Pipeline

by Brenda Adcock

  Throwing her head back, Stevie laughed. "Just kidding, Jo, except for the great journalist part." After a pause, she said, "Well, the other part is true, too, but I figured he probably didn't need to know that."

  "Thank you," I said, relieved. "His opinion of me is bad enough without adding fuel to the fire."

  "I'll tell you the truth, Jo," Stevie said, "I don't think I'm going to find out anything useful for you. It's like your son has lockjaw when it comes to talking about whatever he's working on. I've tried buddy-buddy and had him pretty much three sheets to the wind this afternoon and couldn't get jack out of him except about his girlfriend."

  "Yeah." I sighed. "I think you're right. Maybe he's decided to dump the story."

  "I know you'll disagree, but there isn't a story anywhere worth getting shot over."

  "Neither of us used to think that way." I smiled.

  "Well, maybe your son is smarter than we were."

  Chapter Ten

  TWO LONG WEEKS had crawled by, and Stevie hadn't been able to find out anything about the story Kyle had been working on at the time he was shot, and I was becoming convinced it was a dead end. Kyle and Sarita were going about their daily routines without even a hint of danger around them. I finally decided that it was time for Stevie to go back to her hideaway cabin when the photographer she was replacing came back from his vacation. I had gone through the pictures I had taken in Kyle's apartment a dozen times but still hadn't found anything useful or been able to decipher his shorthand. Pauli was at a dead end, too, and as far as I could tell there was nothing more to pursue. Kyle's shooting had to have been one of those random acts that were always in the news.

  I was relieved to leave San Antonio and get back to my retirement. After all the assignments I had covered, all the dodged bullets, I couldn't remember doing anything more draining than the last three weeks in San Antonio. The only thing I wanted to do was return to the privacy of the ranch, but I felt obliged to tell Cate that I had come up with nothing.

  I stepped off the elevator on the fifth floor of the Travis Professional Building in Austin at two-forty and walked toward a glass wall at the end of the hall. Bradley and Hammond was etched across the glass doors. Just inside was an oak-paneled reception area where a young woman was seated behind the desk. She was groomed for the secretarial fast track, and I was decidedly out of place in my jeans and denim work shirt. I left my sunglasses on as she turned toward me and smiled.

  "Can I help you, ma'am?"

  "Cathryn Hammond, please," I said as I glanced around the office. Cate must have decorated this part of the office herself, I thought. It was tastefully done and as understated as she was.

  "Do you have an appointment?"

  "Just tell her that Joanna Carlisle is here."

  The woman picked up the phone and punched in a few numbers and waited. "Ms. Hammond? I'm sorry to disturb you. There's a lady here to see you. She doesn't have an appointment." She waited a moment and nodded as if the other party could see her. "She says her name is Joanna Carlisle." More nods and a glance at me. "Yes, ma'am. I'll tell her." She placed the receiver back in its cradle and smiled again. "Ms. Hammond asked that you wait a few minutes, Ms. Carlisle. She's just finishing up with another client."

  I sat down on a couch at the opposite side of the reception room, rummaging through a few magazines on a glass coffee table. Fifteen minutes had passed when I heard Cate's voice. She accompanied her client into the reception area and stopped at the desk. She was wearing a fitted gray linen suit with a subtle white pinstriping. The collar of a white silk blouse was turned neatly over the collar of the suit jacket.

  "Peggy, make an appointment for Mr. Douglas some time late next week." She turned to the client and placed a hand on his arm. Smiling, she said, "I don't think you have anything to worry about, Richard, but I'll know more after I've had a chance to check a few things."

  "Thanks, Cate. This really takes a load off my mind."

  They shook hands and good old Richard departed.

  Cate turned toward me. "I'm sorry to keep you waiting, Jo. Please, come in." To Peggy, she said, "Hold my calls for about thirty minutes."

  "You have another appointment in fifteen minutes, Ms. Hammond," the woman said, leafing through an appointment book.

  "Just get them something to drink and apologize for me," Cate instructed. She moved down the hallway and stopped next to an open door. I entered the room, and she followed, closing the door behind her. "Coffee?" she asked as she walked to her desk.

  "No, thanks," I answered. I sat down in a leather chair across from her and removed my sunglasses.

  "Pauli and I have looked into every angle we could think of in San Antonio, but there just is no story there, Cate. Kyle might have been involved in something else, or the kid who shot him could have mistaken him for someone else."

  "I see. Are you going to continue looking into it?"

  "I'm on my way back to the ranch," I replied, shaking my head.

  "He might still be in danger, Jo."

  "He might or might not be." I shrugged. "But there isn't anything more I can do, Cate. I still don't know squat about what he's working on, and I can't spend forever tailing him, hoping to get a break."

  "So you're just going to walk away?"

  Now she was beginning to piss me off. None of this had been my idea to begin with, and her tone of voice made me feel like some kid who'd been called to the principal's office.

  "Well, what would you like me to do?" I asked. "If you think this is so fucking easy then share some of your brilliant insights with me."

  "You're the one who's supposed to have all the fabulous connections. Can't they do something?"

  "They've already done everything they can. Look, I feel bad about leaving him to figure all this out by himself, okay, but that's what growing up is all about."

  "Even if it gets him killed."

  "Goddamn it, Cate. Do you want me to sleep in my car outside his apartment every night and guard him? He's a man. Let him be one, for Christ's sake."

  She rose from her chair and glared at me. "I'm doing what any responsible parent should do when she finds out her child might be in danger. And you should, too, Joanna."

  "In this case I think you're expecting too much."

  "You're right, Jo. I used to expect you to be a parent and a partner, but you couldn't deal with that either."

  Her words stung, and I felt blood rushing to my face as I stood to face her. "Don't throw that shit in my face! I can't change the past, okay."

  "That still doesn't solve Kyle's problem."

  "You asked me to help him, and I gave it my best shot. There's nothing to be found."

  "Then maybe you should go back to the ranch and crawl into whatever hole you've dug for yourself. Forget you ever knew Kyle or me."

  "I never knew him," I said through clenched teeth, "and I'm beginning to think I never knew you either."

  Our discussion had degenerated into something much more personal. Years of built-up resentment and guilt had finally bubbled their way to the surface. We had had dozens of similar arguments during our years together, and our life had been either very good or very bad. Never anything in between. When we loved, we loved passionately. When we fought, we fought just as passionately.

  "You weren't home long enough to know either one of us. Your idea of family responsibility was to leave for weeks or months at a time, come home and catch a fast night or two in bed, and then go back to whatever the hell you were doing without the slightest thought about whether we needed you or not."

  "I don't remember having to work very hard to get you into bed, babe," I said with a sarcastic edge.

  "I was your partner, Jo! I had to hope you remembered that between visits."

  "Fuck you, Cate," I spat, pointing my finger at her. "You knew damn well what I did for a living when we met. I provided for you and Kyle every way I knew how."

  "You gave us everything we wanted. Everything except yourself. I used to
think you were consumed by your career, but now I know it was because you didn't give a damn about anyone except yourself. And fifteen years hasn't changed that."

  During the course of our argument our voices had risen, apparently unnoticed by either of us. Cate had moved around her desk and was standing close enough that I had to restrain myself from smacking her just because it would have felt so damn good. She must have had the same idea because her hands were balled into fists. Whatever thoughts I was having were interrupted by a knock at the door. Before Cate could respond, the door opened partway, and a woman stuck her head into the room. She smiled at us uneasily.

  "Do you need some assistance, Cate?" she asked with a quick look at me.

  "No, Susan. Ms. Carlisle was just leaving."

  Susan remained at the door and opened it further, pulling wire-rim glasses from her face, and stared at me. I would have guessed that she was a few years younger than me, but the gray in her hair made it hard to tell.

  I turned back to Cate and leaned closer to her. "Don't call me again."

  Before she had a chance to respond, I turned and walked to the door. I stopped and glared at Susan until she moved away from the door. As I went down the hallway, I heard her ask, "Who the hell is that?"

  "A dissatisfied former client." Cate's response was bitter.

  Chapter Eleven

  I COULD'VE SLEPT in Wednesday morning, but I'd been restless since returning to the ranch. The sun was just beginning to break through the treeline in front of the house when I carried a cup of coffee out on to the front porch and settled into my father's favorite wooden rocker. Except for the chatter of a few birds and the repetitive squeaking of the rocker on the wooden porch, everything was peaceful.

  The quiet of the morning was broken by the roaring sound of a car engine, and I squinted down the road leading to the house. A cloud of brown dust was billowing up from the unpaved road, and I knew Lena was on her way. I like being left alone but never got the hang of housekeeping. I hired Lena Rubio to come out once a week to dust, wash, and do other little household jobs. Wednesday was Lena's day in the country.

  She was a no-nonsense woman of forty although she looked older. I hadn't asked many questions about her past and wasn't interested in credentials when I met her at a local bar. Best guess was that once upon a time she had been a real heartbreaker. Now she was usually a little overmade and hadn't missed many meals over the years. She always had an off-color joke to tell, smoked like a chimney, cussed like a sailor, and threw back drinks with the best of them. I'd met some rough-around-the-edges women in my life, and Lena ranked at least in my top ten most memorable women. But she had a heart of gold and was a sucker for anyone's sob story after a few beers.

  Her old car slid to a stop near the porch, sending a cloud of dust toward me. I leaned against a porch post to wait as she hauled herself from the vehicle and had to smile when I saw her. Her black hair was piled haphazardly on top of her head with several strands falling down onto her face and neck. She reached into her car and pulled out a large fabric bag and slung it over her shoulder before slamming the car door shut.

  "Rough night?" I asked as she trudged toward the front steps.

  "Fuck you, Jo," she said as she continued up the steps and past me into the house.

  From her response I knew immediately that she had overslept and hadn't had her coffee yet. I caught the front screen before it slammed shut and followed her into the kitchen. She threw her bag onto the kitchen table and grabbed a coffee cup from the cabinet next to the sink. When she turned around, I was already there with the pot of hot, black heart-starter. She shoved the cup toward me, and I poured. Carrying the cup to the table and sipping noisily as she sat, she stopped long enough to dig through the bag, finally fishing out a pack of generic cigarettes and a scratched-up Zippo lighter. She took a long drag on the cigarette as she snapped the lighter closed with a metallic click.

  "God, I hate mornings," she said through exhaled smoke.

  "Then come later. I don't give a shit when you get here," I said.

  "Too damn hot later." She smiled at me, showing teeth that would have made an orthodontist drool. "Maybe I just move in here with you, sugar," she continued, squinting as smoke slowly rose over her face. "Then Lena won't have to worry about gettin' too hot...'cept maybe at night."

  "Afraid I couldn't handle that one, Lena."

  "You skinny women all alike." She laughed loudly. "Shit, I squash you like a bug in bed."

  "But if you're any good, it'd be worth dying for, right?"

  "Don't you worry youself 'bout that. Lena good enough. What you got today? Same as usual."

  "Yeah, I haven't been back long enough to make much of a mess."

  "It ain't like you use all the rooms or nothin'. Three, four at the most." She leaned toward me. "I tell you the truth, Jo. I a'most feel guilty 'bout takin' you money."

  "I don't feel guilty about giving it to you, so what's the difference?"

  "You know, some of the nosies in town are thinkin' you and me got somethin' goin' out here."

  "Really?" I chuckled, remembering Cate's questions about Lena.

  "You bet you ass. 'Fore long everbody gonna believe I'm Jo Carlisle's woman."

  I had to laugh at the idea of the old-timers around Kerrville gossiping about me and Lena. Most of them hadn't seen me since I was eighteen and went off to college, although I liked to think I'd left one or two broken hearts behind when I left.

  "No one believes that, Lena. You're too much woman for me," I said.

  "You fuckin' right 'bout that."

  She crammed the cigarette between her lips, picked up her coffee cup, and waddled into the laundry room behind the kitchen. As I left the kitchen, I could hear her singing to herself and water running into the washing machine. Lena was a good woman who had developed an unsavory reputation when she was younger and never bothered to set the record straight. She had never married and had no children. Most people regarded her as easy, and I had heard plenty of men bragging about being with her, but somehow I couldn't bring myself to believe everything I'd heard.

  Half an hour later I was ready to go out the door. Lena was vacuuming the living room as I came down the stairs. She was wearing headphones and had a cheap cassette player clipped to the waistband of her polyester pants. In between pushes and pulls on the vacuum she undulated to whatever she was listening to. Watching her, I couldn't begin to imagine what kind of music could possibly inspire those particular movements. When I tapped her on the shoulder, she jumped nearly a foot, ripping the headphones off.

  "You tryin' to give me a fuckin' heart attack, you stupid bitch! You shouldn't sneak up on a body like that."

  "Didn't mean to scare you. I'm taking Jack out for a while. I'll be back in an hour or so."

  "You think I give a damn where you go? Ain't like nobody ever calls or comes out here. You live like some kinda hermit anyway, like you 'fraid of folks. If you die, nobody know or care."

  She pulled another cigarette out of her pocket. As I was going out the door, I glanced back and saw she had resumed her dance with the vacuum cleaner.

  When I moved back to the ranch, I sold off all the livestock except Jack. He still had some fight left in him but was reliable, and like me, getting too old to care about very much. We hadn't gotten off to a great start, and I doubted that a friendship would ever develop between us because we were both too accustomed to having our own way. But over the last year and a half, I came to admire his independent nature while he tolerated my stubbornness.

  After lunch, I locked myself in the darkroom to develop some film I'd shot before I went to San Antonio on my Good Samaritan mission. I was in the middle of developing the first roll when Lena banged on the darkroom door.

  "Jo! You got company!" she hollered through the door.

  "Who the hell is it?" I yelled back.

  "'Nother woman. You really be robbin' the cradle with this chica."

  "I'll be out in a minute."

&nb
sp; "Don't take all day. I ain't no hostess here."

  Damn! The road to my house was turning into a tourist attraction. The advantage to living away from town was supposed to be that no one wanted to drive all that way just to visit.

  No one was in the living room six or seven minutes later when I left the darkroom, and I thought maybe whoever it was had already left. As I entered the kitchen, Sarita Ramirez was sitting at the kitchen table with Lena, looking a little uncomfortable as she twisted a glass of tea in front of her. She stood up quickly when I came into the room.

  "How are you, Miss Ramirez?" I said, going to the refrigerator and grabbing the pitcher of tea.

  "Sarita, please. I'm sorry to intrude on you, Ms. Carlisle, but I really have to speak to you," she said.

  "About what? Refill?" I asked, taking a glass from the cabinet next to the sink.

  "No, thank you. I've spoken to Kyle's mother, and she told me she had asked you to help him. I wanted to tell you that I appreciated that. He's very stubborn, but he does need someone's help even if he doesn't want to admit it."

  "I've done everything I can without knowing more about his story. I have to have a starting point."

  "I can tell you what the story is. If you know that, will you help him?"

  "Go ahead," I said as I poured tea into a glass and took a drink.

  She glanced at Lena and then back at me.

  "Would you prefer to go into my office?" I asked.

  "It don't matter none, honey. She gonna tell me everthin' after you gone anyhow," Lena said with a chuckle.

  Sarita blushed slightly and followed me to my office.

  "Does Kyle know you're here?" I asked.

  "No. I called in sick today after he left for work."

  "If he finds out he might not be too happy that you came here."

  "But he'd still be alive."

  "You know that Kyle and I aren't on speaking terms, and I assume you know why," I said.

  "Cate explained it to me, and I've seen pictures of the three of you together when he was a child."

  "Have you ever asked him about them?"

  "He doesn't discuss his past with me."

  "All right," I said with a shrug, "tell me what you know."