Lone Star Legend (13 page)

“Pleased to meet you,” Richard said, taking Sandy’s hand and looking at her suspiciously. “Tío Jaime, are you busy? Should
I come back later?” He looked at them as if wondering what they could possibly be doing. As if he’d caught Sandy in the act
of preying on his elderly uncle in some way while sitting there drinking lemonade.

“No, stay. Sit down with us. We’re just talking. Do you want some lemonade?” His uncle turned toward the door, but Sandy turned
to go.

“Actually, Tío Jaime, I need to be going now. I have to get back.”

“Back?” Richard asked.

“Back to Austin,” Sandy said. “Back to work.”

“Oh? Where do you work?”

Sandy paused, wondering how she could explain it quickly without exciting more suspicion from this uptight, suspicious-seeming
lawyer. But Tío Jaime answered for her. “She’s a writer. She’s been interviewing me.”

“Oh, really? About what?” The nephew’s voice was all charm, but Sandy could just tell that he had a temper and that he probably
didn’t have the sense of humor to understand what she’d been doing.

“Um… about local legends. Chupacabras.” She smiled weakly and Richard raised his eyebrow. “And about his life experience,
living here on this land, and about his friendship with my great-aunt.”

At this, Richard’s eyebrow went even higher and he turned to his uncle for confirmation. Sandy hoped Tío Jaime would go along
with her version of the facts. He said, “I was telling Sandy about how Linda used to write. And she helped me put in the chile
and tomatoes, so you don’t have to do that now. You’re not dressed for it, anyway.”

At this Richard looked down at his outfit in mild chagrin, as if the last thing he’d expected to do that day was manual labor.
Tío Jaime crossed over to Sandy and gave her a hug. “All right, m’ija. Go back to work. I’ll see you next week, okay? Wear
some stronger shoes.”

Sandy said goodbye to them both and hightailed it out of there with her bag and the camera it carried, feeling like she was
escaping with stolen treasure. Her Malibu blew puffs of dust at the BMW as she pivoted in the gravelly yard and then drove
away.

She had a feeling of foreboding as she headed back to town. How long, she found herself wondering, would Nephew Richard be
in town?

It wasn’t until she was miles away that she remembered the release form, and the fact that she still hadn’t gotten it signed.

T
hey were at a party in Atlanta, and Sandy didn’t even know why. She stood with Lori and twenty other people in a blurry line
around a fountain that emitted Toro vodka from the mouth of a bucking metal bull. Lori held a plastic cup with two fingers
of cranberry juice and was waiting to top it off. Sandy still hadn’t finished the dirty martini in her hand. Loud rock-and-rap
music blasted from the speakers of the DJ on the other side of the warehouse-like club. All around them suited men and sparkle-sheathed
women jostled against each other to the beat.

A young woman wearing red shorts, a red bikini top, and red bull horns in her long black hair walked up bearing a lighted
tray of colorful test tubes.

“Shot? Shot?” she offered, smiling at each of the party guests in turn.

“What do you have?” Lori shouted, then leaned in to hear the girl’s answer.

“Toro Berry, Tropi-Toro, Pom-Toro, and Buttery Toro Nipples,” the shot girl shouted back.

“Mm! Two Buttery Toro Nipples, please!”

Lori reached into her pocket and retrieved a ten-dollar bill, but the girl shook her head. All drinks were on the house. Lori
winked at her and tucked the ten into her bikini top before accepting the test tubes. The girl gave Lori her first genuine
smile.

“Want one?” Lori offered the test tube to Sandy, who shook her head.

“Can’t. I’m still working on this.”

Lori shrugged, downed both shots in succession, then replaced the test tubes on the girl’s tray, upside down. The girl glided
away. Sandy couldn’t help wondering if it made sense for her to be wearing those horns. Did female cows have horns too, or
only bulls? She brushed the ridiculous thought from her mind. What did it matter?

Lori yelled “Woo!” for no reason that Sandy could see. But several of the men who’d been watching her yelled back, as if in
approval.

They were jostled up to the Toro fountain. Lori filled her cup and said, “Come on. Back this way.” She threw smiles and winks
to the men still waiting as she and Sandy departed for another corner of the warehouse.

Angelica had given them this assignment, along with their plane tickets, the day before. She’d said simply that they’d been
invited to this party, and that Toro vodka was considering purchasing a sponsorship package from Nacho Papi.

“Should we take our cameras, then?” Sandy had asked. “Or is there anything in particular you want us to cover at the party?”

“Not necessarily,” Angelica had replied. “Just go and have a good time. But be ready to write about it, just in case.”

Sandy, Lori, Philippe, and George had arrived in Atlanta at 5 p.m., right in the middle of a Thursday rush hour. They’d cabbed
it to a café Philippe knew near the center of town and had then taken another cab to their hotel to check in and prepare for
the party. Sandy put on a white tube dress from an Austin boutique owner who’d sold it to her at a deep discount in the hopes
of seeing Sandy wear it on the Internet.

“You’re lucky you can wear white. And a strapless bra,” Lori had said as they dressed in their shared room. “I’d look like
a giant freak monster in that dress.” She was wearing a black backless number from her own collection. It showed off her tiger
tattoo.

In the middle of the party room there was a series of high, circular stages on which girls danced in various costumes—cheerleader,
schoolgirl, referee—all with the red bull horns on their heads.

“This is so nineties,” a familiar voice said behind Sandy. She turned to see that Philippe had joined them. As usual, he made
her laugh and feel a little more comfortable. She had no way of knowing whether he was right; she’d spent the tail end of
the nineties in pubs and coffeehouses and had never been to a party like this. But now that Philippe said it, she could totally
imagine that this scene was already passé.

“At least it’s open bar,” said Lori, who was now finishing the contents of her plastic cup. Sandy knew from happy-hour experiences
during the LatinoNow days that Lori could drink way, way more than that, the only result being that she’d act even perkier
than she had before. Sandy, however, had to intersperse her cocktails with water and food to keep from blacking out. That
was another thing she’d learned at UT.

Philippe led them to a side room Sandy hadn’t noticed before. They’d arrived at the party at 11 p.m. and it was 2:45 now,
Sandy noted by glancing at Philippe’s elegant TAG Heuer watch.

Inside the much smaller but still large room, there was quieter but still loud music piped in through hidden speakers, and
low, plush seats everywhere. It was a sort of lounge, Sandy saw, and people were definitely lounging in it. A woman lay with
her blond hair spread out on a round, oversized leather ottoman, her dress barely hanging on to her body, seemingly asleep
with a smile on her face. Next to her, two men sat in earnest conversation, one of them idly stroking her hair, as if she
were a pet.

On a fur sofa in the far corner, not even very much in the dark, a couple made out languorously. Sandy noted this and then
turned her eyes elsewhere. But they weren’t the only ones.

She and Lori followed Philippe to a group of satin settees where two men and a woman, apparently acquaintances of his, were
talking with bored expressions. Philippe introduced everyone and they all took seats, Sandy ending up on the outside of the
circle.

“Who is that up there?” Philippe asked one of the men, whose name Sandy hadn’t understood.

“No idea. Isn’t it sad? I thought they were going to get Sergio, but he left for Ibiza at the last minute.”

“He looks terrible,” one of the women said. Sandy didn’t know who they were talking about—Sergio in Ibiza, or whoever it was
“up there.”

“Wait. Sergio, as in DJ Thirty-One Flavors?” Lori said.

Philippe and his friends nodded.

“Oh my God!” Lori’s slight Texas drawl made Sandy notice that none of these Atlanta people had accents. They all talked like
people on TV, just like Philippe. She wondered if they’d look down on her friend for that. But Lori went on, “Thank God he
isn’t here—he hates me.”

“Ex-boyfriend?” one of the men asked, as if he couldn’t care less.

“God, no,” said Lori. “But he was living with Josie, who owns Glass Tangerine, and I was dating
her
, like three years ago. So he showed up at the bar where I was working at the time and threw a bottle of Goose at me. It was
so
wrong
.”

The others had leaned forward in interest. “I thought I recognized you!” said the woman. “You were on Sailor Girls, with Rachel
and Abby. Right?”

“Right,” said Lori. “But that was, like, forever ago.”

Obviously, everyone else sitting there had a working knowledge of all the proper nouns being used. But Sandy had no idea.
Subsequently, she began to space out, looking around the room and taking in the details. The blond who’d been asleep was now
sitting up and asking for water. The make-out couple was now rising to leave, probably to escape to someplace more private.
A young woman standing near them was offering something to her friends. It was a brown pill bottle, like the ones from the
pharmacy, Sandy saw.

As if on cue, the Atlanta woman sitting with them and now listening in fascination to Lori’s stories lifted her silver clutch
and took out what looked like an aspirin container. But Sandy knew that what she offered them next probably wasn’t aspirin.
One of the men took a pill, and so did Lori. Philippe shook his head politely, saying “Can’t. Antibiotics.” Sandy followed
his lead, smiling and saying only “No, thanks.”

Now one of the men started sharing gossip about someone else Sandy had never heard of, and she decided not to stick around
any longer. She turned to Philippe and whispered, “Rest room?” He indicated with a wave that it was back in the warehouse
somewhere. Sandy took that as her excuse to set down her martini and leave the group. None of them seemed to notice.

Back in the big room, which sounded so much louder to her now, Sandy looked for the ladies’ room in earnest. By the time she
found it she really did have to go. She burst through the door, which had a female Precious Moments figurine glued to it,
crossed the dingy floor, and pushed open the first unlocked stall. Unfortunately, it wasn’t vacant. Two women looked up blearily
from the white line of powder that was balanced on one of their forearms.

“Oops! Sorry!” Sandy let the door bang closed again and left the rest room just as quickly as she’d entered it.

Back in the warehouse she saw that the circulating shot girls had gotten rid of their trays and were now offering bottles
of Pure NRG water. The Toro fountain had been turned off, leaving the metal bull dribbling. The lights above the bars were
dimmed, indicating that the party was ending, but no one had told that to the DJ or the crowd around him. Young women danced
with young men who’d removed their jackets and ties. Older men stood along the walls and watched the young women. The DJ who
wasn’t Sergio had the party guests yelling and raising their hands at his command. Sandy stood and watched for a while, but
remained uncompelled to move along with the crowd.

“Boring, huh?” an unfamiliar voice said at her side. She turned and saw a guy with his tie loosened and jacket still on. He
had a nice smile.

“Yeah, it is, kind of.”

“I’m Jeremy,” he said. “I’m with Ad Reps.”

She recognized the name from press releases she’d been seeing since her LatinoNow days. He was in marketing, then. “Oh, I
know Ad Reps. I’m Sandy. I write for Nacho Papi.”

“Oh, hey. Isn’t that one of the Levy Media sites? I’m impressed.”

His smile seemed genuine, and Sandy was struck by how good it felt to be recognized for her talent. There were only a few
select people writing for Levy Media, and she was one of them. Hell, yes, people should be impressed, Sandy thought. Not everything
had to be judged by Daniel’s snotty “literary” standards. For the tenth time that week alone, she congratulated herself for
having dumped him.

“Can I get you a drink?” Jeremy from Ad Reps asked her.

Sandy looked around. “Probably not. Looks like they’re closing everything down.”

“You’re right.” He looked around. “Do you want to dance?”

She didn’t. “I’d rather just talk. Is there someplace we can…” She wanted to sit down for a while and get off the high heels
that were starting to pinch her toes, but there were no chairs in sight. She didn’t want to go back to the drug lounge.

“I think there’s a deck or something,” Jeremy said.

“Yeah, there is. It’s that way.” George had walked up behind them and was pointing in the direction from which he’d come.
“Hi. I’m George Cantu. Levy Media.” He held out his hand to Jeremy, who shook it and re-introduced himself. “So, Jeremy, what’s
going on at Ad Reps? How’s business?”

“Not bad,” Jeremy said politely. His smile didn’t waver, but Sandy could see that he didn’t want to talk to George. George,
however, was firmly planted next to Sandy now and seemed in no hurry to leave or to take a hint.

“Well, Sandy, I have to go.” He reached into his pocket and, in one smooth motion, pulled out two cards and handed her the
first. “It was good talking to you. Why don’t you give me a call? George.” He handed George a card with a nod, then disappeared.

“What was he, trying to pitch a story to you?” said George, taking a sip from the sweaty bottle of Bud Light in his hand.
Without waiting for Sandy’s answer, he went on. “This is getting boring. No opportunity anywhere.”

Sandy didn’t know what he meant. Was he talking about stories or business deals, or was he admitting to her that his attempts
to hit on the Toro girls had failed? She’d been about to snap at him for driving off the man she’d been talking to, but the
dumb way he stood there, completely oblivious, made her realize that he hadn’t even done so maliciously. He simply was
that
self-involved.