“To knowing who you are,” Charlie said, raising his cup in toast.
* * *
Contracts were signed, interviews given, speeches made. In Chicago, Charlie had time to kill before his lecture at the University of Chicago that evening. He was walking along Lake Shore Drive on his way to the Field Museum. He’d wanted to go there ever since his father had promised to take him for his eighth birthday, before that nasty old bridge got in their way. He was upbeat, even serene, about fulfilling this lifelong dream. When his cellphone rang, he saw it was Crenshaw. “Hello, stalker.”
“Why didn’t you answer my voicemails?” Crenshaw sounded pissed.
“My battery went dead. Had to buy a new charger. Very busy. Dog ate—”
“How many more excuses do you have?” Crenshaw asked.
“How many do you need?”
“I figure by your caginess that you’ve heard.”
“I’m figuring by my relatively good spirits I haven’t. What’s up?”
“My God, you haven’t heard.”
“Heard what?”
“About your competition.”
“I wasn’t even aware that I had any competition,” Charlie said, adopting a mock-elitist tone, hoping it came across as a joke.
“You know Cecil Montgomery, right? Forsyth County’s local historian?”
Charlie’s sphincter tightened. Careful. “I’ve talked with him. Never met him. Saw where he was in a snit about my book. Figured him for jealous. Wouldn’t call him competition, though.”
“You being a famous author and all, yeah, yeah,” Crenshaw said in a bored tone. “Did you know he was related to Joshua Logan, the subject of Tyrus Bannister’s most recent news conference?”
“I did know that,” Charlie said, holding the cellphone away from his mouth, whistling through his teeth to relieve the sudden rush of tension that hit him. “Why? Is he denouncing me again?”
“Probably would if he could, but he can’t ’cause he’s dead.”
“That’s … that’s terrible. What happened? I mean, not a big surprise, I guess. The guy’s in his seventies, right?” For some reason, Charlie was already thinking of alibis.
“He was murdered during a burglary.”
Wait a minute. Charlie wanted to ask: Was Montgomery the victim, or the perpetrator? However, he had the good sense to bite his tongue instead. Be calm. “What did the burglar get?”
“Shot. Montgomery walked in on him and they killed each other. Burglar’s name was Suches. Ring a bell?”
“One of the guys who came after me was named Suches,” Charlie said.
“Yeah. Interesting. Deputies say the thief was holding some documents.”
“Documents?”
“You know. Paper thingies with writing on them.”
“What kind of documents?”
“Kind the sheriff won’t talk about. Bannister wants ’em, but it ain’t gonna happen, him being black, talkin’ about reparations and all,” Crenshaw said, using his best In the Heat of the Night voice.
“Strange,” Charlie said. “When did this happen?”
“Last night, the day after Bannister’s news conference. Go figure.”
Charlie’s eyes widened. Had the varmints hired another Suches for this job? What a bunch of fuck-ups. “You think there’s a connection?”
“Why, do you?” Crenshaw asked.
“You’re the one who mentioned it.”
“You’re the one who gave the Logan letter to Bannister.”
“So?”
“That’s what I’m saying. So …” Crenshaw trailed off.
“Sorry, man. Can’t help you. I gotta go.”
“You think of anything, let me know. And answer your damned calls, man. You used to be in the business, so be a good source. And don’t leave town.”
“Too late for that, I’m afraid.”
Charlie hung up. Well, that certainly was an unintended consequence. He shuddered as a chill swept through him. Or maybe it was just the wintry Chicago wind. In any case, after what he’d been through the past year, he took the weather personally.
Montgomery’s death brought him no joy, even if the guy was a pissant. But Charlie didn’t see how he was to blame if the old bastard fell into the line of fire. Unto the third and fourth generation and all that. Clearly, the day of judgment was at hand. And there was a bright side. Montgomery couldn’t denounce the letter or challenge him on his footnotes anymore. All part of a divine plan, obviously. Montgomery had been hit by a bus, so to speak, and the wheels must keep rolling. Time to check out the dinosaur bones and fulfill his father’s broken promise.
He took the steps to the museum two at a time.
* * *
Charlie drove to Redeemer’s church the morning after he returned to Atlanta from the West Coast. The visit was a surprise to all parties involved. He didn’t know exactly what he was doing or why, but he was feeling more attracted to the young hooker than repulsed. Absence, he supposed. He brought toys and books for Romy and Wyatt. When he pulled up in front of the church, the lights were on, and after a moment of shock, Tawny let him in. Charlie was relieved that she didn’t have male company.
The children seemed happy and healthy. While Wyatt unwrapped a Nerf football, Romy hugged Charlie’s leg and sang, “I’m better now.”
Just then, Tawny lashed out at him. “What is wrong with you? It’s been weeks and you didn’t even call to see how we were doing.”
Her anger surprised Charlie. “There wasn’t anything I could do a thousand miles away,” he protested.
“I thought that’s why you got me the cellphone, to stay in touch.”
“I got the cellphone for you, not me,” Charlie said. The football hit him in the shoulder. “Hey!”
“Thanks,” Wyatt said. “It was my birthday this week.”
“Happy birthday! How old are you now? Five?” Wyatt nodded.
“You’re my son’s age.” Charlie turned to Tawny, frowning. “He needs to be in school.”
“I know,” she said, looking away. “But there’s no requirement until first grade, next year.”
“You read to them?”
“Yeah, but I don’t need you acting like you’re from Family Services,” she said, her voice rising. “I mean, if you’re going to take care of us, then take care of us. Do not just string us along and show up whenever you want.” She folded her hands across her chest and glared at him.
Tawny reminded him of Susan back when she was young and feisty, before his wife turned malevolent. He wanted Tawny right then. But that didn’t matter, not with the kids around, even though he suspected they hadn’t been spared the sight of their mother at work.
“If I get my act together,” she said, “I could have any man.”
More like every man, he thought.
“I know what you’re thinking,” she said, wagging a finger at him and nearly poking him in the chest. “But you’re no better than me, Buster. Not when you’ve got that asshat problem.”
Charlie puzzled over that for a moment. “Oh. Ascetic.”
“That’s what I’m sayin’.”
“I didn’t come here to fight,” Charlie said. “I should go. Take this.” He handed her a wad of hundred dollar bills—ten minutes’ worth of talk to a bunch of college kids.
Tawny clutched the bills and waved them at him, looking for a moment like she was going to throw them in his face. Instead, she bit her lip. “Fine. Go. Don’t expect me to beg. Anyway, you’re worse off than I am. At least I got my kids.” Then she laughed at him.
Nothing he could say to that. Charlie left, his face burning with both shame and anger. He wanted to scream in frustration, knowing that he couldn’t stay with this disreputable, irresponsible woman nearly twenty years his junior, and he couldn’t desert her, either, because she and those kids needed him when no one else did.
* * *
If the varmints had any doubt that another book was in the works, the call from Brubaker attorney Ray Was
hburn to Uncle Stanley dispelled them. Charlie got one of those calls, too, and after conferring with Washburn, he started revising American Monster.
He was in the process of removing some of the more colorful adjectives describing Pappy when he heard from his divorce lawyer.
“Your wife and her attorney are playing hardball,” Richard Muncie said. “They obtained an extension on the restraining order until mid-June. The fact that you face criminal charges helpeth you not. You working on that?”
“Yeah. I hired Cornelius Searles.”
“Are you facing a death penalty I don’t know about?”
“I figure I’d get the best.”
Cornelius Searles was a well-known African-American defense attorney, a protégé of Johnnie Cochran, who often appeared on CNN as a legal analyst. He loved high-profile cases, and while this was just a misdemeanor, Charlie’s notoriety and ability to pay his fee proved irresistible to Searles, who looked forward to the prospect of doing battle in Forsyth County in front of a dozen TV cameras.
“Whew. That’ll cost you. Not to be racist, but you couldn’t go with a white attorney for Forsyth?”
“Where’s the sport in that?”
“You’re gonna need to hang onto some of that money you’re making. Your wife wants ten grand a month child support.”
“What? I’m not rich yet!”
“She wants the kids in Northside Christian Academy next year.”
Charlie grunted in distaste. “Does she know about the book contract?”
“She will. By the way, assume you’re under surveillance. There’s a chance your cellphone calls may be intercepted, too. Her lawyer’s got game.” Muncie’s voice was filled with admiration.
Charlie thought of his latest visit to Tawny. He’d wanted to go back and patch things up with her, but now he realized he couldn’t afford to be seen with her. The varmints and their allies would use her against him. “Damn.”
“Yeah, I get that a lot,” said Muncie. “Rough business, breaking up. I will say this: Your wife’s a real piece of work. From a purely professional standpoint, I gotta just step back and admire her. You don’t get clients like her every day.”
“She’s not your client,” Charlie said. “I am.”
“Don’t remind me,” said Muncie, sounding glum.
* * *
After a whirlwind speaking tour across the South, Charlie returned to Atlanta late on the night of April 1. The next morning, he was in La Patisserie, sitting by the window enjoying a muffin, fruit cup, and coffee. Two men in business suits entered and approached him. Fearing for his life, Charlie stood and looked around wildly for a weapon. “Are you Charles Sherman?”
“Yes,” Charlie said warily, casting his gaze upon a plastic spork. His would not be a heroic death.
The first man handed him some papers. “You’ve been served,” said the other.
They left. Charlie opened the envelope. It contained a petition for divorce—on grounds of desertion and mental cruelty. His hands shook as he held the paper. Lies, all lies! He hadn’t deserted Susan. She’d kicked him out. What about all the money he’d given her? As for mental cruelty—what about Bryan? And now Harold. God, the woman had gall.
The petition removed any iota of doubt left in his mind that Susan was involved in the varmints’ plot. What else could the divorce petition be but part of a conspiracy to ruin his reputation and destroy his credibility?
After he sent an e-mail to Muncie vowing to “fight this thing to the bitter end and beyond,” Charlie glanced through the morning paper. A brief on the legislative news page caught his eye: Reparations Bill Dies in House. Ah. So that’s why Bannister quit calling him. But really, what could he have done? In this case, given his own weakness as an ally, wasn’t it better to let the dead past bury the dead, and let the living move along? He certainly thought so.
* * *
Charlie spent much of April holed up in his apartment. Besides polishing American Monster, he worked on a book-length, profanity-laced defense of himself as a husband and father for a yet-to-be-defined audience. Muncie’s warning about the possibility of surveillance had become an obsession. Obviously, life was unfair. Just when people stopped trying to kill him, they started spying on him.
Consequently, when he should have been enjoying his newfound freedom and wealth, he was more alone than ever. Tawny was untouchable—grungy, ungrateful, and off-limits due to his fear of Susan’s spies; Jean, his oldest friend in his new life, now seemed distant—and knew too much about his time in the gutter to see him the way he wanted to be seen. Plus, she’d probably shared this information with Dana, who remained illusive. He hadn’t seen Danger Girl since she’d dropped by his loft briefly one afternoon in March with a box full of copies of Flight from Forsyth for him to sign, saying, “Just in case, vell, you know.” In case he got killed and drove up the value of signed copies, she meant. But that was understandable; she was an art dealer. Didn’t they wish for bad luck as a matter of course? And then there was Amy—or rather, there wasn’t. A trace of cinnamon was all he’d had of her.
Perhaps he should just start over and find a new life in a new loft. He’d read about an absolutely fantastic development on Industrial Avenue. It, too, had train tracks and razor wire, requisites for urban living. He could soon afford nearly anything the city had to offer, but he couldn’t motivate himself to go out and look. Instead, he sat at his computer, worked on his rant, and waited for whatever it was that was hurtling toward him.
* * *
Charlie decided he had to get out more, but he didn’t want to go out alone. So he hired a pretend bodyguard to escort him on his outings—Armand Parsons, a beefy, underemployed African-American actor. He’d met Parsons at the bakery one day after a drugged-out panhandler followed a young couple into the shop, demanding money. When Amy Weller told him to leave, the man said, “Suck my dick, bitch.” Parsons, standing at the counter, grabbed the guy by the collar. Charlie, sitting outside, had gotten up for a coffee refill and opened the door just in time for the panhandler to sail through it. Impressed with Parsons’s physical presence, Charlie bought him a cup of coffee and struck up a conversation.
The former high school football player lived across the street from Charlie and hoped to get a part in the next Tyler Perry movie. In the meantime, he needed money.
“If you’re looking for work, I could use a bodyguard on an ad hoc basis,” Charlie told him.
“Ad hoc? I need a job so I can get my stuff out of hock,” Parsons said. “Just one problem. I’m not a bodyguard. I don’t even have a weapon. Matter of fact, it’s at the pawn shop.”
“Oh, I don’t want you to carry a gun. I just need you to act like a bodyguard.”
“Acting.” Parsons rubbed his chin and took a sip of coffee. “How much?”
“Twenty an hour.”
“Twenty-five.”
“All right.”
“When do I work?” Armand asked.
“Whenever. Give me your cell number.”
They reached an agreement: If there was any shooting—whether on location for a movie or during an assassination attempt—it would be every man for himself. That afternoon, on the way to Lenox Square, Parsons said, “I’m like that merchant in The Godfather. You know, the neighborhood guy who came to see Don Corleone in the hospital and Michael posted him as a guard when the hit men drove by.”
“Exactly so,” Charlie said. “I wouldn’t have it any other way.”
“And when they make a movie from that book you wrote, you can get me a part.”
“Victim or criminal?”
“Either one,” said Parsons. “Just needs to be a speaking role.”
They rode for a while before Parsons spoke again. “Man, I hope you sell movie rights soon. Get you a Navigator or an Escalade. This old Volvo ain’t doin’ nuthin’ for your style points. Mine either.”
“Next check comes in, I’m gonna buy a BMW.”
“That’s cool, but an Escalade be better
.”
* * *
In mid-April, GQ interviewed Charlie for an article: “Big Shot Writer.” Charlie found the idea silly, but it was the kind of foolishness that sold books, so there he was, posing for the photographer in front of La Patisserie, wearing a new black duster coat, black custom-tailored, form-fitting Dickies, tight lace-up black boots, and new industrial-grade sunglasses that the shabby-chic young reporter and grungy German photographer found cool. Charlie thought the outfit made him look like a worker in a chic morgue—or somebody waiting for Neo to show up so they could access the Matrix.
Dana, having just returned from Munich, happened to be in the bakery. She came out to watch and soon took over, strutting around like a runway model in high-heeled, knee-high boots over jeans and a bright red sleeveless T-shirt emblazoned with the words Mangez Moi! Soon she’d talked the photographer and Charlie into visiting her art gallery to finish the shoot. There, in her native element, Dana continued to work her magic, breezily greeting customers, terrorizing her assistant, and setting up a backdrop for the photographer. She found time to convince Charlie to spend $12,000 for an abstract painting. “A bargain at any price,” she said. “You vill be thanking me for this. Many times. In many vays.”
When Charlie left for another appointment, the photographer stayed to negotiate a fee for taking photos for a gallery catalogue. That evening, before Charlie could get a return on his investment, Dana called and asked him for a ride to Hartsfield-Jackson Airport. This time, she was going to China. She kissed him lightly on the lips as she got out of his car at the Delta terminal. He pined for her on the drive back to Castlegate and all that evening. He went to bed alone for what seemed the 665th night in a row.
Hoping to learn more about Dana, and feeling nostalgic (as well as horny), Charlie strayed over to Bay Street Coffeehouse to see Jean the next day. He learned from her that Dana’s negotiating tactics with the photographer had included sex. It was a dagger through his heart. How could she do such a thing, when he’d been waiting for months?
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