After an hour or so of waiting, Jessica had to use the bathroom. Lost herself in the Newsweek, Oprah Winfrey on the cover. She returned to find Eli waving cheerfully from what should have been her seat.
“Hey, you!” He raised the glass of Jack, eyes glinting. “Dinner for me? Honey, you really shouldn’t have.”
“It’s not dinner, Goddammit.”
“What’s wrong?”
“Nothing.” Jessica stormed over and dropped into the defunct hot seat. “Except your timing and Dinah getting charged with murder now.”
“Who the hell do they think she killed?”
“Davenport died in the hospital today.”
“Oh, shit…” Eli took a hit of whiskey, scrunched his face. “Hang on, if she never meant to kill him, isn’t that just manslaughter?”
“Don’t know how you do it up in NYC, but North Carolina’s all about the FMR.”
“Which is?”
“A Felony Murder Rule. You kill somebody while committing a felony, you’re on the hook for murder in the first. You could be breaking and entering, give some old lady a heart attack, and you’re looking at life…” Jessica sighed. “Or death, she could also… If they find her guilty, yeah, they could do a little killing of their own.”
Eli polished off his drink. Went to the row of liquor bottles to top himself off.
“Eli, I know you went to see Carlton Walsh.”
“Hm.” Eli calmly capped the Jack and sat back down. “You checking up on me?”
“Oh, I’m about to start. You can bet on that.”
“I haven’t done anything wrong.”
“You haven’t done anything, I haven’t done anything. Nobody’s done anything, so what the fuck is Dinah doing in jail?”
“You think I don’t know what you’re trying to do?” Eli returned her gaze, untouchable. “What you’ve been writing in that notebook of yours?”
“I know you haven’t been snooping in my business, or you’d be picking your teeth of the floor – ”
“Didn’t have to read it. I read you, Jessica. That’s what I do.”
“So go ahead on. Tell me what I’m thinking. Let me in on me.”
“You’re thinking what if Mr. Eli Messner had something to do with this?” His eyes broke away from her gaze, darting. Nothing nervous about it. Systematically landing on each part of her body; hands, shoulders, mouth. “You’re thinking I’ve been here ever since that first night when Jason Castle got it in both eyes. You’re thinking Dinah was passed out that night after The Cardinal, who’s to say Eli wasn’t wide awake?”
“I’m thinking the time of attack on Dr. Lazenby is still up in the air,” Jessica said. “But the window coincides with a time-stamped ticket I found in your car. Parking garage for the Washington Center on Pantheon’s campus. Now I know that people like to arrive early for an event with no assigned seating, but really, Eli: three-fifteen in the afternoon for a show that don’t start ‘til eight?”
“And what I’m thinking is you have no idea why I would do something like that.”
“And there’s our problem, Eli…I don’t know why you do anything.”
Eli pulled out his poker chips. He shuffled them with his fingers. The clay made tiny, scraping sounds. “Dinah’s been sleeping with Carlton since about the end of January. Had been, anyway –”
“What’s this now, you trying hypnotism on me?”
“Davenport wasn’t the only person trying to blackmail you girls.” Eli slapped the chips down on the table with enough force to make his glass jump. “Carlton let Dinah keep using his address in exchange for sexual favors. At first it was once or twice a month, then more frequently… Jessica?”
Jessica followed his eye-line down to the table. She gazed in mute wonder at the sight of her fingernails buried deep in the wood. Hands busy making plans of their own.
“Jessica, if you’d rather I didn’t tell you –”
“Keep talking.”
Eli sighed. “After that night at Spiro’s, the night we all met… She got a call from Carlton. Drove to his house, and told her it was over. I guess she’d finally had enough. Now, I didn’t know about this until the night we went to The Cardinal. She told me on the way; my memory didn’t start going funny till after we hit the Scotch.”
“So?”
“So the next day, I paid him a visit.”
“And you kicked the shit out of him?”
“No.”
“Stop.”
“Stop what?”
“Stop lying.”
“About what?”
Jessica felt her eyelid twitch. “Chaucer said the guy had a split nose, black eye, and yellow bruises all over his face. Don’t act like you don’t know.”
“He was like that when I got there,” Eli insisted.
“I don’t believe you.”
“What don’t you believe?”
“Any of it. I think you’re full of shit. I think Carlton’s a punk who would gladly swipe some chloroform from the lab if he thought the price was right. I think that lab is just a casual stroll from the stadium. And I think you’re topping it all off with some bullshit story about Dinah fucking Carlton because you think it’s so damn believable that she’d do something like that. My drunk-ass, slut of a roommate. Sorry, Eli, but that last part, that’s something only you think.”
Eli shrugged. “You can ask Dinah if you like.”
“Visiting hours are over,” Jessica said, getting up and snatching the keys off the coffee table. “And I’m not waiting another second.”
“You going somewhere?”
“We are both going to pay Carlton a visit.”
Eli pocketed his poker chips and polished off his drink. “I can dig it.”
“I’ll bet.”
So her scheme to catch Eli unawares hadn’t panned out. Secondary worries, at this point. Jessica locked up and led him down the stairs, already working on a whole new plan of attack.
Chapter 43: Home Invasion.
The instant she saw his face in the doorway, she knew it was all true.
It was only afterwards that she was able to put a name to it. They had parked outside Carlton’s two-bedroom in Reservoir Park, marched up the stairs and knocked on the door. Just the flicker of a television set shuddering in the darkened windows. Carlton answered the door right along with her worst fears. His confused expression morphed into something resembling pleasure. Patchy, hipster beard rippling with a smile that veered a little too close to excited. It was his eyes that ultimately clashed with the rest of it; the rehearsed innocence of someone who stops by unexpectedly for just one drink or a cheating boyfriend who swears that’s the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard.
…Who me?
If Carlton wasn’t just an inch or so taller than Jessica, that first punch might have spared him a trip to the emergency room. As it was, her fist smashed into his nose with a sharp thunderclap. His hands flew to his face, drawing in a hiccup of air as he stumbled back from the doorway.
Jessica floated into the living room, truly weightless.
From behind her, she heard Eli mutter shit, as he closed the door.
Carlton snagged his foot on a woven floor mat, pitched against the couch. He bounced off the armrest and landed flat before the television screen. Drew in a deep, rattling breath, ready for a real scream.
Jessica made him swallow it with another punch to the face.
She crouched down, nails digging into his skin through a fistful of his plaid shirt. Brought him to a full and upright position. Blood gushed from his nose, the color of chocolate syrup beneath the watery glow of the television.
Jessica’s head throbbed with hateful glee. Her body never more alive, thoughts so lucid she could see clear across time to the day she had been born. Someone buried deep within the darkest corners of her origins began to whisper, cracked lips suggesting that she start looking for a nice, wide open spot on the wall to spell out a couple of familiar words.
Carlton’s face contorted, blood drooling from trembling lips. “Please, stop. Please. I won’t tell, I won’t tell anyone if you please stop, now. Please.”
“Oh, I know you won’t,” Jessica told him, shoving him back to the floor. Brought her face in close to hover over his. “You know another word for sexual blackmail? It’s called rape, you punk bitch. And if you don’t know what that word means, prison’s a good fucking place to learn.”
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” Carlton squealed, crying now. Shattered nose modulating his words. “I won’t do it – I already did this, I already went through – your boyfriend took care of this, I promise!”
“This asshole ain’t my boyfriend, but thanks for clearing that up.”
“What?” Carlton raised his head. Bloodshot eyes straining to get a better look at Eli, who had taken up a post by the windows. “What? No. No, he’s white.”
“What?”
“I’m talking about the black guy.”
“Chaucer did this to you?”
“You know him too?” Carlton’s voice cracked, beginning to sob. “Christ, how many people have you sent after me, you bitch!”
Jessica raised another fist, but found her adrenalin fading. Curiosity peeking out from the storm cellar, gently reminding her that men without teeth told significantly fewer tales.
She remained in strike mode, bluffing her way into his head. “Who you talking about, Carlton?”
“Oh, like you don’t know!”
Jessica pressed her thumb against his nose, prompting a gurgling screech.
“I’m talking about your boyfriend, Malik! That fucking kid from my lab!”
Satisfied that nobody would be coming to Carlton’s rescue, Eli moved away from the window. “Malik came to see you?”
“Never mind that, what’s he doing working at your lab?” Jessica asked.
“Doesn’t work at my lab. He worked at my lab, was an intern. Like a year ago, last summer, or something. They thought he was swiping supplies, so they got rid of him. I got rid of him, the little fucking klepto. Didn’t see him again until a few weeks ago.”
“Was this before or after you sold Dinah out?”
“Your boyfriend found out, like, two days later!” He grimaced, brought his hands up as though expecting another sucker punch. “Two days after I told your vice-principal about the fake address. I don’t know how Malik found out. He came here, and just fucking started wailing on me. He told me if I didn’t… if I didn’t fix things, that he’d kill me. You two fucking deserve each other!”
Malik certainly seems to believe as much, Jessica thought. Running out of steam. Information overload, television speakers blasting away at her eardrums as the room pulsed with strobe light flashes. She grabbed a handful of Carlton’s hair, slippery with some sort of sculpting wax. “You’re not going to tell anyone about what happened here, right?”
“Please don’t hit me anymore.”
“Well?”
Carlton squeezed his eyes shut and shook his head.
Jessica slammed his head against the floor and stood up. Fought off a brief dizzy spell before regaining her balance. She spotted a dishrag on the coffee table, lying next to a half-eaten TV dinner. She heard Carlton begin to throw up the rest of it as she wiped her hands clean.
“Let’s get out of here.”
Eli and Jessica went down the front steps and across the street, stealing casual glances into the dark. The eight o’clock freighter thundered in the distance, train whistle howling at the moon.
They peeled out, waiting for the first stoplight to fasten their safety belts.
“You all right?” Eli asked, hitting the turn signal.
Jessica wasn’t sure. Disregarding the bloody dishrag wrapped around aching knuckles, her mind was already whispering, velvet reassurances that none of it had really happened.
She was never even there.
Carlton must’ve taken a bad fall down those front steps.
Eli cleared his throat. “Is sexual blackmail really considered rape in North Carolina?”
“What do you think?”
“Well, props for a powerhouse bluff, anyway.”
“This don’t let you off the hook. All you are right now is a liar who lucked his way into the truth.”
Eli pushed in the Volvo’s cigarette lighter. “If that’s the case, then you’re going to need some lessons.”
“What kind of lessons?”
“Of what a liar really looks like.”
“And where do we go to find this liar?”
“A little card game you might be familiar with.” He helped himself to a cigarette. “Starts in around half an hour, but I don’t mind stopping by the house. Give you a chance to change.”
“Change in to what?” Jessica asked.
“Something without Carlton Walsh’s blood on it.”
Jessica checked her tank top, now a red-splattered canvas. She rolled down the window and let the humid wind blow against her face. She thought about what Casper had told her that afternoon.
If you really want to know who’s behind all this, it’s going to take you some ugly places.
Jessica couldn’t say she hadn’t been warned.
The lighter popped out of its socket.
Eli wrenched it free and lit his cigarette against its red, burning eye.
Chapter 44: Held Up.
They were playing tournament-style that night. Four tables, eleven players at each one. Hundred dollars a head, bringing the bank to forty-four hundred dollars. First place, winner take all. Second place, the joke had gone, was a set of steak knives.
Eli sat with his arms crossed. Shoulders relaxed. Awash in ruthless serenity. Watching him navigate the felt, hand after hand, was an open invitation into his soul. Playing the players. Psychologically nudging opponents to bet against him when he had the best of it, or muck their pair against an ace-king high.
Or so Jessica had to assume. Almost every time Eli induced a fold, he would dump his own cards. With just one or two exceptions to keep people guessing, he only turned over winning hands. Ultimately the only thing Jessica learned was that there wasn’t much chance she would learn anything.
Jessica spent over two hours observing, before drifting away to grab a tonic on ice. She tried to keep conversations short. Shot down anyone looking to score her a drink. Wasn’t long before she had to claim Eli as her new boyfriend. With every major hand, she would rush to join the spectators. After the inevitable win, she’d plant a quick kiss on his cheek, then melt back into the walls.
There was plenty of time to think.
Malik had been at Spiro’s the night she met Jason Castle. Celebrating with his parents. On the Fourth of July, he had dropped her at the Center for Human Genetics, roughly an hour and a half before they had discovered Dr. Lazenby. Some twelve hours before Davenport’s body was found, she had seen Malik at the Prescott. He admitted to knowing what their vice-principal had done to terminate her internship.
I don’t care what you think, he had said. I’m going to fix this.
Jessica called Chaucer, asked if he could look into Malik’s own internship at the lab. Maybe get an inventory manifest, see if any supplies might have gone missing during his tenure.
Such as chloroform, perhaps.
Then again, was Malik really capable of something so brutal?
As far as who was capable of what, her only answer was the throbbing pain in her bruised knuckles.
***
It was two in the morning when the game finally wrapped. The final showdown had Eli going heads up with Charlie, the resident redhead. After so many slow eliminations, it was a mere half hour before the final death knell; a house of kings over Charlie’s house of jacks.
Eli’s crushing victory hadn’t earned him too many friends. While most were fine blowing a hundred dollars on an evening’s entertainment, the regulars were done losing their money to this scrawny ringer. Charlie had practically kicked the legs from und
er the table, taking a full lap around the loft before cooling down to shake Eli’s hand.
Bob downplayed the room’s sour mood, doling forty-four hundred worth of twenties as the crowd thinned. “Want to count it?”
“No need.” Eli pocketed his money. “Feel like I might have pissed off some of the natives, though.”
“They’ll get over it.” Bob smiled diplomatically. “Though maybe do us both a favor. Stay away for a bit, would you? Maybe buy your girl something nice with what you made tonight. Let these poor suckers get their groove back. No disrespect, of course.”
“None taken.”
“Once again, congratulations.” Bob locked the cashbox and returned to his duties as host.
Jessica glanced across the room. Caught Charlie giving them the eye, furiously texting his frustrations. He turned away, phone eclipsed by his significant heft.
“Do you see what I see?” Eli asked, polishing off his drink.
“I see a fat bastard in a pink polo shirt, tweeting his pathetic story.”
“Mm. I’m going to hit the bathroom. Wait for me by the front door.”
Jessica did as she was told, checking her phone. Still no word from Chaucer.
When Eli returned, he led her out of the loft and down the steps. “Remember where we parked?”
“Yeah.”
“When we get outside, go right across the courtyard. I’m cutting left. Meet me by car.”
“Why, what’s going on?”
Eli paused by the front door. He handed Jessica the car keys, checked the courtyard though the glass panes. “Don’t worry about it. Just give me a hug, like we’re calling it a night.”
Her arms slipped easily around his bony torso. She gave it one last shot, whispering in his ear: “Eli, please tell me something.”
“I think I’m about to get rolled. Just do what I told you.”
He slipped away and opened the door, looking to break left.
Jessica obediently turned right.
A man wearing a ski mask and dark jumpsuit emerged from beneath the overhang, born from the black. Gun at his hip, pointed directly at Jessica. She threw her hands up. Imagining the gunshot, tensing her abdominals in the ludicrous hope that a hundred crunches a day would be enough to stop the slug.