Winning Texas

by Nancy Stancill

  Krause wondered who’d squealed to the cop. “I said he was welcome to look around the premises. I just asked him not to bug my employees and friends. I told him to call me back during business hours.”

  “Did you tell him you’d throw him out of the club?”

  “Not at all. If anyone says that, they’re lying.”

  “Did you see him again?”

  “No.” Krause looked at the officer without wavering.

  “Can you describe what you did after that conversation?”

  “I had a drink or two, talked to some of the dancers and left when the club closed at 2. Went back to my apartment. My girlfriend was there.”

  “Can I get her name, address and phone number?”

  Bauer broke in. “We’ll provide anything you want.”

  “How about your employees? Do you know what they were doing during the time the reporter was there?”

  “It was an extremely busy night,” Krause said. “Everyone was stretched thin. I’m sure they had better things to do than talk to a reporter.”

  The cop’s eyebrows went up again and he looked at them both for a moment.

  “We’ll be back in touch with you, Mr. Krause, but you’re free to go for now. Just don’t leave town without notifying us. Thank you for coming in.”

  The detective gave Krause and Bauer his card. “If you have any questions or remember something that might be relevant, don’t hesitate to call me.”

  After the cop left the room, Bauer looked at him.

  “He doesn’t have anything on you yet, but if I were you, I’d lay low,” Bauer said.

  “How do you know what they have?”

  “If he had any physical evidence, like fingerprints, you’d know it by now. But they’re still investigating.”

  “Nothing will turn up,” Krause said. “Nothing that incriminates me, that is.”

  “That’s certainly what I hope for,” Bauer said. “In the meantime, don’t do anything dumb.”

  CHAPTER 21

  Betsy Marr held hands with Patrick Costas across the booth of the packed pancake house in Pasadena. Despite the chattering early Sunday afternoon crowd, the high-backed wooden booth gave them the illusion of privacy. They’d finished their blueberry pancakes and sausage, lingered over coffee and now touched delicately on the question before them. It was about as sticky as their syrupy plates, Betsy thought, but Patrick was persistent.

  “Bets, I’m down to my last hundred,” Patrick said. “Our motel room is paid up for two more days. Then what?”

  She squeezed his hand and looked into his almost-black eyes for something, but she really didn’t know what she was looking for – reassurance, trust, love? Maybe all of those things.

  They’d gone last night to the Texas Girls Club for Patrick’s gig and she had to admit, it had been kind of fun. She’d been sitting at a table by herself, watching the band when a nice-looking older man – probably in his forties, she guessed – walked up and asked politely if he could sit down. She was about to say no when he’d extended his hand and introduced himself as Kyle Krause, the club’s owner. She’d told him about the band and her boyfriend, and he’d waved to Patrick and told her how much he was enjoying the music. He asked her about herself and she didn’t flinch as she said she was Betsy Taylor from Dallas. The name came from her genuine-looking fake ID, which he’d asked to see. She could see him computing her birth date in his head, looking relieved that it showed her as twenty-one.

  “Just checking,” he said pleasantly. “We don’t want to get into trouble.”

  They talked until the band’s break, when he walked with her over to meet Patrick. She could see that Patrick liked him, especially when Mr. Krause asked if the band was available the next few Saturdays.

  He led her back to the table after the break and they continued to chat about the club. She was glad for his company, because it meant that other, not-so-attractive men would stay away from the table. There were so many guys in there, older and kind of dangerous-looking, like they’d stopped by for a beer after robbing a gas station. She’d also noticed a couple of younger dudes with scruffy hair and bad teeth looking at her, and she’d been nervous about them. She routinely attracted male attention – she wasn’t completely sure why. Patrick said it was because she was beautiful. But who knew what went through men’s minds?

  Then there were her breasts. She’d developed early and by the age of twelve, her breasts were as full and round as those of grown women. For a few years, she’d been embarrassed when she had to buy 36D bras and bikini tops when other girls her age still had small, graceful buds. By fifteen, she’d discovered their power. She could get a boy to do most anything she wanted just by wearing a tight top and flirting a little. But it caused problems with her dad, who seemed embarrassed if she wore something low-cut or form fitting. She heard him telling their housekeeper, Maria, to talk to her about what kind of clothes proper young ladies should wear, especially to school. She’d felt sad that he wouldn’t talk to her himself because they’d always had such a close relationship. She’d taken to studying old pictures of her mother, who’d died of cancer when she was four. She looked like her mother in the face, but her own body was much rounder than her mother’s slender frame. She guessed her dad was disappointed with her looks.

  She’d been alarmed when she heard he was coming to Houston last week. She’d called Maria and told her to let her dad know that she was okay, but didn’t want to be followed or contacted just yet. Maria had been her confidant, so Betsy had told her about traveling with her boyfriend. She’d threatened to hide if her dad came looking and left open the possibility that she’d be back soon.

  Now, as she sat in the booth with Patrick, she realized that he really was counting on her to start dancing at the Texas Girls club. Krause had offered her three shifts a week and said she could easily earn up to $1,000 in tips for just a few hours of work. He said that if she were a good dancer, she wouldn’t have to strip entirely. She could still wear modesty pasties, blue glittery pieces that would adhere to and cover her nipples, and tap pants, which offered significantly more coverage than bikini bottoms. She wouldn’t have to mix with the clientele much either, he said. She could dance on the main stage, have a drink or two if a customer approached her nicely and wouldn’t be expected to do lap dances in the VIP room. That was important because the VIP room was off by itself and Betsy knew that couldn’t be a good thing. Also, Krause said she could coordinate some of her shifts with Patrick’s band appearances. She’d listened to it all carefully, because she felt guilty about money. After she’d run away, her dad had frozen her bank account and cancelled her credit cards. She wasn’t contributing anything to their expenses.

  When she told Patrick about Krause’s offer, she was slightly surprised that he seemed excited about it. She’d assumed that he might not want her to dance on a stage nearly naked in front of other men. But that didn’t seem to bother him. It gave her a funny feeling, but she supposed he was raised with more liberal parents than her stuffy old dad. She knew Patrick loved her and just wanted the best for them.

  “Think about the money we’d have, baby,” he said. “We could get a really nice apartment, eat out all the time and go to fun places.”

  “Do you really think I should?” She said, sipping the hot chocolate she’d ordered to top off her pancakes. She always ate too much sweet stuff when she was stressed.

  “Your body is gorgeous,” Patrick said, squeezing her hand. “What’s wrong with making a little money off the way you look? You’re luckier than most girls. You’ve got everything – legs, boobs, a fantastic ass and a beautiful face.”

  She flushed with pleasure. Nobody had ever complimented her the way he did. It made her
feel like a real woman, not a stupid high school girl.

  “It seems kind of creepy,” she said. “What if men grab at me?”

  “That won’t happen. I’ll be around, and they’ve got bouncers.”

  “Maybe I should try for a waitress job.”

  “You’ll have bad hours, crabby people and you won’t make any money.”

  He dug in his back pocket, took out some folded bills and put a twenty down on their grease-spotted ticket. The plump waitress in a too-tight pink uniform picked up the bill and went away to make change.

  “She’ll get two bucks from us, which doesn’t add up to much in this old town,” Patrick said. “Do you really want to work that hard for so little dough?”

  “Not really,” Betsy said. “Will you still love me if I’m dancing up there on a stage for other guys?”

  “You’ll be dancing for me, baby, and don’t you forget it,” he said with a wink.

  The waitress brought back the change and he slapped two dollars on the table. They walked out hand in hand and he kissed her at the door of his black pickup.

  “Let’s go have some fun. I want to take you to Galveston where I can show you off in your little red bikini.”

  CHAPTER 22

  Annie got to the office on Wednesday with eyes that felt like they’d been rubbed with sandpaper. She’d lain awake most of the night after returning from Nate’s funeral in Waco. It had been one of the most wrenching experiences of her life. She had gone with several of the paper’s top editors and a handful of the younger reporters, including Travis. Nate’s mother, father and younger sister had behaved with quiet dignity and didn’t say anything to reproach her or the other Times editors, but she’d felt unreasonably guilty and helpless since Nate’s body had been discovered.

  In the last decade, U.S. newsrooms had shrunk by tens of thousands of journalists and their numbers continued to drop off each year. There were fewer reporters working on big, controversial stories, so the profession overall should be safer. Or so Annie tried to tell herself. But she also knew from her own experience that reporters would always risk danger when they asked questions people didn’t want to answer. Still, Nate’s death made no sense to her. He’d been investigating Kyle Krause’s clubs, but police insisted that there was no hard evidence to point to Krause, and employees had backed him up. They’d seen him leave at the front entrance of the club about 2 a.m. Was it possible for Krause to sneak out before he left without attracting attention and kill Nate in the back parking lot? Maybe, she thought, but that seemed like an unlikely scenario when he’d just talked to the reporter. Annie wished that she could think it all through with more clarity, but right now she was too emotional.

  She saw Travis come from the newsroom elevator and head toward her. His face was drawn and he walked more slowly than usual. She knew that as one of the last people to spend time with Nate, he felt as anguished as she did.

  “Did you sleep any last night, Travis?”

  “Not much. You?”

  “No, but today’s the day we need to start going through all of Nate’s computer notes and notebooks. Can you spend a few hours doing that with me?”

  “Where do we start?”

  Before the funeral, Annie had gathered the personal items from Nate’s workspace, including his Baylor mug and pens, a ratty denim jacket and some college textbooks on investigative reporting. She’d piled it all into a box and had given it to Carolyn Hardin the day of the funeral. They’d both cried and she’d held Carolyn for a long moment before promising her that she’d get to the bottom of his death. Annie knew that the Hardins were coming to Houston over the weekend to clean out Nate’s tiny studio apartment near downtown. She could not even imagine how difficult that would be for them, but they’d declined her offer to help.

  “I took Nate’s personal stuff to the Hardins yesterday. I’m going to start going through the paper files in his desk drawers. Do you happen to know his computer password?”

  “Yeah,” Travis said. “Try 123Bearsjourno. He was still a Baylor fan, you know?”

  They worked quietly for a few hours, with Travis sitting at Nate’s computer and printing out files while Annie went through his desk and read through paper files he’d stowed in drawers. Nate, like most journalists, was a pack rat and took voluminous notes in telephone interviews that he later printed out and saved in his own idiosyncratic filing system. It didn’t look like he’d thrown out anything during his stint at the Houston Times.

  Travis took a break to check in with some of his police sources for news of the day, which was light. He’d offered to go out and bring back some lunch. He took his time, driving to a deli near downtown and getting something special. He and Annie went to a small conference room and he offered her a muffaletta with chips, sweet tea and a peanut butter cookie. She was touched that he’d remembered her fondness for the Cajun-style sandwiches on fresh-baked round bread.

  “I haven’t been able to eat much, but this is wonderful, Trav,” Annie said, biting into her sandwich.

  “Thanks. I feel better just getting back to work.” Travis gave her the ghost of a smile and handed her a bunch of napkins. They ate in silence for a few minutes.

  “I know you spent a lot of time with Nate. How much did he tell you about his research?” Annie asked.

  “We’d joke about his visits to the topless clubs, but he seemed really interested about finding out how they operated. He’d definitely honed in on Kyle Krause. I think Krause’s background fascinated him, especially his involvement with the German-Texas movement.”

  “Yeah, it’s a shame Maggie left before doing anything on that story,” Annie said. “Now we’re starting at ground zero.”

  “I don’t think so,” Travis said with a triumphant smile. “Look at this memo.”

  He handed Annie a printout he’d made from Nate’s computer. She read it in silence.

  “Wow,” she said. “If Nate was right, Kyle Krause is the biggest backer of Sam Wurzbach’s campaign to grab a piece of the Hill Country for German Texas. That might give him a motive to kill Nate.”

  “Seems unlikely,” Travis said. “Krause’s contributions are legal, as far as I know. He’s strange and shady, but I don’t think he’d kill anyone to keep his political contributions secret.”

  “That’s true,” Annie conceded. “I ran into Sam Wurzbach at the North Freeway club and he told me Krause was a big supporter. I just didn’t know how big – he’s contributed close to a half-million dollars, according to Nate’s calculations.”

  “Was Wurzbach there the night the cops shut down the Carla Carmine show?” Travis asked. Annie had assigned him to follow up the raid and he’d written a story about that incident.

  “Yeah, he seemed a little embarrassed to be seen at a porn star show,” Annie said. “He made a point of telling me that Krause was an old high school friend who believed in the campaign for German Texas.”

  “You never did tell me how you happened to be there,” Travis said. “Researching the porn industry for your next career?”

  “Hardly. A friend who’s a cop took me with him,” Annie said. She was quiet for a moment before deciding to be candid. “I might as well tell you, but please keep it under your hat. I’ve been seeing Matt Sharpe.”

  “You and Sharpe are dating?” Travis said. “Isn’t he a little old for you?”

  “Travis, how could you say that?” Annie said. “I suspect that Lila Jo has a good ten or fifteen years on you.”

  “That’s true,” Travis said. “I just didn’t picture the two of you together. I’d heard that since he separated from his wife, he’s quite the bachelor about town.”

  “What do you mean? Let’s not even go ther
e,” she said. “I assume he’s dated other women. Should we get back to work?”

  “Okay, sure. Nate traced all the campaign money given to Wurzbach during his last legislative campaign. Some of it came from Krause’s strip club managers.”

  “I’m impressed, but not surprised,” Annie said with another wave of sadness. “Nate really used his investigative skills.”

  “I helped him a little with the money trail,” Travis said. “But he spent hours on this stuff in his free time.”

  “I’m still not sure what to make of this German-Texas campaign. What do you think? ” She frowned as she underlined key phrases in Nate’s notes.

  “It seems different from the Nation of Texas. They’re secessionists who want to turn this state into a separate country, to break up with the United States,” Travis said. “The German Texans say they want an enclave where they can celebrate and keep their heritage alive. It looks like they’re talking about including land west of Austin and north of San Antonio, taking in towns established by German immigrants.”

  “That would include New Braunfels, Fredericksburg, Boerne and Comfort, for sure. What about Kerrville?” Annie thought out loud, running through her mental map of the Texas Hill Country.

  “You’re wondering if Kerrville’s very own state senator, Jake Satterfield, is in on this?”

  Annie frowned. How much did he know about her past history with Jake?

  “I don’t think Satterfield’s involved,” Travis said. “But obviously, we’ll have to find out what he knows.”

  “What do you think they mean by a German Texas enclave?”

  “We only know what they’ve been asking for publicly. German language taught in schools, road and street signs in German as well as English and a big museum and tourist center,” Travis said.

  “My hackles went up when Wurzbach talked about training German Texans to help low-staffed police departments,” Annie said. “He seems like a great guy, but what does he really want? Arming German Texans sounds about as bad as arming the Nation of Texas secessionists.”