Bullet knew Vera better than she thought and she liked that. If there was any doubt, the gleam in her almond-shaped eyes confirmed it. “Well, since you’re paying such close attention I guess it won’t hurt to let you tag along this one time.” Vera’s smile grew when Bullet took a seat and folded his brawny arms.
“You’re stalling. This must be about a man,” he said knowingly. Vera’s smile evaporated in the blink of an eye. Bullet sighed as if he had grown bored with being right. “Humph, thought so.”
“Don’t do this, Bullet,” she objected. “Don’t come down on me when you haven’t even heard why I’m so pressed. It’s not like I have some he-hoochie hanging on my every word like old ‘Detta out there with her ear mashed against the door.” Vera picked up a stapler off the desk and hurled it against the office door.
“Ouch!” screamed Vendetta from the other side.
“That’s what yo’ ass get!” snapped Vera in that direction.
“You put a dent in my door, Vera,” Bullet shouted.
“Sorry.”
“That’s a damned expensive door, Vera.”
She threw her hands up in an ultra-aggravated manner. “Calm down, daddy, I’ll pay for it.”
“Oh, you’ll pay for it?” Bullet questioned. “Since when do you have the money to pay for anything?” As he awaited a response that neither of them wanted spoken into existence, Vera cowered behind two tiny words.
“That man.” Never before have breathless whispers come charging out like a lion’s roar. “My new client put a few dollars in my pocket to find the person he killed and that’s what’s got me bent.”
Bullet was outdone then. “You know this guy? Y’all got history or something?”
“No,” she hated to admit, fearing the next logical line of questioning. Her eyes darted away from his judgmental stare. “He just showed up out of the blue.” Having gone out of her way for a woman in trouble like Vendetta was one thing, but for some man she didn’t know made Bullet’s jaw tighten.
“What? You let some man get you in deep with a homicide?” His head was smoking now. “Hell, it could be worse. It could be a white boy mixed up in this.” Once again, Vera’s gaze floated toward the floor. “Dayyyum, you’ve got to be kidding me.”
“Bullet, let me tell you how it went,” Vera said before he blew a gasket. “It’s complicated but this is how it kicked off.” She explained, in detail what Rags shared, for the second time that day and it showed on her face. Bullet watched vigilantly as he listened to every syllable. By the time she’d finished, he fully understood why she agreed to take the case.
Bullet circled his desk in the cramped room. He pulled Vera close to him and held her tightly against his thick chest. “I know exactly what it’s like to need you, Vera. While I’m not sure why this dude can’t get the kind of help he needs from anyone else, he came to the right place when looking you up.”
“Ooh, that’s the man I can’t do without,” Vera cooed, her face nestled in his arms. “I knew you’d understand.”
“Just promise me you’ll be careful enough not to get yourself killed over skeletons in this man’s past.”
“Careful can get you killed in this business,” she replied. “I will watch my step though. I can promise you that.” Vera pulled away from Bullet’s embrace. “Thank you so much. I really needed that.”
“So, how do you plan to go about helping this Rags? I mean, where do you begin?”
Vera chewed on her bottom lip, like she always did when something had her in a tailspin. “I’m used to looking into the who to find the what. This time, ain’t nothing I can do but look into what happened and work backwards for the who. If there was a victim, I need to find out as much as I can about how things stretched out.” She looked up at Bullet, who was smiling now. “What?” she asked, longingly.
“That’s why you’re the perfect woman for the job,” he answered quietly. “Always was.”
Vera caught Bullet’s double meaning and held it close to her heart. Blushing like a love sick teenager, she exited the office with Bullet close on her heels. It didn’t even bother her that Vendetta glared despicably as she exited the restaurant. Even though there wasn’t a name for what Vera and Bullet shared between them, that didn’t mean she wanted the trifling waitress to have any of it for herself.
Six
Vera knew that uncovering anything about what Rags thought he’d done was a long shot at best, but she was paid to try. On the east side of downtown, she parked her vehicle on the corner of a quiet residential street where two-story wood-framed houses lined both sides of the road. She pulled out her gun and checked the bullet clip. She thought it funny how three pounds of chrome and steel made the difference in one person leaving the scene in a bundle of rattled nerves and the other in a body bag. Her clip held six rounds of fire. Vera hoped that Lucius Carnes wouldn’t try something cute and force her to pump some of that fire in his behind.
The house Lucius hid out in belonged to his mother. Despite being one of the craftiest criminals Vera had ever run across, Lucius was the biggest momma’s boy. Although there weren’t any outstanding warrants chasing him at the time, he spent more than twenty hours a day inside that house. Vera approached it quietly, looking out for anything that seemed out of place. The square white house could have used a fresh coat of paint but then so could just about every house on the street.
Vera stepped to the side of the kitchen window. She leaned against the wood siding to hear what was going on inside. There wasn’t a single sound, so she brushed a layer of dust off the plastic bubble-faced cover to examine the electric meter. The small wheels were spinning out of control as if every socket in house was in use. “Yeah, Lucius, you’re in there all right,” she heard herself say, before banging on the front screen door. “Luuucius,” she sang, “it’s your old friend Vera Miles. Get your ass down here!” She continued pounding with the heel of her hand. “I ain’t going nowhere and neither are you, so open up,” she hollered. “Come on Lucius, this is getting old and I’m getting fed up.” After another few minutes of ratty-tat-tats sounding off, there was a trail of footsteps heading down the stairs. Vera chuckled. “I hear you in there. Open up so we can get down to business.”
“Ain’t nobody here, go away,” a soft voice murmured from the other side of the locked door. “My momma say I can’t have no company.”
“Lucius!” barked Vera. “What’s your momma gonna say when I drag your scrawny ass downtown and make you do the time still on your books at the county?” She listened to the silence that had him in a strangle hold. Within seconds, several locks began popping in a rapid manner. “Uh-huh, that’s what I thought.” Annoyed to no end, Lucius jutted his peanut shaped head out from behind the door. Vera grinned at the small man with a squirrelly build like she was glad to see him. “Now that wasn’t so hard, was it? Good afternoon, Lucius.”
“What’s so good about it?” he asked, with his thick dry lips pursed and puckered.
“Come on now, step aside and let me in,” Vera ordered, when he continued to stall. She nodded agreeably after he did as commanded, although with a great deal of reluctance. Lucius had the body of a young boy and an odd stagnant beige complexion which looked as if it never saw the light of day. Vera nearly laughed at his ostentatious outfit but she knew better. He’d have flown off the handle and clammed up if she poked fun at his pink taffeta ball gown and sash so she reserved her comments.
Lucius stood next to an exquisite Victorian styled sofa covered in navy velvet. He sneered at Vera with both hands propped on his hips. “I know what you’re thinking,” he hissed finally. “But it takes a real man to put on pink.” Lucius was thirty-five years old but you couldn’t tell it by looking at him, even if he happened to be dressed in men’s clothing. He was a convicted white collar crook with a number of quirks. Vera knew that Lucius was ashamed of his cross-dressing fetish and that was the card she played when necessary. Also, the little man was terrified of serving out his jail sent
ence. Vera made it possible to get his previous conviction kicked down to probation after convincing the judge that Lucius wouldn’t last a single day in general population with actual grown men. Besides, Vera’s ace in the hole was the secret she held over that particular judge’s head. As it turned out, she caught him on tape during her first divorce case. He and Lucius were two of a kind, down to their sequined thong underwear.
Several months had passed since Vera felt the need to call upon one of the foremost Internet pirates in the state. There was definitely a need for Lucius’s specialized services whether he was interested in helping her or not. She peered up at the steep staircase leading to the attic and his domicile. “Well, let’s get to it,” Vera asserted, with a raised brow.
“Ooh-ooh, I hate you,” Lucius huffed as he stomped past her in black patent leather Susie-Q shoes. “Come on up so you can hurry back down and leave.”
Vera followed the peculiar little man up the stairs. She counted over ten photos of him as a child, dressed in intricate costumes ranging from superheroes to the Village People. Vera realized then that his mother was partially responsible for his condition. By the looks of it, she must have wanted a girl. Let Lucius tell it, his mother got her wish.
“Don’t touch anything,” he spat loudly as Vera grunted past the top stair. Once her head cleared enough for her eyes to focus, she understood why he was so particular about his belongings. There were rows of porcelain dolls along the back wall, all dressed in fabulous regalia. Boxes of swanky negligees had been pushed toward the far end of the completely refinished attic. The floors were covered with thick plush carpet. Three computer monitors rested atop a broad mahogany desk. Nearby a signed photograph of Marilyn Monroe caught her eye.
“Damn, Lucius,” Vera marveled. “Look at all this stuff. You and Marilyn are living ghetto fabuloso up in here.”
“That’s why I said not to touch anything,” he smarted, with an air of arrogance. “However, if you behave yourself, I’ll let you fish around in my boxes of designer delicates.”
Vera’s eyes widened with anticipation when he reeled off designer labels to choose from. “You can’t have anything in my size?”
“Sure do, I have lots of voluptuous friends,” he informed her.
“Oh, yeah, I’ll be good,” she giggled. “Don’t worry, I ain’t misbehavin’.”
Lucius blushed brightly then waved his hand for Vera to take the seat next to his padded throne. “Now then, whose mainframe do you want me to crack? I know you’re here to use me up and toss me aside.”
“Don’t be so dramatic,” Vera argued. “It’s not that serious. Look, I want to run a scenario by you and we’ll see what pops.”
Lucius licked his lips then smacked them approvingly. “Sookee-sookee, I like the sound of that. Well, go on ahead and speak on it.”
Yet again, Vera was trying to avoid retelling Rags’s story so she hit Lucius with an abridged version. “This client of mine is interested in a murder, an old one. It might have occurred in Dallas, maybe two years ago. The victim, fatally wounded, was likely a fat white guy.” She shrugged her shoulders when Lucius exhaled through his frustration. “What is it, Lucius?”
“I don’t know why I’m surprised. Might haves, maybes and likely? It would be easier to find out who really killed Kennedy.”
“JFK? You could do that?”
“Before you get your panties in a bunch, let’s see what we can dig up on your likely dead, fat, white guy.” Lucius tapped into the Dallas Police Department computer system without much difficulty. He ran a search with the limited information Vera provided. “Imagine that, here I am looking for a man on the Internet again,” Lucius mumbled while waiting. “Okay, adult white male. Who are you and why do I care since you are obviously off the market? Oh, yeah, that’s right, Vera showed up, trying to knock a hole in my door.”
The computer bleeped then flashed several pages with numerous rows of names on a flat blue screen. Vera shook her head. “I can’t investigate that many cases.”
“And the police can’t do a damned thing right,” added Lucius. “Look, homicides aren’t tracked by race. Your client could be interested in any one of these poor men.”
“Dammit, you’re right,” Vera agreed. “I have a hunch that the one I’m dogging isn’t solved. See if any of them are still open.” She watched the monitor as it reconfigured Lucius’s search. This time, eleven names scrolled down the page. “Can you print that for me, Lucius?”
“As long as you don’t get none of this mess on me,” he answered, with a slight head tilt for effect. “If you’ve forgotten, I’m not even supposed to own a computer, much less hack into the police mainframe.”
Vera accepted the list of names and a troubled man’s concerns with them. “You have my word. I won’t let it come back on you, Lucius.” She fished through his box of ritzy negligees before making her way down the tower of stairs to her car. Since Vera couldn’t decide on a black number with straps and strings and a teal-colored sheer ensemble, Lucius suggested she take both of them and do her best to loosen up. A lot.
Seven
On the following morning, Vera headed toward downtown. She called the office to check in with her receptionist but the phone rolled over to voicemail. “Ms. Minnie, this is Vera. It’s after nine. Hopefully you’re just running late. Look, I’m going to stop by police headquarters and I might not be in until late. Please advise callers that I won’t be taking any new clients for a while. I’m just scratching at the surface and this case is more than likely a deep pit. Hey, call me when you make it in. Bye.” By the time Vera closed her portable flip phone, she’d concluded that her trusty office manager was not in any hurry to assist with Rags’s dilemma. She’d made her position on that loud and clear by disappearing the day before. Vera didn’t like it but she tried to understand nonetheless. Sometimes it paid to be afraid.
At police headquarters, Vera waved hello to a number of officers she’d done business with in the past. Salutations with veteran members in law enforcement typically came in the way of warm smiles and cordial winks. Vera’s smile grew noticeably wider when her eyes found Homicide Detective Donald Beasley stuffing his face with a heaping dose of crème-filled delight. Detective Beasley loved donuts and had been dieting unsuccessfully for as long as Vera had known him.
“Ahhh, now that’s just sad,” she teased, while approaching his cluttered desk. The large man raised his head slowly like a child getting caught with a hand in the cookie jar.
The dark-skinned cop with a receding hairline hesitated then bit down into a chocolate covered éclair. “I thought I heard the diet police marching in. It’s Vera Miles as I live and breathe.” He wiped his hands with a paper napkin then he pressed flesh with his visitor. “Sit down and take a load off.” The detective shoved another piece of dough in his mouth and shuffled some papers on his desk. “Mmmm, you look great, Vera. I suck at diets. What else is new?”
“Well, I went to sleep with you on my mind last night,” she answered jokingly. “Guess what, you hadn’t moved one inch when I climbed out of bed this morning.”
Beasley laughed. “I’m flattered. Was it good for you?” he flirted playfully. “Don’t tell the wife. She thinks I spent the night with her.”
“You know what I mean, Donald. I caught a strange one this time and I could use your help. A man stumbled into my place and paid two grand just to hold my attention. It could be nothing but I’d bet it’s a live one.” The cop leaned his thick frame closer to hers with exaggerated interest.
“Humph, I’m all ears.” Since Vera was one of the smartest private investigators he knew, there was reason to take note and listen to what she had to say.
“Here is a list of homicides.” She handed over the copy she’d gotten from Lucius. Beasley took one look at the pages then folded them over.
“Where’d you get these, Vera?” he whispered gruffly. “This is privileged departmental information. Hell, it’s even printed with departmental subheads.�
� He exhaled then surveyed the immediate area. “You could get into a lot of trouble with these and I could catch a lot of grief.”
“I know, Donald, and I’m sorry for putting you at risk but all I need is to be pointed in the right direction. Then, I’m out of your hair.”
Detective Beasley grimaced. “I must be out of my mind. A beautiful woman struts into my office and pulls a list of fatal shootings out of her behind, then here I go.” He glanced at Vera, who had her fingers pressed over her heart.
“Donald, you said I’m beautiful. Does that mean you’ll look into it?”
“Keeping two women satisfied is harder than I thought. I always imagined that stepping out on my wife would be a whole bunch more fun that this.”
“Don’t short yourself. That was very good for me,” Vera whispered softly, with her hand over his. “Thanks so much, Donald.”
“You might want to hold your applause until the show is over. I don’t even know what you hope to gain from this.” He laid his outstretched hand down on top of the list. “What does this client of yours want to know, exactly?”
“Okay, here’s where it gets kinda tricky. I need a needle in a haystack, a gunshot victim, white male, forty plus. My client thinks he has information on one of these murders,” she said, as not to give away Rags’s position.
“Good, bring your guy in and I’ll interview him personally.”
“No, I don’t think he’ll go for that. Besides, he may be mistaken altogether. I’d hate to get him involved unless it’s absolutely necessary.”
Beasley grunted his displeasure. “Oh, but it’s quite all right to involve the hell out of me?”
Vera batted her eyes at him. “You’re built for this, Donald, he isn’t. Don’t go breaking my heart. All I need to know is which of those homicides on that list are white male victims and are still unsolved.”
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