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The first time I ever heard the name Tracy Turner — on a hot, cloudless Tuesday in June — I was tailing an obese, pyorrheic degenerate named Wally Crouch. I was fairly certain about the “degenerate” part, because Crouch had visited two adult bookstores and three strip clubs since noon. Not that there’s anything wrong with a little mature entertainment, but there’s a point when it goes from bawdy boys-will-be-boys recreation to creepy pathological fixation. The pyorrhea was pure conjecture on my part, based solely on the number of Twinkie wrappers Crouch had tossed out the window during his travels.
Crouch was a driver for UPS and, according to my biggest client, he was also a fraud who was riding the workers’ comp gravy train. In the course of a routine delivery seven weeks prior, Crouch had allegedly injured his lower back. A ruptured disk, the doctor said. Limited mobility and a twelve- to sixteen-week recovery period. In the meantime, Crouch couldn’t lift more than ten pounds without searing pain shooting up his spinal cord. But this particular quack had a checkered past filled with questionable diagnoses and reprimands from the medical board. My job was fairly simple, at least on paper: Follow Crouch discreetly until he proved himself a liar. Catch it on video. Testify, if necessary. Earn a nice paycheck. Continue to finance my sumptuous, razor’s-edge lifestyle.
~ ~ ~
You’d think Crouch, having a choice in the matter, would’ve avoided rush-hour traffic and had a few more beers instead, but he left Sugar’s Uptown Cabaret at ten after five and squeezed his way onto the interstate heading south. I followed in my seven-year-old Dodge Caravan. Beige. Try to find a vehicle less likely to catch someone’s eye. The windows are deeply tinted and a scanner antenna is mounted on the roof, which are the only clues that the driver isn’t a soccer mom toting her brats to practice.
Anyone whose vehicle doubles as a second home recognizes the value of a decent sound system. I’d installed a Blaupunkt, with Bose speakers front and rear. Total system set me back about two grand. Seems like overkill for talk radio, but that’s what I was listening to when I heard the familiar alarm signal of the Emergency Alert System. I’d never known the system to be used for anything other than weather warnings, but not this time. It was an Amber Alert. A local girl had gone missing from her affluent West Austin neighborhood. Tracy Turner: six years old, blond hair, green eyes, three feet tall, forty-five pounds, wearing denim shorts and a pink shirt. My palms went sweaty just thinking about it. Then I heard she might be in the company of Howard Turner — her non-custodial father, a resident of Los Angeles — and I breathed a small sigh of relief. Listeners, they said, should keep an eye out for a green Honda with California plates.
Easy to read between the lines. Tracy’s parents were divorced, and dad had decided he wanted to spend more time with his daughter, despite how the courts had ruled. Sad, but much better than a random abduction.
The announcer was repeating the message when my cell phone rang. I turned the radio volume down, answered, and my client — a senior claims adjuster at a big insurance company — said, “You nail him yet?”
“Christ, Heidi, it’s only the third day.”
“I thought you were good.”
“That’s a vicious rumor.”
“Yeah, and I think you started it yourself. I’m starting to think you get by on your looks alone.”
“That remark borders on sexual harassment, and you know how I feel about that.”
“You’re all for it.”
“Exactly. Anyway, relax, okay? I’m on him twenty-four seven.” Crouch had taken the Manor Road exit, and now he turned into his apartment complex, so I drove past, calling it a day. I didn’t like lying to Heidi, but I had a meeting with a man named Harvey Blaylock in thirty minutes.
“Well, you’d better get something soon, because I’ve got another one waiting,” Heidi said.
I didn’t say anything, because a jerk in an F-150 was edging over into my lane.
“Roy?” she said.
“Yeah.”
“I have another one for you.”
“Have scientists come up with that device yet?”
“What device?”
“The one that allows you to be in two places at the same time.”
“You really crack you up.”
“Let me get this one squared away, then we’ll talk, okay?”
“The quicker the better. Where are you? Has Crouch even left the house?”
“Oh, yeah. Been wandering all afternoon.”
“Where to?”
“Uh, let’s just say he seems to have an inordinate appreciation for the female form.”
“Which means?”
“He’s been visiting gentlemen’s clubs.”
A pause. “You mean tittie bars?”
“That’s such a crass term. Oh, by the way, the Yellow Rose is looking for dancers. In case you decide to — ”
She hung up on me.
~ ~ ~
I had the phone in my hands, so I went ahead and called my best friend Mia Madison, who works at an establishment I used to do business with on occasion. She tends bar at a tavern on North Lamar.
Boiling it down to one sentence, Mia is smart, funny, optimistic, and easy on the eyes. Expanding on the last part, because it’s relevant, Mia stands about five ten and has long red hair that she likes to wear in a ponytail. Prominent cheekbones, with dimples beneath. The toned legs of a runner, though she doesn’t run, but must walk ten miles a day during an eight-hour shift. When Mia gets dolled up — what she calls “bringing it” — she goes from being an attractive woman you’d certainly notice to a world-class head turner.
On one occasion, she revealed that she has a tattoo. Wouldn’t show it to me, but she said — joking, I’m sure — that if I could guess what it was, and where it was, she’d let me have a look. Nearly a year later, I still hadn’t given up.
“Is it Muttley?” I asked when she answered.
“Muttley? Who the hell is Muttley?”
“You know, that cartoon dog with the sarcastic laugh.”
“You mean Scooby Doo?”
“No, the other one. Hangs with Dick Dastardly.”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“Before your time, I guess. Are you at work?”
“Not till six. Just got out of the shower. I’m drying off.”
“Need any help?”
“I think I can handle it,” she said.
“Okay, next question. Want to earn a hundred bucks the easy way?” I said.
“Love to,” she said. “When and where?”