Turn or Burn

by Boo Walker

  The top two buttons of her shirt were undone, and a sliver of a gold necklace traced down her chest and disappeared in between her breasts, which I tried not to look at as I started to walk toward her with my hand extended. She smiled and came toward me. I summed it up in my mind. Wendy Harrill was a master of looking hot yet sternly conservative and religious, almost papal (though these people weren’t Catholics), at the same time.

  “Welcome, welcome, welcome,” she said. She was so captivating she almost made me want to explore Christianity for a minute. Then I remembered that my life was shit, and I was going to die and there wasn’t much to look forward to until the coffin closed, and I quickly dropped my need for religion.

  “Thank you, thank you, thank you,” I said with great enthusiasm, the thespian in me shining.

  “Please come with me. We can go into my office.”

  “Thanks for making time for us.”

  “Oh, it’s my pleasure. I had a few free minutes this morning.”

  “You do seem busy. We’ve seen you all over the news.”

  “Oh, yes. Lots of work to be done right now.”

  We followed her back outside and she led us to the main building. She bowed at the altar as she entered. Francesca and I did as well. I felt like I’d take anyone’s help at that point. Take away the massive cross out front, and the church could have just as easily been confused for a medical clinic or an attorney’s office. The pews were designed so that the congregation sat in a half-circle facing the altar, as opposed to the usual straight rows in the church that my folks dragged me to. The design almost suggested a more liberal view of the Lord, but from what I’d seen of Wendy on the tube, that was far from the truth.

  Wendy took a seat in the front pew and motioned for us to join her. We all sat looking at the altar, which was a table holding a four-foot tall golden cross, surrounded by an arrangement of flowers that my mother would have called “darling” or “exquisite.” She did flowers back at our little Episcopal Church in Benton City.

  I sat between the two women. Wendy was almost uncomfortably close. She twisted toward me and put an arm up on the back of the pew.

  “This is my office,” she said with a smile, beginning to work the magic that had no doubt won her a congregation of the devout.

  She started her spiel and it was more like a performance than a discussion. It disgusted me. “I understand you live in Portland and are moving here,” she said. “So you’re searching for a place to worship. I used to live in Portland. I’m an Oregon Duck through and through.”

  I nodded excitedly, showing a lot of teeth, thinking how my last nerve was fraying quickly.

  “Let me tell you a little bit about what we do, what we believe. I’ve been here for fifteen years and—”

  Boring! It was my turn. “Before you go on, let me interrupt you.” My words almost startled her. “I think I can sum up why we’re here pretty quickly.”

  “By all means.”

  “A friend sent us here.”

  “Who would that be?”

  I looked her in the eyes. “Jameson Taylor.”

  All I was hoping for was some sort of recognition, so I could push her if she tried to lie. What I got was one seriously terrified look. It only lasted a second before she composed herself, but it was clear it was way too early in the morning for her to have been prepared for such a perfect blindside.

  I decided to continue. “Now, let’s not waste anyone’s time with you trying to deny that you know him. I know you do. He told me,” I lied. “We’re not here to get you in trouble. We’re here for some information.”

  She started to stand. “Look, unless you’re the cops, I have nothing to say to you. I’ve already told them what I know.”

  I grabbed her arm. “Please sit back down.”

  She wasn’t very quick to move so I pulled her down. Gently, of course. She didn’t like it, and I could see some fear creep into her.

  I got very close to her, still gripping her arm. “I don’t think you’re involved with what’s going on here in this city, but I think you might have some information. No, I’m not a cop. Nor is my partner here. We lost a friend a few days ago because of this, and we’re trying to find some answers. You are our only hope right now. I apologize for grabbing you, but we can’t walk out of here without the truth. I’ll do whatever it takes, if you know what I mean. Don’t make me be that guy. So you can tell us what you know about Jameson Taylor and this group he’s running with, and we’ll walk out of here and you’ll never see us again, or you can try some kind of dance, and I’ll have to include you as one of them. And by that, I mean my enemy. I can be ruthless to my enemies, as you can imagine.”

  A tear fell from her eye, and she wiped it with her free hand.

  “Don’t be scared,” I said, “but I’m glad I got your attention. I’m not here to hurt you. I’m here to find some bad guys. What do you think? You feel like talking?”

  She nodded.

  Of course I had no intentions of hurting her. I was simply doing what needed to be done.

  “Thank you,” I said. Then I did something really out of character. I reached up and wiped a second tear from her eye. Harper Knox, the King of Compassion.

  “Tell me about Jameson.”

  I had just crumbled this poor woman. She took a breath and then leaned over with her elbows on her thighs. “I’ve already told the cops all of this.”

  “That’s fine. I have an inherent distrust in our justice system. In short, I feel confident that I can get more done than they can. So please…”

  “Jameson started coming here about a year ago and got very involved. Quickly. Within six months, he was the head of our vestry.”

  “What’s the word: vestry?” Francesca asked.

  “It’s the administrative committee. They do the stuff that lies on the more political side of our church. He became more controlling than I liked, and extremely radical, and I asked him to leave. Simple as that.”

  Francesca continued. “How did he become a problem specifically?”

  “Well, it seemed he wanted my job. He was trying to undermine me. Change the way I do things.”

  “Like what?”

  “He didn’t think homosexuals should have any roles of authority in our church. He wanted a man that had been with us for five years to stop teaching Bible Study.”

  “You didn’t agree?”

  “Not in the slightest. We are not on this earth to judge. I also got the feeling he didn’t think that, as a woman, I should have any authority, either.”

  We heard a door open and looked back at the entrance. A janitor was coming in, pushing a mop. I turned back around and asked a question of my own. “Where can we find him now?”

  “The cops asked the same question. I have no idea. I made him leave and he hasn’t been back.”

  “Don’t lie to me, Wendy,” I said. “You don’t want to do that. There has to be something you can remember. Some way to find him.”

  She sat up. “I’m not lying.” She glanced at the janitor, who was working his way through the pews. “I’m not lying,” she said again. “I have the address he put on file with us. I gave that to the cops, too. That’s all I have.”

  “Do you know anything about his personal life? Did you meet his wife?”

  “No. I never met her. He said he was trying to bring her in, but she wasn’t ready yet.”

  “What does that mean? ‘Wasn’t ready?’”

  “That’s just what he said.”

  “Was anyone else close to him here? Anyone we could talk to?”

  “No one was close to him that I’m aware of. Everyone seemed to gravitate toward him at first, eating up every word he said, and then by the time I asked him to leave, no one disagreed.”

  “What were his feelings on the Singularity? I know you’ve been extremely vocal publicly about it. Did it ever come up between the two of you?”

  I studied her as she responded. She looked me directly in the eyes and w
ithout flinching, said, “We never discussed it. This was long before the Summit was announced. It was something I hadn’t discussed much with my congregation until afterwards.”

  We grilled her hard for another fifteen minutes and then decided that the well had gone dry. I felt liked we’d gotten the truth. I gave her my number and we left her sitting in the pew.

  It wasn’t until we got back into the cab and had gotten close to the highway that I noticed someone was following us.

  CHAPTER 36

  “Take this exit,” I told the cabbie. Then to Francesca, “Someone’s on our tail. That red wagon, five cars back. VW or something. Been onto us since before we got onto I-5.”

  The cab driver moved to the right lane and exited a half mile down. The wagon followed us. As we came to a stop at the red light, I waited for the wagon to come up behind. It was a busy exit; several cars were between us. A truck drove up, sandwiching our pursuers, and I took the opportunity to make a visit. I opened up the car door.

  “Be right back.” I stepped out and started walking toward them. Two male white drivers sat in front. As soon as they saw me coming their way, they started making a move. The driver threw it in reverse, slamming into the truck behind them and pulling out onto the shoulder on the other side. I ran in between two cars to get closer to them. Thought about drawing my weapon but didn’t want to start firing on people without knowing who they were. For all my luck, it was some of Dick-tective Jacobs’s plain-clothed lackeys.

  They hauled ass off the shoulder into the grass, moving toward a gas station forty yards out. As the car turned, I could see the back end; I looked for a tag, but it didn’t have a license plate. I cursed out loud.

  They hit a bump over the curb, reached the asphalt, and peeled away. I ran back to the cab and hopped in, closing the door. “I’ll give you two hundred bucks to go after that red wagon,” I said.

  “No way. You’re crazy. I got a family, man.”

  “Three hundred.”

  “Get out!” He turned toward us. “You get out of my car! Now! I will call the police.”

  The light turned green and someone started honking.

  “Oh, no you won’t,” I said. “Give us a ride up to the U District and we’re good. I’ll give you fifty bucks extra, cash. Let’s not have any trouble. Not a good idea on your part.”

  He turned around, mumbling something in Amharic, and put the cab in gear. We got back onto the highway and got him to drop us off in the U District.

  “Amesege’nallo,” I said, flaunting more of my linguistic skills.

  “Yeah, whatever. Just get out of my cab.”

  “I’m sorry,” Francesca said to the man. “He has the epitome of a dysfunctional life. Lost his parents when he was younger. Came back from the war with PTSD. Now, he’s an asshole. He forgot how to treat people.”

  I was out of there before I heard what the driver said. I glared at Francesca once she got out. She tilted her head down and raised her eyebrows. “What?” she said. “Did I cross the line? Am I wrong?”

  “You’re not wrong.”

  “At least you know it.”

  We got out of the car and walked over to Jake’s Woodworks. Last time we’d gone by, they’d sent us to Whidbey where they’d burned the triskelion on my skin and we’d nearly died. I figured I owed them one.

  No one was there except for some kid in his twenties. He said he was the only one working and that the owner was out of town. He didn’t know where. Not surprised, we went on our way.

  We walked around the U District wondering what the hell our next move would be; we were running out of options.

  “I don’t know about you, but I sure am getting tired of this cab thing. Want to come buy a truck with me?” I asked Francesca.

  “That would make things easier.”

  “I think so. And at this point, it’s hard to guess how long we’re going to be in town. I’m not feeling much closer to the truth than I was three days ago.”

  Francesca agreed.

  ***

  We left the Toyota dealership around 4 p.m. with my new ride: a white, three-year-old Tundra truck with twenty-seven thousand miles on it. The white would help fight that desert sun, which was going to start delivering 100-plus degree days out at the vineyard soon. Hopefully, my insurance would cover it. I felt like they’d agree my old one was totaled. We went by Jameson’s wife’s house again. She let us in but we learned pretty quickly that she didn’t have much more for us. She did confirm that the cops were looking for him, too. I didn’t mention he had branded me the day before.

  After that, we went by Apple and bought a new computer. The one I’d left in Francesca’s Range Rover, I was sure, was long gone. I will spare you the details of how annoying I was to haggle with during the day’s purchases. I’m pretty sure none of the sales guys I’d worked with would go home thinking good thoughts about me. And it felt good to spend a ton of money I didn’t have. If I ever see Ted in the afterlife, I’m going to collect on whatever the common currency is. This pro bono retribution work was for the birds.

  We got back to the hotel at 6:30, and I said I would go find us some food. Francesca was going to start mulling through some Internet blogs and see if we might make any progress that way.

  I needed a walk anyway. I strolled over to Thirty-fourth and walked into the PCC Market, which is something like Whole Foods, but more Seattle-hip. Still full of tree huggers and yuppies walking around with yoga mats, but hell, you can’t take a step in Seattle without running into three of those types anyway. I picked a few things up from the deli: roasted beets, couscous, spinach salad, falafel, some other picks. What I call “medicine food.” For all the hell I give them, the yuppies do know how to eat. That’s for sure. I hoped Francesca could handle not eating meat for a night, though her body might break down due to a “lack of protein,” as my meat-eating buddies love to say. She sure as hell wasn’t going to get any sausage from me. I chuckled at my own joke.

  As I was leaving, I popped over to the wine section. The past few days had been a lot to deal with, and I had a strong desire to get drunk. I don’t drink California wine because, if I’m drinking domestic, I’m going to support my home state. Besides, I think you can always find better deals in Washington. I ran my eyes up and down the shelves, noticing many wineries I was familiar with, some winemakers I’d run into over the years, and then plenty of others that I’d never heard of. Wineries were popping up like crazy, and I couldn’t keep up.

  I finally found what I was looking for: Red Mountain. That’s where I lived and it ran through my blood. I had been raised on Red Mountain, and in a way, it had raised me. Back when I was a kid, there were no vines. I was a boy when John Williams and Jim Holmes planted the first vineyards on the mountain, back in the seventies. They came in and cleared out the tumbleweeds and dug holes for irrigation and planted baby vines, and the magic of Red Mountain was discovered.

  The bottle I took off the shelf was a blend made by the Hedges family, who lived right up the road from me. They’d come to the Mountain in the early nineties, back when I was head banging to Pearl Jam, and within a few years, they had picked up more than one hundred acres near the top of the mountain. Anne-Marie was from Champagne, France, and Tom was from right down the road in Richland, and they had done a great deal for Red Mountain and for Washington State wine in general. And they were good, honest, hardworking people making top-notch wine that was full of soul. They’d certainly taught me a lot over the years.

  In an almost-happy state, I grabbed two bottles of the Hedges Family Estate Red Mountain wine, paid the lady, and bid her a Namaste on the way out.

  ***

  Francesca was leaning up against the back of her bed looking at the computer. She’d showered and put on an A.S. Roma T-shirt and sweatpants. Women love to get comfortable when they’re not out and about. Apparently, even female soldiers were like that. It didn’t occur to me until right then what kind of trouble I was asking for by introducing alcohol int
o this equation. I think it was my subconscious playing tricks on me, screaming to the real me: you need to get laid!

  “What’d you get for us?” she asked.

  I set the bags down on the desk. “Vegetarian heaven. You won’t believe it.”

  “Great. I would love to dive into a plate of leaves. Sounds delish.”

  “Hey, I’m looking out for you. Can I fix you a plate?”

  “Sure. Or I could just stick my head out the window and nibble on some fir branches.”

  “True. Or you could go downstairs and find yourself a patch of grass to munch on. Bovine style.”

  “Tempting.”

  “I did get some wine. I have an urge to get drunk tonight. You’re welcome to join me.”

  “Is that how you plan to get back in my pants?”

  “Absolutely not. I’d like those pants to stay on tight tonight.”

  “Good…because like I said, you’ve gotten all you’re going to get.”

  “Believe me, I am in no way interested in being the reason the royal highnass of Palermo gets dumped before his big wedding day. You can consider yourself safe here.”

  “Good. All business then.”

  “All business. You couldn’t even tempt me if you tried.”

  “Nice try. You’re extraordinarily smooth.” She pointed her finger toward the bathroom. “Go wash your hands so we can eat.”

  “I’ll be right back.” I prowled slowly as a lion, shaking my extraordinary derrière. Self-proclaimed, of course.

  “Dacci un taglio,” she said, laughing. I didn’t know what her words meant, but it was the kind of laugh that warms you up. I wished I could bottle it and save it for the lonely days that I knew were coming.

  And I’ll admit. I sure did like knowing I could make her laugh. Does wonders for a man’s confidence.

  CHAPTER 37

  I fixed us both plates and handed her one. Then uncorked a bottle of the Red Mountain. “Would you like a glass?” I looked at our options for stemware. “Or, I mean, a plastic cup.”