could drive away, Steve ran out and banged on my window. I reluctantly rolled it down. If another patient came out of the woodwork, they could damn well go to the ER.

  “Yeah?” I asked.

  “Answer your phone,” he said.

  I gave him the stink eye that I’d learned so well from my Aunt Miriam. “Why?”

  He stepped back but was unafraid. “Claire from your dad’s office called. She needs to talk to you.”

  “Swell.”

  “Here.” Steve passed me an individually-wrapped Ghirardelli sea salt caramel.

  “What’s this for?”

  “I have a feeling you’re going to need it.” Steve dashed back into the clinic and I put my head back to stare at the ceiling. My phone was in my backpack. I’d happily ignored it all day and I would’ve happily ignored it all night if it weren’t for Steve doing the right thing. I was starting to think the whole cellphone revolution was a huge mistake for mankind or at least womankind, mostly me. I could never escape. There was always someone watching or texting. Usually both.

  I dug out my phone and there were six messages from Claire and twelve from my dad. Steve was right. I popped the square in my mouth and sucked on the luscious dark chocolate, letting it course into my bloodstream before I dialed Claire.

  “Mercy, thank God,” she exclaimed in a rush.

  “Whattayawant?” I asked through a mouthful of caramel.

  “Are you okay? The news said you’re fine.”

  “Just eating chocolate.”

  “Oh, good. Chocolate works.”

  That’s not a good sign.

  I swallowed and forced myself to ask, “What’s wrong?”

  “I know you’ve had a bad day.”

  In the end, that didn’t make any difference. I don’t know why she bothered to say it, unless it
was to delay, which was likely. “Yeah.”

  “Okay. It’s not a big deal.”

  It was or she wouldn’t be calling me six times in five minutes.

  “Yeah.”

  “Are you upset?”

  “No,” I said. “What happened, Claire?”

  She took a breath. “I was working on the schedule. You know what a mess it is.”

  “Yeah.”

  “And your mom left. I’m so sorry.”

  I groaned and fell over onto my backpack. “She’s not a prisoner. Mom can go out and do whatever.”

  “Tommy’s freaking out.”

  “My dad does that.”

  “I don’t know what to do.” Claire got high-pitched and squeaky. She was my old high school rival, the one that got all the dates and made me feel craptastic. Not that long ago, she’d shown at my parents’ house looking for help. I did her a favor and she wound up working for my dad. In the distant past, making Claire freak would’ve given me perverse pleasure, but now I just felt bad. She’d been on the front lines with my parents and it was too much for her. Heck, it was too much for me.

  “I tried to tell him she went for a walk, but he’s not having it.”

  “Okay.”

  “Can you come over?” she asked.

  I buried my face in the canvas, making my scratches sting. “I need a shower in the worst way.”

  “I know. I saw you on the news.”

  “I look gross on the news. Great.”

  “They weren’t very complimentary to you,” she said.

  “Shocking.”

  “Please come over here and calm your father down. I love your parents, but they don’t pay me enough for this. He’s halfway to hysterical.”

  “Also known as hysterical.”

  “He needs meds.”

  “He needs something.” I had no clue what to do for my dad because I never understood him to begin with.

  Tommy Watts was a top-flight St. Louis police detective who’d opened his own shop a few years ago. He tracked down serial killers, mass murderers, child killers, rapists and saw things other people have nightmares about. Along the way, he’d missed all kinds of stuff, birthdays, anniversaries, and a host of other things. Mom got pushed aside, but she never really complained. Dad worked to help people at the worst time in their lives. How can you complain about that?