82 Desire

by Smith, Julie

“That sounds right. You know what kind of car he drives?”

  “Afraid not.”

  “Okay, thanks.” She tried to give him a grin of gratitude, but she couldn’t get her face to move properly. Her heart was picking up speed.

  She retrieved her flashlight from the car and walked back toward the United building, trying to cover the same ground Beau would have covered, shining the light in every doorway, playing it over every sleeping body. Most of the bodies stirred, and those that didn’t weren’t Beau either.

  She was glad to see a guard in the lobby of the building, and he was glad to help out a police officer, but unfortunately he didn’t know Beau’s car. He let her use the phone to call Deb Cavignac. “His car?” Cavignac was getting steadily more hysterical. “Why, do you know something? “

  “I’m trying to find him.”

  Finally someone else snatched the phone, a daughter presumably. “It’s a white Lexus, last year’s.”

  He probably hadn’t parked it on the street then. She said, “Does your mother know where he usually parks it?”

  The girl conferred with her mother and came back on the line. “In a parking lot. Fairly near.” She gave directions.

  Skip was on her way to the lot, still searching doorways for bodies, when one of the bodies spoke to her. “You lookin’ for the dead guy?”

  The speaker was a white male, maybe thirty, maybe sixty, his body thin and stringy with alcohol abuse. His eyes remained closed.

  “What did you say?”

  “Dead man over there.” The body didn’t move.

  Skip said, “Open your eyes and look at me.”

  “Don’t have no interest in women.”

  “Get up. Now. I’m a police officer.”

  He opened a pair of eyes decorated with red nets. She almost wished he’d kept them closed.

  But something about her must have impressed him. Laboriously, he sat up. “Knew you wanted the dead guy.” This time he got up the energy to turn toward downtown and point. “Over there. Behind the garbage.”

  The street he indicated was little more than an alley. Someone had left a lot of trash on the narrow sidewalk in front of one of the buildings. From where Skip stood, you couldn’t see what was on the other side.

  “Okay, show me.”

  “I just showed you.”

  “Come on. Let’s go.” If this guy knew something, she sure wasn’t going to run the risk of losing him.

  “Shit. You try to be a good citizen and this is the shit you get. Can you beat that, man? This is the shit you get. What kind of shit is this, man?”

  He unfolded himself very slowly and carefully. She herded him over to the place he meant, disregarding his mumbled complaints, which didn’t cease for a second. As soon as they got close to the first of a number of discarded boxes, she saw the foot, a well-shod one obviously not belonging to a street person. She edged forward a little more.

  Her informant was nodding vigorously. “They hit him and stabbed him both. Killed him two different ways.” He nearly collapsed laughing, seemingly so incapacitated that she risked getting closer to the man on the ground. He was lying on his side and wearing a suit.

  “Beau?” she said. He didn’t answer and didn’t move.

  She said to the witness, “What’s your name?”

  “George Trulock.”

  “George, do you have some ID?”

  “You kiddin’?” George fell into another of his laughing fits.

  “Okay, come with me.” She walked him to the nearest car and handcuffed him to the door. “Hang out here a minute, will you?”

  “You can’t pull this shit on me. For Christ’s sake, I ain’t done nothin’…”

  She tuned him out, bent over the body, and turned it far enough over to see the face. It was Beau.

  Dead. Dead with a hole in his jacket and blood all over his chest.

  George might well have been right—he could have been hit and stabbed.

  Skip called for backup.

  After an eternity, a district car arrived, its young, eager driver ready to kick butt. They waited for more help, the coroner, and the crime lab. This was the Eighth District, whose homicides would normally be investigated not by its own detectives but by Cold Cases, which was all that was left of Homicide. She’d worked with these guys, and anyway, they had no reason to be territorial—she’d have no trouble getting assigned to the case.

  She turned back to George. “What happened here?”

  “I told ya. They killed him twice.”

  “Who did?”

  “Black kids. Who else?”

  “What’d they look like?”

  “How would I know? I didn’t see it.”

  Damn. She should have known. “You must have some reason for thinking that black kids killed him.” Sure he must. He’s stoned out of his gourd and probably a racist. That’s two reasons.

  But he said, “Henry saw it.”

  “Who’s Henry?”

  “Ol’ black dude. Shoppin’ basket.”

  “Where’s Henry now?”

  “I don’t know, man. Am I s’posed to keep track of every wino on the street?”

  She got as many details as she could for a bulletin on Henry, but she didn’t hold out much hope for it. Unless there was physical evidence like hair or fibers, this case needed a reliable eyewitness. If Henry did turn up, he probably couldn’t convince a jury it had twelve members. George was bad enough, and he didn’t even have a shopping basket. If Henry had dreads, that was it—the killer walked.

  When the formalities were complete, she let the bright-eyed kid take George in to sober up and wait for questions later. Quickly, she canvassed the neighborhood, a chore which took very little time, as no one lived there; and then she went back to question the men in the bar a little more carefully.

  Finally, since there was no way to put it off any longer, she went to break the news to Deb Cavignac. Deb said what Skip had heard before, maybe every third time she had to inform someone: “Why? Why my husband?”

  For once, Skip thought she knew—though a lot of good it did her.

  Twenty-three

  WHEN HE HAD drunk as much of the Scotch as he could get into his body without an IV, Russell dragged himself to bed and flung himself on it. At some point, he woke up, registered briefly that he found himself disgusting, pulled off his clothes while remaining supine, and dozed all night in the fitful fashion of drunks who haven’t quite managed to pass out.

  He woke up early and often, finally deciding at about seven-thirty to get up and take a walk, maybe get some coffee. He felt like a sack of manure.

  After brushing his teeth for about twenty minutes, he gave up on making progress in that area and drove to the beach.

  This truly was the most beautiful thing about Fort Lauderdale—maybe the only beautiful thing—and this morning the play of clouds and sun and green water was so stunning he simply sat on the sea wall and watched the show for a while. He got some coffee and came back and did it some more. The caffeine gave him such a lift he actually did start out on that walk he’d promised himself. He worked up a sweat in about ten minutes, but he was so weak it took all he had to continue for another ten.

  Okay, twenty minutes. Some experts say it’s plenty, he told himself.

  He moseyed across the street and found a hotel restaurant serving breakfasts of eggs and bacon and hash browns with sour cream on top. Plenty of butter on the toast. And a whole lot more coffee.

  He tried not to think of Dina while he wolfed it. Not to obsess about whether he had truly blown it once and for all. Surely not, he thought. She was just in a mood, momentarily pissed off and confusing him with the T-shirt-wearing cads and bounders she met in bars with too many television sets. If such was the case, though, a peace offering was required, and it should probably be some nice flowers.

  Florists weren’t open yet. Or maybe they were, but he wasn’t up to picking up the phone. He headed for home and a nap, first stopping at a 7-Eleven fo
r The New York Times—as long as World War Three hadn’t broken out, it should make a nice soporific.

  Days like this, he thought, you kind of wish you watched the soaps.

  He made himself yet more coffee and sat in the cockpit with the paper. He was starting to carve out a sense of comfort and well-being, full of grease and flying on caffeine, when he saw a story about New Orleans: The city was having one of its record crime weeks. Once there had been fourteen murders in a week—or was it nineteen in three days? Actually, Russell had forgotten the numbers, just that crime had run rampant. And here we were again—a dozen in four days. Maybe the piece was premature, he thought—why not go for fifteen in five?

  He started to skim the story, but got no farther than the second sentence before he felt his body go rigid: “The latest victim was identified as oil company executive Beau Cavignac.”

  No, he thought, not Beau. Not sweet Beau who was my only link with home. This can’t be—I just talked to him.

  And then it occurred to him that the two events might be connected. He shivered in the light breeze. This could not be happening. They had killed Beau—or more likely, had him killed. His two best friends, Douglas and Edward. They had killed their buddy to save their own sorry asses.

  Or one of them had.

  And whoever it had been was probably going to kill the other soon. He’d killed Beau because Beau wanted to come clean. Now he’d have to kill his other buddy because he was the only one who knew he was a murderer.

  Not my problem, Russell thought. Those two can duke it out any way they want.

  Still, surely he owed Douglas something. He had some feeling for Douglas—less as the years went by, but something. They’d done a lot together.

  So had he and Edward, but the trouble with Edward was he was a pompous ass.

  Fuck it, he thought. Just fuck it. I wouldn’t cross the road to save either one of them. What goes around comes around.

  Of course, if that were the case, Russell Fortier, aka Dean Woolverton, wasn’t exactly safe either. But then again, he was. No one had the slightest idea how to find him.

  He went to make himself some more coffee and found himself staring out the windows of the galley—just staring, trying to put this thing out of his mind.

  Poor Beau—so unremarkable in life, finally getting his fifteen minutes of fame. As a murder victim.

  What was he thinking of? His best friend had just been killed by his other best friend (or friends). Surely he had to go talk to the police.

  And yet, what for? The Skinners were parasites. If they wiped themselves out, so what?

  There was definitely room for argument. Unless they killed each other in a duel, there was going to be only one left standing—and that one was going to be not only a parasite but an assassin.

  Russell was struck with a choice of matching clichés, as Ms. Smart Dart Dina would probably say: To go back and face the music, or to get the hell out of Dodge. This, he thought, must be what’s meant by the fight-or-flight instinct.

  He had an almost uncontrollable urge to talk to Dina.

  He got up and paced the deck, looking out at the horizon, staring at water and sky, at the things that always calmed him, and failing to be calmed. Today, they only made him feel small and alone. He felt the muscles of his throat constrict as he took in his situation, looked for the first time at what he’d really done to himself.

  I’m alone in the world, he thought. By dumping everyone I ever knew or who ever cared about me, I’ve cut myself off completely.

  He realized with shame that he had been so stunned by the revelation of Allred’s murder that he hadn’t remembered to ask Beau to get a message to Eugenie. He didn’t even deserve to have a daughter, and he couldn’t call her, anyway—his current situation was nothing a child could deal with. Bebe was out of the question, and his parents were dead. He’d always regretted having no siblings, and never did he regret it more.

  It would be comforting, he thought, if someone cared whether I lived or died.

  And he found he absolutely could not resist the urge to make someone care, to grab the only line he saw and see if it would hold. Against every ounce of judgment he had, he called Dina, thinking that if she hated him, at least they could get that squared away and he could start thinking about suicide.

  “Dina? Don’t hang up … I’m really sorry about last night.”

  “Dean. I was about to call you. Listen, I acted like a jackass. I’m the one who should apologize.”

  He felt his throat constrict again. “I need to see you.”

  “Uh … okay. I’ll cook dinner.”

  “No, I mean now.”

  “Now?” He could see her in his mind’s eye, looking at her watch, calculating. “It’s almost noon. I’d cancel my lunch date, but…”

  He didn’t let her finish, simply pretended he’d heard something different. “Great. I’ll pick you up in ten.”

  Then he waited for her to call back and set him straight, and when the phone didn’t ring, found himself grinning. He got in the car, thinking, What in hell am I going to tell her?

  He took her to Indigo, where they could sit outside and not be overheard. And when he had talked her into having a glass of wine and while they were waiting for it to come, she said, “You look like shit.”

  “I didn’t sleep. I felt really bad about the way I’ve treated you…”

  “Oh, come on, it’s not like you hit me or lied to me or something.”

  “Uh… you’re making it worse.”

  “It is like one of those things? I think I know which one. My name isn’t really Dean Woolverton. I’m not even a lawyer.”

  The waiter set down two glasses of wine and almost before his hand was out of the way, she picked hers up. “Oh, really?” She sounded utterly unfazed. “What are you?”

  “I’m just an asshole who left his wife and job. And former life.”

  “Just picked up and left? No note, no nothing?”

  “It’s not a pretty story. I did some pretty bad stuff.”

  “Involving your wife?”

  “Involving business.”

  She nodded. “Oh. The export/import business.”

  It took him a minute to catch on to what she meant. “No, no. Not drugs. This was about a kind of fundamental dishonesty—of a corporate kind, say. And then a couple of years ago, I had a sort of revelation about the way I’d lived and how stupid and immoral it was. And how much I wanted to leave it behind.”

  Her eyes flooded with sudden sympathy, and she grasped his hand, which was nervously demolishing a shrimp chip. “But my wife didn’t… get it.” Somehow, he couldn’t bring himself to mention that Bebe knew nothing about either the Skinners or the revelation. “We grew apart, she started seeing someone…”

  At least, that part was true. Dina squeezed his hand. “… and I left at the first opportunity.”

  “Whew,” she said. “I was afraid it was going to be a lot worse than that.”

  “Well, it is. I’ve left out a few details.”

  They had drunk their wine by now, and could manage a laugh. He told her about the Skinners, just the bare outlines, disguising the company and even the town. And then he detonated the bomb: “Two people have been killed.”

  “You lied. It is drugs.”

  “No, I didn’t. It’s what I said it was. But understand—I know enough to…”

  “No! No, don’t go back. That’s what you’re thinking, isn’t it? That you could go back and tell the police what you know? What would that accomplish?”

  “Well, there are more people involved. Two of them could get killed.”

  “How about you? You could get killed, too.” Her steamed vegetables had arrived and she tucked into them with relish, not speaking for a minute. Then she said, “Wait a minute. I’ve got a great idea. Remember that wonderful old movie, Three Days of the Condor? Why not just go to the press and tell them everything—then nobody’ll have a reason to kill you or anybody else.”


  Russell shook his head vigorously. “Can’t do that. Uh-uh.”

  “What’s the big deal? Why not?”

  “My wife’s a very high-profile woman—it would do her irreparable harm.”

  Dina’s voice got kvetchy. “Oh, come on. How high-profile can she be? Is she the mayor or something?”

  He nodded. “She’s in politics. She might be mayor one day—if this stuff about me doesn’t come out.”

  “You still love her, don’t you?”

  He searched for her hand. “Things between us didn’t work out. I’ve been trying to face that for a long time—I wouldn’t have left if I thought we had a ghost of a chance as a couple.”

  “Ah, ‘it is a far, far better thing that I do, than I have ever done.’ “ She gave him an ironic look, but he drew a blank. “It’s from a book,” she said. “Oh, never mind. The point is, you’re a liability to her right now. But on the other hand, people might die if you don’t speak up. Is that it in a nutshell?”

  He nodded. “That’s about it.”

  “May I make a suggestion?”

  “Please. That’s why I’m telling you.”

  “How about an anonymous tip?”

  “Hey.” He chewed on it a bit, along with some seaweed that came with the seared tuna. “You might have something there. Why couldn’t I just write a letter detailing the whole thing and FedEx it to the police? And not sign it?”

  “Not bad. Not bad at all. But even if you don’t sign it, they might figure out who sent it. Who are you, by the way?”

  He took her hand and kissed it. “Russell Fortier, my dear Ms. Wolf. Late of Louisiana.”

  “Enchanté. If they figure out Russell Fortier sent it, they’ll know where he is.”

  “Yeah. Damn. I wish I could get out of the country. But I have no papers—either as Russell or Dean.”

  “You need some forgeries.”

  “Well, I’ve been meaning to do that. The problem is, I’m the new kid in town. I suppose you wouldn’t know where the bad guys hang?”

  She was silent for a moment. “Let me make a phone call.”

  “Huh?” He was staggered.

  “My brother’s a probation officer.”

  She borrowed some change and left. It was a good ten minutes before she came back. “You have to call him.”