Simon Says: Case of the Singing Lady Blues (standard:mystery, 3848 words)
Author: pjlawton	Added: Jan 18 2004	Views/Reads: 3549/2543	Story vote: 0.00 (0 votes)
A hard-boiled private detective makes a fatal mistake. He can't correct it but he can make those responsible pay.

Simon Says: Case of the Singing Lady Blues 

By 

P.J. Lawton 

Simon Says – - Sometimes making the wrong decision is better than making
no decision at all - - Not! 

*** 

It was 4:00 A.M. when the jarring consistent ringing of my phone broke
through my alcohol induced coma.  Stumbling to my desk I attempted a 
coherent answer. After a couple of croaking tries some sound finally 
came out. 

“Yeah, Simon here. Who is this and what do you want?” 

“Hey Sherlock, what's happening?” 

“TJ you jerk, what are you doing calling me at this hour?”  TJ was Tommy
James my ex-partner and best friend. 

“Do you know someone named Melissa Albert?” 

“Yeah, I know Melissa. She's a client. What about her?” I guess I should
have told him that she had been a client. She fired me last night. 

“Look Simon, I'm downtown at the old municipal building, you know the
one over on Lex.” 

“Yeah, I know it, over on the corner of Lexington and Smith right?  What
about Melissa?” 

“I think you need to get down here ASAP. I'll explain everything then.” 

“Okay, give me 20 minutes.” 

Fully awake now, the feeling of dread was pretty much overwhelming. I
threw on some clothes and grabbing my keys headed out for downtown. 

*** My name is Winston Simon and I'm a private detective.  I used to be
a police officer but all that ended when Saddam Hussein decided he 
wanted Kuwait. As officer in the Army Reserve I was sent to Saudi 
Arabia where large piece of hot metal from a Scud Missile took out my 
right knee and my Police career. 

After three painful surgeries I returned home with a brand new plastic
knee and small Veterans Administration pension. I couldn't return to 
the police department so I used my small savings and bought a failed 
detective agency.  That was a little over seven years ago. I had 
handled some successful cases over the years but I knew I was never 
going to be rich. Melissa Albert had been my most current case. 

Melissa was a singer, a blues/soul singer, and by all accounts a very
good one.  Her first and second CDs both quickly went platinum. Her 
third didn't do quite as good. Getting to the top had been a hard climb 
for her and she had made a few mistakes on the way. Her biggest mistake 
had been signing a contract with Mission Street Records. A rather 
large, 400-pound fellow ran Mission Street Records; the fellow was 
named Fat Daddy Jack. Yeah, I know, but that was his real name, he had 
it legally changed when he had gone into the recording business.  FDJ, 
as his friends called him, was into more than just recording. It was 
rumored that he controlled the Upper East Side. Everything from drugs 
to prostitution had his stamp on it. 

Melissa had come to me because when her contract with FDJ had run out
she had wanted to go to another studio. FDJ was having none of that and 
had made several threats against her. The gist of the threat was, “if 
you don't record for me, you don't record for anybody.”  Melissa had 
not taken the threat seriously and had recorded a new CD with a 
small-unknown studio. Consequently, the studio was fire bombed and two 
people were killed.  Melissa got scared and came to me. 

*** 


Click here to read the rest of this story (346 more lines)