My clothes smelled like they had been cured in some sort of barbecue pit. I could only imagine the state of Lonnie’s lungs. I stripped and put everything, suit included, in the hamper and then showered to get the smell off my skin and out of my hair. Clean and bristly, towel around my neck, I stepped out of the bathroom. The bedroom was dark, but through the slats of my blinds the streetlights imprisoned the pictures pinned to my wall in bars of light. I stepped toward the wall. A leg was illuminated, a hand, a knee. I gently rubbed a finger across the smooth arch of a foot.
I had been flirting with her, all the time feeling some deeper connection grow. And then, and then, and then I had pushed her away, like I was Cagney with a grapefruit. I suppose I was tired of hearing how wonderful things had been twenty years ago, how wonderful had been the parties, the cars, the society of young and beautiful friends, the money, the very life, how wonderful had been Tommy Greeley. They were still in the middle of it, Lonnie and Chelsea, Cooper Prod, even Eddie Dean, who was somehow involved in it all, somehow, and I had just then a very strong idea how. They were all still living it as if it had all been so wonderful, as if it had all been so proper and so swell. A life distant yet still alive, a life that could never include me. I felt like I was back in high school, pushed to the side as the cool kids strode like kings through the hallway. The hell with them.
And yet here, on my wall, was part of it too. The pictures, the body, the emotions. Her neck. Her shoulder. The bend of her elbow. The curve of her wrist. Maybe it wasn’t them, maybe it was me. Maybe I had pushed her away because I was afraid. Afraid of getting too close to this, of getting consumed, or maybe of being consumed with disappointment. Answer me this, when had reality ever lived up to fevered expectation? Barely touching the paper I traced the bulge of her calf, the curve of her knee, the smooth inside of her thigh.
The phone rang.
I spun around. I snapped the towel off my neck and tied it around my waist.
The phone rang.
I panicked for a second, thinking it must be her, it had to be her. What should I say? How could I apologize? What were the magic words? There were always magic words. I’m a fool. Forgive me, please. You’re so so special. You frightened me, that’s what it was. Or the old standby, Did you know I can lick my eyebrow?
The phone rang.
I stepped forward and picked it up.
“I found another one,” came the voice.
“Excuse me?”
“A car, mate. Another of Manley’s cars.”
“Skink?”
“Who’d you think it was?”
“No one. Go on.”
“A 1989 LeBaron convertible. Who came up with that name for a car, hey? LaIdiot? But there it is. A LeBaron convertible, a classic much in demand with collectors, sos I hear. But that don’t matter none to you, does it? LePiece-of-crap, it’s one of two registered to the girlfriend, but she drives the other one, a Lincoln. This one, we traced the pinks back to a dummy New Jersey corp. what’s stock is registered to our boy. It’s behind her apartment down in German-town. A la-di-da place called the Alden Park.”
“I suppose we should go after it.”
“Suppose?”
“It’s just that Manley looks like a beaten dog already.”
“Some dogs you just can’t beat enough.”
“You’re a card carrying member of PETA, I presume. I’ll set up a date with R.T. in the sheriff’s office.”
“Do that, mate, afore it disappears on us. The thing about a car is it’s a mobile asset, innit? Here one day, cruising west on Route 66 the next.”
“I don’t think this one’s going anywhere.”
“How’s the job going?”
“Confusing,” I said. “It’s like I’m lost in a maze.”
“Oh, a rat like you will find his way eventually, I got no doubt, long as there’s cheese at the end. Anything more for me?”
“Yeah, there is.” I rubbed my scalp with my fingernails, rubbed it so hard I could feel the burn. “I want someone followed. Very discreetly. No hint you’re giving her the tail.”
“A dame?”
“That’s right. But it’s real Mission Impossible stuff.”
“I’m caught or captured, the secretary will be disavowing any knowledge of my knickers, is that it?”
“That’s it.”
“All right, Vic. It’s good to know where I stand. Give it up.”
“Her name’s Straczynski,” I said. “Alura Straczynski.”
Chapter 33
SEVEN NINETY-NINE WOLF STREET. Apartment Three B.
Beth and I stood in the hallway, at the door. We had debated for how to play it. Vacuum cleaner salespersons? City health inspectors? Homeland Security investigators checking out a suspicious neighbor? We came up with a bundle of bad possibilities, and then decided to play it straight, sort of.
“Hello,” said Beth, when the door was cracked opened by a heavy woman in a great red-and-purple muumuu. “We’re looking for Beverly Rodgers. Is this her residence?”
“Yes.”
“Are you Ms. Rodgers?”
“No.” The woman gathered up the collar of her housedress in a meaty hand. “I’m just a friend who helps take care of her. And you are?”
“We’re lawyers,” I said, handing my card through the narrow opening. “We need to talk to Ms. Rodgers about a matter of some urgency.”
“How did you get through the security door?”
“A nice lady on her way out held it open for us.”
“They’re not supposed to do that. A letter has been sent to all the tenants.” She leaned out the doorway, looked behind us into the hall. “You’ll have to leave. Beverly can’t be disturbed right now. She is ill.”
“Nothing serious, I hope,” said Beth.
“I’m afraid it is. She is a terribly ill woman and she has insisted that she have no visitors. But later, if she gains enough strength, perhaps she’ll be able to give you a call.”
“Like I already told you, we are here on a matter of some urgency,” I said. “It involves a will. I believe she knew a Mr. Joseph Parma, now deceased?” I looked behind me and then lowered my voice. “I can’t talk about it in the hallway, but it might be in her interest to see us immediately, before Mr. Parma’s mother takes charge of the estate.”
“I’m sorry. She can’t be disturbed.”
“Why don’t you ask her. We’ll wait out here while you do.”
She squinted at us for a moment and then closed the door. We could hear the locks engage and then the groaning of the floorboards as she stepped away, toward some back room in the apartment
“It won’t be long,” I said, and it wasn’t.
Muumuu lady gave us a quick, halfhearted smile when she opened the door again. “My name is Martha,” she said. “I’m a friend of Bev’s. I help take care of her.”
“Are you here often?” I said.
“Every day.”
“Paid?”
“I said I’m a friend.”
“So you knew Mr. Parma.”
“They come and go,” said Martha. “Bev is feeling a little better and says she is able to see you. This way, please.”
Martha led us through a fussily furnished living room, with chintz throws thrown over the chairs and strange erotic statues turned into lamps. The place smelled of stale perfume, of spilt whiskey, of Dorothy Parker. A box of candy, its top off, its small brown papers strewn and empty, sat on a coffee table between a fluffy couch and an old console television. A couple of framed art nouveau prints of dancing women were side-by-side on a wall. Erté? Ouch. In the corner sat a wheelchair.