Hornet's Nest

  "I suppose when you stop to think about it, when has something like this ever happened? That reminds me." She laughed.

  "Some studio and a couple producers from Hollywood called, too. Can you imagine?"

  Gorelick wasn't feeling well.

  "It is an unusual situation," she had to agree.

  "An amazing example of community policing, Nancy. People doing the right thing." Hammer paced and gestured with the little crystal building wearing a crown.

  "Your treating a chief and deputy chief just like anyone else, making no special considerations." She nodded.

  "I

  think all those reporters are going to like that. Don't you? "

  Gorelick would be ruined, would look like the dickhead she was.

  Someone would run against her next fall. She'd have to go work in a law firm as a lowly junior attorney to a bunch of overbearing partners who wouldn't want her to join their exclusive ranks.

  "I'm going to tell them all about it." Hammer smiled at her.

  "Right now. I guess the best thing would be a press conference."

  The court date was moved ahead a week, and landed on a day convenient for all, except Johnny Martino, aka Magic the Man, who was sitting in his jail cell, dejected in a blaze orange jumpsuit with DEPT OF CORR stenciled in on the back. Everybody in the Corr wore one, and now and then, when he gave much thought to the matter, he wondered what the hell the Corr was. As in Marine Corps, Peace Corps, CeyO RailRoad maybe? His old man worked for Amtrak, cleaning up cars after all those passengers got off.

  No way young Martino was ever doing shit work like that. No fucking way. He couldn't believe how bad his leg hurt from where that bitch kicked him. The guns people carried these days, women especially. Both of them pointing forty-fucking-caliber semiautomatics at his head. Now where the hell did that come from? Fucking Mars?

  These ladies beam down, or something? He was still stunned, and had sat up on his narrow bunk this morning thinking yesterday on the bus didn't happen.

  Then he focused on the steel toilet bowl that he had not bothered to flush last night. His shin was throbbing so bad, and had a lump on it the size of an orange, the skin broken in the middle, like a navel, where that pointy metal toe had connected. Now that he explored the situation a little further, he should have been suspicious of two rich ladies like that getting on the Greyhound. No way people like them take the bus. Some of the guys were talking and laughing up and down the cells, going on and on about him getting his ass kicked by some old woman with a big pocketbook, everybody making fun of Martino. He got out a cigarette, and thought about suing. He thought about getting another tattoo, might as well while he was here.

  t^ Brazil's day was not going especially well, either. He and Packer were editing another self-initiated, rather large piece Brazil was doing on mothers alone in a world without men. Brazil continued to come across typos, spaces, blank lines that he knew he had not caused.

  Someone had been breaking into his computer basket and going through his files. He was explaining this to his metro editor, Packer, as they rolled through paragraphs, inspecting the violation.

  "See," Brazil was hotly saying, and he was in uniform,

  ready for yet another night on the street.

  "It's weird. The last couple days I keep finding stuff like this."

  "You sure you're not doing it? You do tend to go through your stories a lot," Packer said.

  What the editor had observed about Brazil's remarkable productivity had now reached the level of not humanly possible. This kid dressed like a cop frightened Packer. Packer didn't even much want to sit next to Brazil anymore. Brazil wasn't normal. He was getting commendations from the police, and averaging three bylines every morning, even on days when he supposedly was off. Not to mention, his work Was unbelievably good for someone so inexperienced who had never been to journalism school. Packer suspected that Brazil would win a Pulitzer by the time he was thirty, possibly sooner. For that reason, Packer intended to remain Brazil's editor, even if the job was exhausting, intense, and unnerving, and caused Packer to hate life more with each passing day.

  This morning was a typical example. The alarm had buzzed at six, and Packer did not want to get up. But he did. Mildred, his wife, was her typical cheery self, cooking oatmeal in the kitchen, while Dufus, her purebred Boston Terrier puppy, skittered around sideways and walleyed and looking for something else to chew, or pee or poop on. Packer was tucking in his shirt all the way around as he entered this domestic scene, trying to wake up, and wondering if his wife was losing what marbles she had left.

  "Mildred," he said.

  "It's summer. Oatmeal is not a good hot-weather food."

  "Of course it is." She happily stirred.

  "Good for your high blood pressure."

  Dufus jumped and fussed at Packer, dancing around his feet, trying to climb him, grabbing cuffs in snaggly teeth. Packer never touched his wife's puppy if he could help it, and had refused any input into its development beyond naming it, over objections from Mildred, who had made it a condition of their marriage that she would never be without one of these ugly little dogs from her childhood. Dufus did not see very well. From his perspective, Packer was a very big and unfriendly tree, a utility pole, some other edifice, maybe a fence. Whenever Packer came within scent, Dufus was airborne and in grass and squatting and relieving other basic functions that meant nothing to Dufus. He untied both of Packer's shoelaces.

  Packer made his way across the newsroom as if he saw no color in the world, only gray. He was tucking in his shirt, heading to the men's room, feeling like he had to go and knowing nothing would happen again, and reminded that next Wednesday at two p. m. " he had an appointment with his urologist.

  Vft Brazil was running down the escalator, deciding to take matters into his own hands. He pushed through several sets of doors, finally entering the rarified, air- conditioned space where Brenda Bond ruled the world from an ergonomically-correct green fabric chair with rollers. Her feet were on an adjustable footrest, her valuable hands poised over a contoured keyboard designed to prevent carpal tunnel syndrome.

  Bond was surrounded by IBM and Hewlett Packard mainframes, multiplexor, modems, cabinets containing huge tape reels, decoders, and a satellite feed from the Associated Press. It was her cockpit, and he had come. She could not believe that Brazil was standing before her, had sought her out, and wanted to be with her and no one but her this very second in time and space. Her face got hot as she looked him up and down. God almighty, was he built, and he knew it, and was already showing his contempt for her.

  "I think someone's getting into my basket and going through my files," Brazil announced.

  "Impossible," Bond, the genius, arrogantly told him.

  "Unless you've given out your password."

  "I want it changed," he demanded.

  She was studying his uniform trousers and the way they fit him, particularly in the area of his zipper, appropriating, and full of her superiority. Brazil made a big point of looking where she was looking, as if there must be something on his pants.

  "What? I spill something?" he said, walking off.

  twIt was not that his trousers were too tight, nor were they provocative in any way. Brazil never wore anything for the purpose of drawing attention to himself or impressing others. For one thing, shopping had never been an option. The entirety of his wardrobe could be accommodated by two dresser drawers and about twenty coat hangers.

  Mostly, he had uniforms, and tennis clothes supplied by the tennis team, and by Wilson, which had put him on a free list when he was in high school and consistently ranked in the top five juniors in the state. Brazil's uniform trousers were, in truth, baggy, if anything.

  Yet people like Brenda Bond still stared. So did Axel.

  When Brazil was in midnight blue and black leather, he had no idea what effect it had on others. If he had paused to analyze the matter, he might have discovered that uniforms were about power, and power was
an aphrodisiac. Axel knew this for a fact. He got up and trotted out of the newsroom, in pursuit. Brazil was notorious for his sprints down the escalator, and into the parking deck. Axel worked out in the Powerhouse Gym every early morning, and was rather spectacularly sculpted.

  Axel drank Met-Rx twice a day, and was very much admired when he was gleaming with sweat, and in a tank top and a weight belt, pumping, veins standing out, in his skimpy shorts. Other fit people stopped what they were doing, just to watch. He had been stalked several times by residents of his apartment complex. In truth. Tommy Axel could have anybody, and probably had at any given time. But he was not into aerobic exercise, because it was not a spectator sport. He got winded easily.

  "Shoot," Axel said when he burst through glass doors leading into the parking deck, as Brazil was driving his old BMW out of it.

  ^^2 W Publisher Panesa had a black-tie dinner this night and was going home unusually early. The publisher was starting his silver Volvo, with its unrivaled safety record and two airbags, and was witness to Axel's shameless behavior.

  "Christ," Panesa muttered, shaking his head as he pulled out of his reserved space in the center of the best wall, no more than twenty steps from the front glass doors. He rolled down a window, stopping Axel cold.

  "Come here," Panesa told him.

  Axel gave his boss a crooked, sexy Matt Dillon smile, and strolled over. Who could resist?

  "What's going on?" Axel said, moving in a way that showed muscle to its best advantage.

  "Axel, leave him alone," Panesa said.

  "Excuse me?" Axel touched his chest in pure hurt innocence.

  "You know exactly what I mean." Panesa roared off, fastening his shoulder harness, locking doors, checking mirrors, and snapping up the mike of his private frequency two-way radio to let the housekeeper know he was en route.

  The longer Panesa had worked in the newspaper business, the more paranoid he had become. Like Brazil, Panesa had started out as a police reporter, and by the time he was twenty-three, knew every filthy, nasty, cruel, and painful thing people did to one another. He had done stories on murdered children, on hit and runs, and husbands in black gloves and knit caps stabbing estranged wives and friends before cutting their throats and flying to Chicago. Panesa had interviewed women who lovingly seasoned home cooking with arsenic, and he had covered car wrecks, plane crashes, train derailments, skydiving gone bad, scuba diving gone worse, bungee jumping by drunks who forgot the cord, and fires, and drownings. Not to mention other horrors that did not end in death. His marriage, for example.

  Panesa frantically ran through downtown traffic like a Green Bay Packer, cutting in and out, the hell with you, honk all you want, get out of my way. He was going to be late again. It never failed. His date tonight was Judy Hammer, who apparently was married to a slob.

  Hammer avoided taking her husband out in public when she could, and Panesa did not blame her, if the rumor was true. Tonight was Nation Bank Public Service Awards banquet, and both Panesa and Hammer were being honored, as was District Attorney Gorelick, who had been in the news a lot lately, scorching the NC General Assembly for not coughing up enough money to hire seventeen more assistant DAs, when it was clear that what the Charlotte-Mecklenburg region really needed was another medical examiner or two. The banquet was held at the Carillon, with its wonderful paintings and mobiles. Panesa was driving.

  t| Hammer's personal car was a Mercedes, but not new and with only one airbag, on the driver's side. Panesa would not ride in anything that did not have a passenger's side airbag, and this had been made clear up front. Hammer, too, was rushing home early from the office.

  Seth was working in the garden, weeding and fertilizing. He had made cookies, and Hammer smelled the baked butter and sugar. She noted the telltale traces of flour on the counter. Seth waved a handful of wild onions at her as she peered out the kitchen window at him. He was civil enough.

  She was in a hurry as she headed to her bedroom. God, the image staring back at her in the mirror was frightening. She washed her face, squirted non alcohol styling gel into her hands and riffled through her hair. She started all over again with makeup. Black-tie affairs were always a problem. Men owned one tux and wore it to everything, or they rented. What were women supposed to do? She hadn't given any thought to what she might put on until she was walking into a house that smelled like a bakery. She pulled out a black satin skirt, a gold and black beaded short-wasted jacket, and a black silk blouse with spaghetti straps.

  The truth was. Hammer had gained four pounds since she had worn this ensemble last, at a Jaycee's fundraiser in Pineville, about a year ago, if memory served her well. She managed to button her skirt, but was not happy about it. Her bosom was more out front than usual, and she did not like drawing attention to what she normally kept to herself. She irritably yanked her beaded jacket around her, muttering, wondering if dry-cleaning might have shrunk anything and the fault, therefore, not hers. Changing earrings to simple diamond posts with screw-backs was always troublesome when she was rushed and out of sorts.

  "Darn," she said, closing the drain just in time before a gold back sailed down the sink.

  vy Panesa did not need a personal shopper, had no weight concerns, and could wear whatever he wished whenever he wished. He was an officer in the Knight-Ridder newspaper chain, and preferred black-label Giorgio Armani that he did not get in Charlotte. Hornets fans had priorities other than draping their spouses in two-thousand-dollar foreign suits, it seemed, and shopping remained a difficulty in the Queen City.

  Panesa was, as it turned out, dazzling in a tuxedo with satin lapels, and trousers with stripes. His was black silk, and he wore a matte-finished gold watch, and black lizard shoes.

  "So tell me," Panesa said when Hammer climbed into the Volvo.

  "What's your secret?"

  "What secret?" Hammer had no idea what this was about as she fastened her shoulder harness.

  "You look stunning."

  "Of course I don't," Hammer said.

  Panesabacked out of the driveway, checking his mirrors, noticing the fat man working on geraniums. The fat man was watching them leave, and Panesa pretended not to notice as he adjusted the air conditioning.

  "Do you shop around here?" Panesa asked.

  "Lord, I need to." Hammer sighed, for when did she have time?

  "Let me guess. Montaldo's."

  "Never," Hammer told him.

  "Have you noticed how they treat you in places like that? They want to sell me something because I can afford it, and then treat me like an inferior. If I'm so inferior, I ask myself, then why are they the ones selling hose and lingerie?"

  "That is absolutely the truth," said Panesa, who had never shopped in a store that did not have clothes for men.

  "Same thing in some restaurants I won't go to anymore."

  "Morton's," Hammer supposed, although she had never eaten there.

  "Not if you're on their V.I.P list. They give you a little card, and you can always get a table and good service." Panesa switched lanes.

  "Police officials have to be careful of things like that," Hammer reminded the publisher, whose paper would have been the first to print a story about Hammer's V. I. P status or any other special favors possibly resulting in one establishment getting more police protection than another.

  "Truth is, I don't eat much red meat anymore," Panesa added.

  They were passing the Traveler's Hotel, upstairs from the Presto Grill, which Hammer and West had made rather famous of late. Panesa smiled as he drove, reminded of Brazil's Batman and Robin story. The hotel was a horrific dive. Hammer thought as she looked out her window. Appropriately, it was across Trade Street from the city's unemployment office, and next door to the Dirty Laundry Cleaner & Laundry. No eating or drinking was allowed in the lobby of the Traveler's. They'd had an axe murder there several years earlier. Or was that the Uptown Motel?

  Hammer couldn't remember.

  "How do you stay in shape," Panesa continued the
small talk.

  "I walk whenever I can. I don't eat fat," Hammer replied, digging in her purse for lipstick.

  "That's not fair. I know women who walk on the treadmill an hour every day, and their legs don't look like yours," Panesa observed.

  "I want to know precisely what the difference is."

  "Seth eats everything in my house," Hammer was out with it.

  "He eats so much, I lose my appetite on a regular basis. You know what it does to you to walk in at eight o'clock, after a hellish day, and see your husband parked in front of the TV, watching " Ellen," eating his third bowl of Hormel chili with beef and beans?"

  Then the rumors were true, and Panesa suddenly felt sorry for Hammer.

  The publisher of the Charlotte Observer went home to no one but a housekeeper who prepared chicken breasts and spinach salads. How awful for Hammer. Panesa looked over at his peer in satin and beads. Panesa took the risk of reaching out and patting Hammer's hand.