“I need to borrow your phone.”
“What’s wrong with yours?”
“Dead battery.”
“Tell me the truth. It’s easier.”
“Okay. No.”
She handed me the phone. “I appreciate your honesty. It’s so refreshing. And, after you finish your call, do I get to go on a scavenger hunt?”
“Absolutely.”
“Where do we start?”
“Peggy Martin’s house.”
“Why there?”
“Most trouble starts at home.”
Chapter Forty-two
Braylon Jennings wanted me on a short leash. That’s why he entered his number in my cell phone last night and made an appearance outside the courthouse this morning. Odds were he was also listening in on my calls. If I stopped using my phone, he’d get suspicious, but that was no reason to let him know everything I was thinking. I walked to the corner, keeping my call to Ammara Iverson private.
“I need a favor.”
“Jack, don’t. I’ve given you everything I can. You need something else, you’ll have to deal with Jennings.”
“We both know that Jennings will screw me the first chance he gets. But I can handle him. I just need room to maneuver.”
She sighed. “What do you want?”
“Whatever you’ve got on Cesar Mendez. He runs a gang in Northeast, Nuestra Familia.”
“Where’s he fit in?”
“They do drugs, which means they do guns.”
“So do a lot of people.”
“But Mendez is the only one who’s looking for Brett Staley.”
“Should I ask you how you know that?”
“Probably, next time we have dinner.”
“You’ll buy. Why is Mendez after Brett?”
“Frank Crenshaw was Brett’s cousin. Brett’s father owns a grocery in Northeast, and Brett works for him. Mendez was a regular customer; they knew each other. Best bet, Brett hooked Crenshaw up with Mendez, and Mendez sold him the gun he used to kill his wife.”
“Which you think Mendez stole from the gun dealer?”
“Bingo. And, when Quincy Carter and Jennings make that connection, they’ll be all over Mendez. But, if Brett is too dead to testify against him, Mendez skates.”
“That doesn’t help Roni Chase unless you can prove Mendez stole her gun too.”
“It’s a start. Right now, Mendez is at one end of this thing, Roni’s gun is at the other, and Brett Staley is in the middle. I’ve still got a lot of dots to connect.”
“Pretty hard not to put Roni’s gun in Brett’s hand. Makes him a man without much to lose. You made a deal with Jennings. You should take this to him.”
“He has enough clout to get the charges against Roni dropped so he can use her as a moving target, hoping that whoever killed Crenshaw will come after her. I’m not telling him anything until I’ve got this nailed down and I know that she’s in the clear.”
“Jennings is going to be pissed if he finds out you’re holding back about Mendez.”
“That assumes Jennings doesn’t already know about him. Gangs, drugs, and guns are the ATF trifecta. If I’m right, a lot of this has gone down on Mendez’s turf. He has to be on Jennings’s short list.”
“Then why did he draft you?”
“When I know the answer to that question, I’ll start talking to him. Until then, I need your help.”
She was silent for a moment. “Okay. I’ll do what I can, but watch yourself.”
There are a lot of ways to get from dawn to dusk. Most people lean forward or fall back, trading modest risk for nominal gain, hoping to break even when they cash in. Then there are the outliers, the people who hit the gas, turning into a swerve with a wild-eyed grin or who assume the position at birth, ducking whatever life throws at them. I’d spent most of my life in the first group, leaning into punches when I couldn’t avoid it. But the shakes changed all that, forcing me to learn how to tap dance on a tightrope, solid ground the only thing that made me uneasy.
“Don’t worry. I always do.”
Chapter Forty-three
Peggy Martin didn’t answer her door or her phone. Her car wasn’t on the street or in the garage. There was no mail in her mailbox, and there were no newspapers piled on her driveway. She was out but not gone. Across the street, Ellen Koch watched us from her front window, drawing the curtain when I started toward her house.
“You wanted to talk to her,” I said to Kate. “Find out why she showed such contempt for Peggy. Might as well be now.”
We rang the bell, and she opened her door a crack, the chain keeping us out.
“May we come in?” Kate asked.
“What for?”
“We’d like to talk with you about Peggy. You’ve been such a great help to her through all of this.”
“I’m worried about her kids. Anyone would be.”
“But not everyone would do what you’ve done. There are people who don’t think Peggy is a good mother. They blame her for what happened and use that as an excuse not to help. You’re not like that.”
Ellen studied us for a moment, removing the chain and opening the door. “It’s not those poor kids’ fault. They didn’t choose their mother.”
She led us into the kitchen, warmed her coffee and offered us a cup. “All I’ve got is decaf.”
“Perfect,” Kate said. “The caffeine makes me too jumpy.”
Kate was in her element, reading Ellen, making a connection, turning it into an invitation. She’d done it with Jimmy Martin and Nick Staley, both times sucker punching them. I made myself part of the scenery, wondering whether she’d do the same to Ellen.
“Me too,” Ellen said. “Keeps me up at night.”
“My son is almost as old as Adam. He’s what keeps me up at night.”
Ellen stirred her coffee, eyes on the rising steam. “I know what you mean.”
“There’s a lot of talk about Peggy, about her being unfaithful. I imagine you must have heard that.”
“People talk.”
“The police think her husband may have been so mad at her for cheating on him that he did something to their kids to punish her. What do you think?”
She looked up. “Jimmy Martin has a temper on him, that’s for sure. And, he’s a hateful man. Never said a kind word about anybody that wasn’t White, and that’s a hard way to be around here with all the Blacks and Mexicans and the other immigrants. Seems like he was mad most of the time, and he and Peggy fought like there was no tomorrow.”
“So, you wouldn’t be surprised if he did something to his kids.”
“Oh, no. I’d be shocked if he laid a hand on them. He has a lot of ugly in him, but every time I saw him with
