Dirty

by Debra Webb

  “I don’t know his name,” I admitted, my words as thin as a whisper. Not once in all those years had I allowed myself to consider the full ramifications of what I’d done that night.

  My mind rushed back ten years. The barrage of sensations that accompanied the memories stole my breath again. We’d met at the bar of a local nightspot—the hottest singles gathering place at the time. Even now it felt surreal...as if it had happened to someone else. It was the night my divorce had become final. My son was with his father and new stepmother. As glad as I was to be rid of my lying, cheating, pompous ass husband, I felt lonelier than I’d ever felt in my life. I’d gone out for the evening hoping to get my mind off the past and focused on the future. I was a free woman. Had a second chance. I was supposed to be ecstatic.

  But the truth was I hadn’t dated in fifteen years. I felt out of place, like I didn’t belong. God, that had been a miserable feeling. The other women at the club were flirting or dancing and dressed to kill. I simply didn’t know how to do that anymore. Somehow in all those years of motherhood and being a wife I’d forgotten how to be just a woman.

  Then he had claimed the bar stool next to me. I stared at the man in the photograph...my thumb slid over his face as if I could somehow reach back in time and touch him. Dark hair and eyes. Classically handsome. He’d had that whole Cary Grant suavity going on. The attraction was instantaneous and fierce. The encounter had begun as a game, then he’d started talking to me as if we’d known each other for years. Pretty soon he had me laughing and then...incredibly he’d made me want him like nothing I’d ever wanted before.

  We ended up in a motel room...alone and feeling desperate like the world might end in the next moment. Heat rushed through me as images from that night flooded my mind. Still keeping up the pretense of the game he’d started, we hadn’t exchanged names, just hours of explosive passion.

  How could I have put that night so completely out of my mind?

  Damn. Now I remembered. The next morning I had awakened and he was gone. He’d left without saying good-bye, without my even knowing who he was or where he’d come from. But that magical night had coalesced into a kind of clarity that woke me up as nothing else could have.

  I never told anyone about him...not even my closest friends. But somehow that night a complete stranger had made me see that everything would be all right. I would survive the divorce and all it entailed. I was still a desirable woman and my destiny was my own. All I had to do was make it happen.

  Surely this wasn’t someone’s idea of a sick joke. That couldn’t be. Absolutely no one knew about him or that night. I shook off the memories and, knowing that Hobbs and Alita waited for some sort of enlightenment, I explained, “I mean, I met him...spent time with him, but I didn’t get his name.”

  “What do you suppose the message means?” Hobbs ventured, still looking suspect as regards my responses. The man read me entirely too well. He would want the rest of the story.

  Not trusting my still unsteady legs I stayed put on the edge of my desk, but I forced my mind to wrap around the possible scenarios. I studied the face that held a kind of power over me even now, then reviewed the message once more.

  “I’m not sure. But this—” I tapped the number “—looks like a court case number.” The files my father had brought home from work as a judge had been designated similarly.

  “I can check the PO box. Try and track down the guy’s name if you’d like,” Hobbs offered. “Shouldn’t be too difficult. The DMV will have–”

  “I haven’t seen this man in ten years,” I interrupted my assistant’s attempt at cutting through the awkward tension. “I met him at a bar.” My eyes fixed on his. Might as well give him the facts up front. “We had a one-night stand. When I woke up he was gone. That’s all I know.”

  Hobbs cleared his throat indelicately. “Well, that’s a start. Let me scan that photo and see what I can find.”

  He took the photo from me but hesitated a moment. “You don’t have any idea who might have sent this? Someone you shared the experience with?”

  I shrugged. “No one else knew about that night. Maybe he told someone, but I didn’t.” I kept to myself the other possibility that had already crossed my mind. I just didn’t see what the man in the photo could hope to accomplish by sending something like this.

  Hobbs let the subject go at that. But he wouldn’t rest until he figured out who the guy was. I told myself I wanted to know too, but the ominous warning written on the back of the picture had me hesitating. If he was dead, did I really want to know? What could I possibly have had to do with it? I hadn’t even known his name. Hadn’t heard from him in all this time...of course if I had been the last one to see him alive that would certainly explain why.

  The instincts I’d worked ten years to hone suddenly overrode my more tender emotions. Damn straight I wanted to know who he was and what had happened to him. Obviously someone thought it had something to do with me and that, if nothing else, made it my business.

  “I be going now,” Alita said uncertainly. “You be okay, Miss Jackie?”

  I squeezed her arm and produced a reassuring smile. “I’ll be fine, Alita. Don’t worry. We’ll take good care of Emilio for you and I’ll look into your request.”

  She nodded. “When there is time.”

  With Alita off to work and Emilio busy building a Lego city, Hobbs promenaded back into my office. “I checked with FedEx. They weren’t that helpful,” he griped. “The sender was a John Smith. He’s also listed as the owner of the PO Box.” He snorted. “That’s almost as bad as John Doe. And get this, the shipment originated from right here in Houston. The clerk couldn’t recall what the sender looked like, only that he was male. He could have stuck it in our door and saved himself thirty bucks.”

  I nodded, a part of me still distracted by memories that just wouldn’t be ignored. I should have asked him his name. How could I have slept with a man and not even have known his name? To some degree I supposed that had been part of the mystique...we could be anyone...do anything. No boundaries had restrained us. That night...our being together was all that had mattered. But now, considering the picture and its ambiguous warning it felt wrong.

  “Is there something you’re not telling me, Jackie?” Hobbs prodded. The man loved juicy gossip but I knew his question was related to the worry I saw in his eyes. This blast from the past had shaken me. He’d noticed. “Is there any reason you know of,” he went on, “that this guy could have some sicko friends who’ve just discovered your connection to him?”

  I shrugged. “I don’t know the first thing about him.” Except that he’d been an attentive lover. Why would anyone do this now? Ten years was a long time.

  Hobbs handed the photograph back to me. “What about the number? Can we use that to track him down?”

  I stared at the message for a moment. “That’s a possibility. If it’s what I think it is.” I felt reasonably certain it was. “I’ll check it out.”

  “Before you get into that,” Hobbs said, his tone moving back into his usual perky zone. “I do have some good news.”

  I considered my assistant, dubious of the idea that anything he could tell me would be good news just now. Then again maybe he’d found out he’d won the Lottery and wanted to share with his soft-hearted boss. I might not have a clue as to the guy in the photograph’s name or whether he was dead or alive, but maybe we would be able to pay next month’s operating expenses.

  “Good news? Really?”

  Hobbs looked immensely proud of himself. “Two requests for background searches came in, while you were chatting in secret with Alita.” He tacked on that last part as if he’d been shunned and the pain was far too great to bear.

  I rolled my eyes. Hobbs was like a jealous girlfriend. He couldn’t stand the idea that Alita and I discussed something he didn’t know about. “Great,” I told him, working at a patient smile. At least those two requests would cover some of next month’s lease payment.

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nbsp; I really should show more enthusiasm. Somehow we always managed to get by, this time would prove no exception. Then again, I wasn’t foolish enough to believe our good fortune was mere luck. Hobbs hustled. He’d likely been on the telephone drumming up business while Alita and I talked about Emilio’s father. I didn’t recall hearing the phone ring with incoming requests. Considering that the two cases I had to focus on just now were non-profit, anything Hobbs brought in would be extremely helpful toward keeping the agency afloat.

  “And I have a two hundred dollar bid on the shoes,” he tossed out as if he’d just forecast the weather.

  My head came up. “You didn’t,” I charged. My toes instantly curled in a protective manner. These damned shoes were a symbol of my growth as an independent woman. My badge of sex appeal. Hey, I worked hard in a man’s profession. Kicked ass with the best of them. These shoes made me feel feminine. No way was he auctioning them on eBay.

  “You insist on taking pro bono cases at every turn (referring to mine and Alita’s conversation no doubt–Hobbs has BESP, Bigass Ears Studiously Panning...he heard everything) and you run off the best thing that could have happened to this agency.” He plopped his hands on his fashionably clad hips and glared at me. “Just think how many new paying clients a pretty face like that could draw in.”

  My eyebrows winged upward in a what-the-hell-does-that-mean fashion. “I think I’m offended,” I let him know. Christ, it’s not like I’m frickin’ cover model material, but I ain’t exactly ready for an extreme makeover.

  He huffed as if I should get it and didn’t. “You’re surely aware that female clients prefer a strong, handsome man to attend to their needs. No offense, but you simply don’t possess the right equipment.” He stared at my feet. “However, you do have those shoes. And that bag.”

  “The shoes and bag are off limits,” I snapped. Enough with the eBay cracks.

  “Tell me the truth, Jackie,” Hobbs said as he sidled up next to me. “Didn’t you find Dawson the least bit hot?”

  The little tingle that stirred made a liar out of me before I even spoke but I wouldn’t have admitted it for a second pair of thousand dollar designer shoes. Come to think of it Hobbs had no doubt used that ploy about the shoe bid just to get my mind off the picture from my past and the message it carried. “Honestly, Hobbs, after what I went through this morning and just now how could you expect me to be attracted to any guy?”

  Jesus, did I look that horny? After my shower I’d changed into work clothes. The pale blue skirt was hardly a gnat’s ass above my knees. The matching short-sleeved shell epitomized the term conservative. Other than the stylish shoes I could be a bible-thumping missionary at this point. Every delicious ounce of self-esteem I’d garnered from this morning’s amazing romp in the sack had fizzled like a dud firecracker. And now, I stared at the troubling photograph, the past comes back to haunt me.

  My too smart for his own good assistant grinned. “I knew you’d like him.”

  He just wouldn’t let it go. “Me?” I stood, realizing I couldn’t sit around here feeling sorry for myself any longer. “I wasn’t the one shimmying with excitement.”

  Another surge of red brightened his skin from the mock turtleneck of his short-sleeved cotton cashmere sweater to the top of his gelled head. Black sweater, black wide leg Gabardine pants and two-toned leather slingback shoes. Hobbs always looked ready to step onto the dance floor of the poshest club in downtown Houston. Sometimes I hated him for the ease with which he fell into a state of pure elegance.

  “For the record,” he said pointedly, “I don’t shimmy. That move went out in the sixties. Don’t you have something to do? Volunteer work of some sort? Tracking down old lovers?”

  He was right. The sooner I got on this the sooner I would have some answers. “You nudge your contacts at the DMV,” I told him. I grabbed my bag protectively. “I’ll prod a few contacts on my own.”

  “If I hear from Dawson I’ll let you know.”

  I didn’t bother telling him not to hold his breath. “You do that. I’ll check in with you later.” I glanced over my shoulder as I headed to the door. “And don’t forget—” I let the weight of my stare settle fully upon him “—the shoes and bag are off limits.” I didn’t hang around to hear his response.

  I had to find out what happened to the man in the photograph and what it had to do with me. Someone obviously wanted to know or had a point to prove.

  The only thing I knew about that night for sure was that we’d had killer sex.

  I winced. Bad word choice.

  Actually I knew two things about that night. The sex had been great and my lover had been very much alive when I fell asleep in his arms.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Max Caldwell worked deep in the bowels of Houston’s Management Information Systems, which supported HPD as well as the rest of Houston city government. His pasty skin provided indisputable testimony as to how little time he spent in the sunlight considering his ten-hour a day work place was nestled far beneath city hall without a window in sight.

  His mop of curly brown hair looked as if it had never been plundered by a comb much less a barber or stylist. Since I’d seen him in swimming trunks I could attest to the matching rugs on his chest and back. Eyeglasses with thick, coke bottle lens required his constant attention to prevent them from slipping off his thin blade of a nose and did little to disguise the unibrow he’d had going on since puberty. Faded T-shirts with unreadable logos, tattered jeans and scuffed sneakers had always defined his wardrobe of choice.

  Otherwise, Maximillian Eugene Caldwell was a good-looking young man. There wasn’t a single thing wrong with him that a good stylist, a wax job on the old chassis, contacts, and a trip to Old Navy wouldn’t fix.

  At twenty-three, Max is the quintessential computer geek...a nerd of the highest order. But a good friend and a reliable contact, so eccentricities are allowed. He’d gone to school with my son and I’d patched up many a skinned knees for both of them as well as baked more than my share of chocolate chip cookies. Believe it or not, despite my lack of actual skill in the kitchen I’d never had the first complaint when it came to my baked goods. No one ever had to know that my secret ingredient was the package. Betty Crocker had it going on. Why mess with perfection?

  Max shoved his glasses up his nose and pinched his lips together as he searched another database for a match. Needless to say, after more than two hours, my hopes were waning. The metal folding chair he’d scrounged up for me provided hard evidence that the young man rarely had visitors in this dungeon of a workspace. I might not have noticed the lack of amenities if he’d gotten a single hit with the photo. But, as it was, I’d had nothing else to do except scrutinize my surroundings.

  Damn. Not one hit. Either the guy wasn’t in any system or his face had changed sufficiently that there weren’t enough value points for a decent match.

  My favorite computer guru pecked Enter again and leaned back in his slightly more comfortable upholstered desk chair. He exhaled a mighty breath of spearmint-scented frustration and waited for a report. The kid still liked chewing gum. Which was good since, in view of the number of empty pizza and Thai take-out boxes lying around and the grossly cankered coffee carafe, keeping fresh breath couldn’t be easy.

  I resisted the urge to shift around in my seat in hopes of regaining some feeling in my ass. He was doing me a favor and I greatly appreciated the effort. The last thing I wanted to do was give the impression that I was restless or impatient.

  When the screen stopped flashing once more it showed that the search had again come up with zero matches. Max grunted. “I can’t find him based on this photo,” he said, admitting defeat after dozens and dozens of searches on every database that allowed him access and a few that didn’t.

  Max had learned a number of backdoors into other agency’s systems after two years on the job. But those secrets, he surreptitiously pointed out, he saved for special situations, like now. Max was the smartest guy I knew. He�
��d finished high school two years early, completed college and graduate school in less than four and even then he’d proclaimed boredom with the academic process. The city of Houston snatched him up before anyone else could.

  “It was worth a try,” I said in all sincerity. “At least I know he doesn’t have a criminal record.”

  Max scrubbed at his chin, his hands far too soft looking and his nails too clean for a straight guy. Maybe I should invite him on a picnic, try to fix him up with some nice girl. I figured the only sex he was having was with Rosie Palm and her five merry sisters. The one picture anywhere around his desk was of his mother. Not a good sign. I knew his mother. Talk about over protective. She’d scarcely let him out of the house as a kid. Thankfully he and Steven had buddied up. Since neither had any interest in sports, a cardinal sin in Texas, or band, a similar but lower level infraction, the two had been considered social outcasts in most school circles. But they had each other.

  “Just because I can’t find the case number doesn’t mean it’s not valid,” Max said, wading into my retro ruminations. I’d been doing a lot of that today, traipsing around in the past...recalling things I hadn’t thought of in forever...like long lost lovers.

  “They don’t keep those files in the system as long as you’d think,” he went on as he drummed his hands on the arms of his chair. “If it’s been ten years or more it definitely wouldn’t be there.”

  Ten. My unlucky number today, or so it seemed.

  “How would I go about getting a hard copy of the case file?” I wondered aloud. There had to be a way. Whoever sent me this message had done so for a reason. Wanted me to find out what had happened though I couldn’t yet comprehend why or how. Either that or my John Smith sender intended to lure me into a trap. He definitely hadn’t given me a hell of a lot to go on. And, he could be a she. There was no way to know for certain. The fact that a he had shipped the package to me, didn’t mean he knew what was inside it.