The Girl at the Deep End of the Lake Read online

  I counted the roll of bills Rusty had in his pocket and it came to $1820.00. Hundreds, fifties and twenties. Elena looked at it and said, “What you got there?”

  “Man gave Jackson a wad of bills,” Blackhawk said.

  “For what?”

  “Wants him to find a girl.”

  “You give me that and I’ll find you a girl,” she said, tossing her hair. Her eyes went back to the TV screen.

  Nacho came in without knocking, and Blackhawk threw him an irritated look. Nacho went straight to the bar and fixed a drink.

  Twirling the ice with his finger, he came to the couch and sat beside Elena. He leaned back, throwing his feet up on the coffee table.

  “Don’t put your feet on the furniture,” she said without looking at him. He put his feet on the floor. He took a couple of long pulls on the drink, then got up to fix another.

  Blackhawk watched him, irritation just under the surface. I was trying not to smile.

  Finally Blackhawk said, “Well, goddammit, are you going to tell us where they went?”

  Nacho moved back to the couch. “I lost them,” he said.

  Blackhawk just stared at him.

  “You guys wanna watch this Conan guy?” Elena asked.

  Nacho looked at Blackhawk and got a sly look on his face.

  “But I found them again.”

  Blackhawk put his elbows on his knees and buried his face in his hands. He rubbed his eyes and ran his fingers through his long hair. He looked up at Nacho.

  “You tell me now or I will shoot you.”

  “Hey look,” Elena said, “It’s Paul Newman. I love Paul Newman. Wow, he looks like a baby. I wonder how old this is?”

  “You told me Bavaro was working for Kamex, so when I lost them I realized that was the direction they were headed, so I just headed over to where Kamex has that big compound. You know, the place that used to be a cotton gin in the old days. And sure enough I picked ’m up again.”

  “Kamex has offices there now?” I asked.

  “Yeah,” Nacho said. “Place was lit up all around. Razor wire and security gates with guards. Fuckers had weapons.”

  “Where is this?” I asked.

  “Down around 51st Ave and Van Buren.”

  “I’ve been by there,” Blackhawk said. “Had some big structures on it. Used to dry the cotton.”

  “Been built up recently,” Nacho said. “Has a couple of three story warehouses now. Big. My cousin works construction and laid the concrete there. I parked across the street and watched them. Guard had the gate going up before they even came to a stop. He knew Bavaro. There is parking all around, but they must have hit a door opener because this big frigging door opens up and they drive into the building.” He took a drink. “Guess what was inside?” He got that sly look again.

  Blackhawk said, “You are seriously going to make me ask?”

  “No, no you gotta ask me,” Nacho said completely pleased with himself.

  “I am going to shoot you,” Blackhawk said.

  “What was inside,” I asked.

  “More black Escalades.”

  “More? More than one?”

  “Yeah, I saw two or three more, but I’ll bet that the one we saw outside the Playboy Diablos’ warehouse is one of them.”

  “You see the license number?” Blackhawk asked.

  Nacho finished his drink and got up to get another one. “No, I was too far away, but I’ll bet anything it was in there.”

  Blackhawk looked at me, shaking his head.

  I stood up.

  “I’m going home,” I said.

  “Ain’t anyone going to watch this movie with me?” Elena said. “Paul Newman is in this cracker prison camp and they keep making him dig this hole.”

  “What we have here is a failure to communicate,” I said.

  Elena took her eyes off the TV and looked at me, “What the hell are you talking about?”

  46

  It was late when I pulled the Mustang into its slot. The wind was coming up and the sky was full of clouds racing across the moon. I pulled the canvas cover out of the trunk and covered her up, tightening it down so the wind couldn’t dislodge it. It was tough for one man but I finally got it done.

  The warning light on the boat was blinking red.

  I pulled the little flat and deadly Ruger from my hip pocket. I looked around at the sliding glass door on the bow. It was closed. No one had jimmied it. I silently moved down the side of the boat and slipped aboard on the stern. All the curtains were pulled tight like I had left them. The glass doors on the stern were locked up tight. This meant that either someone had come aboard, then left, or they were up top.

  They were up top. Or, rather she was up top.

  At first it was just a bundle of something but upon closer examination it was the fair Detective Boyce. She was asleep on a lounge chair.

  I moved silently around her, put the Ruger away and sat on a deck chair and watched her sleep. After a while I decided it was warm enough and I might as well let her sleep, so I stood to go back down and she opened her eyes.

  “Oh,” she said. She sat up. “I must have fallen asleep.”

  “Easy to do on a boat,” I said.

  She rubbed her eyes and shook her hair.

  “What time is it?”

  “I don’t know. Late.”

  She took her phone off her hip and hit a button to illuminate it.

  “Almost three,” she said.

  “Can I get you something?”

  She yawned. “Coffee. You can get me some coffee if you have it.”

  “I can do that,” I said.

  She followed me down and plopped in a chair on the stern while I unlocked the doors. I went into the galley and started a pot of coffee. While it was going through, I came back out and sat next to her. She was looking out over the dark water. A breeze was gently rocking the boat and the small whitecaps were fluorescent in the moonlight. We sat in silence until the coffee pot dinged. I went in and came back with two oversized mugs on a tray along with a carton of creamer and bowl that had Sweet N Low and raw sugar packets in it.

  I set the tray between us. We fixed our coffees. We each sipped.

  “Good coffee,” she said.

  “Thanks.”

  “What is it?”

  “Columbian roast I get at Costco. Buy a couple of pounds unground. Grind it fresh.”

  “It’s good.”

  “Thanks.”

  We sat for a while sipping the coffee.

  Finally I said, “So what do I attribute the pleasure of your company to?”

  She didn’t answer right away, then, “Tequila.”

  I smiled, “Tequila?”

  She looked at me and grinned.

  “Girlfriend had a birthday party. Girls' night out thing.”

  “Detectives get a girls' night out?”

  “Leave the badge and gun in the car, they do.”

  “And tequila reared its ugly head.”

  “Fuckin’ Sharla. Started doing shooters and I was real cool, but she kept ordering them till I had a line of five of them on the bar. Then it was a challenge match.”

  “Who won?

  She thought a minute.

  “I don’t remember. Sharla passed out and she had friends to get her home so I decided to call it.”

  “You drive home? How did you get here?”

  “Well, wasn’t going to. I went out front and got my badge and gun and called a cab, and a half hour went by and the cab still didn’t show up so I said screw it and started driving. Got to the stoplight at Glendale and the Black Canyon and don’t know what happened. It turned green and next thing I’m on my way out here. I think I yelled something like screw it, let’s go see ol’ Jackson.” She sipped her coffee, looking at me over the rim. “But ol’ Jackson wasn’t home so I went up top to take a nap.”

  “Well, ol’ Jackson is glad you stopped by.”

  “Seemed like a good idea at the time. Stupid.”

/>   “Not stupid. Late, but not stupid.”

  “So where you been?”

  “El Patron.”

  She set her cup down. “Okay, this is bullshit.”

  “No, I really was at El Patron.”

  “That’s not what I mean. Nobody is named Blackhawk! What the hell kinda bullshit is that? Blackhawk, for Christ sake.”

  I smiled.

  “That’s what he calls himself.”

  “But you know his name?”

  “Blackhawk.”

  “Bullshit!”

  “I will swear on whatever you hold dear that I don’t know him by any other name but Blackhawk.”

  “So is Jackson your real name?”

  I was quiet. Finally I said, “I was born with another name. But that name and that person are dead. For all intents and purposes, my name is Jackson.”

  We were silent for a while and her eyes just stayed on me. Finally she said, “So you think this mysterious bullshit works with the ladies?”

  “Does it work with you?”

  “No.”

  “Are you a lady?”

  “Fuck you!”

  Again we were quiet.

  Finally she said, “So what you got on Mendoza?”

  “What does that mean?”

  “You giving him sexual favors or something?”

  I just shook my head.

  She set her cup down and turned to look at me.

  “Just who or what the hell are you?”

  “What you see is what you get.”

  “That’s crap! Nobody is more by the book than Mendoza and all of a sudden he’s telling me, no ordering me, to bring you in the loop on anything we find on the Revera girl. Mendoza doesn’t like civilians nosing in police business and now he’s telling me to bring you in.”

  “Things I can do, you can’t.”

  “Like what?”

  “Like break the law.”

  “You think cops don’t break the law?”

  “Sure they do, but you don’t and Mendoza doesn’t.”

  She picked up her coffee again. “Okay, I’ll give you that.” She took a sip. “Although I was driving under the influence all the way out here.”

  “There is that.”

  “But you haven’t answered my question.”

  “Which was?”

  “Who are you? Pistorius and Cummings couldn’t find anything on you before you purchased this boat.”

  “Does it matter?”

  “It matters to me,” she said. She drained her cup. “Do you have more?”

  “Sure,” I said. “Would you like a little somethin’ somethin’ in it?”

  “You join me?”

  “Sure.” I stood and took her cup.

  “And then you tell me who you are.”

  “Sure.”

  She leaned forward, stretching her back out. She rubbed her scalp. “God, I smell like that damned bar. I feel like I’m covered with something sticky.”

  “Take a dip,” I said.

  She laughed, “Sure, I’d bet you’d like that.”

  I shrugged, “Suit yourself, brandy okay?” I said, picking up my mug.

  “Sure,” she said looking at me.

  I went back through the stateroom, down the hall to the galley. I poured the coffee, added a dollop of brandy to both and carried them back out.

  As I stepped out on the deck the first thing I noticed was a pile of clothes on the deck. The next thing I noticed was Boyce, naked as an egg, perched up on the rail by the aft ladder.

  “Changed my mind,” she said and went over the side.

  To my credit, I didn’t drop the coffees.

  47

  Okay, I’m not gonna lie. Young men my age who are up late and have had a certain amount of drinks would have jumped in the water, and if a pastor were present, married the girl right then and there. Well, maybe not married the girl but at least made serious commitments. Or, at least done anything to reach a certain connubial arrangement.

  And as I set the coffees down and was wondering the best way to strip down and join her without being awkward, her phone rang.

  Her phone rang.

  Right then.

  And she heard it.

  “Get me a towel,” she called.

  “Let it ring.”

  “I’m a cop, give me a towel!”

  I went inside and found a big beach towel and took it back outside. She was treading water at the bottom of the ladder.

  “Just drape it right there,” she said, “and turn around.”

  “Now you are shy.”

  “Turn around, goddammit.”

  I did as she asked and I heard her come up the ladder, water running off of her body. I tried not to think about it.

  After a moment she said, “Okay, you can turn around.”

  She had the towel wrapped around her and knotted just above her breasts.

  “Hand me my phone,” she said.

  I took the phone from her jacket and handed it to her.

  “This may just be the most ill-timed phone call in the history of phone calls,” I said.

  She smiled at me and hit the redial button. In the silence I could hear it ringing, then a tinny voice came on the other end.

  “This is Detective Boyce,” she said. “I just missed a call from this number.” Then she said, “Oh, hi.” She listened some more. I could tell from her demeanor it wasn’t good.

  “What’s the address?” she asked.

  She didn’t ask for a pencil. She disconnected the phone and looked at me.

  “That was the 911 supervisor. I told you that I’d asked them to contact me if there were any calls from Melinda.”

  “Is she hurt?”

  “I don’t know,” Boyce said. “The call came in from a neighbor who heard loud voices and screaming. They have a black and white heading there now.”

  “I’ll go with you.”

  “You go inside so I can dress,” she said.

  I went inside.

  When I followed her car into Melinda’s neighborhood, the street was awash with flashing red, blue and amber lights. There were a few neighbors standing at the curb, the women in their bathrobes, the men in tee shirts and pants. The flashing lights made long eerie shadows that stretched across the lawn.

  Boyce double parked in the street, and I pulled around her and pulled to the curb beyond the fire truck and ambulance that were parked in front of Melinda’s house. There were also three patrol cars. One in the drive. There was no brown and white truck.

  Boyce waited for me and we went up on the porch together. A patrolman looked at me and Boyce showed her badge and said, “He’s with me.”

  Inside there were two patrolmen standing back in the corners watching three of the paramedics working on a tiny body on a gurney. Melinda was across the room in a straight back chair, hunched over, covered by a blanket and sobbing inconsolably. The female paramedic was performing CPR on the baby. I could just glimpse Hayden’s little face and it was blue from lack of oxygen.

  Boyce beckoned to one of the patrolmen and he followed us back outside.

  “I’m Detective Boyce, this is Mr. Jackson, what’s going on?” she asked him in a low tone.

  He shook his head. His eyes were old and tired even though he looked to be only in his thirties.

  “Neighbor couldn’t sleep and got up to get a drink and heard a baby crying and a man shouting. She said then the man and woman were shouting at each other, then suddenly the baby stopped crying and the woman started screaming and that’s when she called 911.”

  “Baby looks dead,” I said.

  “The baby is dead,” the cop said, “but the paramedics don’t want to call it here so they’ll take the baby into the ER and call it there.”

  “What do you think happened?” Boyce asked him.

  “Same shit, different night,” he said. “Guy that lives here was probably drinking or doping or both, and the baby wouldn’t stop crying so he shook the shit out of the poor
little thing and broke its neck.”

  “Was the guy here?”

  “Just the girl and the baby and the girl’s not talking, but the neighbor heard a man shouting so I’m thinking that the asshole saw what he had done and boogied.”

  Just then the phalanx of paramedics brought the baby out on one of those collapsible gurneys the ambulances carry. They moved across the lawn to load it into the ambulance. Melinda followed, climbing up with two of the paramedics who were continuing the CPR. She was still crying.

  Boyce looked at me. Her eyes were bright with pain. “I’m going to talk with her at the ER.”

  “I’ll follow you,” I said.

  48

  The ambulance didn’t use the siren as it wound its way through the deserted streets to John C. Lincoln hospital at Third Street and Dunlap. Boyce had a dashboard flashing blue light and I pulled in beside her in the no parking zone. The paramedics were unloading and now they didn’t seem to be in a hurry. They were no longer working the CPR. When they pulled the gurney out of the ambulance, the body was completely covered.

  Now the female paramedic was with Melinda, gently talking with her. Melinda had been sobbing so hard she had the hiccups. Boyce and I followed them in. There is something unworldly about an ER in the middle of the night. The light seems too bright, and it has a greenish cast that makes everyone’s skin look sickly. They took the gurney with little Hayden, followed by Melinda and the female paramedic, through some double doors. One of the paramedics peeled off to talk with the admitting nurse.

  Boyce said, “Why don’t you wait out here,” indicating the waiting room.

  I nodded and as she moved through the double doors, I found a chair facing a nearly soundless TV tuned to CNN. There were magazines lying around and I found a Sports Illustrated, and spent twenty minutes reading about the wondrous giants of the NBA. It didn’t take long for my eyes to droop and I could feel the tiredness of it all moving through my body. Finally, I pulled another chair around and put my feet up on it. I slouched down and rested my head on the back of the chair and it was uncomfortable, but I fell immediately to sleep.

  Boyce woke me by shaking my good foot. I sat up and glanced at the clock on the wall. It had been an hour and a half.