CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
The search of the house turned up a half ounce of cocaine. Arno had already been facing one possession charge, which was a possible explanation why a normally level-headed hoodlum like him might have fled. I personally confiscated his identification and ordered his name withheld pending notification of the next of kin. I really wasn’t all that concerned about his relatives, but at the time it seemed like a good idea to play my cards close to my vest.
But the raid had created more questions than it answered. For example, why did I find Paul Arno in that house when I was expecting Scott Kimball? What was their connection? And where the hell was Kimball and why hadn’t he been there? The girl almost certainly knew the answers, but so far she’d proven unwilling to talk. I had lodged her and her kid temporarily in one of the holding cells off the outer office.
Her name was Trina Newland, and the two minutes I’d spent with her back at the house convinced me that while she might be blessed with a body that wouldn’t quit, she was also cursed with a brain that wouldn’t start. From the slight swelling of her belly it was also obvious that she was going to have another child.
She was about five foot five with short, honey-colored hair and a face that would have been very pretty if it hadn’t been marred by her perpetually sullen expression. I told Linda to bring her and her child in.
“I want to go home,” she said in a whiny voice as soon as she was ushered into my office. “I need to feed my baby.”
“You’re not going anywhere for a while,” I said. “We can get him something from the café across the street.”
“He likes Tater Tots. With ketchup. And real sweet iced tea.”
“How about a little protein?” I asked.
“Huh?”
“Fried starch and sugar water aren’t very good for him.”
“It’s what he likes. I don’t see nothing wrong with Tater Tots.”
I had Maylene order the Tater Tots and a broiled chicken breast. Then I turned to the girl and asked, “How far along are you?”
“Along what?”
“You’re pregnant, right? So how many months?”
“Three and a half.”
“Is Scott Kimball the father?”
“That’s none of your business.”
“Is he?”
If looks could kill, I would have been in my grave. “Yeah. So what?”
“Lovely,” I muttered. “And is he the father of this child here?”
“Why are you asking me all these nosy questions?”
“I need to know who to notify about your baby when I lock you up for cocaine possession.”
“What? I didn’t possess nothing. I was just there in that house waiting for Scott to get back.”
“By the letter of the law you’re guilty,” I said. “Now is the father the same man?”
“No.”
“Does this little boy’s daddy pay you any child support?”
“Sometimes.”
“Were you married to him, by any chance?”
“Why don’t you leave me alone?”
“Were you?”
“No.”
“Are you currently living with Scott Kimball?”
“Yeah.”
“Where have you been staying here in town?” I asked. “At that house where we found you?”
“Yeah.”
“Where’s Scott?”
“I don’t know,” she said.
“Why wasn’t he there this afternoon?”
“He said he had to go get something.”
“What?”
“I don’t know.”
“Look, young lady,” I said, trying to sound as fatherly as I could. “You can get some serious time in the penitentiary for cocaine possession. You tell me what I need to know, and you can walk out of here today, and we’ll forget all about that dope we found.”
“I’m not saying nothing against Scott. He takes care of me.”
I laughed and shook my head. “Scott Kimball has never taken care of anybody except himself in his whole life. He treats his mother like a cur dog, and his brother is dead because of his damn foolishness.”
“I don’t believe any of that. Scott told me about his brother, and he said it wasn’t like that at all.”
“Then tell me if he’s so concerned about you why he left you and your baby in the house with a coked-up Mafia hit man?”
“Maybe he didn’t know he was a hit man, even if he was. All I got is your say-so on that, anyway.”
I was getting nowhere. I decided to use a little pressure from another direction. “Don’t you realize you will probably lose custody of this child if you’re charged with cocaine possession? To say nothing of the possibility of going to prison and losing him permanently? Does any of that mean anything to you?”
“I told you I’m not saying nothing to hurt Scott. I love him.”
“I would guess you loved the other one who got you knocked up and then deserted you. Did you ever think that maybe you’re not too good at picking men?”
She stared at me with eyes that were burning with resentment and hostility. “Kiss my ass, Mr. Smarty.”
I motioned to Linda and Maylene. “Call Child Protective Services and have them come get this baby. Then take this little gal out to the jail and book her in for reckless endangerment of a child. That will hold her until I can get the paperwork done on the drug possession charges. And be sure to tell the jailers to put her in the female felony tank. Maybe a night with the big girls will get her heart right.”
“I told you I didn’t have no drugs,” the girl said.
I didn’t bother to reply. Maylene took the baby from Trina Newland’s arms, and Linda cuffed her and pushed her gently toward the door. “Keep your hands to yourself, you dyke bitch,” the girl snarled.
After they left, I turned to Maylene. “It’s above and beyond, but would you feed that poor child when the food gets here?”
“Sure, Bo.”
“Thanks, sweetheart. You’re worth a million dollars.”
* * *
After weighing my options for a while, I grabbed the phone book and looked up Lulu Wilson’s number.
I’m a peace officer, not a social worker. Yet there have been a few times over the years when I’ve taken flyers on people based on nothing more than a gut instinct that told me they were redeemable. Lulu was one such individual. She was about five-eight, slim, wiry and tough, with creamy chocolate skin and a face that could have made the cover of Vogue if she’d gotten a few breaks. She landed in Sequoya a decade earlier badly strung out on heroin and under the thrall of a pimp named Titus Nash who had a long criminal record and a short memory. By that I mean he’d forgotten how much he’d hated the Texas prison system the first time he’d gone down behind two dozen caps of Mexican Brown and an illegal handgun. Which is about what I caught him with after the desk clerk at a local motel called late one evening to report a disturbance that turned out to be Titus beating Lulu half to death.
Something in Lulu’s eyes that night told me she wouldn’t have become what she was if she’d had any choice. So I gave her that choice: testify against Nash for his Sequoya business, plus a couple of armed robberies the Rangers wanted to nail him on down in Houston. In return I agreed to get the DA to drop everything we had against her, get her into rehab, and see to it that she found a job when she got out. I also promised to lend her enough money to get her a place to live and make it through to her first paycheck. She made the right decision and went into the ninety-day drug treatment program at Rusk State Hospital. Meanwhile, the DA hit Titus with the bitch, by which I mean he convicted him under Texas’s habitual criminal statute, which allows a jury to prescribe life for a three-time felony offender it they are in the mood to do so. And East Texas juries usually are. The last I heard, Titus was picking cotton in the Brazos River bottom and would be until about 2030. Lulu had been clean for ten years and was now holding down a good job as the manager of a local convenience store. Somewhere along the way she’d joined Nelda Parson’s father’s Rising Star Baptist Church, and she’d even found a decent boyfriend, a divorced gentleman a few years her senior who coached the boys’ basketball team at the local high school.
When I called she was happy to hear from me. “What have you got on your mind?” she asked.
“Lulu, do you remember how you’ve said so many times that you wished there was some way you could repay me for going to bat for you? You do remember? Well, that’s great because I think it’s about time for you to make your acting debut.”
A few minutes later I put the phone down, laced my fingers behind my head, and leaned back in my chair to stare up at the ceiling fan with a smile on my face. “Dykes,” I said and laughed.