Mean Woman Blues

by Smith, Julie

  When they tell you your husband’s America’s Most Wanted and threaten to lock you up, you’ll do what you have to. Even form an alliance with a fat, pink-faced, perspiring fool like Scottie Frentz. He must be happy now, she thought.

  He’d been trying to date her for years. Now he’d had the chance to be her rescuing knight.

  Still, she had to give him his due. He’d made short work of the overbearing, asshole feds who wouldn’t even let her talk to a cop in the same room with them! What the hell was up with that? Was it some kind of sexism? It seemed to her like the worst form of petty bureaucratism.

  Of course, even that couldn’t keep her out of jail. Being processed was the most humiliating thing she’d ever experienced— and she’d gotten the short form. Scottie said they could have drawn it out for hours.

  She was unexpectedly angry. It felt good. Actually, it felt great. And she had David Wright to thank for it. She was getting her second wind now, thinking things through, and there was a hell of a lot to think about. She wouldn’t have felt like this before she went on his show and got a new life and married him and learned by his fine example— learned to be strong, to care about people who needed caring for. She would have just been some scared little tangle of raw ganglia, afraid to open her mouth, afraid of the feds, afraid of the McLeans, afraid of her ex-husband, just plain scared of everything. And hopeless.

  Right now she had hope— hope that her life as she knew it wasn’t over, that David Wright wasn’t Public Enemy Number One, that there was all some big mistake, and that she could untangle the whole thing— with the use of McLean clout if she needed it. So far it was standing her in good stead.

  Her uncle must have made some high-level phone call— maybe to the governor or something— because she really didn’t think that fat fool Scottie Frentz was capable of getting her out of that place by himself. He’d also made her agree to stay with him and Carol Ann, to keep an eye on her, maybe. She’d insisted on going home to get clothes, however, and for more than one reason.

  Scottie sat happily on her sofa, reading magazines and drinking coffee, while she packed a suitcase. That left her all the leeway in the world to include the emergency cell phone her husband had given her when they were first married. “If anything ever happens, turn it on.”

  “Anything like what?”

  “If we get separated.”

  “You mean like a terrorist attack or something?”

  “Baby, don’t even think about that! But take the phone, will you? I’ll feel better.”

  So what did that mean? That he was Errol Jacomine and he foresaw this? In that case, what did he expect from her? That she was going to go running into the arms of a serial killer? Or whatever he was. Not exactly a serial killer, she was pretty sure, if that was the sort of person who tortured women before filleting them. But he’d killed people. Jacomine had killed people.

  She kept shoes in boxes on a shelf in her closet piled three deep, and in one of the boxes, in one of the shoes, was the cell phone. She hadn’t thought about it since she put it there.

  When she got to the guest room of her uncle’s house, she turned it on and plugged the charger in. And then, unhappily, she called her parents, fortunately getting only the machine.

  She was all alone in her uncle and aunt’s house and feeling odd. Not sad, not angry, but strangely excited. And kind of coolly distant, like she couldn’t really feel what was going on in her life, like she was watching a movie or something. If she had to put a name to the way she felt, “curious” might be as close as she could get. Curious and on edge, waiting for the other shoe to drop. She was dying for a cigarette, though she hadn’t had one since she first started to work for the station. She’d started smoking when the thing happened with Charlie and hadn’t stopped until it was over.

  She was about to go get a pack when the call from the cop came. Skip Langdon was one woman she wanted to talk to. She asked her to bring the damn cigarettes. She showered and changed clothes, to give herself something to do, taking the cell phone into the bathroom with her. She didn’t know if David would even remember it.

  Having dressed in jeans and a tank top and little slide sandals, she tidied the pillows in the living room and in so doing, noticed something odd: a car on the street that shouldn’t be there.

  Her heart jumped into her throat. Okay, she thought, if they want me, why don’t they just come get me? And who was “they”? It sure wasn’t her husband out there.

  She phoned her uncle (who was being exceptionally nice to her), but he couldn’t help because she didn’t have the plate number. And he said whatever she did, don’t go outside to get it; he’d call the Dallas cops to come check it out.

  Skip Langdon got there while she was making iced tea, carrying a plastic Walgreen’s bag. Karen was all hopped up. “Check out that car. Somebody’s watching me.”

  Karen watched the cop make a show of studying the car, finally saying, “I wouldn’t worry about it,” and that was how she found out the feds had her under surveillance. Why the hell else would the cop tell her not to worry?

  “Are you alone here?” the cop said.

  Karen nodded. “Want some iced tea?”

  Skip said, “Thanks. Are you scared?”

  Karen considered. Probably not, she thought, if that car was only feds. “No,” she said finally. “I’m just… discombobulated. Did you bring the cigarettes?”

  “Sure.” The cop handed over the pack. She followed her into the kitchen and took a glass of tea, saving Karen the trouble of fixing a tray. They went back and sat on the newly tidied sofa in the living room, Karen bringing an ashtray she’d found in the pantry.

  She lit up, feeling guilty.

  “It must be an awful thing,” the cop said, “having your world come apart like this.”

  Karen shrugged. “I guess I’m in denial. I don’t feel like my world’s come apart. I guess I won’t really understand anything until I talk to my husband.”

  “You sure are in denial, girlfriend.” The cop spoke harshly and then she settled down. “Look. Tell me about your life together. And I’ll tell you what I know about him.”

  Karen didn’t want to talk at all, just wanted all the information this woman could give her. She felt light-headed from the cigarette and wanted to blame what happened next on that. But maybe she needed to talk more than she thought she did. In the end she told the cop all about the show, and David’s slow courtship of her, and their happy life together, and her new work, her fledgling foundation, Right Woman.

  When the cop said, “You said something about a baby. Are you pregnant?” Karen was shocked. She’d forgotten for a minute. Forgotten in the rush of love she felt for her husband now that he wasn’t there. Her eyes filled. “I had a miscarriage.”

  “Oh?” The cop let the silence fill the room.

  “It was two days ago,” Karen said. And then, “I don’t want to talk about it.”

  “All right, then. Are you okay with talking about Rosemarie Owens?”

  “Sure. Why not?”

  Skip frowned then, but whatever that was about, she put it aside. “Does she live with a man? Maybe a houseboy or…”

  In spite of herself, Karen laughed. “You mean her very much younger ‘husband,’ Billy Bob Bubba? Oh, excuse me, I think his name is Todd. He’s an ex-Dallas Cowboy.”

  Skip looked very serious all of a sudden. “Todd who?”

  Karen thought, What the hell does it matter? but something in the woman’s manner was intimidating. She searched her memory. “Todd Lyman, I think. Layton, maybe. Something like that.”

  Skip said, “Excuse me a minute,” pulled out her cell phone and made a call: “Hey, Turner! Any I.D. yet on that guy they found at the Owens house? She lived with a man named Todd Lyman or Layton. Oh, you did? Okay.” She rang off.

  Karen picked up the past tense like a dog grabbing a scent. “What’s happened?”

  “Todd’s dead. Somebody shot him at Rosemarie’s house.”

/>   Karen’s hands fluttered. “David…”

  “No sign of either him or Rosemarie. May I ask you something, Karen?”

  “Sure.” How can it get worse? she thought.

  “Did you know your husband was once married to Rosemarie Owens?”

  That almost made her laugh. “No, uh-uh. He was her husband’s best friend. Not Todd, the real husband. That’s the connection. David wasn’t married to her.”

  “Oh, really? He was if he’s Errol Jacomine. They got married in their teens, ran away to Alabama, had one son, Dan, now serving time for crimes he committed with his father. Anyway, he and Rosemarie split up, and years later he married Irene, whom he renamed Tourmaline. He likes to control everything, Karen. Haven’t you noticed that? They had one son, Isaac.”

  “Where’s Isaac now?” It was kind of an automatic question, just making conversation. This had nothing to do with her.

  “He’s an art student in New Orleans. Where he lives with his girlfriend, Terri Whittaker.”

  There was something familiar about the name. A shiver ran up Karen’s spine.

  “Terri was a guest on Mr. Right earlier this week. Haven’t you wondered about the timing on all this?”

  Karen lifted her iced-tea glass but somehow missed her lips. She busied herself wiping spilled tea while she thought about timing. That was the night David hit her. The night he changed.

  “Isaac was shot yesterday morning in New Orleans.”

  Karen didn’t get it. “What does that… mean?”

  “It means he put out a contract on his own son.” Skip’s voice was gentle. “He found out before the show that Terri’s boyfriend was Isaac, and he knew Isaac would watch. He was the one person in the world who might both watch the show and recognize him.” She smiled. “I would have recognized him. I’d know him anywhere. But I had no reason to see the show.”

  “You’re telling me that you actually know Errol Jacomine and that he’s my husband?’

  The cop pulled a videotape out of the Walgreen’s bag.

  “You can see for yourself. We’ve got lots of tapes of him. He ran for mayor of New Orleans, you know. He’s always got something grandiose going.”

  Karen felt as if a ghost had laid a cold hand on her neck.

  Like running for president? she thought. Would that be grandiose enough? God, what a fool she’d been!

  Skip was staring at her, assessing. She was holding up the tape. “You up for this?”

  Karen nodded, not speaking. She wasn’t sure she could speak.

  She led Skip into a little den on the first floor where her uncle and aunt liked to watch the news and sat down while Skip popped the tape into the machine.

  At first, she didn’t get it at all. “That’s Errol Jacomine?” The weak-chinned little rodent with the redneck accent was no more her husband than Harrison Ford was.

  But as the tape ran, she began to hear the voice and not the accent, began to see familiarity in the way the rodent moved and, without warning, felt nausea rising so fast she had to run to the bathroom.

  After a discreet minute or two, Skip followed. Karen had left the door open. She was rinsing her mouth. “You okay?” the cop said.

  Karen felt oddly violated. “Just give me a minute.” The cop left. This time she did close the door and she started over, washing her whole face, wanting to rip off her clothes and stand under a hot shower, but there was no shower, this was just a powder room, and so, for the moment, there was no escape.

  She more or less staggered back into the little den, where, she was glad to note, it was blessedly silent. Skip had taken the tape out and was waiting quietly.

  “Let’s go back in the living room. It’s too claustrophobic in here.” She needed as much air as she could get.

  When they were once again seated in her aunt and uncle’s tranquil living room, sunlight streaming in, Skip spoke again. “You’re sure you’re all right?”

  Karen said, “This is so weird,” and thought she sounded like some Valley girl on a television show. She sat up straight and made an effort to restart her mind. “I’m sorry. I’m a little disoriented.”

  “You’ve had a bad shock.”

  Several of them, Karen thought. Several of them.

  “You’ve been living with an entirely different man from the person you thought was your husband. Do you believe that now?”

  Karen nodded. She’d sort of more or less thought she had the hang of it, but viewing that tape was like watching science fiction, some awful end-of-the-world story in which aliens took over the minds and bodies of your loved ones. Except in this case it was the other way around: They wore people suits; they made you think they were human, and handsome, and loving…

  But there was only one, and it was her own husband. She really had to get that through her head. “But… how can you do that?” she said, not meaning how could anyone be so sick and vicious and conniving but how was it possible to accomplish such a thing.

  To her relief, the cop understood. “It would take a hell of a lot of money. Surgery; hair implants, maybe; speech lessons. He has sort of a British accent now— it could have been done in another country.”

  “But the pictures…”

  “Ah, yes. The ones you mentioned, of David with Rosemarie’s former husband. Photographs can be altered. But he’d have to get the photos first.”

  She was speaking very carefully, and Karen was beginning to get her drift. She was beginning to have a small epiphany. “Rosemarie!”

  Skip nodded.

  Karen said, “She has the money, and she’d be the only one in the world— or almost— who had the pictures. And she must have hired him; the cable station belongs to her.” She stopped to work it out. “But why didn’t they just get remarried?”

  “Educated guess? Way, way too close for comfort. It’s known that they know each other, also that he had recent contact with her— either he had her kidnapped and tried to make her help him once before, or they set it up to look like he did. No way could they be seen together. Let me ask you a question. You say he was in Rosemarie’s social set. How do you know that?”

  “We’ve been to parties at her house, parties for the cable station, that sort of thing; he knew the same people she knew.”

  “How many people?”

  Karen thought about it. “Not very many. Two or three, maybe.”

  “Uh-huh. She probably introduced him around at large gatherings, like the ones you went to, and by the time you met him, it seemed as if he was a close friend of her close friends.”

  “We never socialized with those people.”

  “There was probably a very good reason for that. Karen, listen. This man will do anything. If he tries to contact you, you’ve got to promise you won’t see him.”

  She tilted her head at the car across the street. “How could I see him with my babysitter out there?”

  “Don’t hedge. Your life could depend on it.”

  “You honestly think I have anything at all to say to the man I just saw on that videotape?”

  “I hope not.”

  “But what if he calls?”

  “Keep him talking. See if you can get him to agree to meet you. Then call the FBI and tell them when and where.”

  “Fuck the FBI!”

  “Okay. Call me then.” She wrote something on a card. “Call me if you hear from him. And whatever you do, don’t keep the appointment. Do I need to mention that?”

  Karen stubbed out her butt in the ashtray. “You think I’m crazy? The only place I’m going is out for cigarettes.”

  Skip pulled out another pack. “Brought you two. Just in case.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  Mr. Right was at his best in a crisis; as soon as the worst happened, it was like having a weight lifted from his shoulders. Right now, his mind was in high gear, juices flowing, thoughts coming so fast he could hardly process them. He felt alive. He should have seen it coming, the way the bitch had set him up. He toyed with the idea
of killing her now, trying to make it look as if she and her mini-Tarzan had killed each other in a lover’s quarrel. But with Rosemarie dead, there was no chance in hell of getting his hands on any of his money— the blood money he’d earned by freeing her from husband number whatever-it-was.

  His course of action was obvious. There was only one way out of this, and it was Karen. But he had to keep Rosemarie with him as a last resort. You always had to have a backup plan.

  He said, “We don’t have time for anything fancy. Let’s just get out of here before the cops come and find Todd’s body. You game?”

  Rosemarie said, “Where to, big fella?”

  The way she talked made him nervous, way too cool for school. He didn’t know what else she had up her sleeve, but it was something. Now that she’d showed her ass, there was no question of that.

  He said, “Got a nice plane we could gas up?”

  She shook her head. “Fresh out of those.”

  “Mexico, then. We’ll drive to Brownsville and find us a border to cross.” He was trying to match her cool.

  She said lazily, “Jose Cuervo, you are a friend of mine.” She let it lie there a minute. “Only one problem. Do we steal a car or what?”

  “Nope. We take one of yours.”

  “No good. Plates.” Once again, she let it lie there, appeared to be thinking. He was ahead of her though.

  He patted his briefcase. “Got an extra set. Right in here.”

  She shrugged, as if they were going to the movies. “I’ll get my toothbrush.”

  He put the gun back in the case, put the strap over his shoulder. “Uh-uh. No time. We’ll get one in Margaritaville.”

  She got up lazily and started toward the door.

  “Got your keys?” he said.

  “I’ll get my purse.” Not alone you won’t, he thought, and dogged her footsteps.

  They were already in the garage, he following with a show of meekness, when he slipped the gun out and cracked it over her skull. She gave a little sigh as she sank to the floor.

  Okay, he thought, duct tape. There had to be some; they were in a garage. There was a sort of workshop Todd or someone had set up in there. Of course there was tape. He found it quickly and bound her wrists and ankles, cutting the tape with his Swiss Army knife, and threw the rest of the roll into his briefcase. Then be made sure he had working keys and opened the trunk of her least noticeable car— a fairly late-model dark-colored sedan. There was nothing much in it but jumper cables and a can of gasoline. He left them both. Never knew when you might need a Molotov cocktail. And the cables were a big set with little teeth on them; they’d hurt like hell with an arm, say, pressed between them. Excellent for persuading purposes.