Down the Rabbit Hole

by F J messina

  For Sonia, it was as if the entire space were filled with water─each motion silent, each facial expression exaggerated by distress. Floating before her, she saw the bimbo’s hands now clutching her breasts. She could see Jet staring at Bob, the “Oh,” on his lips giving the impression of him being a large fish.

  Sonia blinked her eyes, and just as quickly as the room had seemed to fill with water, the sensation of suspended animation dissipated. Bob’s thin and veined hands began to shake so violently that the paint on the end of his paintbrush splattered, creating a small pattern of bright pink that illuminated the fringes of his wiry beard and spraying several spots on the gray tee-shirt he wore over his carpenter jeans. His eyes were wide behind his John Denver glasses.

  Everything and everyone in the room began to move and make sounds at once. The bimbo finally let out a scream, “Ahhhh!” Bob stuttered, “Who, who are you? What, what . . .” Sonia’s eyes scanned the room furiously.

  Jet just stood there. “Sheeeeeet,” she whispered.

  Finally, Sonia’s eyes found it. Right next to the easel at which Bob had been working, the wooden box that Bad Boy Bob had always carried into the sessions lay open. Sonia’s eyes widened. Up close, it was obviously too small for sex toys, but it worked perfectly well for paintbrushes. Damn, he’s not over here doing crazy shit, he’s painting. He’s painting a portrait of the bimbo. Damn it. He’s painting a freakin’ portrait of the bimbo.

  When Sonia had first seen the bimbo, she’d thought, “Wow, she’s really built.” Suddenly it hit her, so was Mrs. Dylan, and they looked a lot alike as well. Sonia took a quick look around the room. Really. Is that it? Is he just painting a portrait of his own wife and using the bimbo as a model?

  Sonia turned to Jet, who was still frozen, and whispered, “C’mon! We screwed up. We’ve got to get out of here. C’mon! We’ve got to go!”

  Jet didn’t respond. As Sonia stepped around her, trying to move Jet out the door, the look on Jet’s face told Sonia one thing: Jet was desperately disappointed that Bob was not being unfaithful. It appeared to Sonia that Jet wanted Bob to be evil, so she could help bring down fire and brimstone upon him. And the fact that Jet continued to stand there, frozen, told her Jet still had some strange hope that could all still come to pass.

  Sonia looked quickly around the room one last time. “C’mon girl. Let’s go!” Then over her shoulder, she shouted. “No gas here! No gas here! Wrong house, sorry. Next house. Sorry!” With that, she pushed Jet backward out of the apartment, grabbed her hand, and pulled her out of the house, onto the wet, cold porch.

  Sonia kept pulling, but Jet resisted. She stood on the porch, tears running down her face. It broke Sonia’s heart, but she had no words. Sonia could hear things coming to life in the apartment, the bimbo yelling, “Call the police, damn it! Call the damn police!”

  Sonia spoke again, less urgent, but with authority. “We’ve got to go, girl. C’mon. Take my hand. Let’s get out of here.” Finally, with one more tug, Sonia felt Jet begin to follow. They walked quickly back to the office, Sonia feeling uncomfortable that they were still wearing their “gas company” shirts. Neither said a word.

  Climbing those slick stairs was not easy, but with each step, Sonia felt like they were putting some space between them and a terrible, terrible, experience. Sonia grasped the wet, cold, door knob. Up here, no one will find the two gas company imposters. Up here no policeman will find the two PIs who stepped over the line. She looked at the hurt that was still etched on Jet’s face. And up here no one else has to know how much you hurt. No one─unless you want them to know.

  Together, they walked back into Jet’s office. Sonia reached up and touched Jet gently on the cheek, “Can I make us some coffee, sweets?”

  Jet plopped down in her chair. Her hair was damp, her face drawn. She spoke softly. “Not unless you spell coffee b-o-u-r-b-o-n. And use the water tumbler, this is no time for a rocks glass.”

  “Sure, sure.” Sonia found two semi-clean glasses in Jet’s armoire. She thought about the bottle of Angel’s Envy bourbon she kept in her own desk drawer.

  Sonia wiped out the glasses as Jet spoke to the floor. “And listen, I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

  Sonia held up a glass to the light. “No, no, you’re okay. It’s okay.” She turned to face Jet.

  Jet looked at Sonia. “I lost it, I freakin’ lost it, didn’t I?”

  Sonia didn’t say a word. But her eyes spoke of understanding and acceptance.

  Tears started flowing down Jet’s cheeks again. “I just got so crazy. It’s just that . . . I guess it’s just that I never really came to grips with what that bastard did to me. It hurt.”

  Sonia moved close to Jet and handed her an empty glass. Then she reached over and stroked Jet’s hair tenderly as Jet opened her heart. “He hurt me, really hurt me. I was so damn embarrassed. I was mortified. My husband was cheating on me in the van we bought so we could have kids, and I never knew it.” She looked up. “How could I have been so stupid, Sonia? How could I have been so clueless?”

  Finally, standing close to her, Sonia pulled Jet’s head close to her body. “Shhhh. It just happens. It wasn’t your fault.”

  Jet spoke into Sonia’s torso. “I know. I know, but still . . .”

  Sonia turned Jet’s face upward toward her own. “Still, nothing. It was him. He did it. You did nothing wrong. He did it. And you dealt with it. Good for you. You dealt with it and you’ve moved on.”

  It was Jet’s turn to say nothing. She just buried her head back into Sonia’s torso.

  The dark emptiness of the BCI waiting area created a stark contrast to the warmth and light of the friendship that Sonia felt in Jet’s office. She continued. “And sure, it’s going to come back and bite you in the butt every once in a while, but you’re past it. You’ve started a new life and you’re past it. And I’m thrilled to be part of that new life. I’m thrilled to be your partner and your friend.”

  Jet took Sonia’s hand in hers and squeezed it. She looked up. “You’re the best, Sonia.” Then she wiped the tears away from her face with the back of one hand. “Now, where the hell’s that bourbon. You going to hold out on me all night, or what?”

  Sonia squeezed back, then turned and walked toward her own office. “I keep the good stuff in the bottom drawer of my desk,” she said over her shoulder, “just like all those crusty old PIs on TV. Rocks?”

  “Rocks. I plan on drinking more than I can handle without a little bit of ice melting in there. I’ve got a lot of crap I need to wash away, and tonight’s as good a night as any to get started.”

  Part V

  31

  Sonia’s Friday had started early, too early by her standards. She’d been at the office by seven-thirty in order to have a short meeting with Teresa Torres. As early in the morning as it was, Teresa had arrived with her large, well-endowed body covered in a loose-fitting, black, yellow, and red dress. Her dark, wavy hair had hung on her shoulders, sometimes obscuring the long, dangling, red-enameled earrings she wore. There had been no missing the bright red lipstick that had highlighted her broad face.

  Just as Brad had coached her, Sonia had told Teresa that after two weeks of surveillance, she had no reason to believe that Marcos Torres was having any kind of extra relations with other women. “In fact,” she’d said to Teresa, “it’s common for stable hands to use a product called Mane and Tail on the animals, and that product can often smell like a woman’s fragrance.”

  Sonia had thought she would be okay with the lie. She knew it was essential to keep Teresa from snooping around the farm─for her own sake if nothing else. She’d also made up some story about having been able to blend several jobs together, allowing her to charge Teresa less than their original agreement had called for.

  All of Sonia’s rationalizations had flown out the window when Teresa had stood up and started gyrating, doing a happy dance. “My man’s okay, my man’s okay, the boy’s been keepin’ it in his pants. Mi viejo se porta
bien!” she’d sung, dancing herself all over Sonia’s office. Then Teresa had turned back to Sonia and said, “Tonight I’m gonna make the boy the most wonderful dinner. I’ll call him today, and whatever he wants, that’s what I’m gonna make for him. Then after dinner, vamos a hacerlo hasta que no padamos más!”

  Sonia’s face had been one big question mark.

  Teresa had smiled and translated, “We gonna do it ‘til we can’t do it no more! Thank you, thank you, Ms. Vitale. Thank you for your help.”

  Teresa had laid her money down on Sonia’s desk, reached over and half-pulled Sonia across the desk. Leaning in, she’d kissed Sonia on the forehead, leaving a red lipstick impression there, along with the strong fragrance of her perfume. Then Teresa had turned and headed for the door. As she went, she’d swung her hips and her arms and sung, “My man’s okay. My man’s okay. The boy’s been keepin’ it in his pants.”

  As the door had banged shut, Sonia had pursed her lips, picked up the cash, and threw it in a small metal box she kept in her desk. The guilt of lying to Teresa while taking her money had made her sick─actually, physically sick. She’d slammed the desk drawer shut and spoken to the space that had just been filled with the celebratory gyrations of a happy Teresa Torres. “Yeah, and when you call him to ask about dinner, I hope he’s not screwing some whore or out delivering drugs.”

  At nine-thirty, Sonia walked up the steps of the white house, through the first door, and into the offices of Semper Fi Investigations.

  Brad looked up from his desk. “Hi.” As she moved toward the desk, he continued, “Come on over here and sit down. I’ve been working on something and I need your help.”

  “What’s that?” She moved to one of the wheat-colored chairs.

  “I’ve been going over and over the communications we intercepted, and some of them still have me baffled. Do you have your phone with you, the one you keep your notes on?”

  “Of course.” She reached into her purse.

  “The more I go over these communications, the more I get the sense that we’re missing a key player, maybe more than one key player.” He picked up a pencil and began tapping it on his desk.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Listen, we believe that Toro is the code name for the person at the top of this chain, right?”

  She nodded. “Right.”

  “And we believe Forty is a code name for Hollings, the person running the operation here in Lexington.”

  “Uh huh.”

  “Well, what if Toro’s not the top of the chain, but rather, only the beginning of the chain?” Brad stood up and started pacing around the room. “There are just so many different communications flying around in that system. I still don’t have it all clear in my mind.” Brad paused and looked directly at Sonia. “Could you write some sort of computer program that would help us sort some of these things out?”

  “What kind of program?” A tiny quiver ran through her body. She knew her way around computers, but . . . .

  “Something that might lock into the few actual times and dates that we know for sure certain things happened. Knowledge we’ve gained from your prior surveillance.”

  “I don’t know, maybe. Maybe if I set up a few benchmark points in a database and —”

  “Hold on, hold on. Something’s going down. Look.” Brad was pointing to the computer monitor on the far table, the one that was receiving the feed from the cameras surveilling Dahlia Farm. He walked closer to the table. “There it is, our favorite feed and hay truck.” He turned to Sonia and smiled. “Looks like we’re on babe. Grab your stuff. Time to roll!”

  Sonia sat still for just a moment. Her heart jumped. Her brain raced. Here it was, the plan they had been talking about was suddenly exploding into reality. She and Brad were about to take off, following pickup trucks loaded with drugs─drugs that would be delivered to places unknown.

  “SONIA!” Brad shouted. “Now! It’s on now! We’ve got to roll! Go! Go! Go!”

  Sonia and Brad both knew that they only had about thirty minutes to get out to the castle and wait for the first pickup truck to roll by. They had each gone in their own car since Brad had explained to Sonia that a long-term surveillance like this demanded at least two different chase vehicles. He had also given Sonia a walkie-talkie so they could stay in constant contact without messing with their cell phones.

  As they were nearing the castle, Sonia pressed the talk button on her walkie-talkie. “Where are you? I don’t see your Corvette anywhere.”

  “Listen, little lady. If you’re going to do visual surveillance and don’t want to be seen in the first two minutes, you don’t do it in a brand-new Corvette. I’m driving a gray three-year-old Toyota Corolla, the most nondescript vehicle on the road. America’s most popular car. Reliable, and no one ever notices them.”

  “Oh.” She pursed her lips. Damn. I should’ve realized that.

  By ten o’clock the two cars, Sonia’s Subaru and Brad’s Corolla, were waiting, parked on opposite sides of the turn onto Pisgah Pike. That way they knew they would be covered, whichever direction the pickup took. First, the feed and hay truck rolled by. That was something they would deal with on another day. Then, as they had guessed, the first pickup, the bright green one, came to the castle and turned left. It headed toward the roads that would lead to the interstate. Sonia’s car was facing that direction, so she was the first one to pick up the tail. She knew Brad would wait a few moments, then make a U-turn and begin following more than a half-mile behind.

  The green pickup led them to the circle around the city, and then up to Interstate 75. It headed south, just as it had the previous week. After all three vehicles had turned onto to the highway, Brad used the walkie-talkie. “Time for you to drop back. I’ve got it for a while.”

  Following the pickup had been a bit nerve-racking for Sonia. The last time she had followed this truck, she had been curious as to what the heck was going on at Dahlia Farm. This time she knew she was dealing with hardened drug dealers─people who most probably had murdered John Abbott Hensley. The opportunity to drop back and let Brad take the lead for a while gave her a small sense of relief. For the first time in nearly twenty-five minutes, she took a deep breath.

  The green pickup traveled south for another half hour or so. Every ten or twelve minutes Brad and Sonia would reverse positions, one dropping back, the other moving closer to the pickup. Between them, they kept the pickup in sight. Just before eleven o’clock, the pickup left the interstate and headed into Richmond, Kentucky, the home of Eastern Kentucky University. “No surprise here,” said Brad. “College town. Got to be at least a few customers for that stuff.”

  “How sad.”

  As they came off the interstate, it was Brad who was behind the pickup. Soon, however, his voice came to Sonia over the walkie-talkie. “Your turn girl. Get up behind this guy. You can stay pretty close since you’ll both be in traffic. If he turns, though, you go straight and I’ll follow him on the turn. But then get behind us quickly, because if he turns again I might have to pass him and go straight myself.”

  Sonia’s heart was pounding as she slipped in, only two cars behind the pickup. Fortunately, it wasn’t long before it pulled into a strip mall parking lot. The storefront at the corner housed a low-end movie rental joint. The pickup slowed, then drove around to the back of the building, pulling up to the rear door of the movie store. Since there was lots of room in the parking lot, Sonia was able to park quite a distance away and keep her eyes on the truck. “He’s pulled up behind some movie place.”

  “Just stay back and keep a low profile. Let’s see how long he stays.”

  Sonia was quite certain this would be a quick drop-off since she assumed the driver of the pickup had several other stops to make. To her surprise, the driver stayed inside for almost forty minutes.

  Sonia pressed the “TALK” button on the walkie-talkie. “What’s taking him so long?”

  “Listen, these guys are not necessarily striving for,
“Employee of the Month,” awards. Our pal in the pickup might just be spending a few moments sharing in the pleasures of the product he’s delivering, or at least in some other kind of dope these guys have on hand.”

  Finally, Sonia saw the driver coming out. “I think you may be right, he’s got quite a grin going. Looks more like he visited with old friends than like he made a delivery.”

  “Par for the course sometimes. Now heads up. I assume he’s headed back to the interstate. I’ll follow him there. You lay back a couple of cars. But if he gets on, I’ll keep going and you pick him up. You’ll have plenty of time to catch up before he has a chance to get off at his next stop.”

  Sonia watched the pickup pull out of the parking lot and the Corolla follow. It wasn’t long before she saw the pickup take the ramp down to I-75 South. Brad continued past the interstate as if he had nothing to do whatsoever with the pickup. Sonia, on the other hand, cruised down to the highway and slowly but surely kept her speed just a little bit faster than she imagined the pickup was travelling. Within a few minutes, Sonia was about a half-mile behind the green truck and had a clear view of it on the straightaways. About ten minutes later, Brad cruised by, smiling at her as he passed. Sonia backed off for a while.

  The game of leapfrog continued for another twenty minutes or so until the pickup left the interstate near the small town of Berea. Again, the town was home to a college community. This time it was Brad who followed the pickup from the interstate to his drop-off point and Sonia who picked him up as he worked his way back to the highway.