One Hot Mess (7 page)

I took the box, protesting weakly. I love caramel more than sin. “I don't think—”

“Oh…” She waved dismissively. “Don't you go telling me you can't eat it. Scrawny little thing like you don't have the strength to lie. Here.” She picked up a card that was propped with its kindred in front of her. “Your first client. Daryl Ellingson.” She put it on top of the box. “He should be pulling in any minute now. Your three o'clock canceled on account of she has to work, and a woman name of Celeste Friedman called in a panic. Wanted to get her daughter right in. An emergency she says. I told her you didn't have no time 'til this afternoon, but that conflicted with her Pilates class.”

I refrained, quite professionally, from rolling my eyes. “So I shouldn't be expecting her?”

Shirley gave me a “what's that?” glance, accompanied by a sassy tilt of the head. “Course you should. After I borrowed a little of that guilt that's been rolling around in here, she decided to take your free three o'clock.”

“Guilt?”

“I just asked if little Amy was her only daughter or if she had a spare—just in case things don't work out.”

I stared in silent admiration.

“You get goin' now. You better start in on that roll or Mr. Daryl'll show up and you'll have caramel on your teeth,” she said, and shooed me down the hall.

But she opened my office door before I'd had a chance to slip into a glucose high. “I forgot to tell you that a Senator Rivera called.”

“Oh?” I glanced up, immediately nervous.

“He's got a mighty sexy voice for a Republican.” She scrunched up her face a little when she said it. I was going to have to guess she voted for the other side.

“What did he want?”

“Asked that you call him soon as you get a chance.” She glided into my office like an angel and set a note beside the roll. “Home phone, cell phone, pager,” she said, and left.

Unfortunately, I didn't have time to be floored by her efficiency. Back-to-back clients kept me on my toes until nearly noon, at which time curiosity took me by the throat. I set my records aside and called the first number on the list.

“Caring Hands,” said a chipper voice.

I glanced at the phone. “Um … I'm sorry. I was given this number for Senator Rivera.”

“The senator? Hang on a minute.” She covered the receiver, but I could hear her clear as vodka. “Hey, Emmy, is the senator still here?”

The answer was out of my range, but in a minute Chipper was back on the line. “I'm sorry. We can't seem to find him right now. I thought he was serving lunch, but maybe he's helping on the floor.”

I blinked. “We're talking about Senator Rivera, right?”

“Yeah. If you want to leave a number I can try to get him a message, but my shift's done here in fifteen.”

“Senator
Miguel
Rivera?” Somehow I couldn't quite see him dishing up reconstituted mashed potatoes in his Armani suit.

“Yes, ma'am. If you want to come see him yourself, he'll be here until five or so.”

I hung up the phone a moment later and wandered out to the reception desk a little after that.

Shirley was alphabetizing the files and possibly curing cancer in her spare time. “What do you know about Senator Rivera?” I asked.

She wrinkled her nose. “He was against offering condoms to high-school kids.”

“I take it you're an advocate for contraceptives.”

She snorted, jerking her head back a little. “I'm forty-one years old. I got seven kids, five grandkids, and an ex I ain't seen since before Dion come screamin' into the world. Far as I'm concerned, they should be injectin' birth control into them kids' Tater Tots.”

I sat down, watching her work. “What else do you know about the senator?”

She shrugged. “Good-looking fella, if I recall. Got into trouble with the ladies some time—” She stopped, lowered her brows, gave me a sassy oh-no-you-don't expression. “He ain't snooping 'round you, is he?”

“No. No. He just…” Where to begin. “His son and I… Jack is … Lieutenant Rivera and I are … friends,” I finished poorly.

“His boy's a cop?”

I cleared my throat. “Yes.”

“And you two been seeing each other?”

“I guess you could call it that.”

“Well…” She scowled. “Ain't life a kicker.”

“It is.”

“So if you're hangin' with the boy, why you askin' me about the old man?”

I considered telling her that I respected her opinion, but it sounded too mushy even with the sentimentality of Christmas looming over me like a bad-tempered gargoyle. “I was just wondering about your perspective.”

She nodded. “Well, there's a sayin',” she said. “You swim in Shit Crik long enough, some of it's gonna get in your ears.”

T'S HIGHLY POSSIBLE that I should have stayed at work and never made the trip over to Caring Hands, especially since I was undecided about whether or not to agree to the senators proposal. But my last client left at 4:50, and I thought if I hurried and no one tried to kill me, I could see for myself whether the stylish Miguel Rivera really
was
hobnobbing with the down-on-their-luckers in one of L.A.'s high-crime areas. Besides, I had a secret shortcut across town. At 4:58 I joined a zillion cranky commuters who seemed to be in on my secret, but finally I arrived at a listing brick building on the corner of 134th and Wilmington. Leaving my Saturn in the donors' parking lot, I walked in the front door and up the railed
ramp. A dining area opened at the top of the incline. It was filled with a couple of dozen long tables that teemed with shuffling diners. At the far side of the room, volunteers dished meals onto paper plates.

Making my way through the crowd, I ran into a dark-haired woman whose name tag proclaimed her to be Helen. She had somehow dodged the hip spread generally associated with middle age, and I tried not to resent her for that. My efforts weren't tremendously successful, even though she was perfectly civil in a harried sort of way and didn't ask me if I was humping the senator when I inquired about his whereabouts. Pointing vaguely toward the shifting mass of humanity, she hurried off, but a moment later I spotted my quarry dishing up mashed potatoes to a bearded fellow in saggy trousers.

Miguel Rivera wore wrinkle-free blue jeans and a small-plaid button-down shirt. The sleeves were rolled back from perfectly manicured hands and he wore no tie. I figured his working-man ensemble had cost more than I bring home in a week; if there's one thing to be said about the senator, it's that he knows how to dress for every occasion.

The bearded guy moved on, followed by an African American woman with a little girl. Vaguely, I could hear the senator commenting about her cornrows. But after a minute the middle-aged woman sans fat hips caught his attention and directed it toward me. Our gazes met with a little spark of recognition and he smiled.

Subsequently, the hipless woman took over his job and he came my way, wiping his hands on a napkin.

“Christina.” He smiled. The expression was still top shelf, a little self-deprecating, a little flirty, as effective here
as at any lavish banquet in Pasadena. His handshake, however, was the real showstopper. Warm and personal, squeezing my fingers intimately between his slightly calloused palms. “What a pleasant surprise. What are you doing here?”

Excellent question. “My secretary gave me your message, but when I called I got this number.”

He shook his head and looked embarrassed. “I must have given her the wrong number. How foolish of me. But you needn't have come all this way. I only called to …” He sighed mournfully. “To apologize. Both for my behavior and for my son's. We were…” Another head shake, accompanied by a vague scowl. “What is the word?”

“There are a lot of them,” I said, remembering the stunning stupidity of the other night. He looked at me and laughed.

“You see, this is why I like you so very much, Christina,” he said. “You do not stand on ceremony. In fact, that is why I stopped by. I knew you would have the integrity and intellect to get to the bottom of this.”

“The bottom of what, exactly?”

He gave me a curious glance. “The cause of Ms. Baltimore's death, of course.”

“Uh-huh.” Two days and a conversation with Laney had stirred up a few doubts about the good senator. “If you don't mind me asking,” I said, “why do you care?”

“Despite the troubles between Gerald and myself, I am still his father and I still wish to protect him.”

I was only more confused. “And you think he's in danger because …”

“I am beginning to suspect that you are not a great believer in premonitions and dreams, Christina.”

I shrugged, feeling a little guilty for my lack of faith. “I don't think I would bet a new septic system on either.”

He laughed. “Perhaps it is my heritage that makes me more prone to believe. Or perhaps it is my age. In my many years I have seen a great deal that cannot be explained.”

“Like your dream.”

“Yes.”

“About that—how did you know who the victim was when you saw her in your dream?”

“I did not,” he said, and motioned toward the back. I moved in that direction.

“Then why—”

“As it happened, I read an article regarding her death just after…” He shuddered. “After that horrible dream.”

“An article?”

“Online.”

“And it had a picture of her?”

“Taken just weeks before her demise.”

I nodded. I could hardly disprove it. One could find anything online. “Okay,” I said, deciding to let that go for a minute. “But why not hire a professional if you're so set on investigating?”

He sobered handsomely. “May I be honest with you?”

“Does this suggest that you haven't been in the past?”

He laughed again. “As you know, I was in the political arena for a long while. Indeed, I may yet be again.”

I stared at him, not sure where he was going or how long it would take him to get there.

“Having the media connect me with an unsolved death would do me no good,” he added.

Something knotted in my stomach.
“Are
you connected?”

He shook his head like a sad warrior, wearied by the world. “The truth rarely has any bearing in matters such as these. Once the paparazzi learn I have paid to have a death investigated, they will insist on knowing why.”

“Why not tell them about your dream?”

His smile suggested I might be kind of naive. “The citizens of this great country are wonderful people, Christina. Strong. Resourceful. But they—like you, perhaps—do not set a great deal of store in things they cannot touch. Cannot prove. You see, I have no desire to make my constituents believe I am easily spooked. Neither did I wish for my son to think less of me. I was certain I could trust
you
to be discreet. Still…” He motioned me toward a hallway. It was narrow and poorly lit. Three doors lined the wall on the right. One stood open. Inside, piles of paper were stacked on the desk. “I realize now that I was wrong to ask,” he admitted, and motioned to a green plastic chair. “To put you in such a position. I know how you feel about my son.”

Well, I thought, surveying the room, that would put him way ahead of me.

“I'd like to apologize, too,” I said, and, smoothing my apple-green shift against the back of my thighs, classify took the proffered seat. He closed the door and sat in the chair across the desk from me. “I didn't mean to call you a liar. Especially in front of your son. It's just that… he and I… we've had enough trouble between us without added fabrications.” That's what I like to call lying if the lies are propagated by me. “But I'm afraid I may have only made things worse.”

He scowled, looking concerned. “What do you mean?”

“He was obviously a bit… upset.” That's what I like to call rabid when referring to someone I had recently considered screwing. “When he left.”

The senator leaned back a little. “But surely you've spoken to him since.”

I didn't reply but studied the endless piles of paper.

He stared at me a moment, appalled, then shook his head. “My son, he is a stubborn man.”

“Really?” I tugged my attention back to him and gave him my first-string smile. “I hadn't noticed.”

He looked startled for a second, then laughed. “Perhaps love makes you blind, yes?”

“I—” My mouth opened but nothing else came out, and he laughed again.

“Give him time. He will call. He thinks a great deal of you.”

“Does he?” I didn't mean to sound pathetic. But sometimes … well, I'm pathetic.

“Christina,” he said, tone soothing. “Surely you do not doubt that.”

“Uhh…”

“Have you not looked in the mirror?”

I remembered seeing myself in the microwave that night and stifled a shudder. “No more than necessary.”

He shook his head. “Could it be that you truly do not realize how attractive you are?”

I was sure I should think of some snappy comeback to that, but nothing came to mind.

Nevertheless, he smiled, warm and toasty “I am truly sorry to cause trouble between the two of you.”