Hero Stalker

Part Nine

Monday meant meetings with Valerie and suppliers. At least I didn't have to wear heels for those.

"I'll give that bitch a piece of my mind!" She whipped her car across three lanes of traffic. Horns honked behind us. I sank down in my seat and cringed as the air conditioning blasted me in the face.

"Who?" Suppliers screwed Valerie over every week. You'd think they were all incompetent jerks who wanted to lose clients.

"Sarah-Anne McCaulley. That's the last time I buy boxes from her. The logo goes on the right side of the box! I've explained it fifty thousand fucking times!" She punctuated herself by slamming her fist down on the horn. Needles's empty traveling crate rattled in the back. We'd just dropped him off at the doggie spa.

I looked out the window at the grey stone and metal buildings of Slatefort, Bayton's most western neighborhood. Wasn't much of a view, but eye contact with Valerie might make me a target. A flash of light in the rear-view window caught my eye—a woman in a police uniform, holding what looked to be a radar gun out the window.

"Boss, there's a cop behind us. Maybe you should, uh, slow down?" That last part came out as a squeak. Valerie's hot pink Lamborghini drew cops like fire drew moths, and Valerie was the fire in that equation.

 "I'm catering the Police Ball this year. Donating five thousand dollars worth of sushi." She whipped us in front of a minivan. "They owe me."

Yeah, but the Commissioner Mann doesn't send out emails to the force each weekend reminding them who's owed favors. I bit my lip and prayed we wouldn't get pulled over, because I couldn't imagine Valerie not turning into a screaming, cursing mess who'd get herself arrested.

Again.

McCaulley Containers stored inventory in a dull grey warehouse with faded siding along the side of Wilson Parkway. Their office was in a brick house behind the warehouse, which was probably still residentially zoned. The city government had re-zoned half of Slatefort in the eighties in an attempt to create new low-income housing, but only a few buildings had been built, fewer people moved in, and no one stayed. Slatefort had been the place you went to work. Ever since the factories shut down, most people didn't even come out for that.

 "Where's that woman's car?" Valerie muttered as we stepped out onto the parking lot surrounding the warehouse. Bits of gravel crunched under her sandals as she stalked towards the office. I followed, wiping the sweat off my face and praying my deodorant would do its job. Even with clouds covering the sky, it was still hotter than yesterday.

A blond woman in her mid-fifties sat behind the desk in the retrofitted living room. Her white hat dripped red ribbons and pink silk flowers. She wore a floral print blouse and a smile made of iron. "Can I help you?"

If Valerie had been a dog, her hackles would have gone up. "Where's Sarah-Anne?"

"I'm sorry. Mrs. McCaulley is out of town right now." The receptionist stood. "Her father passed away last night. She's gone to be with her family."

"Bullshit." Valerie stepped forward. Her platinum-blond beehive trembled. I edged back towards the door.

"Excuse me?" The receptionist didn't even drop her smile. "You're very rude."

"And your company is very unprofessional! Gloria, my purse!"

I yearned to disappear. Instead, I held Valerie's purse up for her. The dark purple bag was the size of a suitcase. White fur littered the bottom. Valerie dug around and pulled out a box. She slammed it down on the receptionist's desk. "See? Even an idiot can tell what's wrong with these! Gloria, explain it to her!"

"I . . ." The boxes were fine. Cute, even, with the little dancing sushi roll on top. Not a single person in Bayton would stop buying Valerie's sushi because the logo was on the top instead of the side. I could withstand Valerie's fits of madness, but I hated it when she'd drag me on the train to crazy town to keep her company. "We put the logo on the side of our boxes at Sushi Queen. Not the top. It's a branding issue."

The receptionist stared at me like I'd grown a second head. "Young lady, do you—"

The bell on the office door tingled. High heels clicked on the bare wood floor. "Pardon me, ladies. I'm looking for Gloria Dodson."

I turned around and saw a tall white woman in a BPD uniform. Long black hair curled out from under her cap. Her perfectly straight teeth flashed in the fluorescent light. My thoughts flew to the bottle of whiskey hiding in my underwear drawer, but I was twenty-two now and the only person that'd get me in trouble with would be my mom.

"That's me," I muttered. The officer's nametag read 'D. Knight'. She was the one who'd been following us on the road. Hadn't she seen that Valerie was the driver?

"Gloria's very busy right now. Arrest her when she's off the clock," Valerie snapped.

"I'm not arresting her," the policewoman said. "We need her to come down to the station and answer some questions about an ongoing investigation."

Valerie pivoted. Her red cheeks got redder. I felt sorry for the cop. "Gloria is a vital part of my business." That would explain why I made minimum wage. "For the Lord's sake, she just got abducted. It's not like she got murdered or anything."

The cop smiled. "Let her come with me." It was not a request.

Valerie's muscles went rigid, like she'd been Tasered. "Gloria, go with her."

What's going on? I stared at the cop. She looked familiar, but when all you've got is a hammer, everything looks like a nail. "Are you—"

"Busy? Terribly." She grabbed my upper arm and marched me to the door. It felt like getting dragged by a truck.

Her patrol car sat right next to Valerie's Lambo, with lights on top and a panel separating the front and back seats. I shivered in apprehension. No, genuine cop. "This is just about the kidnapping, right?"

"Sort of." She released my arm and walked to the driver's side door. "Get in. Unless you'd like to stand here until Ward Stadium blows up."

I thought back on everything Mom had told me about dealing with the police. Since I didn't drive, my experience with law enforcement encompassed yesterday's much nicer encounter with Dan Silver and the two parties Annabelle had thrown that got broken up after two AM. Be polite. Do what they tell you. If they tell you to stop doing something you've got a right to do, come home and tell me. WSOC and the ACLU will raise hell. But don't escalate the conflict.

I slid into the car. This isn't about me. They've got a criminal to find. I'm just a witness. Unlike the one I'd ridden in yesterday, the car had been meticulously cleaned and smelled of lavender. Didn't Dan say the henchmen would talk if offered a plea deal?

"You like working for the Sushi Queen?" the cop asked me as she typed a number on the pad that covered the ignition. The car growled to life.

"It's a job," I mumbled, looking out the window. Still grey and depressing. At least I'd escaped Valerie for a while. "Is this going to take a long time?"

The car pulled out of the warehouse and turned left on Wilson. "It's going to take the rest of your life." Her voice had deepened. Something beeped.

I turned my head. "Hey!"

Femme Fatale sat in the driver's seat, her violet V-shaped mask perched on her cheekbones. Her curls cascaded down her shoulders, and her black-gloved hand rested on the gear shift. "You're needed at CenturionTower. Hold on."

She pushed the car into 'F'.