Julie Beard - Touch Of The White Tiger

“I spoke earlier with Mayor Alvarez,” Keiser said, looking officious and concerned as he spoke directly to the camera, “and he admits using Angel Baker’s services for a prior retribution job. Here’s what he had to say.”

The mayor appeared in what was obviously a prerecorded interview. “I hired Angel Baker a couple of years ago,” he said. He was a fit and vital man in his late fifties, but now he looked gaunt and grim. “I employed Angel Baker after my niece, Carmella, was raped. Her rapist was convicted, but only served two years because he was clever enough to leave no DNA evidence behind. I was frustrated by the lack of justice. This is a problem many victims must deal with.”

I gasped, unable to believe the mayor had exposed his niece’s violation before the entire world. When he’d hired me, he had been so adamant that he wanted the rape and retribution to remain secret out of respect for Carmella’s privacy.

“With all due respect, Mr. Mayor,” the reporter said, “that’s why the retribution profession came into existence. Victims want justice. Are you saying you will throw your support behind the Certified Retribution Specialists, even though their tactics are coming under increasing criticism from traditional law-enforcement groups?”

Mayor Alvarez hesitated only a moment before replying, “No, I can no longer support the CRS profession. Not after the death of my son. We cannot tolerate any group, no matter how well-meaning, if it turns into a rogue force of assassins.”

“Do you agree with prosecutors who say that Angel Baker was motivated by professional jealousy? She was allegedly envious that your son had passed her over when he hired Roy Leibman.”

“I will not speculate on the matter, nor will I comment on the case until it’s settled.”

“One last question, Mr. Mayor. If Angel Baker were here right now, what would you say to her?”

Hatred filled the mayor’s brown, hooded eyes. “I have nothing to say to her. I hope I never have to see her again.”

I flipped off the digivision with a remote control and sank down into a couch, burying my face in my hands. I wasn’t sure how much more I could take. But a little voice of logic inside my head wouldn’t allow me to wallow long in pity.

“Something’s not right here,” I said, trying to jump-start my resolve with logic.

The door flew open and Lin bounded in, her flip-flops slapping the blond wood floor. “Angel? Are you back?”

“Lin!” I called out and threw open my arms. She ran into them, and I hugged her as hard as I dared. I didn’t want to scare her with the depth of my need for this particular hug.

Lin was a petite seven-year-old, nimble and graceful, with bangs and shoulder-length hair as dark as night. Her lovely almond-shaped eyes always lit up when she saw me, which I considered the eighth wonder of the world.

When Lin had first come to live here, she’d been understandably reserved, but she’d thawed a little with each passing day. And though it would probably take years for her to fully accept me as a mother, we’d bonded in new, unspoken ways during the past week.

“I’m glad you’re back,” she said, beaming up at me with a resilient smile, minus one front baby tooth. “Was your trip productive?”

I laughed to hear such a sophisticated word from her little mouth, but I quickly sobered and felt cold inside. How and when would I tell Lin that I was a murder suspect? After my disastrous interview with the Diva, I’d called Lola from P.S. #1 and told her my retribution job was over and that I’d decided to spend the night with Marco. I wasn’t prepared to admit to my ex-con mother that I, too, was now in trouble with the law. Lola had decided to tell Lin that I’d unexpectedly gone on an overnight trip.

Lola, of all people, didn’t want Lin to think I was sleeping with a man. When I was a kid, I’d lost count of her lovers, but I couldn’t fault her for trying to be better at grandmothering than she’d been at motherhood.

I pressed Lin’s head gently between my hands and positioned her for a loud, smacking kiss on the forehead. “Yes, my darling girl, I had a productive night.”

Lola tromped up the stairs, fanning herself. Her frazzled red hair had obviously revolted in the late blast of summer heat. Her cheeks were flushed and, beneath her voluminous red polysynthe gown, her double-D breasts heaved in her bid for air.

“Hello, Lola,” I said.

“Honey, you got problems down there. Some idiot reporter just asked me if you’d ever threatened to kill anyone when you were growing up. I said, ‘Other than me? No.’” She laughed and I groaned.

Lola was the only person I’d ever known who could catch her breath and expend it without pause at the same time. Suddenly remembering my alleged sleepover at Marco’s, she raised her brows with prudish disdain. “Did you enjoy your trip?”

“It’s a long story,” I said, combing Lin’s silken black hair with my splayed fingers.

“I have all the time in the world,” Lola replied as she headed for the couch. “Lin, honey, fetch Grandmama a glass of iced tea.”

“Grandmama?” I repeated.

She flopped down on the couch and leaned her head back so she could mouth at me: mind your own business. Nothing Lola did was my business, yet everything I did was hers. But now wasn’t the time to get in a mother-daughter spat.

“What’s wrong with Grandmama?” Lola asked petulantly.

I held up both hands in surrender. “Nothing. Nothing at all.”

“What is the matter, Baker?” Mike came up beside me.

I hadn’t heard him coming up the stairs. His calm, accented words washed over me like warm, soothing water. “Oh, Mike, am I glad to see you.”

I put my arms around him, craving his strength. He held himself upright and firm, yet I felt his affection in the light embrace he gave me in return. “What happened, Baker?”

While Lola and Lin played cards in the living room, I joined Mike in his renovated coach house in the back of my garden. I ended up drinking an entire pot of green tea while I told him all that had happened. Fortunately, I had a twelve-foot wooden privacy fence around my oblong garden, so I didn’t have to worry about snooping reporters.

Sitting on the futon on Mike’s floor, gazing at his small stone fish pond through the open French doors of his one-room haven, I began to unwind and restore a sense of inner peace.

Mike listened to my incredible tale and took it all in stride. That was easy to do because he was a former Chinese Shaolin monk who had survived three years of indentured servitude in the poppy fields of Joliet, Illinois, before finding a place to call his own in my backyard. Opium production was legal as long as the harvest was sold only to legitimate pharmaceutical firms. But the poppy farms kept a low profile, preferring to hire foreign immigrants. Mike was such a one. He’d naively signed away his freedom when he signed up to work for the Red Fields opium plant. I’d rescued him and he’d been devoted to me ever since, saving my butt on numerous occasions. Nothing could shock or defeat Mike.

“Who do you think did this, Baker?”

“I’ve been thinking about that, but can’t say for sure. Lots of petty criminals I’ve hauled in for retribution might want to harm me or my friends. But none of them has the power to alter phone records or get into my safety deposit box.”

“What about one of the mobs?”

“That’s more likely.”

There was so much governmental and corporate corruption and the various criminal syndicates had so successfully infiltrated the establishment that sophisticated crimes were hard to trace.

“It could be anybody,” I said. “But the person who comes to mind is Corleone Capone.”