Steel Guitar (2 page)

I yanked off my cap, lifted the heavy curls off the nape of my neck, and wished I'd brought along an elastic band and a few hairpins.

Dee repeated the performance at another bench. A ragtag guy with a week's worth of beard started following her. She turned and spoke to him. I flicked off the air conditioner's useless belch, but all I could hear was a babel of voices. The man's carried farther, but I couldn't understand the words.

Another guy lumbered over, and this one looked like major trouble. Drunk or stoned, he was big and unsteady on thick legs, and seemed to be wearing his entire wardrobe, shirts layered over shirts, pants over pants.

Heat alone can cause ugly moods. Add alcohol or drugs and you've got one of the reasons cops hate hot August nights.

I heard an angry cry and cut the ignition, shoving the keys into my pocket. The cry was followed by a scream. I was already out of the cab and racing toward the park.

I'd automatically grabbed the foot-long chunk of lead pipe I keep beneath the seat. It wasn't as comforting as my service revolver used to be.

“Hell, you can afford it, lady,” a man's voice shouted as I approached.

Dee's hand was tight on the strap of her shoulder bag. She was staring down a guy a foot taller than she was, and she didn't look half as frightened as she should have been. Maybe she didn't see the people gathering on the asphalt playground.

“Get lost,” I heard her say, arrogant as ever. “It's none of your business.”

“Throw the bag here, bitch,” the overdressed drunk yelled. He was leaning on the edge of a trash bin, too soused to move, and for that I was grateful. He egged the others on, their self-appointed cheerleader.

From the direction of the playground a steady stream of hungry, shaky, drunken souls moved toward Dee like sharks closing on a bleeding fish. Her cape swung open and her shirt glittered in a car's passing beams.

I called her name.

She didn't hear me. Another guy, mid-fifties with a tuft of white hair, made a swipe at her bag and connected. They started playing tug-of-war, and the shoulder strap broke. Dee got a corner of the purse and yanked, but the bag upended and spilled with a soft cascade of thuds and clunks. The man hit the ground with a grunt, grasping for change, bills, pawnable trinkets.

I pushed my way between two women muttering at the edge of the pack and shoved in close enough to grab Dee's shoulder.

“Leave me alone,” she said, fighting me, clinging to her handbag. Then she looked up at me for the first time. I saw the shock of recognition in her eyes.

“Let's get out of here,” I said firmly.

“She's gonna give us ten bucks apiece,” a man hollered.

“Shit,” I muttered under my breath. Passing out free cash on the ritziest corner in Boston will get you a guaranteed unpleasant situation. Playing Santa where ten bucks will buy a lot of wine or a lid of dope is just plain stupid. Before my eyes, the promise of free money was changing a handful of unfortunates into a mob.

As I started hauling Dee toward the cab, I could feel sweat trickle down my back. I heard a bottle break behind me.

“Move it,” I urged. She was hanging back, staring over her shoulder. Somebody made a dive for her beads.

“I know him,” a deep voice yelled from the dark. “Gimme the ten.”

“Me too.”

“Where's the money, lady?”

“I see the bastard all the time.”

“I seen him, lady.”

There were at least ten of them circling, four blocking us from the cab. Another bottle broke and this time it was no accident. The jagged lip of a beer bottle caught the sleeve of Dee's shirt. She gasped. I struck out with my pipe and heard an answering growl of surprise and pain.

“Toss your bag over their heads,” I ordered Dee, “and run for the cab. I'll hold them off.”

She grabbed at her arm and I wondered if the glass had cut her badly. The handbag fell in front of her, its broken strap snaking toward the crowd. Her beads got another tug and broke, spilling on the patchy grass. I kept her from diving after them. I was afraid if I knelt to retrieve the handbag, the pack would pile on top of me.

I swung the pipe in a circle to clear some space. A bottle glanced off my shoulder and I whirled to face a nonexistent antagonist.

I was breathing hard. With effort, I slowed it down.

“Okay,” I said loudly, using my cop voice. “Clear a path. Me and the lady are walking away. Whatever you find on the ground, you keep. Fair deal, okay?” I had Dee by the wrist. She struggled feebly. I had forgotten how small she was. My right hand clutched the chunk of pipe. It had felt cool when I'd first grabbed it; now it felt as sticky and damp as my palm.

“What about my ten bucks?” the drunk leaning on the trash can said loudly.

“On the ground,” I said. “Party's over.”

“Don't let 'em go till you see money,” somebody advised with sodden wisdom. “They got jewelry? Diamonds?”

“You been watching too much TV,” I said, edging closer to the cab, waving the pipe. “Everybody's rich on TV. Me, I drive a hack.”

“Yeah, what about rich bitch here?”

“She dropped her jewelry. You're stepping on it.”

A couple of the truly stoned sank to all fours, but the rest weren't fooled. I ran my tongue over my dry upper lip. I wasn't sure I could talk my way out without cracking somebody hard with the pipe—and I didn't know who might have a knife, or a cheap gun. I was scanning the crowd at hand level, looking for the flash of metal, when the cruiser turned the corner.

There's a time for self-reliance and a time to yell for help.

I screamed my lungs out, and the siren's answering wail never sounded so good.

Two

Dee hadn't been afraid of the gang, but she was terrified of the cops. Now
she
grabbed
my
arm and tried to yank me toward the cab. The pack dispersed in the direction of the basketball court. The chunk of lead pipe suddenly felt heavy, so I lowered my arm and concentrated on breathing. The back of my shirt was soaked with sweat. Dee tugged at my sleeve again, but I shook her off.

A cop so young he had to be a rookie burst out of the charging unit and collared a drunk—definitely not one of the ringleaders, who all seemed to have melted into the misty heat. The cop pretzeled his captive into a choke hold and marched him close enough that I could smell him.

“This guy rob you girls, or what?” he yelled, adrenaline raising his voice a hundred decibels.

Calling me “girl” while I had a length of pipe in my hand was a dumb move. His second dumb move was presuming he knew the score.
Never anticipate
, they taught me at the academy. No assumptions. Your opening line is always
What's going on
?

“Let's get out of here,” Dee muttered. She tried to whisper, but the words blared.

“What's the hurry?” the cop said in a less sympathetic tone. “You got some ID on you?”

“This your bag?” The rookie's partner, a black woman with high-piled graying hair, pulled Dee's battered handbag out from under a bush.

“Yeah, uh, no,” Dee said, swallowing and sounding like she'd been practicing all her life to be a suspect.

“Maybe we ought to go back to the station and see if we can sort this out,” the male cop said, relaxing his grip on the sputtering drunk.

“No,” Dee said too quickly. “No. I, uh, was taking a cab, and uh, we got lost. Stopped to ask directions. No trouble. No problem.”

The drunk, a wiry coffee-colored individual who could have been any age from twenty to fifty, picked that moment to stagger, point a shaky finger at Dee, and blurt, “She steal money, that bitch. She steal my ten dollar. I make charge.”

“Carlotta,” Dee whispered urgently, proving beyond a doubt that she remembered my name, “can't you do something, for chrissake? Please?”

Now, I don't generally take to the role of rescued damsel, but I had been genuinely pleased to see these particular cops. Initially, I'd felt a sense of camaraderie, a desire to slap hands and commend them for a job well done. My enthusiasm melted as it became obvious that they were determined to mistake us for a couple of suburban hausfraus slumming for a dope buy. I could practically see the thought balloons over their heads as they all but ignored the homeboys and zeroed in on the two of us.

I was surprised neither of them recognized Dee. She's been on the cover of
People
.

The drunk kept shouting that Dee had robbed him, and he wanted to “make charge.” English was not his primary tongue and “make charge” was about all the cops could get out of him. I did not offer to translate. The more Dee protested her innocence, the guiltier she sounded.

There was no ID in the handbag. No wallet. No money. A comb and a couple of hairpins. Picked clean.

Still, if Dee hadn't given two different names—Jane Adams the first time they asked and Joan the second—we probably wouldn't have won a free ride in a cruiser.

I backed up her story and kept quiet about her name, but I sure wished she could have dreamed up a better lie. Her tale of losing an address, losing her way, and forgetting her handbag sounded definitely fishy. As a citizen and a cabbie, capable of proving it with my driver's license, my private investigator's photostat, and other assorted paper, I could have walked. But I hung around; I wanted to see how Dee slid out of it. I was also curious as to why she'd gotten into it. And she was gripping my arm so hard, I wasn't sure I could escape.

I don't get many chances to ride in the rear seat of a cruiser anymore. I'd forgotten such amenities as the lack of inside door-handles. Three in the back was a definite crowd. I hoped Dee's drunken accuser wouldn't vomit.

“So how've you been?” I said once we got settled behind the mesh screen, with Dee practically sitting on my lap in her effort to avoid contact with the drunk. The cruiser could have used a giant-sized can of air freshener. The drunk added nothing pleasant to the bouquet.

“Hey, I thought you just picked her up in the cab,” the female cop said accusingly, pivoting her head to stare at me balefully over her shoulder.

“I did,” I shot back. “I'm making light conversation.”

“Carlotta,” Dee murmured urgently, “can you help me out here? I just can't have this happen, you know? Can't you do something?”

“You're doing fine. Keep it up, you'll spend the night in a cell—” Her warning glare stopped me from using her real name.

“Isn't there some way? Weren't you a—”

“No whispering back there,” the male cop warned.

“No whispering?” I repeated. “You sure that's illegal?” The drunk was praying to the Virgin in rapid-fire Spanish.

“Smart-assing isn't gonna help,” Dee snapped.

She had a point. “Are you taking us to D?” I asked the cops.

“Why?”

“I wondered if you'd mind a little detour. That way I can save you some paperwork, maybe even a reprimand. Those written reprimands sure look bad when it comes time for the sergeant's exam.”

I had their attention. The rookie drove more slowly. The woman peered at me through slitted eyes. I started naming names. Neither of them looked impressed until I got to Mooney.

When I was a cop I worked for Mooney. He was a sergeant then. He's a lieutenant now and unlikely to rise further through the ranks. He's too good a street cop—and too lousy an ass-kisser.

Mooney owes me, but I hate to call in favors because the chance to help out my former boss rarely comes my way. On the other hand, Dee and I go way back, and her finally booming career probably didn't need the notoriety of a bust.

The woman cop knew Mooney. She was starting to figure out that she had something a little unusual on board. She kept staring at Dee like she was on the verge of remembering something important.

I wasn't sure if Mooney was working nights, although he has a rep for pulling rotten shifts. He lives with his mother. I've met her, and to me she's a perfect excuse to demand twenty-four-hour-a-day duty.

When Mooney is in his office, he's over at the old D Street station, since that's where they stash the homicide squad.

I tried to talk the cops into making the trip to Southie, but the male cop refused, and I couldn't really blame him.

I gave Dee an encouraging smile despite the fetid air and overcrowded conditions. There was another chance, admittedly slimmer. Mooney often worked out of Headquarters on Berkley Street. That was hardly a major detour, and I talked the woman into giving it a try.

We arrived at the station at the same time as a wag-onload of hookers. One of them waved at me, but I didn't recognize her under a ratty blond wig.

I didn't recognize the desk sergeant either. He gave us scant attention, preferring the charms of the sidewalk hostesses. The woman cop finally cornered him and they held a whispered conference while Dee fidgeted and the drunk said thirty-seven Hail Marys.

“So is he in or not?” I asked when the drunk started on number thirty-eight.

“Upstairs,” the woman ordered.

We tagged along behind the prostitutes. How do women manage to walk in five-inch spikes? I marveled. Maybe they're the latest in non-concealed defensive weapons.

I saw Mooney before I heard him. He just stood there, arms folded—neat striped shirt tucked into faded chinos—watching the parade. Someone must have phoned and warned him.

“New job?” he asked, tongue firmly planted in cheek. I was so glad to see him, I almost gave him an unprofessional hug. He smelled of cigarettes, having taken up the habit again after almost a year off. I gave it up ages ago, but the secondhand smoke smelled great, especially after the cruiser.

Dee had slipped on her shades and they were making her less than inconspicuous. Never wear sunglasses at night unless you want to look like a drug addict. She buttoned her cape in spite of the sweltering heat, and tried to fade into a wall.