Rage Factor (22 page)

“Actually, I’m surprised Brenda’s gone already.” The prosecutor was usually a late sleeper.

Gail leaned close to the mirror, separating the thickly coated lashes with a straight pin. “I didn’t even see her this morning. She was gone before I got up.”

Interesting.

“Did she mention the Carrera case? You remember the boy, Paulie, his mother liked to lock him up, punish him?”

“I remember. Brenda had to drop that case.” She blinked at the mirror, then added another layer of mascara. “Why do you ask?”

Dixie wondered if her lashes felt heavy with all that goop on them. “The grandparents filed a civil suit. Looks like Carrera beat that one, too. Only she never picked her son up from his grandparents, and now Carrera’s disappeared.”

Driving over, Dixie had bought a newspaper and had read
the brief article at stoplights. As ordered by the judge, Paulie Carrera’s grandparents had readied the boy and his belongings to be transported home. When Patricia didn’t show by nine o’clock, and didn’t phone with an explanation, they called their lawyer, who alerted the police. Checking Carrera’s home, the police found nothing out of the ordinary. She hadn’t been missing long enough to start a full-scale investigation.

Gail glanced at Dixie in the mirror. “Well, hey. Good damn riddance. As long as the kid’s okay, Carrera can drop dead.” She carefully outlined her lips with a bright red pencil, painting just outside the lip line, making them look full and sexy. Dixie watched, fascinated, as she filled in the pencil line with red lipstick, blotted it, powdered over it, then reapplied everything, adding a spot of lighter color in the center of the lower lip.

Deciding to come clean with what worried her, Dixie said, “Think Brenda might have anything to do with Carrera disappearing?”

“You mean like wrapping her in chains and throwing her off the Galveston bridge?” Gail picked up a wide-toothed comb and fluffed her hair, pulling a few casual wisps over her ears.

“When I was sixteen, I talked Mom into letting me have a cat. One weekend Brenda came home from college, and Mom had gone on one of her weekend getaways. I’d gone home with a friend from school, and we’d forgotten to leave the cat any food or fresh water. Brenda embarrassed me in front of my friend’s parents,
dragged
me to the store, where she bought a whole case of cat food, then home, where she made me clean the bowl and fill it with that smelly fish paste. I had to pay Brenda back for the cat food by doing her laundry and washing her car every weekend she came home—at twenty-five cents an hour. The cat ran away a week later, but I was still paying Brenda back for months.”

She dabbed a scented cream on her wrists. “If Brenda thought Carrera would hurt that kid … well … she might do
whatever she thought necessary to stop it.” She pushed the makeup into a drawer, tossed a towel into a hamper, and snapped off the bathroom light. “Hate to hurry you along, but I gotta get downtown.”

On their way out the door, Dixie said, “After college, I lost track of Brenda, until four years ago, when she applied for a position as ADA. I know she was living out of state, and wasn’t working in any legal capacity, but—”

“You didn’t know she was married?” Gail frowned. “I’m not surprised—she won’t even talk to me about it.”

“How long was she married?”

“A few years, I suppose. Ask her.”

Patricia Carrera stood alone in the dark, her bladder so full she feared it might burst, and listened to the scrabbles and squeaks draw closer. How long did her jailers plan to leave her here?

Suppose they decided not to return at all?

Trying to escape had gotten her nowhere, although she had finally freed her hands, wrenching and pulling until the tape stretched, thinned, and developed a tiny tear. She worked the tear until it separated. Then she struggled furiously with the chain holding her to the slimy wall, bracing her feet and yanking with all her strength. To no avail. Following the chain to its connection, she found a metal eyelet in the plaster and tried to pry the chain loose with her fingers. When that didn’t work, she tried to break the lock that fastened the leather collar around her neck, digging her fingernails under the leather surrounding the lock.

Now her hands were torn and bloody, and she was exhausted. Yet nothing had changed. The chain still imprisoned
her to the wall. She could not sit or lie down unless she was willing to have the collar choke the life out of her. Anyway, she’d rather die standing than sit on that filthy floor.

At first she’d heard the rustling and squeaking only around the walls, but after a while the mice—or rats?—had ventured nearer, until she felt one of them nip at her shoe. Darting away without thinking, she nearly snapped her neck. Now she remained as far from the walls as she could get, in this one spot for what seemed like forever, so tired she could barely stand up. Twice she’d nodded off, only to be jerked awake by the collar as she sagged against it.

She had to concentrate on keeping her muscles contracted so as not to lose the water from her bladder. No matter what else happened, she would
not
lose her water, would not squat like an animal, her own urine splashing up at her from the filthy concrete floor. That was too disgusting to think about.

Her jailers would have to return soon, demanding she sign their stupid papers. She would agree—but only if they let her out of this room first, gave her water to drink and the use of a bathroom to … wash up. Then she’d tell them to stuff it!

They couldn’t force her to sign. What could they do, other than kill her? She’d never been afraid of dying, and she refused to believe she was going to die now.

They wouldn’t leave her here indefinitely, would they?

She’d always gone back for Paulie.

“Belle said you were a lawyer” Sarina said quietly when they were back in the Porsche. She sat fiddling with a mechanical device of some sort.

“Yep.” Dixie entered rush-hour traffic on Interstate 59, squeezing between a Ford van and a big-assed 1968 Cadillac that rattled like it was about to fall apart. If she remembered right, Brenda had a case on the docket later this morning. A midmorning break would be just right to pull her aside for a firm-but-friendly chat.

“All those years in law school,” Sarina said, “and you just quit?” The gadget in her lap made a pounding sound, like a judge’s gavel.

Dixie glanced at the kid. Sarina wasn’t the first to ask that question. It wasn’t easy to answer.

“I spent a lot of time learning a lot of other things, and I’m not putting those to good use, either. The law is still there. I still know how to use it. Right now I’m … a bit burned out.” To put it mildly.

“Like Dad.” She punched a button and the gadget elicited a groan. “He can’t get the juicy parts anymore, so he grunges out, fishing, golfing.”

Dixie cut in front of a truck, reminding herself smugly that she hadn’t quit at the bottom of her career, but at the top. “A few years of grunging out can be useful in rearranging priorities.”

“But you
could
still practice law, you said, right? Remember that boy who sued his parents for divorce—?”

“A kid can’t divorce his parents.”

“Okay, maybe it was a boy in a film, but suppose a kid wanted to make her parents send her to a certain college, instead of someplace lame, like Harvard?”

“Is this kid anyone we know?” Dixie slid the Targa over a lane, to pass a Greyhound bus. She hated riding behind diesel fumes. “Like you, perhaps?”

“Could I do that? You’re a lawyer—”

“Criminal, not civil law, but never mind that. In Texas, Sarina, you’ll be just as much an adult at seventeen as your parents. You can live on your own. You can go to any school that will have you, as long as you can pay the tuition. You can get a job, pay taxes, get married, drive a car, do anything any other adult can do.”

“Me pay tuition? Aren’t parents responsible for that?”

“Your parents’ responsibility ends when you become an adult.”

The thing in Sarina’s lap boomed to life: “Objection, your honor!” The male voice, with exactly the right amount of sarcasm, sounded familiar.

Dixie slid a glance at Sarina. “What was that?”

“Sam Waterston.
Law and Order.”

“You just happen to have a recording of
Law and Order?”

“Only the best parts. I record sounds, then copy to my hard drive for manipulation, and save them to my Datman.” She shoved the sound player into the deep pocket of her poncho and scooped up Dixie’s morning newspaper.

Dixie took the Houston Avenue exit into town, glad to drop
the conversation. Her adoptive parents had spent plenty sending her to law school, even with scholarships. The day she brought home her license, framed in mahogany and gold leaf, Barney’s face had glowed with pride.

“This is incredible.” Sarina’s voice came from behind the Amusements section.
“Star Voyager
starts tomorrow.” She folded the paper in quarters, the movie ads prominent. “There’s a special sneak preview today at six.”

“I didn’t notice movies on your mother’s list of approved sightseeing attractions.”

Sarina poked her head up long enough to pull a face. “Same director and effects team that worked on
Star Exile.
Which, in case you don’t remember, had only the best new effects since
Close Encounters of the Third Kind”

“I saw
Close Encounters.”
Dixie had loved it, sitting on the edge of her seat, shoveling popcorn, practically alone in the theater, having caught a midday showing. She couldn’t convince any of her friends to join her. But that was years ago. “Never heard of
Star Exile.
Was it recent?”

“Last year.”

“Must’ve been obscure. I catch all the SF movies.”

“Not a movie, Dixie, a spectacular film experience. There’s a difference.”

“Okay, but
Star Voyager
starts officially tomorrow, right? That might be a better time to see it. At a matinee.” Although Dixie didn’t believe Joanna’s stalker had traveled to Houston, she didn’t like the idea of taking the kid to a movie theater during peak attendance.

“Tonight
is when it’s happening. Tonight is like opening your presents on Christmas morning, putting on your new skates, and beating the other kids out to the street. Tonight is when we see the film fresh, before critics spoil it.” A hangdog expression overtook the girl’s features, then her excitement burst through again. “They’re using some of the primitive slow-mo effects Ray Harryhausen designed for
Jason and the Argonauts
, but with a new twist on the lighting.”

Dixie secretly enjoyed all those old films, when she could catch the cable reruns.

As Sarina talked, her puppet materialized from her oversized bag, and she began adding odd bits of metal and plastic to it with a small pliers and screwdriver.

“Effects aside, this is going to be the biggest independent film to hit the theaters until summer.” Sarina looked anxiously at the dash clock.

“It’s still morning,” Dixie said. “Six o’clock is nearly nine hours away. Besides, we’ll have a much better chance of getting good seats at a matinee.”

“Matinee?”
She made it sound like something to scrape off your shoe. “Dixie, we
have
to see it
tonight.”

Since Belle was paying her to keep the kid entertained, while also keeping her safe, and since the kid wanted to see a movie, Dixie supposed she’d have to take her.

“Maybe
we can make the preview. But no promises. First, I have to link up with a few people.”

Sarina grinned as she fitted a tubular piece along the puppet’s side. She swiveled the piece upright and pointed it like a rifle, miniature bayonet attached.

Several blocks from the courthouse, Dixie parked at a meter in front of a cinder-block building with one wall that had been covered with graffiti and painted over black so many times the concrete looked smooth as glass. The wall’s location was much too tempting for the local tag artists. It faced a dead-end alleyway partially blocked by a Dumpster, a perfect canvas with just enough privacy.

Dixie dropped two quarters in the parking meter and ushered Sarina to a narrow stairway. No banister. Dixie eyed the steps and her snazzy new cane. If she pulled this off, she’d need a handful of painkillers afterward.

“Come on, crip.” Sarina wrapped an arm around Dixie’s waist, and before she could protest, she was being half tugged, half carried up the stairs.

On the building’s second floor, an energetic decorator
had brightened a previously dark hallway by installing skylights and painting the walls a cheery daffodil yellow. The office doors all boasted shiny brass hardware. Dixie opened the one with a nameplate announcing
RAMÓN ALVAREZ, GRAPHOLOGIST.

Ramón was possibly the best handwriting analyst Dixie had ever worked with on forgery and fraud cases, but he was an arrogant little prick. As an expert witness, he was useless. Since the information she needed now would never be used in court, Ramón was perfect. As the door swung inward, she heard his rapid treble voice raised in irritation.

“Charlie, Charlie, Charlie, Charlie, Charlie, what are you doing to me, man? I do the work, I get paid, blap! No waiting for you to collect squat. Your customer is your business. You, Charlie, are
my
customer. You get the bill, you pay the bill. Otherwise, I might have to ask my big, beefy cousin Palomo to come stand on your face.” The receiver slammed into its cradle.

Dixie rapped the door as she pushed it wide.

Ramón’s round brown head, much too big for his skinny neck, needed shaving again. A gold, diamond-chipped loop sparkled in his left ear. He wore a buttery leather jacket, with no shirt under it, tattered denim jeans sporting a western belt with an enormous silver buckle, brown socks, and no shoes. His Cordovan loafers were parked neatly beside the door. “Can’t think with shoes on,” he’d told her once.

“Ramón, who is this beefy cousin I’ve never met? Like the Wizard of Oz, all smoke and noise?”

“You do not want to meet Palomo, Dixie Flannigan. And for you, I can think of many ways to pay, so you never worry about Palomo.” Ramón’s double entendres were as full of smoke as his threats, but Dixie always paid up immediately to avoid misunderstandings. Ramón bounced to his feet from behind a stained and battered desk, salvaged no doubt from a yard sale. He didn’t believe in incurring overhead costs. His office was the smallest in the building, with no
window and scarcely room enough for himself and one client to sit down. Dixie waved Sarina to the only guest chair and placed the envelope of stalker notes on Ramón’s desk.