82 Desire (3 page)

“Uh-oh. They after you, too?”

“What do you mean,’too’?”

“Jane Storey’s on my ass.”

“Jane Storey? What for?”

“It’s not nice. You free for lunch?”

“Davis Deluxe. Twenty minutes.”

Davis Deluxe had caused Skip to gain five pounds since getting transferred. It was a great neighborhood restaurant—red plaid on the tables, Dr. King on the wall, butter beans on your plate. It was delicious and it was close.

Since it would take her far less than twenty minutes to get there, she called Bebe first. “I hear the press knows.”

“Well, it’s a little puzzling. I’ve only had one call, but since they’d found out, I couldn’t see the point of lying. Did I do wrong?”

“Up to you.” Skip thought a minute. “Probably not. A story might get someone out of the woodwork. I thought you wanted to keep it quiet, that’s all.”

A sob came over the line. “It’s gone beyond that, Skip. I’m scared to death. It’s been two days.”

“I think you made the right decision. This makes my job easier.” A lot easier. Discretion took on a different meaning if the whole city knew.

Something was funny, though. Why Jane Storey and no other reporters? “Has anyone called besides the
Times-Picayune
?”

“No. Jane said she had a tip. And don’t worry, I know it wasn’t you. She told me it didn’t come from the cops. And I’ve worked with her a lot. I trust her.”

So had Skip and she also trusted her—up to a point.

Still, she thought,
That’s your first mistake. Never trust a reporter
. She went to meet Cindy Lou.

Two

“I’M IN A heap of shit, girlfriend.”

“What’s going on?” Skip put down the menu, deciding once again on the fried chicken.

“Well, I was seeing a married man.”

Skip sighed. Cindy Lou was African American, beautiful, brilliant, and cursed with abysmal taste in men. She didn’t discriminate on account of race, color, or creed—all they had to be was unsuitable. “So what else is new?” Skip asked.

“It was Bebe Fortier’s husband.”

“Holy shit. Why didn’t I see that coming?”

“Why do you say that?”

“You talk first. What did Jane want?”

“She told me she had information I was seeing him and asked me if I knew his whereabouts. I called his office and they said he was out sick. What’s going on here?”

“He’s disappeared, Lou-Lou. Jane probably thinks you ran away with him. Did you?”

“Hey, back off. What’s happening?”

Skip told her the story. “What do you make of it?”

Lou-Lou shrugged. “I don’t make anything of it. I barely know the man. It doesn’t sound right, though. Uh-uh. It doesn’t sound right at all.” She was shaking her head. “I don’t like it. From the little I knew of him, he was your basic solid family man.”

Skip almost dropped her fork. “Oh, right. And you’re part of the family? What do you mean, you barely knew him, by the way?”

“It wasn’t a real affair. We saw each other exactly twice. He was at some party without Bebe and we both drank some champagne and flirted. Then he kept calling and hustling and—hell, he’s cute. So I went to bed with him. And guess what? He was great. I hadn’t had a date for six months. I mean it—I know you don’t believe it, but it’s the God’s truth.”

“Lou-Lou, tell me you use condoms.”

“What, you think I’m crazy? I keep a whole box on my bedside table.”

Skip had to laugh. “Okay, I feel better.”

“Then we saw each other a second time and he couldn’t get it up. He was feeling so damn guilty about cheating on his wife; you know that one? I swear, married men aren’t worth messing with.”

“I’m going to type that out and tape it to your refrigerator. You don’t get to eat till you repeat it ten times.”

“I never eat at home anyway.” She turned up her palms. “That was it. The whole thing. And it was two months ago.”

“Who knew about it?”

“Nobody. Listen, you’re my best friend. Did you know about it? It wasn’t worth mentioning, believe me.”

“Did people see you at that party?”

“We talked for maybe ten minutes. Yeah, it was intense, but who could have noticed? Nobody, believe me. Everybody was too busy putting the moves on everybody else.”

“Did you leave with Fortier?”

“Of course not. I just don’t see how this T-P babe could know about it.”

“Well, she does. But what did you mean when you said you’re in deep shit?”

“She’s going to run a story about it.”

“Come on, she can’t do that. It’s not news.”

Lou-Lou put her palms up. “All I know is what she told me. Listen, she’s your friend. Isn’t there anything you can do?”

“I don’t know. I just don’t know if there is.”

But she was sure going to have a talk with Jane Storey.

***

Jane had become a reporter because she wanted each day to be different, because she liked to hang out with people who told a good story, because she had a lot of questions and needed a license to ask them. She was someone who craved adventure through her work.

She’d become a television reporter for the adventure as much as the money. She’d quit because, to her, TV was about appearances rather than reality—you didn’t have to tell a story, you only had to stand before the camera and make mouth noises. What they were signified very little as long as you looked neat and sounded professional.

Stuffy was better still.

And you didn’t get to write much.

She’d also become a reporter because she wrote. Not that she enjoyed writing or wanted to write, or even so much had ambitions to write. It was just what she did. She was a lot more comfortable back at the
Picayune
, but she sure missed Walter.

Walter Cottrell had been her best friend at the paper. He was sixty, which made him the second oldest staff member, and he was Jane’s idol and role model. This was what a reporter should be—alert but not cynical, smarter than your average Rhodes scholar, and a brilliant writer. He had died in his sleep—of a broken heart, she thought. Because journalism hadn’t lived up to his expectations; had become a completely different animal from the one he had tamed as a young man.

Walter loved to talk about matters of ethics and integrity. Nobody else much did anymore. Something else she loved about Walter—he was always a little sloppy, like Skip. Always had spots on his tie, or his shirt hanging out in the back, or hair flying every which way.

Jane’s peers in age and experience looked as if they worked in banks. They were hardly the lovable rowdies, the raffish black sheep who’d been drawn to journalism in Walter’s day. They were serious young men and women who probably wouldn’t give Hildy Johnson the time of day—or even know who he was. They were so politically correct they wouldn’t tell Polish jokes on a slow news day.

But the newsroom still had a certain character. A few people who worked there still excelled in the art of raconteurism. A few cared about their work. Some could make her laugh.

Jane clung to that.

The receptionist phoned from the cool marble entrance two floors down: “Skip Langdon to see you.”

“Well, well. Send her up. By all means.” Jane tidied her desk and waited for Skip to ascend the escalator.

She went to meet her at the entrance to the newsroom. “This has got to be a first. You’re coming to see
me
?”

“Janie, we have to talk.”

“Uh-oh, that’s your mean voice. Let’s go to the cafeteria.”

They went to the second floor. “Buy you a cup of coffee?”

“Make mine water—I just had lunch. With Cindy Lou Wootten.”

“Ah. The plot thickens.” Jane felt her stomach flutter.

“I came to discuss responsible journalism. Isn’t that what you said you were into?”

Jane nodded, trying to keep her cool. “Sure. Tell me what’s on your mind.”

“Some things just don’t jibe. Cindy Lou says you’re going to run a story about her and Russell Fortier. I want to hear it from your own mouth.”

“I don’t mean to be rude—but why?”

“Oh, Cindy Lou’s probably one of my three best friends. So I was just kind of wondering what’s going on. It doesn’t seem like she and Russell are news. So what would the story be?”

Jane felt herself color. She had used a tactic or two to get Cindy Lou talking that might have slightly overstated the case.

She said, “Well, I’d have to go along with you on that. I’m not going to run anything that’s not news. We’re not in the business of invading privacy.”

Skip snorted.

“Unless it
is
news. I mean, if Russell had been shacked up with Cindy Lou, it would be.”

“Oh, come on, Jane.”

“Anyway, it might tell me Russell’s disappearance isn’t the result of criminal activity. Unless you count crimes of the heart.”

“She thinks you’re going to smear her. She’s a respected member of the community and she doesn’t deserve that.”

Jane leaned back in her chair. “I’m sorry I spooked her—I’m not going to do anything unprofessional. But she should have thought about the consequences. Bebe doesn’t deserve a cheating husband either.”

“That’s not your business.”

Jane took a deep breath; she was having a bad time with men lately. “You’re right. I spoke out of turn.”

“Can we talk off the record?”

“Sure.”

“Cindy Lou wasn’t even having an affair with Russell—she did see him a time or two, but she’s surprised anyone could know about that. This whole thing makes me nervous. I know you don’t reveal sources, but there’s something nasty about all this.”

Jane shrugged. “I hear a lot of stories. Some pan out, some don’t. My job is to check ’em out.” She looked at Skip. The cop’s hair was growing back from an undercover do—it was no more than an inch long and already curly and wild. She wore a wrinkled rayon jacket, and pants a little too short. Her brow was all furrowed with worry.

You couldn’t help but like her.

Jane honestly wanted to be friends with this woman, but Skip was a high-profile news source. Was friendship even possible, given the nature of their two jobs?

“Janie, tell me what you know about Russell. I’ve got a bad feeling about all this.”

“You know I can’t do that. You can read it in the paper.”

“What if that’s too late? Where does journalism leave off and life begin?”

“Well, that’s a good question. A damn good question, debated nightly in newspaper grog shops the world over. You and I probably aren’t ever going to get to the bottom of it, but I’ll make today a little easier. I don’t know one damn thing that you don’t. All I really know is what Bebe told me. I presume it was less than she told you.”

“Did she tip you, Janie?”

“Bebe? Of course not.” It just slipped out. The question surprised her so much she forgot to be mysterious.

“Well, that’s something, anyway. Look, I’m sorry I barged in on you. I was a little upset.”

I’ll bet
, Jane thought.
I’ll just bet Ms. Skip Langdon never does anything without considering mucho carefully.

She walked Skip to the escalator and returned to the newsroom, thoughts aboil. This was a highly unusual event, a cop with an impeccable reputation for honesty trying to stop a story—if that’s what Skip had really come for. On the other hand, if she thought Jane really was going to run a story about some stupid love triangle, and Cindy Lou really was her best friend, it made a kind of crazy sense.

Still, it was strange behavior for Skip.

I wonder
, she thought,
if there’s something here I don’t see. Skip’s on the Russell Fortier case and Cindy Lou’s her friend—does she have a conflict of interest?

She tossed that one around in her head. Now that would be a story. But unless there was criminal activity, what did it mean?

Suppose there was criminal activity and Skip didn’t see it because she was too close to Cindy Lou?

She wanted to talk it over with Walter.

She wondered if she should run it by her editor. But they didn’t have a lot of rapport these days.

He was the philanderer in her life.

He had an eye for the ladies, he was married, and he liked to go out with a woman till she was hooked and then dump her—ask about half the female population of the newsroom.

He made damn sure they got hooked. He sent flowers, made dinners, planned romantic weekends. A seducer, Walter would have called him. Did call him, but had Jane listened?

Yes, for a while. Sure. She’d seen it herself. She couldn’t have cared less for the likes of David Bacardi—until one night, with a bottle of champagne, celebrating her return to the
Picayune
.

He had rehired her. Maybe she was just grateful at the time. Now she was supremely pissed off—mostly at herself.

Three

TALBA PLANNED TO spend the day shopping for exotic scarves to drape over the tattered furniture in the little cottage she shared with her mother. They lived in the Upper Ninth Ward between Desire and Piety, a metaphor she couldn’t figure out how to use. It was the house she’d grown up in. Using the proceeds from the job she’d just done at United Oil, she was gradually transforming it into an exotic den.

She was sitting at the old black-painted table in the kitchen having coffee and toast, letting her mama sleep, and reading the
Times-Picayune
, when her eye lit on two words that froze her solid. Russell Fortier.

Russell Fortier had disappeared.

Just fallen off the Earth, if you believed the newspaper story.

What the hell was this?
She knew Russell Fortier, and she wasn’t the kind of person who knew people who made news (though she expected to make some herself pretty soon).

The paper said Russell was married to Bebe Fortier, the city councilwoman. Talba hadn’t known that—some detective she was. It occurred to her that she hadn’t asked enough questions before she took the job.

Maybe she should postpone her shopping trip.

She heard her mama coming down the hall, wearing those ancient blue slippers of hers, sounding like an old lady, though she was only forty-seven. It was her day off.

“Mama? You want some coffee?”

“Ummmm-hmmmm. I got up ‘cause it smell so good.”

“You sit down now—let me make you some toast.”

Her mother wasn’t wearing a wig today. Her hair was cut short, close to her head, so it wouldn’t get all dusty when she went to work. She looked better today. She’d been looking so tired lately.

“What you doin’ today, girl? “

“I got some business to take care of.”

“Bi’ness! Hmmph. You sound like my sister Carrie boy, Jonathan. Spend half his life in jail. Only bi’ness he up to, monkey bi’ness.”

“Now, Mama. You know I don’t deal drugs, I don’t stick up stores, I don’t steal cars.” Steal
some
things, though. “You don’t need to worry about me.” Maybe not, anyway.

“You so secretive, Sandra. Can’t help but worry. I didn’t send you to college so you could lounge aroun’ the house smokin’ cigarettes and readin’ the paper.”

“I’m having a day off just like you. I just got a little somethin’ to take care of.”

“You ain’t in trouble, are you?”

God, I hope not
. “ ‘Course not, Mama. I’m gon’ go out, see a man about somethin’, then I’m gon’ go by Schwegmann’s and get a chicken for supper. Then I’m gon’ come home and do some work.”

“You got a freelance job?”

“My own work.”

“Pshaw! Your own work. You better get yourself a steady job, girl. Miz Clara didn’t send you to college so you could sit home in that room of yours.”

Her mother, who referred to herself grandly as “Miz Clara,” had a list a mile long of things she didn’t send her daughter to college to do. It included everything Talba did. This, despite the fact that Talba had worked for five years at a good job and saved her money so she could quit it and make her fortune. “Now, Mama, we talked about this.”

“That what you always say. I thought you meant a couple of months. Six at the most.”

“You know what you always say—Rome wasn’t built in a day.” That was what Miz Clara had told her and her little brother year after year after year when they wanted to know how long it would be before they could move out of their dumpy little house and into something with a swimming pool in back. Her brother had finally done it himself—today he lived in New Orleans East in a nice big house with a pool. But Talba had ambitions to be something more than a computer programmer.

She’d talked it over with her mother; asked if she could move back in with her. Miz Clara had said yes, and Talba felt betrayed every time she started the I-didn’t-send-you-to-college routine.

So Talba hadn’t told her about this great new way she had of earning money. It was honorable—or almost honorable. And it was certainly fun. Besides, she was learning lots of skills that were going to stand her in good stead. She was going to find the bastard she was looking for and make him pay. Then her mama’d be proud of her.

But she had a bad feeling about this Russell Fortier thing. Maybe old Gene Allred had taken advantage of her—gotten her involved in something that was going to come back to haunt her.

Whatever else Talba Wallis was, she was one smart cookie. She knew enough to cover her bootie and she’d better go do that right now; she couldn’t call Gene from here, with her mother listening and prying and judging every word.

She went and put on a white blouse and a little navy miniskirt, just like a Catholic schoolgirl. She had seven white blouses and four navy skirts. They looked businesslike, they looked humble, they hardly cost anything, and they were almost invisible. They nicely offset the long, gorgeous hair extensions she’d become addicted to—made her just another young black clerical worker who loved to go to the beauty parlor.

By day she was neat Talba Wallis (Sandra to her mother), a young computer whiz or clerical worker—whatever was called for—by night a creature of beauty and glamour and, in a small way, fame, which was soon to spread.

And those were only two of her personalities. She was also a woman with a mission.

The mission was already changing her life. She’d originally gone to Gene Allred about her problem and that had led to a whole new world of adventure and bucks—and sometime criminal activity, which, if truth be told, she quite enjoyed.

I hope that’s all it’s led to,
she thought as she drove to Allred’s crummy office out near Elysian Fields and Gentilly. The building it was in looked like a trailer it was so small and low. Today, his door was slightly ajar.

“Gene?” she called. He had no secretary.

For some reason, she had a sudden outbreak of goose bumps.

She stepped in, and there, in the doorway between the minuscule waiting room and the office proper, stood a man in a ski mask.

She gasped so loud the noise surprised her. She looked wildly around, as if for an exit, and noticed the office was wrecked.

The man came toward her. She backed up; all she had to do was step out on the sidewalk. Someone would see her, or at least hear her if she screamed.

But she opened her mouth too late. A broad ham of a hand smacked against it; the hand was gloved. The man caught her by the elbow and forced her back into the office. He shoved her against an old green sofa that Allred had probably gotten from Goodwill.

“Scream and I’ll kill you,” he said.

Rage enveloped her like a blanket. She had been the despair of her mother all through Catholic school, always getting in fights and kicking the boys in the shins.

“Fuck you,” she shouted, and hurled her body at him headfirst, butting him in the stomach. She heard something crack, probably his head hitting the wall. He started to fall and she righted herself, turned, and split, at more or less warp speed. Sure enough, there was someone there to save her—an elderly white woman was walking toward her.

“Help!” she shouted, and the woman screamed herself, obviously terrified at the sight of a wild-haired black hellion hurtling toward her—probably afraid she was about to be caught in the middle of a shoot-out. Talba couldn’t have guaranteed that she wasn’t.

The woman froze. “Dial 911,” Talba hollered, and kept running. Her car was two blocks away.

She stole a glance behind her and saw that there was indeed a man behind her, though not running. She hadn’t noticed anything about the man in the office except his ski mask—though she thought he’d been wearing jeans. This one was also wearing jeans, and he was white. She hadn’t a clue if he was the intruder.

About a block further on, when she was nearly to her car, she saw that the man was still walking toward her, and fast, she thought. She still couldn’t see his face. She kept running.

She fumbled for her key, glancing around now and then to see if he was close. He was getting into a tan van.

I’ve got to get calm
, she thought. There were lots of cars, plenty of businesses, dozens of people on the streets. Surely she was safe. Surely she could just walk in someplace and ask to use the phone to call the police.

But panic seized her as tightly as the rage of moments ago.
What the fuck am I into?
she thought.
What’s the deal with Russell Fortier disappearing?

The thing was, she had committed a few little illegalities in the course of her work for Allred. Maybe someone was upset about something.

Could she outrun this dude or not? It was worth a try.

Once again, she felt in her purse for the key, and this time her hand closed on it. She saw that the man was already out of his parking spot. She shoved the key in the ignition, but her fingers were so slick with sweat she didn’t trust them on the steering wheel.

Still, at this point there was no choice. He could drive up beside her and shoot her through the window.

Instead, he drove past her. Could it be that this was a different man? Maybe he wasn’t chasing her. He stopped at the stoplight. She was four cars behind him.

As he went through the intersection, she turned right, wondering how this could be so easy.

Yet she drove around a few random blocks, and still the van didn’t follow.

Damn
, she thought.
Why didn’t I get his license number?

But it was obvious why. She was too scared.

Nothing to do but go home. She stopped at Schwegmann’s on Elysian Fields, as she’d promised Miz Clara, and was approaching calm as she got back in the car and went home.

But there, in the center of her modest block, smack in the middle between Desire and Piety, was a tan van.

Oh, Jesus Christ
, she thought,
what now? My mama’s in the house.

She got out of the car warily, looking around her, wishing she had a gun.

Someone seized her from behind, clamping a hand over her mouth. She felt the roughness of his beard as the man leaned close to her ear.

He whispered, “Open the door,” and she realized he meant her own car door.

She worked it.

“No. The back door.”

He pushed her in and slid in beside her. She felt something slip over her head, and then she was wearing the ski mask, backward, so that it formed a blindfold.

“Scream and your mother’s dead,” the man said.

Inside the wool mask was unbearably hot.
Why a ski mask?
she thought.
Why not a stocking mask?
She realized that wouldn’t have disguised the man’s race. But he’d blown that one. The man was white.

He spoke to her gently, much more nicely than you’d expect from someone who’d just threatened to kill your mother. “You’re okay. I’m not going to hurt you and I’m not going to hurt your mother. You’re involved in something you don’t understand, that’s all. Wait till tomorrow and call me at the office.” She felt something slide into her hand, something he was pressing into her palm. A business card.

“Now, wait till I’m gone and then go in the house. Your mother’s okay.” She waited till she heard her car door slam and then ripped off the mask. He had his back to her so she still couldn’t see his face, but she damn sure wasn’t going to sit there like a dummy when she had a chance to get his plate number.

But it had been splashed with something, probably mud. He drove off while she was still squinting at it. She looked at the card in her hand and let out a little gasp.

It bore the crescent and star of the New Orleans Police Department.
DETECTIVE SKIP LANGDON
, it said.

She dashed inside. “Mama? Mama, you okay?”

Her mother was watching Oprah. “Girl, why ain’t you out looking for a job?”

“Did you send me to college to make chicken fricassee? I hope so, ‘cause that’s what I’m gonna do.”

“Hmmph. For ya no-account boyfrien’ wit’ the horrible hair. Not for ya mama.”

Talba had stuffed the damn ski mask into the Schwegmann’s bag. She took it out and looked at it.
Fuck!
she thought.
No way a cop would have treated a white person that way—threatenin’ to kill my mama! I think I might call Public Integrity.

That was the office called Internal Affairs elsewhere, but she hesitated, deciding instead to try Allred’s office one last time. No one answered. All day she kept calling and getting no answer.

She ran the whole thing by Lamar that night, after they’d eaten the chicken fricassee. Whatever her mama said, Lamar was not no-account, any more than she was. He was a grad student at Xavier, in the art department, and he was a damn good artist, especially, as her mama said, if you listened to him. He had fabulous dreads and looked something like Lenny Kravitz, whom he had once seen in the French Quarter, and whose style he greatly admired.

He was outraged. “Are you kidding? Call Public Integrity! Call ’em now! Don’t even call the cop back. Just call and report him. Do a thing like that! Damn.”

“Well, I just thought—”

“I’m gonna do a painting. You know what, I’m gonna paint what happened. Give me that ski mask. He really put it over your head?”

She didn’t have time to answer.

“Maybe I’ll actually use the thing itself in the painting—make a collage with it. Yeah, all red and blue. How dare they do that to my baby? Can’t imagine a cop doing a thing like that.”

“Oh, come on, Lamar.”

“I mean, oh sure, I can imagine it. A good cop’s harder to find than a good artist in this town. Baby, you just lucky you got one. You want to go to bed? “ He nuzzled her.

“Not with my mama—”

“Oh, your mama. You got to grow up, Talba. Fuck this shit. I’m leavin’. Leavin’ right now.”

He marched out the door, his dreads swinging in the breeze. It was something he did about once a week.

“Pshaw,” Miz Clara said. “I come up with that boy’s mama. If she was alive, he wouldn’t be like that.”

“Now, Mama. Lamar’s an artist.”

“Lamar a sperled brat. That what Lamar is.”