OLD FASHIONED

  Former Chicago Homicide Lieutenant Jacqueline “Jack” Daniels has finally left her violent past behind, and she’s moved into a new house with her family.

  But her elderly next-door neighbor is a bit… off.

  Is he really as he appears, a kind old gentleman with a few eccentricities?

  Or are Jack’s instincts correct, and he’s something much, much darker?

  And what is it he’s got in his basement?

  Jack Daniels is about to learn that evil doesn’t mellow with age.

  OLD FASHIONED by JA Konrath

  How well do you know your neighbors?

  OLD FASHIONED

  A Jack Daniels Thriller

  J.A. KONRATH

  CONTENTS

  Old Fashioned

  Begin reading OLD FASHIONED

  Joe Konrath’s Complete Bibliography

  Other recommended titles

  OLD FASHIONED

  2 ounces rye whiskey

  1 tsp table sugar

  Orange peel

  2 maraschino cherries

  2 dashes of bitters

  Put sugar, orange peels, and cherries into a rocks glass. Muddle until macerated. Add rye and bitters. Stir until sugar is dissolved. Top with ice and serve.

  JACK

  Destiny, Colorado

  February 13, 2020

  New house.

  New life.

  The front door was open, and Sam came in, gingerly cradling a box containing her new GameMaster 2.

  Thanks for the money, Harry McGlade.

  “Can we set this up now, Mom?”

  “Later, pumpkin. We have a lot to unload from the moving truck.”

  “Is that nice old man going to help us?”

  “What nice old man?”

  “Standing on our lawn.”

  I patted her head and went out to check.

  Sure enough, standing on our lawn next to the realty sign that read SOLD was an unassuming elderly man. He stared at me blankly as I walked over.

  “Can I help you?”

  The tall man smiled, showing his perfect dentures. He stuck out a hand. “Larry Wintergarten. Looks like we’re going to be neighbors.”

  I shook, matching his surprising firmness. “I’m Jack.”

  “Welcome, Jack. It’ll be strange seeing someone new here. Did your real estate agent tell you about the previous owners?”

  “Only that the place has been unoccupied for over a year.”

  “They disappeared. Husband and wife, little girl no older than yours. Never found them. Vanished without a trace. Creepy, isn’t it?”

  It was creepy.

  Equally creepy was the old man who decided this story was a good way to introduce himself to his new neighbors.

  “The police never had any leads?”

  “No. And it drove them crazy. The husband, he was a cop. Homicide detective. They spent months looking for him. Not a trace. Not a trace.”

  “Cops make enemies.” I knew this from experience.

  “Yes, they do. Could be an old case came back to haunt him. But his wife was the local gossip. Always snooping around in other people’s beeswax. Wouldn’t surprise me none if she was the target all along.” He smiled again, leaning in closer. I saw spinach stuck to his gums. “Are you a snoop, Jack?”

  I didn’t like the way he asked.

  I didn’t like this guy at all.

  “Even worse. I’m an ex-cop. Homicide.”

  “What a lovely coincidence. Old cop disappears. New cop arrives. Well, I’ve taken up enough of your time. I’ll let you unpack, get settled in. Would you like a hand with some of these boxes?”

  “No thanks.”

  “I haven’t seen your husband around. He in the house?”

  “Nice to meet you, Mr. Wintergarten.”

  I nodded and turned my back on him, taking a garbage bag full of old clothes from the moving truck and walking into the house.

  Sam had the GameMaster 2 box open, and was attempting to hook it up to the TV.

  “I told you we can do that later, honey.”

  “Did you talk to the nice old man?”

  “I did. I don’t want you talking to him when I’m not around.”

  “I already talked to him. He told me a little girl used to live here, but I’m even prettier than she was. Isn’t that nice?”

  It didn’t seem nice. It seemed inappropriate.

  But I was probably just overreacting. My old cop instincts firing up, even though there was no threat.

  He was probably just an eccentric old man, eager to meet the new neighbors and share some gossip.

  I mean, what could he be, other than harmless?

  I’ve dealt with way more than my fair share of crazies over the years. The odds would be astronomical that we moved next door to someone dangerous.

  Right?

  LARRY

  February 14, 2020

  I learned some things about the cop, Rita. The one who moved in next door, into Gregg and Sandy’s house.”

  Larry Wintergarten clipped a dead leaf off of the braided Ficus benjamina tree and tucked it into his gardening apron pocket.

  Feed for the compost pile.

  Feed, feed, feed. Larry sometimes felt that was his only reason for existing.

  “I did a bit of library research, and she’s somewhat of a celebrity. Can you imagine that, Rita? A celebrity in our little neighborhood of Farmingwood. Jack Daniels. That’s quite the name.”

  He clipped a dead branch off. Again, into the pocket.

  “I don’t think we’ve had a celebrity here since 1979. Remember that rock and roll singer up on Carter Road? He had that one hit. The one about being in love, and the last line he sings reveals that the song was about his dog. Not a very good song, but the bait and switch was clever. Do you remember him? Had that long, blond, curly hair. Parties every day and night. Groupies sleeping on the lawn. Property values in our neighborhood dropped six percent while he was here.”

  Larry stuck his finger in the soil.

  “I don’t think you need any water, girl. But let’s check your pH.”

  He reached into his apron for the probe and stuck the metal prong into the planter, near the roots.

  “It’s 6.1. A bit acidic. I have some limestone in the woodshed. I’ll be right back, Rita.”

  Nervous, high-pitched laughter, like the chatter of a New World monkey, echoed through the kitchen.

  Larry walked to his patio doors and opened the screen, stepping onto his back porch and taking a big sniff of pure, clean, winter air.

  The outdoors were so much nicer than indoors. No stink of decay. No lingering stench of the Sickness.

  Larry surveyed his domain. A quarter acre rectangle of lawn, portioned off with cedar fencing, lined with carefully maintained holly bushes. Just as it had been for decades. The woodshed wasn’t wood. It was actually made of all-weather resin. A recent acquisition, relatively speaking, that he assembled in 2005. It replaced the original woodshed, which Larry had built in 1978, soon after buying the property.

  Back when the neighborhood was quiet. When eggs were a dollar a dozen, a gallon of regular gas only fifty-nine cents, and Swine Flu threatened the United States, causing widespread panic and mass immunizations.

  Larry wondered if that new flu going around, from Wuhan, would be another false alarm, or if this one would harken back to the Spanish Flu of 1918 which killed over fifty million people worldwide.

  The news seemed to be particularly alarmist about it. As if people weren’t dying all the time from other things.

  He stopped by the compost bin alongside the woodshed, and lifted the lid, tossing in the dead bits of Ficus. Then he dialed the combination lock for the shed and opened the dual doors, searching the interior shelves for limestone, finding the bucket between the sealed bin of Vitamin K (thanks again, Corporal Bob), and a big bag of diatomaceous earth procured for killing bugs. He dug into his apron pocket, finger-walking past his lucky knife, a capped syringe, a boning hook, a stun gun, a pH meter, a penlight, and three shotgun shells, eventually finding the plastic 35mm film canister.

  The canisters were perfect for limestone, and he scooped up about a tablespoon, replaced the plastic cap, and then locked up the woodshed.

  Heading back to the house, he noticed a man standing in his new neighbor’s backyard. In his forties, fit, formidable-looking. Larry smile and waved, and though they made eye contact, the neighbor didn’t wave back.

  Larry found that to be rude, but he knew how stressful moving can be, and immediately forgave the man.

  Plus, it probably wasn’t easy being married to an ex-cop.

  A former deadhead, fully camouflaged in the 1970s freak scene, Larry didn’t like cops, ex or otherwise. He also didn’t like teachers, doctors, politicians, preachers, people in the military, and pretty much any authority figures.

  Larry did like privacy, photography, people-watching, crafting, baking, and Rita.

  “I’m back, Rita.” He immediately went to his Ficus, and shook the limestone from the canister onto the topsoil, working it in with his fingers.

  “This will get your pH back on track, my lovely.”

  More laughter. Musical laughter.

  After washing his hands, Larry went to the hall closet and opened a new crate of air freshener, removing one of the cans.

  He walked around the house, spraying a fine mist, paying more attention to the stinkier areas.

  When the can was empty, he tossed it in the recycle bin and made himse
lf a sandwich. Then he sat on his living room sofa, the sandwich in one hand, his 35mm Nikon with a telephoto lens in the other, and through a split in his window blinds he snapped pictures of the new neighbors as they continued to empty the moving truck.

  PHIN

  March 29, 2020

  The grocery store was insane.” I set twelve plastic bags on the kitchen counter, having lugged in six with each hand. “People are flat-out hoarding. Hand sanitizer, gone. Disinfectant wipes, gone. Bleach, cleaning supplies, hand soap, even rubbing alcohol, all gone.”

  “It’s a pandemic,” Jack replied. “Makes sense.”

  “Sure. But they were out of other things, too. Toilet paper and paper towels. Most of the canned goods. Most of the rice and pasta. The store had a limit on meat and fresh produce, and I watched one guy stand in a huge-ass line three different times just to keep buying baloney.”

  “That’s spelled B-O-L-O-G-N-A,” Sam said.

  “It’s spelled B-U-L-L-S-H-I-T,” I said.

  “Bullshit!” Sam giggled.

  “Sam, you don’t want to be a vulgar jackass like your father,” Jack chided.

  I scooped my eight-year-old up and set her on the counter next to the bags. “Your mother is right. If you grow up to be a vulgar jackass like me, no one will ever love you.”

  “But Mom and I love you!”

  “That’s because you’re both vulgar jackasses.” I tickled Sam’s ribs, prompting a squeal, then sat next to Jack at the kitchen table. “I swear, people have lost their damn minds. I only got about half of our grocery list.”

  Jack made a face that matched mine. “I talked to McGlade last week. He says the supply chain is going to get wonky. California has had a stay-at-home order a few days longer than we have. They’re out of everything.”

  “Uncle Harry smells like salami farts,” Sam said.

  “And you smell like gorilla farts,” I countered. “When was the last time you had a bath?”

  “There’s no school, Dad.”

  “That means you’re allowed to smell like monkey dung?”

  “A gorilla is a great ape, not a monkey. Apes don’t have tails.”

  “Did you tell Sam she had a tail?” I asked Jack.

  “I never told her.”

  Sam smiled huge. “I didn’t have a tail!”

  “We cut it off when you were a baby, because we didn’t want you swinging from trees.”

  “Human embryos have tails,” Sam said. “They disappear in the womb at about eight weeks.”

  “Thank you, Alex Trebek. Now getcher little butt in the bathtub.”

  “Want to have a battleship war?”

  That was my daughter, distilled. Spouting esoteric facts years above her age level, then wanting to play with plastic ships.

  “You’ve been taking baths by yourself since you were six.”

  “I know. But I miss battleship wars. I’ll use a lot of bubbles so you don’t see my naked booty.”

  “Good call. I don’t want to see your naked booty.”

  I helped Sam off the counter, found the bath soap in the third bag I checked, and sent her off to clean herself.

  When she was gone, Jack grabbed my ass. “It’s sexy when you’re all paternal.”

  “You used to think it was sexy when I socked a guy in the mouth.”

  “Bad boys are hot. Caring dads are hotter.”

  I gave her a quick kiss on the neck, then sat back down. “It was pretty bad, Jack. I’m not the worrying type, but this pandemic is making me nervous.”

  “Any face masks?”

  “You mean for sale? Or people wearing them?”

  “Either. Both.”

  “None for sale. A few customers had them on. Everyone did a pretty good job staying away from each other. There were Xs on the floor by the checkout lanes, so people stood six feet apart. The aisles also had one-way arrows, but no one paid attention to that.”

  “Harry says out by him all employees are wearing masks, and a lot of the stores put up plastic shields by the registers.”

  I was sure Colorado wouldn’t be far behind. “The CDC says there’s a PPE shortage. Save the masks for the doctors, nurses, and paramedics.”

  Jack frowned. “If they’re wearing them, we should be wearing them.”

  “I got some N-95 masks in one of my tool boxes, for painting and sanding. I can go hunt around for them.”

  Jack got up and then sat in my lap, a very un-Jack move. “I don’t like this.”

  “Me, neither. Store was a lot worse than I expected. If Harry McGlade is right about the supply chain, we need to think long-term.”

  “Like what? Stocking water and dry goods and medicine and batteries?”

  “I was thinking more along the lines of ammo.”

  Jack made a face. “Seriously? You think we’ll have to protect ourselves from looters?”

  “Neither of us has much faith in human nature, Jack.”

  “Maybe we should start trusting people. I’m sure a pandemic will bring out the best in humanity. Nothing unites people like a crisis.”

  It took us almost a minute to stop laughing.

  “But seriously,” Jack wiped the tears off her cheeks. “I know I have a few boxes of 9mm. Some rifle rounds. Maybe twenty shotgun shells.”

  “I checked before I left. I have a few 9mm boxes still packed. Not a lot, but if we’re careful, we can hunt.”

  “What are we hunting in Farmingwood? Squirrels and skunks?”

  “I was thinking the most dangerous game.” I winked. “The long pig.”

  She snorted. “If we’re going to start eating people, let’s start with Sam’s teacher.”

  “Good thinking. He’s about fifty pounds overweight. He’ll be extra juicy.”

  “I meant because he’s a terrible teacher. He has zero rapport with the kids.”

  “So you want to eat the bad people, rather than the tasty people? I think your priorities are mixed up. I want to eat what tastes the best.” I wrapped my arms around my wife and buried my face in her chest, making munching sounds.

  Phineas Troutt: Cuddle Monster.

  Jack giggled.

  The disgustingly cute interactions of happy couples. If I saw it in public, I’d gag.

  But, goddamn, I really loved my family.

  “Easy there, Alferd Packer. You’re turning me on.”

  I stopped gnawing on her. “Who’s Alferd Packer?”

  “You’re a Coloradan now. You should know all the sordid historical facts.”

  “You can’t even name our governor.”

  “True. But my expertise isn’t in government. It’s in homicide.”

  “I’ll bite. Alferd Packer was a serial killer?”

  “Actually, he would bite. Alferd Packer was a serial killer cannibal,” Jack corrected. “He went into the mountains with four men during a bad winter, came out with their wallets and guns, and ten pounds heavier. Judge sentenced him to death. Want to hear what the judge said? It’s hysterical.”

  “You memorized what the judge said?”

  “Of course not. I’m not Sam.”

  Before the move, Sam had memorized the periodic table of elements. For fun.

  Jack tugged out her cell and brought up Wikipedia. “The honorable M.B. Jerry said, while sentencing,” Jack adopted a Western drawl:

  “Stand up yah voracious man-eatin’ sonofabitch and receive yir sintince. When yah came to Hinsdale County, there was siven Dimmycrats. But you, yah et five of ’em, goddam yah. I sintince yah t’ be hanged by th’ neck ontil yer dead, dead, dead, as a warnin’ ag’in reducin’ th’ Dimmycratic populayshun of this county. Packer, you Republican cannibal, I would sintince ya ta hell but the statutes forbid it.”

  I laughed. “That’s for real?”

  “It was from a local newspaper. I’m guessing some journalistic embellishment was employed.”

  “Did they hang Packer?”

  “No. He weaseled out of it. Served eighteen years, got paroled. Supposedly he was forgiven and embraced by the community when he got out of prison. Kids loved him.”

  “And I bet he loved kids,” I said. “Medium rare.”

  I pretended to nibble on her again, but Jack pushed me away. “I think someone just knocked.”

  My paranoia antenna went up. “Your mom?”

  “The retirement center is completely locked down. No one in or out.”