Choke (15 page)

CHIEF EMERSEN POKED HIS HEAD out of the front door of the single-wide.

“All clear, you can enter now, but your place has been completely ransacked. You’ll have to go through everything and see if anything has been taken.”

“Oh,” said Immy, looking down at her shoes. She had a bad feeling that she knew what she would find inside.

The house was exactly as she had left it after her clandestine trip, foraging for clothing and her phone charger. She really should have cleaned the place up when she was there earlier today.

* * *

IT WAS BEGINNING TO LOOK AS IF spring would arrive soon. Immy and Drew sat on a blanket at the Emersen Memorial Park. The park was named after Chief Emmett Emersen’s great-grandfather and was situated at the edge of Saltlick, next to the cemetery. The town dump, which had been added years later, was on the other side of the burial grounds, but the wind was right today, and the gentle breeze smelled fresh and felt like a caress. It stirred Immy’s hair, newly washed, and rustled the tiny, bright leaves of the mesquite scrub at the edge of the clearing. The sun gave off the right amount of warmth, not hot, like it would be in another month or so, but just right.

Immy and Drew were sitting on an old blanket, finishing up a picnic of Hortense’s chicken strips and mustard potato salad, washed down with Hortense’s sweet tea. After the Chief left, they had tidied up. Immy worked so hard that she wasn’t in as much trouble with her mother as she had expected to be for making and leaving the mess. Then Hortense had taken a brief nap, sent Immy for groceries, and started cooking, whirling around the kitchen like a Texas twister.

“Why don’t you girls go have a picnic? I feel like baking a cake, so I think I’ll stay here.” She scooped food into the margarine tubs she habitually cleaned and saved, and stuck the tubs and an old, thin blanket into a plastic WellMart bag.

“Oh goody!” Drew jumped up and down, shaking the floor, enthusiastic about the idea. “Swings!”

Immy laughed. It felt good to laugh. She didn’t know how long it had been since something had truly amused her. “Sure, Drew. Swings.”

They had strolled to the park, Drew swinging the plastic bag and Immy her purse and the bottle of sweet tea that clanked with ice cubes. They were waved and hollered at by Saltlickians sitting on folding chairs in front yards. Old Mr. Jergens, without his teeth, gave them a gummy grin. His visiting grandchildren chased each other around the yard. Immy assumed his wife and daughter were inside preparing supper. The Yarborough twins, spitting chew in the dirt, played checkers on a card table set up in the shade of the old live oak, the canopy of which shaded the entire yard.

Sometimes Immy longed to leave Saltlick, but not today. These were good people, friendly people. Sometimes she loved them.

In the park, their repast complete, as her mother would say, Drew ran to the swings as Immy packed the empty tubs into the bag to take home and reuse.

A mockingbird sang in the mesquite bush near the swings. Immy fell into the rhythm of pushing a giggling Drew. The child adored swings and thought three hours was a reasonable amount of time to be pushed continuously. Four hours would always be better, though.

Immy was going to start a job working for a real PI on Wednesday, four days away. It made her happy to think that the detective had actually called her, although it seemed that was in a different lifetime. She hadn’t forgotten, though. She should be able to pay the fine soon. True, it was technically an interview, but she figured she would probably get the job. No one could be more eager for it than her, and if the PI job didn’t work out, she might be able to take Tabitha’s job away from her. That would be fun. That Tabitha was so snotty.

“Want some relief?”

Immy jumped and whirled to see Baxter Killroy standing three feet away.

“How did you get here?” she asked, taking a step back.

“Walked. Didn’t you?”

“I mean, I didn’t hear you.”

“The grass may be still mostly dry, but it doesn’t make much noise, Immy.” It was true, it was greening up a little. “Do you want me to push Drew for a while?”

He gave it to her again, that slow, sexy smile. She twitched inside. The fleeting thought of the chief’s warning made her hesitate all of three seconds. She stepped aside and let him take over.

“Hi, Unca Baxxer,” said Drew, twisting her head around to see him.

“He’s not Uncle Baxter, Drew,” said Immy. “He’s just Mr. Baxter.”

“Mixxa Baxxer?”

“That’s right Sit straight so you don’t fall.” Uncle Baxter! Would that ever give people the wrong idea.

“What was the problem at the police station? Why wouldn’t you talk to me when you were leaving?” Immy asked Baxter.

“I’m sorry, babe. I just flat out don’t like that place. Makes me nervous. I wanted to get the hell out of there. What were you doing there?”

“We got a piece of paper for busting the meth lab in Cowtail. Then we got a fine for the fire I set at the station when Mother was there and I sprang her.”

“Immy, I think you read too many pulp novel mysteries. How much is the fine?”

“Five hundred dollars.”

Baxter whistled. Immy watched his lips pucker. They looked warm and soft.

“Yeah, but I might be able to pay it. I got a job offer,” she said.

“Hey, I can help you with it. I came into some cash.”

“Down,” yelled Drew.

“Really? Down now?” Immy was shocked. Drew had never voluntarily gotten off a swing.

“Wanna go over dere inna sand box. Wif Germy.” She pointed to the sand pile enclosed by four eight-foot railroad ties, where a little boy pushed a huge yellow dump truck. His watchful mother, an employee at the library, sat on the bench of the nearest picnic table reading a magazine. The boy, whose name was actually Jeremy, was in Drew’s preschool. Immy lifted Drew off the swing, and Drew ran to the little boy and began helping him load sand into the bed of his toy truck.

Immy returned to her blanket, and Baxter sat beside her. Awfully close beside her.

“You remember our deal, right?” he said, his voice soft.

What deal? Oh, yes.

“You don’t mention I was at the motel in Cowtail, and I won’t mention that you were there,” he said.

“But everyone already knows we were there. We got a commendation for exposing the meth ring. Did you know they were doing that in your room?”

“No, I had no idea.” Baxter shook his head. “It’s sad, isn’t it? But I could give you the money for your fine, and we could still have a deal. What do you say?”

This was a little confusing. There must be something unethical about this, but she couldn’t see just what it might be. It seemed like a fair exchange. He didn’t want to be mixed up in something that wasn’t his fault, and he was perfectly willing to give her the money for the fine. She sure would like to keep her first paycheck. Drew would need new summer clothes soon, and she might want one of the new tube tops she had seen in the Wymee Falls WellMart a couple of weeks ago. And she did want to get her own car someday.

“Let me think about it, Baxter.”

“Don’t think too long, babe.” He leaned back on his elbows and crossed his boots at the ankle.

That was enough thinking. “Well, OK. I could use the money.”

“That didn’t take long.” Baxter sat up, lifted a hip from the blanket, and pulled his wallet out of his back pocket. When he cracked it open, Immy was astounded at the number of bills. Maybe they were mostly ones.

“You said five hundred, right?” He started thumbing twenties. They weren’t ones.

Would it be rude to ask him where he got all that cash? After all, he worked as a busboy at Huey’s Hash, and Immy knew Huey didn’t pay all that well. Maybe he had another job on the side.

“Here.” He thrust a stack of twenty-dollar bills at her, and she tucked them away in her purse.

They sat in companionable silence for a few moments, watching the toddlers play in the sand, then Baxter got to his feet. “I gotta go, Immy.”

Probably to his other job, she thought. “OK. See you around.”

“Hey, what are you doing tonight?” He smiled down on her. Immy reached out her hand, and he pulled her up. His hand was warm and lingered in hers. “Hmm?”

“I, I’m not sure.” Why did her brain stop working around this man? “I’ll let you know.”

“Call me,” he said and walked away.

* * *

“YOU DID WHAT? YOU TOOK MONEY from Baxter Killroy?” Hortense’s good mood evaporated as fast as Texas rain on a hot summer day. “Have you taken leave of your senses? Has your cerebellum ceased to function?” She banged the metal cake pan she had just washed and dried onto the counter. Immy jumped. “What does he want in return? Tell me that.”

“Nothing. Well, nothing new.”

Hortense narrowed her small eyes. “What does that mean, nothing new?”

“Well, I already said I wouldn’t tell anybody he was staying at Cowtail’s Finest when we were there. So he wants me to keep doing that or keep not doing that. Not telling.”

“I know what you’re saying.” Hortense gave a mighty huff. The air in the kitchen moved. “But what you’re doing is aiding and abetting, plus lying to the authorities.”

“You’ve never done that?” Ah, Immy had her there.

“Please don’t bring that up. I don’t care to revisit that lapse in judgment on my part. I have bared my soul to the police now. They know my every movement.”

“You came clean?”

“If you insist on phrasing it that way, yes. I told Emmett I was at the diner the afternoon you were terminated by your own uncle and that Hugh and I argued about his actions.” Hortense slammed the cake pans into the cupboard, grabbed the dish cloth and started wiping down the counter.

“You came all the way clean?”

“What do you mean?” She scrubbed harder.

“Did you tell the chief I was there, too?”

Hortense stopped moving. She turned toward the counter, dropped the cloth, and hung her hands by her side. “No, I didn’t mention that, Imogene. I couldn’t bear it if you were…were found to be…if you…” Hortense wiped the corner of her eye with the dish towel, something she never permitted anyone else to do. “How deep are we?”

Drew raced into the kitchen, wailing, before Immy could come up with an answer for Hortense. Immy thought her mother’s question may have been rhetorical, though. Drew ran to her grandmother and hugged her legs.

“Geemaw, look.” Her little face puckered as she thrust a headless Barbie at Geemaw. “I need a new Barbie.”

“Drew,” Immy began. “You have enough—”

“We’ll buy you a new one,” said Hortense. “I’ll buy you a new one.”

With my money, since that’s all we have right now. The pension check for this month is long gone.

“Mother, she doesn’t need another one.”

“Don’t argue with me, little missy. Drew and I haven’t been shopping together, just the two of us, for too long. You have plenty of currency on you, as you have just informed me. We’ll have a portion of it now, please.”

Immy heard her mother’s unspoken addendum. It might be a while before Drew got individual attention from her Geemaw if she and Immy were jailed anytime soon.

She reluctantly handed over a couple of Baxter’s twenties and turned off the television after they left. The trailer was almost completely silent, an unusual occurrence for daytime. The only sounds were some creaks while the floor settled after Hortense’s passage and the gurgle of the hot water heater. Drew’s play often consisted of loud conversation between her Barbies. Also, Hortense liked to keep the television on so that if anything important happened in the world, she wouldn’t miss it. She hadn’t been watching the morning of September 11, 2001, and would never make that mistake again.

Wanting to be prepared for her new job on Wednesday, in case she weren’t in the big house, Immy pulled out her two precious books. There wasn’t an index entry in the
Compleat Moron’s
book called Duties, so after a brief ponder she looked up the page for Investigative Techniques. She needed to know how a PI investigates, since she would practically be one soon. The section on entrapment might prove useful.

A pounding on the aluminum screen door soon startled her out of her concentration. Ralph stood on the wooden porch, taking up most of the space.

“Hi, Ralph,” Immy said, cracking the door open.

“Immy, I need to talk to you.” He pushed through the door and entered the living room.

“Friday, Ralph. Next Friday is our dinner date. This is only Saturday.”

“Huh? Oh, I’m not here about that. I need to tell you something, to let you know…something.” He turned his cop hat around and around in his hands.

“Well, do you want to sit down?”

“Huh? Oh, sure.” He sat in the recliner, filling it nearly as much as Hortense did, and Immy took the edge of the couch. Ralph cleared his throat. Twice. “OK, then. I’m not supposed to be telling you any of this, but I think you should know. It’s nothing definite, so Chief didn’t want to tell you, but you might not be safe.”

In the ensuing silence, Immy wondered if Ralph knew the chief had warned her about Baxter. It had been a strange warning, because the chief hadn’t said anything negative about Baxter not being safe, just that she shouldn’t hang out with him. But she had to stick to her deal with Baxter. She wasn’t a rat. She wouldn’t sing like a canary.

“How much do you know about the robbery, about the night your father got killed?”

Immy sat back against the back couch cushion. She hadn’t expected that topic. “I know he was shot during a holdup at the diner. He was half-owner when he died, but he didn’t work there anymore. Dad had started being a cop years before that. The night he died he was off duty, looking in on his brother, my Uncle Huey, after the restaurant was closed.” She also knew her father’s death had almost destroyed her mother. “They caught the perps, and I think they’re still in the big house.”

“Huh?”

“I’m going to be a PI starting in a few days, Ralph. I need to practice the lingo.”

“I see.” His face said he didn’t. Mr. Mallett would, though, Immy was confident. He was a real PI, a professional. She couldn’t wait to start working for him. He might even help her find Huey’s killer. “Immy, not all the perps, as you call them, were caught. At least Chief has never thought so.”