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He stopped at a corner and withdrew his phone from his pocket and pretended to make a call. As his target stepped from a nail salon he snapped away. Retreating behind a tree with a trunk wide enough to mask his presence, he retrieved a camera with a low light portrait lens from the bag and again snapped away.
He lit a cigarette and walked back to his rental.
In less than ten minutes he was at his motel, the room small, dingy, and paneled in something pretending to be wood. He booted his laptop and uploaded the pictures he’d just taken. On it there were already dozens of Jenna, a.k.a. Angel, and her daughter. He’d been instructed to follow her at a distance to get her routine down but not photograph her, or risk getting close enough to be recognized. But Larry Belka was not a patient man nor one who followed orders. Celebrity photographers had to be bold. He opened a digital image of the Angel-Mark Chambers love child. Larry clicked and clicked until the high-resolution picture filled the screen. “Hmm,” he whispered. “This is interesting.”
****
Jenna stepped across her foyer, black chiffon brushing her ankles. “How do I look?” she asked Randi, though she didn’t really care much about the reply.
“You look like you got all dressed up to go to a formal wake. You need blush.”
Jenna moved close to her mirror to adjust an earring that was twisted and not hanging in the same direction as its counterpart. “I’m only going to this hospital thing because I told Ash I’d go with him weeks ago. If I look a little pale that’s just too bad.”
Randi draped Jenna’s velvet wrap over her shoulders. “A date with a handsome man isjustwhat you need. Maybe it’ll get your mind off…y’know. Try and have a good time. I’m going to take Janie out for ice cream.” She folded her arms much like a matronly librarian in an old movie. “I don’t want to see you any earlier than midnight.”
A drone of sound signaled Ash’s arrival. The car’s engine gave a smooth rev then fell silent. The door shut with a thump followed by the insipid chirp of the alarm. Her date had arrived.
Jenna opened the door to greet him.Had he always looked so arrogantly elitist, his nose so casually tipped toward the sky? Jenna remembered the feel of his thin lips pressing against hers, and her stomach lurched at the thought of fending off another kiss at the end of the date. She desperately wanted to plead a headache and bow out, but Randi was standing in the living room, eyes raving like a guard dog tethered to a chain.
“Try and have fun,” she ordered.
Once outside, Ash removed his tuxedo jacket and folded the garment, carefully placing it across the back seat of the roadster. His chest strained against his shirt, his weightlifting routine looking too dedicated to his laterals and trapezius muscles. It wasn’t the natural ranginess of someone fit like…Jenna shook her head and forced Eric from her thoughts. She stared ahead as the car’s motor hummed to life. She was having the worst date of her life, and they hadn’t even left the driveway.
****
Ina had less than a tenth of her belongings packed and crammed into the bed of her truck. Whatever articles of furniture she wasn’t able to move and store in her shed would be leveled along with the house in a few days. But that wasn’t her biggest concern. She had made no other living arrangements and was going to be homeless.
“Well,” she spoke aloud as if needing to hear the sound of a human voice one last time in the house. “Until tax time rolls around, I’ll still own the land. I can always pitch a tent and sell my wares from there.”
Of course not many customers would be inclined to shop at a place with splintered lengths of wood and a gaping hole in the yard. She stepped close to the curtainless window, the glazing putty not yet completely dry on the two replaced panes. “I was so close to saving you.”
She looked out to take a last loving glimpse of her gardens. A black pickup truck pulled in, cut across the lawn, and disappeared in the back, away from the road. Ina blinked several times, stunned, relieved, and overjoyed. “Oh my God!” she shouted and burst through the back door.
****
Eric slowly climbed down out of the truck and hitched toward the house. He was met with a beaming Ina, but as he limped closer, her jubilant smile appeared to sink into her socks. “Good Lord in Heaven. What happened? You look like you’ve been run over by a Mac truck.”
Eric managed a smile wrapped up in a wince. “Nope, a truck would have just hit me once. I got run over by the Simpsons.”
Ina’s eyes protruded from their wrinkled sockets. “Jake and Harley Simpson?”
“I didn’t get a formal introduction.”
“It was Jake and Harley all right, those two are such rotten apples even the worms steer clear.”
Eric smiled. He had missed her colorful description of things. His landlady closed in on him, frowning and clucking her tongue as she examined the bruises on his face. “Well thank God your teeth are all intact.” He flinched as she pulled his shirt from his waistband.
“Good sized kidney punch. Piss any blood?”
“Ina please don’t make me laugh,” he begged while holding his side.
“I just knew when you went missing, something awful happened to you.”
He carefully lowered himself into a chair. “I wasn’t officially missing. In custody is what Chief Parks called it.”
Stamping one foot against pitted linoleum, Ina folded her arms across her bosom. “Willy Parks had you locked up all this time? I’m so mad I could spit.”
Again Eric had to resist the urge to laugh as his ribs weren’t up to joviality. “Forget Parks for now. I need a favor. Could you go into townand get an ace bandage from the pharmacy. The Simpsons took my wallet and I’m a little light on cash, but I’ll pay you back as soon as my friend Nick gets here. He’s on his way.”
