As they slid out of their booth, the third man said, “Nah, it’s that damn Al Gore.”
A bus girl cleaned their table so a man and woman could take their place. Judy came with her coffeepot and took their order. The man asked for key lime pie.
The woman said, “Does the lime pie have milk in it? I’m lactose intolerant.”
Judy said, “It has condensed milk.”
The woman scowled as if the milk were Judy’s fault. “I’ve never been so hot in my entire life, and I was looking forward to key lime pie.”
Judy said, “We have some nice apple pie.”
“But apple pie needs cheese or ice cream with it, and I’m lactose intolerant. I don’t want real coffee either. I’ll just have some decaf.”
“Do you take cream?”
“Yes, please.”
Judy swiveled to pour more coffee in my mug. Under her breath, she muttered, “It’s not the heat, it’s the stupidity.”
I tackled my eggs and fries with more speed. If I had to listen to any more dumb talk, I might cram it all in my mouth at one time and choke myself to death.
On the way home, I stopped at a red light and watched a skinny man I thought might be Paco in disguise. He was pushing a beat-up old bicycle across the street. He wore faded jeans and an oversized green plaid shirt buttoned to the neck. His sleeves were buttoned at the wrist, and he wore a dirty bandanna tied over dusty, gray-streaked long hair. He felt my gaze and turned and looked vacantly at me. It wasn’t Paco, it was just a burned-out old stoner pushing his bike across the street.
When I got home, Paco’s Harley was still gone, and Michael was on the deck bent over the table with his back to me. Ella was harnessed and watching from a chaise. From the way she was sitting it looked as if she was gathered to jump and run at a moment’s notice.
I went over to see what Michael was doing. A seagull stood on the table. The gull had a string of seaweed attached to his foot and Michael was gently untangling it. As if he knew he’d come to no harm from Michael, the gull stood quietly until his foot was free. Then he lifted from the table with a quick flutter of wings and flew straight toward the sea.
I said, “What are you, a gull whisperer?”
He grinned. “I have the touch, little sister.”
His smile didn’t reach his eyes or erase the strain around his mouth. Paco had left before midnight, and he wasn’t home yet. Neither of us would mention it, but Michael and I both knew how dangerous Paco’s undercover work was.
I said, “I’ll bet you’re famous in the seabird world. They probably get together and talk about the big guy that gives them choice fish heads.”
He shrugged. “We all take fame where we find it.”
I winced, because my fame was mostly from going nuts while cameras rolled. That, and killing a man.
Without really intending to, I said, “Michael, do you suppose Mom is still drinking?”
Old bitterness made his voice sharp. “Why’re you thinking about her?”
I’d obviously touched a nerve. Michael had been the one who’d had to grow up too fast so our mother could stay a child. If I told him how Jaz’s hunger had made me remember how he’d taken over the job of protecting me because our mother couldn’t be depended on, I’d have to tell him about the young thugs who had come in Big Bubba’s house. He was worried enough about Paco, I didn’t want to give him something else to worry about. So I went in another direction.
“You remember Maureen Rhinegold? My best friend in high school?”
“Tall, hot bod, big curly hair, big boobs?”
“Yeah, her. She came to see me last night. I guess that made me start thinking about Mom. Maureen’s dad was an alcoholic too.”
Michael studied me for a moment. “I heard her when she came.”
I looked toward the sea where the rescued gull was now indistinguishable from all the others. “I guess you heard her yelling at the door.”
He nodded. “Woke me up. I came outside to see if anything was wrong, but you’d let her in so I figured it was okay.”
More than likely Michael had already been awake worrying about whatever undercover job Paco was doing.
I said, “She was upset. Wanted somebody to talk to.”
He stayed poker-faced, which told me he knew there was something I didn’t want him to know.
He said, “I didn’t know you two saw each other anymore.”
I shifted uneasily. “We don’t, but we were close once. Some friendships just stay close no matter what.”
He didn’t seem impressed. In fact, he looked a bit annoyed.
He said, “I remember Maureen Rhinegold better than you think I do. She’s the flake who got you to write all her term papers. She’s the one who gave you weed to smoke. She’s the one who dumped Harry Henry when some old guy waved money at her. I never could see why you put up with her.”
I smiled and patted his big shoulder. Bless his heart, he still thought Maureen had been the one who’d got the weed he’d caught us smoking. Besides, while it was true that I’d written Maureen’s papers, she’d helped me too. Once she’d spent hours helping me build a diorama for a history class. Even used her favorite purple nail polish to paint a roof on a teensy building.
I said, “Considering the way Harry Henry turned out, it was probably smart of her to dump him.”
As soon as I said it, I felt guilty. In actual fact, I liked Harry. And it wasn’t like he’d turned to crime or anything, he’d just become a genial beach bum.
Michael said, “She’s still a bad influence, Dixie.”
I couldn’t keep from laughing. He sounded exactly the way he’d sounded when he was seventeen and I was fifteen, and he’d told me he’d kick my butt clear to Cuba if I ever smoked pot again.
I said, “Michael, I’m a big girl now, and nobody influences me. I think for myself.”
Boy, was that a bunch of crap! I could almost hear the echo of my own voice promising Maureen I’d go with her to deliver Victor’s ransom money.
Michael walked to the chaise and picked Ella up. He’d apparently decided not to press the subject, which should have made me glad but actually made me a bit nervous. Maybe if he pressed me, I could use him as an excuse to tell Maureen I’d changed my mind.
He said, “Want a brownie? I just made some.”
“No thanks, I just had breakfast. I didn’t get much sleep last night, so I’m on my way to bed.”
With Ella’s leash trailing over his shoulder, he gave me a half wave and went inside his house. I headed for my stairs and a nap. Maybe the world wouldn’t look so uncertain when I woke up.
For some reason, my apartment seemed too quiet, as if it were anxiously holding its breath. In my bedroom, I flipped the switch to start the AC on the wall, and started toward the bathroom. But in the hall I hesitated at the narrow linen closet and opened the door. My linen closet is neat and spare, narrow stacks of a few sheets and blankets, some spare towels for guests in case I should ever have any. On the top shelf, a pillowcase holding the furry red Elmo that Christy loved so much, and an elegant round hatbox that once belonged to my grandmother.
Almost furtively, I reached overhead and got the hatbox and carried it to my bed. As soon as I opened it, I was nine years old and secretly watching my mother on the day before she left us. Quiet as death, I stood outside her nearly closed door while she carefully lifted out the contents of the hatbox. She laid them in a precise row along the edge of the bed. She seemed intent on getting them exactly a certain distance from the edge, occasionally adjusting one, moving it higher or lower until she had them the way she wanted them. Then she went still and looked at them for a long time, finally caressing each one as if it were a loved one’s cheek. From my spying place, I held my breath. I didn’t move. If I moved, my mother might explode into one of her irrational furies. I didn’t know what the objects were, but I knew they were more important to her than I was. After a few minutes, she gathered the objects up and replaced them in the box
. When she got up from the bed to deposit the box on the top closet shelf, I melted away.
My mother left us for good the next day—ran off with a man my brother and I had never even heard of. After I knew she was never coming back, I stood on a chair and got the box from its hiding place. I don’t know what I’d expected, but it wasn’t what I found. Ticket stubs to a Grateful Dead concert she and my dad had gone to in Tampa, the baby bracelets Michael and I had worn in the hospital when we were born, Michael’s first lost tooth Scotch-Taped to a card with the date and time he lost it, and a handprint I’d made for her in kindergarten. There was also a photo of her and my dad when they were high school sweethearts.
I’m not sure why I’ve held on to that box, but every now and then I do exactly what I watched my mother do—lay the things out and caress them. The box is my only inheritance from my mother. It links us in a powerful way that transcends reason.
Putting the box back in its place beside Christy’s Elmo, I peeled off my clothes and threw them in the washer in the hall, then clumped naked into the bathroom and turned on the shower.
While I stood under a hot shower, I thought about how Maureen had looked when she begged me to help her. Her big pleading eyes. Her messy hair with that dangling barrette with the red plastic flower.
I imagined myself calling Maureen. I imagined myself saying, “You’re going to have to do this without me.” Then I imagined her saying, “If it were your husband, I’d help you.”
While I brushed my teeth I imagined calling her and asking, “Are we still on for tonight?” I imagined her saying, “We don’t have to! Victor’s here with me! The kidnappers drove him home and we just handed them the million.”
Yeah, right. Like kidnappers delivered COD.
I pulled on a terry cloth robe and fell into bed with a dark cloud hovering over me. From a distant place in my head, a voice sang:
The one with the scarlet flowers in her hair
She’s got the police comin’ after me
11
After a long nap, I dressed and pulled my narrow bed away from the wall to get at the customized drawer built into its dark side—the one that holds my guns in their special cushioned niches. Every law enforcement agency in the country issues standard weapons to its officers, the standard depending on the city or county’s choice. Sarasota police are issued 9mm Glocks, while the Sarasota Sheriff’s Department prefers SIG SAUERS. Regardless of the weapon issued, law enforcement officers also qualify for several off-duty guns at their department ranges. Using a gun for which you haven’t qualified means big trouble, so sworn officers usually qualify for several models even if they mostly stick to one favorite.
After Todd was killed and I went on indefinite leave of absence, I returned our SIG SAUERS to the department, but I still had our personal guns. I was qualified on all of them, and I had a concealed weapon permit making it legal to carry any one of them.
Some states are picky about guns, but Florida, bless its heart, takes the position that people need to compensate for something, even if it’s just their own frightening imagination. The state therefore offers the right to tote a pistol to anybody with the guts to stare down howling hurricanes, venomous snakes, rapacious developers, and squirrelly election officials.
Actually, guns and responsible ownership of guns have always been part of my life. When my grandparents first came to Siesta Key, rattlesnakes outnumbered humans, and some of the humans were unsavory types one step ahead of bounty hunters. A rifle was a handy thing to have around for protection against all those varmints, and my grandfather would have thought it ludicrous for anybody to question his right to own one. On the other hand, he would think it equally ludicrous for civilians to claim they needed machine guns or assault weapons for personal protection.
When Michael and I were little, our grandfather would take us out to the country and let us shoot tin cans off fence posts. He’d preach that guns were dangerous weapons not to be left loaded or lying around. On the way home he’d make us giggle with the old Jimmie Rodgers song our grandmother wouldn’t let him sing in her presence: “If you don’t want to smell my smoke, don’t monkey with my gun.”
I was always a better shot than Michael because he was too physical to enjoy the precision that shooting requires. Good shooters are precise people, like clockmakers or safecrackers. Either because of my grandfather’s training or Jimmie Rodgers’s blue yodel or some genetic trait, I was one of the best shooters the police academy has ever had. Michael, on the other hand, doesn’t own a gun and thinks armed civilians are ridiculous Clint Eastwood wannabes. I sort of agree with him, except that now I’m also a civilian with a permit to carry a concealed weapon.
My preferred gun is one of my former off-duty guns, a snub-nosed, five-shot, J-frame .38 caliber. It has a stainless steel two-inch barrel and cylinder, and an aluminum alloy frame with an exposed hammer. Its checkered black rubber boot grip is easy to handle and it fits well in my hand. No safety to worry about, no decocking levers to slow me down, no magazines to fail. Only thirteen ounces, it’s a sweet, simple, dependable gun.
I doubt that I’ll ever go back to being a law enforcement officer, and I have no fear of hordes of murderous aliens—either from outer space or other countries—coming to hurt me. But good shooters like to remain good shooters, and my lightweight .38 has a wicked recoil that can ruin my aim if I get sloppy about practicing. I therefore spend some time every week at the handgun shooting range. They all know me there, and the young man who led me to a vacant booth didn’t bother to tell me the rules. He just put up the paper target and left me alone.
If I’m honest with myself, I have to admit I don’t practice just to stay a good shot. There’s also something about putting on the eye and ear protectors, spreading my feet, and aiming at a fresh piece of paper with a bull’s-eye painted on it that gives me a feeling of kick-ass Wonder Woman power. I might get the same feeling if I just put on the Wonder Woman costume, but I don’t think so.
I shot with the pistol held in two hands and then in one, and when I was satisfied that I was still a good shot, I loaded everything up and left the range still feeling like Wonder Woman. I remained Wonder Woman until I remembered that I’d just practiced the art of killing another human being. Because let’s get real, that bull’s-eye target stands for a human heart, and every shooter knows that.
Enjoying target practice with a gun is probably the way people feel if they own profitable stock in health insurance companies that routinely deny lifesaving surgery or medication. It’s better not to dwell on the fact that something that gives us so much pleasure is linked to the increased likelihood of another person’s death.
On the way home, I noticed a couple of men I thought might be Paco—a man with a long beard and ponytail leaning against a Pelican Press dispenser, and a teen with a purple mohawk in dark shades, baggy jeans, and a huge shapeless shirt—but it was dumb of me to do that. If Paco’s disguises were the kind I could see through, they wouldn’t be effective, and I knew his were extremely effective.
When I got home, I spent an hour at my desk with client records, then went downstairs to spend time with Michael and Ella. To be strictly honest, I was also drawn by the memory that Michael had made brownies. No matter how grim the world gets, chocolate makes anything more tolerable.
Michael was in his kitchen with several steaming pots on the stove and a look of grim anxiety in the set of his jaw. Ella was perched on her barstool watching him and occasionally licking her lips.
I gave Ella’s furry head a kiss, poured myself a glass of milk from a carton in the fridge, and got myself a brownie. I sat on a barstool beside Ella and watched Michael. Like Ella, I licked my lips every now and then, but in my case it was for the chocolate and milk. I suspected Ella did it from a sublimated urge to lick Michael. She wouldn’t be the first female to want to do that.
He concentrated on his pots and pans, giving one a furious stir, grabbing a smoking cast-iron skillet’s handle and movin
g it back and forth like he was trying to shake sense into it, glaring down into a soup pot’s innards as if he thought it was hiding something. I had the feeling he had forgotten that Ella and I were there.
Meekly, I said, “What’re you cooking?”
His head whipped toward me. “Huh? Oh, just some stuff for the freezer. Corn chowder. Roasted poblano peppers, some shrimp and mushrooms to put in the peppers.”
I said, “Hunh.”
I looked down at Ella, who was looking up at me with a pleading expression. I guess she thought one human should be able to communicate with another human better than a cat could. She didn’t understand how hard human-to-human communication is.
I said, “Have you heard from Paco?”
His shoulders hunched, and he increased the speed of the wooden spoon circling in the soup pot. “He never calls when he’s working.”
I knew better than to ask if he had any idea what the job was, or where it was, or how long it would last. But I also knew that something about this job was unusual. Otherwise, Michael wouldn’t be so closed off.
I said, “Paco’s a good cop. He knows what he’s doing.”
“I know that.”
I got up and rinsed my milk glass and put it in the dishwasher. Threw the paper towel I’d used as a napkin into the trash under the sink. It was time to go out on my afternoon calls. Just before midnight, Maureen would come for me, and I would go with her to her house. Then one of us would make the ransom money drop, and I knew which one of us it would be. Just thinking about it made me stop breathing.
Michael gave me a phony smile when I left and Ella tried for a nonchalant wave of her tail, but we were all putting on an act. I told myself that Paco would be home by nightfall, that the money drop would go off without a hitch, and that Maureen’s husband would be back in the bosom of his family by morning. I told myself that the next day Paco would be resting up from whatever he’d done, I would go off to take care of pets, and Michael would go to the firehouse happily bearing a big container of corn chowder.
Raining Cat Sitters and Dogs Page 8
