“An abuser?”
“He never hit me, if that’s what you mean. But you don’t have to hit somebody to beat them up and beat them down.”
“No,” I said, “you don’t.”
“He tried to do the same thing to our boy. You know I have a son?”
“Yes.”
“Chuck. He’s nine now. I got him away from Joe in time, I think. He’s doing okay in school; he don’t act out like he used to. He won’t grow up to be like his father, not if I can help it. He-” She broke off, flapped one hand in a weary way. “You don’t want to hear all this. And I can’t take more than ten minutes or Connie’ll throw a fit; it’s almost time for her break. Ask your questions.”
“You may have already answered one of them-why you turned your husband in to the police four years ago. Because of the way he treated you and your son?”
“No. That wasn’t the reason.”
“Did it have anything to do with drugs?”
“Drugs? No, he never had nothing to do with that crap; I’ll give him that much.”
“Duty, then? Moral reasons?”
“Duty’s what I said at the trial, that I did it on account of I found out about the stolen property and it wasn’t right to let him get away with it. I couldn’t tell nobody the real reason. I wanted to, I wanted to tell the cops when I turned him in, but I didn’t have no proof. Not anymore. My own damn fault.”
“Proof of what?”
Flesh rippled as she shook her head. Not in response to my question, at her bitter memories. “It would’ve been my word against his and they couldn’t have done anything to him. And I didn’t want Chuck to know, nobody to know, what kind of man I was married to. Stupid. I was so damn mad when I found out… I went a little crazy, you know? Got rid of it, burned it all up.”
“You’re not talking about the stolen property…”
“No, I knew about that already. Well, I didn’t really know; I didn’t want to know where the money was coming from. We were living pretty good, Chuck didn’t want for nothing except a decent father. No, it wasn’t that.” Her mouth thinned down until it resembled a knife slice in her doughy face. “It was the other goddamn thing.”
“What other thing, Ms. Prescott?”
She told me.
And all the good, warm bakery smells suddenly turned rancid.
23
TAMARA
More waiting.
All day long she waited.
Time seemed to contract, slow way down, as it had in high school before she found out how good she was with computers. Kept busy but still found herself clock-watching. And jumping a little every time the phone rang. But none of the callers was Judge Mantle.
She did some work for Bill-a license plate check with the DMV that produced another yelp of protest from Marjorie, plus a deep b.g. search on the owner of the car. The name and info didn’t fit any of the agency cases. Something to do with Emily’s middle school teacher, maybe, and what was up with that? Bill didn’t want to talk about it, any more than she did about the Delmans and Operation Save. Secrets. The serious personal kind for him, too.
Jake Runyon came in with a report on the Madison bail-jump case. Closed, but with an unexpected twist to what had seemed a routine investigation. Reading Jake’s report, she realized she hadn’t paid enough attention to the agency caseload the past couple of weeks. Too much on her mind, too much focus on nailing Antoine and Alisha. But that was no excuse for leaving contract work undone or giving it short shrift. Business to run here. She hadn’t even gotten around to the monthly billing yet.
She attacked the backlog, and that helped make the time go by a little faster. Not much faster, though. Not fast enough.
Noon hour came and went. Tamara worked right through it. Wasn’t hungry; too tensed up, waiting for the judge’s call.
And it kept not coming.
One o’clock. Two o’clock. Three calls, none from Mantle.
Why? Hadn’t been able to get in touch with Viveca Inman? Still deliberating? Decided not to cooperate and was blowing her off? No, he wouldn’t do that-just blow her off. He knew she’d go to the cops without his cooperation if he forced her to. She was pretty good at reading people; Mantle wasn’t the kind of man to stick his head in the sand and hope it’d all go away. Whatever he decided, he’d call and tell her.
So why the hell didn’t he?
Three o’clock. Still nothing.
Tamara got on the horn herself then. Found out from the judge’s aide at City Hall that he wasn’t on the bench or in chambers. He’d been in court this morning but then canceled his afternoon session and left “on personal business.”
Home by now? No. The woman who answered the phone said he wasn’t there and she didn’t know when he would be; she’d expected him to be in court all day.
Four o’clock. No word.
Five o’clock. No word.
Now Tamara was really wired. Shouldn’t be letting the delay affect her the way it was-a few more hours, even another day, wouldn’t make any difference. But damn, when you were close like this, when you wanted something as badly as she wanted Antoine and Alisha put away, all the waiting around couldn’t help but work on your nerves.
Keep on hanging here or close up and go home? Her home and cell numbers, as well as the agency’s, were on the card she’d given the judge; he could reach her no matter where she was. Give it another hour, she thought- but all she was able to stand was another ten minutes. Stay in the office any longer and she’d start bouncing off the walls. New Olympic gymnastic event: wall-bouncing. Get herself started and she’d be a prime candidate for the gold.
She locked the agency, ransomed her car from the parking garage. The Toyota’s engine was starting to make funny pinging noises. Horace’s hand-me-down had better not give her any trouble before she traded it in. Should’ve gotten rid of it weeks ago, when she’d moved out of the Sunset District apartment they’d shared, into her new flat on Potrero Hill. Promised herself she would, and probably would’ve if she hadn’t let that son of a bitch Lucas… Antoine… crawl into her life. First thing she’d do when this business was finished was dump that sucker and buy herself the best ride she could afford.
The new crib was the entire second floor of a refurbished Stick Victorian on Connecticut Street, easily the nicest place she’d ever lived in the city. She’d only had it a little over a month, and with her life in upheaval the past three weeks there’d hardly been time for her to settle in. Still a stack of unpacked boxes to deal with, still some painting and other work to be done, before she could really start enjoying the place.
As soon as she came in she checked her answering machine. No messages-not that that was surprising. Almost never were anymore; if somebody wanted to leave a phone message for her, they called the agency or went to her cell’s voice mail. The answering machine was something else she might as well get rid of. The landline, too, while she was at it. You just didn’t need either of them anymore these days.
In the kitchen she poured herself a glass of merlot to try to unwind a little. The prospect of sitting around all evening, waiting for the judge to call, really would have her wall-bouncing. If she didn’t hear from him by seven thirty, she’d drive over to Monterey Heights and hope to surprise him at home.
She’d just sat down in the living room, taken her first sip of wine, when the doorbell went off.
Now who the hell was that? Not Vonda or any of her other friends; they never dropped over unannounced.
