Charade

by Sandra Brown

  A third customer, she now noticed, was at the video game machine at the other end of the bar. She could see only his back. He was skinny, his butt not even defined in the seat of his dirty jeans. He had stringy, unwashed hair that trailed over his neck to a point between his bony shoulder blades. He seemed to be playing more from boredom than any desire to win.

  When his last rocket crashed with a high, shrill whistle, he turned away, tipped a longneck to his lips, and sauntered toward the bar. He eyed them curiously, then dropped onto a barstool and turned his attention to the bowling tournament.

  Cat whispered, “How long do we have to—”

  “Shh.”

  “I want to know.”

  “I said shut up and let me handle it!”

  Alex’s sudden shout astonished her into silence. She gaped at him while he swore beneath his breath and glanced nervously over his shoulder at the other patrons and the bartender. He gulped a swallow of beer and shot her a warning look as he slipped out of the booth.

  Cat watched him sidle up to the skinny guy who’d been playing the video game. Alex ordered two more beers and sat down on the stool next to his. “Uh, excuse me. You Petey?” Cat heard him ask in an undertone.

  The skinny guy’s eyes never left the TV screen. “What’s it to you, asshole?”

  Alex leaned toward him and mumbled something that Cat couldn’t hear. Petey guffawed. “Whadaya think, I’m fuckin’ stupid? Jesus.” He looked down the bar at the other drinkers and rolled his eyes. The bartender chuckled. “Fuck off,” Petey said to Alex, hitching his head toward the door.

  “Hey, look, I got—”

  Petey came around, snarling like a wildcat who’s tail had been stepped on. “Get the fuck outta my face, man. You got heat written all over you.”

  “You think I’m a cop!” Alex exclaimed.

  “I don’t care if you’re the fuckin’ Tooth Fairy. We got no business with each other.” He turned back to the TV.

  Alex, looking desperate, wiped his palms up and down his pants legs. “Dixie said—”

  Petey whipped his head around, almost striking Alex’s cheek with his stringy hair. “You know Dixie? Fuck, why didn’t you say so? Are you the—”

  “Nephew.”

  “Shit.” Petey signaled the bartender. “Get me one of those.”

  He waited until he had a mug of draft, then motioned for Alex to pick up his two fresh beers. They made their way to the booth. Petey slid in across from Cat. “Hiya, Red.” Eyeing her, he slurped the head off his beer. “This your old lady?” he asked Alex.

  “Yeah.”

  Cat remained silent while Petey and Alex swapped stories about Uncle Dixie. Their voices lowered to a covert tone so gradually that Cat hardly noticed until Alex said, “Thanks for agreeing to see me.”

  “My ass is fried if they figure out you ain’t who you say you are.”

  “I know,” Alex said grimly. “This is important or I wouldn’t have asked Uncle Dixie to set it up.”

  “Will one of you please tell me what’s going on?” Cat hissed.

  “Stay cool, babe.” Petey reached across the table and stroked her cheek. She slapped away his hand. He laughed and waved it in the air as though his nicotine-stained fingers had been scorched. “Hot tempered, hot in the sack, I always say.”

  “Chill out, will ya?” Alex said to her, loud enough for the others to hear. By now, two more customers had ambled in, a man who looked mean and tough enough to be a logger, and a woman who looked meaner and tougher than he. To the amusement of the other customers, she was exchanging amicable but lewd insults with the bartender.

  “Dixie filled you in on what I want to talk about?” Alex asked in an undertone.

  Petey nodded. “I remember it like yesterday. Better’n yesterday in fact. It ain’t something you forget, ya know? Almost four years ago, a gang member slid under a trailer truck. Practically took his head off.”

  Cat sucked in a sharp breath. Petey looked at her, then back to Alex. “Are you sure she’s cool?” he asked worriedly.

  “She’s cool. Go on.”

  “He went by the name of Sparky. Don’t know what his real name was. Serious dude. Always reading books. Poetry, philosophy, shit like that. Had a lot of schooling. He was from back east somewhere, I think. Rich is my guess. Had those fancy mannerisms, ya know?”

  “What was he doing with the gang?”

  “Maybe Mom and Dad got pissed over something and kicked him out. Or he caught his old lady in the sack with her girl friend. Who knows?” Petey raised his bony shoulders in a shrug. “Anyway, he dropped his real name, came to Texas, and found us. He was cool. Everybody liked him okay. ’Xcept Cyc. Right off he and Cyc locked horns.”

  “Cyc?” Cat asked.

  “The gang leader. Called hisself Cyclops ’cause he had a glass eye.”

  “What was his quarrel with Sparky?” Alex asked.

  “What else? A squeeze. Hot piece of ass named Kismet. She’d been Cyc’s old lady before Sparky came along. They hit it off real good. I think they really had a thing going. They liked to rack, sure, but I think it was more than that. You sense these things, ya know? Whatever, Cyc was pissed.

  “Funny,” he said, lowering his voice even more. “Cyc suspected Sparky of being a narc. He didn’t do many drugs, see. A joint now and then. No heavy stuff.”

  “Was he a narc?”

  “Not that I know of.”

  “What brought on the accident that killed him?”

  “Cyc made a move on Kismet. Sparky charged him. They fought. Sparky won. He put Kismet on his bike and off they went. But Cyc chased them. Hell of a race. Sparky had to be going ninety or better when he hit that trailer truck ’cause it was like nothing I’ve seen before or since.”

  His oily hair barely rippled when he sadly shook his head. “Jesus. I’d followed ’em down out of the hills. Figured that Cyc would be the first to draw blood. That trailer truck beat him to it. Sparky was one big blood-slick on the highway.”

  Cat shuddered but remained silent.

  “The paramedics scooped up the parts and piled them into the ambulance. We all followed it to the hospital. To save her life, Sparky had pushed Kismet off the bike right before they crashed. She was hurt, coupla broken bones, banged up beyond recognition. Cyc had managed to swerve and miss the truck, but his bike went out from under him. He was hurt too, but he was conscious.

  “This emergency room dude approached us about Sparky being an organ donor and wanted to know how to contact his next of kin. We said as far as we knew Sparky didn’t have no family. He mentioned something about presumed…uh…something where they can take the organs.”

  “Presumed consent,” Cat said softly.

  “Yeah. That’s it. But he wanted one of us to give him the go-ahead. The rest of us agreed that since Cyc was the leader, he’d have to make that decision. Cyc said, ‘Sure. Cut the fucker’s heart out and throw it to a dog for all I care.’ So I guess they did.”

  Thirsty after the long monologue, Petey noisily gulped his beer before resuming the story.

  “Kismet stayed unconscious for a coupla days. When she came to, she went apeshit. First because Sparky was history, then because Cyc let them mutilate him before he was buried. Cyc kept telling her the guy had no head left, so what difference did it make? But she went freaking nuts about it anyway.”

  “What happened to her?” Cat asked.

  He shook his head. “The gang broke up after that. Our heart just wasn’t in it no more.” He laughed, showing yellowed, pointed teeth that made him look like a friendly rat. He looked at Alex meaningfully. “I moved on, ya know?” Alex nodded. “You gonna tell me why you’re interested?”

  “She’s a heart transplantee.”

  Petey’s eyes swung back to Cat with renewed interest. “No shit? Cool. You think you got Sparky’s heart?”

  Cat didn’t even have to think twice about it. “No. I know I didn’t.”

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  �
�I thought you’d turned up zilch about your donor,” Alex said.

  “That’s true. But even without the agency’s report, I’d have known Sparky wasn’t my donor.” Cat turned to Petey, who was hunched forward, listening. “I didn’t get your friend’s heart. You see, second to blood type, size is critical for a good match.” She made a fist with her small hand. “I needed a heart this size. I’m too small to have received a grown man’s heart.”

  Petey again revealed his jagged yellow teeth in a grin. “Sparky wasn’t grown.”

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “Don’t you think I considered the size of the heart before following this through?” Alex grumbled. He looked at Petey. “Tell her what you told Uncle Dixie.”

  “Sparky was a runt,” he said. “Pint size. Couldn’t’ve been smaller if he’d been sawed off at the knees. He caught hell about his size from everybody, especially Cyclops. Behind his back, Cyc was always saying he didn’t know how a pencil dick like Sparky could keep Kismet happy. Thing was, Sparky had a cock like a racehorse. What he lacked in stature, he made up for in that department.”

  “How big was he?”

  “At least nine inches,” he answered, dead serious.

  Cat shook her head. “How tall was he?”

  “Oh. Five-two. Five-three at most.”

  “Stocky?”

  “Shit, no. Don’t you listen, lady?”

  “Rarely,” Alex put in dryly.

  “I’m telling you, he was a pissant. Strong and quick, though,” Petey added as he thoughtfully scratched his armpit. “He could hold his own in a fight. Landed Cyclops flat on his ass.” He glanced nervously beyond Alex’s shoulder. “Is that it? We gotta wrap this up, if you know what I mean.”

  “Thanks, man.”

  “Anything for Uncle Dixie.”

  Cat watched in disbelief as Alex exchanged several folded bills for a plastic pillow filled with white powder. He slipped it into his jacket pocket, then stood and hauled Cat out of the booth.

  By way of goodbye, Petey said, “Y’all mind if I finish your beers?”

  The sun had slipped below the tree line on the distant hills. It was a beautiful twilight, especially in comparison to the gloomy interior of the bar. Cat breathed deeply to cleanse her nostrils of the stink of booze, smoke, and unwashed bodies.

  She got into the car unassisted and rolled down the window, still greedy for fresh air. Alex slid behind the wheel and, saying nothing, drove for several miles before stopping at a crossroads.

  Cat watched, aghast, while he removed the plastic pillow from his pocket, pricked it open with his thumbnail and worked his finger inside, then rubbed the white powder into his gums above his front teeth.

  He glanced at her. “Why’re you looking at me like that? You can’t be shocked. You’re from Hollywood.”

  “I knew plenty of people who did recreational drugs, but I steered clear of them.”

  “You don’t want to party with me?”

  Her jaw was tense and set. “No, thanks.”

  “You sure? I thought later, when we got back to your place, you could brew us some tea.”

  “Tea?”

  “Yeah. And we could sweeten it with this.” He dumped some of the powder into her lap. She stared at it with apprehension, then looked at him. He winked at her. She dipped her finger into the white substance and tasted powdered sugar.

  “Smart-ass,” she muttered as she brushed the sugar off her skirt.

  Chuckling, he pushed the car through the first four gears. “Petey’s a narc. Works undercover. Deep cover. Has for years. Wouldn’t surprise me if he’s hooked on the stuff himself, but he wouldn’t sell the real thing to a cop. Even a former cop.”

  “How’d you find him?”

  “I started looking through death certificates and turned up several catastrophic deaths that occurred in Texas during the twelve hours before your transplant. This motorcycle accident was a good place to begin. Sure enough, after digging deeper, I discovered that the fatality had indeed been an organ donor.

  “Then I asked a former associate at HPD if he knew of any agency—ATF, DEA, local police—that had penetrated a motorcycle gang in the last five years. He nosed around and turned up Uncle Dixie, who’s supposed to be Petey’s big distributor, but is actually the code word for a special narcotics unit out of Austin.

  “I talked to the chief of the outfit. He was reluctant to set up a meeting with Petey; he only agreed to it because I was a former cop. I went out on a limb by taking you along. I hope you can keep your mouth shut and not blow his cover.”

  She shot him a retiring look. “Your meeting with Petey had nothing to do with drug trafficking. Why did you have to play out that scene? And why there?”

  “If we’d met some other place and someone had seen him talking to a straight like me, it would have aroused suspicion. He can’t afford that. He could lose his credibility, his contacts, and probably his life. Better that I looked like a duffus who dared to tread on Petey’s turf looking to score.”

  “Well, you did look like a duffus.”

  “Thanks. Hungry?”

  Five minutes later they were seated on opposite sides of a square table covered with blue and white checked oilcloth. In the center of it were grouped bottles of Tabasco and ketchup, a variety of steak sauces, salt and pepper shakers, and a sugar dispenser. Tanya Tucker was on the jukebox. Back in the kitchen, their flour-dredged, tenderized steaks were being fried in a vat of hot grease.

  Cat resumed the conversation where they’d left it. “You’re very adaptable, aren’t you, Alex?” She squeezed a fresh lemon wedge into her glass of water, which was so large she couldn’t get her hand around it.

  “In my former line of work, being able to think on my feet was a requirement.”

  “Would you have used the gun today?”

  “To save our lives? Damn right.”

  Trying to sound casual, she asked, “Did you ever have to shoot someone?”

  He stared at her long and hard before saying, “When you’re a cop, you think you’re trained to handle anything that might come down. But you’re not. When you run into an unexpected situation, you do the best you can.”

  That was the only answer she was going to get. She let the conversation lag while he stirred sugar into his iced tea. He was the next to speak. “Where’d you get your training?”

  “You mean my acting training?”

  “I know you were an orphan who was reared in foster homes. Beyond that, I don’t know anything about your life before you joined the cast of Passages. Where’d you grow up?”

  She let herself be diverted, thinking that if she told him something of her background, he might be more open to discussing his. What Dean had told her today had disturbed her, but she didn’t think it was as cut and dried as Dean had made it sound. She wanted to hear Alex’s version of what had happened that fateful Fourth of July, but he wouldn’t tell her if she asked. If he ever gave her an account, he would choose the time.

  “I grew up in the South, actually. That’s right,” she said, noting his surprise. “Alabama to be exact. After years of vocal coaching, I finally lost the accent.”

  “What was little Cat Delaney like?”

  “Skinny and redheaded.”

  “Besides that.”

  She picked up her knife and began tracing the checks in the tablecloth with its serrated blade. “It’s not a pleasant story.”

  “I doubt it’ll spoil my appetite.”

  “Don’t be too sure,” she said around a shaky laugh. She began by telling him about her illness. “I beat the cancer but was still puny for a year or so. One day, I felt so weak the school nurse volunteered to drive me home. My dad’s car was in the driveway, which was unusual for that time of day. I went in—”

  The waitress served their salads.

  “I went inside through the back door, expecting to find Mom and Dad in the kitchen. But the house was very quiet. Later, I remembered that uncommon stillness, but a
t the time I didn’t give it much thought and went looking for my parents.”

  Blood began pounding in her temples as, in her mind’s eye, she followed that painfully thin child with unmanageable red hair, pale, skinny legs poking out of wide-legged shorts, new navy blue sneakers on her feet, moving soundlessly along the hallway where her baby pictures smiled down at her from dime-store frames.

  “They were in their bedroom.”

  Alex stirred in his chair. She sensed him propping his elbows on the table and leaning forward, but she didn’t take her eyes off the checked pattern of the tablecloth. She moved the knife blade along the straight edge of a blue square with the concentration of a child trying desperately not to color outside the lines.

  “They were lying in bed. I thought they were taking a nap even though it wasn’t Sunday. It took several seconds for me to figure out what all that red stuff was. When I did, I panicked and ran to the neighbor’s house, screaming that something terrible had happened to my mommy and daddy.”

  “Jesus,” Alex whispered. “What happened? Robbery?”

  She dropped the knife onto the padded cloth. “No. Daddy took them both out with a pistol to the head.”

  She looked at him with the same defiance with which she had once faced the child welfare caseworkers, practically daring him to pity her.

  “I spent the next eight years in the foster care system, being shunted from home to home until I could take responsibility for myself.”

  “What’d you do?”

  “About what?”

  “About school. Money.”

  “Your salad’s wilting.”

  “Talk.” He speared a leaf of lettuce that was dripping buttermilk dressing, but he didn’t put it into his mouth until she resumed her story.

  “After high school, I got a job as a typist for a large manufacturing firm. But I was going nowhere. Promotions were based on seniority, not merit. It was as unfair as the foster care system.”

  “What was wrong with it?”

  “What wasn’t?” She set down her fork and waved both hands in front of her face as though erasing what she’d just said. “Strike that. That was a gross generalization. Most foster parents are giving and self-sacrificing. It’s the concept that needs reform.”