Louisiana Hotshot

by Julie Smith

  This was a job for Eddie. She realized it suddenly and certainly. There was no way in hell she was going to get through to this woman, but Eddie might be able to.

  She said, “Back to Pam a second. Is she here, by any chance?”

  “Here?”

  “Staying with you.”

  “No, of course not. Don’t you think I’d have told you?”

  “Could Cassandra be concealing her?”

  “Are you kidding? The way she keeps her room you couldn’t get a kitten in there, much less another kid.” She raised her voice. “Cassandra! Come out here a minute, please.”

  The girl appeared with her Walkman still in place. With a show of huge inconvenience, she removed the headset. “What?”

  “Cassandra, is anyone visiting?”

  “What? You know no one’s visiting.”

  “Tell me the truth. Is Pamela Bergeron here?”

  Wonderment appeared on Cassandra’s face, so far her only expression besides clamped shut and angry. “Pam? Are you kidding? She wasn’t even at choir practice.”

  “Okay, you can go.”

  The girl hesitated. “Why? Why do you want to know?”

  Talba said, “Her parents are worried about her.”

  Disdain appeared briefly on the teenage features, and then Cassandra showed them her cute little backside switching down the hall. If it involved parents, it had all her contempt.

  “Ms. Scott,” Talba said, “I think you’ve got a bigger problem than you think you have. I’m going to have Eddie call you.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “You may have a dangerous situation here.”

  Anger flickered on Aziza’s face. It was quickly replaced by suspicion, and then a certain wiliness, the sort that could outsmart itself. “Oh, I get it. Oh, yes, it’s all coming clear. Don’t tell me: you and Eddie probably want to recommend a bodyguard. And your firm just happens to supply them. That’s it, isn’t it? We came to you in good faith, and you’re trying to scam us.”

  There was no doubt in Talba’s mind she really did believe it.

  Oh my God, I’ve blown this so completely. I’m not cut out for this shit. If that kid gets killed, it’s my fault.

  She felt so miserable she wasn’t even angry at the insult. She said what she always said when things were so badly out of control she felt she was about to hit a tree at high speed: “I think we’d better talk about it later.”

  And for the second time that day, she got yelled at: “What kind of fool do you think I am?” Aziza just took the one shot and left it at that. Considering the kind of day Talba’d had, it seemed the mildest of attacks.

  When she was in the car, she thought, That’s three times if you count Eddie. I wonder what my horoscope for today is.

  ***

  The unaccustomed experience of tears left Eddie feeling punchy and bewildered. What in all hell had that been about?

  Anthony. It was about Anthony.

  I miss him, he thought. Well what the hell, he’s my son. Sure I miss him— but why would I cry about that?

  Because of the way he is and what he did.

  He was getting up a little outrage, and that felt better. He was stronger, surer, the minute the grudge started to gather. This was familiar territory, the place he needed to be.

  Goddammit, the kid never… Anthony always . . . His mind was blank. It was huge what Anthony had done. Unforgivable. He’d left home without Eddie’s permission, refused to finish school, sashayed off… and then he’d… Eddie didn’t want to think about it.

  The phone rang. He ignored it.

  Goddam that Talba. Where in hell did she get off? How dare she? He found it absolutely incomprehensible that one human being could invade another’s privacy like that.

  Would I do that to her? he thought. How the hell could she?

  Dad, for Christ’s sake, you’re a private eye. It was Angela’s voice, implanted somehow in his brain. You do shittier stuff on a daily basis.

  He really wished his daughter would clean up her language. Also, get out of his head.

  He picked up the phone and listened to his voice mail— Angie again. In his head and out of it. “Dad, I got the weirdest phone call. Where’s Eileen? What’s going on over there?”

  He went to find some aspirin. He had some kind of tired, naggy headache, but nothing like one of those big babies that kept him out of work. Surprising, he thought. His eyes hurt from the tears, that was about all.

  He choked down the aspirin, washed his face, looked in the mirror, and thought, I want to see him. I really want to see him.

  It was a big fat mistake. A horrible sound came out of him, and then more tears. Damn. He hoped nobody came in before he could get this thing under control. But what in hell to do about it? Every time he turned around, it ambushed him.

  Lots of things ambushed him. Things Anthony had said to him wouldn’t let up, kept cycling round and round his brain, leading nowhere.

  Dad, I’ve been thinking about you a lot. I mean, with your birthday coming up and all.

  This was the son who had defied him, left home at sixteen, quit school. Quit school when Eddie himself had had to work two jobs just to finish high school, and never had gone to college. Mr. Big Shot Spoiled Brat Anthony just thought he could up and do anything he wanted.

  “I just wanted to pursue happiness in my own way,” he’d said. “I don’t understand why the people I love most want me out of their lives.”

  “Because you’re a bum, Anthony,” was what Eddie wanted to say. “Because you don’t care about us. Why the hell should we care about you?” But something prevented him, something in his son’s voice, some remembered note, a remnant from the boy’s childhood that brought back his feelings for his son before it all went sour.

  He had loved that kid. Loved him more than Angie, and that was the truth. He saw bits of himself in Anthony, little inklings of an innocence he couldn’t remember having, but must have had— a purity of heart that might once have been his, that maybe he could recapture. Intelligence as well. Lots of it. More than he had ever had, he was damned sure of that. Of course Angie had it too, but Angie was a girl; she intimidated him. She was foreign. Anthony was familiar. Like Eddie himself, only better.

  Could have been better. Should have been better.

  What the hell was he thinking? He had no idea what Anthony was. For all he knew, his son was now the junior senator from Idaho.

  What was “better,” anyhow? Some part of his brain was asking a question: Does it mean doing better? Or something else?

  I don’t understand how all these years have gone by and now you’re almost sixty-five. I got this email today from a girl who works for you and I thought I might not see you again, or Mom or Angie either.

  When Eddie heard those words, something exploded within him. He felt it start in his stomach and shoot up to his skull. It was pear-shaped and purple and when it popped open it was spiky inside, like the inside of a fig. It was fury.

  He honestly believed he would have killed Talba Wallis if she’d been near enough at the time. He wanted to smack her across the room and stomp her.

  It wasn’t an urge he’d ever had before. It scared the hell out of him.

  Goddam you, he had shouted, and hung up the phone. Now these tears.

  And the headaches, Audrey had said. The headaches were about Anthony.

  Oh, Audrey. Audrey, what have I done to you?

  The shame of it, of her going to a shrink, going on his account, because of what he was putting her through— that was more than he could take. It sat on him like a boulder.

  He closed his eyes. He was lying on the sofa in the reception room with all the lights out, and now he just wanted to rest.

  His brain kept cycling, round and round and round, endlessly, endlessly, and then it stopped.

  He slept.

  He dreamed he was in a courtroom, and Talba Wallis was the judge. She stood before him like a crow in her black skin and b
lack robe, and then he was led to the guillotine. He wanted to tip the executioner, having read that it was the done thing, but the man turned away from him, muttering.

  No words were spoken in the dream, but in the clarity of the dreamscape he understood his crime.

  It was doing the unforgivable.

  He awakened moaning, trying to call for help, to be heard, and tried to remember what it was that he had done in the dream. What was unforgivable?

  He knew.

  It was something so contemptible, so petty and mean, so wrong and immoral, so childish and stupid and arrogant and utterly vile he couldn’t even think about it. It couldn’t have been he who had done it, it was impossible. The best thing was just to bury it, never to name it in his mind again, never to put words to it, never to let it into his consciousness.

  But now there was this thing with Audrey and the shrink. That was right in his face, and it was his doing. That he had to own up to. And if he did that… If he did that, the whole house of cards came down.

  Let it, he thought. Goddammit, let it.

  His son had left a phone number on his voicemail— he didn’t know if he had the balls to dial it.

  Chapter 14

  Ms. Wallis came creeping in like an old cat in a yard full of new smells, unsure what might leap out of the dark.

  “Eddie? You in here?”

  “Waiting for you. Audrey called.” She had called the house thinking he’d be there— as he would have any other time. But tonight he wasn’t ready yet. What had happened to him was far too intimate to talk to Audrey about.

  “Come on in, Ms. Wallis. I’m not gonna bite you. Hell froze over.”

  “Eddie, let me just say… ”

  He stopped her with a slap at the air. “Ya know what we guineas say? Fuggeddaboutit.” He took a sip of the scotch and water on his desk. “I learned that in a mob movie. What’s ya pleasure, Ms. Wallis?”

  “Nothing, thanks.”

  “Ya better have one, or we won’t communicate. I’m way ahead a ya.”

  She seemed to relax a little. “You have any white wine?”

  “Are you kidding? Detectives don’t drink white wine. It ain’t macho.” When he was drinking, he couldn’t be bothered watching his grammar.

  “This one does.”

  “Oh, all right. I’ll get ya some.” There was a little refrigerator in the copy room that now served as her office.

  “I’ll get it.”

  While she was gone, he had a little more of his own drink. He had a real nice buzz, and he wanted to keep it going. She came back with the glass in one hand, the bottle in the other. “I ran into some problems, Eddie. It’s nice you’ve forgiven me, but…”

  “I didn’t say I forgive ya.”

  “Well, anyway, we’re talking. We might not be after I tell you what’s going on.”

  “Damn, Ms. Wallis. Can’t it wait? I talked to my son tonight for the first time in ten years.”

  She forced a smile. “I’m happy for you, Eddie.”

  He could see that she was, or rather he somehow felt that she was, because of a certain softness that had crept into her voice and the set of her shoulders. But she was so tense she could barely bring herself even to utter the social niceties.

  He went into his tough-guy routine. “Yeah, so, we’ll get to that. What’s on ya mind? You were gon’ talk to the hat-shop lady, weren’t ya?”

  “Omigod. Is that where we left off? That was about three lifetimes ago.”

  He found himself getting irritated. “You been doin’ stuff I told ya not to?”

  She was gulping her wine. ‘Yeah. Oh, yeah. I think I really blew it too.”

  “Oh, shit, is anybody hurt? Excuse my French.”

  “Maybe. But that part isn’t my fault. What might happen is.”

  He held up his glass and saluted her. “Good thing I’m drinking this stuff.”

  She tapped his glass with hers. “Me too.” She giggled.

  “That’s it. Ya gotta keep smiling.”

  “The good news is, I’m pretty sure I know who the guy is who had sex with Cassandra. The bad news is, I’m afraid she’s in danger.”

  He snorted. “Danger’s a way of life with that kid. Mama like that, she’ll be lucky to get through high school.”

  “Shall I start at the beginning?” She looked as if she were trying to get her breath.

  Eddie nodded. “Take ya time.”

  “Millie the Milliner told me Rhonda used to date a black guy. And guess what his name was?”

  “I don’t know. How’m I s’posed to know?”

  “Toes.”

  “Well, great. Toes who? Mystery solved. Older sister’s beau seduces kid sister’s kid friend. Toe jam, like I said.”

  “Toes Who is the question, all right. I found out he’s a friend of Baron Tujague.”

  It took Eddie a second to place the name. “The rapper?”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “Damn.” That struck him as not a good thing— too much power and ruthlessness on the loose.

  “So I did a little investigating…”

  “Wait a minute. Not so fast. What exactly did ya do?”

  “I went to work as a temp for Tujague.”

  “You what?” He really couldn’t help laughing. She had more balls than Spalding. “Little lady, you got cojones.”

  “I’m not little, and I’m not a lady.”

  “You right about that— if that trash mouth of yours is any indication.”

  To his surprise she let that one go by, even though it was practically an invitation for a “fuck you.” “To make a long story short, I met him, I met his brother and some of his friends, I followed them, and I figured out Toes is probably the brother.”

  Eddie was starting to grasp the seriousness of the thing. “Whew. Heavy-duty.”

  “Yeah.”

  A light sweat had broken out on his upper lip, an instinctive sign he sometimes got about trouble.

  “So I took some pictures and showed them to the girls— Cassandra and Shaneel.”

  He leaned back in his chair and rocked. “Good,” he said. “Good.” She was brash, but she knew how to get the goods. Actually, he was kind of proud of her.

  “They denied knowing either of the guys I showed them. So I thought, okay, I know someone who knows the guy for sure— Millie the Milliner.”

  Eddie approved. He actually approved. It must be the scotch.

  “Well, that’s when the fun began. She tossed me out of the shop.”

  He might have known. “What’d ya do to her?”

  “Nothing. I swear to God I didn’t even say anything.”

  “Come on, Ms. Wallis. What’d ya do?”

  “Just walked in. And she said she’d talked to her lawyer.”

  “Lawyer? Well, what’d ya do the first time?”

  “Eddie, you’ve got to trust me. I probably did make some wrong moves, but not with Millie. What I think is, somebody got to her.”

  “Paid her off, ya mean?”

  “Or threatened her. Could have been that.”

  He thought about it. “Yeah, you right. Could have been that.”

  She hunched up her shoulders, as if to ward off an attack. “So I had no choice but to try Pamela. I know you told me not to, but—”

  “No. At that point ya had to.” Only, he should have done it himself, Eddie thought. But he’d been out of commission, covering up a ten-year-old sin.

  Talba put her hand on her chest and exhaled. “I thought you were going to kill me.”

  “Give me time. I might still.”

  “Well, her parents were abusive from the start. They’re obvious racists—”

  “I don’t want to hear that. I will not tolerate calling people names as a result of your failure to get along with them.”

  “Eddie, you hired me. Would you just try to trust me? They’re the ones calling names. The father called me the ‘n’ word.”

  Eddie realized she was right. She was brash, but she
was showing pretty good judgment on most things. He really should try to trust her. He was embarrassed, both by the conclusions he’d been drawing and by Bergeron’s use of the epithet. Unfairness always embarrassed him. “You right, Ms. Wallis. You right. I ought to trust ya. And I’m real sorry ya had to go through that. But would ya mind telling me what set it off?”

  “I reached for my I.D. and he grabbed my arm and pulled me in the door— I think he thought I had a gun.”

  “Why would he think that? Ya think he’s just paranoid?”

  “He might be; he sure acted crazy. And one thing I’m sure of— he’s really distraught about his daughter dying. It might just be that. But I think he’s got a reason.”

  Eddie said, “Now why would that be?”

  “When he had me inside, he said— wait a minute…” She set down her wineglass and prowled around in her purse until she found a tiny notebook. “I wrote this down later; I thought it might be important. He said, ‘now you get on the phone and you get her back over here’.”

  Eddie’s sweat-alarm had spread from his lip to his pits. “They’ve got Pamela.”

  “Yeah. And I guess he thought I’m one of them. Because I’m black.”

  He saw she was right. They would think that because they wanted to; their imaginations, in their panic and disorientation, would tell them that any black person must be at fault for the disappearance of one daughter and the death of another; and therefore that any black person could deliver Pamela back to them.

  They must be out of their minds with fear. Eddie thought briefly about Angela, his own daughter dead or missing, but let it go quickly; you didn’t think about the unthinkable.

  “Bergeron kicked me, by the way.”

  “Ya want to press charges? Ya could, ya know.”

  “Nah. Goes with the job.”

  He could tell she was trying to impress him. Well, hell, he thought. She’s succeeding.

  “It did occur to me Pamela was hiding out at Cassandra’s, so I went out to her house to check, and she wasn’t. But I did lay it out pretty thoroughly for Aziza— Rhonda dead, Pamela missing, people who might think they’re God in it up to their eyeballs.”

  “How’d she react?”

  “Like always. Utter and complete denial. She says if Cassandra says Toes isn’t one of the guys in the pictures I showed her, then he isn’t.” She shrugged. “And he might not be. I honestly don’t know if Toes is the brother, or a friend I wasn’t able to photograph.”