So that was it. Of all the damned luck.
Chuck bounced from one foot to the other, filling the awkward emptiness created by the other man’s failure to speak. “So … what kind of work do you do, anyway?”
He cleared his throat. “I’m in … consulting.”
“Consulting. Oh, well. I see.” Chuck continued his annoying bouncing. “Must be interesting work.”
“Yes, it is.” He started to turn away.
Chuck stopped him with another question. “What exactly does that mean—consulting?”
He took a deep breath. “It means other people bring me their problems and … I try to solve them.”
“Oh. I see.” Chuck began to fidget with his hands. “Well, that must be—must be damned interesting work.”
“Yes, it is.”
Chuck pointed toward the interior of the van. “So what’ve you got in there?”
“It’s nothing. Nothing at all.”
“Looks like a rug.” Chuck pressed forward, inching toward the van,
“Yes, that’s what it is.”
“You know, my grandmother had a rug like this.” Chuck reached forward to touch it.
The man slapped his hand away. “Stop!”
Chuck drew back, startled. “But—”
“It s—it s very dirty.”
“Oh.”
He reached for the back van door. “If you’ll excuse me—”
“You’ve got a stain on your rug.”
He turned slowly around to peer into the van, fearing the worst. His fears were not misplaced. A dark black stain was seeping through the bottom of the rug. Blood.
He glanced back at Chuck. His expression had changed. His smile had disappeared.
Slowly, with no great movement, the man slid his hand inside his jacket and touched the long silver serrated knife tucked inside its sheath.
Chuck cleared his throat. “Is that stain what I think it is?”
The man gripped the hilt of the knife. He could have it out in a second, he calculated. He could have it out and slit this fool’s throat before he knew what was happening. “And what do you think it is?”
Chuck shook his head. “Coffee.”
The hand on his knife relaxed. “Coffee?”
“Yeah. Coffee stains are the worst. You just can’t get them out. I suppose that’s why you’re hauling it away.”
The man tried to smile. “That’s it exactly.”
“Do you have more to carry? I could help—”
“No, that’s all there is. But thank you.”
“Oh, not at all. Just bein’ a good neighbor. That’s what it’s all about, right?”
The man watched as Chuck lumbered back to his own domicile. That good neighbor would never know how close he came to being a dead neighbor.
He closed the back of the van, slid into the driver’s seat, turned over the ignition, and switched on the tape deck. Dr. John’s Gris-Gris. It had some moving parts. The good doctor was not bad at all, for a white boy.
He smiled contentedly as he pulled into the street, pounding the steering wheel in time with the pulsating jazz rhythm streaming out of the speakers. Almost showtime!
Chapter 5
SOME TIME AGO, Christina had discovered that an access panel in the closet of Ben’s bedroom opened up onto the roof. Many a day, and even some nights, they had crawled up there to get away from it all, to find a quiet nook to talk or just relax. And on one occasion, the passageway had saved her life.
Ben was stretched out on one end of a flat narrow section of the roof wedged between two gables. Christina was on the opposite end, sitting in the lotus position, catching the setting sun directly in her face.
“Are you meditating?” Ben asked.
She hesitated a moment, eyes closed, as if deliberating whether she really wanted to answer. “If you must know, I’m communing with my angel.”
“Oh, please.”
She opened her eyes. “What? What’s so unbearable about talking to angels?”
“Honestly, Christina. Do you have to jump on the bandwagon for every New Age fad that comes down the pike?”
“Angels are not a fad.” She closed her eyes and turned away. “You can be so intolerant.”
“Intolerant? I don’t think so. I tolerated your digression into past lives. I made no comment when you plunged into the wonderful world of crystals. I remained altogether silent as you charted your course through holistic medicine and when you read The Celestine Prophecy eight times, marking key passages with a yellow highlighter. But angels?”
“Angels are not a fad,” she repeated. “They’ve been around forever.” She looked down her nose at him, which was quite a trick, since her eyes were still closed. “They’re in the Bible, you know.”
“Actually there are only four angels mentioned by name in the whole Bible, and one of them is Lucifer. I assume you’re not communing with him.”
“Angels aren’t just guys with wings and harps,” Christina informed him. “Angels are all over the place. Some of my best friends are angels.”
Ben raised his eyebrows. “Am I an angel?”
“I’d have to say you are at best an angel in training. Still trying to fight your way through cynicism and a sort of neurotic crabbiness so you can earn your wings.”
“Shades of It’s a Wonderful Life.”
“But the good news is, you don’t have to do it alone. You have a guardian angel, you know. We all do.”
“Mine must be on vacation.”
“Don’t joke. It’s true. Your angel is always watching you.”
“Like, when I’m picking my nose? Going to the bathroom?”
“Would you be serious for a minute? If you communed with your angel on occasion, you’d be better off.” She raised her head, letting the bright rays beam down upon her. “Do you miss him?”
“Miss who?”
“Oh, stop pretending. You know perfectly well who. Joey. You kept him for almost six months. Your life must be a lot different now that he’s gone.”
“True. I only go to bed once a night now, as opposed to six or seven times. I haven’t had to mind-read what a crying baby wants. And I haven’t had the supreme thrill of changing dirty diapers.”
“Once again, you’ve skillfully managed to avoid the question. Don’t you miss him?”
Ben shrugged. “Now and again.” He shook his head. “Julia doesn’t deserve a kid like Joey.”
“Face facts: parenthood isn’t a merit-based appointment. Heard anything about him?”
“You know how things are between Julia and me. She’s not likely to phone with an update. Especially after all those nasty remarks she made when she took him away.” He paused. “I don’t know how these things happen. There was a time, when we were little …” He let out a slow sigh. “I remember when Julia and I were the best two friends in the world. When she—” He stopped abruptly. “It seems like only yesterday.”
Christina laid her hand gently on his shoulder. “Did I tell you your mother called?”
“What? Mother?”
“Would you stop acting like that’s so bizarre? Mothers have been known to call their sons on occasion. Especially when their sons have a tendency to forget to call them.”
“What did she want?”
“Apparently she read about tonight’s anniversary show in The Daily Oklahoman.” Ben’s mother lived in the upscale, elite Nichols Hills section of Oklahoma City, about two hours from Tulsa. “She was thinking about coming down.”
“Why?”
“To see you, you blithering idiot. It’s not like you ever invited her to come hear you play.”
“My mother doesn’t know anything about music, much less jazz.”
“That’s beside the point.”
“She’d be miserable.”
“I doubt it.”
“I hope you didn’t encourage her.”