One Love (45 page)

“
Well, well. Seems an old
Metoyer retainer is at his tricks again,” Joe said.

Alex wore an impatient grimace. “Just
tell me about Lanessa. What have you found out that I can use
against Charles? Lanessa could lose everything.”

Joe eyed him. “I thought you were
through with her. A few days ago you were convinced she was back on
the sauce. Didn’t believe a word she said.”

“
I’ve had time to think,”
Alex said. He turned so as not to meet his father’s steady
gaze.

“
I see,” was Joe’s only
reply.

Alex cleared his throat. “So what do
we know now that we didn’t before?”

He paused before going on. “As usual
with the Metoyers, this thing has wheels inside wheels. There is a
certain set of warehouses in Algiers that might hold the
answers.”

“
Algiers?” Alex faced his
father sharply.

A section of New Orleans on the
Mississippi, Algiers had lots of plants, shipyards and factories.
Alex had only been there a few times. But there was one thing he
remembered about the place.

“
Lots of warehouses. A good
place to be if you’re going to ship merchandise from one of the
ports.” Alex gazed at his father. For the first time he felt in
control.

“
Yes, and?” Joe prompted him
like a teacher working with a prize student.

“
Or even down to the Gulf of
Mexico.” Alex took out his cellular phone and dialed.

“
Who are you calling?” Joe
said.

“
My boss. I’m going to
Algiers,” Alex said. He made arrangements to take the afternoon off
without a problem. “Thanks, Bob. I owe you.

“
You’ll need me. I can talk
my way into anything.” Joe grinned at him. “And back out,
too.”

Alex wore a hard, cold expression.
“I’m going to find out what’s in those warehouses and beat Metoyer
over the head with it.”

***

“
Are you sure this is it?”
Jackie peered around.

Yasmin nodded. “Franklin Enterprises
uses this warehouse and Charles bought the company.”

“
How late do these guys
work?” Lanessa said.

“
Until nine or ten most
nights. They’re on long shifts to get ready for big shipments.”
Yasmin said.

They sat in Yasmin’s Mercedes gazing
at the warehouse. The building was huge with huge white lights
turned on to illuminate the interior and parking lot. There was a
buzz of activity.

“
So you’re sure this is
where Charles has the goods stored?” Lanessa watched a man maneuver
a small forklift.

“
Yes,” Yasmin said. “Charles
evidently forgot how much he told me. This warehouse was part of
the deal when he bought Franklin Enterprises.”

“
You mean stole it,” Jackie
put in. “I’d love to get a look at some of the paperwork in
there.”

“
Now you’re dreaming. No way
we can do that.” Lanessa drummed her fingers on the teakwood
armrest set in the car door. “But maybe we can think of a way to
get in closer.”

“
What story could we
possibly tell that would get us into the warehouse?” Robyn looked
at the others with a guileless expression.

“
So young, so innocent.”
Jackie pulled her hair loose from the tortoise shell barrette that
held it.

“
Look and learn, dear.”
Yasmin took out a tube of dark red lipstick and applied a fresh
coat.

“
Ladies, please. Will we
stoop to using our feminine wiles to deceive honest, hardworking
men?” Lanessa looked at her two friends.

“
You bet,” Jackie said
promptly.

“
All’s fair in love and war.
Charles used my love, and now...” Yasmin had a vengeful smile.
“It’s war.”

Lanessa smiled back at her. “Just
checking.” She opened the top two buttons of her white cotton
blouse. “Charge!”

***

Joe, wearing an expensive lightweight
suit, walked into the warehouse as though he was the owner. “Just
let me do the talking first,” he said to Alex over his
shoulder.

“
Easy since I have no idea
what I’d say to get us in there,” Alex walked beside
him.

“
Where’s the manager? He
still here?” Joe’s tone suggested the man should definitely be
present.

“
It’s six thirty and we
don’t do business with the public anyway.” The security guard built
like a linebacker and the color of caramel stared down them. He was
at least six foot seven.

Joe looked him up and down. “You like
working here, I assume.”

The big man’s confident smirk slipped
a bit. “What you tryin’ to say?”

“
You’d better check with the
office before you get in too deep, son,” Joe said
ominously.

The big man looked at Joe for a
moment, taking his measure. He glanced at Alex once. Alex wore what
he hoped was an equally “in-charge brother” expression. Without
another word, the guard went to a small glass encased guard booth
to call the manager. Five minutes later they were on their way up a
flight of stairs to the office.

***

Lanessa approached four men standing
near the wide entrance to the warehouse. The other three women
stood outside the Mercedes a few yards away.

“
Hello, can you help me? We
got lost and our car is making funny noises.” Lanessa pointed. She
watched the men’s faces when Yasmin, Jackie and Robyn waved at them
gaily.

“
Yes, ma’am.” A tall man
with the name Tyrone stitched on the blue shirt he wore spoke up.
“We’ll sure try to help y’all.”

“
Yeah, don’t want you lovely
ladies stranded. I’m Kenny.” Another man stepped forward with a
flirty grin.

“
Let’s take a closer
look.”

In no time, they were all on a first
name basis. Only scant attention paid to the car. Lanessa suspected
the men did not know much about auto mechanics, especially the
workings of a top of the line, computerized Mercedes-Benz. That was
okay since there was nothing wrong with it anyway. After a few
token efforts of listening to the engine and staring under the
hood, they said the car just needed a tune-up.

“
You ladies in town for a
special reason?” Kenny wiped his hands on a large red
cloth.

“
We were going to a show
then out to eat,” Yasmin said with a fetching smile.

“
But we could just grab a
bite and skip the show,” Jackie hastened to add.

“
We’ll be getting off in
another thirty minutes or so,” Kenny said. He stuck his chest out.
“I’m floor foreman, so I can’t leave right now.”

“
In charge of this big
place, huh? Impressive.” Jackie gazed at him.

“
So like you just move
around these big boxes until a truck or something comes for them,
right?” Lanessa strolled toward the warehouse. She cast a glance at
Tyrone.

“
It’s a lot more to it than
that,” Tyrone said importantly. “This is high tech stuff. You gotta
know how to handle it.”

“
Really?” Lanessa looked
fascinated, not hard since she really did want to know more. “I
love learning about computer software and hardware. I took a few
courses in college. I always wanted to learn about the business
end.”

“
Me, too.” Jackie stroked
her hair and grinned at Kenny.

As though on cue, all four women
stared into the warehouse with intrigued expressions. That’s all it
took. Kenny offered a tour with a self-important flourish. They
entered through a doorway next to the huge entrance. Tyrone
competed with Kenny for stage time as they walked down aisles with
color codes above them. The men were explaining the system and how
computers were used to track the items being stored. Lanessa let
Jackie, Yasmin and Robyn do the flirting while she took in what was
written on the boxes. Some had plastic pockets glued to the sides.
She wandered down an aisle by herself.

“
Say, stick with us,” Tyrone
called out to her from the other row. “We don’t want you to get
lost up in here.”

Lanessa slipped the sheet of paper out
of the pocket on the nearest box. She walked quickly back out to
join them. “Oops, took a wrong turn. I was just so interested.
Look, Jackie. They’ve got products from all over the
world.”

“
Lots of exotic places.”
Jackie played along with ease. “Like Thailand, Belgium, and
Nigeria.” She put the right amount of awe in her voice.

“
Wow,” Robyn added, her eyes
wide. She smiled at the young man who was sticking close to
her.

“
Yeah, but we got lots of
action goin’ on right now. We moving out some computer stuff that’s
goin’ to Belgium, then Thailand,” Tyrone said.

“
Yeah, paperwork gotta be
just right. It can get tricky,” Kenny put in.

“
Obviously you’ve got it
covered though.” Jackie gave him a long gaze from head to toe. “At
least from what I can see.”

“
Well that’s about all there
is. The rest of the place is just more of the same really. Besides,
it’s too risky to let non-employees go too far inside.” Kenny led
them back the way they’d come in.

“
We appreciate it. I guess
we should be going.” Lanessa gave Jackie and Yasmin a pointed look.
“We know about as much as we need to.”

“
So where we gonna hook up?”
Kenny looked at Lanessa like a man looking forward to
desert.

“
Yeah, we gotta shower and
change first. Fortunately we got facilities right here.” Tyrone
smiled.

“
Well, uh. Actually we have
an appointment,” Robyn blurted out.

“
I thought y’all came for a
concert?” Tyrone asked.

“
We did. A girlfriend was
supposed to meet us,” Lanessa put in. “We can’t just leave her
hanging.”

“
So we better go. Come on,
Kim will we wondering what’s up.” Yasmin walked backwards as she
gestured to the others.

“
Aw, now. We can pick her
up, too.” Kenny was eager to offer a solution.

“
Yeah, between his van and
my Chevy Blazer, we can all fit,” Tyrone added. He moved his hips
seductively and did a dance step. “There’s a new club on the West
Bank got some hot reggae mixed with Zydeco.”

They were within a few feet of the
door. Everyone was talking at once. The men tried to coax them to
wait, to arrange a meeting time. Most of the other workers had left
with only few stragglers. The security guard came around a stack of
boxes.

“
Hey, what’s goin’ here?
Kenny, Tyrone, I know y’all didn’t!” The security guard strode
toward them with a glower.

“
The ladies had car trouble
and we was just--” Kenny began.

“
Look, you wanna have fun,
get a room at a motel,” The guard’s deep gruff voice cut him
off.

“
I beg your pardon!” Robyn
put both hands on her hips.

“
Uh-huh. I know exactly what
the deal is. Go earn your ten bucks someplace else, sister.” The
security guard took her right arm. “Now move it.”

“
Let her go.” Lanessa pulled
on Robyn’s left arm.” We were already leaving. You don’t have to
put your hands on us.”

“
You right. I shoulda put on
latex gloves first,” The security guard shot back.

“
What? You big ugly hog,”
Robyn yelled.

“
Hey, everybody calm down
now.” Kenny’s eyes were round with fright. “We don’t wanna bring
the boss out here.” He glanced around nervously.

No one was listening to him. Robyn and
the security guard were yelling insults at each other. Jackie
joined in. Yasmin tried to pull Jackie away while Lanessa kept them
all moving in the general direction of the exit.

“
Let’s just forget it and
leave,” Lanessa said through clenched teeth in Robyn’s ear. “We
gotta get out of here.”

“
But he called us hookers!”
Robyn said.

“
Lanessa! What is going on?
What are you doing here?”

Alex and his father stood ten feet
away with the warehouse manager. Their faces showed how astounded
they were by the scene before them. All arguments died away. The
security guard glared at Lanessa then Alex and Joe.

“
Okay, we got some kinda
scam going on here! Mr. Bush, I say we call the police.” The
security guard put his hand on his gun. “Nobody move.”

“
I want an explanation and
unless I get the right answers, we’ll most certainly call the
police.” Mr. Bush was a wiry man the color of dark chocolate. He
crossed his arms and stared at them.

“
I say we call anyway.” The
guard was in no mood to listen.

“
Look, just let us go and we
can forget all about this,” Jackie said. She backed up.

“
Oh no. Y’all wanted to be
here so bad we’re not going to let you rush off.” The security
guard moved to block her path.

“
Go on then, call the
police.” Joe wore a relaxed smile. He put a hand in the pocket of
his slacks.