Joe Lansdale - Devil Red

“Because that Mini you mentioned. Her stepfather tried to tie me to her death. I would gladly have killed her, and all of the others, myself, but I doubt carrying an oxygen tank and having to ride around in this chair would have made me much of an assassin.”

“How did he try to tie you to them?”

“I’m not really sure what he was thinking, but he decided somehow we were responsible, like we had paid to have it done. Ridiculous.”

“Well, we have nothing to do with him,” I said.

“We represent a Mrs. Christopher,” Cason said. “We’re trying to find information concerning the death of her son, trying to figure what connection there could be to him having been killed.”

“You’re detectives?”

“Mostly,” Cason said.

“Wrong place, wrong time,” Kincaid said.

“What?” Cason said.

“The boy,” Kincaid said. “He must have been in the wrong place at the wrong time. Should have kept better company.”

“Perhaps,” Cason said.

“Those are the hard facts. My only son was killed by these animals. Anyone who would associate with them is no better than the animals they were. Vampires! Seriously, now.”

“Animals actually have a much more polite and less devious agenda,” I said.

“I agree,” Kincaid said.

“It’s just that we’ve been hired to investigate,” I said, “so we’re asking some questions. It’s not meant to be personal. We’re just trying to fit some shoes, so to speak.”

“I’m not Cinderella. Whatever you’re asking, whatever shoes you’re laying out, my feet don’t fit.”

“Well,” I said, “long as we’re on a fairy-tale theme, you might call us Goldilocks. We have to try out different things to find out which ones are just right. It’s our job, nothing more.”

He grinned at me. His teeth, though clean and shiny, looked loose in his mouth. “You’re thinking that I didn’t kill them, but that I have money, and I had them killed. The ones who got off, I mean. You’re thinking like the stepfather. I didn’t do anything to them. I should have. I wanted to. But I didn’t know how to go about it. Besides, the law took care of the actual killer, and fate took care of the accomplices and the young man who was in the wrong place at the wrong time.”

“The stepfather, Bert,” I said. “He’s dead too.”

“How unfortunate. He came to me trying to tie me to the death of this… Mini. He was certain I had something to do with it. He wanted money. I told him where he could go, and he must have gone there. I haven’t heard from him, or of him, again, until just now.”

“The others, way the law took care of them,” Leonard said. “That satisfy you?”

“No. But the fat queer got what she deserved in prison. The others got theirs as well. As I said. Fate. I’m not satisfied with the law, but fate has satisfied me as much as a man can be satisfied in a situation like this.”

“Do you have any idea how the others might have died?” I said, trying to make the question sound as casual as if asking him if he wanted a back massage.

“No. Why would I? I was told they were all dead. My assumption is they died due to their connections, others who were as crazy as they were. If I knew who those people were, provided I didn’t think they too were somehow connected to my son’s death, I might throw them a parade. Well, gentlemen. I’m a busy man. I have a nap to take. It’s when I do my best thinking.”

Miss Clinton, who had gone behind her desk to sit, got up and came over and directed us toward the door. She even took my arm and led me. Why the hell was I getting the bum’s rush? Why not Leonard or Cason? Was it because I didn’t look like a lawyer?

We were hurried out into the foyer, where the receptionist waited behind her desk. As we passed she looked at Cason the way a dog looks at a pork chop. He looked back at her and smiled and then she smiled again. There was enough sexual tension in the air between them you could have sparked a candlewick to flame.

We stopped in the jungle section with Miss Clinton. There were still no tigers. The birds were screeching loudly, making me a nervous wreck.

Miss Clinton said, “He doesn’t mean to be rude, but questions about his son, they disturb him.”

“He seemed awfully hostile for someone happy with how things turned out, the killers getting theirs,” I said.

“That was his only son. His only child. He’s dead and he isn’t coming back, and it was all because of some kind of prank, or belief, whatever you like to call it, son.”

“Hap. Or Mr. Collins,” I said. “I don’t go by son.”

“Don’t be cute with me. You’re not that cute.”

I thought: And you’re not old enough to be my mother, so don’t call me son. But I didn’t say it aloud. I was kind of glad she thought I looked that young. You got to take compliments where you find them, even if the remark wasn’t actually meant as one.

“Thing is,” she said, “any discussion of his son always upsets him.”

“Then why did he let us come discuss it with him?” Cason asked. “We’re not here to harass him. Just to find out information that might help our client.”

“He wanted to hear anything that might be about his son, and he wanted to hear nothing. Do you understand?”

“We regret if we upset him, or you,” I said. “You seem very loyal.”

“Loyal? That’s not the word. He’s my ex-husband.”

“Your ex-husband,” Leonard said. “So, the boy was your son?”

“No. Mr. Kincaid divorced me, married… another woman. She died of throat cancer… smoked like a chimney. I was his personal assistant when we were married, and I stayed that way.”

“I can respect that,” I said.

“Can you? You can? Well, I don’t need your respect.”

“Well, you don’t get mine,” Leonard said. “I think you’re a goddamn doormat.”

“You don’t have to be rude,” she said.

“Duh,” Leonard said. “Of course I don’t have to be. Neither do you. We are grown-ass adults and we both decided to be rude.”

She left then, went past the squawking birds and back through the doors that led into Mr. Kincaid’s office. She was a real fast walker.

Leonard looked at me. “You respect that shit? I think she’s goddamn pathetic.”

“I think it’s kind of sweet,” I said.

“You two hash that out,” Cason said. “These damn birds are making me crazy.”

We stood there while Cason went back to the desk and talked to the receptionist. When he came back he had her name written on the back of Kincaid’s business card.

Since Cason had a date with the Kincaid secretary, Lateesha, we thought staying at Constance’s place might be bad form, so we rented a room in the Holiday Inn Express near the airport. It had two beds and a rollaway; we left that death trap for Cason.

Cason didn’t come back that night, so we sat around and watched television and went to bed late, like parents worried about their boy who had passed his curfew. In the morning, we went downstairs and looked at the free breakfast and understood why it was free, so we walked to a restaurant next door.

As we walked, Leonard said, “If Cason doesn’t show soon, he’s going to have to find a ride home. I’m not taking that motherfucker in to raise.”

“I thought you said he was loyal, and-”

“Oh, shut up.”

We were going inside the restaurant when Cason came up. Out in the lot, we saw Lateesha driving away in a red sports car.

“Good to see you,” I said. “But we didn’t come here to serve as a dating service.”

“Oh, I got that date all on my own.”

Cason held up a disc.

“What’s that?” Leonard said.