After the Rain (5 page)

“Very funny.” It was a sore subject.

“Answer the question.”

Gordy shrugged. “I ain’t into nothing that would involve you,” he said slowly. “Not specifically.”

“Not specifically, huh? That sounds like splitting hairs, like lawyer shit.” Ace measured out each word. “If she’s a cop, she’s
your
cop, not mine.”

“I’m telling you, this little thing I got on the side is nothing that involves you.”

“Right, half your drivers still think they’re running Dad’s cargo. And Dad just handled booze, not that bulk ephedrine you buy wholesale up in Winnipeg, that you can’t get down here cross the
counter…” Ace cut Gordy with his first real sharp look of the day.

Gordy folded his arms over his chest, took a step backwards.

Ace continued. “I ain’t dumb. Same couriers. Same transport—different contraband.”

Nina was about two hundred yards down the road now, going past the Alco Discount, coming up on the Dairy Queen. Distracted by Gordy, Ace had lost the fine detail. A pickup went by, slowed to take a look. It occurred to him that some other enterprising shit-kicker was going to give her a lift, buy her a drink…

“Hundred dollars says she ain’t a cop. But she sure is something more than she’s letting on, and I just gotta find out what that is. So I’m gonna go along with her,” Ace said abruptly, making his decision as he reached in his jeans for his truck keys.

“You never bet,” Gordy said.

“Hundred bucks.”

“You’ll lose.”

“Maybe. Probably. So how about another hundred on the side?” Ace grinned slow, with just a drop of the old nasty in it. “Like, what intrigues me is—how far will an undercover go? She goes all the way, we’re even.”

“Ace, you ain’t thinking very clearly.”

Ace shrugged and headed for his Tahoe. “What the hell. Not like there’s a whole lot else going on.”

Ace walked around
the back and braced himself as he came up on his new Chevy Tahoe. A crease ran the length of the right fender and petered out halfway across the door. He had no idea where or when or on what he’d left the paint last night.

Four minutes later he eased up beside her, then stopped the Tahoe a few feet ahead on the shoulder and zipped down the window. When she came up even with him and stopped, he spoke up.

“So, you still want to get a drink?”

Nina pursed her lips and regarded him warily. “Let’s you and me get something straight. I appreciate you helping out back there. But don’t get your hopes up. After what I been through in the last twenty-four hours, the next guy I fuck is gonna be wearing so much latex he can be dive certified…”

“Whoa. Hey, I’m here to listen,” Ace said, marveling. Must be some gearbox she had in there, the way she could speed shift between full-bore hot and cold.

Five minutes later they were settled in a booth in a dark freezing lounge back of the bowling alley, off Langdon’s main drag. They studied each other over a pair of double gin and tonics. Her choice.

“Good summer drink,” Ace said diplomatically.

“I kinda want to ease into it,” she said.

They clinked glasses. As Nina took a sip, she noticed that the waitress who had brought their order was standing at the cash register, very involved in girl talk with two women in shorts and halters who were real suntanned and would never see thirty-nine again. All three craned their necks to get a look at Nina with a certain proprietary interest.

“Friends of yours?” Nina jerked her head at the trio.

Ace frowned. “I was hoping to hear the story of your life, not mine.”

Nina shrugged. “I went to high school in Ann Arbor. Put off going to college to join the Army.”

“That where you got the tattoo?” Ace pointed to her shoulder.

“No, I did that on a dare, in Minneapolis, after the Army, during my brief bartender career.”

“Why brief?”

She took a long pull on her drink. “Because I met this guy and put off going to college a second time to marry him.”

“And you been with him ever since,” Ace said.

Nina finished her drink and emphatically thumped the empty glass on the table. “Not now I ain’t.”

“Look,” Ace said. “The way I see it you can call your husband and have him come pick up your kid and continue on with the lovely Jane. Or you go back with him and give your marriage another try, which is better for the kid.”

Nina’s eyes flashed up. “Really?”

“Yeah. Kids from intact bad marriages do better than ones from broken homes.”

She regarded him carefully. “You figure that out on your own?”

“Nope, this counselor told me and my wife that to keep us from splitting up. Didn’t work. But my mom stayed with my dad, which
probably kept me and my brother and sister from turning out even worse than we did. What about your folks?”

She shrugged. “They stayed married but he was never there when I was growing up. He was in the Army.” She chewed a lip, shook her glass so the ice at the bottom made a chilly rattle. Then she looked away. “And then one day he was really gone.

“Missing, they called it. Twenty years later, the Vietnamese turned over his remains: 1995.” She held up her empty glass until she had the bartender’s attention, then she turned her smoky eyes back on Ace. “So those are my two choices?”

“Or you could try something different.” Ace said, trying his best to look reasonable and helpful.

“I just tried something different.” She looked him over like a piece of merchandise when she said that, and Ace couldn’t tell if she was deciding to buy or walk away.

Then, after a few seconds, she said, “You’re staring.”

“Tell me what happened with your ear.”

She shook her head. “Nah, not yet. Maybe when I know you better. Try again.”

“Okay. Pryce, is that your husband’s name?”

“Uh-uh. His name’s Broker.”

“So you didn’t take his name.”

“And he didn’t take mine.”

“
O-kay.
What about your pal Jane? That hatchet thing around her neck,” he said, exploring.

Nina smiled. “You ever hear anybody call a woman a battle ax?”

Ace thought about it. “Sure, my Aunt Bea.”

“Was Aunt Bea a sweet soft thing, dependent on a man?”

“More like leather braid soaked in vinegar. Outlived two husbands.”

“Uh-huh. See, Jane says it’s one of those clues buried in the language. That ax is called a
labrys
. In ancient Greek paintings, like on vases, there’s pictures of the Amazons carrying them in battle. A lot of lesbians and feminists are into the symbolism.”

“I can dig it,” Ace said, warming to the gin and the conversation. “I’m sort of into Greek mythology myself. You ever read
The Myth of Sisyphus
?”

She squinted, thought; decided how to play it. “The guy chained to the rock. The birds come every day to tear out his guts.”

Ace shook his head. “That’s Prometheus.”

“Okay, then Sisyphus is the other guy with the rock. He pushes it up a hill over and over as punishment.”

“Bingo. The original uphill battle. I got this theory that Sisyphus is really a German-Norwegian farmer who’s trying to make a go on eight hundred acres up on the border by Hannah,” Ace said as his best grin spread over his face.

“You’re turning out different than I first expected,” she said frankly.

“Yep. I’m not like the others.” He held her gaze for a moment. “So Jane’s an Amazon, huh?”

Nina sniffed, retreated back into her foul mood, and sounded irritated. “Jane wants to be a lot of things. Since I’ve known her she’s wanted to a poet and a caterer but what she really does is wait on tables in this restaurant in Minneapolis.”

Ace squinted, thoughts revolving just behind his eyes. “So how’d you two…”

Nina jerked the corner of her lip up in a sort of smile. “That turns you on, huh? The two of us…”

Ace shrugged.

Nina laughed. “Men don’t mind the idea of two women in bed together. You know why?”

Ace couldn’t help smiling. The way she rolled over you like a wheel, mostly hard parts but now and then enough of the soft showing through to keep you interested. “I got a feeling you’re going to tell me,” he said.

“Damn straight. It’s ’cause you can see yourself sandwiched in there with them, huh?”

Ace felt his face get hot. “I guess.”

She leaned across the table, her face softening, lips going mobile, probably from the whiskey. “But if I told you it turned me on to think of you and a guy naked together…”

The way Ace sat up straight, narrowing his eyes, put Nina on guard. Hit a nerve. But she pushed on, wagged her finger and said, “Double standard, Ace.” The joke withered in his cold stare and she was more careful now, signaling that she read the palpable heft of danger in his body language. She sat up primly. “Moving right along,” she said.

He studied her for several beats. “So what you gonna do, Nina Pryce?”

She tipped her eyes toward the bar. “Maybe I’ll go back to tending bar right here. I could talk about you with the sun-fried sisters.”

“I don’t think you’re up to all the sky, wind, wheat, barley, canola, and flax,” Ace said.

“You ever read that play
Streetcar Named Desire?
Tennessee Williams?”

Ace shook his head. “I read a lot of Louis L’Amour once.”

“Well, in
Streetcar
there’s this woman named Blanche who winds up alone, and she says how she’s always relied on the kindness of strangers.”

“So that’s me, huh? The kind stranger?”

Nina raised her shoulders and let them drop. “Maybe
kind
isn’t the right word. I just hope you’re not mean…Your friend with all the hair…”

“Gordy.”

“Yeah, Gordy, he strikes me as being on the mean side. I get the feeling he doesn’t like women.”

Ace watched her carefully; the way she cast it out there like a lure. Was this where she set the hook? Gordy probably had her pegged right. Some kind of cop. “Maybe he just don’t like you,” he said.

“But he doesn’t even know me.”

“You ready for another drink?” Ace said as he swirled the ice in the bottom of his glass.

“Yeah. Something stronger.”

They drank together and began the slow dance, bold with their eyes, less and less cautious with their words as one drink followed another and the tabletop became a field of interlocking water rings. They were coming up on the moment of truth.

“So what are we doing here? You and me?” Ace said.

The smoky eyes came up. “You can buy me drinks all night, Ace Shuster; don’t mean I’m going to give it up to you or anybody else for a long time.”

“I ain’t that ambitious. I mean, like where you planning to spend the night?”

“Motel, I guess.”

“Only one good motel in town and Jane’s in that. Course, so is your kid.”

“Let me tell you something. My kid could use a break. And Jane’s good with her.” Real direct.

“Speaking of Jane. I remember what she said back at my place about you needing to get loaded to be with a guy. Did that bother your husband? You drinking?” Just as direct.

Nina couldn’t stop the flush creeping up her neck. She lowered her eyes. “Not like I had to get falling down…”

Ace held up his glass of scotch and peered into it. “I don’t need the details. And sure, I’d like to fool around but I’d kind of like you to be sober. How’s that?”

Nina’s grin was wary and amused. “If that’s the wager then it looks like nobody’s getting laid.”

Ace shrugged, drained his glass, and signaled for another round. “You can stay at my place tonight. Got an apartment over the bar.
No games, no bullshit, no hidden agenda. I already made up my mind to sleep on the couch. But tomorrow,” he winked, “we’re going to sober up, you and me.”

The drinks arrived and Nina raised her glass in a toast.

“To tomorrow.”

Nina fished her cell phone from her purse. “I’m going to call Jane, tell her I won’t be back tonight, and explain things to my daughter.” She looked around. “And I gotta use the john.”

Ace nodded, pointed toward the rear of the place. “Door in the hall on the right.”

Nina got up, walked down the bar, and went into the women’s john. She took a seat in the stall, latched the door and flipped open her cell phone, thumbed down through the phonebook, selected Jane’s number, and pushed “send.”

“This is Jane.”

“Nina.”

“How’s it going, Mata Hari? You catch that four-pound walleye yet?”

“Very funny. So far so good. I’m invited to his pad for the night. He says he’ll sleep on the couch. And I sort of believe him. He’s this odd mix of Eagle Scout and the Sundance Kid. I can’t tell if he’s going for it or going along with it.”

“We gotta try, right? Hollywood wants to know how you assess your security.”

“My first impression, he’s got some dangerous baggage but it takes a while to get down to it. The other guy in the bar was more edgy. But this Ace, he’s…”

“He’s a tricky guy, Nina; and he’s got some social skills and maybe even some depth of character. But so did Darth Vader.”

“I hear you. So far he hasn’t discussed his business.”

Hollywood came on the phone. “We can’t cover you all the time, Nina. Not in a small town. We talked about this. If you go forward you’re on your own.”

“Understood.”

“We need some idea of his pattern, his contacts, any sign he’s anticipating something big.”

“I got it, Holly.”

“Okay. And we set the ball rolling. Jane has the local cop hunting down your husband.”

Great,
Nina thought, but said nothing.

“I said…”

“I heard you.”

“Okay. Here’s Kit.”

Nina shut her eyes. The bathroom smelled of cheap disinfectant on monotonous yellow linoleum. The walls and floor closed in; claustrophobic. She was quick to fight it off.
It’s not a question of one kid; thousands of kids out there could be potential victims…
Still, she had used her daughter, like a private soldier, to gain position.

“Hi, Mom.”

“You did great, honey. Thanks.”

“Are you done working yet?”

“No, I got to keep going a little while longer. But, hey, Dad’s on his way to pick you up and take you home. What are you and Auntie Jane going to do tomorrow?”

“She said there’s an outside pool, in a park.”

“Remember, you need lots of lotion even if it’s cloudy.”

“I know.” Then Kit’s voice quavered. “Are you going to come home, too?”

“C’mon, honey, we talked about this.” Nina tapped her teeth together.

“Fine,” Kit said sharply. “I know—don’t quit, don’t cry unless you’re bleeding.” Kit had obviously mastered Jane’s cell phone because suddenly the call was over. The connection went dead: she had hung up on her mother. Nina couldn’t afford the luxury of remorse when she was working, but she couldn’t stop a memory. Eight years old, about Kit’s age. An elementary school in Ann
Arbor.
A one-page story assignment: What I did this weekend. “My mom and I went to the VA Medical Center to help the wounded soldiers…”
The teacher, in beads and a peasant skirt, had said, “That’s okay, Nina, it doesn’t mean you’re for the war…”

Focused now, she finished up in the bathroom and washed her hands. She regarded herself in the mirror. The alcohol she’d consumed dragged on her, like the middle of a Ranger run wearing full equipment. Deliberately, to test her timing and reflexes she applied fresh lipstick, taking pains to perfectly match the line of her lips.

She blotted her lips on a paper towel and surveyed her makeup.
So far so good, you floozy.

Well, this is what she wanted. To be a D-girl and hang it way out there, going after something big. On her own.

Which brought her to the subject of what was going to happen tonight. Nothing in her training had exactly prepared her for this assignment.

Would Ace change his story when they were alone and expect to sleep with her tonight? Would he get rough? She took a fast inventory of the men she’d gone to bed with in her life. More than half of them had been a waste of time.