Nickel City Crossfire by Gary Ross (popular romance novels .txt) 📗

“You know, Jen isn’t easily impressed but she liked you, called you tough, in a good way. Wait till I tell her I met you.”

“Tell her I said hi, that I’m doing fine, and I’m back to work.” I glanced at my notebook. “So you and Jen invited Keisha and Odell over for a game night. What did you think of Odell?”

“He was a monster at Guesstures but sucked at Catchphrase.” She sighed. “We both liked him. Keisha looked the happiest I’d seen her in a long time. Jen even agreed to wear her uniform to speak to Odell’s class sometime before the Christmas break. With black men being shot by police all over TV, he didn’t want his kids to be afraid of cops.” Bianca looked away as her eyes moistened. “Jen never got the chance to talk, and Keisha never got her happy ending.”

“Did Jen ever say anything about the overdose or reports that Odell was dealing?”

“This wasn’t the first time we’d spent an evening with them, just the last.” Bianca wiped her eyes and leaned back. “We had dinner together three or four times before, at our place or Keisha’s. Saw a couple movies together. We knew Odell more than casually. Jen wasn’t part of the investigation but prides herself on being a good judge of people. She said she’d bet a week’s pay the informants who dropped his name were liars with other agendas.”

“What do you think?”

“I’m pretty good myself at scoping out secrets. After all, I had to keep my own for years—from family and friends, folks at church. I have to read people every day for my job. Keeping secrets means layers of hesitation in conversation, evasive verbal maneuvers, failure to make eye contact.” She smiled again. “Like a married man buying jewelry for a girlfriend and constantly looking over his shoulder for a familiar face so he can step away from her. I saw none of that with Odell. In fact, he reminded me of myself when I finally came out and found out who loved me and who didn’t.”

“You felt free to be yourself, and to hell with anybody who couldn’t deal.”

“Exactly.” She leaned toward me on her elbows. “Odell was just what he seemed, a good guy who loved teaching and adored Keisha. He would never put a needle in her arm.”

“Even at gunpoint?”

Bianca sat back, frowning. “What do you mean?”

“Just thinking out loud. Something made this overdose happen. I wonder what. Or who.” I chewed the last bite of my calzone and took a swig of iced tea. “Fatimah seemed to think somebody might be after Keisha, maybe for money.”

“I wouldn’t know anything about that.”

“So, you haven’t talked to Keisha since dinner that night?”

“No.”

“Who would she turn to if she was in trouble?”

“Her parents. Fatimah. Me.”

I took out my phone and pulled up Keisha’s letter to her parents. I enlarged the image and pointed to the closing lines as I passed the phone to Bianca. Right now my being with you will do you more harm than good, so please don’t try to look for me. Just know that I love you both. Always.

“What if somebody is after her and she’s afraid turning to all of you would put you in danger? Who would she turn to then?”

Bianca answered without hesitation. “Herself.”

10

Despite his green sweatsuit and brown corduroy slippers, Carl Williamson had the posture of a military man. Dark, broad-shouldered, with thinning hair and a full mustache, he led me to a country-style kitchen table and put on a pot of coffee as I draped my jacket over a white wooden chair. He took the seat across from mine.

We were quiet as he lit a Camel and pulled on it. Then I asked, “Were you in Nam?”

“Yeah, sixty-six to sixty-seven. Infantry.” His voice was an octave higher than his size and his cigarette would have suggested. “How could you tell?”

“Soldiers can pick soldiers out of a crowd,” I said. “Iraq. MP.”

“No shit? Was it crazy as they say?”

“Was Nam?”

He laughed. “Yeah. Clusterfuck from the get-go.” He shook his head, relaxed a bit, exhaled. “When I got back I didn’t think I’d ever feel real again. Know what I mean?”

“I do.”

“Like hearing the Eyewitness News traffic copter and starting to look for cover.” He shook his head again. “Mama said a job would get my head straight. I went to the post office to make her happy but I was shocked to find a brother in personnel. Told me he started after World War II when he got out of the navy. Worked his way up. He explained the jobs they had, benefits, veterans’ credits, the exam I had to take. In fact, he was the one who gave the exams. I did okay on the test and delivered mail for damn near forty years. Like I said, infantry.”

We both laughed.

He got up and went to the counter to pour us coffee. He took his black, and I told him I would too. He set a white china cup in front of me.

“It’s good you came while Rhonda’s at work,” he said, stubbing the Camel in a glass ashtray. “You know, she just went back this week. Losing Odell’s been real hard on her.”

“I’m sure it’s been hard on both of you,” I said. “I’m sorry for your loss.”

“Don’t be. I’ve heard all the sorry any man could ever want to hear. I’m just glad the case is still active. I thought the cops wrote my only child off as a junkie. So what I want to hear is news about who killed him.”

Having introduced myself as Detective Rimes working the case involving Odell, I had not yet given him a Driftglass card or explained I was searching for Keisha. I wanted to be cautious because my clients told me Carl blamed Keisha as much as they blamed Odell, which meant he wouldn’t care whether or how I found her. “I just caught this case yesterday. Officially, it’s still an