Little Girl Lost 6: The Return of Johnnie Wise (39 page)

But for Johnnie, there was a huge level of fear mounting if she refused him. Even though he thought he hid his determination to have her no matter what, she knew that he was prepared to overpower her and force his way into her. His lust demanded fulfillment. He hadn’t had sex with her for six months, and she thought he was probably thinking about it every day, wanting to take her recklessly if she wouldn’t freely give him the music that calmed his savage beast. Billy Logan had coveted her for two years before he finally took what he had been hungering and thirsting for, and had given her a thorough beating in the process, damaging the organ that he had used for his pleasure. And she knew that if she refused Earl, he would take it, too. He had carefully constructed his plan to win her back, and he would not be denied. He would take what his ever-present beast demanded, and then set his judicial hounds of “justice” on her trail.

“Are you going to stare at me all night or are you going to count it?” Earl said, interrupting her logic. When he saw her hesitating, he picked up the bag and turned it upside down. The money clumped down hard on the table and was neatly wrapped in thousand dollar bundles of twenties. He looked into Johnnie’s eyes. He could tell that she wanted the money. It was the answer to her dreams—his, too.

She picked up the first thousand dollar bundle and pulled off the bank binding. Curiosity demanded that she count the money, thinking the bank binding could be wrong, but also because seeing all that cash made her body betray her mind. The money made the eyes on her chest narrow as they tightened. She started counting out stacks of five twenty dollar bills until she had ten stacks. Minutes later, she had counted out twenty thousand dollars. Without realizing it, her legs were opening and closing as the heat down there began to simmer. She looked at Earl and said, “What do I have to do for this?”

“That’s just for openers.” He paused for a second to see how she responded to the money, hoping to see a flicker of acceptance so that he could feel confident to sweeten the offer. “I’ll also build you a home, one with lots of rooms and several bathrooms, right here in Jackson. I’ll buy you a brand new car of your choosing every year. Two, if you like. I’ll take you on a vacation . . . anywhere you want to go at least four times a year, perhaps more. Or, I’ll pay for you to go alone if I can’t go with you. Depending on the time of year, one of my daughters might be graduating, and I never want to miss any event in their lives. Janet is graduating this May, so if you wanted to go, then I couldn’t go with you.

“In addition to that, I’ll even pay for all your medical expenses should you get sick. If you have any of my children, they’ll want for nothing, and I’ll make sure they get the best education money can buy. If you wanna go to college, I’ll even pay for that. I can pay for your full tuition right now. You can start next semester. And since you want to be a stockbroker, I’ll even set you up with an office and a secretary. You’ll have plenty of privacy because I’ll still be living in New Orleans. I’ll only come up on the weekends. I’ll also use my money to defend you if an ambitious prosecutor comes after you for any pending murder charges. If he somehow manages to convict you, I’ll make sure you do minimum time.” He paused again. “This is a generous offer, considering what you did to me. But at the same time, I did you wrong first. I still love you and want to get back together. What do you think? Can we please get back together?”

“What if I don’t want to, Earl,” she said. “What if I just want to move on with my life? Will you let me go?”

“I’m afraid not,” he said firmly like he was digging his heels in, preparing for any argument she might present. “This is a onetime offer, and if you refuse me, I’ll be forced to use my wealth to put you behind bars for the remainder of your life. If you refuse me . . . if I can’t have you . . . with God as my witness . . . no man will. And don’t think for an instant that you can agree for the moment and then escape me. I’ll never let that happen. Never. I’ll hire every detective I can from here to Singapore to find you. I will scour the earth for as long as it takes. And when I find you, I’ll make sure you stand trial for murder.

“There is no statute of limitation for murder so you’ll never be able to rest. You’ll never have peace of mind. You’ll always be looking over your shoulders, wondering when one of my representatives will inform the police of your whereabouts. When you were at work this morning, my detectives were there watching you. Can you tell me which of your customers were detectives and which were ordinary customers? You can’t can you? And that’s how it’ll be for the rest of your natural life. Even after I die, I’ll leave instructions with my attorneys to pursue you until you are caught and punished for murder. It’s a good deal, Johnnie. Take it.”

“Can I think about it,” she asked, offering token resistance.

He looked at his watch and said, “Sure, you’ve got one minute.”

Johnnie was deflated and elated at the same time. She wanted to take the offer. It was a good deal, considering the consequences if she didn’t. Besides, he owed her all of that and more since he was ultimately responsible for her mother’s death. That’s what she told herself anyway. She would much rather a sweet offer like that came from Napoleon Bentley. She would gladly take his money and other gifts. But taking them from Earl? The man who had started everything? The man who had caused so much hardship and death? That was very difficult, but she was at his mercy and he wanted an immediate answer. And the thought of being brutally raped a second time made the decision so much easier.

Sadie Lane came to mind. She remembered that her friend had gotten trapped by money and ended up with three children by a man she didn’t love. Even though she wanted for nothing, she had nothing she could call her own. She was totally dependent on Santino Mancini’s generosity. But now, Sadie no longer had a home or the fifty thousand dollars she had given her. As a matter of fact, Sadie would probably have to live at the Mancini mansion and deal with the wrath of Mrs. Mancini on a daily basis. Even though Earl had her boxed in, she still had some leverage because he wanted to have sex right then if she was willing. And knowing that would make it possible to get the security that Sadie and her mother never had.

“Listen, Johnnie, with you by my side, I don’t plan on dying for a very long time. But, I understand your fears. They are well-founded. I’ll tell you what I’m going to do. If you agree to my offer, tomorrow I’ll hire a Jackson attorney and put you in my will so that what you have will always be yours, and you’ll get a stipend of money every month, so that you’ll always be taken care of after I die. If you ever have my children, I’ll make sure they become a part of the will, too.”

“And I can have an unalterable copy of the will?”

Smiling, feeling like he had been successful, he said, “You sure can. In fact, when you get off work tomorrow, we can go and get it taken care of immediately. And you can choose the attorney, if you like.”

“If you’re serious, why do I have to go to work tomorrow? Why can’t I just quit?”

“Johnnie, you know we can’t have people knowing our business. We have to keep this secret for as long as we can. You know people still hate race mixing. Some people hate it so much that they’ll kill me even though I’m white. You know that. What you have to do is work at Lucille’s, and then little by little, open up your business in an office. But if you all of a sudden have everything, it’ll look like you have the money that Sharon stole. If you work for Lucille and Hank for about a year, then it won’t arouse suspicion, especially if you have clients who have to pay your eleven hundred dollar fee up front.”

“I will build it, but not right away. You’ve got to establish a pattern of working, saving, and building a stock portfolio. Anything less than that will arouse the suspicions of the police. One of the reason’s I’m giving you the twenty thousand is so that you know I’m bargaining in good faith since it wouldn’t be smart to give you everything now. So . . . what’s your answer?”

Twenty minutes later, Earl’s animal-like groans filled the room as she made love to him just the way he liked it. She was on top of him, in control, using her muscles to sustain him, and to ensure her own pleasure. Part of the reason she was enjoying the sex was because she knew she would never have to worry about money again. And so, she was going to make sure he enjoyed himself because if he did, he wouldn’t hesitate to deliver all that he had promised. After controlling his pleasure for over an hour, she took him to the peak of excitement, and he hollered when he released. Then he grabbed at his chest for a few seconds and died with her still on top of him.

Chapter 73

Desperation

E
arl Shamus was dead and Johnnie knew that there was no way she was going to get out of this one. She thought she had taken him to the peak of excitement and stifled his release with her muscles one time too many and the poor man just couldn’t take the repeated intense stimulation she was putting on him. The thought of him having a bad ticker never even crossed her mind. Still on top of him, she tried desperately to wake him up. His eyes were open, and she thought there was a chance to save him. She had been accused of a murder she didn’t commit. Now there would be an actual reason for the police to indict her, she thought.

After shaking him and screaming his name for twenty minutes she gave up. Earl was gone, and he wasn’t coming back. She rolled off him, turned on the light, and went into the living room area of the room, and then over to the dining table. She sat down and tried to figure out what she was going to do. Shaking her head, she was thinking life was so unfair to her. She almost had everything, and now that had slipped away, too. One minute, she was high on life, and now, the high was over, and she had come crashing back down to earth like a duck that had been shot out of the sky.

Her heart was pounding as the thought of being behind bars for the rest of her life set in. A little over a month ago, she had visited Lucas at Angola Prison. She saw what being in prison had done to him in just a few weeks. Prison had made him think that he had no reason to hope that she would wait for him, that they had nothing to look forward to. That’s how he thought, and he was only going to be in prison for three months. She wondered how long it would take her to get to that level of despair now that she was looking at life or the hangman’s noose.

Shaking her head, she told herself that if she had listened to her mother at the Savoy, she wouldn’t be in this mess. But greed had gotten to her then as it had gotten to her once again in that very hotel room. If she had just trusted her God like she had planned and told Earl that she was willing to go to jail if she had to, but there was no way she was going to do what he wanted, Earl would be alive. She had no way of knowing that the sweet deal he had offered her was laced with hemlock. She toyed with the idea of turning herself in, but she knew the police weren’t going to believe she didn’t kill him on purpose. Then, she thought about the twenty thousand.

What was she going to do with all that money? If she turned herself in and turned in the money, given her reputation in New Orleans and the notoriety of the trial that still had people talking, they wouldn’t even bother with an autopsy. Once they found out that another death had occurred and she was involved, they would probably take her out back and shoot her in the head and be done with her. She knew her only chance was to get Earl out of that room, back into his car, and back to New Orleans. He had said that nobody knew he was in Jackson. He had sent his private detectives to Houston to investigate Paul Masterson. If everything he had told her was true, she had a chance to escape life imprisonment.

She figured that if she could just get his clothes on and out of that room before daybreak, she would be halfway home. But she was going to need help. There was no way she could lift Earl by herself. Gloria Schumacher came to mind. She thought Gloria would understand even though she was white. Given all the stories Gloria had told her earlier that night about her deceased husband, she just might be the one person who would be willing to help her. Nevertheless, she was afraid to ask for help because Gloria had told her the day she moved in that she didn’t allow fornication in her hotel.

While she believed that Gloria was fooling herself if she thought unmarried people weren’t having sex in her hotel, she didn’t think it would go over very well if Gloria saw a naked man in her bed with semen still sliding down his leg. She was thinking, “What choice did I have?” And it didn’t help that she’d had trouble with nearly every white woman she encountered. For those reasons, she was more than afraid to trust Gloria even though her experiences with her were altogether different. She had to trust somebody or it was all over. Even if Gloria refused to help it was better than turning herself in or trying to escape, leaving a dead white man in a room that was registered to her. Time was running out. She knew what she had to do. She decided to take a shower before going downstairs to solicit Gloria’s help.