Five Minutes

by R. Lanier Clemons

  “Yeah. Silas’ got that effect on women. Too bad he swings the other way.”

  “Why you out here harassing people?” he asked, strolling up to the Jeep. “Ain’t you still hangin’ with Luther?”

  “I am.”

  “So, what you want?” His eyes flitted to and then away from Jonelle.

  “What I’d like,” Jonelle replied, forcing him to focus his attention on her, “is information about an older woman seeking out little kids—say under ten-years-old. She claims she wants to help the family get back on their feet. To do that, she offers to take a few pictures and in return give them money, food, clothes, for the privilege.”

  “I don’t know—”

  “Yes you do,” Riley said. She pointed a finger with the nail bitten down to the quick, at Jonelle. “She ain’t a cop. Not a real one, anyway. Go on. Tell her what she wants to know.”

  “What’s in it for me?” He smiled lop-sidedly and shoved his hands in jeans that hung below his waist.

  “My eternal gratitude,” Riley said with an edge in her voice.

  The young man got the message. “Alls I know is some ole woman’s been hangin’ out at the shelter off MLK Boulevard. It’s one of them small ones that only take women with kids and don’t have much in the way of rules. Always full up, no matter what time ’a year. But you gotta know about it. There ain’t a sign and I don’t have no address.” Instead, he rattled off the streets that ran around the place.

  Riley snorted. “Heard about that one. That ain’t a real shelter. People say it’s run too loosey-goosey. And you gotta pay more to stay there.”

  “I thought mothers with children had better places to go,” Jonelle said.

  “They do. If they’ve been abused or runnin’ away from somebody. But if all you want is a place for you and your kids until you get back on your feet, well, them places are harder to find and even harder to get into,” he said. He smiled again, transforming his face from wary to cunning. No doubt about it, this kid could make big bucks staring out of the pages of a magazine.

  Jonelle considered her options. She wanted to return Riley to the warehouse while she checked out the place to see if anyone knew Maxine and the young child who may be with her. And she intended to do it alone.

  “Thanks, Silas. I’ll see if I can find it.” She reached inside her bag and pulled out a twenty.

  He smiled that dazzling smile again as he shoved the bill in his pocket.

  “You know . . . well, never mind,” she said.

  “You ain’t the first one to think what you’re thinkin’. It won’t work ’cause he likes it on the streets. By the way, I’m comin’ with you,” Riley said, crossing her arms across her chest.

  Silas turned away, chuckling and shaking his head. He’d only gone a few feet when he turned back around. “Hey, lady. Easier to let Riley’s attitude play out. She gets ahold of somethin’, she don’t let go.”

  Neither do I, Jonelle thought.

  They circled two blocks up and down one street and then the other before they found the building. With no sign out front, and no specific address from Silas, the only indication they had the right place was two women trudging up concrete stairs, heavy bags and small children in tow.

  “Excuse me,” Jonelle called. Both women turned. “Is this the shelter?”

  “Who wants to know?” asked the first woman.

  “Lookin’ to help a friend and her little girl,” Riley yelled before Jonelle could answer.

  “Then you come to the right place.” The woman turned, opened the door and slipped inside. The second one followed wordlessly behind.

  “Weird it doesn’t have security,” Jonelle said. She squeezed her Jeep in a space a little too close to a fire hydrant.

  “Ten to one this place ain’t legal. That’s why they don’t advertise.”

  “So where do they get the money?” Jonelle asked.

  “These ladies work. If I had to guess, I figure they must turn over a good bit of what they earn. How you wanna play this?”

  Jonelle considered the three-story row home. The building sat in the middle of the block. Instead of the same light stone as the others, the dark gray façade sported blackened areas from bottom to top. The bowed window on the main level was angled, not rounded. The stone steps led to a bright blue door with a half moon of glass at the top.

  Each rowhome exhibited a green hedge out front of varying heights and amounts of foliage. Every third home featured a shade tree near the street.

  Her eyes drifted to the end of the block. On one corner, the ever present liquor store. Opposite and diagonally across the street stood a vegan restaurant, with a city bus stop out front.

  “Hey. Did you hear me? Can’t stay here all day with you sittin’ here daydreamin’. We goin’ in or what?”

  Jonelle sighed, already regretting her decision to bring Riley along.

  “Too late,” Riley said, as if reading Jonelle’s thoughts. “I’m seein’ this through.” She hopped out of the Jeep and was halfway up the steps by the time Jonelle caught up with her.

  She elbowed Riley to one side and tried the doorknob. Locked. She hadn’t noticed either woman using a key. Riley reached past and pounded on the door.

  “Knock it off,” Jonelle hissed. Before she could say anything else the door opened and they stood face-to-face with a pleasant-looking middle-aged woman. Short and with the face of a woman who smiled often, the woman said, “How can I help you ladies?”

  While the words were pleasant, the woman’s body blocked the door.

  Jonelle had no idea what to say so she opted for part of the truth. “Afternoon. My name’s Jonelle Sweet. I’m looking for Maxine. She’s . . . an older woman with a young child. Lark. She’s four.” Jonelle reached in her bag and pulled out her private investigator’s ID. “The child’s mother asked me to find them. She and Maxine, uh, had a falling out and now she wants to make amends. Can I come in?”

  “She means me too,” Riley added. “I’m working with her on this.”

  The woman frowned at Riley’s words.

  “We don’t want the police involved. Tamora only wants to know her daughter’s safe,” Jonelle said.

  The woman squinted at Riley as if having trouble believing anyone would want the abrasive blond as their assistant. Before Jonelle could tell Riley to return to the Jeep, the woman moved to let them inside.

  All three squeezed into a narrow corridor painted bright yellow with white trim. Doors opened on the left. “My name’s Wanda,” the woman said.

  Jonelle’s chest tightened in the close space. “Can we go someplace to sit down?”

  Wanda led them up carpeted stairs to the second floor. She stood to one side. “Go inside that door there,” she said, pointing to the right. “That’s the office.”

  Jonelle and Riley stepped inside.

  The small room’s walls were painted the same bright yellow as downstairs and two long, narrow windows allowed a lot of natural light. Jonelle relaxed.

  Wanda indicated two somewhat battered, slat-backed chairs. A small slit in the center of one chair cushion exposed foam rubber. Jonelle took the one without the tear, ignoring Riley’s grunt. She wanted to get right to the point but waited until the woman situated herself behind the cluttered desk. Next, Wanda rummaged through a small metal file cabinet and pulled out a manila folder.

  For the first time since she began working on the case, Jonelle believed she was getting close to finding Lark. She didn’t want anything—or anyone—to screw that up. She willed Riley to keep her mouth shut while Wanda frowned at the words in the file.

  “Pretty sure this,” she tapped the file, “is who you mean, since we don’t get many women her age coming in here. She showed up a few days ago. Early that first day, she came alone. A few hours later, she left and came back with the young child. Didn’t give her name as Maxine, though.”

  Jonelle leaned forward. “Can I take a look at that?” she asked, indicating the folder.

 
“Afraid not. This is confidential.” She placed the file back in the cabinet.

  “The county provides for the elderly. I’m not set up for that. Only reason I let her stay is she had the money and said she’d babysit for the mothers so they can go to work.” Wanda’s gaze shifted back and forth. “I like kids, but they get on my nerves sometimes. Claims she doesn’t mind. Says she likes lots of kids. The more the merrier. So I agreed.”

  “Do you know how the mothers planned on paying her?” Jonelle asked. She kept her suspicions to herself.

  Wanda shrugged. “I don’t really know. That was up to them.” Her gaze shifted from Jonelle to Riley and back again.

  “Didn’t you find it odd an older woman towed a little one around?”

  Sad eyes focused at Jonelle. “No. A lot of children end up staying with their grandmothers. Know what I mean?”

  Neither Jonelle nor Riley responded.

  “I didn’t know she’d taken her granddaughter.” Wanda sat up straighter and smoothed out her blouse. “We don’t allow crime in here.”

  “Does she have a room?” Jonelle asked.

  “All we had left was on the top floor. It’s real hot up there, so—”

  Jonelle held her breath. “Are they upstairs now?”

  Wanda shrugged. “Don’t know. They spend a lot of time in the common room. We can check there first.”

  CHAPTER 51

  I hear voices coming from downstairs. I sneak down a few steps and lean over the railing. I recognize a voice other than Wanda’s. I can’t believe it. How’d she find me? I climb the stairs as fast as my arthritis will allow. My eyes water from the pain. Damn knees. If I try to leave the front way, I’ll have to pass where the voices are coming from. I open the door and she’s sitting on the bed, eyes wide, thumb in her mouth. Butterfly puzzle, butterfly pictures spread all over the place. Damn butterflies. I hate all of that stuff now.

  What to do? Hide!

  Where? The closet.

  No, can’t do that. That’s the first place she’ll look. I grab the child’s arm and yank her close to me as I circle the room. She starts crying. She does that a lot these days. I shake her to get her to stop. She cries louder.

  The window. Maybe we can climb down the back way. Down the fire escape.

  I open the window and lean out, but it’s too far to go with the child. What good is she to me now? Everything’s ruined. I’ll leave her. Maybe I can make it if I don’t have this little . . .

  I hear footsteps.

  What am I gonna do?

  CHAPTER 52

  A blaring television signaled their arrival to the common area. Children and toys filled the large room, but no sign of Lark or Maxine. Across the hall, the tiny kitchen was empty. “You stay down here,” she told Riley. For once the woman obeyed, standing on the landing and watching as Jonelle climbed up to the next level.

  Each step increased the temperature and Jonelle started sweating. At the top of the stairs she wiped her forehead with her bare hand. She faced three closed doors and the end of a short hall. She put her ear against the first door. Loud voices came from inside. She knocked, first softly then harder. Someone turned down the sound. A couple seconds later a young girl around Piper’s age opened it with a “help you? My mom ain’t here.”

  “Do you know which room Miss Maxine stays in?”

  The girl frowned. “Who?”

  “Older woman. Babysits the kids.”

  “Oh, yeah. Last one on the end.” She closed the door before Jonelle could thank her.

  A child’s cries stopped Jonelle in her tracks. Her hand reached in her purse and closed around the pistol.

  She tip-toed to the last door and listened. The crying rose in volume.

  Instead of knocking, Jonelle slowly turned the doorknob.

  A little girl sat in the middle of the bed, dressed in pink shorts and holding tight to a plush bunny. She stared at Jonelle with wide, wet eyes.

  Finally. She nearly fell to the floor from relief.

  “It’s okay, Lark.” She took her hand out of her bag and smiled. “I’m going to call your daddy. Would you like that?”

  Lark nodded, setting in motion pink butterfly barrettes.

  No sign of Maxine. Jonelle checked the one closet and under the bed. No one else was in the room. Curtains fluttered against the open window. She leaned over the sill and observed Maxine clanging her way down metal fire escape steps.

  Jonelle ran out of the room and shouted to Riley. “She’s going down the fire escape out the back. Stop her.”

  Riley sprinted down the stairs.

  When Jonelle returned to the room, instead of calling Burt, whom she knew would have a million questions, she put in a call to Langford. It rang several times before the attorney picked up.

  “Good thing your number shows on caller ID or I’d have let it go to voicemail,” he said. “This is my day to catch up on paperwork. I was starting to wonder about you since you haven’t been that great keeping me informed.”

  She ignored the comment. “I found Lark.” She gave him the address. “Maxine was with her. We’ve got her cornered.”

  “Maxine? Who the hell’s Maxine?” The attorney shouted.

  “Babysitter. Remember?”

  “Oh yeah. She’s had her all this time? Are you kidding me?”

  “Don’t think so. I believe several people took turns moving Lark around. One of the guys who had her ran off in an RV, but I know who he is. I’m not sure, but I think Maxine decided to take matters into her own hands. The important thing right now is, Lark’s safe.”

  The silence on the other end stretched for so long, Jonelle glanced at her phone to make sure they were still connected.

  “Call the cops. I’m on my way.”

  She sighed. “I’d rather call her father first.” Lark stopped crying and stared at Jonelle with wide eyes. Jonelle turned and lowered her voice. “I thought about something. If I call the cops they might put her in some kind of home until things get sorted and she needs to be with someone she knows . . . and trusts.” She thought back to what Watkins, Tamora and now Maxine, had planned for the little one and couldn’t stand the thought of the child being tossed around again.

  “Tell you what,” Langford said. “I’ll call the cops and her father from my phone when I get there. Maybe they’ll be more understanding with a relative there. You sure you’ve got Maxine?”

  Jonelle thought about Riley and smiled. “Oh, yeah.”

  • • •

  With Lark’s hand grasped firmly in her own, Jonelle stepped very slowly down the stairs. Wanda kept ringing her hands, muttering over and over again, “I don’t want no trouble” and “are you gonna call the police?”

  “Don’t have a choice,” Riley said. “You was giving shelter to this one,” she held up Maxine’s arm gripped tight in her fist. “And she ain’t going nowhere until the cops get here.”

  Maxine squirmed, trying to get away.

  Riley held fast.

  “Something told me you was gonna be trouble.” Wanda pointed a finger inches from Maxine’s face.

  Riley hauled Maxine onto the sofa. Maxine shrank into the sofa cushions.

  “Shoulda listened to myself and kept you outta here. That’s what I get for pitying folks.” Wanda leaned against the doorframe, folded her arms and glared.

  “Listen, Wanda,” Jonelle said. “I don’t care what you do here. Fact is, looks like you provide a decent service. But Lark was kidnapped—”

  “She weren’t no such thing,” Maxine screamed.

  Lark hid behind Jonelle’s legs.

  “Tamora knew all along what we was doing. She was part of it,” Maxine said.

  “Save it for the cops, granny,” Riley said.

  “Nobody’s calling the cops until Tamora’s lawyer gets here. It’ll be his call. Me? I’d rather Lark’s daddy take her away from all this mess,” Jonelle said. “In fact, if Langford’s not here in a half hour, I’m calling Vaughn Hanson myself. But first, I�
��ve got a few questions for you.” She stabbed her index finger at Maxine.

  Wanda cleared her throat and managed to get herself together long enough to suggest the residents—lurking in the hall wondering about all the commotion—and their children stay in their rooms or maybe take a long walk for an hour or two, and they grudgingly obliged. Wanda mumbled something about fixing Lark a snack of milk and chocolate chip cookies. Jonelle almost felt sorry for her as Wanda led the child to the kitchen.

  Jonelle sat on the other side of Maxine, turning sideways to face her. “I don’t care what you do or do not tell the cops. I’ve some questions of my own and you’re gonna answer them. You’ve jerked me around for the last time, old lady.”

  “If you don’t wanna answer the detective lady’s questions, I’m gonna do all I can to convince you that’s not a good idea. Got it?” Riley squeezed Maxine’s arm for emphasis.

  Maxine yelped.

  “Ease up a little, Riley.”

  Riley relaxed her grip.

  “Okay, Maxine. First question: who took Lark from the apartment?” Jonelle asked.

  At first she kept her mouth pressed tight.

  Riley shifted on the sofa, tightening the space between the three of them.

  All the air seemed to leave Maxine’s body. “It was supposed to be Jelani,” she said in a high-pitched voice. “Idiot didn’t show so Lorraine told me to do it. I hid her in my apartment until Reggie showed up and took her away.”

  “Did she stay with Reggie the whole time?” Jonelle thought she knew the answer but wanted to hear it from Maxine.

  “No. The plan was always to move her from one person to another so as to keep the cops off our trail.” She snorted. “As if they were ever really on it. Only one who threatened to mess everything up was you. Poking around like you owned the place.”

  Riley leaned across Maxine. “Don’t think she likes you,” she told Jonelle.

  “Yeah. Breaks my heart. So who planned this whole thing. Tamora?”

  Maxine busied herself straightening her clothes.

  Riley poked her. “Answer the question.”