Jazz Funeral

who was in the paper—whose brother was murdered.”
    “Who is? The picture or the singer?”
    “Janis. Why the hell didn’t we put that together?” He turned to Chris. “You knew, didn’t you? You had to have known.”
    The blond just shrugged, didn’t open his mouth. Skip thought he’d be death to teenage girls with raging hormones. She took out her badge. “Let’s talk about it.”
    He didn’t miss a beat. “She fainted when she read about the guy who died. Said she was sick.” He shrugged again. “That was it—she didn’t talk much. Just sang with us and split.”
    “What made her leave?”
    The girl said, “She caught him with another girl.”
    The drummer stared at the blond: “Asshole.”
    It went on like that until Skip was pretty sure they’d given up every crumb of information they had, plus names and addresses. She gave them her card: “If you see her again, call me. And I mean it—it could be a matter of life and death.”
    “Hers?”
    “Yours if you don’t cooperate. By the way, it’s after eight—haven’t you noticed?”
    They didn’t answer.
    Jimmy Dee said, “Should I give them the other half?”
    “Up to you.”
    He handed it over ceremoniously, kissing the girl’s hand. “Stay as sweet as you are,” he told her.
    And Skip said, “When you think about making that call, remember I’ve got a rich friend. He might just get generous again.”
    To Jimmy Dee she said, “Come on, I’ll buy you a drink. I owe you about half a dozen.”
    “I’ve got to finish telling you,” he said urgently.
    “Okay.”
    “You know those other two living relatives? Besides my sister? They’re her kids.”
    “Young?”
    “Eleven and thirteen. A boy and a girl. The dad deserted the family a long time ago. His parents are alive, but the grandfather’s an alcoholic, and they’re really, really poor. They just have a tiny apartment.”
    Skip finally understood what he was telling her. She stared right at him, simply couldn’t play the game any longer. “Jimmy Dee? You’re going to be a dad?”
    He was sweating. “Jesus. I don’t know what else to do.” She’d never seen him look so worried. And scared. Downright scared.

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
    The sounds of breakfast penetrated even to the zendo, where Nick had gone for a few minutes’ quiet. It was a good zendo, a twelve-mat room, but he must remember to have it soundproofed. He had come here thinking to sit zazen, or at least that was the excuse he’d given, but once in here, surrounded by white walls, breathing the heavy scent of incense, he was so happy simply to be alone that he started thinking about that. His life was seeming too complicated all of a sudden.
    He’d invited Proctor to come for JazzFest and stay as long as he wanted—Nick thought it was important to support him while he recovered from his divorce—but now he wanted to take it all back. This thing Proctor had for Ti-Belle was really getting uncomfortable. In fact, that was why he’d left the breakfast table. They weren’t saying anything, there was just an atmosphere. Something thick and ugly in the air. He couldn’t name it, thought it was more than simple dislike, but they didn’t have any history together. He couldn’t figure out where it was coming from. Proctor had seen him through twenty-five years of relationships and never acted like this. All Ti-Belle would say was that Proctor didn’t like her, she could feel it. She never said a word about not liking him. But even Nick didn’t like him much at the moment.
    Oh, hell. He’s not himself. No one is when they’re going through a divorce—I should know.
    Should he be more patient? He wasn’t even sure he had time for Proctor in his life. He wanted to pursue his spiritual life, spend more time with his kids, and there was another thing—he was starting to feel a weird urge to teach. He thought that was partly behind his wholehearted support of Second Line Square. The part that most excited him was the plan to expand the Heritage School of Music; he wanted to be in on that. It was a weird thing and he didn’t have a clue where it was coming from. But Caroline said you had to listen to stuff like that, and Nick saw no reason to doubt her. He could afford to follow any impulse he had, and this looked like a constructive one to him.
    Sort of. There was a piece of it he didn’t trust—somehow it seemed more appealing to teach music to other people’s kids than to figure out how the hell