Mystery, Short Story

Sky Full Of Lies: A Dirk Malone Story

Nancy's Notes 🖊️🎶

Written for Sunday Whirl Wordle – #734. Our host is
Brenda Warren and these are our prompt words: rinse,
days, still, thicket, bomb, fake, criminal, foster, imagine,
lies, sky, and sink. Here’s where the prompts took me.

Image by Me & Copilot

The dame walked into my office like trouble in heels. I could spot her type from three blocks away in a fog thicket. She had the kind of face that made you imagine all sorts of scenarios, most of them ending with a body in the harbor.

“Mr. Malone, I need you to find my husband, Victor Foster. He’s been missing for three days.”

Three days. In my line of work, that’s either nothing or everything. “Police involved?”

“They think he ran off with his secretary. That’s a lie.”

“Everyone lies, sweetheart. It’s the family business of the human race.” I stubbed out my cigarette. “What makes you so sure it’s fake?”

Her eyes went hard as diamonds. “Because Victor is a criminal, Mr. Malone. And when criminals disappear, it’s rarely voluntary.”

The dame had an excellent point. I quoted her my rate …. double, because this had ‘bomb’ written all over it …. and she didn’t even blink. I should have gone for triple.

The trail led me to the docks, where the sky hung low and gray. Foster had been laundering money, skimming from both the mob and his business partners. I found him in a warehouse, still breathing but not by much. Two goons had him tied to a chair.

What happened next involved my .38 and enough gunfire to wake the dead. When the smoke cleared, I had Foster and a new hole in my favorite hat.

Back at my office, Victor Foster coughed up the truth. His wife was behind everything. She was the one who set him up and hired me to make it look legit. By now, she’d be on a plane to Rio with his offshore accounts cleaned out …. no way to rinse that money clean.

I should’ve seen it coming. I let Foster go and poured another drink. Just another case where the only thing deeper than the lies is the ocean they all eventually sink into.

I knew that dame was trouble.

NAR©2025

This is “Lie To Me” by Brook Benton

Wordle 734

All text and graphics are copyright for Nancy Richy and are not to be used without permission. NAR©2017-present.

30 thoughts on “Sky Full Of Lies: A Dirk Malone Story”

  4. Enjoyment personified, Nancy, … you can see, as lois said, Bogey/Bacall, sitting opposite each other, staccato words bouncing back and forth, … you’re fantastic my friend, at bringing the storyline to life, …( or near death, in Victor Fosters case! 😉) …💙

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