Louisiana Hotshot

by Julie Smith

  “Go do it then. Ya got my blessing. Whatever works. And whatever doesn’t work, I don’t care.” He waved her away and called the church to see if he could get Shaneel’s home phone number.

  They said they didn’t have one. Hell.

  And Talba, with all her machines and magic, couldn’t find out where the parents worked. Their only chance to see her was after school, and there was a small problem with that. Eddie shrugged it off— a very small one. He stopped in his assistant’s office on the way out. “Ms. Wallis, I got a lunch date I can’t break.”

  When she turned from her screen, her eyes were scooched up again, and flame shot out of them. He wondered if she had any idea what a presence she was— how easily she made herself known without ever saying a word. He said, “I see you think I should break it,” and Eileen Fisher’s voice sang out from the anteroom, “You’re going, Uncle Eddie. Forget about it. You’re going.”

  “Yeah, yeah, I’m going. Look, there’s nothing I can do until after school, anyway— I’ll meet ya at Fortier, okay?”

  She tried to smile, but it didn’t come off. Well, hell. He gave her points for trying.

  ***

  Talba had been trying so frantically to come up with something— anything— that she hadn’t even checked her email. She had brought herself a tuna sandwich from home. She could eat that at her desk and catch up— she was way too hyper to try to relax.

  But she did go out for a second— to a deli to get a Diet Coke, and, during her errand, she let her mind wander in Darryl’s direction. Their relationship had unquestionably changed, whether for the better she didn’t know. It was both more intimate and more distant, both states caused by his revelation. They were wary of one another now, each circling till there were further developments, yet both knew the meaning of what he had said, the long-term point of it. It was an incredibly brave thing to do. Talba deeply admired him for it. Loved him for it. And wished he hadn’t done it quite yet.

  Talba wasn’t much on kids. Did she really need Darryl’s difficult daughter in her life?

  She scolded herself: Stupid! Shallow! Hateful! That man is so good to you it’s like eating love-flavored ice cream. After the way you acted Friday night too! Women would kill to have a man like Darryl Boueree. What the hell’s the matter with you?

  You are going to love this man. I don’t care how mean and small-minded you are— you are going to get over it!

  She was genuinely ashamed of herself. But she’d turned a corner— she’d had a talk with herself and gotten through to what was real. And what was real was Darryl’s simple, honest love for her; his decency; his choice to be honest with her. A rolling tsunami of love threatened to overwhelm her. She felt tears coming and blinked them back.

  Nonetheless, Eileen greeted her with, “What’s the matter?”

  “Oh, nothing.” She switched the Coke can from one hand to another— she had refused a bag, and the thing was giving her frostbite. “Just worried about the kids, that’s all— Shaneel and Cassandra.”

  “You know, today’s Eddie’s birthday lunch.”

  She’d forgotten all about the damn birthday. “I thought there was a party. I’m supposed to be writing a poem, right?”

  “Oh, the party’s still on. This is just some old pals of his taking him to lunch. Aunt Audrey put them up to it, so he won’t suspect anything.”

  She went in her office and attacked her tuna fish and email. Ah. Tony Tino had dropped her a line:

  Guess what? I’m coming to town! Mom invited me to Dad’s birthday party. This is a big deal— I’m bringing my fiancée. Did I mention I’m getting married? Also, I’m the entertainment— or part of it, anyhow. I hear you are too. Looking forward to meeting you.

  And there was a p.s. that was the real heart of it: About this getting married— we’ve been meaning to do it for a long time, and now Cara’s pregnant. So it’s sooner rather than later. When I got your email, I’d been in a funk for days, thinking about my family, and how my kid would never know its grandparents. See, what happened— Dad told Mom and Angie some lies about me and he told me some lies about them. That was how he kept us apart. So I couldn’t just call— or anyway, I didn’t think I could. Your email was what it took to push me over the edge. I was so ripe for plucking I was starting to ferment. I owe you a lot, Baroness.

  Quickly, she composed an answer:

  Wow. For once, the Baroness is humbled.

  And she was, more or less. What she had done she did on impulse, and it nearly went the other way. I ought to be more careful, she thought.

  ***

  She got to Fortier half an hour early, wondering how she was going to spot Shaneel in the swarm of kids leaving the building. She didn’t even know what the girl was wearing. With two of them, though, they’d have a good chance— and they’d almost certainly be able to see it if Baron Tujague’s brother approached her.

  When the bell rang, Eddie still hadn’t shown. Talba thought, Must have got sloshed.

  Shaneel was a big girl and fortunately, she’d picked today to wear a sweater of bright orange— the color hunters wear so they can see each other. Talba’s eye was drawn to it. A break, she thought. Maybe this’ll go right.

  “Shaneel! Hey, Shaneel— can I talk to you?”

  The girl waved, even, under the circumstances, seemed happy to see her. “Hello, James Bond. ‘Zat who you are? Or ya Jessica Fletcher?”

  “Neither one, exactly.” Talba thought what a shame it was, there wasn’t a female analogy in popular culture. She forbore to mention Nancy Drew. “Got a minute?”

  Shaneel waved good-bye to the kids she was walking with. “Sure. I got a minute.”

  “You know about Cassandra’s mother?”

  “Oh, yeah. She didn’t come home from her date or something.”

  “Her date?”

  “I don’t know. She’s always out on a date.”

  “Shaneel. She still hasn’t come home.”

  Alarm flooded the girl’s plump, carefree features. “She gone the whole weekend?”

  “You haven’t talked to Cassandra about this?”

  She shook her head vigorously. “No. Haven’t talked to Cassandra.” And then she got a sort of stupefied look, as something came back to her. “Didn’t talk to her today. I talked to her; sure I talked to her.”

  “Talk to me, Shaneel.”

  When the girl turned her face up to Talba’s, it was like a lovely dark moon, wide and innocent, not overbuilt with suburbs and subdivisions; a small place in the universe that hadn’t yet been wrecked. “Whassup?” she said. “You look kind of funny.”

  “I think Toes got her. Kidnapped her.” She said it for shock value, didn’t really expect it to have any resonance, but to her surprise, Shaneel’s eyes grew into cookies, a dark raisin punctuating the center of each.

  “Why you say that?” she asked.

  “Shaneel, you know something. Tell me. We don’t have any time to waste.”

  The girl took a step back, horror smeared like mud on her face. “Her mama called him. Her mama talked to him.”

  “Aziza called Toes?”

  “Yes’m. She called Toes.”

  “Come on, honey. Keep talking.”

  “She told Cassandra they could get money from him— she said he owed it to her for what he did to her.”

  “So he was one of the men in the photos.”

  “Yes’m. But Pammie said he was a friend of Baron Tujague. You come in, sayin’ he’s the Baron’s brother, well, Cassandra’s mama smells money. She called the Baron’s office and made a stink— Cassandra heard her do it, right on the telephone. Finally, she got Toes and made an even bigger stink, and Toes said she was right, he did owe her money behind it. He was gon’ pay her the next day.”

  Talba suddenly felt steely and hard inside, for once calm and capable. She found that, often, with her worst fears confirmed, a great calm descended, and she was feeling that now.

  “See, Cassandra…”

 
But Talba interrupted her. There was something she wanted to make completely clear. “That was the day she disappeared, Shaneel.”

  The girl wouldn’t stop. “See, Cassandra wasn’t like— like you think. Cassandra loves to sing more than anything in the whole world— me and Cassandra both; Pammie too. Well, Pammie’s sister Rhonda knew this dude who knew the Baron and Pammie said maybe he could help us get started. You know, the Baron’s got his own recording studio.”

  “Ah. The light dawns.” Shaneel looked at her like she was speaking French, but she couldn’t really help the outburst. She realized she’d just gotten a piece of the puzzle that had been eluding her— exactly what flavor of toe jam she was dealing with. “Go on, honey.”

  “We thought maybe we could make a CD— the three of us, you know? Maybe we’d get high with this guy and he’d listen to us sing. Only, Cassandra… I don’t know… he said he had something special to talk to her about.”

  “Okay, Shaneel. This is not a nice man we’re talking about.”

  “You got that right.”

  “A man who would have sex with a young girl isn’t nice. But Rhonda’s dead and Aziza’s disappeared. This is way beyond ‘not nice.’”

  Shaneel wouldn’t meet Talba’s eyes. “Pammie’s gone too.”

  “Her parents sent her away.”

  “No’m, I don’t think so— they call my house last night to see was she there.”

  Damn! They’d lied to Eddie.

  The girl looked miserable. “After Rhonda got run over, Pammie say maybe Toes done it. She say…”

  “Rhonda knew about Toes and Cassandra?”

  “I don’t know. Why?”

  Because she had to— otherwise Pammie wouldn’t have put it together. And, sure enough, just like we thought, that’s what started it all. Talba could see the whole thing: Rhonda gets outraged, partly on behalf of her own baby sister, pitches a fit, and threatens to go to the cops.

  It had to be that— if it were blackmail, he probably would have just paid her. But by the time Aziza got around to blackmail, the stakes were a lot higher. Now he couldn’t just pay— he’d already killed one Bergeron sister and maybe two.

  And thanks to me, Aziza knew.

  “Never mind, baby,” she said. “A lot of bad stuff’s been going on. It’s time to go to the police about this.”

  The girl took a step backward, dread inching over her face. “No po-lice. Uh-uh. No po-lice!”

  Talba tried to think how to talk about this without scaring her— if she hadn’t already figured out she and Cassandra were in danger, she was plenty scared about something. Adding to it was only going to make it worse. “Why not?” she asked. “What are you afraid of?”

  Shaneel took off running. Talba started to chase her, but a boy, a football player from the size of him, bumped her out of the way. She tried again, but everywhere she turned, someone else blocked her. Apparently, the kids at Fortier stuck together. Shaneel was gone by the time she threaded her way to the sidewalk. Gone, and she didn’t know where the girl lived.

  But there was always choir practice. She called the church and learned it wasn’t being held today.

  Okay, she thought. Back to Uncle Eddie. Also the drawing board.

  Chapter 22

  It was possible to walk to Galatoire’s from the office, but Eddie’s limp posed a problem. He could make it fine, but his leg would ache tonight. And right now he was feeling good. Anthony was back in the family, he and Audrey were lovers again, and he hadn’t had a headache in almost a week. No point messing it up with an aching leg— there was a perfectly good parking lot at Dauphine and Bienville.

  He was meeting three guys from the old days— Calvin, a deputy along with him; Sal, a prosecutor; and Philip, a judge. Of the four, only Philip still had his old job. And why not? It was a good gig. The other two reeked.

  Sal and Calvin had long since gone into business for themselves, much as Eddie had. But one had a video store and the other worked for a shipping company— as far as Eddie was concerned, he was the only one still in the trenches. A couple of days ago, he’d have said that was a bad thing. Today he was feeling smug.

  The others, in keeping with New Orleans tradition, had come early to save a table. Eddie sailed past the jealous folk still waiting for one, greeted the maître d’, shook hands with his favorite waiter, and nearly teared up at the sight of his old buddies. He wanted to hug them, but Galatoire’s was more a handshake kind of place, more French than Italian. A lot of masculine back-clapping was a pretty good substitute.

  Sal started the bidding. “Eddie, ya lookin’ good for an old coot.”

  Philip said, “Eye bags are the latest thing in Paris.”

  “That’s what I tell my wife,” said Calvin. “She still wants a face-lift. Audrey still gorgeous?”

  They could go on like that for hours, and did, insult piled upon courtesy, thrust following parry, joke chasing joke, crab salad disappearing, trout meunière appearing, crumbs from the crispest, sweetest bread blanketing the table.

  There was wine too— not too much for Eddie, because of the kid he had to see after school— but enough to make everybody sentimental. Eddie rose and proposed a toast: “To my three oldest friends. And to friendship. And to living so goddam long we’ve known each other forever— excuse my French.” They’d barely gotten their glasses to their lips, much less thought of a counter-toast when he said, “I got good news. Anthony’s back in the family.”

  And then of course he had to tell the story, which produced such an orgy of storytelling they might have closed the place down if such a feat could be accomplished— on Fridays, men who go for lunch just call their wives to come join them when they check their watches and find it’s dinnertime.

  Eddie took quite a bit of ribbing about his new assistant being black, female, smart, computer literate, and a poet— all stuff of which he vigorously disapproved. But, hell, it was worth it— she’d gotten the kid back, glued the family back together. This week he was running a one-time-only special— she was in his good graces if she didn’t get anyone killed. He was in one hell of a mood.

  By the time the coffee came, they were all young and fearless again, back at their old jobs and kings of the hill. Sal was punching Eddie on the arm. “Goddam! Remember those illegal wiretaps?”

  Philip said, “I didn’t hear that.”

  “Aw, Phil, we did boocoos of ‘em— everybody did it.”

  The judge pretended to hold his ears. “Not for my shell-pinks.”

  They ignored him. Sal said, “Oh, yeah, you guys were famous— how the hell did you get those telephone-company trucks?”

  “Trade secret. But it worked like crazy. We’d get enough for a warrant and say—”

  Philip abandoned all pretense. “— ya got it from a ‘confidential informant.’ Oh, yeah. You guys single-handedly gave snitches a rotten name. Confidential informant, my ass. You guys were the original fruits of the poison tree.”

  “Watch who ya callin’ fruit, big boy. We got past you a time or two.”

  More than a time or two. They all knew it and acknowledged it with big sloppy laughs.

  Calvin said, “It’s just too bad Eddie had to get shot for it.”

  And Sal said, “What’s that?”

  Philip wrinkled his brow.

  Calvin said, “Uh-oh. Did I speak out of school?”

  Eddie’d been shot by the widow of a serial rapist who hung himself in jail. Guilty as sin— two women mutilated for life, three destroyed every other kind of way.

  Entrapped by Eddie.

  The guy knew it too— figured it out, and told his wife before he died. She believed hubby, tried to kill Eddie. He deflected the gun and took the hit in the thigh. Nearly bled to death.

  Almost no one knew the story. It made Eddie cringe.

  He said, “What the hell, Calvin. What the hell— we’re all friends here. Nothing’s gonna mess this day up. I’ve done some things I’m not proud of, and maybe that’s one of ‘
em.” Another was the thing with Anthony— lying to him, lying to Audrey and Angie. Jesus! Yeah, that was another. It was behind him now. Everything was fresh and beautiful.

  “Hey, let’s have some cognac. I got time.” School wasn’t out for forty-five minutes. “Did I tell ya Anthony’s comin’ home? I don’t know when yet; we’re working it out. He’s gettin’ married— I gotta meet the bride, don’t I?”

  When the brandy came, he had another toast: “Here’s to all the stupid stuff ya do before you’re old enough to know better.”

  Philip said, “Hear, hear.”

  Eddie tossed down the rest of his drink. “Okay, old farts— whose birthday’s next?”

  Calvin said, “Mine,” and they agreed to do it again, if they all made it that far.

  Eddie left them to settle up the bill while he went to intercept Shaneel as she came out of school. For two hours, he’d been able to leave the case completely alone. He had a twinge of fear on the way to the parking lot. But he was in way too good a mood to indulge it.

  He was crossing Dauphine, wondering with some interest what it might be like to be a grandfather, when he saw the white car barreling out of nowhere.

  * * *

  Talba figured Shaneel’s sudden departure was a good enough reason to interrupt Eddie’s birthday lunch. Nonetheless, she was slightly relieved when he didn’t answer his cell phone. She paged him and left the number of her own cell phone, then called the office. “Eileen, is he there?”

  “Still at lunch. You know how it is when these old guys get together.”

  “I’m on my way in— if he calls or comes in, tell him it’s urgent that he call me.”

  She didn’t expect to hear from him. Consequently, when her cell phone sang out from the seat beside her, she nearly crashed into the car in front of her. She picked it up. “Eddie?”

  “Talba, it’s Angie.”

  “What? Angie, what is it?” Whatever it was, it was bad. She could tell by Angie’s voice.

  “I’m at Charity Hospital. Dad’s been…” Here she broke off, unable to form words. All Talba could hear was a kind of gasping.

  And then Eileen’s thin, frightened voice came over the line. “He’s been hit by a car. I just got here.”