Ill Will (31 page)

“So you’re sicker than a dog and yet you have to drag your carcass in there to treat kids with runny noses.”

“Adults with runny noses. I don’t do pediatrics. Many people do this—get cancer treatment and keep on working. I’m just going to be another one of them.”

“I can drive you to work if you want. And pick you up.”

She put her hand against my cheek. “Thank you, but no. I have to find out what I can do, how much this is going to affect me. If I need you to drive, I’ll let you know, okay? But right now I need to do this myself.”

I nodded. It is hard to desperately want to help someone and know all you can do is stand aside. I leaned in and kissed her and then watched her walk out the door.

And all I could do was walk out the door myself and go on with my life as best I could.

Somehow I ended up in front of my office without really being aware of driving there—it was a good thing that I worked in a quiet, mostly residential neighborhood, with roadways more forgiving of inattentive drivers.

I trudged up the stairs, feeling helpless and impotent, a bystander in a great drama, one with an uncertain end. As I hid my crying from Cordelia, I suspected she hid her fears from me—this was her first mention of insurance and how tenuous it might be for her to keep it.

My answering machine was blinking like a strip club on Bourbon Street. I could remotely check it, but hadn’t bothered to do that yesterday.

Danny had called to let me know that Dudley had finally woken up and immediately lawyered up. He was still in the hospital, from which he would be transported to the jail as soon as he was well enough.

Joanne called to tell me essentially the same thing with an added warning to be careful; while Dudley wouldn’t be knocking on my door anytime soon, it was possible he might ask someone else to do it for him. He was stupid enough to think that killing me might make his legal troubles go away.

Mr. Charles Williams had also called—
why
was I not surprised—and wanted to know if there was any update on the case. Oh, and would I be willing to speak to his nephew? He couldn’t pay me anything, but he made really good gumbo and he’d bring me a batch.

Alex had called, just to see how I was doing. I was heartened to hear from her. She left a Baton Rouge number to call back. If she was worried about how I was doing, maybe it meant she was doing better herself.

Lydia had called, no message except to call her. I didn’t recognize the number as the office one, so I guessed it was her cell phone. I could only hope that it was to tell me how wrong I was and that everything was some stupid mistake, a computer error or something. Cordelia needing them to keep her on for insurance made that almost necessary.

Then a call from someone named Rafe—I think—he mumbled, no message, just a number to call back. Probably a wrong number.

Several hang-ups. Wrong numbers or people who didn’t like leaving messages.

E-mail was also a pile. The problem with catching up on responding to people is that a large number of them feel the need to respond back again, so then you’re no longer caught up.

Vincent had written Deborah, a chatty little piece about offering to help if she needed any advice or suggestions. Interestingly it wasn’t from his NBG e-mail, but from another account. Guess he didn’t want to be caught poaching in the alpha wolf’s turf.

Mrs. Fletcher McConkle—Donna—had asked her father the name of the bad contractor. It wasn’t one of the names Prejean had used. Maybe it was an additional alias. And maybe just another sloppy contractor. She also passed on that the man they were working for told her that Dudley was misguided and had gotten in with the wrong crowd. Right—that so didn’t sound like my kind of neighborhood—anyone rich enough to live close to me can’t be bad.

But I didn’t call anyone back. It seemed too hard to pick up the phone and pretend that I cared about whatever it was they were worried about.

Alex. Call Alex.
I finally dialed her number. But no good deed goes unpunished. My call went straight to voice mail. I started to hang up, but instead left a message that she could call me if she had the chance.

Then I booted up a computer game and played for the next hour.

I had just been killed and was trying to decide whether to go back and start again when my character was still alive or give up and spend the next half hour debating on what to get for lunch when the phone rang.

I might not have the energy to make a call, but I could at least not be so slothful as to not answer one. I picked up the receiver.

“Michele Knight?” my caller asked in a voice that was a rough whiskey growl. I didn’t recognize it.

“This is the Michele Knight Detective Agency,” I answered, using a slightly higher nasal tone, as if there was an actual secretary here.

“Need to talk to Knight. She in?”

“May I say who’s calling?”

“Rafe Gautier.”

“Just a moment, I’ll see if she’s available.” I put the phone down, took a sip of water, and pitched my voice lower as I answered, “This is Michele Knight. What can I do for you?”

“Detective business not going well?”

“I beg your pardon?”

“Moonlighting selling herbal shit. Or are you on a case?”

“Who are you and what do you want?”

“You were pretty good, didn’t card you till I ran your license.”

The pro at the NBG meeting. I felt stupid for letting him get my license plate and tracing me. “What’s your interest?”

“What are you up to? If you say extra money, I won’t believe you.”

“You’re a voice on the other end of a phone. No reason in hell for me to do anything other than hang up.”

“Would it surprise you if I told you that Grant Walters was indicted on fraud about ten years ago?”

“Nope, no surprise. But he wasn’t convicted, as there was no record.”

“Enough money, good lawyers, he got off. He pissed off a lot of people up in Dallas. Interested in teaming up? We seem to be working on something similar.”

“Sorry, I’m all booked up this week and next.”

He ignored that. “Let’s set up a meeting. Tomorrow morning? I’ll even come to your office.”

“How about that coffee shop right near the corner of Royal and Conti?”

“Across the street from the cop shop? Don’t trust me?”

“Any reason I should?” I said affably enough, considering the situation.

“Nope, not a one. Tomorrow at ten.”

I started to protest—not that I had anything else scheduled, but I wasn’t going to give in to his calling the shots, but the phone was already buzzing in my ear. He’d hung up.

Of course, nothing said I had to show up.

But his call reminded me that life doesn’t stop. I needed to call back the people who had called me and write those who had e-mailed. Maybe their concerns were less important than mine—and maybe they weren’t. I only knew pieces of their lives. Certainly in the past I’d stumbled over someone who was staring at loss and they returned my call, went on as if their heart wasn’t breaking. It was now my turn.

Joanne and Danny were also messages on voice mail. I assured them both I would be careful.

Mr. Charles Williams could wait. Maybe I’d get great insight into the case over coffee with Rafe tomorrow. I desperately wanted to delay—until infinity—any discussion of talking to his nephew.

I dialed Lydia’s cell phone number. She answered on the third ring.

“This is Micky Knight returning your call.”

She didn’t answer for a moment, as if trying to remember who I was and why she called me.

I added, “So are you going to tell me I was wrong about the problems with the billing?”

She said, “Can we meet? I can’t talk now.”

“Yeah. When and where?” I almost hoped she’d say ten a.m. tomorrow so I’d have an excuse to avoid Rafe. He sounded like the kind of man who smoked.

“Tomorrow evening? Maybe around seven?”

“I can do that. Where?”

“I’m not sure. I’ll text you. Please don’t mention this to Cordelia.”

She didn’t wait for a reply.

I stared at my phone for a moment, puzzled. I couldn’t come up with a good reason for Lydia to want to see me. If I was wrong, then I was wrong and she just had to tell me that. If I was right, she should be calling the police—or their insurance investigator, not me. My best guess was she found something not quite a smoking gun, but worrisome enough to concern her. She didn’t know enough about private eyes to know we specialized just like doctors and fraud wasn’t my specialty.

Or maybe she thought I was interesting and wanted to get to know me just in case I was single in the near future. I quashed that thought.

My social calendar for tomorrow was getting full—that just left me with today to get through.

I, as Debbie, replied to Vincent’s e-mail, nicely stringing him along—what was the one thing he wished he’d known when he started out and what did he think made him so successful, before asking the same question I’d asked his boss—if someone was sick, cancer, what would he recommend to help?

Then I tackled the weighty lunch issue. After perusing all the takeout and delivery menus in the office, I went with the cheese and crackers I kept here. With an apple for the fruit and veggie serving.

After lunch I roused myself. Rafe making my license plate convinced me that I did need a cheap cell phone for Debbie to use. It was too risky to attempt to get away with mine—or if I could find one, a pay phone. No one used pay phones these days. Debbie might be down on her luck, but she wasn’t cell phone–less down on her luck.

I wasn’t up for the Metairie ’burbs, so I headed east to Chalmette. It had been inundated during Katrina, a working-class town down the river from the devastated Lower Ninth Ward. I was guessing enough people had come back that there had to be a few cell phone stores. It was one of those places that you drive to and it’s different every time—new stores, something rebuilt, something torn down.

I was right. There were still gaping holes, empty parking lots, but a surprising number of new stores and businesses had opened. Including the kind of cheap electronics places I was looking for.

In less than an hour I was heading back to my office, with a new prepaid cheap plastic cell phone. Hot pink case because that was the kind of girl Debbie was.

Once back in my office I debated calling Grant Walters, aka alpha wolf, but decided to hold off for another day. I didn’t want him to think I was too eager. Or too desperate. I suspected he didn’t like desperate. And if I was lucky I might be able to find out a few more things about him at my coffee klatch with Rafe tomorrow.

I spent the rest of the afternoon searching online for food ideas for people struggling with nausea. Cordelia could not live on chicken soup alone. After jotting down a few recipes, I didn’t even pretend that I could work. Instead I made another run to the grocery store to stock up on thinks like rice, broth, oatmeal, and small containers so she could eat in little portions. Several times during the day I had wanted to call her, but she was right, she had to do it on her own. I had to trust that she would call me if she needed me.

I took it as a good sign that I got home first. That meant she was still at work, which meant she was okay working.

Or had gotten so sick they’d hospitalized her.

No, someone would have called me. Especially as I’d already talked to Lydia. It wasn’t likely that she’d ask me not to mention our meeting to Cordelia, but forget to tell me that Cordelia had collapsed and was rushed to the emergency room.

I started two pots of rice, one plain, bland white rice, the other a brown rice with a nice mix of rosemary, garlic, and chicken.

I even fed the cats early. They started to eat, then heard her car pull up and decided to pull the “this food is from the morning and we’re starving” routine and stuck up their noses. “Don’t bother,” I admonished them. “She’ll believe me before she believes you. Speech, it’s a human thing.”

I stayed in the kitchen, resisting my instinct to meet her at the door. As much as I could, I was determined to keep to our usual routines.

“Hey, you’re home early,” she called from the other room.

“Slow day. I wanted to be here for you.” I turned around to look as her as entered the kitchen. Tired, dark circles under her eyes. “How was your day?”

“I managed to keep lunch down for fifteen minutes. All three crackers and half a cup of soup.” She put her arms around me, resting her head on my shoulders. “I did okay as long as I didn’t eat. I think it was the smell of the fried chicken that did me in. I don’t think I can ever do grease again. Plus everyone was way too nice. Maybe that was what made me barf—the skinny little receptionist offering to carry a stack of charts, Brandon offering to write me any prescription I needed, three people offering to bring me back lunch, two bottles of water in the bathroom while I was vomiting. I really wish they’d stop reminding me that I have cancer.” Then she lifted her head and said, “But I’m okay, mostly. Alex called. It looks like she and Joanne are breaking up.”

“What?” I said. “She called me, too, but we just traded messages. Joanne left a message, too, but it was business.” I decided that there was enough going on without revealing that Dudley was awake.