Night of the Living Deb (7 page)

Call me Tammy, but I planned to stand by my man until I had all the facts. So far, everything was secondhand, and that wasn’t good enough, not when my heart was in the balance.

“Hello, Kendricks? Aren’t you paying attention? Even if Malone can prove he was possessed in the past twenty four hours, he snuck out of the strip joint with a tramp, bailed on Matty, neglected to buzz you and clue you in, and he left me hanging when he was supposed to confab with me over a case.”

“Thanks for the Cliff ’s Notes version, but I’ve read the book.”

Part of me almost wanted to hang up on Allie and do this on my own. But I believed in the buddy system, particularly when traipsing down to a strip joint in a not-solovely area of town was involved.

“Allie? Yes, or no?” I prodded.

After a rather lengthy and, I’m sure, purposeful pause, she gave in. “Why don’t you meet me down here, in the West Village? We can have margaritas first at Taco Diner.”

Um, did she think this was a party? “Not a good idea,” I said, not being a fan of drinking

and driving.

“Okay, you can hold the margarita until after we hit the club and play Matlock, but I’m having one first. I’ll get it in a plastic cup and wait outside, so you don’t have to park or come up to my condo.”

Which meant I’d play taxi driver on this trip.

“Taco Diner, right,” I said then, “Oh, wait, um, Allie?”

“Yeah?”

I wasn’t even sure The Men’s Club was open on Sunday night, and I mentioned that to her, which nearly cost me the hearing in my right ear, since Allie’s response was to laugh like a maniacal hyena.

“Are you kidding?” She chortled, snorted, then chortled again. “You’re hilarious, Kendricks. You really are. Who d’you think runs the place? The Catholic Church? ’Cause there aren’t a whole lot of nuns with a pole dancing habit.

Get it? Nuns with a habit?”

Someone needed to tell the woman to curb her enthusiasm.

Was she this obnoxious in the courtroom?

Yeesh.

I’d convict a client of hers just because she was annoying.

“I’ll be there in twenty, Allie,” I said, as politely as I could.

I hung up before she could offer another nun pun.

Somehow, I just wasn’t in the mood.

Chapter 7

It was not much past eight o’clock, but it was fall, which meant dark.

Not that I minded driving at night, except I had astigmatism that my contacts didn’t correct (the right kind of lenses made me dizzy). So the streetlights and headlamps had extra yellow rings around them. Kind of distracting when a person needed to pay attention to the road and not to glowing aureoles floating at them from the opposite lanes.

I did love how Dallas looked after sunset, particularly as I drove south, toward Lemmon and McKinney where Allie lived. Not that I didn’t like my own turf of North Dallas, in the quiet of the ’burbs, apart from trendy spots and a safe distance from my mother. But places like Turtle Creek and the Park Cities, and even downtown, were an eyeful to see, both in daylight and when dusk descended.

Malone and I had driven around Mother’s neighbourhood after we’d been summoned for dinner there several weeks back. We wound along Lakeside so we could glimpse the mansion I’d always thought looked like the White House reflected in Exall Lake. A coyote had shot across the road ahead of us. Yellow-brown fur with the stub of a tail, so scrawny it looked like a stray dog in need of an Alpo fix.

Who’d have figured there was wildlife living amongst the richest of Big D’s rich? The kind that nature made; not the playboys and party girls, just in case there’s any confusion about what I meant.

I loved viewing the silhouette of downtown, glittery windows lit up like Christmas, the green argon lights that framed the NationsBank building and Reunion Tower with its rotating globe.

There were things I had not missed about my hometown while I’d been away in Chicago at art school—like, the insecurity of not having big enough hair, boobs, and jewels—but there was more still that I’d pined for.

My roots were solidly entrenched in the sandy dirt, buried beneath the soil several generations deep. Occasionally, I considered living elsewhere, the Pacific Northwest, maybe. Or I imagined what it might be like to shuck the real world for a while and move to Paris, go Bohemian, immerse myself in the history of the place, and paint like Van Gogh during one of his happy periods (because I’m sure he had happy periods before the whole cutting-off-his-ear thing).

But I couldn’t do it.

I carried Dallas in my DNA, felt its brand on my skin as surely as if someone had taken a cattle prod with a big
D
to my butt. I was bound by kin to stay near enough to Cissy so I would be close if she needed me. Try as I might to fight the bond between us—both the city and my mother—there

it was. And it was steel.

Malone occasionally talked about going back to St. Louis, and I hoped he wouldn’t. Because I’m not sure I could leave my home again, not even for love.

Or in spite of it.

As I approached the West Village, I spotted the Magnolia Theatre’s red and blue neon lights, and I suddenly found myself wishing I were heading there with Brian, to sit in the back row of a cool art film, his arm around me, my head on his shoulder.

Instead, I aimed to pick up his ex-girlfriend, who’d promised to drive to a strip club with me so I could grill a barmaid named Lu about whether or not my missing beau had slipped out the back of the joint with a girl in a G-string.

Oh, boy.

I’d run that one through my mind a couple hundred times already, and it still sounded awful, any way I phrased it.

I swallowed the lump in my throat, assuring myself I’d have the situation ironed out before the night was through.

Then Brian could come home, and everyone could return to their regularly scheduled lives.

Man, how I hoped that was true.

I double-parked the Jeep alongside a shiny black Escalade that easily took up two spaces in front of the Taco Diner, and I honked the horn lightly, noting Allie was right where she’d said she’d be: under the eaves, sipping from a plastic cup and chatting with a blond-haired guy in a Tommy windbreaker. (Not that she said she’d be flirting with anyone, but I wasn’t surprised.)

Another toot of the horn—which sounded a shrilling duet with the horn of the Audi behind me, no doubt wanting me to move my double-parked butt pronto—and Allie finally glanced my way. I watched her palm a card off on the unsuspecting gentleman before she scurried my way, climbed up, and hopped in with a, “Whew, did you see him? Wasn’t he hot?”

I doubt Mother Teresa had ever hit on anyone before one of her missions of mercy. Allie needed a little more practice apparently.

She could’ve used a few instructions on backseat driving, too, for as soon as we got going, she was giving me heat.

“Oh, no, don’t go that way, do it this way, Kendricks,”

she commanded, and wagged a finger to point out her shortcuts until we were safely on Northwest Highway and heading west, toward our target.

Obviously, she knew the route by heart.

I didn’t want to ask how.

She sipped her margarita and blabbed about some of the less than stellar men who’d done her wrong, obviously her attempt at a sisterhood-type bonding, but I didn’t even have the generosity of spirit to feign interest. All I could think about was Brian and what was going on with him.

Nothing I could come up with was anything less than anxiety-provoking on any level.

Instead, I tried to focus on the road ahead, on the surroundings and the far from picturesque scenery, though my thoughts kept skipping in.

Under the Marsh Lane overpass we went.

What was it my daddy used to say? That there’s always a light at the end of the tunnel, but sometimes it was the headlamp on a train?

To my left, a generic-looking Walgreens squatted beneath the looming presence of a Jack Daniel’s billboard.

Did Brian drink too much, do something stupid that he woke up regretting? That rendered him too guilt-ridden to call me?

Planes with blinking lights multiplied against the dark blue sky as we neared Love Field.

Did he let some big ol’ jet airliner carry him too far away? Did he have a blond bimbo packed in his suitcase?

Auto lots with No Credit signs abounded.

If he’d skipped out without leaving me so much as a Dear Andy note, he’d better not plan on coming back.

I caught the flickering red letters of a Family Dollar.

What’s a broken heart worth these days? Did it even rate a buck?

Shabby edifices with neon advertisements for “restaurant” and “buffet,” missing letters like a poor man’s version of
Wheel of Fortune,
minus Vanna in sequins to jazz things up.

I’d like to solve the puzzle, Pat. The phrase is, “My boyfriend abandoned me for a stripper.” I won, I won! So what’s my prize? A trip for one to Loserville?

The Jeep zipped past Webb Chapel toward Harry Hines, passing countless liquor stores, gas stations, and Mexican places. A bingo parlor with a churchlike steeple flashed blue and pink neon.

What if something happened to Brian? I should be praying that he’s okay, not envisioning him living out Paul Simon’s “Fifty Ways to Leave Your Lover.” Unless he jumped on the bus, Gus, or made a new plan, Stan. He had no key, Lee, so he could set himself free pretty damned easily.

A Jaguar dealership sat right next door to a Best Western.

Could be we were just too different to pull this off.

Maybe Mother was right. What if Brian and I were avoiding discussions of, um, anything more permanent than what we had because we both realized subconsciously that artists and lawyers don’t mix any better than oil and water?

That we’d been doomed from the first?

“It’s there, Andy,” Allie piped up from beside me, flinging a pointed finger into my peripheral vision. “Take a left about half a block.”

I saw an IHOP, and farther up the road, the sign I’d been dreading and seeking. I nudged the blinker.

“Got it,” I said as a left arrow click-clacked on the dash, and I turned into the driveway that took us toward a pink stucco wall with a sign that declared,
the men’s club
. A pair of ornamental lions perched on either end, intended to add a touch of class, I figured, as if that would do the trick.

Minispots illuminated the pale pink façade. Strands of tiny white lights rimmed the roof. As I pulled around to the porte cochere where valets awaited in white shirts and dark pants, Allie let out a dry laugh and remarked, “Oh, God, I still remember when Brian first brought me here. It wasn’t at all what I’d expected. No, scratch that. It was pretty much just what I’d pictured, so it was kind of a letdown.”

When Brian first brought her here? Malone had taken her to a strip club?

“C’mon, Kendricks, wipe the stricken look from your face,” the Blond Menace said, and lightly smacked my arm. “I asked him to do it. It wasn’t his idea or anything.

In fact, he tried to talk me out of it. But I just wanted to
see
. I was curious. I’m sure you know what I mean.”

Um, actually, no.
I didn’t.

I’d lived nearly thirty-one years of my life without the desire to go inside a place where women took their clothes off for money. I didn’t even want to traipse inside
this
one on this particular night, but I had no choice.

“You and I are very different, Allie,” is all I said, a huge understatement.

“You think?” came her sarcastic reply, and I bit my tongue to keep from uttering another word, likely one I’d regret.

As tempting as it was, I wasn’t about to play the superior game, not when she was doing me a favor by being there. Much as I hankered to pin an insult on her skinny tail, it didn’t seem right.

The pimple-faced valet didn’t look any too surprised to see two women in the Jeep when he opened the door for me, while I let the car idle. I’m sure he’d seen everything several times over.

“Be gentle,” I said as I left the key in the ignition (minus the rest of my key ring) and scrambled down and out.

“Have a good evening, ladies,” he drawled, and I expected a salacious wink but didn’t get one. Neither did he comment on the dusty state of my Wrangler, despite it being outclassed by the shiny Jags, Mercedes, and Beemers waiting in line behind it.

As far as I was concerned, that valet had already earned his tip.

“C’mon, Kendricks. Let’s go.”

I swallowed hard, tucking my purse tightly under my arm as I followed Allie up the steps, toward the doors, trying to keep my jaw from dropping as I noted the front windows on the right-hand side were filled with naughty lingerie.

What kind of men shopped at a strip joint, for Pete’s sake?

Geez, but I’d led a sheltered life.

“Yo, girl, pick up the pace,” Allie called, already at the door and holding it wide. “There’s nothing to be scared of, for God’s sake.”

Oh, really?

I wondered if Brian had felt as discombobulated when he’d walked up these stairs to enter The Men’s Club with Matty, or if it had seemed more matter of fact for him, something that guys did every once in a while, sort of a rite of passage, a male-bonding thing.

No biggie.

Just dropping in for a few hours to ogle naked women they didn’t know.

Andy, Andy, Andy
.

I chastised myself, feeling so damned judgmental.

Honestly, was it any different than my going to the

Chippendale’s? Although those guys didn’t do the full Monty, merely unwrapped everything
but
the package. It was a dance revue, albeit a slightly risqué one. But nobody did any lap dancing, not really.

Okay, okay, so maybe I’d even been in a vaguely compromising position with a sweat-drenched, partially clad male dancer who shall remain nameless (because I had no clue what his name was); but it wasn’t the same. Was it?

Besides, I’d gone home last night. I hadn’t disappeared and left behind rumors that I’d run off with a bimbo.