by Eric Beetner
Abel chuckled. “We need to gear up, baby. I’m looking to get us some more shotties.”
“Need a fucking grenade one of these days,” Glanson said.
Abel didn’t say shit to that. He fired up the van, let it roll away from the curb, drift left across the street, and bounce into the parking lot. He stopped. “Your chariot awaits.”
Glanson unclipped the holster for his nine, rested his right hand on the gun.
He opened the passenger door and walked briskly toward the steel-reinforced door, pushed it open and disappeared into Acee’s Apothecary.
This new job Glanson had—it paid the bills and it came with a perk: Mary Jane in spades.
THREE
Jessie Jessup didn’t come from money. She came from three generations of cattle ranchers in east Texas. She was a woman, but for all her beauty—petite at five-three and a hundred seven pounds—Jessie came from men. She was of men—hard fucking men. At thirty-seven years old, she still carried a hint of her Texas drawl, but a decade living in SoCal had drained most of that lilt from her speech.
Jessie’s daddy taught her to invest in herself, in her own operation. He used to say you don’t got a damn thing until you can’t help but give yourself all the money you make. That didn’t make much sense to Jessie when she waited tables, or when she sold used cars, or when she worked at a place called Gino’s Nursery.
It made sense now, after an ex-lover named Amos French taught Jessie a growing technique called aquaponics. That is to say, French taught Jessie how to grow weed using fish—that’s right, fucking fish. And you could do it inside, away from the prying eyes of neighbors and cops.
Turned out, Jessie had herself a green thumb. Two green thumbs.
She grew that dank motherfucking weed.
But Jessie didn’t have any street smarts. Hell, she knew how to tell a horny cowpoke to fuck off, and she knew how to save a horse and ride a cowboy when she needed to, but she didn’t know how to negotiate the gangs and woe-be-gones of the gritty SoCal underbelly.
That’s what LaDon was for. LaDon was big, he was black, and he was mean as shit when it came down to it. He also knew where they could open a dispensary operation and keep it under wraps. No way Jessie could get a legit dispensary license. That shit was too complicated. She took one look at the paperwork after reading through Proposition 64 and decided she’d do this shit on the sly.
Enter LaDon, another regular at The Zip Zap Bar in City Heights. He used to tease her about drinking cosmos in a dive bar, but they got along. Sure, LaDon wanted a piece of her, but he also had an ex-wife and daughter.
Jessie liked to fuck and run. She was a one-night stand kind of girl. That made LaDon off-limits.
So, here the two of them were, waiting around after seven o’clock—quitting time, dammit—for the war vets to show up and get the cash. She watched LaDon sip a Diet Coke and pick at his fingernails. He had a Taser in his top drawer and fists big enough to crush a pumpkin. Their operation was bare bones, but at any one time, they were sitting on twenty K or more in straight cash. That’s decent bait for a stick-up boy, especially in the neighborhood LaDon chose for their place of business. The dispensary was off University Avenue, a small office next to a tire shop and below two studio apartments. All day, Jessie cringed at the little kids stomping on the ceiling. Since they opened this spot two months ago and started working social media and Weed Maps, they’d cleared nearly sixty K in sales.
And shit was ramping up.
Jessie shut off her computer, leaned back in her office chair, and said, “LaDon, you ever think about going on a diet?”
He twirled the Diet Coke can so she could read the label: “The fuck you think this is, woman?”
“That’s diabetes waiting to happen is what that is.”
“I already have the diabetes, sister. It runs in the family.”
“Only thing that runs in your family is a sweet tooth.”
LaDon stared at her with menace eyes. “You going to cook me dinner this week?”
“Wednesday, baby,” Jessie said. “I got some vegan pasta and a couple of—”
“What’s that now?” LaDon shifted in his seat. The floor creaked with his weight. He planted his elbows on the steel desk, closed one eye in confusion.
“Vegan pasta.” Jessie watched him, a smile barely visible at the corners of her mouth.
“Uh-uh, Jess. I want some motherfucking ribs. Or that thing you made last time…” He snapped his fingers searching for the name.
“Marsala,” she said. “Chicken marsala.”
“That was some good white people food. I’ll eat that whenever. But vegan pasta? Oh, hell no.”
Jessie laughed, blew a lock of brown hair from her eyes. “You might like it, big boy.”
LaDon shook his head, checked his cell for the time. “Where these motherfuckers at?”
“Making the Friday rounds,” Jessie said.
“Let me get this straight,” LaDon said, “These dudes are keeping our money with a lot of other drug dealers’ money? And you’re good with that?”
“They’re a security start up. They’re solving an important problem.”
“Sixty K ain’t never gonna be a problem for me, Jess.”
Jessie shrugged. They couldn’t keep the money in the office—in fact, it was LaDon who told her that. But he didn’t like the guy who came to see her about holding their money. Bald guy named Abel. He was a fast talker and sarcastic as hell. But it wasn’t him who sold Jessie on the service.
It was Abel’s partner, a tall eucalyptus-looking guy—white-ish skin and thin, wispy hair—named Glanson. Another war vet. She guessed they served together.
Jessie liked Glanson. He was good looking and had honest eyes. She hoped he was coming to get their pick up this evening.
It’d be nice to see Glanson.
LaDon said, “I think it’s because you like the tall one.”
Jessie rolled her eyes. She turned around in the office chair and began to unlock the safe. “You know I’m the kind of girl who does it one night at a time—I’m not looking for a ball and chain.”
“Whatever you say.” LaDon leaned back in his seat and closed his eyes.
Jessie finished punching in the combination and the safe door creaked open to reveal six stacks of money bound by thick rubber bands. She reached inside and began to pull the money out, tossing stack after stack into a gray duffel bag.
LaDon took a toothpick from a tray on his desk, began to run it along his hairline. “We gonna do six figures this month?”
“Not this month,” Jessie said. “But business is fucking booming. We’re looking at twenty K.”
“And you need any help with the grow?”
“I could use someone to do my laundry, clean up the apartment for me.”
“Fuck that,” LaDon said. “I’m busy.”
Jessie finished with the money, zipped the bag closed, and secured it with a small combination lock. She turned and looked at LaDon. “I’ve been wondering…you got a nickname, LaDon?”
LaDon smiled that nice big smile of his. “They call me Captain Groove,” he said. “You wanna know why?” He shimmied in his seat.
Jessie laughed, she couldn’t help it. “You smart ass…”
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Here is a preview from Swann’s Down, the fifth Henry Swann mystery by Charles Salzberg.
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1
The Age of Aquarius
“We’re partners, right?”
Nothing good can come from that question when it comes from the mouth of Goldblatt.
“I mean, all for one and one for all, am I right?” he quickly added in an attempt, I was sure, to seal the deal.
“I think you’re confusing us with the three musketeer
s. May I point out there are only two of us, and I’m afraid that’s not the only fallacy in your declaration. But you might as well finish what you’ve started.”
We were having our weekly Friday lunchtime sit-down to discuss what Goldblatt likes to refer to as “business.” I have another name for it: waste of time.
Our venue changes from week to week but the concept is always pretty much the same: a cheap diner-slash-coffee shop somewhere on the island of Manhattan. Today’s eatery of choice (Goldblatt’s choice, my destiny) is the Utopia Diner, on Amsterdam, near Seventy-second Street. And as for the business we’d just finished discussing, well, to be honest, there never is much actual business to discuss and today was no exception.
At this particular moment, we were going through a bit of a dry spell, which always makes me a little nervous because no matter how much I banish it from my mind, the rent is due the first of every month and at least three times a day I seem to develop a hunger that must be quenched. Still, a good fifteen, twenty years away from Social Security, and with precious little dough in the bank—okay, let’s be honest, no dough in the bank—and no 401(k) to fall back on, I need to keep working. And, as much as I don’t like to admit it, lately it’s been my “partner,” as he likes to refer to himself, as opposed to my preferred “albatross,” who’s brought in the bulk of our clients.
We’d already finished eating—though technically, Goldblatt never actually finishes eating which means a meal can easily turn into an all-day affair if I don’t apply the brakes—and we were just waiting for the check to arrive. This is a crucial point of any meal with Goldblatt because it is the opening gambit in what has become our weekly routine of watching the check sit there in no-man’s land somewhere between us until I inevitably give in, pick it up, and pay. Otherwise, I risk one of two things: either we’d be there all afternoon or, worst-case scenario, Goldblatt will decide he’s still hungry and threaten to order something else. Neither of these options is the least bit appealing.
“I’ll get right to the point,” he said.
Just then, out of the corner of my eye, I spotted the waiter, like a white knight, approaching with our check in hand. If I acted quick enough I might be able to get out of there before being sucked into something I don’t want to have anything to do with.
“That would be nice,” I said, reaching for my wallet. “What is your point?”
“I need to hire you.”
I was stopped in my tracks before I got my wallet halfway out of my back pocket.
“Really? To do what?”
“I want you to find someone for me. Well, to be more precise, it’s not really for me. It’s for my ex-wife.”
Wait a minute! Goldblatt married? Goldblatt with a wife? Goldblatt a husband? This was a new one on me, something I’d never even considered.
“You…you’ve been married?” I stammered.
Truth is, I never pictured Goldblatt being in any relationship other than with, yes, as irritating as it might be, me. I mean the guy isn’t exactly anyone’s idea of Don Juan, although I suppose in theory there are women who might find him if not attractive in the conventional way, at least interesting in a specimen-under-glass way. Or maybe as a project. Women love a project. They love a challenge. They love the idea that they have the opportunity to remake a man in their image. Maybe that was it. But whatever it was, my world was shaken to the core. And what would shake it even more would be to find that he was a father, too. But one shock per meal is more than enough, so there was no chance I was going to pursue that line of questioning.
“Unfortunately, the answer is yes. More than once, in fact.”
“Holy cow,” I blurted out, channeling the Scooter. “You’re kidding me?”
At this point the same bald, squat waiter who seemed to serve us in every diner we patronized, reached our table and dropped the check right in front of me.
“This is not something a man usually kids about.”
“How many times?”
He held up three fingers.
“Three times! You’ve been married three times?”
“Yeah.”
I gulped.
“Are you married now?”
He shook his head. “Nah. I’m kinda between wives. Giving it a rest, if you know what I mean. But chances are I’ll be back in the saddle again soon enough.”
“Okay, so let me get this straight. You’ve been married three times and now you’re single but you would consider getting married again?”
“Man is not meant to be alone, Swannie. You might consider the possibility that your life would be enriched if you found your soul mate.”
You’re fortunate if you find one soul mate in life and I’d already had mine. She was yanked from my life as a result of a freak accident, a matter of being in the wrong place at the wrong time. I didn’t know if Goldblatt knew the circumstances of her bizarre accidental death, but I wouldn’t have been surprised because he seemed to know a lot of things he had no business knowing.
“Some men are meant to be alone, Goldblatt. I’m one of them and after three failed marriages, maybe you should consider the possibility you are, too.”
He smiled and puffed out his chest. “What can I say, Swann? I’m a friggin’ babe magnet.”
I would have laughed, should have laughed, but I was still processing the scary fact that he’d been married three times. That meant there were three women in the world who not only were willing to marry him but did marry him. I wanted to know more. Much more. Everything, in fact. But this was not the time and certainly not the place to delve into Goldblatt’s mysterious, sordid past. Nevertheless, I promised myself I would revisit this topic in the not too distant future.
Still in shock, I avoided our weekly “who’s paying for this meal” tango, grabbed the check and reached for my wallet…again.
“So, wanna know the story?” he asked.
“Which story would that be?”
“The story of why I want to hire you?”
“Desperately.”
“It’s for Rachel. She was my second wife. The best of the lot, actually. Sweet kid. We had our problems, that’s for sure, and maybe I should’ve stuck with it. You know, like given it more of a chance.”
“It’s a little late for regrets, isn’t it?” I said, but Goldblatt wasn’t listening. His head was cocked to one side and his eyes rolled up in their sockets. It was obvious his mind was off in the ether somewhere, strolling down Memory Lane, I assumed.
“How long were you married?”
“Let’s see.” He closed his eyes and started counting on his fingers. His eyes snapped open. “Technically, I guess it was a little more than six months.”
“Six months? You call that a marriage?”
“It was legal, if that’s what you mean.”
“And exactly what do you mean by ‘technically’?”
“I mean we were together for a few months before we actually got hitched, and then we were legally married for maybe three months before the annulment…”
“You got an annulment?”
“Not me. Her. I woulda stuck it out a while longer. You know, I’m really a traditional kind of guy. But she needed an annulment. Something to do with the church. It woulda looked bad on her record if she got a divorce. I guess Jesus don’t much like the idea of divorce. Mumbo jumbo, as far as I’m concerned. But I went along with the annulment thing. What’d I care? Remember, I’m a lawyer. I know all about legal fictions.”
“Why?”
“Why what?”
“Why’d she dump you?”
“I’m really not fond of the word ‘dump.’ I prefer, parting of the ways. Or, better yet, we had different priorities. It’s complicated and kind of personal.”
“Of course, it’s personal. That’s why I want to know.”
“Yeah, well, maybe some other time.”
“Man, this is a little too much to digest all at once, so we might a
s well skip to the part where you need to hire me.”
“Yeah, right. None of the rest is important. Anyway, Rachel, that’s her name. Did I already say that?”
I nodded.
“She’s a real sweet kid, but she’s always been kinda, shall we say, naïve…you know, trusting. Too trusting, if you ask me. And she’s also a bit woo-woo, you know, out there.” He waved his hands and rolled his eyes, aiming them up toward the ceiling that was blocking the way to heaven, which I presume was what he was shooting for.
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“You know, like what do they call it?” He snapped his fingers. “New Agey. That’s it. She believes in all that bullshit like astrology, tarot cards, tea leaves, all that spiritual garbage. She wouldn’t marry me while Mercury was in retrograde. I don’t even know what the hell that means but hey, it wasn’t like I was in a hurry to tie the knot.”
“I thought you were a traditionalist?”
“That doesn’t mean I was stupid. You gotta get to really know a person before you take a step like that.”
“You took it three times.”
“No one’s perfect, Swann.”
I’m sure we could have gone on like this all afternoon, but I had better things to do, which meant just about anything else.
“Let’s get on with it,” I said, tossing my credit card on top of the check. It’s always a crapshoot as to whether or not I’ve reached my credit limit, but since I’d uncharacteristically paid it off a couple weeks earlier after a minor payday, I figured I was in the clear. Goldblatt had been making noises for several weeks about getting a “company” card, “for tax purposes,” he explained. But I didn’t see him making a move to apply for one and I sure as hell wasn’t going to sign on for a card where I’d be on the hook for any expenses he chalked up.
“So,” he continued, “not long ago, she goes off on this trip to San Francisco. You know, one of those things where she’s gonna find herself. Anyway, she’s hanging out in that old hippie district…”