The Reluctant Prophet

by Nancy Rue

  “It doesn’t make any sense to me either,” I said. “If I could I’d stick you on the back of that Harley right now and we’d ride forever. But we have to wait—and we will—and we’ll trust, okay? We’ll trust in God.”

  Desmond let out a low hiss.

  “What’s with that?” I said. “God brought you to me in the first place. He’s been there through everything. He’s got your mama in his arms. Come on, Desmond—we can’t give up on him.” I put my palm to his. “It’s all good.”

  They were the words I myself had needed to hear all morning. I sat back on my heels and watched Desmond and hoped they would seep into him, too. But no outrageous retort played at the lips where a tiny hardness formed. No charming reply danced through the dull haze in his eyes. There was no smile reserved for me that put me “right there.” He was already edging away from the boy who lived at my house. I had to get him out of there. Soon. Or I wasn’t going to be able to save him.

  Chief had to go to his office from there. After practically signing a sworn statement that I would take every precaution driving my bike home alone, he agreed to go on without me. I fully intended to go straight to Palm Row, but as I drove down Ponce de Leon Boulevard, I thought I felt the faintest of Nudges moving me toward Sacrament House. I really should go over and secure the place. Chances were that in their state of panic, Mercedes and Jasmine hadn’t even locked it up. As I got closer, though, I had to doubt the Nudge a little. If word had gotten out on West King that they’d split, the house could be filled with crack addicts by now.

  I had to swallow hard. Two days ago I would have welcomed any woman who came there tired enough of herself to surrender to our love. Geneveve’s wasn’t the only life that had been cut off by the brutal stabs of that knife.

  Sacrament House looked the same when I shut down the Harley in front of it. No windows had been smashed, no graffiti had been scrawled on the paint. But it wasn’t the same. The hope was gone. Everything we’d worked for had gone down its drains and seeped out of the cracks around its windows. Despite the wreath still hanging bravely on the door, it was as empty as every other house on the bleak street.

  There was really no point in holding back the sobs as I made my way up the walk, so I let them go. That made it hard to locate my key when I found the front door locked, and to get it into the lock once I did. Still weeping from the pit of my soul, I stumbled into the living room, where my cries rose with those of two figures huddled on the couch. Mercedes pulled her arms from Jasmine’s back and held them up to me.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  We untangled a few things—they’d heard about the sirens and run to the scene—watching with the gawking crowd in the side alley as the paramedics loaded Geneveve’s lifeless body into the ambulance. Terrified, they’d spent the night in an abandoned car and returned to the house at daylight. There was no crime tape to keep them out, so they’d come inside to wait for me. I didn’t tell them I never thought I’d find them there.

  I could tell they still had more to say but couldn’t yet, so I called Hank and Leighanne and was about to dial Nita’s number when I remembered she was out of town.

  “She love Geneveve,” Mercedes said. “This gon’ tear her up.”

  “She was a good sponsor to her,” I said.

  Jasmine’s hand crept into mine. “But weren’t nobody as good to her as you, Miss Angel.”

  Maybe. But a lot of good that was doing me now. I tried not to think of Desmond—tried to focus on them. We gathered in the dining alcove, hands grasping at hands on the table.

  “I know it isn’t going to bring Geneveve back,” I said, “but I think it would help us all if we could see her killer put away.”

  Mercedes’s eyes flashed. “They ain’t gon’ catch Sultan—I know that.”

  “Do we know for sure it was Sultan?”

  “That’s what Sherry told us,” Jasmine said.

  Mercedes started to pull her hand away, but I grabbed her wrist.

  “When did you see Sherry?” I said. “You saw her since she called Geneveve last night?”

  Jasmine shook her head at Mercedes. “We through hidin’ things from Miss Angel. She got to know this.”

  Mercedes got her hand away and hooked it onto her neck. Of all the women, trust came hardest to her. As much as I wanted to shake the words from her, I waited.

  “We was lookin’ for a place to be after they took Geneveve away,” she said finally. “And she come out of nowhere, all shakin’ and all blue around her mouth.”

  “Sherry,” I said.

  “Yeah. We was so scared but she worse—and we tol’ her, come with us. Maybe we goin’ home in the mornin’—and this her home too.”

  “She wouldn’t,” Jasmine said. “She don’t want us involved in none of this trouble.”

  “She said it was all her fault, which—” Mercedes took in both of us with wide eyes. “I ain’t never heard her take responsibility for nothin’ before.”

  “That was huge,” I said.

  “Mmm hmm.”

  The rhythm was coming back. I nodded her on.

  “She said she want to come back here and start her steps and have what we got—even God. But she said you gon’ hate her now, ’cause she the reason Geneveve is dead.”

  “She’s not the reason,” I said. “She was just used.”

  “That don’t make it okay,” Jasmine said.

  “No. But it doesn’t mean she has to let it ruin the rest of her life, either.” I grabbed both of their hands. “I don’t want you going to West King—”

  “We ain’t never goin’ there again,” Jasmine said.

  “But if Sherry comes here, bring her in, lock the doors, and call me.”

  “She ain’t comin’ here.”

  I looked closely at Mercedes as she worked her hand away from mine.

  “What do you know?” I said. “Come on—everything on the table.”

  “She hidin’ at C. A .R. S.”

  “In the apartment upstairs? Isn’t that where she lived before she came here?”

  “Before Opus kicked her out.”

  “Opus lives there?”

  “Yeah—but she not up there with him. He beat her up one too many times. One thing she did learn from Geneveve—you ain’t got to put up with that now.”

  “So what are you saying—she’s hiding out in the store?”

  “That old man runs it?”

  “Yeah.”

  “That’s her daddy.”

  “Daddy as in father—or daddy as in keeper.”

  Mercedes grunted. “He can’t hardly keep hisself. No—he Sherry’s father. He rents that apartment to her and Opus, only he don’t know Opus work for Sultan. He just take the money ’cause he ain’t makin’ none on that shop now. He ain’t got no idea what go on up there.”

  “He must know now if Sherry’s hiding out with him.”

  Jasmine shook her head. “He don’t even know she there.”

  I didn’t even ask how that could possibly be. I just hugged them both and thanked them for trusting me, and the minute Hank and Leighanne arrived, I was outside on the phone to Chief.

  “Can you meet me at C.A.R.S.?” I said. “I think we’ve found Sherry.”

  I agreed to wait for Chief in front of the police station so we could ride to the car shop together. When he pulled up beside me, he drew his hand across his throat and I cut the engine.

  “We need to be clear on how we’re going to do this,” he said. “You say she’s hiding in there someplace and the old man doesn’t know it?”

  “Yeah, but I’ve been thinking about this—and I think I know a way to distract him so you can look around.”

  “I’m not exactly unobtrusive, Classic.”

  “You haven’t met this
guy. Trust me. You could probably walk off with a crate of motor oil and he’d never know it.”

  Maharry Nelson looked like he hadn’t moved from the stool since I was there three weeks ago. He didn’t even stir when the bell on the door rang halfheartedly to herald our arrival.

  I was at the counter before the old man raised his head and peered at me through his greasy glasses. I’d forgotten how tiny his eyes were.

  “Hey, Mr. Nelson,” I said. “I’m sure you don’t remember me—”

  “I’m not senile,” he said. “You’re the one who was gonna bring that van in, and you never did.”

  “You have a mind like a steel trap, sir,” I said. “So—can I get on the schedule to get it in here? I know the starter’s shot, and we may be looking at a new alternator.”

  In my peripheral vision I could see Chief moving toward the back shelves on my right. I pointed at a stack of tires to the left. “You do tires, too?”

  “We do it all,” he said.

  “Can we take a look?”

  “Go ahead.”

  “I meant you and me. I have no idea what I’m looking at.”

  Maharry started to turn his head toward Chief, but I laughed. “He’s no help. He doesn’t know a steel radial from a bicycle tire.” I jerked my head toward the tires. “I need your expertise.”

  It took him an eternity to shuffle out from behind the counter, which gave Chief time to disappear through a swinging door marked EMPL ONL. I had a sudden attack of guilt for invading a life that was already half-gone.

  I positioned myself at the tires so that Maharry had to turn his back to the other side of the store. I didn’t know if I knew enough questions to ask about tread and rubber quality for Chief to be able to locate Sherry and get her out the back door.

  I started with, “I’m not sure what size.”

  “I saw your feed-the-homeless thing didn’t turn out so well.”

  I felt my eyes bulge.

  “I seen it in the paper,” he said. “Too bad.”

  “We fed a lot of people,” I managed to say. “Raised some awareness.”

  “You got arrested.”

  “Well, yeah, I did.”

  “Was it worth it?”

  I opened my mouth to answer, but I didn’t know what to say. Was it worth it, or was I any closer today to a solution than I was then?

  “Well, good for you for tryin’, is what I say.”

  “Thanks,” I said. There was still no sign of Chief, and my mouth was going dry. “So—what about these?”

  “You didn’t come in here for tires.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “She’s in the storage room.”

  “Who?”

  “Sherry Lynn. That’s who you’re looking for, right?”

  All the air went out of me. “Sherry Lynn, your daughter.”

  “Only one I got. I hope you can help her, because I’ve never been able to.” His tiny eyes all but disappeared behind the smears on his glasses. “Like I said, good for you for tryin’.”

  I nodded. “Chief,” I called out. “Did you find her? It’s okay—you can bring her out.”

  He appeared within seconds, holding Sherry up with one arm. She looked worse than I had ever seen her, perhaps because of the sadness in her eyes when she looked at her father.

  “You knew I was here?”

  “’Course I knew you were here. You think I’m senile?”

  He pulled a familiar blackened rag out of his back pocket and shuffled through the door they’d just come out of. I could hear him blowing his nose.

  “I screwed up everybody’s life,” Sherry said. “Including his.”

  “Come on,” I said. “Let’s unscrew yours.”

  Somehow we convinced her to go the police with us. She said, over and over, that nobody had ever stood up for her like Geneveve did, until I finally latched on to that and told her this was her chance to stand up for Geneveve.

  Even then she shook her head. “The police aint’ gonna believe a stinkin’ thing I say.”

  “We’ll be there with you,” Chief said. “I’ll make sure they treat you right.”

  Like every other woman who knew him, Sherry succumbed to that uncanny energy and gave in.

  At first the detective insisted on interviewing Sherry alone, so Chief had to pull the lawyer card. Resigned to that with a roll of his eyes, he let me sit in too.

  “I’m Detective Kylie,” he droned to Sherry. “I’m just going to ask you a few questions. Contrary to what your attorney thinks, you are not a suspect.”

  Sherry nodded, eyes leaking. I wasn’t sure she understood a word of that.

  “Just tell me what you know.”

  She looked at me. When I nodded, she told him why she left Sacrament House and returned to the boyfriend who beat her—Opus Behr. He waved her through the explanation that she didn’t intend to let Opus bully her anymore, that she just needed a place to be until she could make another plan. His eyes had no interest at all, even when she said Opus threatened to kill her if she didn’t lure Geneveve to their apartment. Clearly he’d heard far worse.

  “I thought I could warn her when she got there,” Sherry said, head bowed over the table. “And I thought we could both run together—someplace far from here. I always got away from Opus before, and I thought I could do it again. Only this time …”

  “This time what?” I said.

  Kylie shot me a look. “What happened this time?” he said to Sherry. So far he’d written nothing on the pad in front of him.

  “I told Opus I was gonna meet Geneveve under the steps—that I needed to talk her into comin’ upstairs. And he said okay. I thought we could run from there.”

  “We got that part,” Kylie said.

  Chief put his hand over mine—like he knew I wanted to smack the man.

  “I shoulda known when he let me go so easy—but I was just so scared. When I saw Geneveve coming around the corner from the alley, I ran to her. But then Sultan was there, right behind her. He grabbed her around the neck and pulled her back, and I heard her scream.”

  Detective Kylie picked up his pencil. “How could you see if it was Sultan? Isn’t it dark back there?”

  Sherry squinted at him. “It ain’t hard to tell Sultan from every other man on West King Street. He’s the only white man down there besides my father. He struts around like a big ol’ white crane. I know Sultan.”

  I tried not to look startled. I’d always pictured Sultan as a black man.

  “Did you actually see him stab her?” the detective said.

  “No. I waited there until she stopped screamin’ and I was gonna go help her, but I heard him coming back around the corner, so I ran. I knew he’d kill me, too, just for standing there.” She jerked in the chair, toward Chief and me. “He’ll kill me now if he finds out I told this.”

  “I want police protection for my client,” Chief said.

  “We can put her in protective custody—”

  “No,” I said. “She’ll stay with me. You can protect her there.”

  I avoided the black look Chief lowered on me.

  “We can have your house patrolled regularly,” Kylie said, “but we can’t guarantee her safety outside of this building.”

  “You don’t care if your key witness is—” I stopped and looked at Sherry. I could see the terror pulsing through the vein in her forehead. “She’ll be safe at my place until this Jude Lowery person is caught. And he’d better be.”

  “I think we’re done here,” Chief said to Kylie. To me he murmured, “But I’m not done with you.”

  I knew what he was going to say when he had the chance. But even Chief couldn’t convince me to ignore a Nudge.

  He waited until we had Sherry home and fe
d and tucked into bed before he started in. He was only halfway through the first, “What were you thinking?” when the doorbell rang. I didn’t care who it was—I blessed their hearts all the way to the door.

  When I opened it, Mary Alice and India were standing there, arms full of bags.

  “Bonner called us,” India said. “We brought you some things. If you’d be more comfortable, we can just leave them with you.”

  Mary Alice bobbed the chins as if she were hoping I’d lean that way, but I shook my head.

  “No, please,” I said. “Come in.”

  I introduced them to Chief, who sat on the hearth and glowered at me. He clearly wasn’t going anywhere until he’d officially chastised me.

  “This should go in the refrigerator,” Mary Alice said. Her voice was like a thin china saucer.

  “You brought me food?” I said.

  “It’s what we do when there’s a loss, isn’t it?”

  I closed my eyes. Behind them was the image of Mary Alice humming a hymn and feeding tapioca pudding to Sylvia.

  “Thank you,” I said.

  They followed me to the kitchen, where Mary Alice opened the refrigerator and made room for at least three casseroles. India set her bags on the bistro table.

  “I don’t know what you have to wear to the funeral,” she said, “but I brought several choices for you and—the women.”

  “India, I can’t afford—”

  “Allison, why don’t you just slap me in the face, girl.”

  I looked at her, stunned.

  “These are a gift from me. You know I wouldn’t come in here hawking my wares at a time like this.”

  The tears on the edge of her voice made me nod.

  “I do know that,” I said. “I don’t know what I was thinking.”

  “You were obviously thinking we aren’t sisters anymore, and you’re wrong.” India put her hands on my shoulders. Her fingers were anxious-chilly. “I still don’t get what you’re doing, Allison, but I know it’s good because it’s you that’s doing it. I’m sorry I ever thought anything else.”