The Devil's Dance Page 6

  White-collar crime aside, those crooks and the Evil Ex still couldn’t remove the Monte Carlo magic and the best memories of my life. Neither could Agent Jerkface. For ten days, I basked in the Mediterranean sun with the richest people in the world. After growing up much of my life in trailer trash hell, I’d soaked up all the classy I could.

  As I cruised down I-35 South, I reminisced over the zenith of my life. The flowers, the smells. A half a world away. I’d been so sure that I would one day live in Monaco and dance every night at Jimmy Z’s, spend my days in a Ferrari speeding around corners tighter than my father’s wallet.

  When it came to Phil, it bothered me that I had no closure, not even an idea where the bastard took off. Grieving the loss of a relationship was hard enough without it ending without so much as a good-bye. Not knowing where Phil ended up also made it much harder to hire a hit man or send the feds, which was probably why he failed to disclose this information. Not knowing Phil’s exact location also presented all kinds of other, unforeseen problems. For instance, I was pretty sure the Voodoo doll I’d constructed from his cashmere golf sweater was less effective if I didn’t know where to direct the bad juju. I wasn’t a hundred percent sure that geography and bad juju were related, but didn’t want to take my chances. When his Little Buddy went limp, I wanted him to know where that came from, which is why I also timed the Voodoo crotch fleas and premature baldness to hit at roughly the same time.

  Loreena Bobbit was an amateur. Modern science could reattach a man-part, but Voodoo crotch fleas? The Tamale Lady and part-time Santeria Priestess in front of Fiesta Mart assured me there was no getting rid of those.

  Moon River, wider than a mile. I’m crossing you in style, some daaaayyyyyy…

  I loved that song. Made me think of Breakfast at Tiffany’s and Ida. Before I ran off to college in the big city, I’d actually been stupid enough to believe that Tiffany’s was a restaurant. I tried to get everyone on the NYC field trip to go there for breakfast, like literally. I figured the place oughta have a hell of a spread, since Hollywood made a movie about it. The other students all thought I was being clever and deep. I never let on that I really wanted eggs and bacon and was very disappointed at the selection of diamonds.

  Ah, but once I saw the movie with Ida, I was hooked and never minded that she played that movie over and over.

  Bisby.

  After spending most of my childhood wearing donated clothes, I’d wanted more, and, for a brief moment, I’d tasted it, so being poor was now much more painful. I supposed if a person’s always done without, doing without is just another day. No basis for comparison. Now I had to face the people who knew I’d fail and who’d revel in my fall. It proved what they all believed.

  Escape was impossible.

  As the miles ticked by, my anxiety notched steadily higher especially now that it was clear that Sawyer was tailing me. Originally, I’d planned on stopping in a Motel 6 on the way down, but considering I didn’t have a place to live once I reached Bisby, I needed to use my secret nest egg very sparingly. Besides, if Sawyer was convinced I was Burney Madoff because I paid cash for gas and snacks, he’d surely know I was guilty of embezzlement if I stayed somewhere fancy enough to not charge by the hour.

  By ten that night I’d passed through San Antonio and plunged into the darkness beyond the last of the city lights. Around midnight, my butt started to go numb, so I pulled off the interstate and into a rest station to stretch my legs. I noted the Suburban glide into the parking lot as I ran for the ladies’ room. When I returned to the glow of the lot, I saw that Sawyer had backed into the space next to mine.

  He rolled down his window, “Driving straight through, eh? In a hurry to meet up with Lover Boy?”

  Ignoring him, I kicked my leg up on a railing that ran along handicap access from the parking lot and used it like a ballet barre to stretch. I swore I saw him glance at me appreciatively. Only a split-second, then his stone face returned.

  Troll.

  The bones in my back cracked and snapped as I twisted. The Honda was a misery to drive. Not only was it a stick-shift and a four cylinder, but the CV joints were worn and made the car rattle like it was going to fall apart every time I exceeded sixty mph. Good part was it kept me from speeding, but the bad part was I felt like I’d been tossed in a bag of hammers and shaken.

  Sawyer stepped out and leaned against his truck. “Why don’t you make this easy on both of us and tell me where Phil is? Could get you a sweet deal.”

  I bent forward to stretch my hamstrings.

  Sawyer crouched to make eye contact. “You probably won’t do any jail time at all if you tell me where he is. I understand you’re a victim here, but helping him does not help you. If he loved you, he wouldn’t make you cover for him like this.”

  I gritted my teeth so hard I was sure I might crack my molars. Anger frothed up inside me, but I knew men like Sawyer. The more I pled innocence, the guiltier I’d seem. I met his stare.

  “Cat got yer tongue?” he asked. That was the second jackass in two days who’d asked me that question.

  Being in sales had taught me a lot about strategy, and one thing I’d learned was silence held power. The big boys of Verify had a saying when it came to negotiation. He who speaks first loses. Silence and eye contact were weapons. I refused to blink until, after a long couple minutes, Sawyer chuckled and looked away. He shoved his hands in his pockets. “I can play your games, sweetheart, but mark my words. You’ll come around. Gals like you don’t last long on their own.” He returned to the cab of his Suburban.

  Sawyer had no idea how long gals like me could last. I crossed my arms to ward off a chill that shouldn’t have been there. I was so tired I hurt. My hands throbbed from clutching the wheel in a death-grip all day.

  I’d always dreamed I’d one day return home, but that things would be different. I’d grown up trailer trash, daughter of a roughneck who worked the oil fields in Midland, and a maid who cleaned the homes of the handful of rich families in Bisby. I couldn’t count how many times I’d envisioned my homecoming, that my dad and sister would finally be proud of me and my tormentors would respect me.

  I rubbed the invisible place on my left hand where my engagement ring used to be. After all this time, I could still feel its weight, like some ghost limb long ago amputated that still itched. Proof someone wanted me as a wife, ‘til death do us part. No one had ever wanted me, not even Cotton, my high school soul mate and love of my life who promised to meet me in Fort Worth but never showed and never called. My mother hadn’t wanted me enough to stay, and my sister resented taking her place. My father hated everyone, including me. I longed to help Sawyer, but I couldn’t. He probably had a better idea of where Phil was than I did.

  I’d spent the past year trying to make it day to day without falling apart. What kind of person had I loved and agreed to marry? Cunningham was right. How could I have never seen what Phil really was? All those poor people at Verify. I thought about Abraham, the janitor who always brought me coffee when I worked late into the night. Or Celia, the receptionist who was working at Verify so she could get good insurance for her boy, a sensitive intelligent soul no one could reach because of his autism. Then there was Big Jim who worked in the parking garage. Jim had come out of retirement to make money to care for his wife who’d lost her wits to advanced Alzheimer’s. I remembered all their names and all their stories. I saw their faces every night in fitful dreams, and felt I owed them some kind of an explanation. I needed some way to make it right, but had no idea how.

  What I didn’t understand was I hadn’t heard anything for the past year. Had the authorities been watching me all this time, thinking I’d lead them to Phil? Why now? What had changed?

  I slumped against my car, letting the heated metal ease the throbbing ache in my lower back and tried to not think about how every mile closer to home was another mile closer to a new set of old problems. Large grasshoppers buzzed across the asphalt, and tiny swift creatures swoop
ed in and out of the light, feasting on the pulsing clouds of insects attracted to the cones of brightness cast by the lamps. Sawyer’s Suburban loomed dark and quiet next to me. I could make out the faint glow of a cell phone.

  My muscles hurt, and, every time I thought about going home, I had a mini-panic attack. I spilled back inside the warm Honda, cracked the windows and locked the doors. I flipped on the dome light and sifted through the newspaper for any news of homicide victims brained with cookware. After searching every inch of the paper and finding nothing, it seemed no news was good news, even though I knew law enforcement didn’t always report everything to the papers. I was far from in the clear. I willed my mind empty, banishing any thoughts about Cesar, Ida, Daddy, Heather, home, and even Phil. And yet, that gnawing pain deep in my solar plexus remained. I didn’t have the blues, I had the mean reds. Audrey Hepburn’s voice cued in my head.

  The blues are because you’re getting fat and maybe it’s been raining too long, you’re just sad that’s all. The mean reds are horrible. Suddenly you’re afraid and you don’t know what you’re afraid of.

  I reached in the backseat for a small crocheted blanket Ida made for me. It smelled like Glycerin Rosewater and Chantilly Lace. I missed my crappy little apartment. I missed Ida. I missed drifting off to sleep to the sound of Paul Varjack’s voice. I missed being needed and wanted. For a moment I thought of Phil, his charming smile that had stolen my heart and my better sense. Where was he? Worse? Who was he with? Did he ever think of me? Did he have any regret that he’d destroyed my life? Slipping on the headphones, I once again set Moon River to repeat.

  Wherever you’re going, I’m going your way. Two lovers off to see the world…

  Chapter Five

  I made it to FM 1313 by the next afternoon and had to steer onto the shoulder and check the map to make sure I hadn’t ended up in the wrong town. Gated communities of half-million dollar houses had sprouted everywhere. Lush lawns of buffalo grass now replaced much of the desert scrub. Walls of mature oleander lined the streets, and the city had planted palm trees along the roads. Truck after truck bulging with building supplies whizzed by my struggling Honda. New communities of massive homes had popped up along the ridges of the distant desert hills, all in different phases of development. I finally understood what Heather had been talking about. I barely recognized the place.

  The old Main Street through town had completely transformed. When I’d left, it consisted of a pawnshop and a small post office. The rest of the buildings and courthouse, built a few years after the end of WWII, had been left to decay, the space used to store ancient school desks and office furniture. But now? There were fresh brick streets and the handful of original buildings, once abandoned to possums and teenage drunks, had been returned to their former glory and updated. I spotted a juice bar, at least two yoga studios, a Pilates studio, a vegan grill, and a wine bar on the first block alone. German luxury cars, Land Rovers, fancy hybrids, and fully loaded Jeeps topped with world-class mountain bikes crowded the small parking lots.

  A bright eclectic row of restaurants, cafes, and bistros soaked the air with the rich aromas of fresh breads and grilled meats. The new-and-improved Bisby residents ambled shop to shop in Columbia shorts, North Face polo shirts, and five-hundred-dollar hiking boots. I slumped low in my seat hoping no one would notice me.

  Bisby, fancy. Now that was something that would take getting used to.

  I double-checked the map once again still not entirely convinced I was indeed in Bisby, Texas. It wasn’t until I spied the Bisby Baptist Church that I realized I was actually home. The marquis sign out front read, Stop, Drop, and Roll Doesn’t Work in Hell.

  Yep, most definitely home. This was my turn.

  After several miles, Bisby 2.0, now populated with Lululemon-Moms surrendered to rocky fields of brush, beer cans, and cars that hadn’t run since MC Hammer was cool. My childhood home. A rush of memories ambushed me as I slowed at baked wash that only swelled with water when flash floods struck. I thought of all the times I’d sat with a stick and string, imagining I was fishing, wishing my dad would come home from toiling in the oil fields to sit beside me like the dads on TV. Mesquite trees swayed in the blistering breeze and I absently rubbed my thigh, the place where my dad would whip me mercilessly with their knotted branches. How I could love someone and fear them so much at the same time was a mystery.

  Story of my life.

  I made a right at the large oak tree, gnarled and broken but still clinging to life after who knew how many lightning strikes. The old tree twisted at all kinds of wild angles, but every year it sprouted green leaves that turned to gold before the winds of some blue norther clawed them all away. I was impressed it still stood after so many years of hardship, nestled safely behind rows of mature prickly pear, leathery from the unrelenting heat. A sandblasted wooden sign stood sentinel nearby, the last vestiges of white paint clinging in long flaking strips. The red lettering had faded beyond being legible, but I knew the words by heart.

  A righteous man may have many troubles, but the Lord delivers him from them all. Psalms 34:19 A Gift from Antioch Church of Christ.

  This part of the country birthed survivors. The harsh world pressed between blue sky and hard earth bore testament to that. I’d been so snared in my memories, I’d completely forgotten about the Suburban that had tailed me for over a day. I glanced in my mirrors and noticed Sawyer was nowhere in sight. Good. This was going to be tough enough without him here. I slowed to a stop at the entrance to The Cactus Flower Trailer Park. Two tall cacti marked the end of the road. Literally. Beyond the trailer park was nothing but low desert mountains and badlands that stretched to Mexico. Like the squat cacti that covered the hills, no one chose to live here. They were born into the crags of dust and sand would die leaving it to the next generation. My car shuddered as I shifted gears and the Check Engine light appeared.

  Great .

  The city, perhaps in light of the trailer park’s imminent demolition, hadn’t bothered to level the roads, leaving deep ruts carved by spring rains. My Honda’s worn shocks complained as I bounced along the undulations of sunbaked soil. I cringed every time I heard the sharp metallic sound of my muffler slamming against rock-hard dirt fired in the kiln of South Texas summer.

  I sputtered past several lots, but the trailer park was a ghost town. Many of the trailers had decayed to the point of partial collapse, crisp vinyl siding peeled open, revealing the dry-rotted carpet innards where blue-collar families once broke bread. Some of the lots sat empty, the better trailers gone, likely relocated. It was odd how quiet the place was. After living months in the relentless racket of Casa Linda, I should have found the silence welcoming. Instead, it seemed all wrong and strangely unsettling. I made my way to the back of the trailer park, and, when I saw the place I once called home, I felt all the blood leave my face and drop to my feet. This was no longer a trailer.

  It was a junkyard.

  Growing up, our home had been the only spot of pretty in the entire place. My mother was sure we’d one day live in one of the fancy gingerbread homes in town that she cleaned six days a week. When she wasn’t working, she gardened and painted. Our home had at least been warm and welcoming even if it once had wheels. The place I stared at now bore little resemblance to what I remembered. Our once tidy postage stamp green yard was now a tangled mess of junk, tires, broken appliances, and rotting wooden pallets. Piles of old bicycles leaned against refrigerators with no doors, and mounds of broken window AC units and swamp coolers buttressed the sagging porch. The screen on the large front window dangled like a hangnail.

  As I was about to call Heather, I heard arguing and then front door slammed. “Go to hell! I don’t have to put up with yer shit.” My sister stormed out the door as an amber prescription bottle and a water glass flew past her head, ricocheted off the porch railing then smashed to the ground, big white pills flying everywhere.

  My father’s yell boomed then trailed off in a fit of coughs. “I
’m not taking any damn dope. No doctor’s gonna tell me what to do. And take yer rat with you.” I heard the sharp yelp of a small dog and saw a tiny brown Chihuahua scramble out the door a split-second before it banged shut.

  Heather sank to the wooden steps and searched her Dooney & Bourke purse for her cigarettes and lighter. I noted it was the same purse she’d carried in high school, the one she’d bought with saved Christmas money.

  Our last Christmas as a family.

  The tiny dog curled in her lap and shook. She stroked the frightened creature’s head as she stared off, not showing she was aware of my presence. Even from this distance, I could tell she was crying. She looked nothing like I remembered. Still a beauty, only now a woman sat in the place of the girl I’d left behind. My sister was stunning, with a thick ponytail of golden hair piled on her head in that way that was supposed to be haphazard yet seemed chic. She wore super short pink shorts and hot pink Hooters shirt that she filled out nicely. Unlike me, Heather inherited boobs. Her skin was butternut brown and her legs went on forever. I’d always envied how she seemed born to be a ballerina. Every move she made was graceful, like a dancer. Swanlike was not a word that went with me, but was meant for my sister.

  From her voice on the phone, I’d expected her face to be a dry landscape weathered by pain like so many of the locals, prematurely aged from years of stress, smokes, and hard living. Though I could tell she was tired, no one would’ve believed she was older than me. I barely believed it. We looked more like twins than siblings, and as much as I hated to admit it, she was still more attractive.