by Angela Henry
“Why’d you come down to the station?” I asked and handed him a mug of freshly brewed coffee. He was sitting at my kitchen table with his long legs stretched out underneath.
“I saw the report of your sister’s arrest on TV. I came to lend my support to you and your family. I knew you had to be very upset.” He didn’t know the half of it. I filled him in. He let out a low whistle.
“I wouldn’t take this too personally, Kendra. Your family is just upset and since your sister wasn’t around right then they were taking their frustrations out on you.”
“Maybe. But you have to admit I did make a big mistake in not at least persuading Allie to tell Carl about that check.” I joined him at the table.
“Why didn’t you?”
“You’ve never met my sister, have you? Her talent for getting her own way is only rivaled by her talent for flirting. She has my whole family wrapped around her finger. All she has to do is start whining and everyone bends over backwards to make her happy. I thought I was immune to it, but I guess not.”
“Are you jealous of your sister?” he asked bluntly. Was I jealous of Allegra? Now there was a loaded question. I thought about it for a few seconds before answering.
Jealousy implied that I resented my sister for all of her accomplishments and begrudged her her success, and that certainly wasn’t the case. On the other hand, I was envious of Allegra’s effortless charm, her model looks and her fearlessness in pursuing her career goals even though I haven’t always agreed with her choices.
“I’m very proud of my sister’s accomplishments. I only want to see her happy,” I said simply, avoiding Rollins’s eyes. He let out his infectious laugh.
“Spoken like a true diplomat.”
I saw Rollins to the door about half an hour later. We stood in the doorway awkwardly. Finally, he bent down and gave me kiss on the lips. It started out a nice simple kiss. But it quickly changed into something else. Something deep and warm. An invitation to someplace we knew we shouldn’t be going. At least not yet. But as I thought back on Carl’s angry face and harsh words I found myself wrapping my arms around Rollins’s waist and pulling him closer, inhaling his wonderful scent. His hands were massaging my lower back, pressing me tightly against him. I started sucking on his tongue and heard a low groan escape from the back of his throat. His hands found their way underneath my shirt and felt hot against my skin. I could feel his erection pressing against my stomach and was mere seconds away from pulling him back inside my apartment and tearing his clothes off when we were hit by a bright blast of the car’s headlights.
A car was stopped at the corner across the street. The high beams were on us, blinding us momentarily. We pulled apart just in time to see the car make a turn in front of my duplex and speed off down the street, tires squealing. I caught a glimpse of an angry woman’s face. Her eyes were shooting me the dirtiest look I think I’d ever been given. It was Winette Barlow. Had she been out here the whole time? Well, I sure couldn’t say I hadn’t been warned. Winette had told me to stay away from Rollins, and what did I turn around and do? Had myself wrapped around him like Saran Wrap on a tuna casserole. Talk about more drama I didn’t need.
“I think we just pissed off your girlfriend,” I said sarcastically, putting some distance between us. Rollins sighed heavily.
“Winette and I have been out a few times. But it’s not serious. She’s looking for a husband. It’s been less than a year since I buried Nicole. I’m not looking to get married again just yet. Looks like I’m going to have to have a little talk with her,” he said sheepishly.
“Make it soon,” I said sincerely. But I knew it was only a matter of time before Winette made good on her threat.
Later that evening I was lounging in hot lilac-scented bath water, hoping my phone would ring and one of my family members would be on the other end telling me what the heck was going on with Allegra. But I knew it wasn’t going to ring. I wondered what in the world my sister could have been thinking, holding on to that check, and why lie to me about it? Then I realized if she had lied to me about the check being stolen, had she also lied about having told Noelle about the check? I hadn’t seen Noelle since the day I saw her and Kurt with Donald Cabot. Where had she been all this time? Gambling? She wasn’t at the station when Allegra got arrested. Did she even know?
I called the Holiday Inn and had them connect me to Noelle’s room. There was no answer. Why did I have such a bad feeling? Did someone Noelle owed a gambling debt to show up to collect? Had she been beaten up, or worse, killed? I reluctantly left my nice hot bathtub and threw on sweatpants and a long-sleeved T-shirt. When I got to the hotel I asked which room Noelle was staying in and, of course, they wouldn’t tell me. Our Holiday Inn is nice but very small. Only one story and about fifty rooms. The front half of the building was the oldest. An addition of about twenty luxury suites had been added off the back. The new rooms were bigger and much nicer, complete with Jacuzzi tubs and big-screen TVs. They were also more expensive. I couldn’t imagine a producer for a Hollywood news program staying on the cheap.
I had an idea of a way to find Noelle’s room, but I had to get back to the area where the suites were in order to pull it off. Unfortunately, the door that led back to the rooms was located near the front desk and, for security reasons, was locked. Hotel guests used their room key-cards to open the door. I sat in the lobby as though I was waiting for someone. The hotel clerk, a snotty-looking woman whose features were crowded into the middle of her face, making it look permanently pinched, kept eyeing me suspiciously. It was after ten at night on a Thursday. It wasn’t as if there was much else for her to do except watch me. But what did she think I was going do—make off with the ashtrays? Every once in a while the phone would ring and she’d answer it, but she still kept one eye on me.
I was half-asleep in one of the lobby’s comfortable leather chairs when a party of six men entered the hotel laughing, singing and talking loudly. It was apparent they were very drunk as one of the men was playing matador and had taken off his suit jacket to use as a cape while one of his companions was doing an impersonation of a bull with his index fingers held up next to his head as horns. The bull stumbled around, chasing the matador in front of the desk. The other men roared with laughter. The hotel clerk did not look pleased and had come out from behind the desk to chastise the men. She was addressing the matador, shaking a bony finger in his face, when the bull rushed up behind her and gored her in the butt with his horns, sending her almost sprawling to her knees. Maybe if she’d been nicer to me I wouldn’t have giggled my ass off. Predictably, she didn’t see any humor in it at all. She lost it.
“If you gentlemen do not settle down this instant. I’m calling the police,” she hollered.
The men laughed and the matador threw his cape/jacket on her head and twirled her around in a circle. I got up to go help her when she suddenly threw off the jacket, spun around, and landed a roundhouse kick in the middle of the matador’s chest. He let out a surprised, “Oof,” similar to the sounds let out by villains on the old Batman series who were getting their asses kicked, and went toppling backwards over a couch in the lobby, knocking the couch over in the process. The men fell silent and looked from their fallen friend to the smug-looking clerk.
“I’ve got more if you want it,” said the clerk with her hands up in a karate stance.
The men didn’t want any more and rushed over to pick up their friend. They helped him to his feet and headed to the door leading back to their rooms. I fell in line behind them as the clerk went to pick up the couch that had gotten knocked over. It took a long minute for the man with the keycard to negotiate the slot. Once they got the door opened, they all lurched through it, muttering angrily that the “bitch of a clerk just needed to get laid,” assuring the matador, who’d just got punked, that he could have taken her if he’d really wanted to and asking who among them still had some beer in their room. I silently crept in behind the group, until they were all through the do
or, then walked quickly past the inebriated men, ignoring their invitations to party with them, and headed back to the new section.
I could tell by the newness of the carpet when I’d reached the addition. I walked down the hall until I figured I was about in the middle and pulled out my cell phone. I dialed the front desk and asked the Karate Clerk to connect me to Noelle’s room again. I listened closely until I heard the phone ringing in a room three doors down from where I was standing. I pressed my ear to the door. The phone rang and rang but no one answered it and I could hear no movement behind the door. As I pressed myself closer to the door, it swung open abruptly and I went sprawling onto the carpeted floor of Noelle’s room, which apparently was also Kurt’s room, as he was the one who’d opened the door and was now frowning down at me.
“What the hell are you doing?” he asked. Kurt was dressed only in a white towel that was almost slipping off his slim hips. His skin looked damp and there were beads of water in his hair. His eyes were glazed and bloodshot. I wondered which he was: drunk, high or both.
“I was looking for Noelle,” I said, averting my eyes when Kurt’s towel slipped south of the border. He grabbed it just in time and secured it more tightly.
“You the one that just called?”
“Yeah. Why didn’t you answer the phone? Where’s Noelle?” I asked suspiciously.
“Your guess is as good as mine. I got here about an hour ago and crashed. I just got up a few minutes ago and hopped in the shower. What do you want with Noelle?”
“I have something important to tell her about my sister.” Obviously Kurt had no idea an arrest had been made in his mother’s murder. Would he even care?
“Like I told you before, I haven’t seen Noelle since we got that money from Cabot.” He rubbed his eyes and looked at me bleary eyed. He must have really had a rough night.
“Aren’t you worried about her?” If my man disappeared I’d sure be worried. That is, if I even still had a man.
“She’s done this before. She’ll take off and get in on some private card or dice games. She’ll be back when she runs out of money.”
“I’m surprised you and your family are even still in town.”
“Vivi’s will gets read tomorrow morning. My pops seems to think she left him something. I think he’s a fool.”
“Maybe she left you something,” I said. He considered it for a moment. I could see the conflicting emotions flitting across his freckled face.
“Naw. I don’t think so. The woman barely gave me the time of day when she was alive. Why would she leave me anything in her will? And even if she did, I don’t want it,” he said unconvincingly.
“You sure about that? You’ve been stealing stuff from her to sell for years. Least if she left you something you’d have come by it legitimately.”
“I only took junk. Stuff that she wouldn’t miss. It wasn’t like I was ripping off expensive jewelry and shit. What do you care anyway?” He took a step toward me and I realized being alone in a room with a man who could have killed his mother wasn’t a good place to be.
“Can I leave Noelle a note in case she comes back?” I asked quickly.
“Knock yourself out, and make sure you pull the door shut behind you,” he said and headed back to the bathroom where I could hear the water in the shower running.
I grabbed a notepad from beside the bed and jotted down my name and phone number with a brief message to please call. As I was tucking my pen back in my purse, I spied a brown stain on the beige carpet by the bed. It was about the size of a dime. I got on my hands and knees and ran ray index finger over the spot. It was stiff and dry. I couldn’t be sure, but it looked very much like dried blood to me. Was it Noelle’s? I wondered how Kurt could have not noticed the stain. I could hear him humming tunelessly in the shower and decided to look around. The king-size bed was unmade and Kurt’s clothes, a pair of white dress slacks and a gray-and-red patterned silk shirt had been tossed on the floor at the foot of the bed. I checked the clothes but besides reeking of marijuana, they were blood-free. No wonder he hadn’t noticed the stain and didn’t seem worried about Noelle. He was too busy having fun with Mary Jane. I crossed the room to the closet by the door and opened it slowly, half expecting Noelle’s dead body to fall out. But all that was in the closet were a few articles of men’s and women’s clothing.
I looked around on the floor for more bloodstains. Nothing. There were more dirty clothes piled in a chair in the small sitting area in front of the TV. I picked through the clothes and discovered they weren’t stained with blood, just in need of washing. But as I turned to leave, I saw a torn piece of white paper lying in front of the big-screen TV. I picked it up. It was the top section of a sheet of typing paper that read: Onyx Man/ DeArmond. It was a piece of Vivianne’s manuscript. Allegra hadn’t lied about telling Noelle about the check and Vivianne’s book after all. How had Noelle got a hold of the manuscript? And more importantly, where was Noelle now?
I was still holding the scrap of paper when Kurt emerged from the shower again, naked this time. We stared at each other, and Kurt put his hands on his hips and smiled widely at me before I stuffed the scrap of paper in my pocket and quickly left.
I was at the Willow County Courthouse bright and early the next morning for my sister’s arraignment. I saw my family file into the courtroom and sit in the seats behind the table where Carl and Allegra were seated. I was sitting in the back of the courtroom. I didn’t want to be a distraction, plus I was still feeling hurt and sulky about last night. I’d talk to Carl afterwards about what I’d found. I watched my sister. Even though I was mad at her I was still worried sick about the possibility of her going to jail for murder. I was amused to notice that Allegra had even managed to make her jail-issue orange jumpsuit and slip-on tennis shoes look good. Her honey-highlighted hair hung in a long glossy ponytail down her back and her lack of makeup only made her look younger and more vulnerable. I watched as Carl leaned over and whispered something in her ear, and she turned to the back of the courtroom and gave me a solemn wave. I returned it and gave her a smile and a thumbs-up. Carl and I nodded to each other like strangers. Mama didn’t turn around at all. And Gwen and Alex appeared to be doing what they did best—arguing. I saw Gwen shaking her finger in my uncle’s face and Alex turning his back on her.
The judge entered the courtroom and the bailiff commanded us all to rise for the Honorable Judge Peter Franklin, a dapper little man with white hair and a thick salt-and-pepper mustache. When Judge Franklin asked Allegra how she pleaded, she dramatically replied, with hands on heart and head held high no less, “I am innocent, Your Honor.” A few people in the packed courtroom giggled.
“Glad to hear it, Miss Clayton,” Judge Franklin replied drily. “And to the matter of bail?” he continued, looking both at Carl and the prosecuting attorney on the other side of the room, a pleasant enough looking woman in a plaid skirt and ruffled blouse.
“Your Honor, this was a particularly vicious crime. We ask that the defendant be denied bail and remanded to custody pending the outcome of the trial.”
“Nonsense, Your Honor,” Carl piped up. “My client has strong ties to this community and poses no flight risk. May I also add that my client has never been in trouble with the law before and is a popular television personality easily recognized all over the country, which would severely hamper any attempts to flee. She looks forward to defending herself against these charges.”
Judge Franklin set bail at two hundred and fifty thousand dollars. Yikes. I knew Mama would probably have to put up her house to raise bail. Allegra was led away and I reluctantly made my way to the front of the courtroom. Alex whispered something in Gwen’s ear and they both turned to look at me. I waited until the prosecuting attorney had left the room before speaking.
“I’m sorry about not telling anyone that Allegra had that check. I don’t know what I was thinking,” I began before Alex cut me off.
“Don’t sweat it, kiddo,” he said, squeezing
my shoulder. I was doing good to get that bit of affection from Alex. He’s not big on public displays of affection, but Gwen is.
“Yeah. Everyone was upset last night. We were all trippin’,” said Gwen, putting her arm around my shoulders and pulling me tightly to her side. Gwen’s five-ten, in heels, over six feet. I felt dwarfed by her embrace but grateful for it all the same.
Two down, two to go. I peered over at Mama who was talking to Carl, probably about arranging bail for Allegra. She turned to look at me and gave me a neutral look. Not mad, but not exactly welcoming, either.
“Soon as I bail Allie out, I’m having a cookout,” Mama announced. “No need for any of us to be hanging our heads. I have faith that this foolishness will all be resolved soon enough and we can all put this behind us.” She breezed past me without speaking and then turned back.
“Kendra, you’re going to help me get everything ready.” It wasn’t a question at all. It was a command to be obeyed.
“Of course,” I said, quickly bringing a satisfied smile to her face. Work was apparently going to be my penance for stupidity. And if that was the case, I wondered what she had in store for Allegra.
Mama, Alex and Gwen left, leaving me alone with Carl, who was shoving papers into his briefcase with his back to me.
“I have some information that might help Allegra’s case,” I said timidly. He turned around. He looked tired. I wanted to give him a hug, but I didn’t know if he’d let me.
“Well, I need all the help I can get because, to be honest, Kendra, this isn’t looking too good for your sister,” he said quietly.