Wonder Woman #20

Three Chinese thugs are running away from their pursuer and they hide in an alleyway, hoping to lose her. But she floats down from above. One of the thugs fires a bullet and she blocks it with her bracelets and she grabs the gun, crushing it. She then sends him crashing near some rubbish bins. Another thug tries to cut her with his knife but Wonder Woman disarms him and drops to the floor.

At a crime scene, Inspector Ed. Indelicato arrives at a crime scene and discovers that Myndi Mayer has been dead for a few hours and he looks up at the walls of her office. He then notices one of the pictures, and that is Wonder Woman. Lt. Shands then comes in and asks the detectives what they have discovered. One replies that she didn’t give up without a fight, and she also had an empty purse. Ed then replies saying that all this blood seems pretty extreme for a simple robbery and the other detectives agree, saying that they found cocaine on her table. The cleaning lady who discovered Myndi’s dead body said that there was a short man with a white beard entering, who looked quite upset, entered the building and had a jacket with the words “Common Sense” on the back of it. The coroners take the body away and the two detectives ask Christine, Myndi’s secretary, asks her about her boss’s murder. Christine says she isn’t even surprised and when Lt. Shands shows her a sketch of the murderer, and Christine gasps in surprise and says that it is Steve London, an ex-artist of Myndi’s. She had fired him a week ago. Finding Steve London was easy, as there were blood stains on his jacket and he stunk of beer. He speaks to the detectives and tells them he wanted to talk to his ex-boss, but not kill her. He doesn’t even own a gun. He explains how her art staff was called into a meeting, and he says how he could smell alcohol in her coffee and her nose was all puffy. She proceeded to rant how they had many lawsuits filed against them and that everyone was fired on the spot and Deni had taken it really badly. The detectives ask who this Deni is and says that she was Myndi’s ex-assistant and didn’t Skeeter La Rue who was also in the conference meeting, or Myndi and Deni and Steve had decided to drunk in a bar. Just then, Steve remembered saying something about Skeeter and Myndi and it was something that made Steve furious. He starts to sob and puts his hands in his heads and starts whispering "Oh God! I couldn't have! I couldn't have killed her! Could I?"

Meanwhile, Wonder Woman makes her way to Choi Industries Headquarters and Mr. Choi greets her. She tells him she needs to speak with Skeeter La Rue as he seems to be working for Mr. Choi. He replies that no one like that has been employed here and she replies that that is impossible. Maybe La Rue isn’t on his records, but he certainly has worked here before and tells him that she needs to find him. Mr. Choi tells her that he cannot help her, but Diana begs if he can. Choi’s bodyguard then holds Wonder Woman by the arm and takes her outside, but she resists and he is then seen flying across the room. Choi then dials for the police and but before he can finish dialing, he is tied up in the Lasso of Truth and he then tells Wonder Woman where Skeeter is. He writes down the address of a nearby warehouse and Wonder Woman then puts her thumb on his forehead and puts him to sleep.

Meanwhile, while Ed Indelicato is questioning Steve London, he says that he is innocent when later they find that a shotgun is out the back Myndi’s office building with his fingerprints over it. They then interviewed Deni and she told them that she snooped around Skeeter’s office and found that he was a drug dealer and had been using the client list to score some big money with the drugs he got, and one of these clients was Myndi. That’s the reason why he had reached the top so quickly. She continued saying that when some other clients found out about this, that’s when the trouble started and that it has something to do with the Wonder Woman Fair. Hearing this, Ed thinks back to the fair, and remembers Solomon Buchman. They had tried to find some leads on him but were unsuccessful. Silver Swan was to get the specially marked bag, which apparently contained some special chips so they could sell it for some drug money. Deni had even shown Myndi the papers which proved Skeeter was a drug dealer, but Myndi just glared at her. Deni had begged Myndi to give back Steve’s job, as it was clear has who Skeeter really was, but Myndi refused and said to her that if she would let any of this get out, she would lose her job. When Deni told this to Steve who was drunk, he stormed out. Now it seems very clear that Steve is the murderer, but the two detectives think that some things don’t add up, so look through his records and find many crimes that he’s committed and his real name is Michael Boyd. They warrant a search for Skeeter La Rue. Just then, a visitor wishes to speak with Ed Indelicato and it turns out to be Wonder Woman herself, along with Julia Kapatelis and Christine Fenton. Ed feels like he is in a dream when he sees her, but he snaps back to reality, and a flashback comes about.

At Drake Warehouse, Skeeter is inside and is playing cards with his two bodyguards. He then hears a noise and asks his bodyguards to see what it is. They grab their guns and head outside and suddenly, gun fire begins. He cowers in the corner and the office window shatters and standing there is Wonder Woman. She unhooks her lasso and tells him that if he cooperates, he will not be harmed and she asks him who killed Myndi Mayer.

Wonder Woman asks Ed if they have found out who killed Myndi, he continues to tell the facts of the case. Wonder Woman’s eyes then fill with tears at Myndi’s death but Christine rages that Myndi may have been many things but she was certainly not a smuggler. Wonder Woman feels that Ed also thinks that Steve is innocent, but the DA and his Captain do not. Christine then suggests that Wonder Woman find out who killed Steve and Ed questions how. Wonder Woman then holds up her lasso. Ed asks his Captain but he is not too happy about the idea, but Wonder Woman begs him to let her, but the Captain replies that the Defence Attorney will not be too happy with his client being lassoed. The DA will say that the lasso was used to add credibility to his story, but Wonder Woman reasons with him again, saying that he should be given a chance of whether he should be lassoed or not. The Captain finally allows it, and Steve is enthusiastic, but his lawyer and wife talk him out of it. Wonder Woman looks towards Ed, but he can’t help either and Ed remembers he has that the Boyd case to get to but then Lt. Shands comes back in the office with no Michael Boyd in sight and apparently he is on the run.

The next morning, Ed gets a call from Shands and he tells Ed that they have found Boyd dead over an electric fence. Wonder Woman was also there and is now waiting inside the warehouse. Lt Shands and Ed are in the warehouse and ask Wonder Woman how she found him. She replies that Deni Hayes had remembered some names on Skeeter’s files and questioned them and their questioning had found Skeeter in this warehouse. Wonder Woman got to use her lasso on him and Skeeter admitted to killing Myndi. Myndi was furious that Skeeter was using her agency as a front for his drug business and she wanted to know how he could do this after all she had done for him and he then placed a packet of cocaine on her desk. She refused and asked him to leave, or he would go down with her. He knew she was bluffing but Mr. Choi, his supplier didn’t trust her so he instructed Skeeter to murder her. He had sneaked in one night and had shot her in the head with his shotgun. Skeeter panicked and turned the office upside down to make it look like a robbery and at the same time, Steve showed up. The two men struggled and Steve fell to the floor, and then Skeeter wiped his fingerprints off the envelope opener which he used to stab Steve, and put it in Myndi’s hands. He then cleaned his fingerprints off the shotgun and made it look like Steve was the murderer. He threw it in the dumpster and then stayed in the warehouse until he was able to get out of the country. When Wonder Woman showed up, she was so upset that she let her guard down and the guards came bursting in and they started shooting at her. She was able to deflect them but Skeeter ran for it and that’s how he got electrocuted. She tells Shands and Indelicato that Steve was not the murderer and was sure that Myndi would have beaten her addiction.

Ed is uncomfortable as there is a bit more too this than Skeeter murdering Myndi. He tells her that it will be in the newspaper tomorrow morning. Shands then tells Wonder Woman that on the autopsy report, Myndi had died off a hemorrhage, but before she was shot and it was because of large amounts of cocaine and alcohol. It seems that she had taken the drugs Skeeter left on her desk. Wonder Woman is shocked at the truth and says "Oh Dear Gaea, why? She was so young, so vital!"

Notes:

• "Based off an idea by Carol Flynn."
• Last .75 cent issue.