by Lou Berney
“You better believe me!” he said.
Interesting, Wyatt thought.
Julianna
CHAPTER 13
Julianna got to work late. She planned to leave early. While shuttling between the hip replacement behind curtain number four and the hysterectomy behind curtain number nine, she schemed. Diarrhea again? Ben, knowing Ben, would demand to see a stool sample. The funeral of a loved one? No. Ben, under the guise of sympathy, would be certain to pry. He would question the last-minute notice. He would ask her when she’d return. He might chat up Donna and discover that Julianna no longer had any loved ones.
“How are you feeling, Mr. Bell?” she asked the hip replacement. An old man whose new body part would survive far longer than the rest of him.
“It hurts a little,” he said. Julianna was unsure if he was smiling or grimacing.
“I know it must,” she said.
He seemed warmed by the glow of her concern. “Thank you,” he said.
For what, exactly? People said the strangest things when they first stumbled from the mists of anesthesia.
Julianna had gone to nursing school because she thought caring for others might give her the kind of peace that getting high every afternoon did not. And the state had paid her way, room and board included. Julianna’s test scores in college had been excellent, either despite or because of all the pot-smoking.
Her biggest surprise, once she became a nurse, was how talented she was. How talented in certain ways. She recognized connections that others did not, and her intuitive leaps were generally correct. And without even trying she was able to make her patients feel as if she really cared for them. Wasn’t that, at the end of the day, just as good as the real thing?
Ben ambushed her in the break room. He wore special sneakers that never squeaked—Julianna was convinced of it.
“Julianna,” he said. “We need to talk.”
“Sure.”
He tapped his iPad and frowned. Tapped and frowned. She knew she was in deep shit.
“I’m sorry I was late, Ben,” she said. “I had a rocky night.”
“The diarrhea.”
“Yes.”
“Julianna.”
“Yes.”
“I’m concerned. May I be perfectly candid? I feel as if certain patterns are emerging again.”
“Can we talk about this later, Ben? I just got a call from my neighbor. Apparently ONG was doing work on the block, digging up a gas line to repair it or something, and they accidentally let my dog out of the yard.”
Ben looked up from his iPad. He was a dog person. Julianna knew this about him.
“You have a dog?” he said.
“A Lab mix. Candy. She’s a rescue.”
“You shouldn’t keep her in the yard,” Ben said. “Dogs are den dwellers. They like to be indoors, surrounded by the scents of their pack. They’re much safer and happier indoors.”
Julianna was already exhausted by this conversation.
“I don’t have a fucking dog, Ben,” she said. “But I have to go. It’s only an hour early.”
He pursed his lips with deep disapproval. He stood between her and the door. Julianna weighed her options. She could threaten to knee him in the balls, or she could really put the fear of God in him.
“Let me get this straight, Ben,” she said. “You want to have this conversation without a representative from HR present? Because I have to say I feel very uncomfortable about that.”
His eyes widened. Then narrowed. But what could he say? Those who were sticklers for rules had to submit when the rules stickled them back.
He stepped aside. “Of course.”
“Thank you.”
“Julianna?” She was almost out the door. “I’m going to schedule you in ER the rest of the month.”
She turned back. “ER? I haven’t worked ER in two years.”
“Phil is on paternity leave. They need a floater for the overnight.”
Ben’s beard parted: two rows of tiny white teeth, a smile, victorious. Overnights in the emergency room were often hellish, the worst punishment he had the authority to unilaterally inflict upon her. Julianna didn’t care. She had to go.
“Sure,” she said.
She made it home a little after six and took the turkey out of the oven. Just in time. The skin was beginning to blacken. She set the pan on the counter. A second later the smoke detector shrieked. Julianna had to open windows and wave a dish towel until it stopped.
She peeled and boiled the potatoes. She knew how to make mashed potatoes, but the gravy came from Whole Foods, and the apple pie, too. Would Crowley notice? Care? Julianna doubted it. She suspected that despite what he claimed, the very least of Crowley’s objectives for this evening was a home-cooked meal. What he really wanted: to test her, to play with her, to bat at her with a finger until she either showed her claws or scampered away in fright.
Maybe he thought, if he played his cards right, she would have sex with him. Maybe he imagined a dinner that ended with her pressed up against the wall like the woman with the long braid, her head tilted back and throat bared, Crowley’s hand between her legs.
Julianna poured the store-bought gravy into a saucepan and turned the heat to simmer. In the bedroom she changed from her scrubs into jeans and a fitted tee, a blouse over the tee, black leather boots with two-inch heels. Not enough height to make up the difference between her and Crowley, but better than nothing. She tried the blouse buttoned, unbuttoned. She left it unbuttoned.
She felt safe enough. Julianna hadn’t told anyone about this dinner, but Crowley would have to assume she had. There was no way she’d invite an ex-con into her home without taking at least minimal precautions. She couldn’t be that crazy a bitch.
How many times while she was growing up, Julianna wondered, had she sprawled on Genevieve’s bed and watched her sister get ready for a date? Genevieve: fresh from the shower, nose to nose with her own reflection in the mirror above her dresser as she squeezed the eyelash curler tight. A turban made from a towel, her bare shoulders still jeweled with moisture, the Talking Heads or Maria McKee on the boom box.
Genevieve never spent hours and hours primping like some of the girls Julianna knew later in college. Genevieve was lazy, always running late, and—most important—she had no need to primp. Her natural beauty could be adjusted but not improved. The eyelash curler, mascara, a swipe of lipstick—that was it. Julianna had inherited this same minimalist approach, even though, especially now, nearing forty, a little foundation would not have killed her. As Donna at work had pointed out to her a few times. As in, You’ve got nice skin, girl, but.
She put on mascara. Lipstick only a half shade darker than her own lips. The doorbell dinged. Julianna checked the time. She was not expecting Crowley for another ten minutes. She supposed she shouldn’t be surprised. The games had begun.
At the door she took two breaths, steady, and then put her eye to the peephole. She froze.
DeMars.
Every light in her house was on. Her car was in the driveway. The doorbell dinged again. She opened the door.
“Detective,” she said, and smiled. “What a surprise.”
“Look at you.”
“At me?”
He smiled back at her. His mind kept working. Julianna had never known it to stop.
“Be careful, Detective,” she said. “You’re on thin ice.”
“You look nice. You always look nice. This evening you look a different kind of nice.”
“Well played.”
“I been married a long time, Juli.” He smoothed his silver-flecked goatee, striking a pose, and then chuckled.
Her heart raced, each beat stumbling up against the one ahead. If Crowley arrived while DeMars was still here, Julianna would never see either one of them again. That, an
d she didn’t know what else would happen.
“Come on in,” she said.
“You sure?”
“I’m sure.”
“But you’ve got plans for the evening.”
“Do I? DeMars. Ask if you’re going to ask.”
“You have a date,” he said, palms up, “then that’s none of my business.”
He could tell that her heart was racing. Her cheeks were probably flushed. The fresh mascara, the boots. Did a part of DeMars suspect that all this had something to do with Crowley? Probably so. To be a detective, to see all the things he saw on a daily basis, he had to suspect the very worst in people.
Julianna didn’t want to lie to him. Not in the state she was in. You had to be at the top of your game to get a lie past DeMars.
“You are correct,” she said. “That’s none of your business.”
He chuckled again and handed her a slip of paper. “You need to answer your phone,” he said. “I called you a couple of times.”
Julianna took the slip of paper and unfolded it. On it, in DeMars’s steady hand, was written a phone number and a name: “Mary Hilger Hall.” At first the name meant nothing to Julianna, and then she realized who it was: the woman on Facebook who’d posted the Food Alley photo from the ’86 state fair.
“Oh,” she said.
“I talked to her,” DeMars said. “Just for a minute. Didn’t tell her much. Didn’t think you’d want me to. She said go ahead and give her a call. She’s not sure she can help, but she said she’ll try.”
Julianna’s love for DeMars at that instant almost broke her into pieces. But she didn’t have time for that. She stole a glance at his watch. Crowley would be there any minute, any second.
“Come on in,” she said again. “Do you have time for a beer?”
Such a transparent bluff. She was ashamed of herself. Her only hope was that DeMars really did think she had a date tonight and that was why she wanted him gone.
“You be good, now,” he said.
He dipped his head so she could give him a peck on the cheek and then walked to his car. Julianna watched him drive away. DeMars had just turned the corner when she heard the rattle of Crowley’s truck—from up the block, the opposite direction.
It was too late for her to go back inside. Crowley parked on the street and lumbered across the lawn toward her.
He had his hair in a ponytail instead of down. His plaid shirt was pressed. As he climbed the two steps to her porch, his blue eyes moved over her—from her boots to her face, then all the way back down to her boots again.
“Waiting out front for me,” he said. “Eager beaver.”
Yes, she felt safe enough. Julianna told herself that if Crowley planned to do her harm, he wouldn’t have driven his own truck. The neighbors would take note. Someone might jot down the license plate. Crowley could see it was that kind of neighborhood.
“You’re late,” she said. And thank God he was.
“I’m whatever the hell I want to be,” he said amiably. He tipped his chin up. The wiry gray goatee, a strong jaw. Julianna glimpsed, beneath all the sag and crease, the young man he’d once been—the ruins of an ancient civilization half buried in the jungle. Crowley’s nostrils flared. “I smell something tasty.”
But was it his own truck? Julianna realized she didn’t know.
“Let’s go inside and eat,” she said.
She followed him in. She shut the door behind her but didn’t lock it. Crowley glanced at the dining-room table, set for two, and moved past into the living room. He dropped heavily onto the sofa. Letting Julianna know, again, that all this was on his terms, not hers.
“You got any whiskey?” he said. “Beer if you don’t.”
She took a tumbler from the cupboard and filled it with Maker’s Mark. Crowley took a sip.
“That’ll do,” he said.
Julianna felt surprisingly calm as she carved the turkey. Her heart had run itself ragged during the conversation with DeMars. It took a breather now, coasting.
The kitchen opened onto the living room. Crowley sat and watched her carve.
“You know what that reminds me of?” he said. “One time in the yard down at McAlester. This old boy took a shank to his little buddy and just split him up. I mean it. But did it calm as can be. Just another day at the office.”
He smiled at her. Julianna knew what he was doing. She scooped potatoes onto his plate and ladled gravy. Green beans. A roll.
“White or dark meat?”
“As long as it’s juicy.”
“How do you know I won’t poison you?” she said.
Crowley’s gaze, moving around her living room, came back around to her fast. Julianna smiled at him.
She carried their plates into the dining room and sat down. After a minute she heard the sofa springs creak. After another minute Crowley entered the dining room, carrying the bottle of Maker’s Mark, his glass, an extra glass. He sat down across from her. Without a word he snapped his cloth napkin open and started eating.
“Tell me what you remember about my sister,” Julianna said.
He shook his head, mystified. “Turkey with no stuffing.”
“I forgot.”
“You make this gravy yourself?”
“No.”
He was a surprisingly well-mannered diner. Small bites, mouth closed when he chewed, elbows off the table. An occasional dab of the napkin to his lips. Julianna ate a little of the mashed potatoes and then put her fork down.
“Will you tell me what you remember about my sister?”
“Slow down, now.” He reached for the bourbon and refilled his glass. He filled half of the glass Julianna supposed was meant for her. “Let’s get to know each other.”
His eyes were so blue. Piercing? Not exactly. The effect was more subtle than that. Like he was leaning in toward her when in fact he was sitting still.
“I don’t want to know you,” she said.
“Tell me a secret ’bout you that nobody else in the world knows. Nobody but you and me.”
“No.”
He nodded at the glass he’d filled for her. She hesitated, then lifted the glass and drank the bourbon down in one swallow. She held Crowley’s blue-eyed gaze and waited for the booze to land. When it did, heat spread out to her farthest edges. A massive splash. A fat kid doing cannonballs in a pool. She laughed.
“I didn’t know what semen was,” she said. “I mean, I knew. But I’d just turned thirteen. I was young for my age. There was a boy who lived down the street. He was older than me, a junior or senior in high school. I waited until I knew that his parents weren’t home, and then I went over. I asked him if I could see his penis. I just came right out and asked him. I was curious. I wanted to see his penis make semen. I knew that the penis was involved. He said no, at first—no way! I was just this little pest of a little neighbor girl he’d never even noticed unless my sister was around. But he gave in. It was fascinating. I was fascinated. Afterward he was so embarrassed. He couldn’t even look at me. Which was funny, because he was this big athlete at his high school, this cocky guy all the girls were in love with. But really he was a sweet kid.”
Crowley had started to take a sip of bourbon but then forgotten to finish. Julianna saw the surprise in his eyes, the fresh wariness. He’d planned to keep her on edge. Now he was on the edge with her. Maybe he was wondering how the hell that had happened. Julianna stood.
“More?”
“Everything but the gravy.”
When she returned from the kitchen, Crowley had the tumbler of bourbon in his hand, contemplating it, the way Julianna had seen him do in the bar. She put the plate in front of him and sat back down.
“Corn-bread stuffing,” he said. “That’s what my mama made. But my daddy’s mama, she’d always made it from white bread. That was
a war, let me tell you. Every Thanksgiving and Christmas. Long as they was together, at least.”
Julianna remembered Denny, the boy who lived down the block from them. He went to U. S. Grant High School, and his letter jacket had an embroidered patch, the word GENERALS, sewn on the leather sleeve. He was good-looking, but Genevieve never had any interest in him. Bohunks bored her.
He didn’t mind showing Julianna his cock. He thought it was kind of a hoot—innocent, educational. But when she told him she wanted to see everything, she wanted to see him do everything—that was why she was there, after all—he shook his head hard and pulled his jeans back up.
“You’re just a kid,” he’d said.
“You’re chicken,” Julianna said. “You’re a big chicken.”
“No I’m not. This isn’t right.”
“Chicken,” she said. “I’m going to tell everyone you’re a big chicken.”
He stopped buttoning his jeans and stared at her. “You can’t tell anyone about this.”
That might have been the moment, Julianna thought, when she realized that power could be taken, not just bestowed. All you had to do was recognize the opportunity when you saw it.
“Hey!” he’d said. “I mean you can’t tell anyone about this!”
Julianna just sat there cross-legged on the floor of his bedroom, her chin in her hand, and said nothing. She waited.
As he neared the end of the process, Denny let Julianna put her hand on his hand as he moved it up and down, up and down, faster and faster. In retrospect Julianna thought he might not even have noticed her hand on his. His eyes were closed, his face crumpled. He looked like he was in pain, like he’d banged his toe on the curb.
“Tell me what you remember about my sister,” she told Crowley.
“What do you remember ’bout me?”
“About you?”
“I was a handsome young man, wasn’t I?”
She noticed that he’d filled her glass again. She reached for it and had a sip. Just a sip this time. Her head felt light but clear.
“I remember you never took your eyes off my sister.”