Desmond was watching the last ten minutes of Wings when an alert popped up at the bottom of his TV. Jo wanted to Skype with him.
He froze the movie and connected with her, putting the video stream on the big-screen TV. His kid sister was sitting by a grove of palm trees in a flood of tropical sun, a floppy straw hat framing her face. A tall glass of something with alcohol rested in front of her, slightly out of focus. If she was trying to make him jealous, she’d succeeded.
“G’day, mate,” she said.
“Hey, Jo.” Desmond smiled into his netbook’s webcam. “How are things Down Under?”
“Depends on who I’m down under, if you get my drift.”
“I got it. As drift goes, it wasn’t subtle. More like continental drift.”
“We Aussies don’t go for subtlety.” She actually seemed to be developing an Australian accent. Going native, big time. “Hey, I’m not calling too late, am I?”
“You know me. Up till all hours. Project coming along okay?” Her company had sent her to Sydney to consult on beach erosion. She was an environmental engineer—a whiz kid, super-smart and more studious than he had ever been.
“It’s great. I could be stuck here another few months, which is fine by me.”
“Get in any surfing?”
“A little. Saw a shark the other day.”
“I’m more worried about the land sharks. The ones in the local bars. They’re harder to fight off.”
“Who said anything about fighting?” She sipped her drink. There was a tiny parasol sticking out of it. “How about you? Getting any action?”
“Not at the moment.”
“You need some contact with the opposite sex, you know. If only to stimulate the right cerebral hemisphere. That’s your feminine side.”
“I’m plenty stimulated on both sides. And I do see girls sometimes. Bonnie came by a little while ago.”
“Ah, the woman of mystery.”
“Is she?”
“You’re always mysterious when you talk about her. Which you do, a lot.”
“It’s not like I’m in love with her,” he said a little too quickly.
“No, of course not. Love is for suckers.” She gave him a look. “You know, if you’re holding back with her on account of that chair—”
“I’m not.”
“Sure about that?”
“The chair isn’t an issue. The issue is—forget it.”
“Don’t tease me, bro. If there’s an issue, I want to know what it is.”
“The issue is, I don’t really know her.”
“What’s that supposed to mean? You see her all the time.”
“Oh, sure, she’s a friend. Probably my best friend. But I don’t know her.” He sighed. “It’s complicated.”
“Some complications can be good for you.”
“True. But these particular complications might be a little too ... complicated.”
“Well, there’s nothing mysterious about that.”
He caught the edge in her voice. “You really want to know?” he said slowly. “I think she’s a killer.”
“You mean she has a killer bod, or—”
“No. I mean, I think she’s a hit man. Or hit woman. A paid assassin.”
“Big brother, you’ve been hitting the bong again.”
“She’s a private eye. There are rumors that this guy in town who got murdered back in March was a client of hers.”
“Doesn’t mean she did it.”
“I have reasons to think she might have. And I don’t think it was an isolated case.”
“Killing your clients is no way to get repeat business.”
“I’m not saying she goes after her clients ordinarily. I think she’s like a—a cleaner, you know? A fixer. Whatever.”
“People hire her to put the kibosh on somebody?”
“That’s what I think.”
“Either you’re crazy, or she is.”
“Neither of us is crazy. But she can be ... hard.”
“Have you ever asked her about these suspicions of yours?”
“It’s kind of a tough thing to work into a conversation. ‘Hey, Parker, killed anyone lately?’ I don’t know how to segue into that one.”
“Good point.” Jo bit her lip. “Plus, if she thinks you know too much ...”
“It’s not like that.”
“How do you know? She could be psychotic.”
“She’s not psychotic. Neurotic, maybe. Quirky ...”
“Nuh-uh, bro.” She wagged her finger at the camera. “Quirky is changing your hair color every two months. Quirky is joining the My Little Pony fan club as an adult. What quirky definitely is not, is putting people on ice for fun and profit.”
“If it’s any defense, I think she does it mostly for profit.”
“You’re not helping her cause.”
“Look, I don’t know that any of this is actually true. It could all be empty gossip.” Except for the gun in the air duct, he thought. “Sound and fury, signifying nothing.”
“Don’t be Shakespearean. It doesn’t suit you.”
“I’m just saying, maybe there’s no there there.”
“Don’t do Gertrude Stein either. Are you really serious, or is this some kind of goof?”
“Do I look like I’m joking?”
Even from ten thousand miles away, she could see he wasn’t.
“Okay, big bro. In that case I revise and extend my previous remarks. Stay away from this woman. Stay very far the fuck away.”
“It’s not like I’m scared of her.”
“Maybe you should be.”
“She’s no threat to me. To other people, yeah. But probably only people who deserve it.”
“Deserve it? What is this, a Charles Bronson movie? Your gal pal doesn’t get to decide who lives and who dies.”
“That’s where you’re wrong, Jo. I’m pretty sure she does.”
They talked some more before she signed off, claiming she had to get back to work. He could tell she was a little rattled.
He hadn’t told her the whole truth, though. He was scared. Not scared of Bonnie. Scared for her.
Whatever she was doing, it was dangerous business. Life-and-death stuff. Not the boring crap most PIs did. Not snapping photos of a husband and a hooker, or running a background check on your daughter’s boyfriend.
She was into things a lot dicier than that. Things that could get her killed. She knew it, too, and she liked the thrill. Pushing the envelope, beating the odds.
He knew how that was. And how it ended. He used to take risks in his car. One night he took a blind curve and flipped over, and he’d been in a wheelchair ever since.
That was what scared him, and kept him from getting too close. He could see down the road a little farther than she could. And he saw where that road ended.
He only hoped it wouldn’t end too soon.