Off You Go (5 page)

He’d invited a banjoist named T.A. Reddick
to join him. Reddick had just left the DEA, so he understood
addiction. T.A. had gladly accepted, not knowing Dewey had another
motive as well.

***

Twenty-four men and women, all addicts of
varying degrees, sat in folding chairs under the shade of an oak
tree behind the two-story brick house that had been turned into a
rehab/halfway house by an older addict who had been sober for
twenty-something years. He had thrown a bunch of bunk beds into the
bedrooms, six coffee makers into the kitchen, ashtrays on every
stoop, and started inviting people. Dewey had heard about it at his
first AA meeting, and it had done the trick.

It was Mexico hot, and Dewey’s short sleeve
button-down was showing perspiration. He’d put his fedora on the
ground next to him. Everybody had the Big Book open in their laps,
and more than half of them held burning cigarettes in their
fingers, smoke rising into the air like lowcountry fog. After the
Serenity Prayer, the experienced ones took turns reading and
commenting. With a butt in between his fingers, Dewey read a bit
about spirituality and talked about what it meant to him, how
finding something to believe in had pulled him through. For Dewey,
it was love. The love he felt for his family. He talked about Erica
and Sonya and Elizabeth, and he wiped away tears as he spoke about
the pain of not coming home to them every day.

A young woman, maybe twenty, took the
spotlight next and told her story. She looked too young to be
there, but there were always a few of those. She pulled at her
necklace as she spoke of her alcoholism and getting kicked out of
her house at sixteen, and having a child when she was seventeen
with a drug addict who still didn’t know she’d gotten pregnant. Not
too long ago, she put a gun to her head. But before she pulled the
trigger, her son walked in. It was at that moment that she woke up
and realized that she couldn’t leave him alone. She found an AA
meeting and checked into rehab that day. And she was now
seventy-one days sober. No eyes were dry by the time she
finished.

T.A. Reddick pulled up in his old CJ7 Jeep
as the meeting was finishing. Dewey asked for ten minutes and went
over to say hello. The bluegrass world is a small one, and Dewey
kept hearing T.A.’s name, but everyone said he never took the
stage. Desperate for some musical companionship, Dewey had finally
found someone who knew where T.A. lived and paid him a visit with a
mandolin in his hand. T.A. invited him into his James Island home,
they picked music on the dock overlooking the marsh late into the
night, and a friendship began. That was five months ago.

T.A. hopped down from his Jeep in cowboy
boots and jeans. Dewey had never seen him in anything else. The man
was in good shape, built tough, but nothing was out of place and
bulky. During their picking sessions, T.A. had shared stories of
his life with the DEA, and it was a wonder he was still alive. You
could see the scars of rough living. He’d left that all behind,
though, and was now living off an inheritance from his murdered
father and some good money he was making from writing country songs
for well-known Nashville artists.

“
Thanks for coming.” Dewey
reached out and shook his hand.

“
I’ll play for anybody
willing to listen, brutha.” He pulled his banjo from the back.
“How’s your jumper case?”

“
Jumper case?” Dewey
asked.

“
The girl who
jumped.”

“
Oh, coming along.
Actually, I have a favor to ask you.” Dewey handed him a brown
bag.

“
What’s this?”

“
A pregnancy test and a
hairbrush.”

“
I appreciate it. You
saved me a trip to the store.”

Dewey laughed. “Do you think you could find
out if the test was used by the same person who owned the
hairbrush? I’m sure there is DNA, if not prints. Do you still have
connections?”

“
I could probably make it
happen.”

“
I’ll trade you for a
basket of my veggies and a big bag of those Cajun boiled peanuts
you like.”

“
Give me a
day.”

Dewey and T.A. tuned up
and played for those lost souls of addiction for more than an hour,
and it made their audience damn happy. It made Dewey happy, too.
They both sang and played their asses off, performing like there
was ten thousand people watching them, and as T.A. wrapped up the
set with a “Shave and a Haircut”
lick,
Dewey looked at each one of those addicts with encouragement,
hoping they would keep fighting the good fight. Keep fighting, keep
hoping, and keep loving.

***

Dewey got back to his
place around seven, eager to find out if the Hungry Hippo had
responded. Still in a bluegrass state of mind, he put on
Church Street Blues
and
let Tony Rice get after it for a while.

With little hope, Dewey opened up Gina’s
computer. “I don’t even know why you’d still be checking this
e-mail unless you have some other women on the line. I guess I
won’t put that past you. It’s a slippery slope, my friend.”

He got to her account. The Hungry Hippo had
replied. “How about that!” Dewey yelled. He clapped his hands. “How
about that!”

CHAPTER 6

The e-mail read:
Oh, my God, baby. Is this really you? What did
you do? I’m so happy. Can we meet tomorrow at 11 a.m.? Same place
as last week? I can’t get away until then. Are you still in
Charleston? Be careful.
He didn’t sign his
name.

Dewey read it several times. “How the hell
am I going to figure out where you met the last time?” he asked.
Dewey pulled a smoke from the deck of Spirits and put one in his
mouth. No smoking inside but he liked to let one dangle sometimes.
Without thinking much more about it, he replied to the e-mail in
the affirmative, figuring he worked best under pressure. He now had
fifteen hours to figure things out.

He pulled up Gina’s calendar, thinking that
was a good place to start. Maybe she had written the meeting spot
down, though it was unlikely. Matter of fact, judging by what he’d
heard about Gina—the way she’d floated through life, how she had
never even tried to find a job—Dewey guessed she wasn’t that
organized or busy enough to need a calendar. He was right. The
calendar had never been used.

He dialed Faye. She wasn’t able to give him
any leads, but she said she’d e-mail him Gina’s credit and debit
card statements for the past few months. Without wasting any time,
he called Gina’s best friend, Sandra Wyatt. He’d gotten her name
and number from the list Faye had given him when they first
discussed the case. A woman answered.

“
Hi, my name is Bob
Tooman,” Dewey said, offering a fake name. He didn’t want to leave
a trail. “Is this Sandra?”

“
Yes, it is.”

“
Gina’s mom hired me to
help settle her affairs, and she told me that you’d be happy to
answer some questions. Is there any way I could meet you somewhere?
It’s nothing to be concerned about. I’m trying to return a few
things to their rightful owners, make sure everyone is aware of her
passing, that kind of thing. It’ll just take a few minutes. I can
come to you.”

“
Anything to help. I’m at
Pearlz Oyster Bar with some friends.”

Dewey promised he’d be there in thirty
minutes and let her go. He could have asked the questions over the
phone, but that would have been lazy detective work. It’s always
best to get in front of them. To let them see you’re human—and to
catch them in any lies.

***

Dewey called Sandra on his cell as he
arrived at Pearlz, and she came out and met him. Sandra was a dark
blonde with light blue eyes. A Louis Vuitton handbag hung from her
shoulders and a sign on her forehead said she was a former sorority
girl through and through. Dewey had a love/hate with her kind. They
took a seat outside at one of the empty wrought iron tables lined
along East Bay. It was windy and warm, a nice combination.

“
Thanks for meeting me,”
Dewey said. “I know this isn’t easy to bring back up.”

“
No, it’s not.” She was
sipping a Cosmo but appeared sober.

“
Did it surprise
you?”

“
Yeah, absolutely. She
didn’t seem that broken up to me over anything. I know she had some
problems in the past, but I thought they were over.”

“
How long have you known
her?”

“
We met at the
College.”

“
The College of
Charleston?”

She smiled. “Yes, the College of Knowledge.
I guess this was…ten years ago. We were both Tri-Delts.”

Ding! Ding!
Yep, he was right.
Yo,
ho, ho, a sorority life for me!
Dewey
loved and hated sorority girls, especially Tri-Delts. His first
broken heart was a Tri-Delt at the College of Charleston, back when
Gina and Sandra were in diapers. This girl had ripped him apart,
and he was still thinking about it.

A young man in a mustache approached the
table and asked if Dewey wanted anything. Dewey almost said that
he’d love a half-liter of vodka and a dozen oysters shooters, but
he held his tongue and shook his head. Being at a bar surrounded by
alcohol was not easy business for him, but that was part of the
drill. He had to get used to being the only one without a drink in
his hand.

Looking back at Sandra, he asked, “So you
didn’t pick up any sadness last time you two hung out?”

“
Not at all. She was on
top of the world.” Sandra frowned. She suddenly seemed suspicious.
“What does this have to do with cleaning up her affairs? What did
you say your name was again?”

“
Bob Tooman. These are
standard questions. It helps if I understand things.” This girl had
read too many mysteries. “Do you know who Gina was seeing? I have
some of his stuff I’d like to get back to him.”

“
Mrs. Callahan already
asked me that.”

Dewey tried a more sympathetic approach.
“Sorry, I didn’t know that. I haven’t gotten much out of her. She’s
pretty torn up.”

“
Yeah, I know. She and
Gina were really tight. Anyway, I don’t know if she was seeing
anyone. She hadn’t told me about it. Could have been a one-night
stand. It wouldn’t have been the first. I’m sure the guy will show
up if he really cares about his things.”

“
You’re probably right.”
Dewey lit up a Spirit and blew the smoke off to the side. “I think
Mrs. Callahan is hoping I might find some answers while I’m poking
around. That’s between you and me, of course. It’s something that
usually comes with the territory. You learn a lot about someone
going through all their things and meeting their friends and
family.”

“
I can
imagine.”

“
When was the last time
you saw her?” Dewey noticed her tensing up, and he knew he needed
to back off the interrogation. “Did you get a chance to spend any
quality time with her before she died?”

“
We worked out together
Thursday, the day before she…you know. She was supposed to come to
dinner with a bunch of us to celebrate my birthday but she said she
couldn’t. Even though she’d already promised me. That wasn’t like
her. And then she was dead. I guess she had already decided on
killing herself, but it seemed weird to work out the day
before.”

“
She didn’t tell you why
she was cancelling?”

“
She is the queen of
vague. She said something personal was going on and didn’t
elaborate. I called her a bitch and walked away.” She took a deep
breath. “That’s the last thing I ever said to my best
friend.”

“
That’s tough.” Dewey had
an urge to argue with her and try to show that she had nothing to
regret. People never know when someone is going to die, and
arguments are a part of life. But Dewey held back, knowing that
sometimes women just want to vent. Yes: Dewey, the Woman Whisperer.
He encouraged the venting by saying, “If you could only take it
back, right?”

“
Yeah,
exactly.”

Good job, Dewey. Now go in
for another question
. “What time was it
that y’all left the gym?”

She wiped her eyes. “We always go from seven
to eight, just before I have to work.”

As the tears began to fall, Dewey’s success
in getting anything more out of her dwindled. After about fifteen
more minutes, he wished her well and hit the road.

***

Dewey drove back over to Gina’s. Candice was
sitting on the porch just like last time, her legs kicked up on the
table, her eyes on her book.

“
Still hooked?” Dewey
asked.

“
Hey, there. Yes, I’m
hooked badly.”

Dewey kept walking to Gina’s door, trying to
indicate he was in a hurry. “No one came by?”

“
Not that I’ve seen. Can I
offer you a cup of tea?”

“
No, thanks. I’m in a
rush.”

“
What a shame,” she said
with disappointment.

Was she hitting on him? He
dropped the key
twice
before finally getting it into the lock. Why hadn’t they done
that when he was young and single?

Making it inside
unscathed, Dewey went straight to the trash can in the kitchen.
He’d seen something that had stood out in his mind the last time.
Trying not to inhale too much of the odors, he began digging.
Finally, after several dry heaves, he pulled out a receipt from
Common Ground, a coffee shop in Beaufort, South Carolina. It was
time stamped at 11:32 a.m. the Thursday before, not too long after
Gina had left the gym in Charleston. The day before she jumped.
What most interested Dewey was that she’d bought
two
coffees.