for finger prints, and that as soon as they were identified we’d be arresting someone.”
“That must’ve freaked them out.” I said.
“No it didn’t seem to.” She said, thinking it over. “Maybe it really wasn’t Jordan in there. Either that or he’s a good actor. He really didn’t look particularly scared at all.”
“He probably knew you were just bluffing.” I said.
“Yeah, I suppose if you had been there he would’ve cried and admitted everything.”
“No, I didn’t mean that,” I said, “just that, you know, these kids think they know everything. He’s an arrogant little prick.”
“Yes, he could use a good beating.” She said.
TWELVE
Jessie had called everyone who had ever sold her weed in her entire life, and still hadn’t found anything. She tried to wake me up at nine the next morning, shaking me and asking how I could sleep when we were in the middle of some kind of freaky weed drought. I told her to leave me alone and let me sleep. She continued anyway, demanding that I call Georgia, my ex-girlfriend, and ask if she knew where we could score. This time I yelled into my pillow that I just wanted to sleep, and she took the hint and went back into the living room. I finally got out of bed a little after eleven o’clock and went to the kitchen to make myself some coffee. She came in after me.
“You have to do something.” She said. “I’m not going to be much fun to be around if I can’t smoke. I’m starting to wig-out already. I can’t even score dirt-weed.”
“I’ll ask our stowaway.” I said. “He’s got some. He almost got busted last night.” I told her how David was going to kill Niti, and how the whole place reeked of herb smoke. She laughed.
“He wouldn’t hurt anyone.” She said. “He was probably just stoned and freaked out.”
“Jessie, I love you, but you give people way more credit than they deserve sometimes. David would absolutely kill someone to save his own neck.”
“He never would’ve done it. He’s all talk.”
“You need reality orientation.” I said. “It’s Friday, July twentieth, two thousand seven. I’m glad you can’t score, I need you clear-headed right now. I mean think about it, our destiny is tied up with David Telano Jess, David Telano. He’s the worst fuck-up I have ever known, and I’ve known some heavy fuck-ups. He’s not going to take us down with him, alright? I wont let him. He’s a big boy, he’s made his decisions and he can live with the consequences. I’m going over there to set him straight today.”
“You’re such a brute of a man.” She said. “So authoritative. You have to take decisive action don’t you?”
I flexed my arm muscles. “That’s right.” I said.
After I’d dropped her off at the PFPFP I headed over to Lakeview early. I parked up the street from the Relna place and walked down. I got the key from underneath the potted plant and entered quickly, leaving the kitchen light off. I went into the living room and sat on the couch, so I couldn’t be seen through the front window. I slid the answering machine over and hit play. I skipped a couple of reminders about Lakeview Resident’s Council meetings, listening for my own voice so I could erase the incriminating message. It wasn’t there. They had a high-end digital answering machine, so it was a possibility that Phil had called to check his messages from California. He certainly wouldn’t have known what to make of my message. I tried to remember what I’d said. Had I said David’s name? I couldn’t remember.
I was starting the messages over again when I heard David’s voice. “I erased it already.” He said. He was standing inside the doorway, at the top of the stairs to the basement. I quickly got across the room and through the door, shutting it behind me.
“What the fuck was all that shit last night?” I asked, following him down the stairs.
“It was a bad scene,” he said, “I was scared man, real scared.” We got down into the rec-room, and I noticed right away that the TV was gone. We crossed into the inner room where David had set the TV on the bar. I was glad to see he hadn’t sold it. There were blankets and a pillow on the floor and the whole place reeked of stale cigarette smoke. I shut the door behind us and turned on the light.
“You’re wrecking this place.” I said. “You’ve only been here two nights. Where’d you get these sheets and stuff?”
“From the bedroom.”
“You shouldn’t even be up there.” I shook my head. “Even if we clean this place up, you think Phil and his wife aren’t going to notice that smell? It smells like a bar in here. You can’t get that smell out of carpet. It’s permanent.”
“So they get here and one of the rooms in the house smells like smoke. Big deal. There was an ashtray down here, so they must have friends that smoke. It already smelled when I got here. -We’ll fuckin’ Febreeze it.”
“No, I was here last night with Niti, and the whole place reeked of weed. It smelled like Willie Nelson’s tour bus -I mean the whole house, we were up in the kitchen smelling it.”
“I can’t help it, I got some extra stinky shit.” He said. “I need it to calm my nerves.”
“Were your nerves real calm last night when you said you were gonna to stab Niti?”
“I never said that.”
“You said, I have a knife. I’ll take care of it. How was I supposed to take that?”
“I woulda only done it as a last resort.” He said. “I’m not crazy.”
“It shouldn’t have come to that in the first place. What are you walking near the windows for? Someone saw you.”
“I don’t know when. I only left this room twice. I gotta piss, right?”
“When did you move the TV?” I asked.
“Last night.” He said. “I was bored.”
“And I suppose you turned on the light didn’t you?”
“I couldn’t move that shit in the dark. The light was only on for a minute.” He said.
“Well it was long enough to freak Mrs. Pern out! You almost got caught-”
“But I didn’t get caught Ben. Fuck… You just come here to lecture me?”
I took a deep breath. “No man, just please, be more careful. I’m in this now too. I don’t want to go to jail either.”
“The TV barely works in here anyway.” He said. “There’s no cable hookup. I only get channel two. Have you found out anything on my uncle? How’s the search?”
“Nothing so far.” I said. “We don’t have shit to go on really. This friend of Amanda’s, Gretchen Salle, we met with her and she told us some story about a missing kid from Extended Families. She said Junior’s trying to cover it up and keep it out of the papers. You know anything about that?”
“No.” He said. “Listen, his whole organization is crooked as fuck. I wouldn’t put anything past them. My uncle’s end of it involves driving large quantities of small bills to various businesses around town. My uncle’s motel, a couple of car dealerships, a salon, a nail place, and Megapark! They get most of it. If Junior Pierson is involved with the adoption place you can be one hundred percent sure he’s not motivated by the milk of human fuckin’ kindness.”
“Yeah.” I said. “I guess we don’t have anything new to tell you then. Gretchen Salle is on a crusade to find out what happened to this kid. I don’t think she can really help us.”
“Yeah.” David said. “My uncle is the guy who could get me out of this. If we could get Freddie busted he might give up Junior. That would save me. I mean they’re more likely to believe that a drug dealer killed his wife than a respectable business man or whatever he’s supposed to be.”
“Yeah, but your uncle’s in the financial end of it, he probably never even sees the actual drugs.” I pointed out. “It’s gonna be hard to get him busted.”
“I’m working on a letter.” David said, pulling a legal pad off the bar and handing it to me. “It’s to the cops.”
I read:
To the police working on the Becky Pierson and Amanda Porget murder case,
I am David Telano.
I did not kill anybody. Please beleive me. For more than a year I worked for my uncle, Freddie Divos. I was the “manager” of his hotel, Shoreston Motor Lodge. I sat behind the desk and rented rooms to people, but I never touched the books. After a while, I realized that there was no way even during the summer rush that he was making enough money to pay the bills. There’s a Budget Inn right off the highway that’s nicer and cheaper! I personally witnessed Freddie Divos bringing large amounts of cash in every month to make it look like it was coming from the hotel. I believe this is called “Money Laundering.”
I also did some illegal stuff. I admit it. My Uncle sold me electronics and other goods at very low prices which I would resell at flea markets around here. I did this a lot, and had done some stolen credit cards too, that he provided for me. He gave me Amanda Porget’s credit card trying to frame me for her murder. He also gave me her camera and some jewelry which they didn’t mention on TV. The real person who killed her was Harold Pierson Junior. Freddie Divos told me. When I confronted Junior Pierson he told me to take his car, in an attempt to buy me off. I was going to bring the car to the police the next day as evidence of attempted bribery, but the next day I found out that his wife had been murdered and that the police were after me. But I didn’t do it!
All this is true. My uncle is a bad person, and I’m sure he will tell you everything if he thinks it will get him out of trouble. I am willing to testify to all this in a court of law. I got