Breeze.
This time he walked even more slowly and his eyes scanned all the homes for signs of activity. It was a quiet night on Breeze. He saw no one. He heard no one, not even a television voice. He passed 909 again and saw no indication that the tiny house was currently inhabited.
As he got to the end of Breeze a blue pickup truck pulled up and stopped at the mouth of the sidewalk. It had the familiar Domino's sign on the top. A small man of Mexican descent jumped out with a red insulated pizza carrier and quickly headed down the sidewalk. Pierce let him get a good lead and then followed. He could smell the pizza despite the insulation. It smelled good. He was hungry. When the man walked across the porch to the front door of 909, Pierce slowed to a stop and used a red bougainvillea tree in the next-door neighbor's yard as a blind.
The pizza man knocked twice -louder the second time -and looked like he was about to give up when the door was opened. Pierce realized he had chosen a poor location to watch from because the angle of view prevented him from seeing into the house. But then he heard a voice and knew it was Lucy LaPorte who had answered the door.
'I didn't order that.'
'Are you sure? I have Nine oh nine Breeze.'
The pizza man opened the side of his carrier and pulled out a flat box. He read something off the side.
'LaPorte, regular with onion, pepper and mushroom.'
She giggled.
'Well, that's me and that's what I usually get but I didn't order that one tonight. Maybe it was like a computer glitch or something and the order came in again.'
The man looked down at the pizza and sadly shook his head.
'Well, okay then. I tell them.'
He shoved the box back into the carrier and turned from the door. As he came down off the porch the door to the house was closed behind him. Pierce was waiting for him by the bougainvillea tree with a twenty-dollar bill.
'Hey, if she doesn't want it, I'll take it.'
The pizza man's face brightened.
'Okay, fine with me.'
Pierce exchanged the twenty for the pizza.
'Keep the change.'
The pizza man's face brightened further. He had turned a delivery disaster into a large tip.
'Thank you! Have a good night.'
'I'll try.'
Without hesitation Pierce carried the pizza to 909, went through the front gate and up onto the porch. He knocked on the door and was thankful there was no peephole -at least that he could see. It took only a few seconds for her to answer the door this time.
Her eyes were cast down -to the expected level of the small pizza man. When she raised them and saw Pierce and registered the damage to his face, the shock contorted her own unbruised, undamaged face.
'Hey, Lucy. You said next time bring you a pizza. Remember?'
'What are you doing here? You're not supposed to be here. I told you not to bother me.'
'You told me not to call you. I didn't.'
She tried to close the door but he was expecting it. He shot his hand out and stiff-armed the door. He held it open while she tried to push it closed. But the pressure was weak.
She either wasn't really trying or she just didn't have the juice. He was able to keep the door open with one hand and hold the pizza up like a waiter with the other.
'We have to talk.'
'Not now. You have to go.'
'Now.'
She relented and stopped what little pressure she was putting on the door. He kept his hand on it just in case it was a trick.
'Okay, what do you want?'
'First of all, I want to come in. I don't like standing out here.'
She backed away from the door and he stepped in. The living room was small, with barely enough room for a couch, a stuffed chair and a coffee table. There was a TV on a stand and it was tuned to one of the Hollywood news and entertainment shows. There was a small fireplace but it didn't look like it had seen a fire in a few years.
Pierce closed the door. He stepped further into the room and put the pizza box down on the coffee table and picked up the TV remote. He killed the tube and tossed the remote back onto the table, which was crowded with entertainment magazines and gossip rags and an ashtray overburdened with butts.
'I was watching that,' Lucy said.
She stood near the fireplace.
'I know,' Pierce said. 'Why don't you sit down, have a piece of pizza.'
'I don't want pizza. If I wanted it, I would have bought it from that guy. Is that how you found me?'
She was wearing cutoff blue jeans and a green sleeveless T-shirt. No shoes. She looked very tired to Pierce and he thought maybe she had been wearing makeup after all on the night they had first met.
'Yeah, they had your address.'
'I ought to sue them.'
'Forget them, Lucy, and talk to me. You lied to me. You said they hurt you, that you were too black and blue to be seen.'
'I didn't lie.'
'Well, you sure heal up fast then. I'd like to know the secret to -'
She pulled her shirt up, exposing her stomach and chest. She had deep purple bruising on the left side along the line where her ribs crested beneath her skin. Her right breast was misshapen. There were small and distinctly separate bruises on it that Pierce knew came from fingers.
'Jesus,' he whispered.
She dropped her shirt.
'I wasn't lying. I'm hurt. He wrecked my implant, too. It might even be leaking but I can't get into the doctor until tomorrow.'
Pierce studied her face. It was clear that she was in pain and that she was scared and alone. He slowly sat down on the couch. Whatever designs he had on the pizza were now long gone. He felt like grabbing it, opening the door and flinging it out onto the sidewalk.
His mind was clogged with images of Lucy being held by Six-Eight while Wentz hurt her. He clearly saw the joy on Wentz's face. He had seen it before.
'Lucy, I'm sorry.'
'So am I. I am sorry I ever got involved with you. That's why you have to leave. If they know you came here, they'll come back and it will be a lot worse for me.'
'Yeah, okay. I'll leave.'
But he made no move to get up.
'I don't know,' he said. 'I'm batting zero tonight. I came here because I thought you were part of it. I came to find out who was setting me up.'
'Setting you up for what?'
'For Lilly Quinlan. Her murder.'
Lucy slowly lowered herself into the stuffed chair.
'She's dead for sure?'
He looked at her and then down at the pizza box. He thought of what he had seen in the freezer and nodded his head.
'The police think I did it. They're trying to make a case.'
'The detective who I talked to?'
