J is for JUDGMENT Read online

  I hauled my handbag from the backseat and fumbled in the front pocket until I found my penlight. “Let me see what’s going on,” I said, as though I had a clue.

  I got out of the car. Wendell got out on his side and moved around to the rear in concert with me. I was glad of his company. Maybe he knew something about cars that I didn’t – no big trick. In situations like this, I always like to take action. I opened the back flap and stared at the engine. Looked like it always did, about the size and shape of a sewing machine. I expected to see sprung parts, broken doohickies, the flapping ends of a fan belt, some evidence of rogue auto parts adrift from their moorings. “What do you think?”

  He took the penlight and leaned closer, squinting. Boys know about these things: guns, cars, lawn mowers, garbage disposals, electric switches, baseball statistics. I’m scared to take the lid off the toilet tank because that ball thing always looks like it’s on the verge of exploding. I leaned over and peered with him. “Looks a little bit like a sewing machine, doesn’t it?” he remarked.

  Behind us, a car backfired and a rock slammed into my rear fender. Wendell made sense of it a split second before I did. We both hit the pavement. Wendell grabbed me, and the two of us scrambled around to the side of the car. A second shot was fired, and the bullet pinged off the roof. We ducked, hunched together. Wendell’s arm had gone around me protectively. He flipped the switch on the penlight, making the pitch dark complete. I had a terrible desire to lift up to window level and peek out across the street. I knew there wouldn’t be much to see: dark, a dirt bank, swiftly passing cars on the freeway. Our assailant must have followed us from Michael’s house, first incapacitating Wendell’s car and then mine.

  “This has got to be one of your pals. I’m not this unpopular in my set,” I said.

  Another shot was fired. My rear window turned to cracked ice, though only one chunk fell out.

  Wendell said, “Jesus.”

  I said, “Amen.” Neither of us meant it as profanity. He looked at me. His previous lethargy had vanished.

  At least his attention had been sharpened by the situation. “Someone’s been following me the last few days.”

  “You have a theory?”

  He shook his head. “I made some phone calls. I needed help.”

  “Who knew you were going to Michael’s?”

  “Just Renata.”

  I thought about that one. I’d taken her gun, which I remembered now was in my handbag. In the car. “I have a gun in the car if you can reach it,” I said. “My handbag’s on the backseat.”

  “Won’t the inside light come on?”

  “In my car? Not a chance.”

  Wendell opened the door on the passenger side. Sure enough, the interior light came on. The next bullet was swift and nearly caught him in the neck. We ducked down again, silent for a moment while we thought about Wendell’s carotid artery.

  I said, “Carl must have known you’d be at Michael’s if you told him you’d meet him afterward.”

  “That was before his plans changed. Anyway, he doesn’t know where Michael lives.”

  “He says his plans changed, but you don’t know that for a fact. It wouldn’t take a rocket scientist to call Information. All he had to do was ask Dana. He’s kept in touch with her.”

  “Hell, he’s in love with Dana. He’s always been in love with her. I’m sure he was delighted to have me out of the picture.”

  “What about Harris Brown? He’d have a gun.”

  “I told you before. I never heard of him.”

  “Wendell, quit bullshitting. I need some answers here.”

  “I’m telling you the truth!”

  “Stay down. I’m going to try the car door again.” Wendell flattened himself as I gave the door a yank. The next shot thunked into the sand close by. I flipped the seat forward and grabbed my bag, hauled it out of the backseat, and slammed the door again. My heart had rocketed. Anxiety was coursing through my body as if a sluice gate had opened. I needed to pee like crazy, except for the fact that my kidneys had shriveled. All my other internal organs had circled, like wagons under serious attack. I pulled out the revolver, with its white pearlite grips. “Gimme some light over here.” Wendell flipped on the penlight, shielding it like a match.

  I was looking at the sort of single-action six-shooter John Wayne might have favored. I popped open the cylinder and checked the load, which was full. I snapped the cylinder shut. The gun must have weighed three pounds.

  “Where’d you get that?”

  “I stole it from Renata. Wait here. I’ll be back.”

  He said something to me, but I was already duck-walking my way out into the darkness, angling toward the beach and away from our assailant. I cut left, circling out a hundred yards around the front of the car, hoping I wasn’t visible to anybody interested in target practice. My eyes were fully adjusted to the dark by now, and I felt conspicuous. I looked back, trying to measure the distance I’d come. My pale blue VW looked like some kind of ghostly igloo or a giant pup tent. I reached a left-turning curve in the road, crouched, and crossed in a flash, easing back toward the point from which I imagined our attacker was firing.

  It probably took ten minutes until I reached the spot, and I realized I hadn’t heard a shot fired the whole time. Even in the hazy visibility of the half-dark around me, the area felt deserted. I was now directly across from my car on the two-lane road, keeping myself low to the ground. I popped my head up like a prairie dog.

  “Wendell?” I called.

  No answer. No shots fired. No movement in any direction and no more sense of jeopardy. The night felt flat and totally benign at this point. I stood upright.

  “Wendell?”

  I did a 360 turn, sweeping my gaze across the immediate vicinity, and then sank down again. I looked both ways and crossed the street at a quick clip, keeping low. When I reached the car, I slid past the front bumper into home base. “Hey, it’s me,” I said.

  There was only sea wind and empty beach. Wendell Jaffe was gone again.

  Chapter 20

  *

  It was now ten o’clock at night, and the roadway was deserted. I could see lights from the freeway tantalizingly close, but no one in their right mind was going to pick me up at that hour. I found my handbag by the car and hefted it over my shoulder. I went around to the driver’s side and opened the car door. I reached in, leaning forward to snag the keys from the ignition. I could have locked the car, but what would be the point? It wasn’t running at the moment, and the rear window was shattered, open to the elements and any pint-size little car thieves.

  I hiked to the nearest gas station, which was maybe a mile away. It was very dark, street lamps appearing at long intervals and even then with only dim illumination. The storm had apparently stalled off the coast, where it lingered, brooding. Lightning winked through the inky clouds like a lamp with a loose connection. The wind whuffled across the sand while dried fronds rattled in the palm trees. I did a quick self-assessment and decided I was in pretty good shape, given all the excitement. One of the virtues of physical fitness is that you can walk a mile in the dark and it’s no big deal. I was wearing jeans, a short-sleeved sweatshirt, and my tenny bops, not the best shoes for walking, but not agonizing, either.

  The station itself was one of those places open twenty-four hours a day, but it was run largely by computer, with only one fellow in attendance. Naturally he couldn’t leave the premises. I got a handful of change and headed for the public phone booth in the comer of the parking lot. I called AAA first, gave them my number, and told them where I was. The operator advised me to wait with the car, but I assured her I had no intention of hiking back in the dark. While I waited for the tow truck, I put a call through to Renata and told her what was happening. She didn’t seem to bear me any grudges after our tussle on the boat deck for possession of the gun. She said Wendell wasn’t home yet, but she’d hop in the car and cruise the route between the house and the frontage road where I’d
last seen him.

  The tow truck finally appeared about forty-five minutes later. I hopped in with the driver and directed him to my disabled car. He was a man in his forties, apparently career tow truck, full of sniffs, tobacco chaws, and learned assessments. When we reached the vehicle, he stepped down from the truck and hiked his pants up, circling the VW with his hands on his hips. He paused and spat. “What’s the deal here?” He might have been asking about the shattered rear window, but I ignored that for the moment.

  “I have no idea. I was tooling along about forty miles an hour and the car suddenly lost power.” He reached toward the car roof where a large-caliber slug had punched a hole the size of a dime. “Say, what is this?”

  “Oh. You mean that?” I leaned forward, squinting in the half-light.

  The hole looked like a neat black polka dot against the pale blue paint. He stuck the tip of one finger into it. “This here looks like a bullet hole.”

  “Gosh, it does, doesn’t it?” We circled the car, and I echoed his consternation at all the hurt places we came across. He quizzed me at length, but I fended off his questions. The guy was a tow truck driver, not a cop, I thought. I was hardly under oath.

  Finally, head shaking, he slid onto the driver’s seat and tried starting the car. I suspect he would have taken great satisfaction if the engine had fired right up. He struck me as the sort of fellow who didn’t mind women looking foolish. No luck. He got out, went around, and peered in the back end. He grunted to himself, fiddled with some car parts, and tried the starter again without producing results. He towed the VW to the gas station, where he left it in a service bay and then departed with a sly glance backward and a shake of his head. No telling what he thought of little ladies these days. I had a chat with the attendant, who assured me the mechanic would be in by seven the next morning.

  By now it was well after midnight and I was not only exhausted, but I was stranded as well. I could have called Henry. I knew he’d have hopped in his car and driven down to fetch me at any hour without complaint.

  The problem was I simply couldn’t face the drive, yet another lap in the track I was running between Santa Teresa and Perdido. Happily, the area wasn’t short of motels. I spotted one on the far side of the freeway, within easy walking distance, and hoofed it across the overpass. In preparation for such emergencies, I always carry a toothbrush, toothpaste, and clean underpants shoved down in my handbag.

  The motel had one vacancy. I paid more than I wanted, but I was too tired to argue. For the extra thirty dollars I was accorded one tiny bottle each of shampoo and conditioner. A matching container held just enough “body” lotion to moisturize one limb. The problem was you couldn’t get the stuff out. I finally gave up the idea of being moist and went to bed stark naked and dry as a stick. I slept like a zombie without any medication and decided, with regret, that my cold was gone’.

  I woke up at 6:00, wondering briefly where I was. Once I remembered, I sank down under the covers and went back to sleep, not waking again until 8:25. I showered, donned my clean underwear, and then put on yesterday’s clothes again. The room was paid for until noon, so I kept my key and grabbed a quick cup of coffee from the vending machine before I hiked back across 101 to my car.

  The mechanic was eighteen years old, with frizzy red , hair, brown eyes, a pug nose, a gap between his front teeth, and a thick Texas accent. The coverall he was wearing looked like a romper suit. When he saw me, he beckoned me over by doing curls with his index finger.

  He’d put the car up on the hydraulic lift, and we peered at the underside together. I could already picture dollars flying out the window. He wiped his hands on a rag and said, “Lookit.”

  I looked, not understanding at first what he was pointing to. He reached up and touched a vise clamp that had been affixed to a line. “Somebody put this little dingus on your fuel line. I bet you only got about three blocks before the engine give out.”

  I laughed. “And that’s all it was?”

  He unscrewed the clamp and dropped the little dingus in the palm of my hand. “That’s all. Car should run fine now.”

  “Thanks. This is great. How much do I owe you?”

  “Thanks is good enough where I come from,” he said. I drove back to my motel room, where I sat on the unmade bed and called Renata. Her machine picked up and I left a message, asking her to give me a call. I tried Michael’s house next, surprised when he snatched up the phone after half a ring.

  “Hi, Michael. This is Kinsey. I thought you’d be at work. Have you heard from your father?”

  “Nuhn-uhn, and Brian hasn’t, either. He’s called this morning to say Dad never showed. He really sounded worried. I called in sick so I could hang by the phone.”

  “Where is Brian?”

  “He won’t tell me. I think he’s afraid I’ll turn him in to the cops before he and Dad connect up. You think Dad’s okay?”

  “That’s hard to say.” I filled him in on events from the night before. “I left a message for Renata, and I hope to hear back. When I talked to her last night, she said she’d see if she could find him. She may have picked him up somewhere out on the road.”

  There was a brief silence. “Who’s Renata?”

  Oops. “Ahh. Nnnn. She’s a friend of your dad’s. I think he’s been staying at her place with her.”

  “She lives here in Perdido?”

  “She has a house on the Keys.”

  Another silence. “Does my mom know?”

  “I don’t think so. Probably not.”

  “Man, oh, man. What a jerk.” Silence again. “Well. I guess I better let you go. I want to keep the line free in case he tries to get in touch.”

  I said, “You’ve got my number. Will you let me know if you should hear from him?”

  “Sure,” he said tersely. I suspected any lingering sense of loyalty to his father had been erased with the news about Renata.

  I tried calling Dana. Her machine picked up. I listened to strains of the wedding march, drumming my fingers until I heard the beep. I left word for her to call me, keeping my message brief. I was still kicking myself for mentioning Renata in my conversation with Michael. Wendell had generated enough hostility in the kid without my adding the issue of his common-law wife. I tried reaching Lieutenant Ryckman at the Perdido County Jail. He was out, but I had a quick chat with Senior Deputy Tiller, who told me there was a big department shake-up over Brian’s unauthorized release. Internal Affairs was scrutinizing every employee who lad access to the computer. Another call came through, and he had to ring off. I said I’d try Ryckman again when I got back to Santa Teresa.

  I’d just about exhausted my list of local calls. I checked out of the motel and was on the road by 10:00. I was hoping that by the time I reached the office in Santa Teresa I’d have some return messages, but I unlocked my door to find the green light glowing blankly on my answering machine. I spent the morning with my usual office routines: business calls and mail, a few bookkeeping entries, one or two bills to pay. I made a pot of coffee and then called my insurance adjuster to report last night’s incident. She told me to go ahead and get the rear window replaced at the auto glass shop I’d used before. It was clear I couldn’t ride around without protection because I’d be ticketed.

  In the meantime I was half tempted to leave the bullet holes where they were. Make too many claims and you get your policy canceled or your rates elevated to astronomical rates. What did I care about bullet holes I was sporting a few of those myself. I called and m an appointment to have the window taken care of late afternoon.

  Shortly after lunch, Alison buzzed me to say Rena Huff was in the reception area. I went out to the front. She was sitting on the little sofa, head back, eyes closed. She was not looking good. She wore chin bunched together and belted at the waist, and a black V-neck top with an orange anorak over it. Her curls were still damp from a recent shower, but her eyes were darkly circled and her cheeks seemed gaunt from stress. She pulled herself together with an
apologetic smile at Alison, who seemed especially perky by comparison.

  I took Renata back to my office, sat her on my visitor’s chair, and poured us both some coffee. “Thank you,” she murmured, sipping gratefully. She closed her eyes again, savoring the rich liquid on her tongue. “This is good. I need this.”

  “You look tired.”

  “I am.”

  It was really the first time I’d had a chance to study her closely. Her face in repose was not what I’d call pretty. Her complexion was lovely-clear olive tones without flaw or blemish-but her features seemed wrong: brows dark and untamed, dark eyes too small. Her mouth was large, and her short-cropped hair made her jaw look squared off. Her expression ordinarily had a petulant cast, but in the rare moments when she smiled, her whole face was transformed-exotic, full of light. With her coloring, she could wear hues a lot of women couldn’t get away with: lime green, hot pink, royal blue, and fuchsia.

  “Wendell got home about midnight last night. This morning I went out to run errands. I couldn’t have been gone for more than forty minutes. When I came home, everything he owned was gone and so was he. I waited for an hour or so and then got in my car and came up here. My real inclination was to call the police, but I thought I’d try you first and see what advice you might have to give.”

  “About what?”

  “He stole money from me. Four thousand dollars in cash.”

  “What about the Fugitive?”

  She shook her head wearily. “He knows I’d kill him if he took that boat.”

  “Don’t you have a speedboat, too?”

  “It’s actually not a speedboat. It’s an inflatable dingy, but it’s still at the dock. Anyway, Wendell doesn’t have keys to the Fugitive.”

  “Why not?”

  Her cheeks tinted slightly. “I never trusted him.”

  “You’ve been together five years and you didn’t trust him with the keys to your boat?”

  “He had no business on the boat without me,” she said in an irritated tone.