Tipsy (21 page)

Using my teeth, I separated the little
metal prongs and then slid the end into the lock. It took quite a
few tries.

Okay, it took ten.

On the eleventh try, the handle turned
and I smiled. Leaving the bobby pin sticking out of the handle, I
pushed it open and went inside.

It was dark, but overhead was a bare
bulb hanging from the ceiling. I yanked the little chain dangling
down and the room flooded with light.

There was a water heater and circuit
breaker box in here, along with some old brooms and dustpans and a
vacuum from the nineteen fifties. But among those things were also
boxes.

Boxes of hair color.

Why in the world would she have me
order all that hair color when we had boxes of it sitting in
here?

Suspicion tasted worse than cold
coffee. Looking over my shoulder to make sure I was still alone, I
crept closer to the boxes.

Pulling down one of the cardboard boxes
from the top, I dropped it at my feet, wincing because it was
heavier than I expected it to be. After a few minutes of no one
rushing in to see what the loud noise was about (thankfully, I was
still alone), I knelt down to pull off the thin layer of tape
sealing the box.

Once the top was completely open, I
looked inside.

And frowned.

There in neat and symmetrical rows were
the black boxes I knew so well. It was just developer. Developer
was the stuff we mixed with the actual hair color; it was the stuff
that actually changed the hair. It put the blond in blond. The
higher the developer, the more lift you got in the shade of your
hair.

Still not understanding why there would
be so much of this stuff back here, I broke open one of the boxes
and pulled out the clear bag of white powder.

I knew right away what was going
on.

This powder wasn’t as thick, wasn’t as
heavy as the developer I used every single day. It was finer, a
little lighter looking. It was like sugar compared to
flour.

But this wasn’t sugar.

And this wasn’t the same kind of clear
bag the developer came in from the supplier.

I wasn’t a druggie. I never even
experimented with drugs as a teenager (it was too scary). But I
knew cocaine when I saw it.

I’d found my proof.

Proof I kinda hoped I wouldn’t find. I
mean, what girl wanted to find out that her boss was in bed with a
bunch of nasty scumbag drug dealers?

Not me.

I stood up, still holding the bag of
cocaine in my hands. I had to find a way to get word to Blue. I had
to tell him what I found.

I turned to rush out of the back
room.

I gasped, stopping in my tracks, as I
stared down the barrel of a pistol.

The bag of coke dropped onto the floor
with a smacking sound, and I put my hands up in the air.

The police officer on the other side of
the gun looked like he wasn’t afraid to shoot.

“
Ma’am,” he said, his tone
hard and very impolite, “you’re under arrest.”

“
Arrest!” I gasped, flinging
my hands out in shock.

His arms jerked and the gun pointed at
me with renewed force. “Hands up!” he yelled.

I put them up. I heard footsteps
rushing in from the front of the salon.

“
In here!” the officer
yelled, not taking his eyes off me.

“
There’s been a mistake.” I
tried.

He looked at me with unveiled disgust
dripping from his features. “No mistake. You’re under the arrest
for possession of an illegal substance.”

He glanced at the boxes lining the
walls and then back at me. “Lots of it.”

Two more police officers flooded the
tiny back room, all of them taking in the situation and then
looking at me.

A pair of handcuffs appeared, and I
felt my shoulders slump.

This was not at all how my plan was
supposed to go.

22

Blue

“
License and registration
please,” the cop said, shining his flashlight right in my
face.

I dug around and produced the items he
asked for. He didn’t even look at them. “What are you doing out
tonight?”

“
We just came from seeing a
movie.” I lied.

“
You have any illegal
substances in this vehicle?”

“
No.”

I could feel Tony fidgeting in the
passenger seat. I wanted to snap at him to control himself, that
his anxious behavior only made us look guilty, but I couldn’t say a
word.

“
You mind if I take a look
around, then?” the officer asked, friendly-like. I squinted up at
his face, trying to see if I knew him. But the light from the
flashlight was so blinding that I couldn’t make out his
features.

I shielded my eyes from the light and
said, “Actually, I do mind.”

Tony gasped and I stifled an eye roll.
Dumb kid probably didn’t even realize that he didn’t have to let
the cops search his car unless they had a warrant.

The officer regarded me stonily. “I’m
going to have to ask you to step out of the vehicle.”

He wanted to see if I was sober. He
wanted grounds to arrest me or search this car. The officer stepped
back so I could open the door and get out. I glanced at Tony, who
was sweating profusely.

“
Chill, man,” I
whispered.

“
Dude, we are so
busted.”

“
No, we aren’t. I can handle
this. Just play it cool. Stop fidgeting.”

He nodded.

Both of us climbed out of the car. The
officer studied me and then asked me to perform a few basic tests.
I passed with flying colors.

He seemed irritated by this and
adjusted the cap on his head. “Stay here,” he said and then walked
to his cruiser to run my plates and ID. I wondered what he would
think when he realized I was undercover.

I couldn’t see what he was doing in the
interior of his car because it was so dark, and I didn’t want to
stare. Tony and I stood there for a while, the brisk night air
pulling at our clothes as we waited.

Eventually the officer got out of his
cruiser and walked toward me. Gone was the stiffness in his body. I
prayed he didn’t say something that would give me away.

“
You know you blew that stop
sign back there?” he asked.

What? No, I hadn’t. I wasn’t a careless
driver. “No,” I said strangely.

“
That’s the reason I pulled
you over.”

I glanced over at Tony, who was
frowning. “He didn’t run no stop sign,” the kid argued.

“
You arguing with an officer
of the law?” the man snapped and shined his light directly in
Tony’s face.

Tony threw up his hand and shook his
head rapidly. “No.”

The officer looked back at me, lowering
the light. I recognized his face immediately, and I turned so my
back was to Tony and gave the man a glare.

He didn’t so much as blink. “I’m giving
you a ticket for failing to stop at the stop sign,” he
said.

I gave him a WTF look. He ignored me
and began writing on his pad. A few seconds later, he turned his
ticket pad toward me and clicked on the blindingly bright light
again.

I had the urge to knock it out of his
hands.

But then he shone it on my ticket.
Which wasn’t a ticket at all.

It was a note.

“
You see here that you have
this amount of time to respond,” the officer pointed to the paper
like he was explaining something as I read his hastily scrawled
note.

He continued to explain to me how the
ticket worked, but I stopped listening because the writing made my
blood run cold.

Julie was brought in on
drug charges. Julie is asking for you.

Come if you can.

“
Thanks for explaining,” I
said, still staring at the words.

The officer ripped the fake ticket off
his pad and handed it to me. I had to take it or Tony would think
it was weird.

“
Stay out of trouble,” he
warned and then went back to his cruiser and drove away.

“
You were awesome,” Tony
said, relief clear in his voice.

“
Thanks,” I said, hollow,
thinking about Julie and what the hell was going on. How the hell
did she get arrested on drug charges?

I wondered if she asked for me. I
wondered if she was scared.

I needed to get rid of Tony so I could
go to the station and see her for myself. I started the engine, all
the while brainstorming ways to get rid of my partner for the
night. A cell phone rang and I stiffened, thinking of my department
cell strapped under the seat. What if it was someone trying to
reach me about Julie? What if something was seriously
wrong?

I fought the urge to reach beneath the
seat, my knuckles turning white on the steering wheel.

“
It’s Dom,” Tony said,
holding up his cell. Then his forehead wrinkled. “Hey, you
okay?”

I forced my body to relax. “Yeah. I’m
okay. That cop just shook me up.” I lied.

“
Could have fooled me,” he
said and silenced the ringing of the phone. “Hey, boss. What’s
up?”

He listened a minute and began to talk.
“We’re near the mall. We got pulled over. Blue was awesome, handled
the cop with ease!”

I wasn’t sure if Tony singing my
praises was going to help me or not, but in that moment, I didn’t
care. I just wanted to know how Julie was.

“
Yeah! We even scored a new
client!” Tony was saying. He reminded me of an overeager puppy
trying to please his master.

He fell quiet and I breathed a silent
thank you. I could pretend I was sick and wanted to go home. But
someone could come by my house, and if I wasn’t there…

I could pretend I had a booty call… but
with who? I refused to bring Julie into this anymore and act like
it was her.

“
Yeah, no problem,” Tony
said and then hung up the phone.

“
Dom wants us to come
back.”

Good. I could dump Tony and figure out
a way to leave. Driving would give me some time to think of a plan.
Maybe I could somehow get a message to Slater and he could give me
an out.

When I pulled up to the curb at Dom’s,
Tony opened the door before I could cut the engine. “Dom said you
didn’t have to come in.” His voice was wary.

“
Is there a problem?” I
asked, finally realizing there might be something going
on.

“
No, I don’t think so. He
just wanted to talk supply business with me.” His eyes shifted
away.

“
Ahhh, crew business that
I’m not allowed to be involved in.”

Tony’s face blanched. I could tell he
felt bad. “Yeah. Look, I’m sure Dom will come around.”

I held up my hand and cut him off.
“It’s cool, Tony.”

“
Really?” he asked, looking
hopeful. If I hadn’t just witnessed him giving drugs to a kid, I
might actually like the guy.

“
Yeah. I’ll see ya
later.”

He slammed the door and it took
everything in me to not peel away from the curb like a bat out of
hell. After letting the engine idle for a few seconds, I pulled out
onto the street at a normal speed. A few blocks over, I couldn’t
take it anymore and I pushed on the gas pedal and sped toward the
station.

23

Julie

Interrogation rooms smelled. Well, I
don’t know about all of them, because this was the first one I ever
had the dishonor of being kept in. But still, it smelled. The tiny
square room was filled with stale air tinged with sweat and
possibly urine. It made me very afraid about the chair I was
sitting in and who may or may not have peed in it.

I thought for a long time about asking
for a Lysol wipe.

I figured there was no use because I
likely wouldn’t get it. They wouldn’t even take the handcuffs off
my wrists.

Aside from the Lysol wipe, the only
other thing I could think of was if I was going to have to mark
that box on every application that I filled out from now
on:

Has been arrested for committing a
felony.