Percival Everett - Assumption

“What, you get rolled by some hooker and her pimp?” the man at the counter said.

“No.” Ogden showed the man his badge. “I’m just the lowly chump deputy from a Podunk little county in New Mexico that got sent up here to find something out about a murdered woman. A woman who was arrested here for prostitution last year.” Ogden felt he’d diffused what contempt or simple ridicule the man might have directed at him with the words chump and Podunk.

The man studied Ogden briefly. “Vice is down that hall. You’ll see it written on the door.”

“Thanks.”

Ogden did find the door and he walked in. A woman detective was seated on the edge of a desk, just hanging up the phone. She was tall, what his mother would have called a horsy woman. She wore her sidearm, a.38 special, butt facing forward on her right side. “What do you want?” she asked.

Ogden introduced himself and noted that she was even less impressed with him than he was with himself. He went on. “We’ve had two murders and I’m here to see if I can find out something about one Carol Barelli.”

“Destiny,” the cop said. “How does she fit into your case?”

“She’s one of the dead people,” Ogden said.

The cop whistled, shook her head.

“You knew her?” Ogden asked.

“Picked her up a few times. Busted her once. She was an alright kid. Smart.”

“Maybe,” Ogden said.

“I’m Detective Hailey Barry,” the woman said. She reached up and shook Ogden’s hand. “Don’t even mention my name.”

“What about your name?”

The woman cocked her head and looked at Ogden. “Halle Berry, the actress?”

“Listen, Detective, I find pot growers and throw sticks for my dog. I don’t know much about movies. I just found out about Craigslist this morning.”

Detective Barry smiled briefly. “So, what happened to poor Carol Barelli.”

“Shot. I believe by a man with one hand. Do you know of anybody with one hand?”

“Sounds like you got yourself a mystery.”

“Could you ask around a little for me? And do you know anyone called Petra? Another hooker, worked with Carol.”

“No.”

Ogden showed her the picture he’d printed from Craigslist.

“Don’t know her.”

“Do you have an address for Carol Barelli?” Ogden asked.

Barry sighed and looked at her computer screen, typed a bit. “I’ve got one here, but I’m sure it won’t do you any good.”

“Mind if I take a look at her arrest report?”

“You sure ask for a lot.”

“Sorry.”

Barry turned the screen so Ogden could see it. He wrote down the address and read quickly through the report. There was nothing that struck him as unusual. “Well, you were right about her being smart,” Ogden said.

“Very bright.”

“I didn’t have her pegged for a hooker.”

“Drugs,” the detective said.

Ogden nodded.

“She really wasn’t like the rest of them,” Barry said. “I shouldn’t say that. She was a lot like the rest of them.”

“You know anything about a guy with one hand?”

“Yes, he’s a drug dealer. They call him, if you can believe it, One Hand.”

“Know where I can find him?”

“No. I’ve never seen him. He’s never been busted here in Denver as far as I know.” Barry pushed herself away from her desk and looked at the ceiling.

“Also, I just wanted to let you know that I’m in town and I’ll be asking some questions, probably pretty clumsily. I don’t mean to step on toes.”

Barry nodded. “Mind if I ask where you’re going next?”

“I guess I’m going to find myself a hooker.”

Ogden used his cell phone that he always refused to use at home. He was sitting in his truck in the police parking lot. He called the number from the Craigslist ad.

“You want to make an appointment?” the woman asked.

“Yes, ma’am.”

She gave him the address.

He looked up the address in his Thomas Guide and drove the twenty minutes across town. The neighborhood was slightly industrial and the address he’d been given had a small sign that read NO PAIN CLINIC. There was NO PARKING posted on the street, so he drove around the corner. It was just before ten. It seemed an odd time to call on a hooker, but the woman had answered the phone.

There was a buzzer button, but there was no knob or handle on the outer wrought-iron door. The inner wooden door opened. A middle-aged Asian woman looked at Ogden, opened the metal door, and let him in. She didn’t speak, but led him by the hand through a dim room with a couple of sofas and into a room with what might have been a bed or a massage table pushed against the far wall.

“What do you want? Thirty minute, one hour?” the woman asked. She was anywhere from thirty to fifty, with a wide, almost pretty face and hair that was dyed light brown and streaked with a strange red. She wore a light blue smock over sweatpants.

“Thirty minutes,” Ogden said. “I just want to talk.”

“What?”

“Talk.”

“Wait here.” She left quickly.

Just as quickly, a younger woman came in. She was also Asian, pretty, with dark hair pulled back tight. She was dressed like the first woman. “Cindy don’t understand English good,” the woman said.

“I just need to talk to you for a minute,” Ogden said.

“To me?”

“Yes.”

“No, I Mama.”

“I want to see Petra.”

The woman stared blankly at him.

“Destiny,” he said.

Her expression changed slightly.

“I’m looking for a white girl.”

At first Ogden thought she was offended or angry. He could feel her tensing up, like a horse on the muscle. Then she laughed. “Oh, you want white girl.”

“Yes,” Ogden said.

“You don’t want white girl. You pick the girl you want. I bring in, you pick.”

“Do you know a white girl named Destiny?”

“No, no Desny.”

“Carol? Do you have any white girls?”

The woman’s feelings now appeared hurt. She walked out without a word. Ogden sat on the bed and waited. After about ten minutes, ten long minutes, a white woman walked into the room. She was not Petra and she looked none too happy to be there. She looked as if she’d just been roused and told there was a man there to fuck her. She ran a hand through her stringy blond hair and looked at Ogden with weak, blue-green eyes sunk deep into her face.

“Okay,” she said, “what do you want?”

“What’s your name?”

“Shelly.”

“All I want is some information.”

“What? Are you a cop?”

“I am.”

“Ain’t no money changed hands.”

“I’m not interested in arresting you. I’m looking for someone who goes by the name of Petra.”

“What do you want with her? I mean, even if I did know her.”

“Listen, I’m not even a cop from around here. I’m from New Mexico. I’m just looking to ask Petra a couple of questions.”

“She’s not here.”

Ogden nodded. This was at least information. “Do you know where she is?”

“She used to live a few blocks from here. We was never friends. She shared some dope with me once.”

Ogden nodded.

“Do you remember the address?”

She shook her head.

“Can you describe the house, the building?”

“It was big and square and it had windows, like a building, you know. Yellow, it was yellow, hard to miss all that yellow. It’s on a really busy corner and there’s a big cyclone fence with wire on top down the street side.”

“You ever see a man around with one hand?”

“You mean One Hand?”

Ogden smiled. “Yeah, One Hand.”

The woman was either suddenly nervous or needed a fix of whatever fixed her, but she withdrew. “I’ve heard of him.”