The driver behind her must have been another woman, for she did not run up to Rosa’s rear fender and suddenly slam on her brakes like most male drivers seemed wont to do. As much as Rosa liked men, she couldn’t stand the way they drove.
Satisfied that the person behind her – who did indeed appear to be a woman – was driving safely, she turned her attention to what was going on in front of her. If there was something going on at Texas Stadium, it would be the other side of the freeway at a standstill, not her east-bound side. The west-bound traffic was going slowly, but was not completely stopped like all three lanes on the east-bound side seemed to be.
Rosa let out an exasperated sigh and banged her hand on her steering wheel, careful not to hit the horn. Even in the Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex, Saturday afternoon traffic usually went fairly smoothly. What could be going on? When they finally started moving, it was at a snail’s pace that took her fifteen minutes to go three miles. The culprit ended up being a car on the side of the road with its front jacked up. No accident, no barriers in the road, just somebody changing a tire.
Biting back a Spanish expletive, she glanced at the time on the clock dashboard once traffic was moving again. Five-fifty. She would still make it – barring any other traffic mishaps.
The thought did not bring her much relief. By being on time, she would escape a big chewing-out, and perhaps slap in the face, by Eddie, but she would not escape the degrading feeling of being violated all night, as she had experienced most nights for the past ten years. After her first year in the “business,” she learned to medicate the feelings with alcohol, an occasional high, and men.
With considerable emotional and mental struggle, she had recently been able to give up all three. She was more than ready for a change in her life, and, after attending church services with Sheila for a few weeks, had found the strength and motivation to do so. She had learned that God had better things planned for her life, she had done what she could to begin straightening it up.
It was hard, and she met with temptation every night. But she was doing her part.
To get free from her job, however, would require a miracle.
As she turned off 183 toward Harry Hines Boulevard, she marveled that Hank and Sheila, former schoolteachers-turned-missionaries, would even allow her to be at their wedding. They knew what she did for a living, did not know why she continued on. She dared not tell them – or anybody else – the truth.
Girls who left the employ of Eddie E. without his express permission mysteriously disappeared.
Whether this rumor was true or not, it seemed to fit his nefarious character, as well as Rosa’s personal experience. Twice in the past ten years a dancer did not show up for work. The first time this happened, a few days later Rosa questioned Eddie about it. He told her to drop it, and when she persisted, he slapped her face so hard he bruised her, pinned her up against the wall and told her again – in a violently threatening manner – to drop it, or else.
She asked no questions the second time a dancer suddenly disappeared.
While very little about life scared or intimidated Rosa anymore, her boss did, so her plan was to remain under his employ until one of three things happened: one, the police arrested him; two, Eddie let her go; or three, God did something else to get her out of that hellhole.
Since Eddie seemed to be especially careful to overtly stay within the confines of the law, the first option seemed impossible. The second one did not seem to be imminent.
That left it up to God. Rosa knew He was capable; she had seen Him instantly heal her brother, Miguel, of one of the deadliest cancers around, cancer of the liver. For the moment, all she had faith for was that God would keep her from temptation that night, and that Eddie’s bouncer, Gil, would keep her safe from would-be rapists. Her boss’ cousin, Gil was a tall, burly white man who had done well on that account so far.
Rosa finally drove into the small parking lot of the ugly, windowless, gray building adorned only with a neon-light sign that flashed, “XXX Night Club.” The main area inside the club had a small, square bar that was well worn, with numerous chips and scratches in its wooden sides. The cushions in the old stools had holes in them big enough so that you could see the filling poking out.
Between the bar and the small stage were about fifteen tables, in a similarly dilapidated condition as the bar. The men who came to that place cared nothing for décor or appearances; they only wanted to fulfill some impossible fantasy without having to actually have a relationship with a woman. Eddie only replaced a table or chair if it completely broke. For that reason, about a third of the chairs were newer than the rest, and two tables were in much better shape than the others.
Besides the public area was the small entryway inside the front door with a counter where you had to pay the entrance fee; the dressing room right behind the stage; and Eddie’s office at the back of the place, on the opposite side of the dressing room.
It was, in short, as ugly a place to look at for Rosa as her actual job was to do.
As the club would not be open to the public for about another hour, the front door was locked so she had to go in through the side door. There was a back door, too, but to go through it meant to go through a musty, cluttered storage room piled high with boxes and broken chairs.
It was an accident waiting to happen. In fact, the newest dancer, a twenty-year-old named Lisa, had recently gone in through the back and narrowly escaped being hit on the head by a falling box.
Anyway, the side door led straight into the dressing room, where Eddie rarely made an appearance. So on days when Rosa wanted to avoid him for as long as possible, she could go in there first and bide her time until she needed to go out into the public area of the club.
This evening, though, the door that opened from the dressing room onto the small stage was open. Rosa went to close it, but a familiar and unsavory odor hit her nose when she got to it. Having worked in this part of Dallas for so long, she had smelled it a couple of times before when a fight between either gang members or drug dealers broke out.
Gunpowder. Somebody had recently – probably just before she got there – fired a gun.
Slowly and cautiously, Rosa opened the door wider, looking all around as she did so. The lights were dim and it was difficult to interpret all the shadows. Gingerly, she took a few steps forward.
The she stepped back with a gasp.
Eddie E. and Lisa lay in the middle of the dance floor, dead.
Rosa looked around wildly, suddenly feeling more vulnerable than she ever had before in her life. Who had done it? Were they still here?
She wished she had a gun, or a knife. Pepper spray. Anything to defend herself, in case the murderer was still there. Long ago she had learned karate, but she was rusty in the art and it would do her little good if the killer was a big person, like Gil. He could be hiding in the dark shadows or underneath the bar.
Rosa’s heart began pounding in her chest. She knew her best defense was to run away, but what if the victims might still be alive? She had to be certain they were not before she left them.
Her heart pounded as she slowly approached the bodies. The blood stains on their clothes and on the floor confirmed that they had, indeed, been shot. Eddie appeared to have been shot in the chest; Lisa, in the head. The blood was still bright red.
The reality of the situation hit Rosa and she cried, “Oh, God, Lisa!”
She kneeled down and examined both bodies carefully. Neither of their chests moved. Rosa dared not to touch the bodies to check for either temperature or pulse. She knew better than to leave her fingerprints anywhere near the body of a murder victim. Regardless, the location of the bullet holes and stillness of their bodies was enough indication that they had not survived the attack.
She took a deep breath to calm the nausea welling up in her gut. Lisa did not deserve to die. Like Rosa, she had made some foolish, bad choices – the worst one being to agree to work for Eddie – but she ha
d had her whole life ahead of her to make a drastic turn-around. Rosa did not know the girl well, but had spoken with her enough to know that she had once had dreams, and had finally been driven to work at the night club by a series of circumstance that made even tough Rosa’s hair stand on end when she heard them.
Rosa slowly got back up on her feet. Her entire body felt numb, as though a megadose of Novocain had been pumped through her veins.
Suddenly, she heard a crashing noise and a door slam. Startled, she whirled around. The killer. That must be the killer. Whoever it was had run through the storage room and knocked over a box or two, and gone out the back door.
Rosa felt all the blood drain from her face. Adrenaline coursed through her veins as she ran for the front door, fumbling around in her purse for her cell phone. Right now, the only place she could feel safe was in her car, driving to anywhere else. Scanning the parking lot, she could see no sign of anybody else. She ran for her car, got in, and shoved the key in the ignition as she slammed the door.
Breathless, she turned the key while hitting “9-1-1” on her phone. Somehow, she managed to catch enough breath to tell the operator what she had just seen, and where she was. “I am leaving the parking lot of the club right now,” she told the operator. “I will be back in ten minutes to meet the police. I am alone, and I don’t feel safe.”
She hung up, then found her way back to Harry Hines, and drove for five minutes one way, then made a U-turn and returned to the night club. It was a long enough span for her heart rate to slow down and her breathing to return to normal. When she pulled into the parking lot, she was relieved to find two police cars and an ambulance already there.
She felt some trepidation as she parked her car and got out of it. She knew that she might be considered a suspect, despite having been the one to call 9-1-1, despite having given her name.
One police officer stood just outside the front door, arms crossed, watching as Rosa approached the yellow tape a female cop was wrapping around the place.
“My name is Rosa Manriquez,” she said, stopping when the man put his hand out and shook his head in warning. “I am the one who called 9-1-1.”
The man frowned, dropped his arms, and walked toward her. “You found the bodies?”
“Yes, sir.” Rosa did her best to look and sound confident, although her stomach was beginning to churn and her legs suddenly felt like jelly.
“Not a good day for you, is it, ma’am?” The officer still frowned, but his tone was edged with a hint of sympathy. “Mind if I ask you some questions?”
“No, sir.” In truth, the only part of the ordeal she dreaded was admitting to the cop that she was one of the club dancers. She followed him over to the side of the building, feeling a little more at ease. When he asked her to tell him the whole story, she did so, thinking carefully so as not to leave out any details. The policeman took notes and occasionally asked for clarification.
When she concluded, he asked, “Any idea who might have done it?”
Rosa hesitated. The fact was, any one of Eddie’s employees, including herself, had plenty of motive to take him out. She supposed that Gil, the bouncer who also happened to be Eddie’s cousin, could even have had a falling-out with their boss. Then there were the numerous other lowlifes that Eddie had had conflict with over the past few years, guys who had nothing to do with the night club but were neighborhood drug dealers, drug users, and pimps who had tried to harass Eddie or one of his employees.
Finally, she responded as honestly as she could. “I can’t think of any one person who might dare to cross Eddie. For what it’s worth,” she added, “I don’t think Lisa – that’s the girl – was the target.”
“Wrong place, wrong time?” the cop queried, jotting down another note.
Rosa nodded, then looked over at the front entrance as paramedics pushed out two stretchers, carrying the bodies which were both fully covered with a sheet.
She shuddered and looked away, exhaling loudly.
“Miss Manriquez,” the officer said, a small smile now playing at his lips, “that’s all I need. Thank you for your cooperation. Please call us if you think of anything else you might have missed in your description tonight. And may I suggest you go home and get a good night’s sleep.”
Rosa nodded, attempting a weak smile, and walked with leaden legs to her car. She had seen bloody fights between drunk men, had her naked body manhandled by multiple ugly men at the same time while she danced, seen people threaten each other with knives and guns, and seen women beat up by a man.
She thought she had seen all the depravity of humanity there was to see. Until this evening.
Once again, she started her Camaro, imagining the e-mail she might send to Sheila: “Guess what happened to me on your wedding day?” Well, her friend in Zimbabwe would eventually learn about it, but certainly not for a couple of weeks. Sheila and Hank deserved at least a little time to themselves, to believe that all was bliss in the world.
Rosa flipped on one of the local Latino radio stations as she got back on to Harry Hines. She hoped that listening to music on her way back to Fort Worth, where she lived in an apartment in the eastern area of the city, would push back the thoughts and images floating around her head. She knew the picture of Eddie and Lisa lying dead on the floor would not soon leave her memory.
A love song came on, the singer declaring to his beloved how precious and beautiful she was to him, how he yearned for her every waking moment, how thrilled he was when they were together. Both the lyrics and the melody pulled at a deep longing that Rosa tried to keep buried, for she had no hope that any decent man would want a woman with her past.
That was not making her feel better. Rosa sighed and snapped off the radio. Then she turned it back on and flipped it to 94.9, an English Christian music station Sheila had told her about. While fluent in English, as a non-native speaker Rosa still had some trouble understanding English song lyrics, but she didn’t mind. She knew whatever she heard from the station would bring her peace, not turmoil.
She listened to it the rest of the way home, chuckling when she heard the D.J. give a report about the standstill on 183, which was apparently still going on. When she got to her apartment, she called her brother to make sure he, who had also attended the wedding, had come home.
When he answered, she simply said, “Good. You’re home. I need to talk to you. I’ll be there in about fifteen minutes.”
*****
Gil always parked his truck in the back of the club, pulling in several yards away from and just opposite the back door. That way, he could go in and out without being seen or bothered by the clientele. He was early today, because his girlfriend just broke up with him after finding out where he worked. He needed a stiff drink before he got started.
This was far from the first time something like this had happened. But he had, for the first time in his forty-three years, actually started wondering what a future might be like with a woman. There was no chance of that now, given the choice words she had had for him the other night.
Gil was beginning to wonder if it might not be time for a career change. But how could he tell Eddie?
When he pulled into his usual spot, facing east and away from the building, the sun was in the exact right spot to shine a glaring ray of light into his rearview mirror. He reached up to move the mirror to keep the reflection from blinding him, but as he did he saw the back door swing open.
Somebody ran out, but thanks to the bright glare, he could not tell who it was. He twisted his neck around to look out the truck’s rear window, but by then the person had already disappeared.
Gil immediately smelled a fish. Usually, the only people who might be at the club this early were Eddie and a couple of the dancers, and once in a while the bartender. And as far as he knew, he and Eddie were the only ones who ever used the back door, Eddie only on occasion. Nobody else liked to tackle the mess in the store room that led to the back door.
He jumped out
of his truck and ran around to the front of the building. As he got to the north side, he stopped and threw himself against the side of the building.
Rosa was running for her car.
He waited until she drove out of the parking lot, then ran for the front door. It was open; Rosa must have opened it when she came out. Or, no, didn’t she just come out the back? Anyway, someone had unlocked the front door an hour early, and Gil went into the club through it. The lights were dim; Gil felt for the master switch next to the admission counter, turned the house lights to full brightness, and wildly glanced around in case there was somebody else in there.
No one. He took a couple steps forward, then stopped. Two bodies lay on the dance floor.
He walked up to the bar, then groaned out a string of cuss words as he recognized Eddie. Slowly, he wove his way through the tables and stepped onto the dance floor.
Lisa, too.
He may have felt some sympathy for her if not for the tidal wave of anger and grief that suddenly overwhelmed him. Though his cousin by relation, Eddie had been more like a brother to Gil. They had lived next door to each other for most of their childhood, in east Dallas, and had been almost inseparable. They played together, fought together, and defaced property together.
When Eddie started to get into trouble in high school, so did Gil. Then his family moved to Garland and he did not see his cousin much anymore. The day Eddie got sent to Juvenile, Gil’s mother put her foot down and told Gil he would not be allowed to hang out with Eddie any longer. But he was fifteen, and Eddie sixteen, by then, so it was only a matter of a couple of years before they could – and did – legally pair up.
Perhaps “legally” was not quite the word, as Eddie had a spirit that combined rebellion, disgust for authority, and entrepreneurialism that led him to concoct money-making schemes that were often outside the bounds of the law.
Gil, not as smart as his cousin but with much more brawn, often acted as Eddie’s strong man, which had landed him in jail twice but for which Eddie had always paid him well. Eddie, therefore, had not only been a close friend but the sole source of Gil’s income his whole life.