Sue pays her tab and leaves, feeling her hackles rise. When she drives away, the cook is standing outside, pretending to smoke, studying her car. If he were to run the plate—but why would he run the plate?
Her job is done. Almost too quickly. She thought she’d get a few more billable hours out of this one. If she were sleazy, she’d play both sides, ask Pauline Hansen how much it’s worth to her not to be found, if her ex knows she used to be Pauline Ditmars and all that entails. But that would be wrong and, besides, Pauline Hansen clearly has no money. Sue shakes her head at her own foolishness, decides to go to a bar she knows, a discreet one in Little Italy where the locals pretend not to notice the women with good haircuts and well-tailored clothes. She needs to hold someone tonight. A dance or two would be enough, but maybe someone will want to come home with her. That would be nice.
Once in the bar, vodka in hand, she finds herself looking for redheads, trying to find someone with that same sweet, wild strawberry scent of June.
11
Gregg walks into the High-Ho three days after the visit from that salad-munching PI. Polly probably doesn’t make the connection, but Adam does. And you don’t have to be a private detective to know that the man who slams the door open at 4:30 p.m., standing there backlit for a moment, all shadow in the afternoon sun, has a claim on Polly. Even Max and Ernest pick up on it.
Yet Polly couldn’t be calmer. “What can I get for you?” she asks, drawing drafts for Max and Ernest.
“You can get your butt in the car and come home to your daughter.”
“Our daughter. And I wager she’s all I’m coming home to. You’ve got one foot out the door, Gregg. Can’t blame me because I got both feet out before you did. Saves you the postage on the child support, the way I see it.”
“Dammit, Pauline. I can’t take care of a kid and work. She’s your job.”
“Yeah, well, I quit. Sorry I didn’t give you two weeks’ notice.”
Unnatural, Adam’s client had told him. He still doesn’t believe it. She seems the opposite to him, almost too natural. The weirdest image pops into his head. Botswana, three years ago. He always travels after a big job, but when he got an unexpected bonus, he went really big, did the safari thing at a high level. Lodges with air-conditioning, great food, all the South African wine you could drink, and South African wine turned out to be darn good. But he was there to see wildlife, didn’t miss a chance to go out with the guides. One night at dusk, riding back to the lodge in the setting sun, they saw some odd weasel-like animals darting across the road, mama and a brood. She was pushing and herding most of her children, but she was indifferent to the smallest one, resigned to its slim odds for survival. He could see Polly doing that, giving up on a lost cause.
Or maybe the kid’s actually her stepchild? He never thought to ask about that. Yeah, probably a stepchild, like the other one.
Other than Max and Ernest, no one else is in the bar and Gregg probably doesn’t register Adam, a headless patch of white T-shirt in the rectangle of the pass-through. If things get rough, Adam will step out, but he has a hunch Polly can take care of herself.
Sure enough, when Gregg grabs her arm, she doesn’t shake it off. She levels her eyes on him in a way that demands: You sure you want to do this here? Is she counting on Adam to come to her rescue? Or simply assuming her husband won’t get rough in front of witnesses? Max and Ernest are watching the couple with the same rapt attention they usually reserve for the television. This scene has much more of a plot than anything on CNN.
He drops her arm.
“I’m sorry, Gregg, but you can’t make me come home. If you’re not cheating on me already, it’s not for lack of trying. You’ll be dating someone soon as we have the ‘talk.’ Right? A weekend at the beach, one last family fling, then we were going to go home and you were going to sit me down and tell me what’s what. Probably have someone picked out. Well, good news. You’re in a better position to take care of our kid, at least for the time being. You’ve got the job. The house is in both our names, but I’ll waive my equity in it.”
“We don’t have any equity.”
“The economy’s not my fault.”
“Isn’t it? Isn’t everything your fault? You’re the one who wanted the kid.”
This last seems to get her in a way that his presence, the physical aggression, didn’t. She turns away, out of arm’s reach now, and busies herself behind the bar.
“Dammit, Pauline.”
Max and Ernest don’t notice the slight variation in her name. Adam does. But then, he has known her real name all along.
Her voice gets harder, although not louder. “Get out, Gregg. Get out or I can’t be held responsible for what happens next.”
And he does. Wuss. How did such a pansy ever land a woman like her? But Adam knows that she landed him. She just let him think he was in charge all these years. Cast, hook, reel.
The question remains why she wanted him in the first place.
Because the kitchen closes before the bar does, Adam and Polly leave about the same time. He’s still in the motel across the road, while she has to walk about six blocks into town. Hard to imagine a safer place than Belleville. In the early days, he asked to walk her home and she always said no. Since he started sleeping with Cath he’s pretty sure Polly wants him to ask again. He doesn’t.
But Cath’s not there tonight. Had to go see her sister up in Dover.
“You sure he’s gone?”
“No,” she says. “But he doesn’t scare me.”
“I don’t think you should walk home alone.”
“He’s a coward, don’t worry.”
“That’s why I do worry. No one’s more dangerous than a coward.”
They walk single file along the macadam that borders the old highway, then turn onto the main street. Called Main Street. Not much imagination in Belleville.
She must be thinking the same thing. “Always Main Street. Never Primary Street, for example.”
“Central Avenue sometimes. And in the UK, they call it the High Street.”
“You’ve traveled a lot.” Statement, not a question.
“Yeah.”
“I’ve hardly been anywhere.”
“Most people’s lives don’t allow them the time to travel, really travel. If you’re going to go places and get to know them, you need to take three, four weeks. Maybe six. I’m lucky to be able to do it that way.”
“Because your work is seasonal.”
Had he told her that? Maybe the day they went to the auction? Why does she make it sound as if she doesn’t quite believe him?
“It can be.”
“You make enough to travel, being a line cook?”
She knows he’s not telling her the full story. But all he says is, “You’d be surprised.”
“I bet I would.” Sultry, suggestive, four ordinary words taut with meaning. Maybe tonight—
Gregg steps out of the shadows ahead. He has a gun. The stupid fucker.
“Maybe I can make you do what I say, Pauline.”
“Dude—” That’s Adam. He’s more scared than he wants to be, but a guy this stupid, he’s likely to fire the gun by accident. It’s bizarre the image that comes to him, Polly in his arms, eyes unfocused, her face vacant with shock.
“Stay out of this. It’s not your business. Even if you’re fucking her, it’s not your business.”
She sighs, calmer than both men.
“Oh, Gregg. You can’t keep a gun on me 24/7. I’ll be gone again the first minute I can. And this time, I’ll do a better job hiding.”
Adam does wonder how the private detective, the woman, found her. Polly’s getting paid cash by the bar, doesn’t have credit cards or a phone. Utilities on her apartment are probably paid by the landlord.
“Why, Pauline? Why?” Gregg’s voice is whiny.