A Kiss Gone Bad (29 page)

Velvet was awake when he returned. Wriggling carefully, she had worked the blindfold back into place. She kept her head turned
to the side to hide any lopsided silk.

‘Did you miss me?’ Corey asked.

‘Why do you hate me so,’ she said, ‘to do this to me?’

‘I don’t hate you. Not at all. I love you.’

She wanted to scream.
This isn’t love, you freaking nut bastard. Even as screwed up as I am I know this isn’t love.
Instead she said, ‘Are you doing this because you’ve seen my movies?’

A soft laugh. ‘I’ve seen your movies. Am I better than Pete?’

She didn’t answer.

He touched her cheek. Gently. ‘Tell me.’

‘Of course you are,’ she lied. She heard shoes easing off feet and hitting the wooden floor, the soft rustle of clothing sliding
down legs, a jingling of keys tossed to the floor.

‘Don’t,’ Velvet said. ‘Please don’t.’

Silence again.

‘Why not?’ Corey finally said, sounding amused. ‘Since I’m so much better.’

‘Because,’ she said, her voice calmed with a mighty effort, ‘you don’t have to. Not this way.’

‘I need to.’

‘Corey?’

Silence again, longer this time. She heard the even rasp of his breathing, near her ear.

‘What?’ he finally said.

‘Corey. Please don’t.’ She put even more fear into her voice than she felt.

‘No talking now.’ He climbed upon her and forced himself on her again. She gritted her teeth, tried to summon memories from
faraway sweetness. The tang of lemonade on a summer day, the soft pine-cologne smell of her father’s camel-hair jacket, cinnamon
and butter pooling on hot toast. Sitting in the quiet dark of her daddy’s church on a Saturday afternoon, leaning back in
a wooden pew while he practiced his sermon, pretending to snore if the sermon got a little dull, him never getting mad. Pete,
bedecking her with roses on her birthday. But all the good failed her and she screamed and cried, muscles aching, body sore.
She told herself.
It will be over soon, over soon, over soon.

It was. He lay atop her when he was done, his skin sweaty and smelling of burgers, her skin clammy. His face was buried in
her hair, and she felt him breathing in its scent. Lingering on her, like they were lovers. She so wanted her gun. She would
fire a thousand bullets into his guts and brain and what odd lump passed for a heart.

‘Why did you kill Pete?’ she asked.

‘Who says I did?’ His voice was muffled in her hair.

‘Did you kill him to get at me?’

No answer. His seed trickled out of her and she wanted to vomit.

‘Tell me,’ she said. ‘Please.’

‘I didn’t kill him. I wanted to, but I didn’t.’

‘Liar.’ She couldn’t hide her contempt.

He sat up, going on his knees, straddling her, and slapped her hard. Once, twice, three times. Her ears rang. Blood leaked
from her nose. He stopped; she felt his erection return, pressed into her breasts.

‘I thought I was your darling,’ she managed.

He made a guttural sound. She could feel his legs shivering against hers.

Velvet wet her lips, tasted her own blood. Pete loved you, Corey. He only wanted to help you.’

Another low laugh.

‘Do you want me to love you, Corey? Maybe I could.’ She heard him laugh but not move. ‘I can’t love you if I don’t know you,
though,’ she said.

‘You love Whit Mosley.’ His voice grew distant. ‘I saw you hug him.’

‘I sure as hell don’t love him. I hate his guts.’

‘Don’t hate his guts. I might bring them to you.’

Velvet’s tongue felt stuck. She expected him to rape her again, but instead he clambered off the bed. She heard him gathering
his clothes and then the door shutting behind him. In a minute or so the soft hiss of a shower began to run.

He was gone. And he had not shoved the gag back in her mouth. With its tiny lock. Its edged metal lock.

In the end, of course, she called David.

Claudia awoke early Saturday morning and lay on the futon for an hour, her body stiff against the flowered sheets. She had
no job. She had rent, she had food to buy, she had a car payment, she would have no health insurance, she had less than two
thousand dollars in her checking account and less in a savings account, she owed six hundred on a Visa card with seventeen
percent interest. Twice she reached for the phone to call her mother, but even before she dialed her mother’s voice rang in
her ear like discordant chimes:
Whats wrong with you? You give up a wonderful husband, now you lose your job? What, you want to shrimp with your father? There’s
a future. Why did we bother sending you to school?
She wasn’t up for her mother’s blunderbuss catechism.
Heather Farrell’s face swam before her, dream-edged, and twice Claudia stumbled to the bathroom, surrendering to dry heaves
of sick and shock.

So she finally called David, whispering to him about losing her job, about failing Heather. He came over at seven-thirty in
the morning, arrived with a bag of breakfast groceries, drew a hot bath for her, made omelets while she bathed and dressed
in old nubby pajamas soft as a kiss. She heard him in her kitchen, sliding drawers, chopping vegetables, pouring juice, sizzling
butter.

That didn’t take long, did it, Miss Tough? You’re just gonna let him right back in, aren’t you?

She popped open the drain, let the soapy water begin its downward swirl.
Yeah. Maybe I am.

They ate their eggs and biscuits and juice, and Claudia, rather than talking, went under a wave of exhaustion. She fell asleep
curled on the futon, David lying beside her, stroking her dark hair.

She awoke at 10 a.m. Her blinds were lowered, the room grayish dark. She stumbled to the kitchen. David sat drinking coffee,
reading the Corpus Christi paper.

He lowered the paper. ‘Hope I didn’t overstay my welcome. I thought you might want to talk when you woke up.’

‘Thanks. Thanks for the bath and breakfast and everything.’

‘But I want to get something straight, okay?’ New steel in his voice she hadn’t heard before. ‘I’m not trying to take advantage
of the … emotional train wreck you’ve just gone through. I’m saying that out loud because I know how your mind works, Claud,
and sooner or later you’re gonna think I’m trying to tiptoe back in.’

‘Oh, David, I don’t think that,’ she said, unsure of what she thought.

‘Okay. I just don’t want you to be alone if you don’t want to be.’

She got herself a cup of hot coffee – he’d brewed hazelnut, her favorite – and added generous milk and sugar. He had his back
to her, sitting at the kitchen table, and she watched the set of his shoulders, his burr of auburn hair, his wiry arms, the
constellation of freckles on the back of his neck. She wanted to hold and kiss him and feel him against her, and she nearly
dropped her mug.

Carefully she sipped the piping hot coffee, standing in the kitchen away from him. He turned around in his chair. ‘You want
to talk options? Delford can’t just terminate you, Claudia.’

‘He could and did.’ She shrugged. ‘It’s a right-to-work state, he can fire me at will. I had to go back in, surrender my side
arm, my badge. I didn’t have a box to clean out my desk, I guess I have to do that Monday.’

‘Are you going to appeal to the mayor?’

‘I’ll write him a letter,’ she said. ‘But I don’t think I’m overflowing with options here.’

‘Come work for the sheriff’s department,’ he said instantly and then stumbled. ‘I mean, you’re a good investigator. You could
work for DPS, too, or Parks and Wildlife, maybe.’

‘I’m sure something will come up. I can always shrimp with Papa. That should drive Mama into the crazy house a full ten years
ahead of schedule.’ She finished her coffee. ‘So what about your big Jabez Jones case?’

He shrugged. ‘He was spotted in New Mexico. I think he’s probably heading back to California, where he’s got a lot of friends.
The DEA agent from Corpus told me they think Jabez’s donation receipts don’t match the figures in his books. He’s gotten maybe
thirty thou in donations and three million on his ledgers. Mary Magdalene still
ain’t talking. Sits in her cell like a freaking Amazon warrior, silent.’

‘I thought maybe Junior Deloache was bringing drug money into Port Leo.’

David nodded. ‘Probably. With Junior dead, and Jones running, I wouldn’t be surprised if there was a connection. That three
million, maybe it’s Jabez laundering Junior’s money.’

‘I just wish Velvet would turn up,’ Claudia said, thinking of Heather’s water-paled face. ‘Her car was at Junior’s condo,
her purse with a gun in it, but she wasn’t.’

‘You think she killed him?’

‘No. I mean, I doubt it, but who knows. I don’t know her.’ She gave a thin, nervous laugh. ‘I for sure thought I knew Delford,
but he turned on me quicker than a rabid dog.’

David shook his head again. ‘With all this insanity, I can’t believe Delford fired you. He needs everyone he can get.’

‘Does he? If the crime’s this big, the DEA and FBI will take it over. Delford’ll just wax his mustache and make press announcements.’
She retrieved the coffeepot, freshened their mugs, came and sat next to him at the table.

‘I don’t get how the Ballew girl fits in,’ David said. ‘Comes from Louisiana to see Jones, gets involved in this money laundering,
and ends up dead?’

Claudia explained what she had found about the nursing home connections. ‘It’s strange, and maybe I chased a shadow,’ she
said. ‘But I found, well, not quite a pattern, but a couple of odd coincidences of timing.’

‘Are all your notes at the station?’

‘Yeah. But I can get you a copy. I mean, it’s really your case.’

David phoned the station and got a clerk to make copies of Claudia’s notes on Marcy Ballew.

‘Ask them if I’ve gotten any messages from out-of-town police,’ Claudia said.

He did. He paused, gestured at her for pencil and paper, which she handed to him. He jotted notes.

‘Well, this is interesting. You got messages from investigators in Brownsville and Laredo.’ Neither police department had
made much progress on the Morris or the Palinski case. Both women seemed to have vanished into thin air: no witnesses, no
evidence.

‘Let’s call them back,’ she said.

He reached for her phone. ‘Not on my unemployed dime,’ she said. ‘Let’s go over to the sheriff’s department.’

She dressed quickly and they drove over. David made the calls, asking the investigator on duty if there was a nursing home
near either woman’s workplace. The Laredo detective said yes, there was a nursing home right across from the Taco Bell that
Angela Morris vanished from, Bellewood. It was the same one that Placid Harbor had handled a patient transfer from. Brownsville
didn’t know if there was a nursing home near the pizzeria; they’d find out and call or fax David back.

So David called the pizzeria to ask if St Mary’s Nursing Home was close by. No, not at all, the pizzeria was at the northern
edge of town on Highway 77. St Mary’s was on the east side of Brownsville.

‘But 77’s the main highway,’ Claudia said when David hung up. ‘Anyone going to St Mary’s might still pass that pizzeria. I’d
just like to know more about these transfers, about how they work, the time involved.’

David set the phone down. ‘You want to go talk to Buddy Beere with me?’

‘I’m not a cop anymore,’ she said. The truth of it still sounded alien to her ears.

‘You are to me. C’mon, you’ve already talked to the
guy. Better than sitting around updating résumés and harboring grudges.’

Now she smiled at him. ‘Sure. Let’s go.’

The little lock lay in the no-man’s-land between Velvet’s torso and her elbow, and if she moved her arm slightly, the lock
and its strap teased her skin. But she could not move it toward her hand.

She wept briefly in frustration and then she slept again. Sleep was the escape door. In sleep her father’s arms enfolded her
and he said,
I forgive you I forgive you and I love you no matter what.

She woke at his touch. She wasn’t sure if it was minutes later, hours, time ceased to hold meaning.

‘Need to pee?’ he asked abruptly.

‘Yes, yes,’ she said. She had peed in the night, like a baby, and the towels were sodden with the smell.

‘I don’t got no more sheets or towels to put under you right now,’ he said.

Of course not. Who has time to do laundry when you’re busy kidnapping and raping?
she thought crazily.

She felt a bag – roomy, made of soft chamois, reeking of dust and fuel – go over her head. He loosened the cords at her feet
first, rubbing her ankles for her.

‘I’m taking you to the bathroom. Now, you try anything, I’ll cut and gut you, you understand?’ he muttered.

‘Yes. I’ll be good,’ she answered in a timid murmur.
I’ll kill you if you give me a moment’s chance.

He slipped her hands free from the shackles. She heard the toss of keys again on the floor. She slowly massaged her wrists.

‘Do what I say.’ He pulled her to her feet. Bolts of numbness shot up her legs. She nearly fell, every muscle screaming. He
yanked her forward and the doorjamb brushed her shoulder, and seven steps down – she was
counting – along carpet that felt frayed, he steered her to the right. Cold tile prickled her bare feet.

He pushed her down onto a cold toilet seat.

She urinated, emptying her aching bladder. He hummed along, a bouncy tune she recognized as ‘I Get Around.’

I am so gonna kill you,
‘I need to poop, too,’ she said in a very quiet voice.

‘I’m not leaving.’

She couldn’t see him with the sack over her face. ‘Corey, you’re not gonna find watching me take a crap sexy. Please.’

‘No.’

‘Please, Corey, please!’

‘No.’ He sounded amused again. He wanted her to grovel, wanted her to beg, just so he could say no.

If he kills you now at least it’s over.
She had acted the queen bitch dominatrix in her movies, and now she called up that icy, imperial voice. ‘Do you get off on
bathroom functions, Corey? How sad. I thought you were a real man.’