by Vicki Delany
Nicole knew nothing about Joey’s personal life. She wanted to know nothing. She wasn’t even sure if his last name was Stewart. Until this week, he hadn’t known her real name. It was possible he had another business on the side, but he’d always been available when needed.
She wondered if he were looking for a new opportunity. Running kiddie hookers or taking pictures for child porn was risky, and the law cracked down hard.
Which made it highly lucrative.
She’d had enough of Joey. The bag of cocaine was burning a hole in her purse. She pushed her chair back and stood up. She walked away without saying good bye to the girls. Scissors barked.
***
Molly Smith stared at the phone in her hand. Adam. Probably wondering where she was. They were supposed to be going to the youth center to hear the son of one of the RCMP civilian clerks playing with his new band.
She’d dressed for a night out in jeans and a loose blue blouse shot with gold threads and gold sandals with killer heels. Adam loved stiletto heels, and if she weren’t going to be waking far, she liked to please him.
Nicky Nowak had been wearing sky-high heels last night. When she got into Adam’s truck. Adam also liked long legs. Nicky was very short, but somehow in the flowing skirts and sexy shoes she favored she managed to look as if her legs were endless. Perhaps, Smith thought, Nicky acted as if her legs were long and sexy, ergo they were.
She and Adam had never said they had an exclusive relationship. She didn’t think that was something that had to be said.
She’d thought Adam was going to ask her to marry him.
Had she been wrong about that?
Had he taken her coolness to mean he could screw around anytime he wanted?
Or had he been screwing around all the time, and just happened to be seen this once?
Giving a woman a lift didn’t mean he slept with her.
Did it?
The phone rang again, and this time she flipped it open.
“I’ll be there in a couple of minutes. Are you ready?”
“Almost,” she said.
She didn’t know what, if anything, to say to him.
She certainly didn’t want him to think she was spying on him. She hadn’t been spying, only walking down the street as it was her job to do.
But she had seen him. With another woman.
Tonight he was going out with her.
Not Nicole.
She decided she had to believe in him. She’d let it go, unless something happened to make her think otherwise.
Three minutes later the doorbell to the street rang. She plastered a smile on her face and ran downstairs. She opened the door and turned and walked up the stairs without looking over her shoulder. By the time she got to the top, Norman was ahead of her. She gave him a pat and let him into the apartment.
Adam kicked the door closed behind him and leaned down to give her a kiss. “You smell nice.”
“Thanks.”
“Is something the matter?”
“No. What makes you think that?”
“You seem a bit off. The band’s probably going to be pretty bad. Noise and enthusiasm but not much talent. We don’t have to stay long if you don’t want to. Show our faces and sit through one set should be enough. Marie’s hoping to get a big crowd out to make the boys happy.”
“I’m sure they’ll be fine.” She picked up her bag.
“New shoes?”
“Like them?”
“Like you in them.” He pulled her close. “Think we can be late?”
“No.” She pushed him away.
The band was much as Adam had predicted. Plenty of enthusiasm, little musical talent. But the boys were loving their moment in the limelight, and the crowd applauded each song with gusto.
Smith sipped at her Coke and felt herself relax. Adam squeezed her hand under the table. She squeezed back.
They went to the Bishop and Nun after the show with a group of officers and partners. They pulled tables together and dragged over chairs and were a loud, laughing bunch as they devoured burgers and wings and pitchers of beer and told war stories. Tocek was spending the night at Smith’s apartment, so he was able to enjoy his beer.
He was telling about Norman finding Nowak’s bones, with much embellishment and not a little exaggeration, to some of the people who hadn’t heard the details, when the door opened and Dawn Solway came in. A woman followed her.
“Hi,” Solway said, “Mind if we join you?”
Everyone moved as more chairs were dragged over.
“This is my, my girl… my friend, Francesca,” Solway said. Her cheeks were red, her shoulders set, and her voice sharp.
Francesca was older than Smith expected, quite a bit older than Solway. Of average height, about twenty pounds overweight, with olive skin and short, brittle gray and black hair. She wore loose jeans, a red shirt, floppy black sweater, and peered at the room through rimless glasses. She shook hands and said hello, but her smile was tense.
Smith got to her feet and held out her hand. “Hi, I’m Molly. Pleased to meet you. Adam, shove over.” She waved toward the bar, trying to attract the waiter’s attention.
“First time in Trafalgar, Francesca?” Tocek asked.
“Yes. It’s very nice.”
The waiter waved in acknowledgment, and Smith resumed her seat. So this was Dawn Solway’s mad passion. Oh well, no accounting for taste.
The police officers and their friends had greeted Francesca with warmth and then immediately resumed their own conversation. Solway’s shoulders relaxed, and Smith gave her a wink. The waiter took orders for more drinks.
Alan Dobson staggered over to their table. He rested his hands on the back of Molly and Adam’s chairs and leaned in between them.
“Thought we’d lost you last night, my boy,” he said with a leer. His eyes were red and he blinked to focus.
Tocek shot him a dark look. Dobson laughed again. “Could of knocked me over with a feather when you came back so soon.”
“Shut the hell up, will you,” Adam said.
“What happened?” Smith asked. She’d almost forgotten about Nicky and last night. Dobson would have been there—it was his promotion they’d been celebrating.
Dobson leaned into her face, breathing beer and undercooked hamburger. “Now that I’m leaving, Molly, I can tell you that you’re way too sexy to be a cop.”
Adam’s chair scraped the scarred wooden floor as he got to his feet. “Get lost, Dobson. You’ve had enough.”
The people around them stopped talking. A couple of men pushed their chairs back, ready to intervene. Solway and Francesca exchanged glances.
“Hey,” Dobson said, raising his hands in submission. “What’d I say? She’s cute, okay. Must be darn good in the sack to keep a man’s hand out of that short one’s pants. God, she wanted you.”
Ron Gavin grabbed Dobson’s arm. “Come on, Alan. I’ll take you home.”
Dobson pulled away. “Nah. I’ll have another beer.” He staggered off toward the bar.
Gavin gave Smith and Tocek a shrug. “His wife’s in Ottawa house-hunting. With the baby. Guess it’s the first time since the kid was born Alan’s had a chance to let loose. He’s overcompensating.”
“Any more overcompensating,” Tocek growled, “and he’ll be spending the night in the drunk tank.”
“I’ll keep an eye on him,” Gavin said. He followed Dobson to the bar.
“Want to tell me what that was about,” Smith said once everyone had sat down and conservation began flowing again.
“No.”
“But you will anyway.” She kept her voice low. “I assume he means when you left the Hudson last night with Nicky Nowak.”
Adam looked at her. “You know abo
ut that?”
“Saw you. I was walking past on the beat. About to come in and say hi.” She felt tears prickle behind her eyes.
“God, Molly. I dropped her at her mother’s house. Nothing happened.”
“So Dobson said.” She looked into his soft brown eyes and whispered. “I love you, Adam.”
He pushed his chair back. “Let’s get the hell out of here.”
They walked the few blocks to her apartment holding hands. She’d said the words. For the first time. It felt good.
“About Nicky,” he said, as they turned the corner into the alley that led to her apartment over the bakery.
“Never mind Nicky.”
“I know she’s your friend, Molly.”
“Used to be my friend. When we were in grade school. I was hoping we could be friends again, but I guess not.”
“You know she’s a hooker, right?”
“What?” Smith stopped walking.
“She’s a hooker.”
“You’re kidding.”
“I am not.”
“Did she ask you for money?”
“Didn’t have to. A guy can tell, Molly. I wondered about her when I met her that first night, when you were there. There’s just something… a way that a guy can tell when a woman expects him to pay for it. Even when, like that time, she wasn’t working, it was there. Last night she came into the bar at the Hudson. She laid it on pretty thick, and the guys bought her drinks and played it up. She’s very attractive and knows how to shine a spotlight on a man so he feels like he’s something special. She asked me to take her home. She’d had a lot to drink, so I said yes.”
“But she didn’t ask for money?”
“Not in so many words. That’s not how it’s done. I didn’t have much doubt that a figure would be named soon. Look, Molly, I don’t want you to think I didn’t sleep with her because she wanted me to pay for it. I didn’t sleep with her because I am head over heels in love with another woman. And she gives me everything in the world I could possibly want.”
“Another woman,” Smith said the words slowly. “Anyone I know?”
“No.”
She slapped his shoulder and they continued walking.
“She doesn’t look like a hooker,” Smith said, unlocking her door.
“You’re thinking of the sad cases standing on street corners. That’s the sort of hooker a beat cop or social worker sees.”
“When I was in school, I did a placement at a shelter for street workers.” She had been studying for her MSW, master of social work, when she quit the program after Graham’s death. “Saddest bunch of people I ever did see.”
“That’s the underworld. Lowest of the low. Moving up the ladder you get women who work out of massage parlors, strip clubs, escort services, so-called gentlemen’s clubs. And the escort services can get fancier and fancier. Better class of women, more money.”
“Like Nicky?”
“I’d say your friend is at the top of the game. Now. There’s no place for her to go but down. And in that world, it’s a long way to the bottom.”
Smith unlocked the door, and Norman greeted them with a long wet tongue and wagging tail.
“Should we do something about it?” Smith asked. She headed into the kitchen to put the kettle on. There was no prostitution in Trafalgar. Cases of sexual exploitation on occasion, but not prostitutes working the streets or the hotels. The town was too small, the community and the police too familiar with everything that went on.
“I’ve been thinking about that all day. I might mention it to John Winters, but what happened really? She didn’t ask me for money. Easy enough to say she was captivated by my manly charm. She’s in town for her father’s funeral. Do you know if she’s planning to leave once that’s over?”
“She told me she lives in Vancouver. Where she owns an interior decorating business. I might tell her I’ll drop into her store next time I’m in the city, see how she reacts. She did say she hates being in her mother’s house. They don’t get on, and she can’t wait to get home.”
“So that’s it then. She can take her sordid business back to the big city. Leave us upright, decent citizens alone. Speaking of decent,” he came up behind her and kissed the back of her neck. “I have to take Norman out for a sec. It would make me very happy if you were wearing that red nightgown when I get back. Keep the shoes on.”
Chapter Thirty-one
May Chen didn’t know why she couldn’t be like Becky or Donna or any of the other girls in school. Her parents would have had a fit if they knew she’d gone to Big Eddie’s with her friends on Friday. She told them they were walking the dogs. That hadn’t been a lie; she’d just not mentioned they’d gone for coffee after.
She was almost the last one of the girls in her class to get a phone, and she’d had to beg and plead for it. It was only when Simon told them a cell phone was a good idea, so she could call in case of an emergency, they relented and bought one for her birthday. It wasn’t even an iPhone like Donna had, just a cell, but it was better than nothing.
Saturday night and another dreary week lay ahead.
Monday was violin lessons. May hated the violin. Actually she didn’t hate the violin, she loved the instrument, loved making music, loved the way it felt in her arms. She just hated Mr. Franklin, the teacher, and she hated having to sit in his stuffy back room after school while the other kids were riding bikes or going to Eddie’s or hanging out, and she hated the hours and hours of practice her parents made her do.
She hated her parents.
There, she’d said it.
She hated them.
They were strict and old-fashioned and didn’t understand that they lived in Canada, not some peasant village in China where a trip to the store was a three-day ride on a forty-year-old bus over unpaved roads. Her dad loved to tell stories about how hard life had been in China.
She didn’t believe him.
Tuesday was Mandarin lessons. May hated Mandarin even more than the violin. At least her violin gave her pleasure (well, sometimes) but Mandarin was a waste of time. Her parents didn’t speak English very well, her mom hardly at all. She didn’t understand why she had to go to lessons when she could just talk to Mom, but Mom wanted her children to speak properly. Her own accent, apparently, was uncultured.
At least that was something to be thankful for. May’s friends wouldn’t know her parents were uncultured peasants.
May Chen wanted to be an actress. She loved watching movies and TV shows starring Asian women. Sandra Oh on Gray’s Anatomy, Grace Park on Battlestar Galactica, Lucy Liu in Charlie’s Angels. May had good skin, long silky black hair, big black eyes. Her friends told her she was pretty and there was that boy at school… No point thinking about him. Her parents wouldn’t let her even think about dating.
Courtney had been going out with Trevor Saunderson for six months and she wasn’t much older than May.
Courtney’s parents were cool. They let her do what she wanted, when she wanted. Becky’s dad was a cop, but he seemed like a nice guy and that was cool.
May’s parents worked in a restaurant.
They owned the restaurant, and people worked there for them, but that didn’t matter. All the kids at school knew was that the Chens were cooks and waiters.
Simon had been in a fight a couple of months ago when a boy at his school had said Trafalgar Thai made “Chink” food. Donna’s brother told Donna about it, and Donna told May. They said Simon really sorted that kid out. Simon didn’t know judo or karate or anything, but the kid thought he did and ran away.
May would have liked to have seen that.
It was a Saturday night and May Chen was standing at the sink washing dishes. Becky and Donna were going to a movie. She’d asked if she could go, but Mom said no, she had to study. Dad had co
me home for dinner, which was unusual on a Saturday, but he had to get back soon. Simon stood up for his sister sometimes, but tonight he was getting ready to go out himself and wasn’t paying any attention.
The one good thing in May’s life was that her parents paid no attention to what she did on the computer. They couldn’t read English well enough. Becky had said her dad checked her computer all the time to see who she was talking to. Cops were suspicious, she said.
May’d enjoyed having coffee at Eddie’s on Friday, sitting out on the patio. They’d met a man there and he’d been nice, buying them drinks and asking questions about what they wanted to be when they finished school. May had hesitantly told him she wanted to act, and he’d gotten all excited. Said he worked film shoots in Vancouver, big Hollywood movies.
He Facebooked her later and said if she was ever in Vancouver he’d take her to work with him. Introduce her around. She had, he said, the look the camera loved. Asian girls were hot in show business right now.
She’d been on the phone with Becky while using Facebook. She told Becky she was thinking of going. Becky said the guy was just trying to sound important.
As if her parents would ever allow her to go to Vancouver, anyway. They didn’t even want her to talk about acting. They wanted her to be a doctor, like her cousin Ellen who was in med school in Toronto. Simon hoped to go to UBC next year to study math and computer science. Maybe when Simon was at the university she’d be allowed to visit.
But that was a whole year away.
“May, violin,” her mother said.
“Ah, Mom, no. It’s Saturday.”
Her phone rang, and she turned away from her mother’s scowl to answer.
“Whatcha doin’?” Courtney asked.
Her parents didn’t like Courtney much. Mom had been shocked the one time Courtney had come over during the summer because her T-shirt showed her bellybutton and the top of her breasts. Courtney had the biggest breasts in grade eight. Maybe that was why her boyfriend was Trevor Saunderson, who was in grade ten.
May’s mother took May shopping for clothes.
