by Katy Munger
"Yeah, put me through," he said hoarsely. "It's important."
"It's your funeral," she replied and transferred him.
"I told you I didn't want to be disturbed." Sandy Jackson's tightly controlled twang snaked out of the telephone wire and coiled on the table.
"Sandy," Adam said. "It's me."
"Where the hell are you?" she demanded. "We don't pay you six figures to get the flu. There will be no sick days until this election is over, do you understand? Do you think I can do this all myself?"
"She knows," Adam interrupted. He shut his eyes and waited.
There was a short silence. "Who knows?" Her voice was steady. Sandy Jackson was either mighty cool or mighty heartless. Possibly both.
"The detective. The one Mary Lee Masters hired."
"What?" she demanded. "The trashy one?"
I winced but no one else seemed to notice.
"Well..." Adam said, his voice trailing off as he nervously eyed me.
"How did she find out anything?" she demanded. "What did you tell her?"
"Nothing!" he protested, real fear in his voice. "I didn't say anything at all. You have to believe me. She found out somehow, though, and she wants to cut a deal." His voice cracked and he choked on what sounded like a sob. That was when I realized that Adam Stoltz wasn't afraid of the police or of what his family might think. He was afraid of Sandy Jackson.
"She would try to cut a deal," Stoney's mother said nastily. "She's the type. First chance she gets to make a buck, she'd throw all her scruples out the window. I'm not surprised. I pegged her for a cheap tramp the minute I set eyes on her."
Well, how do you like that? The bitch had blown away an old friend in cold blood and she was calling me names?
"But she wants a lot of money," Adam added, glancing at me with contempt as if he were telling the truth.
"I'll just see about that," the woman replied. Her laugh was even nastier than her voice. "How does she want to do it?"
"She wants to meet and settle on the price. She says she's left behind a letter in case something happens to her so we better not touch her."
"Touch her?" Sandy Jackson laughed. "I wouldn't touch a hair on her trashy head. And I'm giving in to her only because the easiest and smartest thing to do is to buy her off. Especially since she can be bought off cheap. She'll come down easy, believe you me. I know her type."
Oh boy, was that old biddy digging her grave. Any hesitation I felt, any nagging doubts of moral entrapment, any sympathy for her age and lost opportunities went right out the window with that crack. I was bringing that woman down.
I was so lost in my plans for revenge that I hardly noticed while Adam made the final arrangements and hung up the phone.
"Done," he said, looking at Bill Butler for approval.
Uneasily, I noticed that the lawyers were all staring at me as if trying to decide whether I was cheap or not.
"It's on," Bill said. Then he stared at me, too. I tried to think of something trashy to do, but failed.
"You're still in, right?" he asked me. "Ten o'clock tonight?"
"Ten o'clock," I confirmed. "Aloha. Be there."
I had to wear a bulky sweater to conceal the gun and I was suffocating in it. The night was cool enough, all right, but I was sweating like a pig. My armpits were soaked and rivulets trickled down my neck, making the hidden microphone itch. Any other time I would have been pleased to have Bill Butler's face buried between my breasts, but right now it was embarrassing.
"Try to relax," he told me. "We'll be nearby. I'm not going to let anything happen to you."
"It's not fear," I lied. "It's this synthetic sweater. I hate rayon."
He smiled and adjusted the tiny microphone so that it pointed up above the band of my bra. "How's it sound, Mark? It looks good from here." He looked up at me and winked and, against all odds, I managed a smile. He cupped his hand to his ear receiver and nodded. "She'll be okay. Maybe we should spray?" He nodded again and excused himself for a moment, returning with a small can of Arrid Extra Dry. "Hold still," he commanded, prying the microphone free and spraying my chest with the anti-perspirant. "Hope you don't take this too personally."
I groaned. My ego would never recover.
The police van pulled over to the side of a darkened cul-de-sac a few minutes before ten o'clock. We were parked at the top of a small, heavily wooded hill overlooking the backyard of Sandy Jackson's house.
"Can't risk covering the front," Bill had explained on the way over. "She's tight with the neighbors. The yards are too close. And she's too smart. We'll come in from the back and I'll send people around the sides and front of the yard as soon as you're inside. If some do-gooder doesn't call the police to report prowlers, we'll be okay."
"You'll be okay no matter what," I reminded him.
"You're going to be okay, too," he said. "I guaran-damn-tee it."
My gun felt heavy and clammy against the small of my back, but its weight was reassuring. I checked to make sure the safety was off and the clip fully loaded, shrugging away Bill's warnings. I'd rather risk shooting off a few inches of cellulite from my butt than lose time when I needed it the most.
"Let's go," I told Adam when I was ready. An officer had followed the van in my Plymouth Valiant and we climbed silently inside. Adam had turned a greenish white and sweat shone above his upper lip. "Stop it," I told him as we pulled up in front of Sandy Jackson's home. "You're making me nervous."
"I can't help it," he whined. "I'm scared."
"I'm armed," I replied. "And if you don't calm down, I may be forced to shoot." I don't think the poor kid knew I was kidding.
When Sandy Jackson answered the door with a shotgun in her hand, I knew we were off to a bad start. "Hurry up and get inside," she demanded. "I don't want the neighbors to see me associating with someone like you."
"At least I'm not a murderer," I said evenly, stepping across a doormat that was decorated with magnolia blossoms, dogwoods, and a banner that read A HEARTY SOUTHERN WELCOME. Yeah, right.
"A blackmailer's the lowest form of life on earth," she spit at me, waving the barrel of the shotgun toward her living room.
"Is that why you killed Thornton Mitchell?" I asked.
"Shut up and get away from the front windows," she commanded.
No problem. I wanted the whole scene to go down as close to the back windows as possible where I had someone to watch over me.
The plush carpet was thick beneath my feet and dyed a creamy white. It shone in the glow from several expensive standing lamps. The furniture was top of the line and the paintings that decorated the walls were originals. Sandy Jackson liked her status symbols.
"Pat her down," she commanded Adam.
"What?" he asked stupidly. The dim lighting helped conceal the sweat on his forehead but I was afraid he might pass out.
"Check her for a gun, you idiot," Stoney's mother commanded, swinging the long stock of the shotgun toward Adam. He scurried over and began to pat his hands up and down my body like he was plumping up a limp scarecrow.
"Hey, watch it!" I complained when he reached my breasts. This distracted the old biddy enough to take her mind off the lousy job Adam was doing. The last thing I needed was for her to take over. But even Adam had enough sense to block the search from her view with his body and my gun remained safely concealed in my waistband.
"She's okay," Adam croaked. "Can I sit down now?"
"For god's sakes," Sandy said in disgust. "Just don't put your feet on the furniture."
Adam sank gratefully onto the white brocade couch and loosened his collar with a finger. I remained standing, staring at my opponent, wondering what in the world made that woman think that the rules didn't apply to her.
"Let's get started," she said nastily. "I'm not paying your price and you better be prepared to deal. You saw what happened to the last person who tried to blackmail me."
"So that was it," I said, memorizing the layout of the living room while I blathered. An
entrance off the rear led to the kitchen and beyond that was a garage door. Straight ahead was the archway to the front foyer. Two ways out. "Thornton Mitchell was trying to blackmail you. About what? About your brother dying from lung cancer?"
"Shut up," she squawked, the shotgun jumping an inch.
Yikes. I'd better take it easier than that. "I'm sorry your brother is dying from lung cancer," I said, "but people are going to find out eventually. You didn't have to kill Thornton Mitchell for knowing." I was verbally tap dancing, trying to get her to talk about the murder without putting words in her mouth.
"He wasn't going to quit," she told me, her narrowed eyes glinting in the reflected glare of a nearby lamp. "He'd come to me once before to say that if I didn't give him money for some damn fool project of his, he would let the world know that he had paid for Stoney's tuition at Duke, which was his idea in the first place. But I knew people would twist it into something wrong, so I gave in and invested in his Neuse Park scheme. But then he came back and wanted more. You ought to keep that in mind when you leave tonight. Because this is the only deal I'm going to make with you. I want you out of my house and my life but quick. You don't belong here. You're nothing but white trash."
"We've all got to come from somewhere," I said, remembering the words of the old black fisherman who Sandy Jackson had insulted. If only she had been a shade more polite, I believed, I wouldn't be standing where I was.
"Let's talk about where you're going," she replied. "Name your price and name it now so you can get your cheap ass out of my home."
"My ass is not so cheap," I improvised. "Concealing a murder should have a bigger price tag than concealing lung cancer, wouldn't you say?"
"How much bigger?" she demanded.
"She wants half a million," Adam croaked from the sofa.
I could have strangled him. He was stepping on my lines. What was he trying to pull? I glanced at his stricken face and decided he only wanted to look good when sentencing time came. He was kissing ass as best he could.
"Half a million dollars?" Sandy Jackson repeated. She threw back her head and laughed. "For half a million dollars, I could buy air time every day between now and the election. What would a girl like you do with half a million dollars?" She lowered the shotgun in disgust and shook her head. "I'll give you $25,000. That's it. Take it or leave it."
"Twenty-five thousand dollars?" I repeated incredulously. "For keeping my mouth shut about a murder?" Come on lady, I silently willed her. You're arrogant. Take the bait.
"You can't prove I killed him," she said tightly. "Adam here isn't going to talk, are you?" She turned the shotgun on him and I thought he might faint. His mouth opened and closed like a fish gasping for air, but no sound came out. The old bitch laughed. "See what I mean? If he makes so much as a peep, his career is ruined and that boy is a political whore. He doesn't know how to do anything else. Do you, Adam?" She smiled at him and her teeth seemed small and sharp, like the teeth of a cat stripping a mouse of its flesh. Adam looked down at the floor and gulped for air.
"You're gonna have to do better than $25,000," I said. "I have a witness I have to pay off."
She froze. "That old colored man." Her face was a blank. "I told you we should have gotten rid of him," she said to Adam.
Bingo. She had just confirmed that Adam was telling the truth. It would hurt her if it went to court.
"The old man'll keep quiet," I assured her. "But I need cash for him, too. Make it $200,000 in all."
She lost her temper. "I'm not going to stand here and haggle with some white trash, two-bit tramp," she said. "You can take the money I offer or you can take your chances with me. I killed one time and you listen to me good sister, because I won't have any trouble doing it again. You can take the money and walk out of here tonight and I never see your trashy face again or you can spend the rest of your life wondering when I am going to come and find you. I've been shooting since I could walk and you won't ever know what hit you. And no one will ever know. If not for my son trying to be such a do-gooder, you would never have found out about that fat old blackmailer. My son's a good man and you're not bringing him down. I'll kill you and dump your body on the capitol lawn if I have a mind to."
I had her. She had just dug a big enough grave for an entire jury to roll over in once the case went to court.
"How long did you say you'd been shooting?" I asked suddenly. It threw her off guard.
"Since I was three years old," she said. "Growing up on a farm. I could shoot the eyes out of a squirrel from twenty yards. And, honey, you're a much bigger target than that."
"Three years old, huh? Well, I hate to tell you, but I've been shooting the ticks off a hound since I was two." I pulled the .380 out from behind my back in one smooth motion and rushed her, pushing the barrel of her shotgun down toward the floor and clamping her hand tightly shut around it. I had my gun in her face before she could blink. And it felt real good.
"Now you listen to me," I told her through clenched teeth. "I don't appreciate having a shotgun pointed at my face. How do you like having a pistol pointed at yours?" Bill Butler was probably pissing in his pants.
God almighty if that woman hardly blinked. "You aren't going to get your money that way," she hissed. "And I'm not scared of the likes of you."
"Drop the shotgun," I told her, squeezing her wrist even tighter until I could tell the nerves had deadened.
I released her hand and the shotgun fell to the carpet. I motioned for her to step away from it and to sit on the couch beside Adam. She sat there sullenly, glaring at her companion. "I told you to search her," she spat at him. "You can't do a goddamn thing right, can you?" She stared at me, her face ugly with fury. "You won't get your precious money that way."
"I don't care about your money," I started to say but the change in her expression stopped me cold. Her eyes had slid beyond me. She was staring toward the kitchen, her face transformed by a grotesque smile.
"Stonewall!" she cried. "Just look at this. This woman has burst into my home with all sorts of accusations. She's working for that awful woman, Mary Lee Masters. She's trying to ruin the campaign."
Stoney Maloney stepped out of the kitchen doorway, his car keys in hand. He looked at his mother's weird smile and then at the gun in my hand. "What's going on?" he said warily.
"What are you doing here?" I asked him, eyeing the distance between the shotgun and the kitchen door. What if he tried to go for it?
"I think you know why I'm here," he said. His voice was calm. "I'm surprised you'd be a part of this, Casey. My mother deserves representation."
"Who told you we were here?" I asked. Was he in on it, too? Had his mother told him everything? Did Adam know Stoney was involved and had he been trying to save his candidacy by saying nothing? I felt outnumbered and out of control.
"I have friends in the department," he said, shrugging as if it were no big deal. "One of them called me and said the police were planning to question my mother tonight. What are you doing here? Where are the cops? Why didn't you let her know she could have a lawyer present?"
Maybe he didn't know, I thought. Oh, please god, don't let him be a part of it. I glanced at his face for a clue and that was my mistake.
As soon as I took my eyes off her, she went for the gun. That old biddy flew off the couch and snatched the shotgun off the floor faster than I have ever seen a human being move in my life. She had it pointed at my head before I could swallow.
"Throw the gun over there by the fireplace!" she screeched. "Or I'll blow your head into pumpkin pulp."
I believed her. I tossed my pistol across the carpet and prayed it wouldn't go off. Or that it would shoot anyone but me if it did. It fell harmlessly into the thick nap of the carpet.
"What are you doing?" Stoney asked, appalled. He stared at the shotgun, then turned his eyes to his mother. His voice quavered but he did not flinch. "What are you doing, Momma? Put the gun down."
"I'm not putting it down!" his mother screamed
. "This cheap little bitch is a liar. She's trying to make it seem like I'm the one who shot Thornton. They're trying to make me take the blame. She works for that Masters woman. She did it. They probably both did it together."
"Mary Lee did not kill Thornton Mitchell," Stoney said. He moved closer, hand outstretched. His voice softened. "Put the gun down, Momma."
"She did it," his mother insisted. "I'm telling you she did. She's the type. They just want to make me look bad. They want to make you look bad. They're trying to take us down. I'm not going to let them."
Stoney stepped between me and his mother. "Give me the shotgun," he repeated slowly, a hand outstretched. "This woman did not kill Thornton Mitchell," he told her. "And Mary Lee could not have killed him, either. She's not that type of person, Momma. She couldn't take another life. Think of what you're saying. She's not the kind of person to take another life."
"Not take another life?" the old woman shouted. "She's trying to take yours. Can't you see that? She'd do anything to win. She'd kill and cheat and steal and she'd use this cheap tramp here to help her. Why can't you see what kind of person you're up against? We could lose this election, Stonewall. We could lose it all. She'll stop at nothing to defeat you."
"Momma!" Stoney's voice grew louder until it filled the room. "Give me the gun. They had nothing to do with Mr. Mitchell's murder. Let the police find out who did."
"I won't," she shouted back. "Why won't you ever listen to me! I've tried to tell you from the start what that Masters woman was like, but you won't listen to me."
Stoney pushed the barrel to one side and grabbed his mother's arm, forcing the shotgun toward the roof. "Mother," he said evenly—and every word that followed was slowly and clearly pronounced, as if it pained him to say them out loud: "Stop saying such things right this minute. Mary Lee Masters could not have shot Thornton Mitchell. She was with me when he was killed."
Chapter Fourteen