Neely Tucker - Murder, D.C.

Moving his left hand from her waist to the small of her back, he pulled her toward him and leaned back on the couch, balancing the wine in his right hand. She came forward lightly, balanced, her knees on the couch now, straddling him, blouse still open. She took the glass from his hand and moved forward. She fluffed the skirt up so it wouldn’t get caught in the bend of her legs, a movement that allowed him to slip his hands under the skirt and onto her ass, the skin so soft it made him blink. She could be so rough, one of the guys, knocking back shots in the hack hotel in whatever hellhole they were all in, and then make those little moves, so graceful, so feminine.

She reached down, with trickling fingers, to his belt buckle and zipper. She undid both, letting him free, stroking him, cupping him.

“Oh my,” she said, “you got a package for me, Mr. UPS man?”

“Special delivery,” he said, his breath coming short. “You can sign for this?”

“Kiss my neck,” she said, “and give me the package.”

Her throat humming against his lips, her back arching.

“Lower,” she whispered into his ear. “Lower. Like I like it. You know.”

Jimmy T’s didn’t have much of a crowd the next morning. It was overcast and dreary, one of those raw spring days when it was cold down to the bone and your nose itched, all that pollen. He opened the glass door of the place for Alex, letting her step inside before him, not even sure what time it was.

He had woken up just after eight thirty, gotten out of bed, and Alex said she was going to roll back over but then he said he had this rich-kid homicide to chase, and she groaned, “I am not even going to take a shower.”

While she was getting ready, he made a call to R.J. at home, giving him the kid’s name (R.J. and his longtime partner, Elwood, a painter of some distinction, recognized the family immediately), and then roughed out plans for a short daily to get the name on the record. Then he would go hard for a long takeout on the Bend, maybe for Sunday.

Alex had come downstairs then, her face puffy, hair bedraggled, wearing some clothes of his she’d pulled from the closet-sweats, rolled up at the cuffs, a T-shirt from the Chart Room in New Orleans, where he’d tended bar a million years ago. He gave her an Italian leather jacket (from Rome, when he’d been on assignment and it had gotten cold) out of the hallway closet and then they were ambling the three blocks down to Jimmy T’s, the neighborhood dive tucked into a narrow old row house on East Capitol.

Alex slid around a vacant four-top right at the entrance, navigated the narrow aisle, and plunked down in a booth along the back right side. She looked around, taking in the cracked vinyl seats, the green Formica table still wet with the rings of glasses and coffee cups of the previous occupants, the tin ceiling stained colors not found in nature.

“It’s so upscale,” she said finally.

“I only bring the classy broads here.”

Wanda came by and wiped down the table. “Wanda,” he said.

“Morning, sugar. Waffle and coffee?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“What about you, sweetheart?”

“Is there a menu?” Alex asked, running her hands through her hair, pulling it back into a ponytail.

“Why don’t you just tell me what you want?”

“Ah, an omelet? Onions and mushrooms, a little cheese? And toast.”

Wanda, leaning over the table, finishing with the cleaning rag, “Drinking anything?”

“Orange juice. And water. Please.”

Wanda nodded and left, sidestepping a chair behind her.

“And the staff is so charming,” Alexis said, looking after her.

“Wanda’s all right,” Sully said. “Been here since Nixon. Or Kennedy. Doesn’t give that good-morning, good-to-see-you bullshit.”

“And you tip for this sort of service.”

“My aunt works in a place like this.”

“She does? Aunt who?”

“Mable. Still down in Nola. Not far from Tipitina’s.”

“And she’s a classy broad?”

“Until you piss her off.”

“Does that happen often?”

“By me? No. I got farmed out to her after my parents got put in the ground. My sister, she went to my dad’s people, out in Tucson. There was not a lot of shit to give Aunt Mable, not if you had any sense. I was thirteen and change when I moved in and by the time I turned fourteen it was clear who was the chief and who was the Indian. Wonderful woman, once you get past the chain-smoking alcoholic thing, and I mean that. Love her to death. Plus, she had this fighting cock in the backyard, Rojo? You did not want to get Rojo pissed at you, either. Right here, the forearm? Rojo did that.”

“You cannot keep a wild rooster in your yard.”

“Who said Rojo was wild? And this was in New Orleans. You don’t go messing with somebody’s chickens. Marie Laveau’ll turn up on your doorstep.”

“You’re making this up.”

“You don’t have to make shit up in New Orleans.”

“You don’t have an accent until you’re drunk or start talking about back home, did you know that? Why do you say the name of the place like it’s one word?”

“Because it is, cher .”

He leaned over to brush a stray hair from her face, dangling over her right eye, smiling at her then, the sleepy eyes, the face without makeup, no earrings.

“Think anyone can tell I stayed over last night?” she said, smoothing out the ponytail.

“Whyn’t you ask Wanda?”

“I don’t think Wanda gives a rat’s ass.”

“And you ask me why I tip.”

“I’m guessing you eat here more than at home.”

“Breakfast, anyway. When I eat breakfast. So what’s this project you’re shooting? All I know is that it’s about the Israeli pullout.”

“Depends on the access.” She shrugged, pushing back in the seat to let Wanda slide the plates in front of them and put down the coffee, juice, and water. She didn’t say anything and was gone.

Alexis sliced her omelet with a fork, then took a bite. “Richard’s going to write. It’s going to be a three-day series, starting on a Sunday. I’ve been on the Lebanese side so far, the soft-tissue stuff, lives in transition, like that. Sabra and Shatila. Then you go out into the Bekaa and wonder how many people are looking at you through binoculars.”

“The lovely Bekaa Valley, home to more spooks than anyplace on the planet,” Sully said pleasantly, sitting back. “I’s talking to this farmer out there this one time, way the hell out in this field? It’s all open country, you know, the mountains in the distance. The side of the road we were on was just being planted. You can see, or be seen, for a mile in any direction. Hadn’t been there five minutes and three cars pull up and stop at hundred-yard intervals. Guys get out of all three.”

“Ah shit.”

“I’m thinking I got to outrun these fuckers to the village or I’ll get Terry Anderson’s old room for the next six years. And then the guys start pulling out baskets. Baskets. They were picking fruit, this orchard the other side of the road.”

“Sweet baby Jesus.”

“Blood pressure dropped about eighty points in three seconds.”

“You miss it, don’t you?”

“Who wouldn’t?”

“See, that’s what I mean. We got to get you back out in the real world, doing real stuff. They got you doing what? A piece on some rich kid who got popped in the Bend? Tooting nose candy? So what?”

“The piece I’m doing, it’s more on Frenchman’s Bend. The rich kid’s murder looks like the way in. The Bend, it turns out, is the murder capital of the murder capital. It’s the deadliest spot, per square foot, in the deadliest city, per 100,000, in America.”