Lousiana Hotshot

decent amount of time had gone by. And getting to Pamela was absolutely crucial.
    The woman who came to the door was thin and drawn, no one Talba remembered from the funeral. Her hair and lipstick were too dark for her skin, making her look older than she probably was. She had on neat polyester slacks in a charcoal color, and a tailored print blouse. She was dressed for doing errands, perhaps, or receiving visitors. Talba remembered that Shaneel had said the three girls hung together partly because their mothers worked. This woman must still be on bereavement leave, still trying to accept the finality of her daughter’s death.
    She had deep lines between her eyes, a perfect eleven, and the forehead above them was furrowed as well, contorted so heavily Talba was reminded of a sharpei. Her eyes were frightened, darting behind and around her visitor. It made Talba uneasy.
    “Mrs. Bergeron?”
    “Yes?” The woman wasn’t openly hostile, but she was on the verge.
    “I’m a friend of Aziza Scott. Cassandra’s mother.”
    “Cassandra?” Her brow curled further in on itself; her eyes became wilder still.
    “Pamela’s friend from choir practice.”
    “Pammie never mentioned a Cassandra.”
    Talba was at a loss. Aziza had said she phoned and talked to the Bergerons; Talba was sure of it. And that Cassandra had phoned, but couldn’t get through to Pamela.
I couldn’t have dreamed it,
she thought.
    But it was clear that being Aziza’s friend wasn’t going to cut any ice. “Look. I’m a detective…”
    Mrs. Bergeron didn’t wait to hear any more. “Lloyd! Lloyd come here!”
    Almost instantly, a man appeared, his arm encircling his wife’s waist as he stepped up behind her. He was quite a bit taller than she was, and he carried a pillow of fat at his center. He wore a short-sleeved white shirt that fit him in such a way that it emphasized both his spare tire and his sloping shoulders. It was an odd shape for a man of his size; perhaps he had never done manual work or exercised.
    He was almost bald, but still had a few strands of light brown hair between the two side tufts, worn too long, so they were limp and lifeless. He wore a pair of thickish glasses with thin-rimmed frames, and his face had a vague, confused look.
    “Lloyd, this woman says she’s a detective.”
    The man held out his hand, as if entreating a child to give back the butcher knife. “Lemme see ya badge.”
    “I’m not a police officer. I’m a private detective, and I’m extremely concerned about your daughter. Let me show you some I.D.” She started to reach into her purse, but the man grabbed her forearm. She raised her chin, alarmed. Behind the glasses, Bergeron’s eyes flamed.
    What the hell was going on here?
She was starting to panic.
    She spoke softly. “Okay, now. Okay. Everything’s all right.”
    She started to step back, but Bergeron pulled her into the house, slammed the door, and slung her across the foyer. She crashed into a wall and tried to come back to her height with dignity, suddenly remembering the sensation of playing statues as a kid. The door was closed, and Bergeron had his back to it, blocking her from leaving. His wife stood at his side, forehead still furrowed. Talba’s heart thundered.
What the hell
is
this?
She hoped she hadn’t spoken aloud.
    Bergeron spoke in a controlled, menacing voice. “Now you get on the phone and you get her back over here.” His arms were folded over his chest and his feet were about a foot apart. He sounded like a poor man’s Clint Eastwood.
    How in hell to defuse this? Talba found she wanted nothing so much as to curl up and have a nap. She knew the impulse well. Miz Clara had been sick once when she was a child— confined to the hospital— and Talba and Corey had gone to stay with Aunt Carrie. Talba had spent the whole time under her cousin’s bed sucking her thumb. When she came back to herself, the grown-ups talked about her “coming out of her shell.” It happened to her again the first time a boyfriend broke up with her, yet again the time she saw someone struck by a car. By that time, she had a name for it— the turtle response, she called it. It was her invariable reaction to stress, and she was never more aware that it could hardly be less appropriate.
    Struggling to lift the veil of lethargy that was settling over her, she ran her mouth, blurting just to keep herself animate. “You mean Pamela?” she said. “Get Pamela over here?”
    “You heard me.