Rock Chick 01 (8 page)

I decided to cut into the history lesson.
“Our Rosie doesn’t live around here but his friend does, down and
across the street about four houses. His name is Tim Shubert.”

“I know Tim, he buys lots of cheese puffs and
frozen pizzas.”

If Tim was a stoner the caliber of Rosie, I
had no doubt he bought a lot of cheese puffs and pizzas.

“Rosie’s thin, about five foot six, dirty
blond hair, looks a bit like Kurt Cobain but his face isn’t as
pointy,” Ally put in.

“I know no Kurt Cobain but I have seen a man
of this description with Tim. Is his name really Rosie?”

“Nickname,” I said, “his name is
Ambrose.”

“Ambrose is a perfectly fine name. Why does
he not call himself Ambrose?”

Ally looked at me.

I decided to ignore that one. Any answer
would have to span a generation
and
a culture gap. I didn’t
have it in me today, in less than twenty-four hours, I’d been shot
at, physically dragged out of bed and kissed by Lee Nightingale
three and a half times (yes, I was counting and the half was the
kiss he planted on my neck).

I was a woman on a mission and I didn’t have
time to explain a dud name like Ambrose.

“Have you seen him lately, like say, today?”
I asked as I paid for my purchase.

“No, not today.”

“Tim?” Ally asked.

“Not Tim either.”

He handed me the bag and I took it, at a loss
for what to do next.

“Jeez, Indy. Don’t you read detective novels?
You own a bookstore for God’s sake,” Ally hissed and then turned to
the store owner.

The counter man smiled huge. “You own a
bookstore? I love books. What bookstore do you own?”

“Fortnum’s, on the corner of Bayaud and
Broadway,” I answered.

“I know that. My wife goes there. Books are
cheap there and then you can sell them back and get cash
money.”

“Yep, that’s it.” I nodded and smiled, happy
to meet a customer-by-proxy.

Ally was busy scribbling my name and numbers
on a piece a paper she found in her purse and when she was done,
she handed him the paper. “Maybe you could give us a call if you
see Rosie or Tim. Would you do that?”

“Of course. I’m an employer, only my wife
works for me but I understand how important it is to trust your
hired help. I will call you.”

“Thanks.”

We went out and sat in my car and stared at
Tim’s house while we thought about what to do next. We both were
new at this. Neither of us had tracked down a stoner-on-the-run
before. We’d stalked plenty of guys, but we’d known where to find
them.

We both ate a cupcake to get the brain juices
flowing.

“That was a nice guy,” I said through yellow
cake and cream.

“Yep,” Ally replied, her mouth equally
full.

Someone tapped on Ally’s window and we both
jumped and swiveled our heads to the side.

I nearly spewed
better-living-through-chemistry cream on my windshield at what I
saw.

It was Grizzly Adams, but the serial killer
version. He was enormous, had lots of wild, blond hair, a thick,
seriously overlong (we’re talking ZZ Top here) russet beard and was
wearing a flannel shirt even though it had to be nearly ninety
degrees.

He was also carrying a shotgun and had some
kind of freaky-ass goggle apparatus on the top of his head.

“You want somethin’?” he growled.

“We’re looking for Tim Shubert,” Ally replied
calmly.

“He’s not here,” Grizzly said, “move
along.”

“Yep, yep. Going!” I shouted and started the
car, put it into gear and took off.

“Where are we going?” Ally asked.

“Hell if I know.”

“We should have asked him some questions,”
Ally said, completely at ease

“Right. No. We’re trying to
avoid
me
getting dead. Definitely
you
getting dead. I don’t talk to
people who carry shotguns around in broad daylight.”

“He looked interesting,” Ally said
contemplatively.

Shit.

* * * * *

It was just after four.

After our introduction to Grizzly, we’d swung
back by Fortnum’s to help out Jane for awhile and ask if she’d
heard from Duke (answer: no).

Now, Ally and I were in my dark blue VW
Beetle, windows down, sunroof back, sitting outside Rosie’s house
sipping leftover water and waiting.

My Beetle wasn’t exactly a rock ‘n’
roll-mobile but it was cute. It had cream leather seats that were
great in the winter because they heated up. Now that it was summer,
the seats stuck to your legs and every time you got out, it felt
like three layers of skin tore off (another reason to wear
jeans).

Denver had killer weather, as in nearly
perfect. Summers were hot but usually at night it cooled off enough
to sleep under a cover. Spring and Fall were volatile and allowed
for variety in wardrobe. Winter was never too cold because there
was no moisture in the air. The occasional blizzard was a bummer
and sometimes there were snowstorms in July but nearly every day
was sunny and the blue skies of Denver could not be beat.

We’d already called Duke, like, a gazillion
times. Duke and Dolores were visiting Dolores’s parents in Pagosa
Springs and they were supposed to be home in the morning but had
still not arrived. I didn’t know Dolores’s parents’ number or her
maiden name. We were stuck on that score.

I found Duke’s disappearance curious and a
little scary. Though Duke had been known to go walkabout, except it
was walkabout on a Harley.

Duke didn’t do cell phones and I was loath to
go to Evergreen. Although Rosie would likely be there or go there,
at least eventually as that was where the diamonds were, so might
Lee and I had decided I was definitely back to avoiding Lee.

I had not come to terms with this abrupt
about-face and needed time to process it.

Who was I kidding?

There was no processing going on.

Lee and I were not gonna happen.

I hated to break Ally and Kitty Sue’s hearts
but I’d seen Lee tear through a variety of women’s lives and I
wasn’t going to be one of them.

These days, he was never home.

I had no idea what he did for a living but I
was pretty sure it was dangerous.

And he was way too damn cocky.

Ally and I were both staring at Rosie’s house
and I was trying to pluck up the courage to drive to Evergreen and
maybe have a scary faceoff with Lee that I had to have the cojones
to win when someone tapped on the back passenger window.

“Shit!” I jumped and shouted.

“Sorry. Didn’t mean to scare you.”

In Ally’s window was a nice-looking man,
though a wee-bit steroid ridden and overdeveloped in the chest area
but he had a good haircut, shirt, tie, slacks.

“We’re a bit jumpy. We’ve had kind of a rough
day,” Ally explained, smiling her flirty smile.

Conversely, although Ally could head bang
with the best, she was a White Hat type of gal. She liked the good
boys. She liked preppies and corporate types and definitely men in
uniform. She understood a good guitar riff but she liked her men
clean-cut and ties and uniforms drove her wild.

“You lookin’ for Rosie?” the man asked.

I blinked.

Were we that obvious?

“Uh, yeah,” I replied.

He nodded. “I live over there.”

He pointed in the vague direction of “over
there” and both Ally and I followed his finger, not sure precisely
which house “over there” was his then looked back to him.

“Is Rosie in trouble?” the guy asked.

“Does Rosie get in trouble, do you know?” I
asked in return.

The guy shook his head. “Not that I know of.
Quiet guy. Killer coffee.”

We all nodded.

“I’m Gary,” he said.

Ally extended her hand. “Ally,” she said and
then she pointed to me, “and this is India.”

Upon hearing my name, he turned and looked
over his shoulder and gave a nod.

Ally and I turned and looked over our
shoulders too.

Too late.

Before I could react to the two men running
toward our car, my door was wrenched open, I was dragged out and I
let out a howl when the backs of my legs were ripped from the hot
leather seats.

I stopped my howl midway with an “oof”
because I hadn’t taken my seat belt off and when the guy yanked me
out, my belt jerked me back.

“Jesus, Teddy. Release the belt,” another man
said.

I took this opportunity to scream.

Teddy dropped me, I hit the side of the seat
and I used the steering wheel to pull myself back into it.

Ally had already been hauled out the other
side, she wasn’t screaming and that scared the shit out of me.

I had no time to look for Ally as Teddy’s
hands came around to undo the belt and I bent forward and bit his
arm.

“Fuck!” He reared back and punched me in the
cheekbone.

Hard.

I have never, in my life, been hit by a
man.

I got in a bitch slapping catfight at a
Public Image Limited – Big Audio Dynamite double bill but we were
in a mosh pit gone bad. It was punk, it was expected.

Getting hit by a man hurt.

A fucking lot.

So much, I quit screaming and concentrated on
the burning hurt that was radiating out of my cheekbone into my
entire face.

“Teddy, for Christ sake. Are you nuts? She’s
Nightingale’s. He’s gonna rip your dick off. This is supposed to go
smooth.”

I opened my mouth to scream again and started
back with the struggling.

Then Teddy was pulled away, someone touched
me with something and after that, I didn’t remember a thing.

Cupcakes

I came to feeling very funky and unable to
move my limbs.

I focused on what appeared to be the ceiling
of a car and heard voices from what sounded like really far
away.

By the time the car stopped, I was able to
move a little bit but not much. I was feeling tingly all over and
my head was fuzzy.

The door to the car was opened and I was
hauled out with hands under my armpits. Whoever hauled me out put
me on my feet, my legs buckled and I nearly went down before I was
caught. It was time again to lament the mini-skirt as a girl
doesn’t want to be tossed around by bad guys while wearing a short
skirt.

“Shit, hold her up, you moron.”

Two guys, one of them I noted was Goon Gary
(not The Moron), dragged me by my upper arms through a tidy garage
and into a house. I was shaking my head, trying to clear it and
thinking not much of anything except that I wished I was wearing
jeans.

I was taken into a room and heard a man say,
“Jesus, what the fuck?”

The answer came hesitantly. “We had to stun
her.”

“What happened to her face?”

This answer was more hesitant. “She bit Teddy
so he hit her.”

“Christ! Which part of ‘I want this to go
smooth’ did you not understand? Nightingale’s going to have a shit
hemorrhage. Get her some ice then call Teddy, get him out of
town.”

I was planted on a couch and not processing
much of their conversation. I was focused on getting my fingers to
move. I was together only enough to notice Goon Gary and The Moron
making a hasty exit and that the couch I was on was a really nice
couch, fluffy and covered in cream silk damask. I’d only just
bought my couch a couple of months ago and I was still in
couch-assessment mode, the kind of mode that unconsciously comes
whenever you make a major purchase.

I succeeded in lifting my head to look at the
guy who’d been talking. He was wearing gray slacks, a maroon shirt
with a monochromatic tie. He was short, had to be in his fifties
and had jet-black hair with white at each temple. He looked like
what I would guess a younger Grandpa Munster would look like.
Except a lot more creepy and definitely scary but not in a comic
way.

“You okay?” he asked me.

No, I wasn’t okay. I’d just been punched in
the face and then kidnapped.

I just stared at him.

“I’m really sorry about his,” he said. “I’m
having troubles with some of my employees.”

No shit.

I thought it but didn’t say it, I hadn’t
recovered enough to form words.

Gary came back with an ice bag wrapped in a
kitchen towel and handed it to me. I was happy I had enough limb
coordination to put it on my face. My cheekbone hurt like hell.

“This didn’t go as I’d planned. I just wanted
to have a chat. I heard Nightingale had a woman and I was curious,”
the man said to me, his tone surprisingly conciliatory.

“Where’s Ally?” I asked.

First things first. I wanted to know Ally was
okay and then I wanted to have a nervous breakdown.

Young Grandpa Munster looked at Goon
Gary.

“She was with another woman, we stunned her
too,” Goon Gary explained, “We left her in the car with the keys.
Teddy’s behind watching the car to make sure she’s okay.”

“Ally?” Young Grandpa Munster asked.

Gary shrugged.

Mr. Munster’s face tightened. “As in Allyson
Nightingale, Lee Nightingale’s little sister?”

Gary began to look a wee bit
uncomfortable.

It would appear this was an “oopsie” moment
for Goon Gary.

“I’m at a loss for words. You do know that
this isn’t only Lee’s woman, she’s Tom Savage’s daughter? And her
friend is
a Nightingale
.”

Gary shifted on his feet while the color rose
in his face.

Young Grandpa Munster sat down, shaking his
head. “This whole thing is a complete fuck up.”

He looked at me and his face had an
expression that was somewhere between resigned and depressed. In
normal circumstances, I’d probably feel sorry for him. Since I
didn’t know if I’d live to see the end of this scene in the film
that was my life, I was too busy feeling sorry for myself.

“The simple life is holding some appeal,” he
said and I nodded because I could see where he was coming from.