More Money for Good

by Franklin White

  “I was told that at least forty couples RSVPed,” Rossi let me know.

  “Cool, and all we need is one,” I said.

  For the umpteenth time Rossi smoothed his hand over his now-bald head.

  I turned to him. “So, what’s up with this haircut?”

  “Oh, this?”

  “Yeah, that.”

  “Rita wanted me to get it. Said I would look good.”

  “You sure are blaming a lot of shit on your girl these days. First this piece-of-shit car, now your head. I’m beginning to wonder about you.”

  “Why?”

  “Just saying, man, you got a perfect head full of hair and you cut it off?”

  “I already told you. She likes it. It’s a change.”

  We waited some more and watched a few couples go into the W Hotel hand in hand wondering which ones were going inside to be a part of the interview process.

  Rossi plopped a mint in his mouth. “So, how sure are you that there is even two million dollars?”

  “I can tell you I’ve never seen it because it wasn’t there when we went to the house. But I did see the dead body and the space where it could have been hidden. But I wouldn’t have a reason to doubt Tavious or I wouldn’t be here. He did twenty, man—a twenty-year bid for drug trafficking. Mrs. Bullock told me that much.”

  Rossi was a stickler for knowing the facts. When I first met him he would test me by asking me a question, then wait for some time to elapse, then ask the same question again to see if he got the same answer.

  We ended up having to line the pockets of the valet with fifty dollars to allow us to stay sitting parked in our car at the front of the hotel. Rossi walked down Lenox to a hamburger joint and brought us back burgers and large drinks. In the meantime, I called Tavious to see if he was finished setting up the apartment. I also let him know we were waiting for the girls to come out.

  Lauren and Rita had been inside close to three hours and we figured they hadn’t run into the Thompsons yet or they would have come out right after.

  “What do you think this couple is like?” Rossi wanted to know. “You really have to be comfortable with one another to invite someone in your bed, man.”

  I paused for a while because when I met Rita I remember her and Rossi going at it a mile a minute right in front of my face. It took everything I had not to make light of Rossi and remind him but I held it for another time. “Yeah, you really have to be in another zone, man.”

  Finally, at a little past twelve that night, I spot Lauren coming out. She sees us and comes over to the car. She sat down inside and exhaled. “Whew, never in my life.” We both had our eyes on her. “West, I am telling you,” she said.

  “What are you telling us?” Rossi wanted to know.

  Lauren looked at him odd. “Did you get a haircut while I was up in there?”

  Rossi looked over at me. “No, no, I didn’t, Lauren. Can you just tell us what happened? Where’s Rita?”

  “I don’t know where she is. I didn’t even see her. Can you believe they had us meet these couples by their last names? I mean, I was freaking looking for the Thompsons and I had to wait that entire time to finally meet them.”

  Rossi pushed. “You met them? What did they say? Did you get a contact number or something?”

  “No.” Lauren flipped off her shoes then saw the wrappers from the burgers we had and let us know she wanted one too.

  Rossi kept on. “No number? Why not?”

  “’Cause I didn’t like the way he was looking at me,” Lauren said.

  I am pretty sure we both said, “What?” at the same time.

  Lauren started to fidget around. “He was looking at me all freaky and shit, baby... I mean how many times does he have to lick his lips when talking? I know they wanted someone to watch them, but I think they were on some real freaky shit. I can’t exactly put my finger on it but they were some kind of freaky.”

  Rossi slid down in his seat and grabbed the steering wheel. “Fuck me.”

  “That’s right, Mr. Rossi, fuck you,” Lauren told hm.

  I tried to calm things down because Lauren and Rossi still would go at each other’s throats for any reason, anytime, not out of hatred but because it is what they enjoyed about one another. They went on and on for a few minutes over my objection and then finally Rita came strutting out like she was reliving her prior life before Rossi.

  As soon as she sat down Rossi started in on her. “How’d everything go?”

  “Wow . . .” Rita said. Then she sat back, exhausted, in the back seat. “Wow . . .” she repeated.

  Lauren was still rubbing her feet. “Girl, are you okay?” Lauren wanted to know.

  “Yes . . . Wow . . . Wow,” Rita purred.

  “Rita, you better tell me something besides wow, or I’m going up in that place and kicking somebody’s ass,” Rossi said. “I just know you didn’t—”

  Rita cut him off. “Hush it up right there, Mr. Man, I’m okay . . .”

  Lauren looked at Rossi. “I don’t know, maybe you did . . .”

  “No, it’s just the atmosphere in there. Who would have thought I sold my pussy for two years and I could have joined this club and probably gotten paid to watch; this world is fucked . . . up.” Then she started in with her deep, bellowing laughter.

  “Whatever, whatever; did you meet the Thompsons?” I asked her.

  “Yes, I met them,” she said.

  “I did too,” Lauren added.

  All of a sudden Rita looked out the front window from the back seat and pointed at them. “There they are . . . right there.”

  We all see a rather tall white man with a black woman under his arm wearing a tight dress.

  “There they are, the Thompsons,” Rita said.

  Then almost immediately Lauren saw another couple exit the W walking in the opposite direction; then she began to point. “No, no, those two right there are the Thompsons,” she let us know.

  Chapter 23

  Turns out that both couples were named Thompson and we had to act quickly because it seemed as though our entire night could have been for naught. When Rita told us that she exchanged Facebook accounts with her Thompsons we decided to keep an eye on the other pair, and watched as they walked down Lenox and into a swanky-looking bar.

  After about twenty minutes of back and forth, Lauren gave in and decided that she would go in and “accidently” run into the Thompsons again. She wasn’t happy about it. We waited long enough for her to have a drink with them. Rossi waited inside across the bar, keeping a close eye on her. When she returned and filled us in on their conversation we were 100 percent sure they were not the Thompsons on our radar. Their kink was flirting with women and only allowing men to join them in the bedroom.

  I had always been amazed at how the Internet and social media applications brought people together. But more so by how quickly Rita was able to connect and become very intimate with her new friends the Thompsons. We confirmed that their names were Charles and Gale and they lived in Cobb County in a nice and quiet private spread. Charles was a surgeon and Gale had a high-profile position with an Atlanta law firm.

  When Rita reached out to them they accepted her friend request. The first day they shared fifteen messages and during the night spent close to three hours just chatting on instant messenger. Charles and Gale had become more than ready to meet with Rita in real time but she continued on her objective to get any information she could muster on Amara without mentioning her name. But no matter how she tried they would not give any information about anyone who they could have been intimate with. Charles began to talk about his interns on his job and how he had them follow him on Twitter to follow his daily activities. He sent Rita an invite to follow him and once again the Internet had turned out to be our friend because we found out he loved to eat lunch at the same place and time every day.

  I called Tavious and asked him if he wanted to do lunch.

  I’d never imagined a hospital cafeteria to be so crowded
and right away I thanked the man upstairs for never really having to know. We knew the good doctor came into eat at preciously one-fifteen because he tweeted it. He sat right next to a wall facing a flower bed with the white marble birdbath just like he told everyone in cyber space that he would. Tavious and I were sitting and waiting when he arrived and we decided to get a bite to eat, too.

  “I can’t fuckin’ believe people will put their every move on a computer screen so anyone can follow what they’re doing,” Tavious mentioned. “Shit is as bad as prison, if you ask me.”

  “Well, I know at least one activity he’s not telling anyone about.”

  Tavious grabbed his drink and shook his head. “I don’t get it, West; technology has taken over the world in twenty years, man. GPS, texting, computers, cell phones, books in a machine. Amara told me it was crazy out here but where in the fuck am I? Look around . . . more people in this café looking down at their fuckin’ machines than talking to one another.”

  I’m sure life and everyday living had to be a change for Tavious. Probably in his eyes it was like he was stepping into a world from which he was far removed. I could sometimes see his frustrations with some of the cars we’d get in the shop and the computers that told us how to do our job, or even the computers that make the cars actually run.

  We waited in the lunchroom at least twenty minutes before we went over. Charles was a few minutes into the front page of the AJC. We finally walked over and I spoke first.

  “Dr. Thompson?”

  He looked up from his paper and quickly scanned me and then Tavious with his eyes before he ran his hand through his dark hair and answered. “Yes.” He looked to be over six feet and in pretty good shape, maybe a runner or boxer type.

  “My name is West, do you mind if we have a bit of your time?”

  He was clearly confused. “But I—”

  “It’s about Amara,” Tavious let him know; then he sat down without an invite.

  There was a quiet pause and the good doctor looked around the cafeteria. “I . . . I didn’t get your name,” he said.

  “My name is Tavious Bell. A friend of Amara’s.”

  The doctor softened. “Tavious . . . ? Yes, yes . . . I’ve heard all about you.”

  Tavious inched up closer to hear what the doctor had to say, and the doctor’s face told me he could feel his anxiety.

  “Just a figure of speech. But yes, I’ve heard Amara say your name several times . . . if you know what I mean.” Then he smiled.

  “Okay, since we got that all out the way, can you tell us what happened to her?

  The doctor paused. “Can you tell me how you found me?”

  “Internet,” I let him know.

  “That got-damn Twitter no doubt. I teach a class at Georgia Tech and it’s a part of the territory. Got-damn technology, whole world can find out what you’re doing. Fuckin’ gadgets—we’ve become too spoiled. Spoiled to no end.” He pointed to his paper. “Look here: yesterday two teenage girls killed their mother. For what? I bet they were given everything they ever wanted in life and never told no. Or worse yet they’re a fuckin’ result of that crack epidemic. I see it all the time, mothers who smoked that shit—their kids have turned out to be fuckin’ devils I tell you . . . devils.”

  “Yeah, it’s a bad situation, but you’re clear why we are here, right?”

  The doctor shook his head no but said yes.

  “Amara. We need to find out who killed her and if she had any other contacts in the club who got you guys together,” I said.

  “My, you guys know my life story or something?”

  “It would probably take us a few days but we could get it,” I let him know.

  “Wouldn’t even have to ask Gale,” Tavious boasted.

  The doctor put his paper down. “Look, I don’t know what to tell you. I told the police everything I know.”

  I wanted to know about the police and asked him about it.

  “Two cops came to see me. That’s how I found out she had died. They found my card with my number in her bedroom and wanted to know our relationship. And they asked if I knew you.” He pointed at Tavious.

  “What did these officers look like?”

  “Um, I don’t know. One white, the other black,” he said.

  “What did you tell them?” Tavious asked.

  “I gave Amara all the respect she deserves. The only thing I told them was that she came to my office for a consultation.”

  I asked him what type of consultation.

  “I told them it was confidential and couldn’t divulge it to them. But she was fine. I just didn’t want to scar her memory in any way; plus, it’s none of their damn business what people do in their private lives.”

  “Including yours,” I mentioned.

  He pointed at me. “Exactly.”

  “She ever mention if anyone was after her? Was she scared of anything?”

  “Amara didn’t have an ounce of fear in her body. Like I said, all she talked about was waiting until you got home and how her life would change. To me, she was head over heels with you and wanted you, man.”

  Tavious had a look on his face that if he heard that again he would explode.

  “How long did you know her?” I asked him.

  “A couple of years.”

  We sat and talked until his next scheduled surgery. When we left the only things we knew were that the detectives had paid him a visit and Amara was not heavy into their wild and kinky lifestyle while caring for Tavious a great deal all along. On the way out of the hospital the first thing Tavious said was concerning the story in the paper the doctor spoke of. He wanted me to know that he never sold crack and these bad kids running the streets are not a result of what he did in his past.

  Chapter 24

  We were in the car and back to square one. No leads, no clues. Tavious seemed very uncomfortable to me and I asked him if he was okay.

  He was looking out the window. Didn’t even look back at me when he spoke. “I just got out of prison, man. I have the damn police asking questions about me. This is bullshit, West. We need to find out who else was involved with Amara. She had to have someone in her life closer to her than these freakin’ fools we’ve met so far. Just doesn’t make sense.”

  I couldn’t agree with him more. Amara lived alone and from what I could tell had deeper feelings for Tavious than he ever knew and enjoyed sex on some type of abstinence level. I’d always had the philosophy “to each his own” and my intuition was telling me that she was saving herself for Tavious but didn’t want to keep her needs unmet to a certain point. I was all out of ideas on which direction we should go to keep Tavious from being harassed by the police or even being charged, because I knew if the police were coming up goose eggs like we were. They were going to make a case against Tavious and do whatever they could to make it stick.

  Tavious agreed to have dinner with us at my place. Rita and Rossi called to let us know they were on their way, and when we walked in everyone was in the kitchen, surrounding the island, looking at Rita’s laptop.

  “Look at this,” Rita said, pointing to the computer screen. “Amara has a Facebook page and someone is online at this very moment.”

  Tavious moved in to get a closer look. “Let me see that.”

  “Whoever has her account has been online for the past two hours,” Rossi said.

  Lauren said, “Either she’s online in heaven—or begging for help in hell.”

  “This could be our chance to find out what’s goin’ on,” Tavious said.

  “I could try inviting whoever this is to be a friend,” Rita suggested.

  “But that might scare them off,” Lauren said.

  “We just can’t sit here and not do anything, because you never know when they’ll be online again.”

  There was pause.

  “Try to talk to them,” Tavious said.

  “What?” Rita said.

  “Everyone we have met so far has at least heard of me.” Tavious became
excited. “Hurry, say hello to them and tell them it’s Tavious. Tavious Bell.”

  Rita looked around.

  “Go ahead, do it. Whoever that is has my life in their hands.”

  Rita maneuvered around everyone and in no time did exactly what Tavious asked.

  Hey, Amara. It’s Tavious. Tavious Bell.

  Then there was a return message: Tavious. Meet me at Screen on the Green. Don’t sit. Stand.

  Everyone read the message planted across the computer screen, and it was followed by silence, then a jolt of energy. We were back in the game. Tavious was hyped with his aggressiveness to give his name in cyberspace; but slightly deflated after he questioned what the Screen on the Green was and Lauren let him know there were thousands of people at the event at any given time, and a place where someone could see you without you even knowing.

  “It’s a really big event. People watching a movie out on the lawn, the place is very crowded,” Lauren let Tavious know.

  Rossi added, “Public meet and greets always diffuse problems; somebody is playing it safe.”

  “You think we are talking to Amara’s killer? If we are, we need to play it safe for damn sure,” Tavious promised.

  “Can’t tell,” Rita said. “But it’s obvious whoever this is knows something.”

  It was time to go sit down in the family room and get in defensive mode. I knew that whoever it was must be living in Atlanta, and if Tavious did make contact with the person we were going to have to follow them and find out where they lived without them knowing.

  It took us a few hours to figure out a plan. Tavious would be alone and I would sit closely by with Lauren on a blanket watching his every move. Rita and Rossi were going to be close on the street in the car and we would call one another every ten minutes on the cell. When Tavious made contact I would call Rossi and Rita so they could follow whoever Tavious met to their home so we would have a definite contact on them.