“Get him out of here, would you, Officer?” Brice said. “Call for a wagon to haul his ass to jail.”
“For what?” the guy protested. “A bloody lip? You don’t even know what she was up to here. Why don’t you ask her that?”
“You’re going to jail for aggravated assault, for starters,” Zee said, gripping the man’s forearm and forcing him to his feet. He took the handcuffs from his belt and clipped them over the man’s wrists.
“No,” Colleen Boardman whispered. “Don’t take him to jail. He didn’t mean it.”
“What?” Brice sat down on the edge of the bed again, lowering his voice, so the other two couldn’t hear what was being said.
“Colleen, this guy is bad news. He hit you once, he’ll keep on hitting you. I’ve seen it before.”
“It was a misunderstanding, that’s all,” she said, avoiding his gaze.
“You’re saying you don’t want to press charges?” His voice was incredulous.
“I’m fine. Really. Allen only gets like this when he drinks.”
“If you press charges, we’ll testify in court about how he hurt you. He could do real time. You could at least get a restraining order, to keep him away. So he can’t do it again.”
She shook her head violently. “No. Can you just, I don’t know, maybe get him to leave now?”
“Are you sure?” Brice glanced over his shoulder at the husband. Zee gave him a questioning look.
“Cut him loose,” Brice said.
“See? I told you. No big deal,” the man said, smirking.
When he’d unlocked the cuffs, Zee gave the husband another shove, in the direction of the door. “Get out,” he said. “And don’t go anywhere near her, you hear me? If you lay a hand on her again? If we get another domestic call about you? I promise, things won’t end like this next time.”
Brice was still looking at Colleen. “Officer, maybe you could give him a police escort, say, to a friend’s house, where he can cool off for a few days.”
“That’s a really good idea,” Zee said, opening the motel room door and pushing the man outside. “Come on, dipshit. Let’s take a ride.”
* * *
“Thanks,” Colleen said, when her husband was gone. Through the cheap rayon drapes they saw the headlights of a car, backing out, and then the blue lights of Zilowicz’s unit following, and then both cars merged onto traffic on Ninth Street.
“You should have let us lock him up,” Brice said, staying by the window. “So, what now?”
She shrugged and the sheet slipped just a bit, for only a second, affording a glimpse of the top of her creamy breasts. She pointed at the empty scotch bottle. “I wish I had some of that. I could use a little liquid courage, you know?”
* * *
They found an empty booth near the back at Mastry’s, an old-school dive bar downtown on Central Avenue.
Colleen waved her hand at the plumes of cigarette smoke wafting from the next table. “I can’t believe people still come in here. All this smoke is so gross. You know, I used to sneak in here when we were in high school.”
Brice pretended to look shocked. “You? Miss Susie Sorority? Underage drinking?”
She sipped her Manhattan. “I wasn’t quite the Goody Two-shoes everybody thought I was back then.”
“Could have fooled me,” Brice said. He sat back in the booth. “How’d you end up with that loser from the motel?”
“The usual story,” she said. “We met when I was in college, he was cute and sweet. He had a nice car and came from a nice family.” She twisted her lips in a bitter smile. “Not so sweet now, huh?”
“Has he done this before? Hit you? Beat you up?”
She was drawing loops with the condensation from their drinks. Dipping a pink-tipped finger into the beaded-up water, drawing circles and whorls. He’d waited in his patrol cruiser, outside the motel room, while she showered and changed. Her hair fell past her shoulders, shiny and blonder than he remembered from high school. She’d applied a heavy layer of makeup to the bruises.
“I don’t want to talk about him.”
“What do you want to talk about?” He sipped his Pabst Blue Ribbon.
“Let’s talk about you. You said you’re married? Do I know her? Is she nice?”
“Her name’s Sherri. She grew up in Tampa. Yeah, she’s great. Got a hell of a temper, though. Cubans, you know? We’re actually living in her parents’ house out at Sunset Beach, trying to save up to buy a place of our own.”
“Sunset Beach. Where all the old hippies end up. You know,” she added, tilting her head, “I never would have guessed somebody like you would become a cop.”
“And I never would have figured you for the kind of nice wholesome girl who’d get married and let some asshole beat the crap out of you.”
“People change,” she said. “You got drafted, right? Never went to college?”
“I went to Vietnam. Made it back home. I’ve been taking night classes at the junior college. I’m thinking maybe I’ll go to law school.”
She raised an eyebrow. “I’m impressed.”
“Why do you stay married to him?” Brice asked.
“I thought we weren’t going to talk about him.”
“No. You said you didn’t want to talk about him. I never agreed to not talk about him. What’s the douchebag’s name, by the way?”
“Why do you want to know?”
“So I can check for priors against him when I get back to the station.”
“You won’t find anything,” she said. “Allen is a model citizen.”
“What’s his last name?”
“Hicks.”
“And what does Allen Hicks do for a living?”
“He’s in commercial insurance,” Colleen said.
“What about you? Do you work?”
“Nothing too exciting. I’m a dental hygienist.”
He nodded. “You want another drink?”
She glanced at the neon Schlitz clock on the wall. “It’s pretty late. Won’t your wife wonder where you are?”
“I’ll tell her I had a domestic call, right before I was about to get off shift, and I had to deal with it. All of which is true.”
“Why not?” she said, looking around. “For old times’ sake.”
19
“Ms. Howington?”
“Yes,” the older woman said impatiently. “Whatever you’re selling, I can’t afford.”
It was Thursday afternoon. The office was empty. Everyone else was on lunch break, but she kept her voice low anyway to avoid being overheard. “This is Drue Campbell. From Campbell, Coxe and Kramner?”
Yvonne Howington gave an exasperated sigh. “Honey, I don’t wanna be rude, but I got nothing to say to you people.”
“I’m so sorry about everything that’s happened to you, Ms. Howington, and that’s why I’m calling. I was wondering if I could come talk to you.”
“What for?”
The question took Drue by surprise. She’d just assumed that Jazmin Mayes’s mother would welcome her assistance.
“I want to help,” Drue said. “I think the way your case was settled is wrong. And I thought maybe, well, if I could help you prove that Jazmin wasn’t working that night, my father could renegotiate with the insurance company.”
“I ain’t got time for this,” the woman said. “And what good will it do anyway?”
“It might not do any good at all,” Drue heard herself say. “But I’d like to try, if you’d just let me come out and talk to you.”
“I don’t know,” Yvonne said. “Every time I get myself all worked up over this thing, I just get slapped in the face. I’m home from work right now, because Aliyah’s been sick.”
“I could come after I get off work,” Drue said eagerly. “Would six o’clock be all right?”
“Be fine,” Yvonne said.
* * *
The Lyft driver gave Drue a dubious look over her shoulder. “Hon? You sure this is where you wanted me to
take you?”
They were in a neighborhood full of boarded-up abandoned homes and shabby duplexes. Yvonne Howington’s home was a single-story yellow stucco bunker bedecked with stout burglar bars. The yard was weed-choked with a single huge jacaranda tree, whose arching branches with purple blossoms nearly brushed the ground.
Drue looked at the address she’d typed into the Lyft app. “Yes, this is it.”
“Okay,” the driver said. “But I’m not sure this is a real safe neighborhood.”
She nodded toward a group of teenagers loitering on the corner, passing around a joint.
“I’ll keep that in mind,” Drue said, climbing out of the backseat.
* * *
A set of frazzled exposed wires were the only sign of a doorbell. Drue was about to knock when she heard a deadbolt being slid open. The door opened three inches and Yvonne Howington peered out from behind a chain lock.
“Shh,” she said, opening the door and nodding toward a sofa where Aliyah was curled up under a pink blanket, dozing. “She had a bad night. Come on in the kitchen.”
A window air-conditioning unit blasted cold air into the living room, but the tiny kitchen was oppressively hot. A standing fan directed warm air at the dinette set where Yvonne directed her to sit.
“Okay,” she said, folding her hands on the table. “What do you want to know? I already talked to two other lawyers and ain’t none of them say they can do anything about what happened to my baby girl. Say their hands are tied.”
Looking at Yvonne Howington, Drue was struck by how beaten down she seemed. Her skin, coated in a fine sheen of perspiration, had an unhealthy ashy cast, there were large bags under her eyes and her mouth was bracketed by sagging cheeks. Only forty-eight, she looked twenty years older.
“Tell me everything you know about the night Jazmin was killed,” Drue said.
Yvonne gave Drue a curious look. “Does your daddy know you’re here?”
“No,” Drue said. “In fact, he told me to stay completely away from this case.”
Yvonne got up and went to the refrigerator, reached in and pulled out a can of orange Shasta. “You want something to drink?”
“Maybe just a glass of water,” Drue said.
Yvonne poured tap water into a glass and cracked three ice cubes into it. “Water’s better for you, but I got to have my orange soda,” she said, returning back to the table.
“Okay. So the day it happened. Jazmin called to tell me her car broke down on the way to work, guess that was around two-fifteen. She was supposed to be at the hotel at two. She left the car and called a cab to get there. And that’s the last time I talked to her.”
Yvonne grasped her soda can with both hands. “I fussed at her, told her she needed to save up and get her a good reliable car, and she just told me, ‘Mama, don’t worry about me. I got plans, and pretty soon me and Aliyah are gonna have a new car and a house of our own.’”
“What do you think she meant by that?” Drue asked, scribbling notes.
“Don’t know. That girl was always dreaming big dreams.”
“She didn’t have a boyfriend? Maybe someone to help her out financially?” Drue asked.
“She was going out with somebody, but she wouldn’t tell me his name or anything else. Said it was too early. But she’d get herself all fixed up on her night off, when they were going to meet. And she didn’t come home ’til way late those nights.”
“No idea who he was?” Drue asked, intrigued.
“No.”
“Okay, let’s go back to that night, September fifteenth. You said before that Jazmin complained about some man at work bothering her. What did she mean by that?”
“She said this man came around when she was by herself. Like, if she was cleaning a room, he’d come in there and close the door, and say things to her.”
“What kind of things?”
Yvonne took a swig of soda and looked away. “At first she said he just told her how nice she looked that day. She said it made her feel funny. And then he started saying, well, sex stuff to her. Things he wanted to do to her. Or have her do to him.”
“Did she ever report that to management?”
“She said she told one of the bosses,” Yvonne said.
“Which boss? In housekeeping, or personnel, somebody like that?”
Yvonne scrunched up her face as she thought. “Maybe personnel? Doesn’t matter, because whoever it was told her she should quit dressing so sexy at work. Sexy! She wore jeans and a top the hotel gave all the housekeepers. You tell me what’s sexy about that.”
“Any idea when she complained?”
“I can’t remember. It’s all a jumble in my mind now.”
“What about her friends at work? Did Jazmin tell them about this man bothering her?”
“The only friend I met was Neesa,” Yvonne said. “I don’t know what Jazmin told her.”
“That’s Neesa Vincent?”
“Mmm-hmm. She come to Jazmin’s funeral and brought me real nice flowers.”
“I’ve read our investigator’s notes about the case. He was never able to contact Neesa. Did you know that the hotel fired her? Shortly after Jazmin’s murder?”
“No. I didn’t know that happened to her.”
“Any chance you know how to reach her?” Drue asked hopefully.
“No.” Yvonne shook her head sadly. “That’s been two years.”
“When was the last time you talked to the police about Jazmin’s case?”
“Oh, I talk to Rae pretty regular. She calls to check in, let me know if there’s anything new going on.”
“Rae?”
“That’s Rae Hernandez. With the police. I talked to her after I left your daddy’s office last week. She thinks I got a bad deal with those hotel people. And your daddy,” Yvonne added pointedly.
“Have there been any new developments in the case?”
Yvonne sighed and mopped at her face with a paper towel. “I think they looked at a guest who stayed in a room Jaz cleaned that night. But Rae, last week, said it wasn’t him.”
“Grandmama?”
Both women looked up. Aliyah stood in the kitchen doorway, her blanket wrapped around her neck like a muffler. Her pink nightie was too short, revealing a pair of long, toothpick-like legs.
“I’m hungry, Grandmama,” the child said. Her dark eyes registered a glimmer of recognition when she saw Drue.
“You’re the lady who gave me markers,” she said, offering the same shy smile.
“Hi, Aliyah,” Drue said. “I’m sorry you’ve been sick.” She reached into her backpack and brought out a Little Mermaid coloring book and glitter markers she’d bought at Target.
“These are for you.”
A huge smile lit up the girl’s face. “Oooh.” She pressed the art supplies to her chest.
“What do we say to Miss Drue?” Yvonne prompted.
“Thank you.”
Yvonne opened her arms wide and enveloped her granddaughter in a hug. “This girl here was real brave today. Let the doctor give her a shot and a breathing treatment.”
“Can I have some soup? And some Goldfish?” Aliyah asked.
“You sure can. Grandmama’s gonna fix you your supper right now,” Yvonne said, rising.
Drue stood too. “Thanks for talking to me. I appreciate your time.”
“I’ll walk you out,” Yvonne said, leading her through the living room. She looked out the window at the group of young men standing across the street.
“I don’t see no car out there,” she said.
Drue took out her phone and swiped over to the Lyft app. “I used a ride service to get here.”
She held up the phone. “See? A car will be here in five minutes.”
“Huh,” Yvonne said. She motioned toward the street. “You best stay right inside here until that car gets here. Them thugs over there, ain’t no telling what they might do if they see a girl like you standing alone outside.”
Drue had a thought
. “Did any of those guys ever bother her?”
“They wadn’t living here when Jazmin got killed,” Yvonne said. “There was a nice young family living over there, but they moved away. That’s how it is here. All the nice people move off. That’s what Jazmin wanted, for her and for me and Aliyah. She wanted something better.”
20
After the driver dropped her off at the cottage, Drue went inside, stripped and put on a bathing suit. She called Corey.
“Hey, I was wondering if it would be okay if I came down and used the pool at your complex,” she said, as soon as he answered.
“Oh hi, Drue. I’m headed home right now, and I was actually planning on swimming laps tonight, so yeah, perfect timing. Meet you there in twenty minutes?”
* * *
As soon as she waded into the pool, Drue felt her tensions begin to melt away. She floated on her back and closed her eyes, willing herself to relax. She heard a splash from the far end of the pool, and watched while Corey swam toward her.
“Water feels great, right?” he said, emerging at the shallow end where she was clinging to the side of the pool.
“It feels amazing,” she said. “I can’t even tell you how much I’ve missed this.”
“Feel like doing some stretches?”
For thirty minutes he patiently put her through a routine of exercises designed to strengthen her still-mending knee. “Stop if it starts to really hurt,” he instructed. “You don’t want to do too much too fast.”
Finally, she waved the white flag. “Okay, I think that’s probably enough,” she admitted.
“I’ve gotta get my laps in, but if you want, just hang around and do some really easy pedaling like I showed you,” he said.
She watched appreciatively as he glided back and forth through the water, his eyes covered with swim goggles, his Lycra suit molded to his body. This could, Drue reflected, come under the category of soft-core porn.
* * *
They sat on the edge of the pool, their legs dangling in the water, while Corey took glugs from an evil-looking plastic gallon jug of something he called “go-juice.”
Sunset Beach Page 13