Mick the Dick Ch. 37

I had to take a little detour past the main offices of the station the Dipshit brothers work for. I walked up to the receptionist and made my request.

"My name is Pheury. Let Mr. Miller know I'm here to see him. He's expecting me."

"Please have a seat, Mister... Fury did you say?"

"That's Pheury, P-H-E-U-R-Y."

She picked up her phone and dialed an extension.

"Mr. Pheury. Mr. Miller will be right out to see you."

"Thank you." I stood by the window looking out at the parking lot.

After a few minutes, I saw the reflection of someone walking up behind me.

"Mr. Pheury? Hal Miller. I'm glad to meet you. What can I do for you?"

"I just wanted you to know that two of your personnel are now guests of the city. I told you what they were doing. I had to get a restraining order against them. And they still followed me. My attorney will be contacting you tomorrow."

"Mr. Pheury, I told both of them to leave you alone. I will fire them the first thing tomorrow."

"Well, if it's any consolation, they confessed that their manager told them to "stay on me", that's a quote."

"Their manager? They must have meant the news department manager because that's who I told."

"Well, which ever one it was, you're the boss. You're the one I told to leave me alone, and they didn't. Now you'll have to pay."

"We'll be looking for an entirely new news department by the time you're finished."

"From what I've seen of your news department, you could use it. But keep in mind, you may be looking for an entirely new station staff by the time I'm finished."

I turned and walked out of the building. I couldn't help but laugh as I passed through the doors.

Carla and I really busted our tails on the gym. It was looking good. We actually got a lot done. A little trim work and a little touch up here and there and it will look like a new room.

Carla actually helped quite a bit. It is just so much better to have an extra pair of hands. Of course, company is always good.

We ordered pizza for dinner. I know, "Don't you ever get tired of pizza?" Frankly, no! I could live on pizza.

While we ate pizza Carla asked about watching the video of Teresa and the 3 black guys. I hesitated, but Carla begged. I love to hate women begging, if you know what I mean. I put it on for her.

At first I thought Carla wasn't amused by it. She watched, made a few comments, but didn't seem to get turned on. She commented on how well Teresa was built, "for an older woman." She also commented on the size of the one black guy's cock. She mumbled a few things to herself as she watched the big black cock slide in and out of Teresa's pussy. When I asked what she said she wouldn't tell me. Carla even fast forwarded through parts of it. But boy was I wrong about her not getting turned on.

We watched the late news. One of the top stories was how there was a deal struck between the owners of Murphy's Pub, Murphy Properties, and the owner of the old wharf on the waterfront in town and how it was going to help restore and preserve that section of the city. They interviewed Teresa Armacost who said she was glad to help out in restoring "a beautiful and historically significant area of the city". Murph showed some rough plans of what would replace the wharf and how he planned to expand Murphy's Pub. His brother and sister showed some of the buildings they had already refurbished and those next on the list.

It was a good story. After we watched the news, Carla took me by the hand and suggested, "How about if we christen the new gym?"

I actually had to play dumb for a few seconds just to make sure I wasn't reading into her suggestion. "Sure, why not?"

We went back to the gym, and before we got there, she had me almost completely stripped. Of course, she did a pretty good job on herself too. I had to make sure I pulled the blinds before we went too far into the room. Even though the neighbors are a good distance away, and there are trees and shrubs between us, I didn't want them to be walking their dog or something and happen to see us.

I found out that the weight bench makes an excellent "love chair". We took turns laying on it and having the other do things. We decided the weight bar was strong enough to handle two pairs of hand cuffs, one for each wrist. The only thing I thought would be required is to put safety locks on the ends of the bar to keep it from being pushed or pulled off onto someone's head, namely mine.

We fooled around in the gym until after midnight. Then we went to bed.

Shortly after I woke up in the morning, my cell phone rang. It was McNally.

"Mick, sorry to bother you this early, but I thought this was important. Armacost tried to commit suicide last night."

"He what? What happened?"

"Last night we got a call about somebody standing on a balcony screaming and hollering. When the cars got there, they found Armacost, half naked, yelling that he was going to kill himself or someone else. He was throwing things off the balcony. He fired a pistol in the air, not at anyone. The SWAT guys went in with a key from the manager of the building and took him down without any further incident. They said he tried to shoot himself in the head but he had used up all of the bullets. He kept saying he was going to kill "her" for what she did. I guess he meant his wife."

All of the sudden it dawned on me. He must have been watching the video. "What happened to him?"

"He's at Happy Acres right now. He had been drinking heavily and took all kinds of pills, including some he shouldn't have even had. He completely lost it. I mean, they put him in the proverbial padded cell. You know how difficult it is to get someone committed. The doctors took less than an hour. He kept trying to escape and everything. He started threatening everybody."

"Do you have any idea what set him off?"

"Nope. The doctors couldn't get anywhere with him. I was kind of hoping you might be able to help."

"No suicide note?"

"Nope."

"Does his wife know?"

"I think so. I think one of the officers that handled it called her."

"Can you meet me at his apartment in about an hour?"

"Sure. Why, do you have something?"

"I might. I'll see you then." I hung up.

Carla was awake and listening to my side of the conversation.

"Armacost tried to kill himself?"

"Yeah, it sounds like it."

"I guess Teresa's plan worked, huh?"

"It sounds like it."

"Why are you meeting Mac at Armacost's apartment?"

"Well, I'd like to see what tape he has in his player."

"You're not going to tell Mac about the tape, are you?"

"Not if I don't have to. But I'd rather him find it than someone else. If Benny had died, the homicide and crime lab guys would have taken everything. Chances are they'd see it. In case something happens to him or the apartment, I'd rather not have one of the kids or Armacost's partners find it."

I started to pull my clothes out and got ready to take care of the 3 S's. I thought I should check with Teresa so I called her house.

"Hi Mick." It was Holly. "You're up bright and early."

"Yeah, I am. Is your mother?"

"Yes, she is. What? I'm not good enough for you any more?" Holly snickered.

"You're more than enough for me. Now put your mother on the phone."

Without saying another word, Holly handed the phone to Teresa. "Hi Mick."

"I take it you got the word, didn't you?"

"Word? What word?"

"About Benjamin?"

"No. What?"

"He tried to commit suicide last night."

"He did?" She almost sounded happy.

"Yeah. He was screaming out on his balcony. He threw stuff off of it and even fired his pistol into the air. When the SWAT officers stormed his apartment, he tried to shoot himself, luckily the gun was empty. He was yelling about wanting to kill you for one thing or another."

"Oh. That must be what the phone call is about. I went to bed a little early last night and didn't hear the phone. I see there's a message."

"I guess he got the video."

"I guess so. It was delivered to him yesterday. I guess it did the trick."

"Yeah, but I hope you didn't intend for him to kill himself."

"Of course not. Where is he?"

"The police officer that told me about it said "Happy Acres", so I guess the asylum."

"That's good. That's what I wanted."

"I'm going to try to go to his apartment and get the video tape."

"Be careful Mick. I don't want you to get into any trouble over this."

"I won't. I'm meeting Sergeant McNally there. I'll talk to you later."

"Okay, be careful."

I got out of the shower, got dressed, and drank a cup of coffee. I let Carla take her time and lock up the house when she was ready.

When I got to Armacost's apartment building, Mac was standing outside waiting.

"So, what's this idea you have?"

"I'll tell you when I get there."

We went up to the apartment and Mac unlocked the door. We went in and I scanned around the room. I went over to the VCR player and hit the eject button. Nothing came out. "Shit," I said to myself, "they must have already taken it." I picked up the remote for the TV and turned it on. It was the same channel as the news station that had the story on the wharf last night.

"Mac, what time did all of this happen?"

McNally opened his notebook. "It was around 11:15 last night."

"Same time as the story."

"What story?"

"They had a story on last night about how the owners of the old wharf behind Murphy's are selling it to him."

"They are? I thought Armacost owns it."

"Mrs. Armacost owns it."

"Ohhhh! No shit! That's funny. So that's why he was mumbling about his wharf. We didn't know what he meant."

"Wharf?"

"Yeah! He kept saying something about his wharf, you know, stuff like "My wharf, my wharf. I can't believe the bitch sold my wharf." Things like that."

As I looked around, sitting on a stack of mail just inside the door was a brown envelope, just like the one I received. "How 'bout that. Now you know what he was talking about."

"So, is that what you wanted to see?"

"That's it. I wanted to see what news station he had on."

"That's a pretty good deduction there Sherlock."

"Thank you, Watson." We laughed.

As we left the apartment, the brown envelope just happened to jump inside my jacket without Mac seeing it.

"So, Mick, do you think this is what Teresa had in mind when she talked about revenge?"

"I wouldn't be surprised. I did talk to her a little while ago and she was surprised, but didn't sound heartbroken about it."

"Well, she is a woman scorned."

All I could do was shrug my shoulders. "By the way, how'd my friends make out with their bail yesterday?"

"The station bailed them out. If I heard right, it was about $10,000 each."

"That's not bad."

"It would have been higher, except the hearing officer knows you and said you are well capable of taking care of yourself and highly suggested they take the court's advice and order and stay the hell away from you before they get hurt. What did the boss say?"

"He tried to make it sound as if he was going to fire both of them and their manager for telling them to stay on me. I'll believe that when I see it."

"Do you think he knew about it?"

"I wouldn't be surprised. Regardless, this is one of those instances where shit flows upstream too."

I snickered as I told McNally I'd give him a call a little later.

I stopped by the little shop for two of their egg sandwiches, a couple pastries, and coffee. I made mine an extra large coffee, I needed it. When I got to the office, Carla was already fast at work, as usual. I put the food down on her desk.

"So you did remember."

"Of course," I said with a smile. "Any calls?"

"The G.M. from the news station called and apologized about the Dipshit brothers. He'd like you to call him when you get the chance."

"Fuck him, and his news crew. He can talk to my attorney."

I went into my office and opened up the envelope just to make sure I got the right tape. Just what I would have needed was for Benny to subscribe to some movie of the month club. I popped it in the VCR player. It was the right one.

Carla watched me to make sure I didn't watch more than I needed to verify that it was the "one".

"So he never got the chance to watch it?", she asked.

"Nope. It was still sealed in the envelope."

"Are you telling Teresa?"

"Yes. I think I should, shouldn't I?"

"I guess so, but is she going to feel like a fool? She whores herself to a bunch of black guys just to get revenge, and then didn't even need it."

"Imagine, all she'd have had to do is sell the wharf to Murph. She didn't even have to go to California."

"Of course, maybe she had to vent all of that sexual frustration somehow."

"Is that what it's called now?", I asked as I walked back to my desk.

I picked up the phone and called Teresa.

"Hi, Mick."

"I have something for you."

"Did you get it?"

"Of course. Stop by and pick it up when you get a chance. I'll be here all day, I hope."

"Okay Mick. Thanks. I'll be by in a little while."

As I hung up the phone, Carla turned up the radio. "Hey Mick..."

The morning news was on and the lead story was once again starring Benjamin Armacost. I walked over to Carla's desk and sat down. I listened to the report as we opened up our sandwiches. Whether the police didn't tell them everything or they omitted it for the sake of the family, more likely the first choice, the report came across like he simply had a nervous breakdown and fired a couple of shots off his balcony. Nothing was mentioned about the attempted suicide. That's good, at least for the family.

After listening to that report, the normal boring "murder last night" stories came on. Carla turned the radio back down to its normal volume. "Mick. I was thinking..."

"Now there's a news story!", I said with a shit-eating smirk.

"Fuck you!", she replied. "Seriously. Maybe you'd be better off not telling Teresa that Armacost didn't see the tape."

"Why's that?"

"Think about it for a minute. She did all of that to make the tape to achieve what happened last night all by itself. Instead of what she did being in vain, wouldn't it be better for her to think she caused it? I mean, if I went to that length to piss somebody off and then it just happened on its own anyway... well, I just think she'd feel... more satisfied."

"You might be on to something." I thought about it for a minute. "Maybe you're right. If I don't say anything to her about where the tape was, she won't ask and will just assume that is what caused him to go over the edge."

"Sure. That way she feels like she accomplished what she set out to do."

I smiled as I stood up from the chair, leaned over and kissed Carla. "I knew I keep you around for something."

Carla smiled back at me as she sipped her coffee.

A short while later Teresa came through the door. She said hi to Carla as she passed through the outer office.

"Hi Mick."

"Teresa." I held the tape up. "Here you go. I hope this is the last of these floating around out there."

"It is. I told you, the copy you have, this one, the original that I have, and the one they kept to use as a model for the remake."

"That's good." I handed her the tape.

"How much do I owe you for this, Mick?"

"Nothing. This one's on the house."

"No, no. I want to pay you something."

"You've already paid me enough, Teresa. A partnership in a firm and all of that, plus what you already paid me for the other jobs."

"Are you sure? I don't want to take advantage of you."

"You're not taking advantage of me. Just keep it locked up in a safe place."

"I will. Thanks once again Mick." Teresa walked over and kissed me. "Do you know something? If I didn't know how serious you were about Carla, I'd jump your bones."

I almost blushed. "Wha..." Then my ego took over, saving my ass once again. "Well some day we may have to investigate that possibility." That's all I would need, a mother daughter combo along with Carla. I know I would die.

As Teresa wiggled out the door, saying good-bye to Carla on the way past, Carla looked over her shoulder at me. "Did I just hear her say what I think I heard her say?"

Knowing Carla heard correctly, "No, you were mistaken. She said we needed to pump up the volume on my phones."

"Uh huh! Sure Pheury. Just what you'd want, Holly and her mommy."

"What about you?"

"When I said I would stick around, even if there was another woman, I didn't mean for you to start a collection." Carla laughed.

"Don't worry. I don't think Holly would go for it either."

About an hour later, Holly came crashing through the front door, right past Carla and into my office.

"What the fuck is this?" She threw a tape on the desk in front of me. "Did you know about this?"

Like the typical male caught up in something, I said the first thing that popped into my mind, "What?"

"This tape with my mother. Did you know about it?"

"Sit down Holly." Carla came in and stood by the door.

Holly looked at Carla and then back at me. "Sit down, hell! Did you know about it?"

"Not exactly."

"Not exactly. That's just great! Not exactly means yes."

"No! Not exactly means I didn't know about it before she did it."

Holly took a deep breath. I could tell she needed to cry but I wanted to make sure she knew what happened first. Women have a tendency of becoming vulnerable and forgetting everything said during a good cry. I walked around from behind the desk and took her by the arm. "Here Holly, sit down. I'll tell you what I know."

Holly sat in the chair.

"I got this package on Monday. It was the video. After I saw what it was I called your mother. She told me that this was the only thing she could think of that would set your father off. She told me how your father had tried talking her into doing it with a couple of black guys while he watched."

"What? Oh, come on Pheury, you can do better than that."

"Seriously, Holly. That's what she told me. She said he was really mad with her that she wouldn't do it. After the thing with Stacy Schmidt, just to piss him off, she hired a film studio in California to make it. She only had the original and two copies made." I forgot to tell her about the one the studio kept.

"Did you know that's why she was going to California?"

"No. You know I was trying to figure out what she was up to. Remember? You were the one that told me where she went."

"Mick, I'm sorry. I don't mean to blame you. Last night I was looking for a movie to watch. My mother went to bed early and I wasn't tired. This one doesn't have a label on it so I put it in to see what it was."

"Did you say anything to your mother?"

"No. How am I supposed to ask my mother why she's in a porn movie with a bunch of black guys? I wanted to wake her up. I started to, but then I started asking myself why?"

"Holly, after I saw what it was, I called your mother. The one thing she asked me was to make sure you didn't see this. I think it would be best if you didn't let on that you've seen it.

"That's going to be hard to do, Mick. Seeing my mother turn into a whore? I don't know. I just don't know."

"Remember something. Your mother was hurt when she found out your father was fooling around on her. She wanted revenge. This was the one thing she thought would really get to him. That's the only reason she did it. It wasn't for fun. She was angry."

"Did she really say my father wanted her to fuck a black guy?"

"He wanted to WATCH her fuck a black guy, or a couple of black guys. That's what she said, and from what I've heard from other people, including the police, he liked watching."

Holly stared at me for a few seconds. "You mean he is a voyeur?"

"That's what I'm hearing."

"So, on top of being an adulterer, he's a pervert."

I couldn't help but chuckle, especially with the expression on her face. "There is, or I guess was, a club downtown, one of these secret password type clubs, that put on shows for some very "well to do" members. Your father was one of them."