Black Beans & Vice (16 page)

"Uh oh;" he spoke to his reflection in the rearview mirror. "With
Jane sleeping over, I forgot to listen to my reinforcement CD. I've
missed two nights in a row! No wonder I feel the old cravings coming to life." He parked the truck next to Milla's lavender minivan, relieved that he'd be the only guest. "It's a good thing I'm seeing Harmony for another session tomorrow."

The renovated kitchen in his former home was filled with delicious aromas. Milla was just pulling a coffee cake from the oven
when James tapped on the back door and let himself in.

"Oh! I am so glad you showed up!" Milla placed the cake on the
stovetop and gave James a hug. The warmth from her oven mitts seeped through his shirt, sending a soothing feeling across the
width of his back. "I asked Willow to join us this morning, but she
couldn't make it. She and Francis are off to catch a matinee-some
killer robot movie Francis has been waiting to see for months."

"Looks like you cooked enough to fill them to the point of
exploding!" James exclaimed, eying a platter of crisp bacon and
sausage links. "But I'd be delighted to eat Willow's share. In fact, I
came over hoping you'd want to feed me."

Milla beamed. "Nothin' would please me more. And you know
I have to make piles of bacon for your daddy. That man loves his
meat!" She sprinkled pepper over a frying pan filled with scrambled eggs and gestured at the coffeemaker. "That's a fresh pot. Get
yourself a cup and tell me how my grandson is doin' with his new
diet."

James selected a mug from the cupboard, noting the chip on the
rim. The majority of the coffee cups were damaged in some way
and the dinner plates weren't much better. Jackson might have given
the kitchen and upstairs bedrooms and baths a makeover, but those
major cosmetic changes were enough to last him for decades.

Milla had brought her own cookware to the marriage, but she
appeared to be perfectly content with the chipped crockery, the
twenty-year-old curtains, and the ancient television in the den.
She merely filled a closet with her clothes, added some pots and
pans to the cabinets, and hung a few pictures on the wall. Most
of these were of her beloved Corgi, Price Charles, who had passed
away in his sleep shortly after Jackson and Milla were married, but
there were photographs from her childhood as well. The end result was a house simultaneously marked by both of Jackson's two wives and no one entered the structure without feeling immediately and inexplicably at home.

"Eliot is still committed to his decision to be a vegetarian,"
James answered Milla's question as he fixed his coffee. "He complains about all the extra fruit and vegetables that show up in his
lunchbox, but he eats them."

"Stickin' by his guns, just like his daddy and granddaddy." Milla
used a spatula to lift a scalding bacon, egg, and cheese sandwich
from her griddle onto a plate. James stopped her before she could
add a piece of coffee cake, though the cinnamon crumble topping
sorely tempted him. "You still trying to avoid sugar?" she asked.

"I am. I don't know that it's done any good, but I'll weigh myself tomorrow and hope for the best." James put his plate down on
the kitchen table. "Where's Pop? Out in the shed?"

"Yes. He's doing a new series of paintings showing women at
work." Milla set a loaded dish in front of Jackson's place. "'Course
he won't let me look at them until they're done, but perhaps you'd
be willing to risk your neck and tell him his lunch is ready and already getting cold."

Jackson shouted his usual, "Go away!" when James knocked on
the shed door.

"Come on, Pop. Milla's made you a meal fit for a king!"

"I don't doubt that," Jackson mumbled, but his voice betrayed
his anticipation. "I gotta finish this one thing, but it just ain't
comin' out right." There was a pause and then Jackson shouted,
"Damnation!"

James smiled. "Let me in, Pop. Or I'll huff and I'll puff..."

After a long hesitation, Jackson shuffled over to the door and
slid a key into the padlock. His face appeared in the doorway, but he made no move to allow James inside. "That big, bad wolf thing
never gets any funnier, no matter how often you say it." Finally,
he sighed and backed away, letting his son enter his private haven.
"Go ahead. Never mind my food's gettin' cold as ice."

Jackson had begun his artistic career by painting birds. He then
focused on the rendering of people's hands as they performed various tasks. After that, he produced a large number of paintings of
little boys (all of whom bore a close resemblance to Eliot) until
the D.C. gallery owner (who also happened to be Lindy's mother)
asked him to find a fresh subject.

Taking her advice, Jackson had worked feverishly for the past
few months. He'd started at Dolly's Diner, watching the waitresses
and of course, Dolly herself. After painting a woman bearing a
heavy serving tray, he'd selected a cashier at Food Lion, a female
construction worker, and a mother balancing a toddler on one
hip and a bag of dog kibble on the other. The women were busy
concentrating on their tasks, their faces aglow with purpose. Every captured movement held a trace of power, and the determination in each woman's plain face transformed them into radiant
beauties.

"You've done it again," James whispered in awe as he stared at
the canvases. "These are magical."

Suddenly, he had an idea. "Pop? I'd like to talk to you about a
commission."

Jackson snorted. "You can't afford me, my boy."

Knowing his father was just giving him a hard time, James
slung an arm over the older man's bony shoulders and squeezed.
"Come on, Pop. I know how much you want me to drive you to
Home Depot this afternoon."

"All right, son. We'll talk in the kitchen. Can't make sense of
anythin' without a big plate of bacon."

Later that afternoon, James returned home with the parts he
needed to replace the leaking faucets in the master bath and the
kitchen sink. He'd never had reason to perform home repairs
before as Jackson had handled all the maintenance around the
Henry home, but he was excited to learn. Armed with a Time Life
book on basic plumbing, James felt confident that he possessed
the smarts and the tools to complete the necessary repairs.

He began with the bathroom faucet. By the time he'd figured
out how to turn off the water, replace the faucet, and clean the water spots from the countertop, mirror, and floor, the sky had begun
turning the orchid-purple of twilight.

James decided to repair the kitchen sink before heating up a
dinner of roast chicken marinated in white wine and rosemary
with a side of butter beans. It was only when he laid out his tools
on a dishcloth next to the cutting board that he happened to
glance out the window facing the backyard.

Something was hanging from the yellow birdhouse he'd placed
in the center of a ring of Knock Out rosebushes behind the deck.
The birdhouse stood on a tall wooden post and a light breeze was
wafting through the yard, causing what appeared to be a piece of
paper taped to the base of the birdhouse to flutter up and down.

Laying his wrench on the dishtowel, James stepped outside and
walked to the garden bed. After pulling the letter off the birdhouse,
he swiveled so the waning sun would illuminate the plain white sheet. He read the single sentence printed there in plain block letters. Stunned, he read it again. It said:

STAY AWAY FROM HER

Taped to the bottom of the paper was a single black feather.

JAMES STOOD ROOTED TO the spot for
several minutes, his eyes moving from
the letter to the deepening shadows in
the trees and back to the letter again.
His eyes fixed on the words and his body
became unnaturally still, as though an
invisible Gorgon had turned him into a
piece of statuary. When something flew
past his face, startling him, he looked up and saw a cluster of bats
darting across the purplish sky. The rapid fluttering of their wings
and their high-pitched squeaks awoke James from his immobility.

Rushing into the kitchen, he eased the letter into a gallon-sized
freezer bag, grabbed his car keys from the counter, and dashed out
to the Bronco. A combination of anger and fear caused him to take
the winding mountain roads at a risky pace, but his dependable
old truck gripped the pavement as though sensing James' need.

Once, as James paused at a stop sign, he glanced at the letter lying on the passenger seat. The words, printed in bold ink, seemed
to be silently shouting at him and the black feather looked like the
curve of a malicious smile at the bottom of the paper.

He did not look over again.

It took less than ten minutes to reach Lucy's house on the outskirts of town. As James pulled into her dirt driveway, stirring up
billows of dust as he rammed his gear stick into park, her three
German Shepherds bounded from the open gate in the backyard
and swarmed the Bronco. Though the dogs had known James for
years and were intelligent enough to recognize his truck on sight,
they enjoyed the idea of intimidating any intruder and began a
chorus of snarling and barking raucous enough to wake the entire
valley.

James rolled his window down an inch. "Bono! Bon Jovi! Benatar! It's me!"

Clearly, the canines were not impressed by the voice of their
mistress' ex-boyfriend. In fact, they curled their lips, revealing
more of their threatening fangs and their dark eyes glimmered
with excitement.

"Come on, now." He pleaded with them through the window.
"I've seen all of you act like oversized lap cats plenty of times! I
know this is all a front. A few Milkbones and you're putty in any-
one's hands. Are you going to let me out or what?"

Apparently, they weren't. Tails swishing with glee, the dogs
circled the Bronco and carried on with their howling until Lucy
opened her front door. James only saw her for a second, but he
could have sworn that she was wearing a slinky nightie. She vanished from view, returning less than a minute later.

Attired in sweatpants and a tank top, Lucy trotted down her
front steps and walked hurriedly toward the drive, shouting at the
dogs to "stand down." James noticed her feet were bare and she
didn't seem too pleased to see him.

That was when James noticed there were two vehicles parked
along the fence line toward the rear of Lucy's house. Her dirt-covered jeep and a mud-splattered Camaro.

"I'm sorry," he said after she'd secured the disappointed canines in the enclosed backyard. "If I known you had company..."
he trailed off. "Actually, I would have come anyway. You're the first
person I thought of to turn to..." He met her eyes and saw that
the initial disapproval he'd seen there had been replaced by concern.

"What's wrong, James?" She stepped aside, beckoning for him
to get out of his truck.

He handed her the letter and then explained about the dead
birds left at Jane's house.

Lucy brought the plastic bag closer to her face. "Doesn't sound
like a coincidence to me. A crow was nailed to her door and now
there's a crow's feather taped to this letter." She shook her head.
"I don't like this. Someone's trespassed on two properties and deliberately placed animal corpses or threatening letters in strategic
locations. It's too invasive and far too sinister to be considered a
practical joke."