I turn back to Clark. "I won't let you down, Captain. Send me in. Please. Let me do this."
Clark looks at Olson like my mom used to look at my dad when it seemed they were about to give in on something. "The truth is, we don't have many ideas on how to get to Freestone." Clark sits back but then shakes his head. "But I would never forgive myself if something happened to you, Tennyson." He laughs dryly. "Shit, Maddox would personally put me in the grave."
"He'd probably be relieved. Then he could have his new partner," I say flippantly as if it doesn't matter, as if I didn't drive around for hours wondering when the heaviness would leave my chest and my limbs.
Clark looks at Olson again. "What do ya think? Even with the scant information you have, we might be able to get her close enough to Freestone to find out where and what the hell is going on in this secret society."
"If she can get out of there alive," Olson adds darkly. "While I was out there every girl came back. But from the bits of information I picked up, every once in a while, a girl doesn't return. No explanation and the other girls keep a tight lip about it."
Clark slaps the arm of his chair. "Olson's right. I can't do it."
"I'll get in and get out. Alive." I lean forward with two goals—to look him harder in the eye, letting him know I am dead serious and to get out of the circle of stench flowing around Olson. "Captain Clark," I say with as much charm as I can muster, "I. Have. Got. This."
Clark's barrel chest lifts and falls with surrender. "Maybe this could work." He sticks his elbow on the desk and points at me, reminding me of my dad telling me what I was doing wrong during the mile relay. "There's no way we can send you in with a wire. Freestone is too clever, and from the information I have on him, he trusts no one. He has a few confidantes and that's it. A wire or any hint that you're not actually a kid off the streets and you'll wind up just like those guys with their skulls bashed in or worse."
I smile. "Not sure where worse goes once you get your skull bashed in." Adrenaline is surging through me and, at the same time, a dose of apprehension. I'd been undercover before but posing as a junkie or prostitute out on the streets was child's play compared to this. None of us have any idea where this secret club takes place, which means I disappear and my usual safeguards and safety nets are stripped away. It will be just me and my wits, and even though I feel pretty confident about those wits, I'm not completely sure how they'll hold up facing whatever the hell is waiting for me in the Lace Underground.
Clark is squinting at me, seemingly trying to read my thoughts. "Tennyson, you're not doing this because of the note about the partner switch?"
"Nope," I say too confidently, and it sounds forced. "I need something new. I'm getting stale. Today, I got outsmarted by a damn skateboard. It's time to push myself." I'm still absorbing the entire notion that I'm going undercover on a big investigation. At the same time, my head is spinning from the stinky man sitting next to me. I turn to him. "What other information do you have, Olson? How do I get noticed by Freestone?"
Olson lifts open his coat and pulls out a notepad. He fans his face. "Whoa, do I need a shower," he comments before flipping open the notebook.
"You need more than a shower," Clark quips. "I was thinking about calling the guys at the fire station to see if they could come hose you off in the parking lot. By the way, don't bother to get too clean. I'm going to need you back out in that roadside tent hanging with your homies."
Olson's mouth drops open. "What the hell? Why?"
"Cuz you're going to be keeping an eye on Tennyson while she's on the street. If Freestone picks her up, we need to know it."
"God dammit," Olson mutters as he looks at his notes. "Cherry Cola," he says, without any context or preamble. Clark and I wait for him to continue.
I can see the dirt inside Olson's nostrils as he faces me. "Not sure what it's connected to but it seems to be a code word for the girls hanging out in the park. It starts with Cherry Cola, that's what I heard them say to each other."
"Was that while you were lurking in the bushes snooping on them in your flasher trench coat?" I ask.
Olson lifts his dirt covered middle finger at me. "On second thought, Ten, you'll do just fine at the park with that smart mouth."
I know the park he's referring to. It's at the end of the city limits. At one time, it was a nicely kept picnic spot, a place to bring kids to play, but as the homeless population grew they sort of claimed the park as their sanctuary. The city manager and police chief decided it was better having them in one place and off the sidewalks and bus benches. So the park became a sort of campsite for runaways and people down on their luck.
"But you don't know who Cherry Cola is?" I ask.
He shakes his head and some flakes fall from his hair. I sit back again to get farther away from him. "I know this sounds strange but the homeless kids hanging out in the park seem to want to disappear. Like they think something better is waiting for them on the other side."
"The other side?" I ask. "What do you mean the other side?"
Olson shakes his head again, dislodging more flakes. "No, I'm using the wrong phrase. Underground. Someone has them convinced it's better for them underground. And the journey to the underground starts with Cherry Cola." He flips through his tiny notepad. The outside cardboard is coated with black fingerprints. "I kept a tally of the days between episodes. It's three weeks."
"What episodes?" Clark asks before I can get the question out.
"The time between the girls disappearing for the night. I never saw them leave or come back. They would all just be back in the morning looking cleaner, happier, less homeless."
"Less homeless?" I think aloud. "Strange. But they all came back? You're certain?"
"Yep. I kept track in my notebook. I had nicknames for each of them so I could keep count of them."
I sit back and look at Clark. He's wearing the same level of confusion that I'm feeling.
I turn back to Olson. "Well, fuck, that's about the most useless bunch of information ever. Two months?" I ask again.
Olson shrugs. "Let's see if you can do better, big shot."
"Yeah. Let's just see." I look at Clark for one last confirmation.
"It's against my better judgment but let's try it."
"You'd better get in there quick then." Olson looks at his notebook and counts a series of tally marks. It's three weeks this Saturday."
"Which gives me four days out on the streets to figure out this Cherry Cola clue."
"And convince the park inhabitants that you're not some undercover plant," Olson adds.
"For starters," I say. "I'm going to skip the coat."
"Yeah?" Olson smiles. He seems pleased with what he's about to say. "You'll be sorry. You won't be sleeping in your comfy bed, Ten. You'll be outside, and the elements don't care if you're undercover or the real thing."
"I'm not a cream puff. I grew up with three brothers and a dad who believed the only good vacation was when you hiked ten miles to a remote location with a forty pound backpack on your shoulders. I'll be just fine."
Clark's phone rings. He answers it. "Clark here." His face hardens and his brows crunch together. He pulls free a file folder from the pile of paperwork on his desk. He opens it. It's the faces and names of the missing girl cases. His wide finger moves down the list. "Yeah, Rachel Booker? I've got her." He pauses and listens. For some reason his gaze now flicks my direction. He nods. "Right. Thanks for letting me know." He hangs up and looks at the faces on the page again before closing up the file.
"What's up, Cap'n?" Olson asks.
"One of the girls has been found." Clark looks at me. "Her body was in a dumpster in an alley. Slit throat and multiple bruises. Coroner's looking at her right now."
"More reason to send me in," I say quickly. "Let's stop this guy before more girls show up dead."
Clark shakes his head. "I fucking hope I don't regret this."
8
Angie
Yoli, short for Yolan
da, I assume, lifts the end of the heavy green tarp and I scoot under it for relief from the rain. I'd spent a good three hours deciding what to wear to make me blend in with some of the other park inhabitants, while at the same time making sure I didn't catch pneumonia on my first night out. Fortunately for me, I never threw stuff away, and the back of my closet was a treasure trove of worn out clothes from my teenage years. I still fit in most of them except a few of the skinny jeans that had gone way past my level of skinny. My favorite Levis, the pair that I had lovingly worn so often and on so many adventures that I'd created a series of holes all the way down from the thighs to the knees, still fit perfectly. I'd found them balled up under the aviator jacket I scored at a garage sale. The jacket had corny orange patches on the shoulders and the fleece lining looked less like fleece and more like sad cotton, but I concluded it would protect me from any night air chill. What I hadn't considered was that the jacket was too threadbare to protect me from rain. Aside from wearing the appropriate clothes, I'd needed to wipe several years off my appearance. I decided Tawny Smith, my new persona, was going to be nineteen. It was one of those rare occasions when my freckles came in handy. I had braided my dark red hair into two braids and topped the look off with a floppy brimmed felt hat that reminded me of something worn at Woodstock.
Yoli and Becky, the other girl huddling under the tarp with us, both nibble on half a sandwich someone left on the park bench. Apparently workers from nearby offices and buildings occasionally lunch in the park and leave their leftovers for the park's inhabitants. I am still working up the courage to eat someone else's leftovers. It's only my second day in the park, but I figure by nightfall, my stomach will be chewing itself if I don't put something in it.
Yoli, a petite seventeen-year-old, is always smiling. Even now, sitting on the curb around the slide and swings, huddling under a tarp and eating a stranger's leftovers, she's grinning. She told me life in her home was unbearable because of her stepfather and she has no intention of ever going back. The other girl, Becky, has curly brown hair and a tattoo of roses that crawl up her arm and around her neck. Apparently, her boyfriend was a tattoo artist and a successful one at that. The quality of the tattoo on her neck seems to confirm it. But it seems Chaz, as she calls him, was into some illegal shit along with the ink business. The cops yanked him out of his bed one morning and dragged him off, leaving Becky alone and penniless.
Besides the hours I spent perfecting my street kid wardrobe, I spent a good hour concocting a believable backstory, complete with an abusive mother and grandmother who had no interest in raising me. But I quickly discovered it didn't matter. Everyone out at the park was more concerned about their next meal and staying safe and warm and dry than the woes and tragedies faced by their fellow park mates.
What I did discover early on is that the park gives them all a sense of community. They have little but they share what they have. No one questioned me or my motives or my past. It seemed they had no option but to trust everyone. Paranoia and suspicion were only going to work against you when you were out alone on the streets.
Yoli offers me one last chance at the sandwich. "Are you sure, Tawny? With this rain, there won't be many more people eating lunch at the park today."
I feel guilty taking the last bite from her, but I decide since she's been living at the park for six months, she knows what she's talking about. I close my eyes and push the bite into my mouth. It's mostly bread crust and mustard, but it tastes good.
"Where did you find this tarp?" I ask. "It sure is keeping the rain out." I decided long before I arrived at the park not to bring up Cherry Cola with the hopes that one of them would bring it up first. Then I could innocently ask them about it.
"Oh jeez, that's it," Becky says as she pulls her old army jacket tighter around her. "You have asked the golden question."
"Have I?"
Yoli is smiling and readjusting herself for what seems like a potentially long answer. "Well, now that you ask," she says and pulls the tarp farther forward to shield us from rain being blown our direction. "One day I was walking along the freeway overpass, just minding my own business, like always, when from the corner of my eye a big flash of movement drew my attention to the freeway below. A massive tarp." She points up to the canvas cover above our heads. "It had blown free from a truck. I think it was carrying potting soil or fertilizer," she adds.
"Which explains the earthy odor," I say to an agreeing nod from Becky.
"The tarp must have caught the wind just right because it blew up into the air. It dipped and dashed over the cars, eventually getting tangled on the freeway sign hanging from the overpass." Yoli continues with her story, but my attention has been drawn to Rowan. Rowan has thick hair that is a little out of control, reminding me a bit of Maddox. It's hard to tell the age of some of the people in the park. Poor nutrition, lack of sleep and constant exposure to the elements makes some of the inhabitants look older than their natural age, but I estimate Rowan to be about twenty. He's handsome in a rugged, roguish sort of way, and he reminds me of Mark Stockton, a guy I went to high school with. Mark wasn't very social, and he always seemed kind of dangerous and mysterious. The girls in high school were always debating whether he was crush worthy or cringeworthy. He never returned for senior year, and since he was mostly friendless, we could only speculate about what had happened to him. His somewhat sketchy mystique helped formulate the farfetched tale that his dad had been in the CIA and they had to relocate suddenly to some far-off, exotic location. Rowan has some of the same mysterious, sketchy edges to him. I determine that he is a person to keep an eye on.
Rowan is standing in front of the tent he's constructed at the far end of the park where a dirt trail leads off into a copse of oak trees. The rain has slowed to a light drizzle. He is taking long, slow drags on his cigarette. His eyes are black and shiny like slate. Even from the distance and through the mist in the air, I can see that he's watching the three of us huddled under the tarp.
"And so I hung way over the sign, thirty feet above fast moving traffic," Yoli's voice drifts between my thoughts. "But I got the thing free, and now here we sit, dry and happy."
"Let's just leave it at dry," Becky says.
Yoli winks at her. "Yes but we're two days away from—" She stops when Becky shoots her a shut the hell up look. I'd already calculated that Yoli was the likely source for rumors and gossip at the park. Whereas Becky seemed to like to keep things sealed up.
But withering look or not, I jump on it. "Two days before what?" I ask airily.
"Nothing," Becky says quickly.
Yoli's face drops. She pretends to be interested in the pattern the rain has left on the sand in the swing set area. She avoids looking at me when she repeats what Becky says. "Yeah, it's nothing."
"I understand," I say dejectedly. "I haven't been here long enough to be one of the group." I sigh and make it sound a little mournful. "Story of my life, I'm afraid."
From the corner of my eye, I see Yoli elbow Becky.
"We can't tell her and you know it. It's up to—Jeez, it's getting hot under here," Becky complains and dashes out from under the tarp.
Yoli casts me a sheepish half smile. "She's always so dramatic." Before I can ask her more, she drops our canvas cover back. "Yay, I see some sun. I'm going to take a walk down to the market. Sometimes I get lucky and find perfectly good bread or fruit that they pull from shelves because it's past its prime. Wanna go?"
I glance toward the end of the park. Rowan has pulled a twisted, broken beach chair out of his tent. He's sitting on it and has switched tobacco for weed. Our female huddle is over, but he's still watching us. Or me, to be exact. My detective intuition tells me there's more to his bold stare than just general leering. He seems to be assessing me. It's hard to know if it's just because I'm new to the park or if he's deciding whether I can be trusted.
"Thanks for the invite, Yoli, but I think I'll stay here. I didn't get much sleep last night. I think the guy in the cardboard
lean-to was snoring. Either that or there was a bear in the park."
Yoli laughs. It's a good, genuine laugh. It's hard to understand how a girl like her ended up sleeping in a park scrounging for leftovers and stale food. "That was no bear. It was Grover. Poor guy. He's been homeless off and on for twenty years. And he does resemble a bear when his beard is extra long."
I help Yoli fold up the tarp. She tosses it into the tent she has graciously offered to share with me. The local church has done fundraisers to buy tents for some of the park inhabitants. I see now how important that small gesture of generosity has been.
Yoli pulls a plastic grocery bag out of the stack of belongings she has shoved in the corner of the tent. She pulls the handles of the bag over her wrist like a woman with a handbag. "Wish me luck," she says as she walks spritely toward the sidewalk.
Olson has managed to snag himself a tattered tent at the opposite end of the park from Rowan. He's pitched his pathetic shelter near the bathrooms, a location that has its perks, along with its obviously pungent disadvantages. Aside from Clark, Detective Olson is the only person who knows about my assignment. That fact takes me directly to thinking about Maddox. I have no idea what Clark will tell him, but I can only assume my partner will notice my absence. Maybe Maddox will be relieved that I'm out for a few days. That thought drops a lump into my throat.
I head to the bathroom but stop in front of Olson's tent to tie my shoe. The earlier rain has pushed Olson inside. He's leaning against a pile of old clothes reading a throwaway newspaper.
"Any clue as to why that guy Rowan keeps such a close eye on me?" I burble from the side of my mouth while concentrating on a lace that doesn't need tying.
"Might be those Orphan Annie braids," he quips unhelpfully.
I switch to the other shoe, which also doesn't need tying. "You're a big help."
Olson stays inside his tent but moves closer to the opening. "See if you can get to know him. I tried and he wanted nothing to do with me." I glance through the netted opening. Olson has switched out the flasher style coat for a worn out ski parka. The downy stuffing is poking out through numerous holes. I can't hold back a laugh.