Home Free

by Sonnjea Blackwell

“Well, I have a new rule not to assume anything. Anyway, you can come over and work on the computer. I have all the programs, and I have tutorials for most of them. I’m a horrible teacher, but the books are good and you won’t have any trouble.”

  Her eyes were wide. “Really? You wouldn’t mind?”

  “Nope, and you can help me with some designs when you figure the programs out. But I don’t want you to stop drawing.” I waved Danny’s portrait at her. “You have a real talent, and you need to keep working at it.”

  “Okay.”

  I had another thought. “Do you have a cell phone with a camera?”

  She looked embarrassed. “No. We can’t afford one right now.”

  “No problem. I’ll be right back.” I ran out to the car and rummaged through the glove box and pulled out my Cannon PowerShot digital camera. I always kept it in my car in case of accidents that required photographic evidence. One of the few pieces of good advice Brian ever gave me. Now that I had an iPhone, the camera was just taking up space. I brought it into the house.

  “Take this and shoot some photos with it, then when you come over, you’ll have something to work on in Photoshop.”

  “Are you sure? Wow, thanks. I won’t hurt it.”

  She walked me out to the car, and just before I drove off, she smacked herself in the forehead. “Duh, I almost forgot. There was a guy at Sherry’s this morning, early.”

  “Did you recognize him?”

  “I couldn’t really see him. He didn’t go in. She was on her way out, and he pulled up in his car and talked to her through the window, and then he left.”

  “Did you get the license plate?” Now, why would she do that? I asked myself. I was the crazy one, not Angela.

  “No, sorry, I didn’t think of it. It was a sedan, kind of dark. It was new and pretty expensive. I think I’ve seen it there before, but I’m not sure. It was early and I wasn’t all the way awake yet. If I see it again, I’ll pay more attention.”

  “No problem. Thanks for telling me.” I wondered something else. “Does Sherry get many visitors?”

  “Nah. Her folks come by once in awhile, when Lonnie’s at work.” She wrinkled her nose. “I mean, you know. Before he was dead. They try to convince her to go into rehab.”

  “She told you that?”

  “Hunh-uh. They came over and talked to Liz and Stephen about it once, and I sort of overheard. Anyway, they have a regular car, nothing fancy. Like a Camry, I think. But that’s why I noticed the expensive car. Don’t see many of them in this neighborhood.”

  “What about Lonnie? I mean, you know. Before he was dead.” Angela giggled. “He get many visitors?”

  She snorted. “Nobody would visit Lonnie.”

  “You said something about drugs before. Didn’t he have customers coming around? Maybe one of them has a nice car.”

  “You were the one who said something about drugs, not me,” she hedged, her protective facade slipping into place.

  “You asked me why I was visiting ‘Miz H’ and said it didn’t look like I was buying. I didn’t notice a lemonade stand, so I assumed you meant drugs.” So there, I thought, mentally sticking my tongue out at her.

  She grinned. “Oh yeah. He sells to his buddies, a bunch of losers. No high-class clientele. He’s probably the only drug dealer around - sorry, was the only drug dealer around - who actually made more money being a night watchman.”

  My house was peaceful when I got home, but my brain wasn’t. The portrait of Danny was haunting. The photo had been in color, but in the black and white drawing, his face lost some of its animation and took on a ghost-like quality. I took a five by seven framed photo of Kevin off the mantle in the living room and removed his picture and replaced it with Danny’s. I stared at both photos for a long time, wondering what was going to happen to them. I went to my room and tucked both pictures into the drawer of my nightstand.

  I thought about the man who had visited Sherry. Maybe she had a fancy side dish, and he killed Chambers out of jealousy? I tried to picture a fancy side dish having some interest in Sherry. I couldn’t quite get there. Then I reminded myself about yesterday’s fiascos and willed myself to let it all go.

  I couldn’t let any of it go, so I called Pauline at work.

  “Pauline Horowitz.”

  “I need therapy.”

  “Hello. I see. I have some comp time coming from when I had to work all that overtime last year when the boss got fired for exposing himself to the UPS man. I’ll take tomorrow off, and I’ll pick you up at nine o’clock.”

  “Thanks.”

  I hung up and went back to the raisins.

  I was just shutting off the computer when the phone rang. My mother. I considered not answering, then figured there was no point in postponing the inevitable.

  “How are you, Mom?”

  “I hear you had a little spat with your brother this afternoon. He’s just trying to protect his little sister, you know. You could have been nicer.” My thirty-five year old brother had tattled on me.

  “Mom, he told me I couldn’t have men in my house. He was acting like he was my father and I was fourteen. And besides, he wasn’t trying to protect me, he’s worried about the stupid election.”

  “Well, the campaign is neck-and-neck. He could use your support. And Jack’s truck is pretty distinctive, you know. People are bound to notice.”

  “For the last time, Mother, he’s a contractor. They work early hours. He doesn’t spend the night here.” Anymore. “But even if we were having sex doggie-style on the front lawn, it wouldn’t be anybody’s business.”

  “Alexis! Who says that to their mother?”

  “Well, you always take his side.” Now I felt like I was fourteen.

  “Oh, honey.” That was her favorite trick, the “oh, honey” with just the right mix of disappointment and parental disapproval. It was the equivalent of fingernails on a chalkboard, and I stifled a shriek. “Well, I hope you’ll be able to behave yourself at dinner on Saturday.”

  Groan. “What dinner?”

  “I told you, we need to pull together as a family. We’re having a barbecue. Two o’clock. And Alexis, try to be on time this week, okay?”

  Pauline arrived ten minutes early Friday morning, bearing Starbucks decaf mocha lattes and chocolate croissants. We ate in my office while I checked my email and sent the draft of the brochure to the senior home. The phone rang. It was Angela. Her sister wanted to drop by to make sure I had a suitable environment for her to hang out in. I told Angela to come over tomorrow at lunchtime, hung up the phone, logged off the computer and swallowed the last of my croissant.

  “Therapy time.”

  I locked the door as we left the house. The morning was already heating up, the last of the dew steaming off the grass. The jogging man trotted by, eyes down, probably watching to make sure he didn’t step in dog doo.

  “Who runs in this heat?” Pauline asked.

  “Who runs?” I countered. I hadn’t gotten around to joining a gym since I’d moved to Minter. I figured I was going to have to, sooner or later. There was only one thing of an aerobic nature I considered fun, and I wasn’t doing that often enough to stay sane, let alone keep in shape. And if I kept up with the chocolate croissants, I’d either have to start swimming laps in my pool or join the gym and get reacquainted with the stair machine. But under no circumstances would I take up running.

  Satan’s house pet was sprawled on the hood of my car, at a very unlikely angle. I didn’t know why it didn’t slide off. I went to give it a little push, but the damn thing didn’t budge and seemed to think I was petting it. Its fur was soft and felt hot from the sun beating down on it, but the cat seemed content and didn’t make any move towards shade. Evidently, compared with hell, Minter wasn’t all that hot.

  “I’ll drive,” Pauline said. She had a new, bright red VW Beetle and was still getting a kick out of driving it. It was cute. I thought she should paint black polka dots on it to make it a ladybug, but she sai
d that was stupid.

  The mall in Minter is functional, but not therapeutic. The two anchor stores, Sears and JC Penney, carry lots of merchandise that I need, but they don’t have mood enhancers or antidepressants. Consequently, as soon as Pauline and I had gotten our driver’s licenses, we, along with every other female in Minter, did all of our shopping forty-five miles to the north, in Modesto. The mall in Modesto wasn’t going to give Rodeo Drive a run for its money, but for a quick therapy session, it was passable.

  We drove down Highway 59 towards the edge of town. I stared as we passed the gravel yard and the charred body shop next door. The body shop was deserted, but the gravel yard appeared to be running at full tilt. I saw a dark car in the parking lot, along with several white pickups with Salazar’s Sand & Gravel in blue lettering on the doors, and I thought about the man who had visited Sherry.

  When we reached the junction of Highways 59 and 99, Pauline turned north onto 99, a mid-sized freeway that bisects California lengthwise from south of Bakersfield to north of Chico. We had been sipping our coffee, listening to the traffic reports. No slowdowns were reported for our chunk of the road.

  Pauline turned off the radio and got down to business. “So, what are we in therapy for?”

  “What aren’t we in therapy for?” I sighed. “Let’s see. Lonnie Chambers, the dead guy at the body shop, was shacked up with Sherry Henderson, Danny’s ex from high school. Rory Blankenship thinks I’m losing my hair. I insulted a perfectly nice, intelligent girl. I picked a fight with Salazar. I called Jack Danny at a rather inopportune moment. My idiot brother doesn’t think I should allow men in my house. And I have to make an appearance at the folks’ tomorrow. That about covers it, I guess.”

  She nodded, her face solemn, her hair swinging in gold waves. “That’s a lot for two days. Maybe you should try to pace yourself.”

  It took most of the forty-minute drive to catch her up on everything. She freaked out when I told her about Derek. It appeared I was pushing the limits of best friend etiquette in the number of things I had neglected to tell her. She glowered.

  “So who beat him up, if Danny was with you?”

  I shrugged. I’d never figured that out. For all I knew, it was a random, karmic episode. On the other hand, Danny’s father and uncles specialized in breaking joints for Mario Casaletto. I’d always chosen to believe that the phone call Danny made that night was to Sherry, or whoever it was he had plans with. But maybe he had called one of his uncles.

  “Maybe Alex or Louie, I guess.”

  “Maybe he called your brother.”

  I shook my head. “Kevin would have told the folks. He would have called the cops. Besides, he didn’t know Danny and I were together at that point, so it would have been longer than a thirty-second phone call.”

  “He knew already.”

  “What?”

  “You said if I didn’t believe you, I could ask Kevin. So I did.” She was smirking.

  “You didn’t believe me? You’re supposed to be my best friend, and you think I’m not good enough to get a guy like Danny Salazar? Thanks a helluva lot for the vote of confidence.”

  “Well, you know, all the rumors lately about your mental condition. I just wanted to make sure you weren’t delusional or anything. It was for your own good.”

  I rolled my eyes.

  “Kevin knew the very first day, after your dad asked Danny to leave. Danny told Kevin he was going to marry you one day and asked him not to say anything about the two of you to your folks. Clearly Danny could be very persuasive.” She gave me a look. “But I guess I don’t need to tell you that, do I?”

  I wanted to believe that Danny had meant what he said to Kevin, but with his track record with women, I figured he had a list of lines to use to get out of sticky situations. Anyway, I was more surprised by my brother. Not only had he not said anything to our parents, he’d never even let on to me that he knew anything was going on with Danny.

  “Well, I still don’t think that’s who Danny called. Besides, when Kevin was busy telling you all my secrets, wouldn’t he have mentioned Derek if he had known about that?”

  Pauline nodded, thinking. “Maybe he wanted to protect your privacy? Although - ” she stopped mid-sentence and gave a wrinkly-nosed grimace, and I knew Kevin had told her about the night I’d always assumed was the first time he found out about Danny and me, which certainly precluded any possibility of protecting my privacy.

  As we took the mall exit off the freeway, I blushed and changed the subject. “Enough about me. What’s new with you?”

  “Well, I’m still seeing Kevin, obviously. You know, Al, he’s a really great guy. And the sex, holy shit - ”

  I shrieked, covered my ears with my hands and made “lalalalala” noises to drown out the sound of her voice.

  “I listen to all your stories,” she pouted.

  “My stories don’t tend to involve naked mental images of your brother.”

  “I don’t have a brother.”

  “I think you see my point.”

  It was barely ten o’clock, and the mall had just opened, so parking was a snap. We took a spot a few steps from the entrance to minimize sweat time and dashed inside. Since the purpose of our visit today wasn’t to find a specific outfit, but rather to lift our spirits, we started with the good stores, Victoria’s Secret, Old Navy and Ann Taylor. If additional counseling was needed, we’d include Macy’s and Nine West.

  Five hours, three hundred bucks and a large everything pizza later, I was in a great mood. I had bikini and thong underwear in animal prints, floral prints and bright solids. I had stretchy tank tops, stretchy t-shirts and colorful board shorts. And I had a slinky, pale pink sundress that was definitely dangerous, and a pair of little high heeled sandals to go with it.

  “Who’s that for?” Pauline asked when I took the dress to the fitting room.

  “What do you mean?”

  “That’s a fuck me dress if ever there was one. I’m just wondering who the intended victim is. Jack’s not sleeping with you because he thinks you want Danny. Danny’s not even speaking to you because he thinks you’re sleeping with Jack.” She thought for a moment. “And because you think he shoots people. Your husband lives three hundred miles away with the pool boy. So? Who’s it for?”

  I sighed. She was bound to find out anyway. “Johnny Depp. We’re going to Cannes for the film festival, and I need a new dress. Jack and Danny are just a smoke screen to keep the paparazzi away.”

  She gave me the disgusted eye-roll. “Did Rory give you her phone number? I’m going to call her. I need a new best friend.” She stomped out of the fitting room, and I tried not to laugh too loud.

  We were almost home, singing along to a Bruno Mars CD when Pauline turned serious.

  “Alex, I really like your brother. What do you think’s going to happen?”

  I knew she meant about the investigation, but I didn’t want to think about that. “Judging by the lingerie you just bought, I’d say everything is going to happen.”

  “You know what I mean.”

  I blew out a breath. “I don’t know, Paul. I wish I did.” I thought again about Chambers. Who would have killed him? He was a dealer, but small-time, so it wasn’t likely to have been a drug deal gone bad. I felt certain, finally, that Danny hadn’t killed him. The only other person I could think of with a decent motive was Sherry. I seriously doubted she was the shooter, and even if she had been, she definitely was not the arsonist. A pro had set the fire.

  We were approaching the gravel yard, and I was having a thought.

  “Pull over,” I told Pauline.

  She jerked the Bug into the parking lot and skidded to a stop on the gravel. “What for?”

  I was looking at the black Lexus parked at the edge of the lot, the one I’d noticed this morning. It was covered with dust, but it looked pretty new. “Angela said she’s seen a man in a pricey dark sedan at Sherry’s house, more than once, she thinks. He was there yesterday morning. You t
hink that’s Junior’s car?”

  Pauline followed my gaze to the Lexus and gave me the who the hell knows face, and I hesitated, chewing on my lip. “I was thinking maybe Sherry had another friend who might’ve wanted Lonnie out of the picture.”

  She stared at the car for a minute, and I could see the lightbulb go on. “You think Junior Salazar was screwing Sherry, got jealous of Chambers, and killed him?” Skeptical didn’t begin to describe her tone.

  It sounded stupid to me, too, when she said it out loud. “I don’t know what I think. You coming?” I was already out of the car. A wood and aluminum office structure separated the parking lot from the gravel yard. There were enormous piles of sand and gravel sorted by size, and dump trucks, forklifts and concrete mixers criss-crossed the yard like ants on steroids. I eyeballed the Lexus. Surely a car like that would be alarmed, I thought.

  I gave a yank on the door handle, and sure enough, the whoop, whoop, whoop of the alarm kicked in. There was no way anyone other than Pauline and I could hear it, though, over the deafening sound of several tons of rock being dropped from the sorter into a dump truck.

  “What are you doing?” she shouted.

  I shrugged and motioned her into the office. A hefty middle-aged woman in jeans and a red polo shirt that said Salazar’s Sand & Gravel over the left breast sat at a desk on the other side of the reception counter, stapling a receipt to a work order. She glanced hopefully at the clock before looking over at us.

  “Help you?” She blew a stray piece of dark brown hair out of her eyes.

  “Hey, is that your Lexus out front? ’Cause the alarm’s going off.”

  “Shit,” she said, rolling her eyes. “My husband’s baby.” She scooted her chair back, yanked a set of keys out of the pocketbook next to her desk and lumbered gracelessy around the counter. “I’ll be with you in a minute.” Crap. Not Junior’s car. Still, I cheered myself with the thought that just because the Lexus wasn’t his didn’t mean he didn’t have a dark, expensive sedan and a penchant for unattractive junkies. I’m a glass-half-full kind of person.