'Don't ask.'
'Hire anyone yet?'
'She starts tomorrow. In the meantime I can't find a goddamn thing because nothing's in order.'
'You should make Vinnie help.'
'Vinnie isn't here. Vinnie went to North Carolina with Mo Barnes to pick up a Failure to Appear.'
I took a wad of folders and started alphabetizing. 'I'm at a temporary impasse with Kenny Mancuso. Anything new come in that looks like a fast bust?'
She handed me several forms stapled together. 'Eugene Petras missed his court appearance yesterday. Probably at home, drunk as a skunk, and doesn't know what day it is.'
I glanced at the bond agreement. Eugene Petras showed a burg address. The charge was spousal batterment. 'Should I know this guy?'
'You might know his wife, Kitty. Maiden name was Lukach. I think she was a couple years behind you in school.'
'Is this his first arrest?'
Connie shook her head. 'Got a long history. A real asshole. Everytime he gets a couple beers in him he knocks Kitty around. Sometimes he goes too far and puts her in the hospital. Sometimes she files charges, but eventually she always backs off. Scared, I guess.'
'Lovely. What's his bond worth?'
'He's out on two thousand dollars. Domestic violence doesn't count for much of a threat.' I tucked the paperwork under my arm. 'I'll be back.'
Kitty and Eugene lived in a narrow row house at the corner of Baker and Rose, across from the old Milped Button Factory. The front door sat flush to the sidewalk without benefit of yard or porch. The exterior was maroon asphalt shingle with weathered white trim. Curtains were drawn in the front room. Upstairs windows were dark. I had the pepper spray easily accessible in my jacket pocket, and my cuffs and stun gun stuck into my Levis. I knocked on the door and heard scrambling going on inside. I knocked again, and a man's voice shouted something incoherent. Again, more shuffling sounds, and then the door opened.
A young woman peered out at me from behind a security chain. 'Yes?'
'Are you Kitty Petras?'
'What do you want?'
'I'm looking for your husband, Eugene. Is he at home?'
'No.'
'I heard a man's voice in there. I thought it sounded like Eugene.' Kitty Petras was rail thin with a pinched face and large brown eyes. She wore no makeup. Her brown hair was pulled back in a ponytail at the nape of her neck. She wasn't pretty, but she wasn't unattractive, either. Mostly, she was nothing. She had the forgettable features that abused women get after years of trying to make themselves invisible. She gave me a wary look. 'You know Eugene?'
'I work for his bonding agent. Eugene missed his court date yesterday, and we'd like him to reschedule.' Not so much a lie as a half-truth. First we'd reschedule him, and then we'd lock him up in a dingy, smelly cell until his new date came around.
'I don't know . . .'
Eugene reeled into my line of sight through the crack in the door. 'What's going on?' Kitty stepped away. 'This woman would like you to reschedule your court date.' Eugene shoved his face up close. All nose and chin and squinty red eyes and 100-proof breath. 'What?'
I repeated the baloney about rescheduling and moved to the side so he would be forced to open the door if he wanted to see me.
The chain slid free and clanked against the jamb. 'You're shitting me, right?' Eugene said. I positioned myself halfway into the door, adjusted my pocketbook on my shoulder, and lied my little heart out. 'This will only take a few minutes. We need you to stop in at the courthouse and register for a new date.'
'Yeah, well, you know what I have to say to that?' He turned his back to me, dropped his pants and bent over.
