Devil take me down, p.3
Devil Take Me Down, page 3
part #2 of Clementine Toledano Mystery Series
“Two?? Two? That video I found showed him raping Ronnie a dozen times plus two other girls.” Q yelled in disbelief.
“The one girl we found says it was consensual, and that she was over the age of consent when it happened. The judge says there’s no proof that Veronica Denton wasn’t consensual sex. We’ve got him dead to rights on a statutory based on Pete Fontain’s testimony,” Terrance paused and let out a heavy sigh. “Multer is still a big deal in this state. I got him on three charges. He’ll do fifteen years. His wife will do at least twenty-five, maybe thirty,” he explained as if anything other than life without parole would have placated her.
“How long before probation?” Q asked, already knowing the answer.
“Three to five if we’re unlucky.”
She could hear the desolation in his voice. “This wasn’t your idea, I take it.”
When he didn’t say anything, she knew the answer. Politicians looked out for one another, and the D.A. was nothing if not a consummate politician.
“Don’t sweat it, Terrance. You did what you could,” she said, knowing that he really had done all he could, but the system was rigged in the favor of men like Gus Multer.
Q hung up without waiting for a response and left her phone on the bottom stair. She climbed the stairs to the bedroom and screamed into a pillow for several long moments. Once she felt marginally less like burning the world to the ground, she slipped out of her Cannibal Corpse t-shirt, Converse, and jeans and into one of Ben’s dress shirts. Ben was a good foot taller than her and extra-long in every way. His shirts fell down to her knees. She took a deep inhale, breathing in his allspice and lavender smell and was instantly comforted, and slightly aroused.
Prior to the Mardi Gras, during which the Multers had committed the crimes that had gotten them arrested and Q nearly killed, Q and Ben’s relationship revolved completely around getting one another naked as quickly and expediently as possible. But while Q was somewhat out-of-character in her casual treatment of their relationship, Ben patiently bided his time, pulling down the little brick walls she kept building up around her and using them to build something real and lasting with her instead. Nevertheless, thoughts of Big, Beautiful Ben Bordelon generally elicited memories between her legs that momentarily overshadowed her love for him. Within seconds, however, her rage bubbled itself back out of her momentary calm.
Gus Multer is going to get away with it.
The child of an A.D.A., Q was prepared for some sort of plea deal, but this was a bridge too far. Serving three to five years for raping a teenage girl and having her killed when she demanded some semblance of justice, was concrete proof of the systemic corruption that ran through every level of Louisiana government. Q wandered across the hall to her music room and sat at the piano to attempt another pass at the song she’d failed to master during rehearsals. She conquered it on the first try.
“Motherfucker,” she muttered and successfully played through the rest of the set.
Standing up to stretch, she found herself making a straight beeline for Ben’s antique vanity to check his sock drawer again. She reached into the back left corner and her fingers wrapped around the tiny silver box. Pulling it out, she looked at the inscription on top. A single word in elegant Hebrew script read: _______ ‘Bashert’. Yiddish shorthand for soul mate.
She opened the small silver cylinder to reveal a single square-cut diamond on a simple silver band. Q’s stomach flipped and she felt an uncomfortable heat rising through her spine to her neck. She snapped the offending box closed and shoved it back into its hiding spot. Storming out of the bedroom, she crossed the hall to her music room and grabbed her guitar before heading downstairs.
She poured herself a taller than advisable glass of vodka and walked out onto the fern-lined front porch. Sitting down in the white porch swing at the far end, she took a long sip of her beverage before setting it down on the table. She began to absent-mindedly strum out a tune, listening to a nearby mockingbird cycle through its set.
Q caught a hold of a melody and began to lightly strum the strings, pulsing out an easy four bar blues progression and looking out onto the street. Unused to having so many visible neighbors in close proximity, she'd developed a new hobby during the gigless season of the past two summers that she liked to call, ‘what's your secret?’
Already abundantly equipped with trust issues, Q figured everyone was hiding something; and by and large, it turned out that she was right. She watched as the fifty-something man who lived across the street pulled into his driveway.
Right on time.
He walked over to the thick hydrangea bush next to his house and pulled out a small bottle. He glanced around before draining what was left in it and replaced it with a full one from inside his suit coat pocket. He casually strolled to the other side of the driveway, dropped it into the neighbor's recycling bin, and walked up his front walkway and into his house: Dennis, the secret drinker with a rabidly Pentecostal wife and the best cared-for flower beds on the street…each with a little bottle of sin nestled safely within the blooms.
Dennis wasn’t alone. The neighbor to the left of her had a home office that shared a window view with Q’s music room. As far as she could tell, he spent eight hours a day with a small window of hard-core pornography open in the lower right corner of his second screen while he churned out endless spreadsheets and circuit diagrams for his telecommute gig. He also was either oblivious to the fact that his neighbor’s window was less than six feet away from his own, or got some sort of thrill at being caught. Regardless, as soon as his wife and eight-year-old returned home, the computer screen went dark, and his surreptitious porn addiction was hidden safely away.
Alcohol and pornography were at least understandable secrets to keep hidden from view, what Q could not understand was the upstairs/downstairs neighbors in the duplex to the right of Dennis, the Secret Drinker. The two were obviously single, obviously screwing, and obviously hiding the latter for absolutely no reason that she could decipher.
Eventually, Q set down her guitar and gave up her neighbor spying. She watched the moon rise through the live oak branches before going back inside the house. Retrieving her phone from the bottom stair, she called Ben, nervously tapping her finger on the foyer table.
“Evenin’, darlin’. How’s rehearsal going?” Ben’s gravelly voice sent a wave of comfort through her.
“It’s not. We called it a night. I’m home. Where are you?” she asked.
Q had expected to be assaulted with loud voices and throbbing music distorting the speaker on Ben’s phone. The uptown club that Ben owned was never that quiet on a Friday night.
“Fucking Beth texted me an hour after she was supposed to be at work. Said her car broke down way the hell down in the ninth ward and she was waiting for a tow. I jumped in my car to go get her. Now I’m sitting in front of the vacant lot that should be the address she gave me and no house, no car, no tow truck, no Beth.” Ben sounded annoyed.
“Maybe she sent the wrong address?" Q guessed.
"Yeah, maybe, but she could answer my damn calls,” Ben complained.
"Her phone probably died by the time the truck came,” Q said trying to keep him from getting too upset. The last thing she needed was Beth Hunter and her mildly obsessive, school girl crush on Ben adding to an already crap day.
“I don’t know, maybe. That girl’s been little Miss Unreliable lately. Joe thinks she’s strung out on somebody, but this is straight up bullshit. Josh is ready to fire her. Gonna have to give her a talking to tomorrow.” He paused and sighed before continuing, “So what did I do right to get a call from you?”
Q tried to think of something pithy and flirty to say and apparently waited a beat too long.
“What’s wrong, darlin’?” Ben asked gently.
Fucking timing. God Damn.
“Nothing. I’m fine. I just…Terrance called. Gus Multer copped a plea bargain. That low-life is only getting charged with two counts of sexual assault and one for covering for that crazed bitch of a wife, who, incidentally is the one who’s going to do the hard time. And to add insult to injury, one of Niko’s exes is our sound guy tomorrow night. Can you believe my luck?” she whined as casually as she could.
“One of Niko’s exes is your sound guy?” Ben asked with serious concern.
“He’s harmless, Ben. But he followed me from the club and all the way up Canal on my way home. Probably to apologize, it’s nothing…” Q glanced at the clock on her phone. “Damn, baby, it’s almost ten thirty, you better get back to work.”
“He was following you?" he asked, more serious still.
She quickly replied, not wanting him to worry, "Like I said, he probably just wanted to apologize. The Beasts and I weren’t exactly subtle when he..."
"I’m coming home.” Ben interrupted.
“I’m ok. Seriously, it’s nothing. Go to work so I don’t have to hear Josh bitch for the next two weeks. I’ll come to you.”
“Fuck that. Lock the damn doors. I’ll be home as quick as I can. Just let me call in some help for Josh,” he said, panic rising in his voice.
“Ben, you’re overreacting,” she soothed.
“The hell I am!” Ben yelled back. “Some creepy ex-boyfriend of Niko’s suddenly turns up as your sound guy, and follows you halfway through the Quarter to Canal? I find him within a mile of our home and I’m gonna beat his ass.”
“You sound like Charlie,” she teased.
Ben let out a growl of frustration and paused to catch his temper. “Q, darlin’, just please lock the doors,” he pleaded. “Please, baby, I don’t know what I’d do if…”
Q held the phone up to the deadbolt as she snapped it home and set the alarm. “Doors locked. Alarm set. Now get your ass home and defend your woman already.”
She did a little happy dance and hung up the phone. Ben worked nearly every night of the week at the club he owned in uptown New Orleans. Lafitte’s Cove was a hot spot for the gentrifying masses and was a proud promoter of good jazz, good cigars, and good Scotch. The once shady neighborhood that surrounded it was slowly giving way to hair salons and art galleries. Things changed slowly in New Orleans, but not slowly enough to prevent affordable rentals from becoming half-million dollar condos.
The fact that Ben and she kept nearly identical schedules during the hectic tourist season was a benefit to their relationship. Ben was busy with the Cove and QT and the Beasts were busy gigging. But during the long, nearly gigless month of August, Q found herself enjoying being alone less and less.
She poured herself another drink and headed upstairs to run a bath. Pausing halfway up the stairs, she slipped out of Ben’s shirt, leaving both it and her underwear hanging from the banister before going up to the bathroom. She started the water in the bathtub and doused it with bubble bath. While the tub filled, Q stared at her reflection in the oval mirror above the pedestal sink. She wondered at her turquoise eyes, searching for any visible sign of death behind them.
Most days she could justify the actions she took that led to Niko's death. Her life was in danger. Ben's life was in danger. Over time, she'd come to realize that shooting Niko wasn't the cause of her guilt. It was knowing that her friendship with him had given him safe passage into her world. Louis Falgoust had wanted to be with her, had loved her even, but Q couldn't let him in. Niko used it to get close enough to kill him. And Ronnie, too. Ronnie had even been privy to enough knowledge to realize that Niko was dangerous, but couldn't recognize it because Niko was the gay sidekick of her boyfriend's childhood friend. Right or wrong, Q figured that she had to atone for all three deaths and still hadn’t found the best way to do so.
Q sighed and shook out her long, dark hair from the single barrette that held it in its upturned twist. Submerging herself in Ben’s larger-than-necessary tub, she lay back and waited for his foot falls on the stair treads. The comfort of the water, with the vodka's kind assistance, lulled her into a fugue state somewhere between dreams and reality.
“Damn it, Clementine, this was a clean shirt,” Ben said from the doorway holding up her discarded shirt.
Some way or another, 'Q' was the abbreviation for 'Clementine' in her late mother’s family vernacular. Most of the people closest to her, including Ben, knew that she preferred her nickname to her given one. This, of course, meant that, outside of her family, she only heard her given name uttered during moments in which she had aggravated someone.
Q's eyes fluttered open and she drowsily smiled up at him. Ben walked into the bathroom and stood at the side of the tub with his hands on his hips. Q looked up sideways at him. His long, blonde hair was pulled back into a neat ponytail and black cufflinks stood out against his striking white button down shirt.
“Some creepy friend of Niko's turns up out of the blue, after all this time, and tries to follow you home and you think 'I'm home alone, how could I possibly make myself more vulnerable,’” he scolded.
Q stood up in the middle of the bath and put her hands on her hips to mock him. “Yes, that's exactly what I was thinking. Did you come home to protect me or to lecture me?”
“Go to hell, Clementine. I’m going on to work if you’re going to try and get out of talking about this,” he said, his voice full of aggravation.
As he turned to go, Q reached out and slipped her hand under the front of his belt to pull him to her.
“You can’t go to work with your shirt all wet,” she teased.
Ben was not amused. “And whose fault is that?”
She began to unbuckle his belt.
“Q, I have a business to run,” Ben said as he tried to gently pull away.
She used the leverage to pull the belt off and cast it aside.
“They’re going to be short-handed without Beth,” he insisted.
She lifted his shirt and kissed the face of the angel tattoo that covered his entire torso before working her way down to its feet. “Thought you already called someone in.”
“Q, baby, please, I’m the boss. I can’t just not show up,” he said, without moving an inch. "I came home because I thought you were scared and needed me."
She stood on her tiptoes to wrap her arms around his neck. “But I do need you. I’m all alone in this big, old house. Who knows what could happen if I'm left unprotected."
Ben moaned in mock frustration and picked her up out of the bath. She wrapped her legs around his waist.
He yelled at the ceiling one more time before grinning and saying in a low voice, “You in for it now, girl.”
“Promises, promises.”
Bourdello Burlesque
Q strode into Club Sin Sin through the throngs of women of all shapes and sizes, and the occasional uncomfortable, token male. The weather had swung a full three-hundred-and-thirty-two days to the second day of August and a hundred-and-forty-three percent humidity. Wearing a tight black tank top and a pair of fitted linen slacks was going to get her in trouble with Charlie, who liked her to be significantly more flamboyant, but she was cool and comfortable and feeling confident, so Charlie Bourdel was just going to have to deal with it.
As if on cue, Charlie cut her off at the entrance to the theatre. “Q, just because our audience this evening consists mostly of dykes, doesn’t mean you have to dress like one.”
“Says the little man wearing too much eye liner,” Q hissed. She threw her arm around Charlie's shoulder and strode with him towards backstage and the rest of The Beasts. "Charlie, my boy, if you want to attract a new kind of fish, you've got to use a different kind of bait."
Max chimed in from his perch at stage left. "She's right, Charlie. If you're going to use a carrot to lead the mule, the mule's got to think it has a chance of eating it."
Q grinned. "I'm not sure carrots are the right-shaped vegetable for this particular analogy, but thanks for getting my back, Max."
She clapped her hand on Charlie's shoulder. "You'd make a terrible lesbian, Charlie."
"On the contrary, dykes and me got a lot in common." He paused and leered overtly at Q's braless chest before moving uncomfortably close. "We all like the same sort of carrot," he finished in a low voice.
"I'd agree with you, except of one, small, minor detail." Q said, pushing him away.
"I've told you before. It ain't small." Charlie said.
"And I've told you before. I don't think you have the first clue as to how to properly eat a carrot." She winked.
Max let out an emphesemic laugh as Q turned and walked to the piano to sit next to JJ on the bench while he changed the strings on his bass. Max waddled over to Charlie. "Think she got you good, Charlie."
"Shut up, old man," Charlie pouted.
"Don't feel bad, son, it took me a good twenty years of marriage before I figured out how to properly eat a carrot,” Max said, offhandedly.
"T.M.I. Max, " Q called from the piano.
"Remind me to remind you to tell Camilla that the next time you see her, Mr. Max. Give her something to look forward to." Tom said with a demented grin. How Tom had managed to seduce a woman as beautiful as Camilla St. John, let alone convince her to marry him, had always been a mystery to Q. From what little Camilla had disclosed, however, Q was fairly certain Tom had already figured out how to eat his vegetables.
JJ leaned closer to Q on the bench and whispered, "I don't get it. Don't white folks like eating carrots?"
"More than black dudes, so I'm told," Q winked at JJ.
"But I like carrots," JJ whined.
Tom dissolved into pre-adolescent giggles before leaning down to whisper something into JJ's ear. His nephew's eyes widened and he started laughing. "Q's right on this one."
"Black dudes don't like eating carrots?" she asked.
"Nope. Charlie ain’t got the first clue on what to do with one." JJ elbowed Q and hefted himself up. "And don't sell yourself so short, Uncle T. Mama says that's why Auntie C married a white dude in the first place."
"Enough with the carrots!" Charlie exclaimed.
"But it's your favorite subject, Charlie," Tom feigned confusion.
