“What are you doing?” Viv jerked her arm back.
“If we have to deal with the receptionist it’ll take an hour, and I want to get this over with. I’m going to have to grovel.”
Trisha – Patrice, Patrice, for Pete’s sake call her Patrice! – was on the phone when we got there. She raised an eyebrow when she saw me but kept talking.
Viv wandered around the room staring at people and picking up stuff she probably wasn’t supposed to touch. “Can I help you?”
“You’re Mike Maloney!” Viv said to the red-headed kid who did the weekend weather. “What are you doing here? Did they let you out of school early?”
“I’m filling in for Bob Sherwood while he’s on vacation this week,” Little Mikey said. Geez, he looked even younger in person, not standing in front of his weather map. Did he even have a driver’s license yet? Or was I just old enough that everyone looked too young to me?
On that happy note, Trisha – man! Patrice! – walked up behind us. “They’re here to see me,” she said. She clipped an earring on her ear. “Come on back here.”
She hustled us out of there pretty quick, and I saw a couple of curious heads turn our way as we passed through. I even thought I heard a couple of whispers. I looked at Viv to see if she was catching the vibe, too, but she was too star struck to see anything but Patrice.
There. I said it.
She led us into a break room and closed the door behind us. “What do you want? I’ve already told you that you have no chance of winning a lawsuit. The station is behind me one hundred percent and is prepared to fight whatever charges you want to file. In fact, they’re hoping you’ll file a suit so we can get some publicity out of it.” She crossed her arms over her chest, looking from me to Viv. “So? What do you want? A quick buck? Think you can blackmail me or something?”
Geez Louise, but Trisha had gotten bitter. I just stared at her, not believing she was going over this again. I was afraid she’d bring up the thing with Scott, but she was still on the non-existent lawsuit stuff.
I thought about how she’d rushed us in here and closed the door, and suddenly her attitude took on a new light. She was going for a determined look, but something told me this was a “the best defense is a good offense” move.
“You’re suing her?” Viv looked from Trisha – good grief, I was never going to remember to call her Patrice – to me. “No wonder she’s mad at you.”
“I’m not suing her. I’ve already told her that.” I narrowed my eyes and studied Patrice. “You’re bluffing.”
She snorted. “I’m what?”
“You’re bluffing. The station’s not behind you. You got in trouble for showing my picture, didn’t you? They raked you over the coals and now you’re all just waiting for me to file a lawsuit, scared to death.”
“You live in a dream land, Salem.” She turned and reached for the door.
“Trisha, I know you, and I know when you’re lying. Remember when you told Coach Haney you had cramps so you could skip P.E.? You have that exact same look in your eyes. You’re lying through your teeth because you know I can hurt you.”
She froze for a moment, then turned slowly. “You can’t hurt me, Salem. You can make me lose my job, you can destroy my reputation, you can take every material thing I have. But you can’t hurt me. You’ve done all of that you can.”
Well. There wasn’t much I could say to that. If I’d had any notion of pressuring Trisha into helping me, it flew out the window. I wished we hadn’t come.
“She’s not here to hurt you, you drama queen. She’s trying to help you.”
Trisha raised one eyebrow and looked at Viv.
“I’m serious. We’re on to something in the Lucinda Cruz case. We have the actual killer in our sights. We just need to do a little investigating and gather the evidence to prove it.”
I rubbed my upper lip. I really wished Viv would leave the speaking to me sometimes. I’d planned to ease our way into things a little more gracefully.
“You have the real killer, huh? Who is it, O.J. Simpson?”
“You’re funny. Too bad you’re not going to be laughing when we go down to Channel Seven and give them our exclusive.”
“Okay, that’s enough.” I put a hand on Viv’s shoulder. “Patrice probably doesn’t care where we go with our exclusive, seeing as how we don’t actually have anything yet.” I turned to Tri…Patrice. “Look, I think Tony’s innocent, and I’d do just about anything to help him out. We’ve been talking to some people and we think maybe he’s being framed.”
“Is that so?” She looked at her fingernails.
“I know you don’t owe me anything, just the opposite. But I don’t know who else to ask, and I figured in your line of work you’ve probably learned a thing or two about investigating things. You know, you being a journalist and all. We could tell you what we’ve learned, and maybe you could share with us things you know that are not public knowledge, things you’ve learned from being in your position. Then maybe we could decide where we need to look next.”
“You’re serious?” Patrice sneered a little. “You’re really doing some kind of private eye thing to vindicate Tony?”
“I know it’s crazy, and I know if he gets out of this horrible mess, it’s probably not going to be because of us, but…well, I’m sure you can understand that there are a lot of wrongs I’d like to make right. There’s a lot of hurt I’ve caused that I really want to make up for, and Tony’s pretty high up on my list of people I want to make restitution to.” I cocked my head and met her eyes, which wasn’t exactly an easy thing to do. “He’s second from the top, in fact.”
Patrice looked at her nails some more and chewed the inside of her lip. I was pretty sure she still wanted to slap me.
“Would it help if I told your boss I have no intention at all of suing you? Maybe I could sign some kind of waiver or something?”
She narrowed her eyes but still didn’t say anything.
“Can I talk now?” Viv asked.
“Not yet,” I said. “Give her some time to think about it.” If she said yes, maybe that would create an opening for her to forgive me. I knew it wouldn’t happen quickly, and for sure we’d never be friends again – how could we be? – but if she said yes, that would mean that some part of her wanted to forgive me, or wanted to see something redemptive in me – something, just a crumb.
I found that I couldn’t breathe, waiting for her to answer.
“I doubt very seriously you’re going to have any information I don’t already have.”
“Probably true,” I said. “But maybe some people would talk to me who wouldn’t want to talk to someone official, you know? Since I’m just a regular person and all, I’m not a threat or anything. Not that you’re a threat to anyone,” I said quickly. “It’s just…maybe people who aren’t comfortable talking to you, might be less intimidated by me. We’ll never know till we compare notes,” I offered.
Patrice responded, “there’s probably not much I could share with you. If I haven’t used it in a story, it’s because all I have is a rumor, or I haven’t been cleared by the PD to use it.”
I was dying to know if she already had something she couldn’t tell me, but I kept my mouth shut and nodded quickly. “That’s okay. You can’t work off of rumors, I get that, being a professional and all, but Viv and I aren’t bound by the same rules, and we can chase all the rumors we want to. We’re not respected professionals.”
“Would you quit sucking up?” Viv frowned at me. “We don’t need her that bad.”
“She slept with my fiancé,” Patrice spat out. “She will never suck up enough.” She looked at me. “Look, I’ll help you on two conditions. The first is, you do sign a statement saying you do not hold me or this station or our parent company liable for anything in the past or in the future. And second, you tell me everything you get no matter how small or how far out in left field it seems. If this case breaks open, I want to be the one to break it.”
&n
bsp; “So you think he’s innocent, too?” I wanted to heave a big sigh of relief. Finally, someone with actual credibility was agreeing with me. “I mean, Tony’s not the type of person to do something like this, don’t you think?”
She shrugged and rolled her eyes. “Salem, I’ve long since quit being surprised at the horrible and out-of-character things people do to each other. I have no idea whether he’s innocent or not. I do know that if I can get a story out of it, I will.”
She turned and yanked open the door, leaving us to follow in her expensive-perfume wake.
“Cold,” Viv said, with a trace of admiration.
“Don’t let her fool you,” I whispered as we followed. “She pretends to be a hard-ass, but I remember how she cried when the ‘Saved by the Bell’ kids went to college. She has a soft heart.”
The first thing Patrice did was type up a letter saying that Channel Eleven had my permission to use my likeness in any situation deemed appropriate by them and in any media, whether it be print, film or video – blah blah blah – that I held them blameless now and forever more for any and everything – blah blah blah –that I would neither expect nor request to be compensated in any way. Blah blah blah. I was pretty sure even she didn’t know exactly what she was writing and that something that broad would never hold up in court, but I signed it anyway. I was happy she was willing to spend five minutes with me.
“I’m going to lunch,” she announced to the room at large as soon as she’d made copies and given me one. “I’ll be back in forty-five minutes.”
Viv and I watched her walk out the door. We looked at each other. “That didn’t really go as well as I would have hoped,” Viv said.
“Me either. Are we supposed to stay here till she gets back, or just wait at home till she calls us?”
Patrice poked her head back in the door. “Hello? Are you coming or not?”
“Oh. Yeah!” Viv and I lurched behind her.
Chapter Ten
Viv drove her expensive sedan behind Patrice’s expensive sedan to an Italian place down the road from the station. Apparently Patrice Watson was a regular there, because they sat her at her “usual” table near the back of the room.
I perused the menu, wondering if I could get away with ordering a bowl of soup or a salad or something. Payday was still two days away and I had less than ten bucks in my purse. The cheapest entrée was eight-fifty, and with tax and tip that would be…
“What can I get you?”
Patrice ordered a fancy fish dish with cream sauce. Viv ordered linguine with clam sauce. I closed my menu. “You know, I’m really not very hungry. I think I’ll just have a glass of iced tea.” My stomach growled.
“The station is paying,” Patrice said curtly.
“I’ll have fettuccini alfredo,” I said.
“And bring us a bottle of that Merlot I had last week. Three glasses.”
The waitress walked away, and I could feel Viv looking at me. She wondered if I’d told Patrice I wasn’t drinking. She didn’t want to out me if I didn’t want to be,
but Patrice knew. I’d told her three days ago when I saw her. And from the smirk on her face, she was enjoying this little test.
I took a deep breath. “That’s very generous, but Viv and I don’t drink. Thanks anyway.”
“Oh, come on. One glass isn’t going to hurt you. We need to loosen things up in here.”
“She said we don’t drink –”
I put my hand on Viv’s. “It’s okay. Don’t worry about it. Let’s go ahead and get started, shall we?”
Patrice had thrown down a gauntlet, and thankfully her manipulation was enough to get me focused on winning this contest instead of on how much I really wanted a glass of that wine – just one glass – because everything had been so crappy lately. One glass because I’d been so good and deserved a reward. One glass because I was trying so hard and nothing – abso-freaking-lutely nothing had gone my way in a very long time. Just one glass because right at the moment I felt like I’d been a sold a bill of goods with the whole sobriety and Christianity thing. None of it was what it was cracked up to be, and none of it was as great as Les and everyone else kept promising me it was. I wanted just one glass.
I focused on what information we had. “We’ve been able to get a brief glimpse at the initial crime report and just saw a few things; blunt force trauma, and something about St. Christopher. We also know that Lucinda had bruises or something around her neck – the funeral parlor guy called them strangulation marks.”
The waitress dropped a basket of breadsticks on the table and Patrice and I knocked our knuckles reaching for carb heaven. Now this, I could indulge in. To heck with the skinny jeans in the closet.
“That’s all pretty much public knowledge, Salem. The official autopsy results won’t be in for a few more days so we don’t know which injury was the actual cause of death, but it doesn’t really matter. She was knocked over the head and choked and something did her in.” She slathered butter on her breadstick.
I hadn’t seen the butter. I waited politely till she got through, then dug my own knife in.
“Will the autopsy results be public record when they come in?”
“Not until after the trial. If this is all you have, I don’t see how we’re going to be able to help each other.”
“Don’t get your panties in a twist,” Viv said. “Give me some of that bread. All this animosity flying around is making me nervous.”
“I talked to Sylvia and I think there’s something worth looking into in that direction.”
“Sylvia?”
“Sylvia Ramirez, Tony’s aunt. Rey’s mother. You remember Rey.”
Patrice groaned and rolled her eyes. “Slimeball.”
So she didn’t know about Rey yet. Ha.
“He used to date Lucinda Cruz. She lived in Oklahoma City, and they dated for a year and a half. Then she broke up with him and he supposedly went crazy. Said if he couldn’t have her, nobody could.”
“Dialogue straight out of America’s Most Wanted.”
“So apparently her mom called Sylvia and Josephine – Tony’s mom – and asked them to help Lucinda. Tony gave her a job, and she was staying with Sylvia in Rey’s old room.”
“Why would the girl want to break it off with Rey, then move in with his mother? Why not just break it off clean? Or stay with him?”
I blinked. When Patrice said it like that, the whole thing didn’t make sense. I bit into another breadstick.
Viv, thankfully, was better at thinking on her feet. She slipped into her tough-old-broad persona. “Here’s what went down. Rey knocked her up, but he’s such a jealous control freak he doesn’t believe that the baby is his. He hits her, accuses her of messing around on him. She gets fed up and leaves him, but she’s got nowhere else to go. She doesn’t want to go back to Mexico, she wants her kid born here, a US citizen, so what’s the next logical step? Turn to someone who knows her, someone who might have an interest in seeing that the kid is okay.” Viv leaned back in the booth and shrugged. “You know how Sylvia was always cleaning up Rey’s messes. Of course she steps in to make things right.”
I looked at Viv, impressed. She’d managed to make even me believe for a second that she’d known this family all her life, and I knew for a fact she’d met Tony, Sylvia, and Rey exactly once each.
“This is all total conjecture.”
“We can conject,” Viv said. “We’re investigators, not litigators. We don’t have to prove anything to start snooping around.”
“Here’s the weird part,” I said. “We went to Sylvia’s place yesterday and talked to her about the murder. She didn’t say one word about Rey and Lucinda being involved. Or about the baby being Rey’s.”
“She was definitely hiding something. Very hostile. Secretive.” Viv gestured with her breadstick.
“Maybe she was just didn’t want to talk to you. Didn’t want to answer nosy questions.”
On that happy note the waitress brought the
bottle of wine and set down three glasses.
I picked up two and handed them back to her. “We’re just going to stick with the tea, thanks.”
Patrice kept up the smirk while she poured her wine. “Good,” she said. “More for me.” She drained half of it in one drink, then sighed and said again. “Good.”
I grabbed another breadstick and swirled it around the bottom of the butter dish. “Anyway, I had a funny feeling that Rey had been there recently. I could smell his cologne, but Sylvia said he wasn’t coming into town until last night.”
Patrice looked bored, then drank down her glass. She poured a second glass, her eyes on me as the wine ran thick and dark into the glass. I remembered the taste of Merlot, the dryness of it, how full it was. White wine or beer was for drinking when you were doing something else – hanging out with girlfriends, watching television. Good Merlot was an event unto itself.
Viv didn’t seem to like the silence. “She was definitely hiding things. Why would she do that, unless she had something to cover up?”
“I’ll stand by my nosy question hypothesis. And I hardly think smelling the man’s cologne is proof positive of his being there. Lots of men wear cologne.”
“I know, but it was the same kind that Rey wore, and really strong like he always wore it. Kind of a coincidence, don’t you think?” I was sounding desperate and I knew it. I felt like I was making my way through a tunnel with my tiny key chain flashlight. “And, no, that doesn’t prove he was there by any means. But all of it together, I believe, bears looking at. Rey threatened Lucinda, Rey had a heck of a stronger motive than Tony did. Rey has a history of violence. Tony has a history of being inhumanly nice. There’s something wrong with this picture, and I don’t see any harm in looking a little closer.”
Patrice raised her glass again, her eye steady on mine the whole time. Bulldog stubbornness had me refusing to look away, but I would have been better doing so. I could taste the wine as it went down her throat.
The Middle Finger of Fate (A Trailer Park Princess Cozy Mystery Book 1) Page 18