The Lady Upstairs

by Halley Sutton

  My throat started to close up and I shut my eyes, trying to block the humming in my ears. “Thanks for the heads-up.”

  “If he’s unmarked, he’s not there to arrest you. Only to observe.”

  “That makes me feel so much better.” I took a sip of my drink, putting a hand over the mouthpiece of the phone so Lou couldn’t hear the ice rattle on the other side. “You didn’t happen to get a look at his face, did you?”

  “No.” She didn’t tell me it would all be fine, that this was normal. I wouldn’t have believed her if she had, but I still wanted her to say it. “As long as you don’t give him any reason for probable cause, he’ll probably stay out there tonight. I’d go to Jackal’s if I were you.”

  Or you could invite me over, I thought but didn’t say. I could stay with you. “I’ll do that,” I lied, and hung up.

  I told myself I shouldn’t be bitter, that she’d come to the canyon; she’d helped me with Ellen when I needed it. I couldn’t blame her for the fact that she’d chosen not to stay with me after, that she’d had someone else to hold her while I lay sleepless, Ellen’s ghost fluttering over my bed every second. Most of all, I told myself that bitterness wouldn’t be attractive to Carrigan. That was what I needed to be focusing on.

  If I had any shot with Carrigan left, it would be tonight. Now that I’d already talked to him, I couldn’t regroup, try to corner him again—it would look too suspicious. I had to push it, now, see how far I could take it.

  If he came back to refill drinks, I’d try again. If he got up to go to the bathroom, I’d follow him down. I pressed my hand to my temple, tried to think, but my hands were shaking. MacLeish was waiting for me. Or Escobar, or someone new, to ask me questions about Ellen.

  The woman next to me was starting to get loud and belligerent. “. . . what if it was murder all around? Like, so, she kills him, but then someone kills her and leaves those bodies in the canyon . . . or maybe someone killed them both, you know? Like don’t those producer guys always have mob ties?”

  “You watch too many movies.”

  “Mark my words. Cosa Nostra.”

  And then I truly couldn’t breathe. I was sweating even though we were inside and the heat had started to retreat in the last week—although I couldn’t remember, had it been hot the morning of the canyon, had Ellen’s body been sitting out in the heat, had her mother had to identify some heat-eaten thing, had she, had it . . .

  “Goddammit,” I snapped out loud. The woman to my left turned to stare at me. I stood up, plunking two twenties down on the table to cover my bill. I had to get some fresh air. I kept an eye on Carrigan’s table—he was still nursing the club soda, nodding at something one of his partners was saying—and ducked outside. I picked a spot near the valet stand where I could gulp the fresh air, pretend to smoke a cigarette, maybe, but where I could still keep an eye on Carrigan’s table.

  The stars pinwheeled above me, pressing down. The pressure pushed inward on my ears like I was underwater, and I tried to yawn but nothing popped. If we’d gone to the police, Ellen would still be alive. But maybe we would all be in jail right now. If it had been me and only me on the hook, that might’ve been all right. But it wasn’t only me—it was Lou and Jackal, too. The long line of what-ifs stretched out in front of me: I could’ve picked a different girl. If I’d parked one street over, I might never have met Lou. If I could’ve looked ahead, I might’ve told her to get lost after that plate of pie. Or stopped things that night after the first mark, when Lou had been waiting for me. I wished I could unzip my own skin, get out of Jo for a moment.

  I closed my eyes, but waiting behind them was the bright picture of Ellen’s face with her mouth open, screaming, choking. I gasped and shuddered, covering my face and rubbing, rubbing at my eyes.

  “Are you all right?”

  My head snapped up. A few feet away, Mitch Carrigan stood on the pavement, eyeing me warily. But not unsympathetically. I didn’t trust myself to speak, so I nodded a little. He moved a step closer.

  “Are you sure? Maybe I can help.”

  He was inching forward, like walking toward a wild animal, afraid it would bolt. But it was also the first time he’d looked at me with any real interest all night. His face was kind but serious, his mouth twisted down in sympathy.

  “Sorry, I didn’t get your name before.” His eyes gleamed in the twilight. He brought a whiff of honeysuckle with him as he moved.

  Men, I thought, disgusted even as my stomach clenched—in hope. Hardwired to be drawn to the damsel in distress. I blinked rapidly, working up a moistness, and bit my lip. From a nearly forgotten place inside, I heard Lou’s voice: For a certain kind of man, the worse you can make that pretty face look, the better.

  He reached into his pocket and pulled out a monogrammed handkerchief, handing it to me. I dabbed at my eyes with it, noticing that it was both starched and pressed. His eyes were locked on my face the entire time I tidied it with his linen square.

  “I’m Mitch,” he said. I gave him a watery smile of thanks, and his hand lingered a bit on my own as I passed him back the crumpled and mascara’d handkerchief. “Do you need a ride home?”

  He was so close I could almost touch him. Not flirtatious, but I could see it now. I’d learned my lesson in the bar. He had Tana the ballbuster at home. It was the little crucifix-clutching virgin he was missing. I swear, up close his breath smelled like money.

  “Please,” I whispered.

  * * *

  Carrigan drove a restored ’50 Plymouth De Luxe—“a present,” he’d said simply, when I’d admired it, and I guessed that meant a present from his wife—and we puttered along the freeway going about twelve miles per hour, but that was fine with me. I was happy for the time alone with him.

  He’d wanted the full story once I was in the car. I told him an ex had been following me, someone I was scared of. That I was worried he’d be waiting for me and if Mitch would just drive me home and escort me to my front door, I’d be forever grateful. It was a story with so many holes in it, it could’ve been a cheese, but Carrigan bought it, or seemed to. I’d laid it on thick, telling him about calls in the middle of the night, hang-ups, that it was starting to drive me crazy, that I wasn’t sleeping. That, at least, wasn’t a lie.

  By the time we got to Tarantula Gardens, he was starting to warm to me—trying to cheer me up by telling me about his campaign. Telling me Bogart was one of his favorites, too, and that it might be an obvious choice, but he preferred Casablanca to all other films. It was obvious. I didn’t say it.

  As we pulled into the parking lot, I could feel my stomach tightening again, and I couldn’t stop myself from looking around, trying to find the unmarked that Lou had spotted earlier. I couldn’t see it, but that didn’t mean it wasn’t there. Or maybe I got lucky, and they went home.

  “Do you see him?” Carrigan craned his neck to stare out the window. If I really was trying to avoid a jealous ex, he would be a terrible choice to keep me safe.

  “I . . . I’m not sure.” I made my voice breathy, like I was trying not to cry.

  “Don’t worry,” he said. “I’ll walk you to your door.” He smiled at me, kindly, but kindliness was not the feeling I was looking to arouse in him tonight. As he navigated the boat of the car into a parking space practically a city block long, I slipped off Jackal’s bracelet and tucked it into the valley between the bucket seat and the door, somewhere not so obvious that the wife would notice it next time she went for a ride. I needed an excuse to see him again, not for Carrigan to be even warier of strange women.

  Carrigan escorted me past the pool, one hand rubbing soothing circles on the small of my back, and up the steps to my apartment. When we got to my door, I turned, pressing my back against the wood. Trying to shrink like a violet. “Thank you, Mr. Carrigan.”

  “That’s you thanking my father-in-law.”

  “Thank you, Mitc
h,” I corrected. “Nice to meet you.”

  I hesitated for a moment, thinking the word bashful over and over in my head until it took over me, until I was radiating it, and then stepped up on tiptoe to kiss him on the cheek. I let my hands skim the shoulders of his suit jacket, dragging my nails a little so he could feel them. His cheek was in that in-between state of smooth and stubbly, a touch oily under my lips. I lingered there, leaving the invitation in the air. Carrigan gripped the top of my arms to steady me, and I let my heels hit the ground. A man that handsome, turned on by a scared little woman—it would be up to him to make the next move.

  “Good night,” I said, breathless for a second—but not with desire. Feeling instead the delight of realizing I hadn’t entirely forgotten the game. Maybe you never really could. “I don’t know what I would have done tonight if you hadn’t shown up. It makes me believe good men do still exist.”

  I had my key half in the lock when he threaded his fingers into my hair and, with one gentle tug, pulled me to face him. I let my lips part and my eyelashes flutter, putty in his hands, his for the taking. It didn’t last long—not even long enough for him to slip me the tongue—before he was shaking his head and saying, “I don’t know what came over me. I have to go.”

  “Of course,” I said, pretending to be in a daze. “Good night.”

  I watched him walk past the pool, the blue glow illuminating the underside of his face, shadowing his eyes—like a skull, I thought, then shook my head. I’d been morbid enough for one night. He didn’t stop once, didn’t turn around to look for me. And he hadn’t exactly thrown me into bed. But there was something there.

  As he walked away, getting smaller and smaller, I rubbed the bare spot on my wrist where Jackal’s bracelet had been and felt, for the first time since that night in the canyon, hope. That thing for suckers.

  Chapter 22

  In the morning, I checked the cars on my street. No unmarked now, no one surveilling the place. If Lou was right and had seen someone, he or she was long gone by now—but I was also pretty sure they’d be back. I thought of the slipped bangle, lodged in the side of Carrigan’s car. I wondered how quickly I could call and ask to retrieve it.

  I was about to head inside, call a taxi so I could pick up my car from Sole del Mare, when I heard her.

  “I see you didn’t sleep at Jackal’s.”

  I whipped around. Lou was leaning against her car door, smiling at me. She didn’t seem pissed, or suspicious—just waiting.

  “No,” I said, stepping toward her. “What are you doing here?”

  “I went to Jackal’s first,” Lou said. “He said he hadn’t seen you.” She shook her head at my complex. “This place is such a dump.”

  “It’s beachfront,” I said automatically. “Really, Lou, what are you doing here?”

  Lou’s smile faltered. She looked tired. I wondered how much sleep she’d missed last night and who she’d been missing it with. “I haven’t been sleeping,” she admitted. “I wondered how you were doing.”

  “That’s why you haven’t been in the office?” I took a step toward her. Lou nodded. Bullshit. Across the hot car, glittering in the morning sun, Lou was tapping her hip against the open car door. Fidgety. That worried me. Drop-in visits weren’t her style, not at all.

  “Lou, about Chinatown—”

  “Forget it, Jo,” she said. “Really, forget it. That’s not why I’m here, anyway.” The corner of her tongue darted out and touched her very pink lips. I closed my eyes for a moment, trying not to remember the feel of those lips pressed against mine. Trying not to think of her face, bone white, in the moonlight, Ellen’s body between us.

  “Let’s play hooky,” she whispered. Up close, her eyes looked smeary and her lips were twitching. “Let’s forget everything that happened, today only. Okay? We’ll forget her and we’ll go somewhere else, and then tomorrow, it will be like it happened, but for today only, we’re not going to talk about it or think about it or anything. Okay?”

  I squinted into the morning sun. Put Ellen aside for the day. In theory, it sounded wonderful. But it would also mean a day of drinking with Lou—it always meant a day of drinking with Lou. I wasn’t sure I could handle that. I wasn’t sure that two drinks in, I wouldn’t be able to stop myself from reciting all the little details I was barely keeping a handle on now—Ellen’s favorite color, the plasticky feel of the shower curtain around Klein’s body, the candied smell of the drugstore perfume she always wore.

  Not to mention Carrigan.

  But there was also Lou in the morning sunshine, so still and calm and smiling at me, not moving even when a plane roared overheard. Her eyes trained on me like I held the key to every problem she’d ever had, like there was no one else she wanted to see.

  “Where should we go?”

  Lou dimpled. “Leave it to me.”

  * * *

  Halfway there, I realized. We were headed for Santa Monica. In the direction of Sole del Mare, in fact, or, at the very least, of my abandoned car. If we passed it on the street, Lou might recognize it. Then there would be questions I didn’t know how to answer.

  “Where are you taking me?”

  “It’s a surprise,” Lou hollered over the sound of the air rushing by, the radio cranked all the way up. She wouldn’t answer me when I asked again, kept singing along to the radio. Every so often she’d pause and turn to me and smile, a big one, showing all her teeth. Whatever feelings she’d had outside Tarantula Gardens, she was good at setting them aside. A new thing to marvel at, her ability to compartmentalize.

  For once, I wished that we were stuck in our city’s most well-known natural disaster, gridlock traffic, so I’d have more time to work on my cover story. I hoped I was wrong, but I knew I wasn’t—Lou hated Santa Monica. There was only one reason she’d willingly brave the well-intentioned yogis and tourists.

  “The Sole del Mare,” I said, pretending surprise. I watched Lou from the corner of my eye as she pulled the car into the lot. It couldn’t be pure coincidence that she’d brought me here, today of all days. But I couldn’t figure out the angle, either.

  “They have a brunch menu,” Lou said happily, throwing the car into park in front of the valet stand.

  “Since when do you brunch? Since when do you pay for valet parking?”

  “Since”—Lou willowed her body into the back seat for her purse, brushing against me—“today, my friend. Since today.”

  My feet were lead, and I didn’t bother trying to catch up to her. She was practically skipping into the restaurant ahead of me. At the door, she turned and held it for me, and I smiled at her weakly. She grinned at me and ushered me through, trying to get me to move faster.

  I heard Lou tell the maître d’, “Two for brunch,” but I couldn’t stop staring around the restaurant. It was busy, even considering it was a weekday. The curse of Santa Monica. There, the corner where Carrigan had been seated last night. Across from the bar where I’d whiled away some time. Behind it, a woman with a lot of dark curly hair pulled away from her face. Sleeves of tattoos disappearing beneath her T-shirt. I squinted. A gap in her teeth you could lob a tangerine through. Christ. Same bartender.

  “Do you have a reservation?” The maître d’ frowned and tapped at the computer screen ahead of them.

  “We’ll sit at the bar,” Lou offered.

  Shit. “Let’s go somewhere else, Lou,” I said, my mouth dry.

  Lou waited until she’d thanked the maître d’ for escorting us to the bar to respond. “I should be able to let it go,” she said, leaning close to me. “But I can’t.”

  “What? You mean . . . Ellen?”

  Lou glared at me. I was ruining her buoyant mood. “I mean Carrigan,” she said.

  I started to sweat. I wanted to order a drink, desperately, wanted the fuzz that would cloud my mind and make everything feel less sharp and bitter, but I didn’t w
ant the bartender to get a good look at me, either. Don’t be silly. She doesn’t remember you.

  “It would’ve meant something to me,” Lou said. “You see that name everywhere. It would’ve been big for us. Toppling the patriarchy and all that,” she said, adding air quotes to try to convince me she was teasing, but her smile didn’t reach her eyes and she coughed gently into her hand after she said it, like the words had bruised her throat on their way out.

  “Can I get you ladies something to drink?” The bartender leaned forward on her elbows on the glossy redwood-slab bar. Her T-shirt hiked up an inch, revealing the cluster of bumblebees on her biceps. I looked down at the menu, studying it like she’d quiz me later.

  “Coffee,” Lou said.

  “Make it two,” I replied, not looking up.

  “Really? Wait a second,” Lou said to the bartender, then turned to me, eyebrows raised. “No mimosa, no Irish coffee?”

  “I meant it, I’m taking a break from alcohol.” At the Sole del Mare, anyway.

  Lou smiled at me, a megawatt dazzler, and I felt a little warm glow in my chest—the first I could remember since Ellen died. The bartender stared at me for a moment before she turned away. Maybe trying to place me. Maybe curious why Lou had pushed it.

  “Anyway, I thought it would be good to come here. I’ve thought about it since that woman mentioned it. We would’ve been here tonight anyway, for Carrigan’s happy hour.”

  “Last—” I caught myself before I got the sentence out. Jesus, Jo. But that was unlike Lou, too, to forget a detail that would’ve been so important to the case. I coughed, started over, picking my words carefully. “Last I heard, his campaign isn’t going well anyway. Less incentive to pay us off,” I lied. The last poll still had him up a hair’s breadth in the polls. A perfect setup for our type of sting.