By the time I opened up the store the next morning, I had stopped thinking about Milton and went on about my day. As goofy and meddlesome as Buddy and Sadie was, they kept things under control when I didn’t want to be on the main floor. As much as I loved my work, I wanted to do as little as possible. I had been holed up in my office for the past two hours, reading a detective magazine and playing tic-tac-toe on the same pad I used to take notes when I did do some work.
A few minutes after eleven, I went back out to the main floor. I was pleased to see that we had more than a dozen customers. Just as I was about to return to my office and do some more reading and play another game, probably hangman, I scanned the room and spotted Milton lurking at the end of Sadie’s counter. “Milton, what you doing here?” I glanced at the clock on the wall and walked up to him. “It’s mighty early for you to be shopping. You ain’t working today?”
He bit his bottom lip and let out a loud breath. “Naw. I ain’t come up in here to buy nothing. I’m here on business,” he told me, speaking in a low tone. It wasn’t low enough, because Buddy and Sadie heard him and immediately started gawking in our direction. I gave them a stern look, and they returned their attention to their cash registers.
“Oh? What business is that?” I asked, giving Milton a puzzled look.
“Me and you need to conversate about some serious business.”
“We do?”
“Yup.”
I shrugged. “O . . . kay. What business do we need to conversate about?”
“I think we should go somewhere more private first.” Milton pursed his lips and glared at me from the corner of his eye.
“How come we can’t talk out here?”
“Trust me, brother man, you don’t want nobody else to hear what I got to say.”
That was all I needed to hear. I motioned for him to follow me. When we got in my office, I closed the door and sat down in the chair behind my desk. “Can I get you a bottle of pop or a pig foot?”
“Nope. This ain’t no social visit. Mind if I sit down?” Before I could answer, he grabbed the metal chair I kept in front of my desk and turned it backward. He straddled it and plopped his butt down with a groan.
Not only was I getting impatient, I was getting annoyed. “I’m real busy, so whatever you got to say, you need to say it fast so I can get back to work.”
He caught a glimpse of the magazine and tic-tac-toe pad in front of me. “Uh-huh. I can see how busy you is,” he snickered, folding his arms. “I wish my job at Cunningham’s was as easy as yours.” He blinked and leaned forward. “Odell, I like you and I like Joyce. But sometimes people ain’t what they seem to be, even me. Some folks got some serious shit to hide. . . .”
I sighed and scratched the side of my head. “Milton, I know you and Yvonne done spent some time in jail. She told Joyce and Joyce told me. That’s your business and I don’t know why you’d think it would be a big deal to me. Shit. I ain’t never been in jail but I ain’t no angel.” I cracked up at my own comment. “I don’t know why you bothering me with something like this. I—”
Milton held up his hand and cut me off. He gave me a hostile look to boot. “Okay. I’m fixing to get to the point and it ain’t got nothing to do with me and Yvonne spending time in jail. It ain’t got nothing to do with us at all. This is about you.”
Chapter 43
Odell
MY BLOOD PRESSURE ROSE SO HIGH AND SO FAST, I THOUGHT I was going to drop dead on the spot. “I . . . I ain’t got no idea what the hell you . . . you talking about,” I stuttered. “I ain’t done nothing wrong.” As soon as them words slid out of my mouth, I realized what a stupid thing I’d just said. I’d been stealing from my in-laws left and right for years. Other than Betty Jean, nobody else knew about it. Or did they? The thought almost brought me to my knees. I decided to wait until I heard what Milton had to say before I fell apart. Maybe it wasn’t nothing serious anyway.
Milton reared back in his seat and coughed. “Where was you at this past weekend?”
“Why?”
“I’m just curious.”
“Well, I don’t like to tell nobody my personal business, especially if the only reason they want to know is because they ‘curious.’”
“You remember Cecil Braxton? That bootlegger that used to run his business out by the railroad tracks?”
I did a double-take and shifted in my seat. “Why you changing the subject all of a sudden?”
“Hold on now. I’m getting to the point.”
“You better hurry up and do just that because I ain’t got time to be sitting up in here playing games.” I let out a disgusted breath and glared at Milton. “Yeah, I remember Cecil. I thought he was dead. I heard he had a stroke.”
“He did. But he still as alive as me and you, and doing just fine.”
“I’m happy to hear that. The next time you see him, tell him I’m praying for him. So what do Cecil have to do with why you came to talk to me?”
Milton sucked in some air and goggled at me so hard, I flinched. “I was at loose ends this past weekend, so on Saturday I decided to pay a visit to old boy and see how he was doing. His wife
