Adrienne sashayed over to the kitchen table in her stocking feet. She tasted the quiche. “Wow, is this ever good. I’ll go take this off so I can dig in. Be right back.”
Jonelle and Sheila were on their third cup of coffee by the time Adrienne returned.
“I’m going to call Detective Tankersley and set up an appointment to see him about the report on Del,” Jonelle said as Adrienne sat down. “I’m sure there’s more to this than what’s in the official police version.”
“Good, now you’re making sense,” Adrienne said between bites. “Get the cops involved.”
“No, not involved. I’m just going to ask him a few questions.”
Adrienne leaned her elbows on the table and looked at Jonelle. “So, what do you want me to do?”
Jonelle was having second thoughts about getting her friend involved. It was one thing for her to risk danger but quite another to knowingly put her best friend in jeopardy of who knew what. Still, she knew Adrienne would keep hounding her if she didn’t give her something to do.
“Manross let it slip that no one was expected to visit the graves, and the only reasons I can think of are that he expected the deceased to either not have relatives or there were no relatives in the area who would visit. I remember when I looked for Del’s grave there was a marker with the name ‘Dalton Street’ near where Del was supposed to be. It’s possible they meant to dig up this Street guy and dug up Del by mistake.”
“So you don’t think his body being stolen has anything to do with this prostitution business?” Sheila asked.
Jonelle shrugged. “I don’t know what to think at this point, except I need to find out everything I can.” Jonelle turned toward Adrienne. “That’s why I’d like you to go to the cemetery and pretend to be Dalton Street’s sister or cousin. Make inquiries about the cost of moving his body to, oh, I don’t know, Pennsylvania or somewhere. To be closer to his family.”
“Was this Dalton Street a black guy?” Adrienne asked. “’Cause if he ain’t, I got some ‘splainin’ to do.”
“Damn. Don’t know. It’s possible they don’t know, either. I mean, gravediggers don’t look at the body—they just put the casket in the ground. Anyway, you’re good at thinking on your feet. Make something up. See where it takes you. Just be sure you talk only to Manross, not the Mexican guy and definitely not the preacher.”
The conversation around the table stopped while Adrienne mulled over what she would do. Looking at Jonelle, she said, “Give me some kind of idea what questions you want me to ask.”
“Pretend you need his help finding the grave. I want to know if Manross appears nervous that someone’s actually asking to see it. See if he seems especially interested in whether or not there are more relatives in the area. That sort of thing. Just keep him talking as long as you can. Since he hasn’t seen you before, he might disclose something without meaning to.”
Jonelle studied her friend as Adrienne finished the quiche. “The only thing I’d like to request is, well, could you wear something a little less, uh, obvious and memorable?”
“You want me to wear a disguise. Is that it?”
Sheila watched the exchange between them with a wide smile on her face.
“If you wanna call dressing like the rest of the population wearing a disguise, then, yeah, pretend you’re like me.”
Adrienne sniffed. “I don’t think I own any clothes like yours, but I guess I can find some from somewhere.” Muttering under her breath, she added, “Goodwill, maybe.”
“I heard that.”
“Ladies, ladies.” Sheila laughed. “I gotta kick you two out. I need to start getting ready. Jonnie, I’ll stop by for that address on my way to work and let you know what, if anything, I find out about Del’s other activities.”
“And I gotta call someone to take me to my car,” Adrienne said.
“Where’s your car?” Sheila asked.
“At the track. Jonelle wasn’t in any shape to drive, so I brought her home.”
“I’m leaving here in about an hour. If you want, I can drive you. My first client is only about five minutes from there.”
Adrienne nodded happily. “That’d be super. Uh, Sheila, you make home visits?”
“Not very often. Usually I meet them at the office. It’s got all of my work supplies there. But my first client’s wife is out of town, and he’s got this re-modeled room he keeps locked so she can’t go snooping around. The other client is divorced and has this specially equipped basement. Well, I don’t think I need to go into any more details.”
Adrienne got up and placed her plate and coffee cup in the sink. “If I can ever return the favor, let me know.”
Jonelle gathered up hers and Sheila’s plates.
“I got those,” Adrienne said. “I’m going to start working on repaying that favor by cleaning up.”
“Leave those,” Sheila said. “I’ll take care of it.”
Adrienne grabbed a sponge. “At least let me load the dishwasher.”
“That’ll be fine,” Sheila said.
Jonelle stood next to Adrienne at the sink, taking the scrubbed plates and arranging them in the dishwasher.
Afterwards, Adrienne grabbed a damp cloth and wiped the kitchen table. “So when are you gonna tell Marvin what happened?”
“Right after I go to the shooting range,” Jonelle responded. Her eyes hardened. “Now, more than ever, I gotta make sure I stay sharp.”
CHAPTER 17
A shadowy figure chased her down a deserted alley, illuminated only by the full moon high above. Tall dark shapes loomed on both sides. Common sense told her not to get trapped at the end. At the end was no way out. There! An opening to the right. She turned and ran down a path between two buildings and out onto the street. She quickly glanced over her shoulder. The figure was getting closer—she could hear his feet slapping against the pavement. Her chest tightened with the exertion, and she knew she couldn’t outrun the stranger much longer.
Her feet pounded down the middle of the street. She searched frantically, eyes darting left and right. The houses on both sides were dark. Should she run up to one and pound on the door anyway? Over there! Pale light in the window of a small white frame house. She ran up the steps and hit the doorbell. She could hear the buzzing inside. The shadow was getting closer! Hurry! Open the door! She leaned on the doorbell. The buzzing continued.
Jonelle sat up, heart thumping, body drenched with sweat. She glanced at the alarm clock on the night stand, hit the button to stop the persistent buzzing noise, and concentrated on quieting the hammering in her chest. Jonelle tried to recall the dream. Who was the shadow chasing her? Manross?
She shoved the dream to the back of her mind, threw the covers off, and padded to the bathroom. Jonelle squinted at her reflection in the mirror. With her headache reduced to a dull throbbing, she gingerly touched the wound. Carefully, she removed the bandage.
The cut was starting to close. A vivid red mark developed underneath the hairline. “Hmm.” She fingered the wound. “Doesn’t look so bad.”
After washing two aspirin down with water, Jonelle hopped into the shower and hurriedly scrubbed herself clean.
Shower over, she toweled off quickly and pulled on a cotton top and jeans. Rushing to the aquarium to feed the fish, she noticed a few white spots on one of the black molly’s body and fins.
“Shit,” she said. “Don’t have time for this now, guys.” Jonelle pinched out some food and made a mental note to call the pet store.
Jonelle hurried to the kitchen, gulped down orange juice, swiped a doughnut from the cupboard—gotta get rid of these—and headed out the door.
***
The “Open” sign greeted Jonelle as she arrived at the Sure Shot indoor shooting range. Looking around, she noticed only two other cars in the gallery’s parking lot.
In another hour the lanes would fill with off-duty police officers, gun club members, and what Jonelle called the “mom and pop” shooters—civilians who
just wanted to practice unloading a few rounds.
She removed the gun case from the back of the Jeep, entered the facility and nodded to the clerk behind the counter.
“Hiya Pete. What’s shakin’?”
“It’s the same ol’, same ol’. Knees’re still crackin’, wife’s still bitchin’, and I’m overworked and underpaid. Been a while since I seen you, Jonnie. How’s it goin’ with you?”
Jonelle grinned at the middle-aged man straightening the practice firearms in the display case. Nearly as wide as he was tall and wearing the same curly red toupe since she first met him ten years ago, the two exchanged the same familiar banter every time she visited the shooting range.
“It’s going just fine, Pete,” she replied. “Got enough buttons there?” She pointed at him.
A multitude of NRA buttons adorned Pete’s green smock.
“Election year’s coming. Gotta make sure the message gets out,” he said.
To each his own. Jonelle didn’t want to engage him in an argument over disparate political beliefs. Pete and the other members of the shooting range staff were friends, and she went there only to shoot, not to debate.
“Are you okay?” Pete peered closely at Jonelle’s face. He pointed to her head. “Looks like you got kind of a nasty bruise there. Whaddya do, beat up on some bad guys and they got in a few licks?”
If you only knew.
Aloud, Jonelle replied, “Naw. Clumsy old me just bumped into the edge of a wall. Nothin’ serious.” She groaned inwardly at the lameness of the excuse.
Jonelle set her gun case down and walked over to the racks on the wall behind the counter. She shuffled through the paper targets. Foregoing the standard bull’s-eye, Jonelle selected four of the human outline forms. Placing them on the counter, she noticed moisture where her fingers touched the sheets. Jonelle pretended to search her pockets as she rubbed her damp hands against her pants.
Pete raised an eyebrow as Jonelle paid him for the targets and a box of ammunition.
“Goin’ for a different kinda target today, huh?”
Jonelle nodded. “Yep.”
Pete waited for her to say more, but when nothing else was forthcoming, he smoothed down the sides of his toupe and added, “Well, then, good shooting.” He handed her the protective “eyes” and “ears.”
“Thanks.”
Jonelle adjusted the plastic goggles and made sure the ear protectors fit snuggly against her head. She entered the shooting range and found her lane.
The sporadic crack of a smaller caliber firearm was interspersed with the sudden boom of a larger weapon. The smell of gunpowder mixed with the acrid smell of smoke lingered in the air. The odor seeped through her nostrils and settled in the back of her throat.
Jonelle stood at the bench and tried to clear her mind of the previous day’s events. She looked down at her hands. Moist hands meant nervous hands. Past experience taught her that concentrating only on shooting while pushing everything else from her mind was the difference between landing the shots precisely or not landing them at all.
Oddly, being enclosed in the lane did not trigger a claustrophobic reaction. Instead, Jonelle felt at peace. She put her weapon and ammunition on the bench in front of her and inserted each bullet into the cartridge. She snapped the loaded magazine into the pistol. It felt right cradling the smooth, cool metal of the weapon in her hands.
Jonelle took her stance—legs spread shoulder length apart, right leg slightly back. Shoulders relaxed, she breathed in and out slowly, rhythmically, eyes focused on the front site and aligning it with the back. Settling on her target, Jonelle imagined Manross’ face above the outline of the target’s shoulders.
Jonelle closed her eyes to get rid of the image. Am I really ready for this? Opening her eyes again, she held her breath and squeezed the trigger once, twice. She could tell even without looking that her shots didn’t land in the right spot on the target.
I’m seeing this through with Manross, no matter where it leads. If he wants to play hardball, I’ll be ready, she thought.
Emboldened, Jonelle set herself up once more. She squeezed the trigger continuously until the magazine was empty. Pulling the target forward, she smiled. At least three shots had landed squarely in the heart.
Jonelle hooked a clean target onto the clip. The motor whirred as the target slid back into position.
With her pace established and her comfort zone confirmed, Jonelle nodded to herself with satisfaction, reloaded, and fired again.
CHAPTER 18
Reveling in the new sense of confidence from her experience at the shooting range, Jonelle strode to the assigned meeting place and spotted him from a short distance away. He wore a sports coat in spite of the warm morning and slouched on a slatted bench in front of the elephant house. A brown paper bag and two Styrofoam cups were next to him.
“Hi, Detective. I’m a little surprised you wanted to meet here instead of at the police station,” Jonelle said, smiling down at a head of thick, gray hair.
Gordon Tankersley turned and looked up at her. “Have a sit down,” he said, patting the seat. “I hate Mondays. Places like this help me prepare for whatever lousy things human beings have in store for one another.”
Jonelle sat, and Tankersley handed her one of the cups. “There’s cream and sugar in the bag, if you want. I also got us a coupla blueberry muffins.”
He reached in the bag, took out a tissue-wrapped pastry, and handed it to her.
“Thanks,” Jonelle said, putting the muffin in her lap and pouring two creams in her coffee.
Tankersley nodded. “Cheers.”
“Clink.” Jonelle touched her coffee cup to his.
“Ever wonder who came up with the idea of putting men and women in cages?” Tankersley asked, gazing at two elephants munching on scattered piles of hay.
“Uh, no, not really.” Jonelle studied him closely. She noticed again how attractive he was in an academic sort of way.
“Pretty sure it was the English,” he said. “They’ve had centuries of practice. But before it became the standard to incarcerate the bad guys, way back in the Middle Ages, if people were seen committing a crime, the men of the village would raise a verbal alarm and give chase. Once caught, they either hanged them or cut off the offending part, or at the very least whipped them or made them pay a fine.”
Tankersley took another bite of muffin. “Bet it saved a whole lot of time and expense,” he said, staring at the elephants.
Jonelle drank more coffee and listened to the birds twittering somewhere off in the distance. She wondered if Marvin’s old friend was just a few eggs shy of a dozen.
“Nowadays, of course, the idea is to reform rather than punish,” he continued, sipping more coffee. “Considering how crowded the jails are, don’t think it’s workin’, do you?”
Not waiting for her to answer, Tankersley leaned forward and rested his elbows on his knees. “I find the zoo a relaxing place,” he said, changing the subject, “and I always try to find a bench upwind.”
“Listen, Detective. If you’d rather I see you about Del some other time, I could… ”
“No, no. Just an old man’s ramblings.” He leveled pale blue eyes on Jonelle. “I told Marvin I’d fill you in as best I could, and I intend to keep my word. But the investigation is still ongoing, so I’m not at liberty to divulge everything, okay?”
Jonelle nodded. A piece of muffin stuck in her throat. She washed it down with coffee.
Tankersley leaned back, long legs stretched out and crossed at the ankles. “The report I gave Marvin was strictly bare bones.” He took another sip from his cup.
“A hotel manager noticed an elderly gentleman and a very nervous kid in the lobby of the hotel at Fourteenth and K Street Northwest in the District. Guy said the two didn’t look like they were related. He confided to the patrol officer that something seemed off about the two. It was obviously the kid’s first time, ’cause the beat cop said when he confronted him, he shook like a
leaf. Anyway, the kid admitted to being sixteen and a runaway from Pennsylvania, so the officer brought him and the old guy in. The kid gave a current address in Maryland, and that’s the one in the report. That part you read about, right?” Tankersley finished his muffin in three bites.
“Yes.” Jonelle swallowed. “And I understand that because of what the kid said, you staked out the house where he was staying and noticed Del and a few others going in and out. Plus some other teenagers. Is that right?”
Before answering, Tankersley stretched his arms above his head. He sighed deeply, then gathered up the trash and placed everything in the bag.
“Yep, the youngest had just turned fifteen.”
Jonelle’s stomach turned. Crossing her arms tightly in front of her chest, she shook her head over and over. “That’s just great,” she said, her voice cracking.
The elephants in the pen moved around listlessly from one pile of food to another. Not one animal paid any attention to the few humans staring at them.
“Let’s move around,” Tankersley said, tapping Jonelle lightly on the arm. “I’m starting to stiffen up.” He got up, went over to a waste bin, and deposited the bag.
Jonelle pulled herself up and fell in step beside him. “Tell me about the stakeout. There’s no doubt it was Del going in and out of that house?”
“None,” the detective responded, “even though he never stayed overnight.” Tankersley cleared his throat. “But I guess you already knew that. Usually he’d arrive sometime around seven or eight in the evening and only stay a few hours. A coupla times Vice followed him home.” He glanced at Jonelle.
She stared straight ahead. “I guess my biggest problem with this whole mess is that I had no clue,” she said, her voice tight. “How long were you watching him?”
“We were going into the third week of surveillance. We took hours of videotape of the prostitutes and their johns going in and out of that house. Never together, of course. After your husband’s accident, we decided that since one of the main players was no longer in commission, it was time to go in before they closed up shop and moved somewhere else.”
Burial Plot (A Jonelle Sweet Mystery Book 1) Page 11
