The Gone Dead Train (9 page)

“You've already discussed this with Freeman?” Billy said. “Shit, man. They're potential evidence.”

Augie slapped his shoulder. “It's all good. Think of Freeman as a consultant.” Augie put up a hand when Freeman tried to maneuver past. “This is the detective with the pictures I told you about.” He held out the stack of photos.

Freeman's gaze slid toward Billy. He waited for a reaction. Billy nodded for Augie to hand over the photos. Freeman flipped through, stopped at one, and glanced at Augie.

“What is it?” Billy said.

“Nothing,” Augie said, but guilt played over his face.

Freeman handed the stack back to Augie and fixed Billy with a cold stare. “Can't help you, Detective. And if I could, I wouldn't.” Then Freeman turned on his heel and headed for the door.

“What the hell was that about?” Billy asked.

“Did I mention the guy hates cops?”

“No kidding. Why?”

“Something happened with his dad's bar on Beale Street. Something ugly.”

He watched Freeman weave through a line of Parliament-smoking young women who were filing in. Behind the women, Jesus Junior strolled in. Ten steps inside the door, the bouncer grabbed J.J. and twisted his arm behind his back.

“Not tonight,” the bouncer announced and marched him toward the door.

“Hey, Detective!” J.J. yelled over his shoulder.

“Shut up,” the bouncer bellowed.

“Heelllp!” J.J. hollered.

“Help” isn't a word you want shouted in a bar. Billy walked over.

“I got this,” he said and pulled J.J. outside into a greasy rain that was just beginning to coat the streets. They stood under the awning of the office building next door. “What the hell's wrong with you?”

“I tol' you my problem. Jesus said he wants us to look out for each other.” J.J. reached out to pluck at Billy's sleeve.

He knocked the hand away. “What do you think I can do? I got more rules on me than anyone else in the book. You created this. Fix it yourself.”

“All right. Then give me twenty bucks.”

“You should be selling used cars. You'd make a fortune,” Billy said.

J.J.'s tone downgraded to contempt. “I
tol'
you about Tyrese. I figure you
owe
me.”

Billy laughed and opened the door. “You think
everybody
owes you.”

Inside, he found Augie still at the bar, focused on the postgame. He understood Augie's compulsion to look into his mother's death. His own mother had driven away on a cold night, leaving him so she could run off and marry a man who didn't want her kid included in the deal. She died on an icy curve five miles from the house.

Augie didn't understand that no matter how hard you try, you can't rescue the past.

He picked up the photos and folded them into the
Flyer
. “I'll look into your mother's case, but there's only so much I can do. You got that?”

Augie's attention never left the TV. “Sure, buddy. Thanks.”

B
illy stepped outside. The rain had picked up to a steady beat. J.J. was gone. He stood under the awning and phoned Frankie, got her voice mail, and left a message saying he'd found something interesting hidden in the jacket. He didn't give the details. Healthy speculation turns a patrol cop into a detective.

He tucked the
Flyer
under his arm and cut through a narrow alley across the street to shorten his walk—a risk, but he knew what to watch for.

But the light in the alley was out. As he passed the Dumpster, he felt a hand on his back. Before he could react, an arm came from his right and wrapped around his neck, cutting off his air. He grabbed the thick forearm with both hands but was dragged backward.
Break loose
, he thought,
or go down
. He drove his left elbow backward into the man's gut.

“Ughhh.” The mugger's grip broke and he doubled over.

Billy nailed him with an uppercut to the chin. The man went down and rolled to hook Billy's left ankle with a leg swinging like a scythe. Billy fell on his ass, his shoe flying across the alley. He grabbed for the guy. Too late. The man was already up and running.

“Son of a bitch!” Billy yelled, mad at himself. First, he'd walked into a dangerous situation. Then he'd underestimated the dirtbag who had been waiting.

He watched the guy turn the corner, silhouetted in a curtain of rain. He was tall, solid, broad-shouldered. Bad luck that he'd picked a cop who knew how to fight. Beside Billy lay the
Flyer
, with the photos inside. He scooped them up. Thank God they were dry. He went after his shoe. No point in calling the cops with no real description to give them. He would call Bardog's manager from the barge and tell him about the mugger in the alley.

His phone pinged, signaling a text, probably from Frankie.

It was from Mercy.

Just like that. They were over.

F
rankie had leased the top floor of a two-story home in midtown Memphis with its New Orleans–style garden, a sweeping staircase for her use alone, and sunlight that flooded the place through floor-to-ceiling windows. The giant pin oaks in the front yard grew so close to the windows, she felt like a forest creature living inside their branches.

She'd kept the furnishings spare with a few antiques, a couple of good paintings from her father's house, comfortable chairs, and good reading light. At first she'd thought the place was too big for her, then one night she'd danced from room to room, swaying to classic jazz on 91.7 FM. After that she'd danced through the rooms every day.

Back from Ramos's house, she boiled the herbs for the
ewe
and strained the liquid into the tub. After the soak, she wanted to do some research on Ramos, followed by a few hours of sleep before her final night shift. Exhausted, she removed her clothes, folding each piece to lay on the bedroom chair until she stood naked. She caught a glimpse of herself in the shadowed mirror—her splotched cheek and puffy eyelids, her body looking awkward and vulnerable. Her arms automatically wrapped around her stomach to stave off that feeling of being overwhelmed.

Shake it off
, she reprimanded herself. Emotions accomplish nothing.

She applied the salve to her cheek, which smelled of menthol and flowers, then placed her hands on either side of the claw-foot tub and eased her body into the water. Lying back, she let the purifying warmth lap over her thighs and breasts. It was her nature to overthink things, rip down the walls of a problem and restack the boards. Once you've torn the romance out of something and replaced it with logic, there was no way to go back. Her eyes closed. Her shoulders dropped. She listened as the buzz of the cicada died off in the evening light. She wanted to search for comfort, but her mind wouldn't allow it. It constantly played the scene from the day she'd lost control.

I
t had been her day off. She stood in the parking lot of a Days Inn next to I-40 where tractor-trailer rigs rattled by twenty-four hours a day—a real classy setting for her first time with Brad. She'd been nervous. Brad pulled in and took his time getting out of the SUV, leaving her waiting and exposed to the truckers and other couples who were there for the same reason. What a club she was about to join. Cheaters on the Cheap.

Brad finally opened his door and set one foot on the pavement, half in and half out of the SUV, talking on the phone. That's when it hit her. There would be nothing romantic about what would happen in the next hour. Brad was working her into his schedule, a quick fuck on the side. She didn't like that word, but nothing else so completely described the situation she'd put herself in.

He slammed his car door and walked toward her with the phone pressed to his ear.

“Yes, sweetie. I know,” she heard him say. “You're daddy's girl. Love you. See you tonight.”

A daughter
. Frankie had known Brad was married, but he said they were about to separate. She hadn't asked about kids. She'd justified their relationship by telling herself she was in love. Love, hell. This was sexual hunger. It's hard to think straight when you're hungry.

Brad strode toward her smiling, already loosening his tie. He reached into his pants pocket and flashed a package of condoms for her to see. What a good boy. He'd remembered her request.

She could tell by his grin he was about to say something lewd. She cut him off by announcing that she'd changed her mind, offering her hand for a let's-call-it-a-draw handshake. He stopped a foot in front of her and began to rant about the risk he was taking to be there—his family, his job. Everything he loved. What he might lose.

She knocked the condoms out of his hand. His face turned red. He looked away. Then he backhanded her, putting a lot of force behind it, his heavy class ring smashing into her cheekbone. No man had ever dared hit Frankie.

I
n the bathtub she bounced the flat of her palms on the surface to break the water's tension and to inhale the
ewe
's fragrance. She drifted back to her childhood with her Jamaican nanny, Amitee, who used to drag a zinc basin into the backyard under the hibiscus trees. Amitee would pour in the
ewe
. Frankie would get in and lie back under hibiscus blossoms that smelled like honey. Amitee sat beside her and recited the names of the orishas. She would tell the stories about their passions and the blood of the animals each orisha preferred to drink. The stories were like African Grimms' fairy tales, not told to frighten her but to prepare her for life. There was no one else around to do it. Her mother was gone. Her father preferred losing himself in his work to avoid spending time with a daughter who was the spitting image of his cheating wife.

Amitee would say, “A problem confronts you, bathe in the
ewe
. When the Evils sit on your shoulder, drink the
ewe
. Clean your house, clean your body with the
ewe
.”

Frankie rose from the tub now, water sliding off her compact body with its muscled biceps and strong legs. Durable. Not given to breakdowns.

She pulled the plug in the bath and got out. She needed focus. She had to control her thoughts. Toweled off, she put on yoga pants and a tank, reviewing in her mind the message Billy had left. He'd found something interesting in the jacket. He didn't say what. He'd left her wondering on purpose.

Still keyed up despite the
ewe
, she rummaged through the medicine cabinet for another bottle of tranquilizers. She took one pill, started to put the bottle back, then slipped it into her purse. She e-mailed Billy the notes from her interview with Ramos and included the doctor's credentials, published articles, awards from international peer groups, and his charity work.

She poured club soda in a wineglass and studied an Internet photograph of Ramos lecturing at a podium in a large auditorium. Her intuition did a war dance with her logic. She couldn't believe this educated man, apparently a compassionate man, had been complicit in a plot to terrify Red and Little Man. The conjure bag wasn't proof he'd been involved, but that photo in the hallway put him at the top of her suspects list. Ramos had the knowledge and the means. Did he have the malice?

His card listed a site where she could book online. His scheduling calendar showed a one
P.M.
appointment in two days. She had three days off after tonight's shift.

She went back to his photo—the intelligent gaze, the pleasant mouth. He didn't have a murderer's eyes. But she knew from experience that, despite appearances, doctors can be crazier than most people when they put their minds to it.

She booked the appointment.

T
he next morning, Billy opened his eyes to a blurry realization. During the mugging there'd been no “give me your wallet” demand. The guy had used way too much muscle for the attack to have been random. The jolt he got from Mercy's text coming right after had kept him from making the connection between the mugger and the guy on the street outside Red's place. The two men were the same height and build. Something else was at play here.

He rolled over carefully, sore from being dumped on his ass in the alley. Dumped by Mercy, too. He handled the breakup pretty well while it had been his idea, but her text stole his illusion of control, like driving a car and suddenly having the steering wheel yanked away. What really burned him was her closing line. “All the best” sounded like a kiss-off for a guest who'd overstayed his welcome. She'd packed up his stuff and shipped it in one day. Maybe she'd planned the whole thing.

He took a hot shower, dressed, and scrambled eggs with cheese. While he ate, he found Frankie's e-mail saying she'd located a man named Sergio Ramos, a psychologist and a Santerían priest. She'd learned that Ramos had the knowledge and the components to make the curse, but then he had cut their interview short. Frankie was planning to go back and question him further. If Ramos had any sense, he wouldn't be available. However, Frankie was earnest and appealing. Even a smart man might drop his guard for that.

He took his second cup of coffee to the aft deck. Frankie made fast work of locating a possible source for the conjure bag. Aggressive, inquisitive, she appeared to have the temperament of a born homicide cop. She had the mind for the work. He hoped she had the judgment.

He switched to considering his upcoming meeting with the deputy chief of investigative services. The chief, Bud Middlebrook, had called him in Atlanta, fishing for information about his return to the force. He'd made a point of being evasive with the chief, not realizing that Mercy was already in negotiations for the new lease.

He stared across the water. Circumstances had beaten him up over the last year, but he damned sure wasn't beaten. Time to suck it up and reclaim his territory. He was signing back on, but the chief wasn't aware of that. If he played this right, he could get Middlebrook to make some concessions for things he wanted. This meeting was the only time he could make that happen.