I hit Helen up the next day while our dogs tore up the park. “I’d love to watch Angel for you. Maybe she can work the extra ten pounds off of Bruiser for me.” I didn’t tell her where I was going. If this thing went south, the less she knew, the better. I left Angel playing with Bruiser. Good-byes weren’t really my strong suit. I sold my bike for six grand to a guy who owned a shop that specialized in Nortons over in North Hollywood. I left him drooling over the flawless black paint and perfect chrome, I had bigger fish to fry. I took a bus ride over to Jason B’s, a wanna be actor who paid the bills by buying cars at the police auction and re-selling them over Ebay. He had a ’05 Ford Crown Vic police Interceptor I bought for his cost of twenty-three hundred dollars. It was big and black with white doors which I spray painted to match the body. With an old school V8 and computer driven fuel injection, the bitch was built for fast takeoffs. It had heavy-duty four-wheel discs to stop on a dime, and a suspension tuned for ripping around corners at max speed. With a twenty gallon gas tank, it was a long range road beast built to take down the bad men. A gaping hole in the dashboard spoke of a missing radio and computer terminal. She wasn’t pretty but she would blend in on most streets and she was mine. For an extra fifty bucks Jason B tossed in a set of prop Nevada plates, they were hand-painted to look punched out. Although they wouldn’t hold up to close eye-balling, if the cops got that close I was screwed anyway. I had him transfer the papers on the car over to Johnny Stahl. He was a clean identity I’d built over the last ten years, with just enough of a paper trail to make him legal. Johnny owned a legally registered.45 automatic, a Visa card with a five hundred dollar limit and a library card. Johnny was twice the square I was. He was almost human.
Back in East LA I had a neighborhood kid hook me up with a car stereo for forty bucks and a six pack of tall boys. If I was going to be rolling long and wide I needed tuneage. He cut a piece of plywood to fill the gaping dash and bolted it in. Like everything else in the Ford it was all go, no show.
My house felt empty with Angel gone. Silly, I hadn’t had her that long but I missed her wagging tail and sloppy face. This is no time to go soft and cuddly so I loaded a Mossberg twelve-gauge riot gun, a Colt.45 1911 automatic, my S amp;W.38 and boxes of shells for all into the trunk of the Crown Vic. I didn’t know where the trail would lead, but I knew I should pack heavy just in case it turned ugly. I filled a gym bag with jeans, tee-shirts and socks. I took out my one and only nice suit. It was gray gabardine with black piping on its country western yoke. I added a white western shirt with pearl buttons, a scorpion bolo and a pair of black Tony Lama boots. Packed and ready, I was almost out the door when I noticed the Marilyn cookie jar with the charm bracelet wrapped around the handle on its lid. If I found Kelly’s sister, she might know what to do with Kelly’s remains. I set her in the back seat and rumbled out of town.
Joe Strummer and the Mescaleros kicked a beat to my retreat from the city. Fuck Mick Jones, Strummer’s drunken growl will always be the heart and soul of the Clash. The only blessing in his death is the world will be spared an embarrassing oldies tour. I almost threw up when I heard Johnny Rotten and a less Vicious Sex Pistols played Trump’s place in Atlantic City. In case there was any doubt that the go-go 80’s had killed punk, that show put the nail in the coffin.
The Crown Vic took to the freeways like a duck to water. It was still early enough so that the quitting traffic hadn’t clogged the road. In San Berdo I took the I-15 toward Vegas, up over the mountains and then a gentle sweep down into the desert. I had made this run enough times in my life, I probably could have done it with my eyes closed. Vegas had been my Camelot, the land where all the rules were clear and fair. Less than a tank of gas from LA and I was in a whole ‘nother world, one full of beautiful women who brought you drinks, lit your cigarettes and laughed at all your jokes. One good run at the blackjack table and I drove home with shiny new boots and two months rent. And if I lost, I’d had one hell of a time doing it. The main difference between Bob the bookie and a Vegas pit boss was, Bob would let me lose more than I had, in Vegas when I was broke, I was broke. I might have to hock my watch for gas money, but that was the worst it could get.
Pushing the accelerator down an SUV full of college kids pulled over to let me fly by. One of the added benefits to driving an ex-cop car is when the other motorists see that familiar silhouette in their rear view, they get instant guilt and slow down to let you pass. Cruising along at a safe eighty miles an hour I had plenty of time to think. I had lived my life to this point without direction, letting the currents take me where they would. I was a ship without a rudder, and a questionable moral compass to guide me. My childhood was something I didn’t like to dwell on. A violent father who had skipped when I was six, and a mother who mixed equal parts gin and televangelism, she could quote all the parts in the Bible that made you feel shitty and small. Most afternoons she would fly into rages and tear the house up, by night she would pass out in front of the TV set while some preacher droned on about the cash he needed. My older brother Luke and I mostly raised ourselves. It wasn’t all bad, we had nothing to judge it against so it seemed like our lives, nothing more nothing less. We didn’t know that other kid’s moms tucked them in at night, or that their moms didn’t wake up every day with bloodshot eyes and sick headaches. We lived in a small two bedroom bungalow in a court of other paint chipped bungalows up on the sad side of Altadena. The court was populated by the retired, the recently rehabilitated and those like our mom, who lived on permanent disability. Luke and I were the only people under thirty so we kept to ourselves. In school we had a reputation as wild boys, probably well earned but it kept most of the parents from letting their progeny hang with us. That was fine by me, screw the squares if they don’t want to be with us. Luke and me were a tribe of two, or we were until he grew hair on his nut sack and discovered that being a bad boy got more girls to lift their skirts than driving a BMW or living in a mansion up on the hill. So he deserted me for gash and I waited alone for the mystery to take hold of me. At fourteen I lost my cherry to a thirty five year old pro who had gentlemen callers as she called them into her bungalow across the brown patch of grass from our front door. Right after I came I had two contradictory ideas, what was all the talk about? Getting laid wasn’t all that big a deal, in fact it was kinda nasty. At the same moment I heard a much deeper voice saying when do we get to do this again? I spent the whole summer doing odd jobs around her place, working on the barter system.
My brother left when I was sixteen. He just packed up his ’56 Ford and moved to Texas. He said it was where our roots were, our old man had been a Texan, and I guess that was all the excuse Luke needed to put three thousand miles between himself and our childhood. Whatever his reasons were, he left me alone with the care and feeding of the monster. I still haven’t forgiven him for that. She was getting crazier by the day, bouncing between DT’s and liver meltdown. Her skin had taken on a greenish yellow color and a dull shine like wax. Her hearing was shot so she always had the Bible Boosters on full blast overdrive.
I stood it for two long months, believing Luke would roll up with a beer in one hand and a Texas cheerleader in the other, and our life would go back to the dull crazy I had always known. But he didn’t, so I lifted his birth certificate and an old driver’s license and enlisted in the Marines.
Six weeks later, I graduated boot and was shipped out to Lebanon. President Ronny that actor fuck sent us a televised message. He was proud of us upholding the Marine tradition of protecting the innocent. Our mission as he outlined it was to show the world our support of the legit Lebanese government. How that translated into a battle plan was a bit sketchy. They posted some bullshit called the ROE, rules of engagement, we were never to carry a round chambered in our guns, we were only to fire if in direct and imminent danger. Under no circumstances were we to give chase or fire upon the enemy unless they were firing on us. It was pure political bullshit and we knew it.
WELCOME TO THE ROOT, was chalked in tall uneven letters on the landing strip where our transport chopper landed. The Root, Beirut, or what was left of it stretched out before us, the night sky lit up with green tracers and the city rocked from mortar fire.
Me and a twelve-man squad were assigned to checkpoint 79. It was down in an East Beirut ghetto we called Hooterville. The first time a sniper fired on us I about shit myself. Rounds burst open our sandbags and we dove for cover. Most of the time they were bad enough shots so that it became more of an irritant than any big danger.
I had only been in country about a week when the Shiite militia drove a truckload of explosive into the American embassy killing 17 Americans. The press blamed the marine guard, but what the hell were they supposed to have done? By the time they saw what was happening and chambered a round it was too late.
That’s when we decided to change the rules of engagement. The Gunny had us rake a 50 caliber machine-gun across an apartment building where ten or so snipers had been harassing us. The big bullets ripped glass, curtains, plaster, wall studs, whatever came into their line of fire. Me and two other sharpshooters lay on a rooftop across from the building. When the Muslim fighters came running out into the street, Gunny blew a whistle. We rose up and tore the surprised sons of bitches to shreds. Blood and bone chips and pieces of cloth flew in all directions. One of the militia spun trying to aim up at us, through my scope I could see the stupid shock on his face as my bullets ripped him apart.
There was movement at the front door, more were coming out, I sprayed them down before I noticed it was a young mother chasing her panicked child out of the building. Miraculously the child was not hit, but his mother hadn’t been so lucky. A line of my bullets had stitched across her chest. She fell face first down the stone steps, her arm outstretched, reaching for her son.
Afterwards the Gunny said it couldn’t have been helped, it was the cunt’s fault for running into a fire zone. That night I discovered peace in a glass. Six boilermakers and I couldn’t even remember what I was crying about.
Our misguided adventure in that red shit pile came to an end after a suicide bomber drove his truck into a barracks killing 270 sleeping marines. One flash of light followed by a pillar of fire and every friend I had in the corps was dead. 270 KIA in one day, the only thing even close was Iwo Jima. It was a few too many body bags for Prez Ronny and his cronies to stomach so we got our orders to ship home. It would be a lie to say we left that place any worse than we found it, but we sure didn’t do it any good.
Back stateside, my head was filled with the smell of burnt Marines and the face of a dead woman. My C.O. got word that my mother was in the hospital, he offered me hardship leave to go to her. I told him it must have been a mistake, I was an orphan.
I spent my off hours in the base club drowning my head in beer and whiskey. To their credit the officers understood that what we had been through over there had taken its toll, but even they had their limits. My almost constant drinking and general insanity led to a medical discharge. I didn’t fight it, I was sick and tired of their rules eating into my drinking time.
I was waiting for the paperwork to clear when I got word that my mother had died. I should have felt guilty for not going to her, but I didn’t. I only felt free.
The drive was giving me way too much time to think. Sometimes I wish I could contract Alzheimer’s so I could start every day with a fresh slate. Once, in the joint this lifer, who had discovered AA six dead bodies too late, had told me that my mind was a dangerous neighborhood and I shouldn’t go in alone. I could see the wisdom in that but the truth was if I invited anyone into my head they’d lock me down and toss away the key.
At Baker I pulled into Bun Boys for a burger and a cup of coffee served by a waitress named Dolly. I think she had the last beehive in captivity. Back on the road I headed for the Nevada State line. Out on an empty section of highway I decided to keep my mind occupied by seeing what the Crown Vic could do. Mashing down the gas pedal it leapt from eighty to one-twenty like a racehorse. Slamming on the brakes it skidded to a stop in a relatively straight line. It proved to be a good solid piece of Detroit iron. I knew that if they took this battle to the roads I could trust its moves.
About five feet across the state line Buffalo Bill’s casino stabbed up out of the tan dirt desert floor. In a nod to the family fun theme of it all, they have a roller coaster running five stories up above the place. Come on down and bring the kiddies, let them ride the whopper while mom and dad get hammered and spend the rent check. Oh yeah, that has family fun written all over it. I pulled in to fill the tank. Standing in line to pay, the ping and ching of slots clattering around me in the service station, I looked out the window to the welcoming face of the casino across the road. I had a roll of cash, hell a couple lucky hands and I would be square with Bob the bookie and maybe with just a little more luck I could put my ex-wife finally behind me. Just a few quick hands and then back on the road, no one would ever know I had stopped.
“That’s right where it happened.” I turned to see a greasy haired clerk watching me. “I saw you staring, we get a lot of that. It was all over the news. I was working that night, saw them pull her out, even got myself on the eleven o’clock news.”
“What?” I said in total confusion.
“That little colored girl that got raped and murdered in the men’s room, it was right over there. That boy did it while his friend watched or some shit.” The story came back to me, it had been all over the airwaves a few years back. A little girl of six or seven had been raped and strangled by this nice looking freak in his early twenties, his pal had seen him starting to do it and had walked out, didn’t try to stop him. Her mom was right outside in the restaurant the whole time, not fifty feet from where her daughter was being dragged through hell. I wonder if that woman ever got another peaceful moment’s rest; what does she see when she closes her eyes at night? The kid who did it, he was broken beyond repair long before he dragged that scared little girl in there. I know what they do to short eyes in the slam, so he is getting his daily, but the fuck who really needs to be taken off the count is the punk who saw it start and walked away. In my book that’s the worst of all, because at some level he knew better and wasn’t man enough to act.
I shoved my change into my pocket and cranked the beast over. I made a friend a promise and gambling wasn’t part of the deal, so I pulled past the casino and onto the highway, dodging that bullet one more time. At Sin City I took a left onto highway ninety-five. The Cock’s Roost was sixty miles from Vegas, just outside the Clark County line. Back in the sixties when prostitution was made legal the mob boys and the state struck a deal to keep it out of the gambling capitals of Vegas and Reno. The sex trade is small potatoes compared to the real cash cow, the twenty-four-hour hum of slot machines. The gaming business, with its stage shows and roller coasters was after all good clean all-American fun. The smaller counties were free to license brothels, it helped their tax base and hurt no one. They had strict health codes and the girl’s safety was protected. In a world that always had and always would have hookers, it seemed sane to regulate it. Not that anyone ever asked my opinion. The same hypocrites who screamed to outlaw all “deviant” sex acts were no doubt banging their interns behind closed doors. Power attracts creeps, that’s just the fact of the world.
It was about ten thirty when I started to see signs with a cartoon rooster and hens inviting me to stop on by for a good time. Pulling down the long driveway I discovered the Cock’s Roost, a squat, spread out complex of interconnected single story houses. The slapped together additions looked like sorry afterthoughts. An eight-foot cyclone fence surrounded the property. The fence was to keep the girls in. The way the rules worked is that while the girls were employed, they couldn’t leave the compound, they didn’t want them going to town and freelancing. The large gravel parking lot was only a quarter full. I parked the Crown Vic and slipped the.38 into a boot holster. At a gas station along the road I’d changed into my suit. Pulling up my bolo tie, I rang the bell. The gate opened with an electronic click and I walked the thirty feet up the path to the door where I was greeted by the floor manager, a professional looking older woman who piled her gray hair on top of her head in a tight bun. She smiled pleasantly and invited me in.
Twenty-five girls stood in a line waiting for my approval. They were all dressed in skimpy outfits, from lace baby doll nightgowns to short shorts with bikini tops. They each held out a hand and demurely said her name. “Lacy,” “Shayla,” “Daisy,” “Mercedes,” “Bianca,” “Trinity,” “Pleasure,” “Sunset,” “Savanna,” “Dallas,” “Phoenix,” “Cherri,” “Shanda,” “Jessie,” “Ginger,” “Kiki,” and “CoCo”. Their names like their breasts and their lusty smiles were all counterfeit. Not that most men would care, not as long as they knew how to make him come, which, by the way, ain’t really rocket science. All the dancers I knew had two fake names, a stage name and one to tell a big spender so he could feel like he really knew her.
At the end of the line of names I would never remember, the floor manager asked me to make my choice. It was all so cold and businesslike, devoid of any of the romance one might expect in a whorehouse. No old black man playing piano, no men playing cards and laughing with the girls. This was a place you bought sex clean and cold. I acted nervous, said maybe I needed a drink first. I moved to the small bar and the line broke up. The girls lounged around the lobby, some trying to catch my eye. Others wrote me off and sat chatting with their girlfriends. I ordered a rum and coke, sipping it while several young lovelies came by to see if I wanted a party. I told them maybe later and they drifted off. “Party,” that’s their classy way of saying “fuck,” it made it sound so clean and fun. “I would like an oral party followed by a you-peeing-in-my-mouth party?” Oh yeah that sounds so much better. Jessie, a woman about my age sauntered up and leaned against the bar, resting her thigh against my leg.
“First time?” she asked.
“Yes… truth is I’m looking for a friend of mine.” I casually set a hundred dollar bill on the bar. “Her name is Cass.” Jessie looked at the hundred then up at me. Her eyes flitted to the floor manager who was watching me like a hawk.
“Why don’t we go back to my room and have a party?” Jessie said, “I think I know just what you need.”
Her room was small, enough space for a bed, dresser, and a small writing table. She had a bathroom that she shared with the girl next door. Through the walls came the squeak of bedsprings and a man moaning. “Now, what kind of party would you like?” Jessie said, pointing to a small microphone in the corner of the ceiling.
“I don’t know, you’re the pro, what do you think?”
“How about we do a half and half for two-fifty?”
“Sounds fun,” I said, trying to sound excited.
“Drop your pants, I have to check your tool, health code.” I did as told and stood like a piece of meat for inspection. She raised an eyebrow when she saw all my scars. “You’ve had a rough life,” she said, then lifted my limp penis and inspected it closely. “Ok. I’ll be right back. Make yourself comfortable.” She took my bills and went out to pay the cashier. The girls split the money fifty-fifty with the house. In the bathroom I found a bowl of cotton balls and some Band-Aids next to an industrial size bottle of Betadine. Stepping up on her chair I bandaged a cotton ball over the microphone. When she returned I said I’d like a little music, to get in the mood. She turned a small radio on and tuned in a country station. Willie Nelson was singing about an angel flying too close to the ground. I pointed to the job I’d done on the microphone and Jessie smiled. “You’re one smart cookie. Not that it matters, but are you a cop?”
“No, just a man trying to find a friend.” Pulling my pants down again she kneeled between my legs, letting her bleached blonde hair fall over my lap.
“Just in case someone comes in,” she said. From the door it would look like she was taking care of business. “Cass was a sweet girl, tough as nails but not catty like the others. She didn’t hit on other girls’ regulars or any of the other crap most of these skanks do.”
“How long was she here?”
“About two months. I remember she was here for a big Easter party we threw for a busload of Japanese businessmen. She and I did a double for this one skinny dude. You sure you don’t want me to relieve a little tension while we talk? I mean, you paid for it and all.”
“Don’t do that.”
“What, stroke you? You like it, I can tell.”
“I’m not a John. I really just need help finding Cass.”
“You sure?”
“Absolutely.”
“Thank heaven for small favors.” She sighed looking up at me. “I get so tired of dick. Dick for breakfast, lunch and dinner. And sometimes dick for a midnight snack. On my day off I can’t even look at a hot dog, swear to god.” Her eyes sparkled with good humor.
“Rough life.”
“It isn’t digging a ditch, but sometimes it feels like it.”
“Are you going to tell me about Cass?”
“Ok, you’re not with the mob and you’re not a cop, I can tell, want to know how?”
“How?”
“You didn’t fuck me first and then ask your questions. Power boys always have time to get their nuts off. So here it is, a week or so ago, two guys in classy suits showed up, Cass took one look at them and slipped out of the lobby. Ditching lineup is a firing offense, but some girls do it, say they had to pee or some bullshit. They picked Venus and Gwen, two young girls with monster fake tit jobs. Afterwards, Gwen said the whole time the guy was fucking her, he was asking about Cass. She played dumb like she had never heard of Cass, she figured he had big bucks and maybe she could become his regular. She said he liked it rough, slapping her ass while he pumped her. She also said he had a gun in his jacket.”
“What did these guys look like?” I asked.
“Goombas, Vegas mob boys, dark hair, Italian features, you know the look. We better move on to the bed.” I took off my shirt and lay back on the bed. She slipped out of her dress. She had a strong tanned body with flesh in all the right places, she lay on top of me. Our naked bodies pressed together, she raised up onto her elbows, bouncing her hips so the bed squeaked softly. I knew there was no love, not even very much attraction between us, but put a body on a body and the blood wants what the blood wants. I could feel myself stiffen as her beasts rubbed against my chest.
“What happened to Cass?” I was fighting for concentration.
“The next morning, she wasn’t at breakfast, and that was weird because as skinny as she was, that girl could eat. I went to her room to check on her but she was gone. She must have slipped out in the night. Maybe the night manager would know, but when I asked her, she said it was none of my business. You building a house?”
“What?”
“You’re packing some serious timber. Sure you don’t want me to handle it?” She said dully, it sounded like she was offering to fix my drywall.
“No, really. Do you have any ideas where she might have gone?”
“If I was to guess, I’d say she went up north. She had heard from some of the girls about a house in the mountains outside of Reno. The Eagle’s Nest, a much smaller place, off the beaten track, serves mostly locals.”
Climbing off her, I thanked her for the information and got dressed. She told me with a laugh that leaving a man stiff hurt her professional pride. She also told me if I found Cass to send her her love. I walked back through the lobby and none of the girls even looked up. Whatever cash I had was spent, so I was of no use to any of them. Back in the Crown Vic, I took a long breath. I wondered what had kept me from screwing Jessie, it wasn’t like me to pass up sexual favors. In the rearview mirror I caught Marilyn staring at me with her pouting red lips. Was I keeping myself pure for a dead girl? Had the talk around the club about us bugged me because it was true? Had I waited too long to discover what I really felt for Kelly wasn’t just friendship? I slammed the Crown Vic into gear and spun out of the parking lot, spraying gravel in a fan out behind me.
Down the road I found an open liquor store and bought a half pint of Seagrams and a bottle of ginger ale. I mixed the drink in a paper cup in the car. The booze quieted my brain down. All those unanswered questions weren’t going to help me find what I was looking for. I had to keep focused. I crunched a white crisscross with my teeth. I’d bought a bag of cheap, homemade speed from Billy the DJ before leaving town. It tasted bitter and nasty but I knew it would get the job done, so I crunched another. Unfolding a map I discovered that Reno was three hundred and forty miles up Highway 95. I settled in for a long night’s cruise.
The timing on the suits showing up at the Cock’s Roost was right. Maybe they found an address book, or maybe they made Kelly talk. The speed kicked in, giving me that rough jangle I knew so well. If the suits were looking for Cass, it meant I was on the right track. The sun rose over the barren countryside. On the dirt shoulder I poured the last of the Seagrams into a cup and chased two more tabs with it. It wasn’t enough to get me drunk, just enough to take the edge off the speed. In a pasture beside the road a bunch of lazy cows watched me. Driving on, I bypassed Reno taking highway 80 toward Battle Mountain. I followed the signs up a small county road to the Eagle’s Nest. Just before the brothel I turned up a dirt road and parked in the tall pines. Dressed again in my jeans and tee-shirt I climbed a small scrub covered hill. Laying on my belly, I looked down at the Eagle’s Nest through a pair of army surplus binoculars. A tall chain-link fence surrounded a two-story farmhouse that looked like it might have been built at the turn of the century. The dove-gray paint was peeling. A large porch covered the front. It was around eight in the morning and I couldn’t see anyone moving inside. The sun felt warm and good on my back as it filtered down through the pine boughs. An hour later, I watched a muscular young man water the lawn and pull some weeds out of a rose bed up against the front porch. He pushed a hand mower across the grass. It was all so Norman Rockwell.
Four hours later, I awoke to a large crow cawing in the tree above. The sun overhead burned into my eyes, sending sparks exploding into my brain. There is nothing quite as much fun as a speed hangover. My entire nervous system felt toasted and I could taste something like burned wires in the back of my throat. I focused on my watch, it was one o’clock, I struggled to get my bearings. I was on my back on the hard packed dirt, I could feel pine needles in my hair. I had been in the middle of a dream I couldn’t shake, as if it was still overlapping the waking world. Kelly and I were riding my Norton in the Mexican countryside. I could feel her arms around me, the warm air rushing past us. As I continued to wake the dream broke down into fragments too small to hold onto. Kelly and I played in the surf on an empty beach. In the sand she turned to kiss me, but somehow she changed into a young Lebanese mother. Blood rolling from her chest she fell into the surf.
The only cure for this sort of craziness was forward movement. Popping a couple more whites I rolled over and scanned the brothel. A few cars were in the parking lot, a late model Toyota, a couple of pickups, and a Jeep. Blue-collar cars, transportation for the working class. An hour later, a red 1971 Cutlass convertible pulled in and four teenagers piled out, laughing and horsing around. They rang the bell and waited with nervous glee. To call the older woman who opened the door for them buxom would be an understatement. She was opulent. Even from a distance I saw she had the kind of curves that little boys dreamed about and grown men sighed thanks watching her sway by. A short time later a man in a khaki gas company uniform left in the Toyota. Two cowboys arrived in a bondo patched pickup. Whenever a new car arrived I could see movement behind the curtains, but I couldn’t see any faces. The sun set behind the mountains and the temperature instantly dropped. I shivered, waited and ate some whites to keep my edge on.
At eight o’clock I climbed into the Crown Vic, put on my suit and headed down to the parking lot. There were more pickups than sedans in the small, half-full lot. Buzzed in I walked up the pea gravel path. Under a propane heater in a porch swing a young girl in a teddy was drinking and talking to an equally young cowpoke. I was met at the door by Mrs. Altman in all her curvy glory, up close I could tell she was pushing sixty, not that it mattered, she was timeless and knew it. Instead of a lineup, she took me around the parlor, introducing me to the girls. It was a wide pleasant room, with club chairs and overstuffed sofas. As I looked from face to face, I realized I had no idea what Cass looked like. She could be any one of these lovelies, maybe not the Chinese girl, unless she was adopted. I suddenly knew with certainty that my mad rush to find Kelly’s sister had one gaping flaw.
After I met all the girls, Mrs. Altman led me to an old oak bar stretching the length of the room. A cute gal in jeans and a shirt tied just under her breasts poured me a stiff bourbon. Around the room there were several other men, some at the bar drinking, others sitting chatting with the girls.
“So, big feller,” Mrs. Altman said, “you see any fillies that strike your fancy? No need to be shy, we run a nice friendly house.”
“Actually, um, I was looking for a girl a buddy told me about…” effecting my nervous first-timer act.
“Well, you tell me her name and I will make sure you’re taken care of,” she said with a big easy smile.
“I think her name’s Cass?”
Her smile remained but I could see a steel door slam shut behind her eyes. “I’ve never heard of a girl by that name, are you sure he said she worked here?”
“Yeah, but to be honest he drinks a bit and may have gotten it wrong.”
“Guess he did. What sort of girl are you looking for, maybe I can find some one to fill your desires. Do you like young? A girl-next-door blonde? Black widow brunette? Wild redhead?”
I looked at the floor, feigning shyness. “I don’t even know what I’m doing here. My wife left me last year and I…” I gulped my drink.
“Why don’t you just have another drink, get comfortable. You decide on a girl, you just let me know. Or go talk to her, they won’t bite, not unless you ask them to.”
In the mirror behind the bar I saw her talk to a weathered-looking working cowboy. He glanced over to where I was standing and then disappeared up the stairs. If I had unlimited funds I might have taken one of the girls upstairs to find out what I could. But I knew she was there, I could feel it. I finished my drink and decided to come back when the place was empty, plead my case then and hope they believed I was a friend not foe. As I walked back down the path I felt eyes on me, turning I looked up, the porch was empty. I scanned the windows on the first floor, I could see movement in the parlor but no one looked out so I moved up to the second floor bedroom windows. A lace curtain fluttered and for the briefest of moments I saw her. Dark curls framed a round lovely face that I knew so well. Kelly was looking down at me, the ghost of a dead friend, her eyes calling me to come for her. Then she was gone leaving only a small ripple in the curtain. Logic and the desire to have it be her fought in my head. I stumbled back, it was as if the ground under my feet had gone to jello. I wanted to run back into the house. I wanted to find Kelly there safe, but life doesn’t work that way. The dead don’t rise up to greet you.
Too much speed and not enough sleep will twist your mind. I knew a trucker once who was driving in the fog, he hallucinated a ship sailing in front of him. He kept driving and plowed into a yacht that had fallen off another rig. I guess the moral of that story is don’t trust your eyes except when you need to. Trick is, knowing when that is. Was I so fixated on finding Kelly’s past that I was seeing her in the shadows?
My headlights pierced the silky blackness of a moonless night. As I rounded a corner I saw headlights speeding up behind me, bearing down on me. I mashed down the gas pedal. The monster V8 roared to life. I took a corner in a four-wheel drift, sliding across both lanes, then punched it and the Crown Vic straightened out. Behind me the lights came on, unrelenting. Suddenly they disappeared as I flew over a small hill. The asphalt was pocked with potholes so I dropped down in speed. No need trashing my suspension if they’d given up. Suddenly, in front of me a red Chevy pickup truck bounced up onto the road. It locked its breaks and stopped, blocking the road. In a squeal of burning rubber I skidded to a stop inches from the truck. I was scrambling for reverse when my driver’s side window exploded showering me with chunks of safety glass. Before I could react the weathered cowboy had my door open. With a mighty pull he had me dragged out and on the ground. A younger man stood by the truck aiming a hunting rifle at me. Trying to get up, my shoulder rippled with pain as the cowboy hit me with the axe handle he had used to bust out my window. A powerful blow struck my gut and I went over, my face grinding the pavement. I curled into a ball, hoping to reach the.38 in my boot holster then I heard a rush of wind and rolled just in time to have the hardwood miss splitting my skull. Reaching my pistol I pulled it and rolled up onto one knee but before I could aim, he hit my arm with a blow that made it go numb. The.38 skidded across the pavement and under my car. He swung again at my head, I ducked quick enough to take the force on my neck. Pain racked my body. I fell onto my side and threw up. The axe handle touched my face, twisting it so I looked up at the cowboy.
“Give me one reason not to kill you and leave you out here for coyote bait.”
“I just…I wanted to meet a girl,” I mumbled.
“Maybe, but I doubt it.” He slapped the wood against my cheek, hard. I could feel a warm trickle of blood.
“She’s a friend of… a…” My brain was struggling to rise above the pain to think of any words that would keep the axe handle from causing any more agony.
“Horse shit.” A thud sent my left leg screaming. “Forget you ever heard that girl’s name. Go back and tell the mob boys you couldn’t find her. Tell ‘em she’s dead, tell ‘em any damn thing you want. But don’t come back. We clear?”
“Yes… I won’t…” I said, feeling the bile back up in my throat.
“Next time we meet, you die.” He accented his words with another strike to my gut. Puke of rotten whiskey and green gut slime flowed past my teeth and down my chin. From the ground, I watched the boots walk away. I heard the truck start, then they drove past my crumpled form and the world went dark. I lay there covered by a blanket of stars. I hurt all over, I couldn’t imagine standing up. My brain had betrayed me when I most needed it, it had left me to flop like a landed fish under his blows. I was that little kid cowering under an adult’s power. Defenseless and stupid.
My old pal anger reached down and pulled me to my knees. Fuck that corny cowboy bastard. Fuck him and his axe handle. Tomorrow was my day, and if I could stand up, his ass was mine.
On my hands and knees I crawled over to the Crown Vic. I found my.38 and pulled myself into the driver’s seat. Small cubes of glass were scattered everywhere. In the mirror I found my cheek was purple and cut but it wasn’t deep. The blood had already stopped flowing. Peeling off my shirt, my belly was mottled red and swelling but my ribs had been spared. All things considered the old guy had gone light on me. Not that that made me feel any better about him. Driving with my lights off I turned down the dirt road and parked hidden behind the pines and scrub brush. I lay in the back seat, forcing the pain down until I finally drifted into a nightmare filled sleep.