She managed to kill another hour, reading a new book she had purchased that won some big literary prize, although she only halfway paid attention to it. She argued with herself over driving to the club or taking an Uber, but she knew she wanted at least a couple of whiskey sours. And she didn’t want to have to count how many drinks she had to figure out if she could still drive or not.
The Uber took ten minutes to pick her up. When she walked outside, the fog had started to roll in, making the night dark. The driver greeted her nicely enough, but slid his eyes all over her as she got in the back seat. Fenway could feel his eyes on her through the rear-view mirror. He tried to make small talk, and Fenway faked a phone call so she didn’t have to answer his increasingly probing questions.
But when she got to the club, she felt almost relaxed. The glassy-eyed doorman let her in without paying the cover charge—on a weeknight, it didn’t cost much to get in, and there weren’t very many people in the club, but it still made her feel good to get in for free. And only about five or six brave souls were scattered on the dance floor. There were about twenty people in the club altogether.
The music had a powerful, electronic beat to it; she didn’t recognize the song. She walked alone to the bar and figured she should start on her first whiskey sour. She saw several men swivel their heads to watch her travel from the door to the bar, and for the first time she wondered whether it was a good idea to arrive alone.
She noticed the bartender, with dark wavy hair, and dark eyes that were also looking her up and down. She made eye contact with him, and he walked from his spot in front of the register to meet her.
“What can I get you?” the bartender asked in a deep baritone. The music hadn’t been turned up to overwhelm conversation—though Fenway thought the volume would get cranked up soon enough.
“Whiskey sour.”
“Make it two,” said the man sitting on the stool next to her, holding out his credit card.
The bartender glanced at Fenway. She took a quick look at the man on the stool; he was young and white and fairly cute, but was dressed too casually for a night out dancing, in faded blue jeans and a wrinkled two-tone blue short-sleeved button-down shirt. He was looking at her the way Akeel looked at her, though, and she turned back to the bartender and shrugged. The bartender nodded and took his card.
“Thanks,” she said, sitting on the stool next to him.
“You’re welcome,” he said. “I don’t think I’ve seen you in here before.”
“I don’t usually come here,” she said. “Especially on a work night.”
He held out his hand. “I’m Zach.”
“Nice to meet you, Zach. You here often on a work night?”
“Never on a work night.” Zach grinned. “Often on a school night, though. Good thing it’s summer break.”
Fenway smirked. “Yeah, I figured you were a college boy. You over at PQ, or are you strictly private school?”
Zach’s grin faltered a bit, but he recovered. “Private. I’m a senior at Nidever. How about you? Where do you work?”
“At the county,” Fenway said, evasively.
“Ah,” Zach said. “So, county girl, you got a name?”
“Joanne,” Fenway said.
“Nice to meet you, Joanne.”
The bartender brought their drinks. “Keep it open?” he said, holding up Zach’s card. Zach nodded, not taking his eyes off Fenway.
Fenway started to take a drink and then noticed Zach awkwardly held his up to toast. She pulled the drink away from her mouth.
“To the prettiest girl in here,” he said, and he made an effort to pull his mouth into a genuine smile.
Fenway nodded, trying to save him from an even more awkward moment, clinked his glass, then took a drink. The cheap bourbon tasted like rubbing alcohol and burned going down; not even the lemon juice and syrup could adequately cover it up.
“Yeesh,” Fenway said.
“A little strong for you?”
Fenway shook her head. “It’s not that. I should have asked for a better bourbon.”
They talked a little more; Fenway quickly determined that they had absolutely nothing in common. He liked rock climbing and sailing. Fenway got the idea he’d been born into an incredibly rich family. In fact, he may have gone to the same private elementary school as Fenway before she and her mother had left for Seattle. He would have been about six years behind her.
“So, Joanne, why did you come out on a Tuesday night? Rough day at work?”
“Rough week at work,” Fenway replied. “And my father is being a dick.” She drained the last of her drink.
“Join the club,” Zach said, a little sadly. “Can I get you another?”
“Actually,” Fenway said, “I came here to dance.”
“Oh.” Zach nodded, but looked wary, like he didn’t really want to dance.
The music changed to an old R&B hit from the eighties, but with a modern house beat behind it. Fenway recognized the song, but couldn’t quite place it. A few people who had been hanging around the edges of the dance floor started to move to the music and slowly made their way toward the center of the floor.
“Oh, I love this song,” Fenway fibbed. “I’ve got to get out there. Thanks for the drink.”
Fenway got up from the stool and went out onto the dance floor. She started to sway her hips to the rhythm as soon as she got up, and she noticed out of the corner of her eye that Zach slammed the rest of his drink, put the empty glass on the bar, and followed her out to the dance floor.
Fenway knew she danced well, and the whiskey sour, even with the rotgut bourbon, erased most of the self-consciousness she’d felt when she walked in. She danced, paying attention mostly to the music, and Zach stepped closer to her, beat by beat, song by song.
Zach’s rhythm faltered, and he looked uncomfortable as he realized how good of a dancer Fenway was. He tried to make eye contact, smiling as he attempted to mirror some of the steps Fenway made. She smiled back at him, mostly to try to get him to feel more comfortable. Although she had come dancing to rid herself of her discomfort.
She closed her eyes for a moment and lost herself in the rhythm of the music, feeling the booming bass in her chest. The music frenetically crescendoed, building, building, like she was slowly ascending a tall track on a roller coaster, feeling the clicks as the ground got farther and farther away.
Then just at the peak of the crescendo—all the instruments went silent.
Fenway felt the lurch of the music almost as strongly as if the coaster plummeted toward the earth.
It only took a quarter of a second, but it was brilliant. She opened her eyes again as the music restarted, the chorus triumphant.
Zach had moved closer to her.
He was starting to relax, even if he couldn’t stay in rhythm. And he was cute, if almost certainly too young to have anything more than a fling with. Which, she reminded herself, was exactly what she wanted tonight.
She took a step closer to him, too, and leaned forward. He met her halfway and their lips met, tentatively. She, at over six feet tall in her heels, had a good three inches on him, and had to lower her face slightly to kiss him. She tasted lemon juice and cheap bourbon. He smiled and leaned in again.
She put her arms on his shoulders and they kissed again, this time with more feeling, more effort. She opened her mouth slightly; so did Zach. She stepped into his body in time with the beat of the music.
“Wow,” Zach breathed.
Fenway smiled again and pulled him closer again for another kiss.
They broke apart slightly, and Zach visibly caught his breath. “Damn, Joanne,” he said, “you are super hot for a black girl.”
Fenway felt like she had just been punched in the stomach.
For a black girl.
She kept a smile on her face. Zach reached his right arm forward from his side and put his hand on her left hip and started to pull her into him again.
Fenway, laughing without feeling any joy, spun out of his reach, masquerading it as a dance move. He looked a little confused, though he tried to hide it, and she smiled at him and started to step away.
“Bathroom,” she mouthed to him.
She stepped off the dance floor and into the corridor that led to the restrooms. She exhaled, exasperated, and swore at herself as she walked into the women’s room. Both stalls were taken, but she didn’t really have to go anyway.
She looked at herself in the mirror and she saw the hurt and the loneliness in her eyes and wondered if everyone else could see it too.
Two women came in, breathless, talking about the men they had left on the dance floor. Fenway maneuvered around them, stuck her foot out to prevent the door from closing, and pushed it open with her hip.
The empty corridor greeted her, and Fenway sighed. This hadn’t worked out like she hoped. The promise of a night with Zach had been dashed, and with the way she had acted with him on the dance floor, kissing him, grinding up against him, it would be difficult to change dance partners.
A skinny man, looking more like a surfer than a club kid, shuffled into the corridor, up to Fenway. “Hey, girl, you looking for anything?” he mumbled. “I got Red Skies if you’re down.”
Fenway looked at the man. It was Zoso.
“Hey, Zoso,” she said quietly.
He looked up at her, shocked. “Oh, hey—you’re, uh, Parker’s friend.”
“Yep,” Fenway said.
“I didn’t recognize you.” He looked her up and down, taking her in through his half-lidded eyes. “You don’t look like no coroner I’ve ever seen,” he drawled. “How you doing? You good?”
“I didn’t know you were dealing at clubs, Zoso. The establishment cool with that?”
“Uh,” Zoso said, realizing that this exchange was less social than he’d thought. “We haven’t had any trouble yet. Lot of rich kids with money in here. Everyone’s looking for a good time.”
Fenway suddenly realized why the doorman had been glassy-eyed.
“I thought you said the pill trade was segregated,” Fenway said. “Why you trying to sell to me?”
“Maybe I’m trying to be more open-minded.”
Fenway chuckled.
“Listen,” Zoso continued, “are we cool?”
Fenway looked at Zoso out of the corner of her eye. “You know I shouldn’t be cool with this, right?”
Zoso shifted uncomfortably.
“I thought you said you didn’t know the Red Skies distributor guy,” Fenway said.
“Naw,” Zoso said. “I just couldn’t get none before.”
“Something change?”
“I figured I’d go with the lower percentage he offered me. A little percent of a lot is bigger than a big percent of jack shit.”
“That sounds like a rational business decision.”
Zoso held up his hands in front of him, palms out. “Hey, listen, you don’t need to make fun of me.”
“I’m not making fun of you, Zoso. I’m saying you make good business decisions. A lot of people in your line of work have some trouble with that.”
He looked at her with suspicion.
“And another good business decision would be for you to tell me what you know about the distributor.”
Zoso shook his head. “No way. I’m not getting in trouble with those guys.”
“Those guys?”
“Yeah, I heard they do some bad shit. And it’s not the guy I’ve met, it’s his boss.”
“His boss, huh? You got a name?”
Zoso shook his head.
“You know if it’s a him or her?”
Zoso looked at Fenway quizzically.
“A her?” He laughed. “Man, I never heard of a boss who was a her. You must not know the game.”
Fenway pulled her phone out of her purse and brought up a picture of Natalie. “What about her?”
“As the boss? Are you serious? This chick is spakka.”
“She’s what?”
“You know. In a wheelchair and shit. Big-ass muscles, though. She could rip my shit up.”
“How do you know her?”
“How do I know her? She’s one of my best customers. She gave me some sob story about getting blown up in Iraq or Iran or some shithole like that. She’s been after me for Red Skies forever. She asked about them before I even knew what they were.” He ran a hand through his hair and looked around. “These vets are the best. They get money like clockwork from the government and spend all of it trying to forget they only have half their body.”
Fenway felt queasy from the conversation. “You ever see her with the distributor guy?”
Zoso shook his head.
“So tell me about this distributor guy you’ve been talking to.”
“You mean here?”
“Sure.”
“Oh. I thought you meant like at the station. I can’t be seen at the station again.”
“Because of your relationship with your new distributor?”
“You know it.”
“So spill it, Zoso.”
He paused. “And you won’t take me in for dealing?”
“If you tell me about him. You get a get-out-of-jail-free card tonight.”
“Okay,” Zoso said. “So I get a call on my cell, and I don’t really know how he got my number, but he did. And he says he wants me to be the first dealer to get Red Skies in my territory, which I know is bullshit, because I know Tommy G got some last week, but I don’t say anything, because if I don’t get his shit, I might be out on my ass in a couple of months.”
Fenway nodded.
“And he gives me an address out on 28th, near La Crescenta.”
“The warehouse district.”
“Yeah, a warehouse space. A bitch to find, too. Behind a couple of other buildings, and the numbers don’t make any sense there.”
“So did you see him?”
“Yeah. A short guy, maybe five-five or five-six, but stocky, really muscular.” He paused. “I’d pay money to see him fight the handicapped chick, though. That’d be a good fight.”
“What else about him? White? Black?”
“Some sort of Asian,” Zoso said. “I don’t know, Japanese, Chinese, Thai, something.”
“Maybe Filipino?” Fenway thought of Natalie—maybe she had a brother or cousin, and maybe the vet-looking-for-a-fix was a front to see how her potential dealers fared in unusual situations.
Zoso shrugged. “He always wore track suits, though. Like he was in an eighties nerds-versus-jocks movie. Pretentious little prick, too. Like he thought I’d give him ebola if he touched me.”
“Like the shiny Adidas-type of track suits?”
Zoso nodded.
“Okay,” Fenway said. “Sure you don’t want to come down to the station and sit with a sketch artist?”
“Yeah, I think I’ll pass on that.”
“Okay, Zoso,” Fenway said. “Thanks anyway. This is a big help. This guy might be behind the mayor’s murder.”
Zoso looked puzzled. “But I thought they caught the guy.”
“Yeah,” Fenway said, the wheels turning in her head about how Natalie might be running the show while at the same time be posing as a user. “If you believe the guy’s confession.”
Zoso looked at Fenway. “You don’t?”
Fenway shrugged. “I guess I’ve said too much. Thanks again for your help.”
Fenway started to walk past Zoso toward the dance floor. Zoso grabbed her arm.
“One more thing,” he said. “I thought the guy would want to impress me with the amount of shit he had in the warehouse. But he wouldn’t let me get near it.”
“Really?”
“Yeah. I heard some sort of crying or something. I figured the guy had his girlfriend there and maybe she had brought her kid.”
“Her kid? The crying sounded like a little girl?”
“Shit, I don’t know. How am I supposed to know what a little girl sounds like?”
“Did you see a child when you were over there? A girl, about five? Maybe one with my skin color?”
Zoso shook his head.
“Okay. Can you give me that address?”
“No, come on, Fenway, I don’t want to get this guy into trouble. It’ll get back to him that I gave it to you and then I’m a dead man.”
“Did you hear what I asked you? Whether it sounded like a little girl? Whether you saw a little girl?”
Zoso paused. “You think this guy kidnapped a little girl?”
Fenway looked at Zoso. “I know someone kidnapped a little girl, and I’m trying to find her.”
“Shit,” Zoso said. “These assholes can’t ever just stick to pills. They gotta be all up in everyone’s shit too.” He set his jaw and pulled out his phone. “Yeah, fine. Eleven fifty-seven 28th Street. It’s the building behind eleven ten, which makes no sense, but whatever.”
“Thanks, Zoso,” Fenway said, typing the address into her phone. “You might have saved a little girl’s life.”
“Aw, shit, girl, don’t try that with me. Don’t pretend I’m gonna get religion and join the academy.”
“Wouldn’t dream of it. Okay, I gotta go say goodbye to my, uh, dance partner.” She took a couple of steps to the end of the corridor and looked around the dance floor. Zach wasn’t there. She looked at the bar. He had sat back down on the stool, two more whiskey sours in front of him.
“I guess I didn’t scare him off,” Fenway murmured.
Zoso turned to look. “That guy?”
“Yeah.” Fenway smirked. “Don’t get all jealous, Zoso, it’s not working out between us.”
Zoso hesitated.
“What?” Fenway asked.
“Uh—maybe you don’t want to have that drink with that guy.”
She gaped at him. “What the hell, Zoso? Did you sell him something to put in my drink?”
“I ain’t saying I sold this guy anything, all right?”
Fenway frowned and looked Zoso in the face. He wouldn’t meet her eyes.
“I’m just saying, get out of here. And don’t drink that.”
Fenway narrowed her eyes. “It’s not just me, Zoso. If I don’t drink that, another girl might,” she said.
Zoso looked uncomfortable. “Maybe you can talk to the bouncer.”
“Maybe you can talk to the bouncer, Zoso.”
“No way. I don’t want him to—”
“All you have to do is tell him you saw that guy put something in my drink. You don’t have to admit to selling it to him.”
“They’ll know it was me, though.”
Fenway crossed her arms. “That get-out-of-jail-free card still look good to you? I might change my mind.”
Zoso shuffled his feet. “Fine. I’ll take care of it,” he said miserably.
“You’re lucky you gave me the address of that warehouse,” Fenway said through gritted teeth. “If I ever hear you’re selling roofies, you’re never getting another get-out-of-jail-free card from the department again.”
“Okay,” Zoso said softly, looking down at the floor. He started to walk toward the front of the club where the glassy-eyed bouncer was manning the door. Fenway followed him, hoping Zach wouldn’t notice her leave.
Zoso stopped to say something in the bouncer’s ear as Fenway went past them. When she got to the exit, she looked behind her. The bouncer was walking purposefully toward Zach at the bar. Zach started to look up and Fenway ducked around the door out of sight.