DIVA

by Susan Fleet

  “You afraid to talk to me, AK?” Renzi said in a hard voice.

  AK’s face turned to stone. No gold-tooth smile now. Without a word, he swaggered after his homeboys, waiting for him in a souped-up Lincoln Town Car idling noisily in the street beside the NOCCA parking lot.

  Praying for a miracle, Antoine remained rooted to the spot.

  “Don’t turn around, Antoine,” Renzi said softly. “Make like I don’t know you, get in your car and drive to the New Orleans Art Museum. I’ll be right behind you so don’t try and run. Don’t answer me, don’t look at me, just get in the car and drive away.”

  He got in his car, grateful the cop understood the situation, but dreading the idea of talking to him. Didn’t want to wear out his head remembering which lies he’d already told the man, which lies he was about to tell him.

  Ten minutes later they were sitting on a stone bench under a weeping willow tree in the NOMA sculpture garden. What was left of it anyway. Sculptures still there, but broken tree limbs and debris littering the formerly tidy walks. Before Katrina, he and Chantelle used to come here and smooch as they wandered through the peaceful garden. Not peaceful now.

  He clasped his hands together to keep them from shaking. His insides were already shaking, and not from the chill in the October air.

  “What was going down back there?” Renzi turned to face him, lay his arm along the back of the bench and crossed his legs.

  Relaxed and confident, Antoine thought, now that he knows I know AK.

  “We just talking.” He clenched his hands so they wouldn’t do something stupid like fly into the air. Planted his feet so he wouldn’t run away.

  “Looked to me like AK was threatening you.” Renzi put a hand on his shoulder. “Talk to me, Antoine. I know Chantelle was your girl and I know you’re hurting. I want to put the bastards that killed her in jail, don’t you?”

  He nodded, afraid to speak, afraid his voice would jump an octave and betray him.

  “I think AK was involved. What’s his connection to Chantelle?”

  “Chantelle was living in Iberville,” he muttered, and turned away so he didn’t have to look into the eyes of his relentless interrogator.

  “So? What did she do to cross AK?”

  “I dunno,” he whispered. Knowing Chantelle had done nothing to cross AK, knowing her mere existence posed a threat to the King of Iberville.

  “What was she doing in Lakeview that night?”

  “Don’t know nothing ‘bout that either.” Praying God didn’t strike him dead for lying.

  Renzi’s fingers dug into his shoulder. “A woman died, Antoine. Someone pushed her out of the getaway car. Who pushed her out?”

  He shook off the man’s hand. “What you asking me for?”

  “The cop that got shot is out of intensive care, getting better every day.”

  “That’s good,” Antoine said. “I’m glad to hear it.”

  “Chantelle was worried about him too. Why was that?”

  His heart pounded and his palms got sweaty. Had Chantelle told Renzi something? He doubted this but couldn’t be sure. He wanted to ask what else Chantelle said, but he couldn’t, not without admitting he knew why she was in Lakeview. Because he’d made the biggest mistake of his life, helping AK rob that store, thinking he was protecting his girlfriend.

  What he’d done was get her killed.

  Murdered. In cold blood. By AK and his thugs.

  His eyes filled with tears.

  “The off-duty cop helped a police artist draw some better sketches of the robbers.”

  His heart almost stopped. He felt like a two-ton truck had fallen on his chest, felt the heat of Renzi’s eyes, probing, testing. Accusing.

  “One of the sketches looked a lot like AK.”

  What about the other one? he wanted to scream, clamped his lips together so he wouldn’t.

  “Did Chantelle help him rob that store?”

  “No!” The word sprang from his mouth before he could stop it.

  “She had to be up there for a reason. You and I both know fifteen-year-old black girls don’t go running around a white neighborhood that time of night without a reason.”

  “AK,” he said, knowing he was edging into dangerous territory. “AK made her do it.”

  “AK did the robbery, right, Antoine?”

  He turned on the cop. “You trying to get me killed like Chantelle? That what you want?”

  “No, that’s exactly what I don’t want. But I need evidence to put AK in jail. I need a witness. Someone willing to testify in court.”

  His blood turned to ice. Testify in court. Against AK. A death sentence.

  Renzi put a hand on his shoulder again, put some muscle on it. “We’ll protect you. We can get you back to your folks in Houston after the trial.”

  Houston? Shit. Nowhere near far enough away to escape AK’s thugs. Spider and Deadeye would find him and shoot him down like a dog.

  Renzi gazed at him, his dark eyes intense and implacable. “I think AK killed Chantelle. Don’t let him get away with it, Antoine.”

  A soft moan escaped his mouth. All this talk about Chantelle was ripping his heart out, reminding him he’d never see her again. Never talk to her again. Never make love to her again.

  He clenched his hands. Gritted his teeth. Tensed his body. Rose from the bench and walked away.

  Renzi would have to find someone else to finger AK.

  He wanted justice for Chantelle, but he didn’t want to die.

  CHAPTER 18

  Tuesday, 31 October

  “What’s wrong, Jake?” she said. “You seem upset.”

  What an understatement. He was gobbling M&Ms by the fistful. Jake used chocolate like worry beads to soothe his frazzled nerves.

  “Silverman booked a seat on our flight to Cincinnati.” He dipped his fingers into the brandy snifter on his desk for more M&Ms, tossed them in his mouth and chewed furiously.

  “How did he know what flight we’re taking?”

  “How the hell do I know? He comes in and snoops around when I’m out of the office. This guy is a pest. Yesterday he was playing your piano, now this!” Jake waved a sheet of paper. “This morning he came in and handed me an invoice for the plane fare!”

  “Calm down, Jake. Mr. Silverman is not going to Cincinnati. The orchestra will have a limo pick us up at the airport, and someone will drive us to the rehearsals. We don’t need him.”

  “That’s what I told him, but I figured I better talk to you before I did anything. I told him to go outside and wait in his van.”

  She turned and looked out the window. Silverman was leaning against his van, a muscular presence in his black Armani suit and sinister-looking sunglasses. He raised his hand and waved at her.

  Without thinking, she waved back and saw him smile.

  “I think we should get rid of him,” Jake said.

  “But he’s only been working for me a week.”

  “And he’s been a pain in the ass the whole time. We could hire someone else—”

  “No. I didn’t want to hire a security man in the first place, you did. I can’t help it if you two don’t get along. He’s been fine with me.”

  Not entirely true. He had rescued her from that drunk after the concert, but she’d been shocked to catch him playing her piano yesterday. His attempt to impress her was pathetic, his suggestion that they play duets ludicrous. But she’d jollied him out of it.

  “Maybe I’ll start driving again,” she said. “My car’s been repaired. Things have been fine lately.”

  Another half-truth. After her perfect performance at the NOCCA concert, Frank hadn’t come backstage, hadn’t even called to congratulate her. She’d been forced to call him. How embarrassing. Even then he’d sounded as though he didn’t want to talk.

  “What do you want me to do?” Jake said in the gruff tone he used when he was resigned to something but didn’t like it.

  “You’re good at managing people. Tell Mr. Silverman to can
cel the plane reservation. Tell him I don’t want him playing my piano, too.”

  Jake regarded her with a sullen expression. “Okay. He won’t like it, especially coming from me, but that’s my worry, I guess. Just part of the job.”

  ______

  Wednesday, 1 November

  After they interviewed the rape victim—Julie Martin, a twenty-two year old secretary for a small engineering firm—Frank suggested they have a beer at the Bulldog and talk it over. Unlike their previous visit, the bar was relatively quiet so they grabbed a table. Kelly looked elegant in her tailored black pantsuit and royal-blue blouse. She had on a different pair of Big-Z earrings tonight, bronze with thin blue stripes.

  “Do you kibitz with your father about cases?” he asked.

  She had told him her father, Enrico “Rico” Zavarella, was a detective in Chicago, but not much else. Nothing about her mother.

  “Not often.” She sipped her Heineken draft and licked foam off her lip. “It sickens me, the horrible things people do to each other.”

  A perfect segue to discuss the interview, but he didn’t feel like it. Earlier, Julie’s apartment had felt like a fortress, new locks on the door, every light blazing, the windows covered by heavy drapes. Julie was scared. Her life wasn’t going to be the same for a long time. Maybe never. He’d known rape victims who’d been plagued by flashbacks for years.

  “I bet your dad likes your big-Z earrings.”

  Kelly grinned. “He does. He wants me to make him a tie clip. The letter Z is elegant, design-wise, but having a last name that starts with Z sucks. You’re always last on the list, assigned to the last row of the classroom, the last one to get your diploma.”

  “Kelly Zavarella, huh? Were you the only kid in your class with a Z name?”

  “No. Me and Benny. Benedetto Zeppetella.”

  “Now there’s a name!”

  She grinned and he caught a glimpse of her crooked front tooth. “Benny’s mother loved Tony Bennett and his actual last name is—”

  “Benedetto.”

  She wet a finger and drew a “one” in the air. “Poor Benny. The nuns always gave him a hard time. They said he wrote too big. He could never fit his name on one line.”

  “You went to Catholic school?”

  “With an Irish mother and an Italian father? What else? Didn’t you?”

  “No. My mother refused to send me to parochial school.” And when his Irish mother put her foot down, she’d usually gotten her way.

  “Maybe she had a run-in with a nun like me. In third grade a nun rapped my knuckles with a ruler for bad penmanship. I don’t know why the nuns were so obsessed about penmanship.”

  “That’s easy. Pens are phallic symbols.”

  She rolled her eyes. “Trust you to think of that. When I told Dad, he pulled me out of there and sent me to public school.”

  “What about your mother?” he asked. “Was she mad, too?”

  Kelly’s eyes grew somber and her mouth quirked. “She was too sick to make a fuss. She died the next year. Ovarian cancer.”

  He could tell she didn’t want to talk about it. “And you never saw Benny again?”

  “Not till high school.”

  “Yeah? Did you date him?”

  She gave him a flirty smile and batted her eyelashes. “Nah. I didn’t date Italian guys. I got enough of that at home with my three brothers.”

  I’m your first? he thought but didn’t say. It seemed like she was still pretending this was all about work. Reluctantly, he eased into the purpose of the meeting. “We didn’t get much out of Julie tonight.”

  More like nothing. Julie, a small-boned wisp of a woman swallowed up by an overstuffed chair, couldn’t even remember the color of the rapist’s car. All she remembered was the terror and humiliation, a forlorn figure, twisting a tissue in her hands, saying: I was afraid he’d kill me. He said he wouldn’t hurt me, but he lied! He did hurt me!

  “She’s blocking things out,” Kelly said. “Disgusting things. What is wrong with these guys?”

  “Rape isn’t about sex, Kelly. You know that. It’s about power.”

  “And preying on vulnerable women.” Her eyes blazed with anger.

  He pictured Julie, weeping as she recited her nightmare: He said he loved my boobs. And after he . . . afterwards, he asked if I enjoyed it. I knew he expected me to say yes. So I did. Staring at the floor as she spoke, cheeks flushed with shame.

  He fingered the scar on his jaw. He knew most rapists had been abused as children, but he couldn’t imagine treating a woman like that. He had told Julie it wasn’t her fault; the important thing was that she was alive. Even so, tears had continued to pour down her cheeks, an image that would stay with him for a long time.

  “You care a lot about the victims,” Kelly said, gazing at him with her mesmerizing eyes.

  “How could anyone not be appalled by what she went through? I’d like to put the guy in Attica, let him find out what it’s like to be raped.”

  “Me, too, but we’ve got nothing, no description of him or his car.”

  “Maybe the next victim will be able to help you.” When he saw her face register dismay, he said, “I know you don’t want to think about the next one, but guys like this don’t stop.”

  She guzzled some beer and toyed with a lock of dark hair that curled behind her ear. He traced a finger down her forearm. “Can we get off the rape case for a minute? I get the feeling you’re pretending this meeting is all about work. Is it?”

  Her eyes widened. She tilted her head and her Big-Z earrings swung back and forth. “I don’t know, Frank. I’m not sure. Or maybe I just don’t want to think about it.”

  “You’re comfortable talking to cops, because of your dad and your brother.” And your husband.

  “I feel comfortable talking to most guys. Growing up with three brothers gave me a front-row seat on how guys act.” Her eyes crinkled at the corners as she smiled. “I got used to figuring out what guys mean when they say one thing and mean something else.”

  He drew a “one” in the air with his forefinger.

  His cell phone chimed. Not what he needed now that the conversation was going in the right direction. He checked the ID and answered.

  “Hey, Kenyon, what’s up?”

  “Good news, bad news,” Miller said. “They found the Lakeview getaway car. Fuckers dumped it out in New Orleans East, tow truck’s hauling it to the police garage right now. We get Forensics on it maybe we’ll ID the bastards.”

  “Great,” he said. “What’s the bad news?”

  “Jim Whitworth’s in the hospital with chest pains.”

  “Damn! How’s he doing?” Everyone loved Jim. The veteran detective went out of his way to help rookie cops. He’d helped Frank out a few times during his first year with NOPD.

  “They’re running all kinds of tests, you know, a guy over fifty they take no chances.”

  He wrapped up the call and told Kelly about the getaway car and Jim’s heart problems. She grimaced, as if to say Life’s a crapshoot.

  Or so he imagined. That’s what he was thinking.

  Forget trying to resume their conversation. The intimate mood was gone, and Kelly was yawning. Vobitch had called an early meeting tomorrow. If they didn’t solve the Lakeview case soon, Vobitch might have a heart attack. After three weeks, the reporters were still hot on it.

  Ten days since Chantelle’s murder, not a peep since, nobody making waves about a dead black girl, seemed like he was the only one mourning her death. Except for her boyfriend. Antoine Carter.

  He wasn’t looking forward to telling Vobitch that Antoine might be getaway driver at tomorrow’s meeting.

  _____

  Friday, 3 November

  Antoine copied down the chord progressions Mr. Dawson had written on the white-board in blue Magic Marker. Advanced Jazz Harmony class was one of the few things that kept his mind busy these days.

  Don’t think about Chantelle.

  He focused on the c
hanges, looked up when Georgina entered the classroom. Georgina worked in the office as a student aide during her free periods. Acting self-important, she strutted across the front of the classroom, the little white rings at the ends of her cornrowed hair bouncing off her shoulders. Georgina was a decent singer but chubby, like her pal Marcus, didn’t get to sing with the best bands like the sweeter-looking girls. Not half as pretty as Chantelle.

  Damn! Why did everything remind him of Chantelle?

  Mr. D studied the slip of paper Georgina gave him and said, “Antoine, you’re wanted in the office.”

  Double damn! Nothing good ever happened when you got called to the office. He stuck his pencil in his shirt pocket and rose from his desk. Felt Marcus’s eyes on him. Made sure he didn’t look at the little drug-dealing flute player as he left the room.

  Sure enough, bad news was waiting in the office. Detective Renzi.

  The office lady waved them into a counseling room that smelled of aftershave and burnt coffee. Antoine tried to act cool, perched on a folding chair in front of the desk. But his pulse was racing.

  Looming over him, Renzi set his butt on the desk and gave him the laser eye. “Have you given any thought to what we talked about, Antoine?”

  He kept his face blank, but his heart pounded. What could he say?

  Thought on it every night since, don’t see any way out of the jam I’m in.

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Good. Anything more you want to tell me?”

  “No, sir.” Ain’t giving up AK to no cop, don’t wanna wind up dead.

  Renzi’s eyes grew distant, like he was thinking on something important.

  “We found the getaway car.”

  His heart skittered inside his chest like a jackrabbit.

  “We lifted some prints off the steering wheel.”

  Jesus God, no! His Adam’s apple bobbed up and down. He couldn’t swallow for spit, felt like Godzilla jumped on his chest.

  “We ran 'em through the criminal data base, but we didn’t find a match.”