“I said, step out of the car.”
Rolly keeps a rusted tire iron beneath the front seat, or at least he used to. Jay reaches for it. He’s about to hop out of the truck when Rolly comes out of 27-A, walking briskly across the alleyway. Seeing Rolly and the .45 in his right hand, the driver of the Caprice backs up slowly. In his arms, Jay sees he’s carrying not a weapon but a paper grocery bag, a loaf of white bread sticking out of the top. He starts off, giving Rolly a sideways glance as they come within inches of each other in the parking lot. Rolly gives him a nod, as polite and casual as if they were strolling along the seawall in Galveston. The driver of the Caprice heads in the opposite direction from unit 27-A. Rolly opens the door to the El Camino.
“No girl?”
“No girl, no nothing,” Rolly says. “The place is completely empty. No bed, no couch, no furniture, nothing, just some trash on the floor, a few ghost marks in the carpet. There’s no way anyone’s living in that apartment.” He slides behind the wheel, throwing the truck into drive and pulling out of the carport. He makes a quick turn toward the entrance to Beechwood Estates and the 45 Freeway. Jay looks at the envelope with Hollis’s address scribbled on the front.
“So either he lied to his ex about where he was living–”
“Or he moved out of 27-A in a hurry,” Rolly says.
Jay lifts the cell phone from his lap as they ride, dialing home. Evelyn answers on the fourth ring. “Where are you?” she barks, forgetting that she’s the one who’s been out of touch for hours. It’s Saturday night, and she has plans to see a show at the Magnolia Ballroom, she reminds him. At this point, there’s barely enough time left for her to wash and dry her hair.
“I’ll be home soon,” he says. “But do me a favor, will you? Keep the kids out of my bedroom, okay? It’s important, Ev. Don’t let them go in there.”
“Why? It’s something dirty in there?”
Jay doesn’t bother to correct her because, frankly, he’d rather have her think he sleeps with a stack of Penthouse magazines under his pillow than a handgun, the very thing he told his wife he’d never bring into the house again. But Tuesday night, after the break-in at his office, he walked right inside the house and slid it beneath his bedroom pillow, like old times.
“You hear me, Evelyn?”
“Fine. But don’t you have none of that shit in this house the next time I come, you hear? You already got me over here babysitting somebody else’s kid.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Ellie’s friend, what’s her name?”
He knows instantly. “Lori?”
“They’re holed up in Ellie’s room now.”
“She’s grounded.”
“Guess she found a loophole.”
“Well, tell her it’s getting late. Tell her it’s time for Lori to go home.”
“Don’t look like the girl is planning to go home no time soon. She walked in carrying a big-ass duffel bag, both of them heading straight to Ellie’s room.”
Jay sighs. “Okay, I’ll be there soon,” he says.
As they pull out onto the feeder road, Rolly reaches across Jay’s lap for the glove box. He returns the set of picks to its hiding place. “Come on, Counselor, let’s get you home,” he says, doing a piss-poor job of hiding his disappointment over the gaping hole he can’t close. Tomorrow makes six days, and they are no closer to finding Alonzo Hollis.
CHAPTER 10
Ellie is on him the second he walks through the door. “It’s just for tonight, I swear,” she says. “She had a fight with her mom, and she just wants to get away from home, just for tonight.” She’s at his heels as he walks through the house. Evelyn bid a quick good-bye in the driveway, offering no more than a small wave before driving off. But she left a pot of oxtails on the stove, peas, and a chopped salad, for which he doesn’t think he could be any more grateful. He hasn’t eaten anything since a boiled egg at breakfast. He nods at his son, who’s lying on the floor on a pile of couch cushions, watching Star Trek. “Hey, Dad,” Ben says, barely looking away from the TV. Jay takes off his suit jacket, heading past the kitchen to the front of the house and the main hall that leads to the three bedrooms. Ellie, behind him, continues to plead her friend’s case. Lori, he guesses, is hiding out somewhere, waiting to hear her fate.
“She tell her parents yet?”
“This isn’t even about that,” Ellie says. “She got into a fight with her mom about leaving wet clothes on the bathroom floor. Her mom’s fine with her spending the night.” Jay stops at the door to his bedroom, not wanting her to cross the threshold. “And the other thing, well, we’re going to figure something out.”
“This isn’t your problem, Ellie. Stay out of it.”
“She’s my friend, Dad,” she says, in a way that makes it impossible for him to scold her or offer any better counsel than the words that just came out of his daughter’s mouth. She’s compassionate, not to mention loyal, two qualities he finds precious and too fragile for his clumsy hands to touch, tonight at least.
“We’ll talk about it in the morning,” he says.
Ellie smiles.
She might have thrown her arms around her dad in gratitude if he weren’t so stiffly guarding his bedroom door. “Did you get something to eat?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Okay,” he says awkwardly. “Good night, then.”
She gives him a strange look, suspicious even. It’s not yet seven o’clock.