“Calm down, Jessa,” I said. “It’s gonna be all right.”
Tenderness only served to make her cry harder. I opened 266
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the door as fast as I could and pushed her across the threshold.
She stood in the little reading-room entranceway, racked with sobs, leaning against the wall. I let that go on for a minute or two and then dragged her toward the kitchen-porch. When we passed the place where Fearless and I had come upon Tiny, she dug her nails into my forearms.
“That’s where he died,” she said through a series of hoarse sobs. “That’s where my baby boy died.”
“Died?” I asked. “Who died?”
“Tiny,” she said, nodding and leaning on me as we went from the room.
“Is that where the blood came from?”
My incredulity put her tears temporarily at bay.
“Didn’t you find him there?”
“No,” I lied. “All there was was a little blood. I thought that it must’a been from him beatin’ on you. Matter of fact, I was worried ’bout you until you decked me out there in front’a Hector’s place.”
“Hector shot him. He was dead on the floor.”
“Hector must’a missed,” I said. “Because there was nobody here. Just some blood, like I said. Did he shoot him in the head?”
She nodded at me hopefully.
“Must’a just grazed him,” I speculated. “Must’a either bounced off or glanced off the side. The bullet hittin’ him prob’ly knocked him out and then, after you left, he must’a woke up and run.”
“You really didn’t find him?” Jessa asked.
“No, ma’am,” I said. “If I found a body, I’d have to call the cops, and you know I’d be in jail still, them wonderin’ how a white man came here to die.”
“You didn’t see him?”
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“If he’d been shot by a black man in my store, I’m sure he decided to cut his losses and run. Probably thought it was one of my crazy cousins.”
“He’s alive,” she breathed. Then she giggled madly.
It was a straight-faced lie, but there was nothing wrong with it the way I figured. It took a great weight of guilt off Jessa’s shoulders and successfully removed the only living witness to the murder.
“Let me make you some tea,” I said, and she went to her favorite chair in my kitchen.
It was almost like old times.
We ’ d g r a d u a t e d f r o m English Breakfast to peach schnapps when Jessa relaxed enough to tell me her tale.
“Tiny came back an’ started beatin’ on me when you got away. He was mad, and I couldn’t blame him. But you know I was crazy for you, Paris,” she said, as if our affair had been many years ago. “He wasn’t hittin’ me with his fists or nuthin’, just open hand. He must’a been extra mad after he saw you naked. I don’t think that he would have killed me. I don’t think so, but then Hector came in.”
“Did you know this Hector?” I asked.
“I had never seen him before. He yelled at Tiny to stop, and Tiny ran at him. He called Hector nigger, and Hector shot him in the head. I thought he was dead.” Jessa’s eyes got wide while she stared at the kitchen floor. I knew that she was seeing Tiny’s body at her feet.
“What happened then?” I asked.
“Hector grabbed me by the hair and asked me where Useless was. He hit me and asked me and hit me again. I just 268
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screamed and cried and said that I never heard about any Useless. I didn’t even know that he was talkin’ about a man.”
“Did he believe you?”
“Later he did. A lot later. But then he kept slappin’ me and askin’ me. Then he asked who Tiny was, and I told him that he was my boyfriend and he’d found me with you. I think he started getting scared about Tiny and the gunshot, so he made me go with him out to his car.”
“Did you try to get away?” I asked.
“No. I just went. I just went with him to the car, and he drove me to that apartment where I saw you. I’m sorry I hit you, Paris.
I’m sorry. I was just so crazy after seeing Hector like that.”
I wasn’t ready to find out about Hector yet. I wanted to get there slowly.
“What happened when he took you to his apartment?” I asked.
She seemed relieved to be distracted from the second murder.
“He brought me in and kept askin’ what he should do with me. He kept sayin’ that he should kill me. I tried to
