The Big Ugly (15 page)

She pursed her lips and said, "Wait."

She retreated down the hall for a moment. I stood there and tried unsuccessfully to breathe through my nose.

When she came back, she handed me a small .38 Smith & Wesson wrapped in a blue handkerchief. "Here. Six shot, but you only got four bullets in it."

"Thanks."

"Meet me out at Darnell's tomorrow. Noon. We'll try and figure out what the fuck is happening."

She walked me to the door.

"Thanks again," I said.

"Stay out of trouble."

"I will."

She opened the door. I stepped through it, and she said, "Bennett."

The city night was silent. I whispered, "Yeah."

"If something happens before tomorrow and you got to take care of yourself with that thing …"

"Yeah."

"Leave the state and don't never contact me again."

I nodded and walked downstairs. I got into my car, started it and drove to the outskirts of the city. I took a two-lane road toward one of the white flight communities that had sprung up back in the eighties.

The road curved through the countryside, past McMansions and horse fields and the occasional gas station. I passed a car wash, turned around, drove back to it, pulled into one of the stalls and shut off the car. I reclined the driver's seat and left the keys in the ignition. Wind shook the dirty tin walls of the stall and whistled through the broken plastic sign chained to a pole out front.

The place was creepy as hell, but in just a minute or two I collapsed into a dreamless sleep.

The discomfort of the car woke me up a few hours later. As I raised my seat back into place, a sharp golden sunlight sliced through some trees at the edge of the car wash. Squinting against it, I got out to stretch.

The car wash sat at the top of a little hill just up from the two-lane blacktop. Fallow fields surrounded it on all sides. The wash itself had a couple of stalls with quarter operated soap-and-water wands. There didn't seem to be any box for an attendant. Someone probably came out every day or so to collect the quarters.

I dug around in the car until I found a couple of napkins, then I walked around to the other stall to pee.

Somewhere in the distance, a bird squawked.

I threw away the napkins and walked to the edge of the field and watched the grass grow.

For a moment, I thought about running away. It'd be easy enough. Get back in the car and drive away. I could be out of the state in a couple of hours. In seven or eight hours, I could be in Atlanta or Chicago. I could be gone.

Goose bumps rose on my arms. I felt warm and cool at the same time. "I could just go," I said out loud. It sounded good. Hell, when I said it somehow the idea even
tasted
good.

I could just go.

But then what?

I had practically no money. I was driving my brother's car. It had a little under half a tank of gas. My face looked like a busted grapefruit. The second I crossed the state line I became a parolee in violation of her parole.

And I'd killed a man the night before.

I rubbed my burned and battered hands together and remembered Colfax thrashing underneath me as I kept pulling and pulling.

My body spasmed.

I stumbled back to the car, opened the passenger side door, and slumped down.

The Colfax connection was the only chip I had left to play. If I stayed, I could try to negotiate with Kluge. If I left town, I had nothing.

I stopped at Waffle House for breakfast. I was surprisingly hungry. Waffles, eggs, sausage. Two cups of coffee, three glasses of water. The waitress kept stealing glances at me. At first I assumed it was because I was eating like a pig, but when I was done I went to the bathroom and saw myself in the mirror.

Puffed up and discolored, my face looked like a third grade art project. My nose was purple, my eyes had slight green-ringed bruises, and my lips were as mangled as crushed tomatoes. Blue splotches covered my neck and throat.

It startled me for a moment, but the longer I stared at my face the less it bothered me. My nose hurt like hell, but I didn't think it was broken. "Beat up," I said in the cold echo of the ladies room, "but not yet beaten."

I went back to the counter to pay my bill.

The waitress was an old brunette with hairy arms and big tits. She took my bill and my cash and tried not to stare at me.

"Rough night," I said.

She smiled.

At the counter next to her, a big, cross-eyed guy with a crew cut and Dickies work clothes sipped his coffee. "Had a better night than ole Vin Colfax," he said with a squinty smile.

"What?"

He smiled some more.

"What did you say?" I asked.

He scratched his stubbly chin. "Colfax. The governor's brother? You hear what happened?"

The waitress asked, "He get arrested or something? Them politicians are always up to something."

The old man kept squinting and grinning and said, "Nah … he didn't get arrested. Died."

The waitress's mouth became a big silent O.

"He did?" I said.

"Yep."

The waitress asked, "Well hell, Gene, what you grinning about? Man died. The hell's so funny 'bout that?"

Gene slowly sipped his coffee for dramatic effect. "I always root against them type of people."

The waitress said, "You are an awful man."

"How'd he die?" I asked.

"Went off the side of a mountain upstate somewheres. State troopers found him this morning is what I heard on the radio."

"That's awful," I said.

Gene twirled the coffee around in his cup. "Eh, I've heard of awfuller."

"They know anything else?"

He shrugged. "Check the radio. It's all they're talking about this morning. Local news anyway."

I went out to my car and searched around on the radio. Gene wasn't lying. At the top of the hour, it was the lead news story. Vinton Colfax, brother to Governor Lou Don Colfax, had been found in his burning car after driving off a road in Searcy County during the early hours of the morning. The governor was deeply upset by the loss of his brother. The Colfax campaign for Senate had been suspended and all public appearances had been postponed while the governor grieved the loss of his brother and helped to settle his estate and make plans for his funeral service. The campaign was expected to resume after the funeral.

Darnell sat in his icebox of an office with his hands laced over his belly, staring at me over his glasses. He wore a different color of sweatshirt—red instead of blue—but his basic look was the same as it had been before. The shotgun stood against the wall behind him.

When I finished explaining what had happened, he swiveled the chair a bit to regard Jack.

She leaned against the wall, her arms folded across her chest. She wore a white blouse with gray low-cut slacks. She tapped the fingers of her right hand against her left elbow.

"How come you didn't tell me about all this mess you was into?"

She said, "I ain't gonna lie, Darnell. I kept it from you to protect you. I know that wasn't right, but that's what I did."

"Whatchoo expect from me now?"

"Nothing. Not a thing. I just wanted you to know what was going on. Figured I owed you that."

"Where'd you all take Alexis?" he asked.

"Alexis is gone. We don't know where. Don't want to know where."

He stared at her.

"Mm hmm."

Jack asked me, "Where'd you say they picked you up at?"

"A couple of miles from my brother's house."

Darnell turned his attention to me and said, "They ask you about either of us?"

"No."

They both stared me.

"No," I said again. "Really. They only seemed to know about me. They picked me up on my way to …"

I sat back in my chair.

"What?" Jack asked.

"That motherfucker."

"Who?"

"Belton."

I caught my parole officer unlocking the door to his office while trying to manage a bag of Chinese takeout. When he got the door open, I rushed him with my shoulder down and knocked him inside. He tripped over his own feet and his food hit the floor and exploded. He picked himself up from a mess of rice and chicken chunks and orange sauce. He seemed mad enough to take a crack at me, but then he saw me leaning against the door with the gun in my hand.

He wiped a long blond lock out of his face. "What the fuck are you doing?"

"Why'd you set me up, you piece of shit?"

"What the fuck are you talking about?"

"Don't play stupid with me."

He seemed to notice my face for the first time. Then he glanced back at the gun and held up his palms. "Look, I …"

"What?" I said. "You set me up. You know you did. You called me to get me out of the house."

"Look, Bennett, give me a break. I didn't have a choice. In this town, if Junius Kluge calls you and tells you to do something, you do it."

"Kluge put you up to it? He pay you?"

"No."

"You're a lying sack of shit, Belton. I know he paid you. Everybody pays you. Me, all your other parolees."

"You think I'm going to sweat down Junius Kluge?"

"I think he didn't have to force you to do shit. How much he give you?"

"Just a little cash. Nothing big."

"Nothing big to set me up to be beaten and killed."

Belton yelped, "He never said nothing about that. He just said they wanted to talk some sense into you."

"And he gave you a little cash. And you took it, like you take it from me and every other broad who gets out of Eastgate."

"Look," he said, "I got bills. I got a gambling problem. For real. No, listen, for real. I need that money. Now maybe I've been a little hard on you. You don't have to pay me. Okay?"

"What about all the other parolees under your watch? You still going to sweat those bitches down to pay your bills?"

For a moment, he looked like he might argue, but then he just lifted his palms. "What do you want me to say? You want me to leave them alone, sure, I'll leave them alone."

His desk phone started ringing.

"Answer it," I said.

He picked it up and stammered, "B-Belton."

He listened. His eyes jerked up at me. I showed him the little mic clipped to my necklace.

He hung up.

"You taped me."

"Well, there's no actual tape involved, but yeah I recorded you. I recorded you talking about Junius Kluge. I recorded you talking about setting me up to be killed. I recorded you admitting to being a corrupt piece of shit. Lucky for you, though, I'm not working for the cops."

His expression changed. He'd never taken a good look at me before. I'd just been another parolee. Now that I had him by the balls, I had his whole attention. He asked, "What do you want?"

"First, take out your wallet."

"What?"

"You got Kung Pao in your ears, motherfucker? Take out your wallet."

He pulled his wallet from his back pocket.

"Here."

He tossed it to me and I caught it without breaking eye contact with him. I was pretty happy about that. It was full of cash. I took it all out and shoved it in my pocket. Then I threw the empty wallet back at him.

"Let's consider that a little compensation for my time and trouble."

"Okay. Now what?"

"Now I want you to leave. I want you to quit your job and get in a car and leave town. No more embezzlement. No more blackmail. Starting now, you're former PO Belton."

He stared at me.

"You understand," I said.

"Yes."

"I swear to God, Belton. I will send this shit to the DA. And I guarantee you that every woman you've taken advantage of would love to tell the world about it. If nothing else, I bet the governor's people would love to know that you've been recorded talking about Junius Kluge."

I left him there covered in orange sauce to think about his future career options.

As far as I know, that was the last time anyone in town saw him.

Outside, Jack was waiting for me in her truck. I got in and she pulled away.

As I unclipped the mic, she said, "It work?"

I put the mic in the hollow armrest between us. "Yeah. Thank Darnell for me when you give it back to him."

"I mean the whole thing with Belton. Did it work?"

"I think so. He knew I wasn't bluffing, the miserable piece of shit."

We stopped at a traffic light.

"You nervous?" I asked.

"Be stupid not to be."

I watched her think. As I did, for some reason, I thought
Effervescence Jackson
. Nothing more than that, I just thought her name.

Her eyes darted at me. "What?"

"Something I always wondered."

"What's that?"

"How'd you get the name Effervescence?"

"My mama named me. Your mama not name you?"

"Sure, she named me after my great aunt Eleanor. You got a great aunt Effervescence?"

"No."

The light turned green and we crossed the street and headed toward her place.

She shrugged. "I don't know. Guess I was a happy baby. The name never did me no harm."

"You were the only person at Eastgate who knew how to spell Effervescence, I'll give you that."

She smiled. "I guess."

The sun shone through her windshield, so I flipped down the sun visor. Then, since it was down, I slid open the plastic cover on the mirror. Not much had changed. I still looked like shit.

"You okay?" she asked.

"What do you mean?"

"You know. What happened last night."

"Hell no, I'm not okay. But there's nothing I can do about it except deal with shit as it comes up. That's all I know to do."

"That's all there is to do."

We passed some women pushing strollers along the river walk.

"It's like my time in Eastgate. You try to plan the best you can, but all you can really do is handle what's in front of you."

Jack was quiet for a moment, and I could tell she was thinking about Eastgate.

"We all knew that deal with Paquita was a set up," she said. "You was always on the up with people. I never thought you whipped her ass."