Legal Tender (19 page)

Mrs. Zoeller kept shaking her head. “I tried to tell him, but he fell so in love with her you couldn’t tell him anything. Thought she was so smart and exciting. Sophisticated, I guess. He couldn’t see what was right in front of him. That’s just the way he is. The way he’s always been.”

I nodded, identifying.

“And that girl has some history, I’ll tell you. He knew all about it, but he ignored it.”

“Mrs. Zoeller, I can help Bill if you let me. Tell me where he is. I know he’s not responsible for the murder of that CEO.”

She frowned. “Oh, I mean, I don’t know. What do you think, Gus?”

He didn’t answer, but switched the focus of his attention from my bar card to the white doily at the center of the table. Silence fell, and I became suddenly aware of a loud grandfather clock in the corner.
Tick, tick, tick.

“Mrs. Zoeller,” I said, “I know it’s hard for you to trust me with Bill’s life, but you have no choice. I’m the only one who can clear him.”

“He’s the only one who can clear you,” Mr. Zoeller countered gruffly.

“Fair enough, I need Bill as much as he needs me. But that doesn’t change the fact that he needs me. I’m the only one who can prove the murder of the CEO was Eileen’s idea. If she did it without him, as I’m sure she did, I may be able to get his charges dropped or at least get him a plea bargain.”

“How can you do that?” Mrs. Zoeller asked, arching a delicate eyebrow. “You’re hiding.”

“I know plenty of criminal lawyers. I’ll get your son the best one I know and tell them he’s telling the truth. I can help Bill without showing myself.”

“What if they put him on trial for murder?” Her voice began to tremble slightly. “Won’t you have to be there and testify?”

“By then I’ll have this thing over with. I have a life to get back to, and a mother of my own.” It was a corny touch, but I wasn’t above it. Not with the stakes this high.

“Oh my. Your mother, too.” Mrs. Zoeller’s hand flew to her chest. “She must be so worried about you.”

“Worried sick.” Sick, sick, sick.

Tick, tick, tick.

“Mrs. Zoeller, you can trust me. I believe in what I do. I believe in the law, whether you’re rich or poor or cop or bad guy. And that’s enough with the speech.”

She smiled cautiously, then looked at her taciturn husband. “Gus, what do you think? Do you think you should take Bennie to see Bill?”

Eeek. “No, wait, Mrs. Zoeller. Tell me where Bill is and I’ll go alone.” I didn’t want Mr. Warmth anywhere near his stepson. Unless I missed my guess, he was half the reason for Bill’s acting out.

“Why? It’s far from here and hard to find. You said you got lost finding us.”

Think fast. “The police might be surveilling you and Mr. Zoeller. They know your car, but they don’t know mine. You don’t want to lead them to Bill, do you? Tell me where he is. I’ll go alone.”

She looked at Mr. Zoeller, who looked at his fingernails. “Gus? Should I?”

He turned his fist over, making her wait.

Tick, tick, tick.

“Gus?” she asked again, and it occurred to me there are many forms of domestic abuse. “Honey?”

“Up to you. He’s your son.”

She turned back to me. “More coffee, dear?”

“I’d love some,” I said.

And she smiled.

Tick.

I
got back in the bananamobile with my written directions and Mrs. Zoeller’s homemade map. Bill was holed up in a cabin his uncle owned and kept for hunting. The Zoellers thought it was untraceable to them and also that Bill hadn’t told Eileen about it. I wasn’t so sure. I had to believe Eileen knew about it, and had maybe even been there. A young man and a young girl, not shacking up in a shack? This was still America, wasn’t it?

I studied the map. The cabin was at the godforsaken frontier of the state, probably seven hours north of here and as far west as Pittsburgh. I needed gas, food, and more coffee. I ended up getting it at a minimart far from the Zoellers’ farm, in case there were any cops around.

“Nice car, Jamie,” said the teenaged attendant, who also sold me two bloated hot dogs.

“Jamie?”

“Your license plate.”

“Oh. Right.” I kept my head down, hurried back to the car, and took off.

I drove through tunnels blasted out of stony mountains and around corkscrew highways carved into grassy hills. It began to rain, and I sped by strip mall after wet strip mall. By the time I had gulped down the hot dogs and terrible coffee it was the worst storm the radio disc jockey had ever seen. Thunder rumbled in the western sky and my stomach rumbled, too, but not from the provisions. Finally I couldn’t stand it anymore and made a call on my cell phone.

“Is she okay?” I asked, when Hattie picked up.

“What? Bennie? Is that you?”

“Yes. Is she okay?” Gray rainwater pounded on the windshield. Between the storm and the static, we could barely hear each other.

“She’s fine! Fine!”

“When does she have the ECT?” The signal broke completely, and I waited for the crackling to subside.

“—Saturday morning, eleven o’clock! Bennie? You there? You okay?”

More crackling. It was maddening. When it stopped I yelled, “Why so soon? Can’t it wait until I’m there?”

“You worry about yourself! Your momma’s fine!”

“Make them wait, Hattie! You can’t do it alone!”

“She can’t wait!” she shouted, before the signal broke for the last time.

It was inconceivable that cops had followed me here, I couldn’t have followed myself here. I was utterly and completely lost. I sat in the bananamobile with the ignition off and the car light on. Rain pelted the roof, and I turned the homemade map this way and that. As best I could tell, I was in the middle of the woods, in the dark, in a thunderstorm.

There were no streetlights in the magic forest because there were no streets, just skinny, unmarked roads that snaked through the woods. I’d passed a nature preserve an hour ago, but since then the roads meandered around forgotten ponds and alongside endless stretches of trees. Trees were even less help than corn, and they all looked the same. Brown with green at the top. I wished for a match.

I grabbed the Keystone AAA map I’d found in the glove box and held it next to Mrs. Zoeller’s map. I would’ve called her if not for the cell phone records. I didn’t want to leave a paper trail, especially one consistent with the cops’ theory of me as Eileen and Bill’s accomplice. Besides, I should be able to figure this out myself. I stared at one map, then the other. Damn. I should be close.

Fuck it. I felt like I was close; I’d rather drive around and find it. I threw the maps on the mustardy hot dog wrappers, snapped off the light, and slammed the car into reverse. When I clicked on the high beams, they shone on a tiny sign through the trees. 149. What? I rubbed a hole in the foggy windshield with the side of my hand. 149 Cogan Road. That was it! The cabin. Holy shit!

I turned off the ignition and climbed out of the car, covering myself with an Eddie Vedder CD. Rain spattered through the tree branches and onto my suit. I tramped through the underbrush in leather pumps, finding my way in the darkness with an outstretched hand. If I planned ahead I would’ve kept the headlights on, but if I planned ahead I wouldn’t be wanted for a double murder.

Light shone like a yellow square from the cabin through the trees, guiding me as I trudged on. Luckily there were no creepy animal noises. I like my wildlife on leashes, with faces you can kiss. I picked up the pace and bumped into a branch, pouring rainwater onto my padded shoulder.

Shit. I stepped over a fallen log, shoes soggy and shrinking at the toe. I was in sight of the cabin, but could make out only its outline. The block of light looked bigger, closer. I slogged through mud and wet leaves and in ten minutes arrived at a clearing. There it was. The cabin. It was made of wood, weathered and ramshackle, and stood one story tall and barely twenty-five feet wide.

My heart lifted. I would see Bill and get to the bottom of this. I went to the door, also of wood and bearing a Z brace it clearly needed. I stepped on the ratty doormat and knocked.

“Bill?” I called softly, too paranoid to shout even in Timbuktu. There was no answer.

“It’s Bennie. Let me in.” I knocked again, louder this time. Again, no answer.

“Your mom sent me. I want to help you.” I reached for the doorknob, but there wasn’t one, just a metal latch and hook that had rusted years ago. I gathered security wasn’t an issue up here in the wholesomeness.

I pressed open the door. Suddenly, something clawed at my ankle. “Aaah!” I yelped. I flailed and shook it off. The CD clattered to the ground.

“Miaow!” came a thin, high screech, and I looked down. Cowering in the yellow slice of light from the room was a tan kitten with a spiny back. Jesus. I swallowed hard, picked up the kitten, and told my heart to stop pounding. I went through the door and inside the cabin.

“Bill, look what the cat dragged in,” I called out, but there wasn’t a sound except for the rain’s patter on the roof. I stood motionless in the living room, which was empty and still. It contained a tattered couch, a lamp with a dim bulb, and a spartan galley kitchen. Hunting fatigues hung on an industrial rack against the wall. There was no TV, phone, or radio. Bill was nowhere in sight. Nobody was. Nothing looked out of order, but I was getting the creeps.

“Miaow?” The kitten jumped from my arms, her tail curled like a question mark.

“Don’t ask me, cat.”

The kitten padded into a dark adjoining room I presumed was the bedroom. I followed, edgy, and groped on the bedroom wall for a light switch.

I flicked it on and gasped. The sight was horrifying. There, stretched out on the bed in shorts and a T-shirt, was Bill.

Dead.

B
ill’s eyes were wide open in a face that looked frozen, and his skin had the unmistakable gray-white of a corpse. Blood caked in a parched river from his nose and dried over his child’s freckles, staining his shirt brown and soaking stiff a shabby plaid bedspread. I couldn’t believe my eyes, even as they moved down his body.

A twisted pink balloon was wrapped around his upper arm like a tourniquet. It was jarringly out of place, cheery and bright, next to a lethal syringe still stuck in the crook of his arm. The balloon was still taut, so Bill’s forearm was the only part of his body that had blood in it. It was red and grotesquely swollen to the size of a club, rendering his fingers shapeless and puffy. Lying beside him on the bed was a plastic Baggie.

I backed against the bedroom door. My eyes smarted but I couldn’t look away. Bill, on drugs? An overdose? Was it possible?

“Miaow?” asked the kitten. It had jumped to the bed and was futilely rubbing against Bill’s too-pale leg.

Bill hadn’t been the type to do drugs. Had he just become despondent, or made a mistake? Maybe whatever happened with Eileen and the CEO had set him off. I remembered Mrs. Zoeller. Bill was her only child. If only I’d gotten here sooner. If only I hadn’t gotten lost.

Why had he died?

I forced my brain to function. I flashed on Bill at the stationhouse, his arms flabby and white in his jumpsuit. Weren’t his arms clean when I saw them? I’d had a client, a former heroin addict, and he’d showed me his arms once. They were so bumpy with scar tissue they looked like Amtrak’s eastern corridor.

“Miaow?” said the cat, pacing back and forth on the bed.

I fought back my emotions and leaned over Bill’s body, catching a scent of blood and feces. His arms lay stiff at his sides, and I squinted at them. No needle tracks on either one. It didn’t make sense. Was it the first time Bill had tried heroin? How likely was that? What about Eileen, did she have something to do with this? Who else did Bill know?

“Miaow!”

I looked around the bedroom. There was a bare night table and a cheap dresser with some paperbacks on top, next to an Ace comb. There was no sign to reveal what had happened. Beyond the dresser was the bathroom, and I crossed to it and peered inside. A tube of toothpaste and one of Clearasil sat on the tiny, dirty sink. There was no medicine chest, just a toilet and an old frameless mirror, its silvering wrinkled.

I faced the bedroom and poor Bill’s body on the bed. My heart felt heavy, my chest tight. From all outward appearances, he had sat at the end of the bed, mixed himself his first hit of heroin, then flopped backwards, dead of an overdose.