“Have you seen your father recently?”
He didn't say anything.
“Had your mother?”
He shrugged.
“Do you know if they ever had a violent confrontation?” The way the kid's face dropped told me that my question had come out of left field. I knew the murder had probably been committed by somebody Celia knew well, and a man who had just done some years for killing somebody over a card game was as likely a suspect as any. I wondered if the cops had talked to him yet.
“No. He never hit her.”
I waited a couple of beats before I asked the next one.
“Do you think he could have done this to your mama?”
“No. I know he definitely didn't do it. I know that! He wouldn't do nothing like that!”
I didn't push it. That would come later.
“Who was she afraid of, Cecil?” He glanced down at his hands, not wanting to answer, so I asked again.
“I don't know the names, I told you, dudes were always hanging around her.”
‘And you don't know which one was threatening her?”
“No.”
“But it wasn't your father?” I went back to Brent Liston.
“I told you already. Naw, it wasn't my father.” I thought about Jamal and his relationship with my ex-husband, DeWayne Curtis. Jamal could talk about his father like a dog, but if he heard anybody utter the slightest criticism, he was on them like white on rice. No matter what DeWayne did, he was still his father, and that counted for something.
‘About the book you got my name from? Do you still have it?” There might be names I could follow up with, even Brent Liston's number or address.
He pulled a book covered in red cloth out of an inside pocket and put it on my desk. I picked it up, glanced through it, then put it back down. “I'd like to keep it, okay?”
“It was my mama's.”
“It will only be for a couple of days while I go through it, and then I'll give it back.”
He looked doubtful. “Okay.”
His beeper went off, and he pulled it out, glanced at me, then at the beeper, then pulled out his cell phone, changed his mind about using it, and put it back in his pocket.
“Can we talk later on? I got an appointment.” He looked nervous, and I wondered exactly what kind of business this boy was in.
“Sure.” I pulled out my appointment book. “What about tomorrow, around this time.”
“Okay.”
“By the way, where do you live?”
“Sometimes I stay with my girlfriend over on Eighteenth Street. But you can reach me at one of these numbers if you need to talk to me.” He jotted down three numbers on the edge of the blotter on my desk. I stood up to shake his hand. He looked surprised, but when I smiled he returned it. Celia's smile.
“I'll ask around, see what I can find out. But don't get your hopes up. I'm sure the cops are still trying to find out who killed your mother, and I really think you should talk to them again.”
“I'll think about it,” he said.
“Everything will be okay, Cecil.” He nodded like he believed me.
After he left, I put his money and the book into a safe I had recently installed. It was then that I noticed the small case he'd left on the edge of my desk. I wasn't surprised when I opened it to find Celia's locket. The fact that she'd kept it for all these years brought tears to my eyes. I placed it in the safe with the money and the book, planning to give it back to Cecil when I saw him the next day.
But the next day came and went, as did the next, and when I hadn't heard from him by Thursday, I called the first number he'd jotted down on the blotter.
“What you want with him?” The woman's voice was rough and ugly.
“Who is this?” I asked her.
“What you want with him?”
“Just let me talk to him, please.”
The woman choked out a laugh that sounded like a croak and came from the back of her throat. “You better make yourself a date with St. Peter then. That boy was stabbed through his heart Monday night. He dead and gone, just like his slut of a mama,” she said.
CHAPTER TWO
I don't remember hanging up the phone or even what I was thinking. I just felt cold, as if somebody had shoved a bag of ice into the center of my heart. By the time I got myself together enough to ask the woman for more information, the line was dead. When I called back, the phone was either busy or off the hook; I suspected the latter. So all I knew for sure was that the kid was dead, that he had left my office and run into somebody evil who had wiped him, the last little bit of Celia Jones, off this earth. I've seen a lot of death in my time: my parents, my brother Johnny, more good folks than bad. But when a kid dies like this one did, his future gone before he knew he had one, it's hard as hell for me to shake it off. I'm used to death, but I ain't that used to it.
I'd never seen so much sorrow in a kid's eyes, and the thought of it made me utter one of those long, sad sighs that take everything out of you. I finally got up to make myself some tea, hoping it would make me feel better. Celestial Seasonings is my brand, and I picked through the assortment I keep in a plastic bag in my desk drawer for something to soothe my nerves. Sleepytime wasn't going to do it. Red Zinger had too much zing. I settled on Tension Tamer, then laughed out loud at my choice. Hell, there wasn't that much “tension tamer” in the world. A slug of bourbon from that bottle Wyvetta Green, the owner of Jan's Beauty Biscuit, keeps stashed in her closet would do me better, and I thought about going downstairs to ask her for a shot.
But it was very late on a Friday night, and although Wyvetta worked late on Fridays, she was probably on her way out. She was a good friend, and I knew she'd help me out if she could, but there wasn't anything she or anyone else could do about what had happened. The boy was dead. His mama was dead, and as far as I knew, I was their last and only link to the living.
I won't lie about it. Part of me wanted to forget the whole damn thing. I didn't really know the boy, I reminded myself. He'd shown up with his bad-boy attitude topped with his mama's smile and forced his woeful little self into my world. As for Celia Jones, that was one sister who was decidedly in my past. And what was that dream about anyway? Leftover thoughts from some article in the Ledger? My belly turned sour on ribs gobbled down in record-breaking time? It was plain foolish of me to think that a woman, dead as she was, could send me messages from her grave. Yet I could still hear her voice.
Help me!
“To hell with you, Celia Jones!” I said aloud what I'd once before declared through the dust of that car. I had too many other things on my mind now to worry about Celia and her wayward child. I had my own son to take care of, a car to buy, and half-dozen unpaid bills stashed in the top drawer of my desk. True, things weren't as bad as they sometimes are. Although my life is usually a struggle between broke and broker, this year hadn't been half bad. But I wasn't rich enough to spend time looking for a killer who even the cops had probably given up on finding. Time is money in my business. I charge by the hour, and I've got to be smart about how I use my time. I'd bet the bucks I owe PSE&G, my unforgiving utility company, that the police already had a lead on the bastard who stabbed Celia's boy, and that would probably lead to who had killed her. They sure as hell had more resources than me. Maybe for once, I should leave it to the experts. Truth was, Celia and Cecil Jones had confronted someone hateful and vicious enough to kill them both, and I sure didn't want that craziness touching me or my child.
But talk between my head and my heart are two different conversations, and my heart told me I'd gotten involved in Celia's mess the moment her child walked through my door. He had plopped down his $400 in good faith. I owed it to my client, dead as he was, to do what was right. I didn't have a choice.
So I plugged in my electric kettle and while I waited for the whistle, started looking through my tea bag collection for something with caffeine; later for taming my tension. Lipton does the job in a pinch if I spike it with
a load of sugar, so I dropped four tea bags into the black flowered teapot, which Jamal had given me for my birthday, poured in some water, and brewed myself a cup of tea strong and sweet enough to pull me out of my funk.
After a few sips, I turned on my old-ass, no-name computer and waited for it to boot up. A couple of years back, I finally saved enough money to buy a new one, and ended up giving it to Jamal, who needed it more than me. My attitude toward my computer is like my attitude used to be toward the Blue Demon; it would have to do me until its last gasp. It was also a comforting thought that if some nosy somebody broke into my office one night and tried to pull up a file, he'd still be sitting here when I walked in the next morning.
When the thing finally lit up, I typed a date on the screen, saved the file as “redlocket,” and typed in the facts I knew about Celia and Cecil Jones and the details of my meeting with the boy. I searched through my file cabinet for the Star-Ledger article about Celia's murder and found it tucked under a stack of old Macy's bills. I shook my head at my own self-deception when I read it.
Whenever I thought about Celia's murder, I imagined it happening as it had in my dream—her eyes big with terror, her red nails clawing somebody's hands. But she had been killed by multiple gunshot wounds from a .22 caliber weapon. Popular wisdom says the .22 is a woman's gun, a lady's little protector that fits neatly into a purse or handbag. But I know from experience that a .22 is as lethal and quick as a .38, if you aim it right and shoot at close range. My guess was that Celia's killer had pumped half a dozen bullets into her, pleased with the thought that he was bound to strike something vital. When somebody kills like that, he wants it to hurt; there's hatred in every shot.
I wondered if the cops had made any progress on her case. Most cops are reluctant to share information on a murder still under investigation, and officially they'd still be looking into Celia's, even though it was more than a month old. But her son's killing would be the one they'd really be interested in because it was fresh. I typed down a note to myself to ask my friend Jake if he'd heard anything about the progress on that one. Not that I needed to remind myself. Despite what is, what isn't, and what I wish were between us, Jake Richards is my first, last, and most important resource.
I took from the safe the red book and plastic case the boy had left and brought them to my desk. The case was a cheap, tacky number Celia had probably picked up for a buck and a half in one of those 99-cent bargain stores. I'd done my share of shopping in places like that, and was sure that Celia had, too. The book, which was the size of a diary, was more expensive. Upon close examination, I saw that it was covered with red cloth made up of tiny hearts, which made me smile. Celia was born on Valentine's Day, and even Christmas had taken second place in her hierarchy of favorite holidays. She had always had a sentimental side to her, crying at sad movies, buying food for some poor, bedraggled cat, remembering your birthday when everybody else forgot it. She didn't let a lot of folks see that tender part of her; hard times and harder men taught her to cover it up, but I knew it was there, and I was sure her son did, too. Did her murderer know it?
The book was brand new, the pages still crisp and white. The price tag on the back cover was legible, and I could see that the original price had been cut by half, which suggested that it may have been part of some post-Christmas sale. The boy had been right about my name. It was the first thing I saw when I opened it. She'd printed it along with my address and telephone number in big, bold letters like a kid does, forming each one carefully, as if she were afraid of getting something wrong.
Her boy had said that the book had been opened to my name when he found her. When did she plan to call me? I wondered. If she'd bought the book after Christmas, calling me may have been part of some New Year's Day resolution. People sometimes reach out to old friends on the first of the year. It's a time to renew acquaintances, make amends, apologize for past wrongs. She'd written “Hayle Investigative Services” next to my name, which suggested that maybe she wanted to use my professional services; the boy had said as much when he came to see me.
But maybe I was wrong about the timing. There was no way to know what her intentions were. The only thing I knew for sure was that she'd been murdered on New Year's Day. Had she spent New Year's Eve with her killer? Could her death have been somebody's New Year's resolution?
On the top of the next page, she printed the letters ABCD, encircling them with hearts and arrows. It was the kind of scribbling a teenager does when she has nothing much on her mind. I couldn't tell whether the hearts and arrows were connected to a particular letter or if they were simply put down randomly. Had she been jotting down the alphabet for the hell of it? Or could the letters stand for names, the “B” for the “B” in Brent, the “C” for Celia or Cecil? Chances were that the whole thing meant squat, but I typed the letters on my screen anyway—A, B, C, D—with “Brent Liston” who only showed up “every now and then” according to the kid, in parentheses behind the “B.”
The pages that followed were filled with scraps of indecipherable scribbles, what seemed to be lists of gifts for her son, lines of poetry, and the titles of self-help books. I finally struck gold on the last page. Halfway down, she'd scribbled three names and numbers in red ink. I typed the names and the matching numbers onto my screen, then called each of them.
The first belonged to someone named Rebecca Donovan. The phone rang four times before it was answered by a woman with a pretentious British accent who told me in a no-nonsense voice that I'd reached Ms. Donovan's answering service and that Ms. Donovan, with an emphasis on the Ms., would return my call on Monday. Although the woman didn't say exactly what Rebecca Donovan did, I assumed she had some kind of a professional relationship with Celia, probably in a “helping” capacity. I knew from my experience with Karen, the hardworking sister whose twenty-four-hour answering service I use, that you don't bother with a service unless you need to get your calls screened. When you run a business like mine, you never know when some nut is going to get your number from the yellow pages and call you with foolishness you don't want to be bothered with. I was sure that Ms. Donovan, whoever she was, paid plenty for that clipped British accent. Karen, with her home-girl attitude and occasional lapses in judgment and grammar, came cheap. I love the sister, but for a hot minute, I wondered how Hayle Investigative Services would sound in that high-class professional voice. That would be one way to let losers know that Ms. Tamara Hayle was definitely beyond their reach.
A sullen teenager answered the phone for Annette Sampson, the second number on the page. I left my name and number, but knew from experience with my occasionally sullen teenage son that she probably wouldn't get it until sometime next week. I made a note to call her back on Monday morning.
Aaron Dawson, the owner of the last number, apparently wasn't at home either, or at least wasn't answering his phone. I tried him again, then gave up. On impulse, I called the three numbers the kid had jotted down on my blotter, with no responses. I couldn't forget the undisguised contempt for both Celia and Cecil that had been in that woman's voice, and whoever she was, she didn't answer again. I added those numbers to the screen, saved the file, and decided to call it a night. It was time for me to go home and spend some time with my son.
I'd almost forgotten about the plastic case next to the book. Before I put it away, I opened it, took out the locket, and read the inscription: “… best friend.”
Within a month, we'd both forgotten about the fool who had torn us apart, and all that remained was our anger. But she had been my best friend on that warm June day, when loving each other like sisters, we'd bought and exchanged our gifts.
“Catch you later, girl,” I whispered, uttering the farewell we always said when we parted, and the long-gone teenage girl I'd once been was back in my voice. We'd believed then that we could beat anything the world threw our way and that nothing could change how we felt about each other. Tears welled in my eyes for the loss of her life and my innocence. The locket was min
e now, back with the “best friend” who had bought it.
A cold gust of wind blew in from somewhere, startling me. Impulsively, I glanced at the locket and then at the window, which I saw was cracked. I chuckled at my uneasiness. It was wind from the open window, not Celia's spirit, that had sent me shivering. I'd had enough haunting by my old friend for one day. But difficult friends, even dead ones, can be hard to shake.
I put the necklace back into the safe along with the book, then filled a glass with water to pour on the orphan aloe plant that had taken up residence in a corner of my window. I called my aloe an orphan because years ago I found it, dusty and stunted, on my doorstep. Nobody—not Annie, my best friend who owns the building, nor Wyvetta from downstairs—claimed to have put it there, so I became its adopted mama. My orphan aloe had aged like me and everything else in my life. I smiled tenderly down at it as I poured water into its roots.
It was then that I saw him.
He was dressed in a black, heavy coat that fell to his ankles. I couldn't see his face, but I knew that the light from my office made it easy for him to see mine. He stared up toward my window, as if spellbound by what he saw. He made no movement, no nod of his head or shift of his arms or legs. He just stood there staring up, and it felt like a violation of my space and of me. I pulled back into the shadows even though I knew it was too late.
What did he want with me? Was it simply chance that he was standing here under my window tonight? Instinct, which I have in spades, told me that chance had nothing to do with it, that he wanted something only I could give him. Fear squeezed my stomach tight, and for a moment I couldn't catch my breath.
Dying in the Dark Page 2