Mean Woman Blues

father?”
    Skip shrugged. “He’s still alive.”
    “You know, yesterday I talked to my daughter for the first time in a year. Lovelace answered when I phoned Isaac. Started me thinking about her.” He leveled his eyes at Skip. “About why she’s alive.”
    Skip nodded. She knew what he was getting at: In one sense, Lovelace was alive because of Skip.
Nice of you to notice
, she wanted to say. But it was no time for sarcasm.
    “You know she writes me? Wrote while I was in Parish Prison, waiting for trial, on trial, all that time. Sends me Christmas cards, everything— Christ, a fucking Father’s Day card! But the cards were always mailed from New Orleans, by Isaac I presume. She never says where she’s living, or going to school, or what she’s doing; never even told me about her name change. I had to find out from the newspapers.”
    In spite of Skip’s efforts, sarcasm won the day. “Maybe she doesn’t trust you. For some reason.”
    Abasolo gave her what were known in the Third District as his reproachful guinea eyes, but Daniel ignored her. “Look, I know how good Isaac’s been to her, that she does talk about. And another thing. He’s my baby brother, goddammit!” He banged the table. His face had suddenly turned red, veins popping out like tunnels. The old Daniel was back, but the anger was redirected. “He can’t fucking kill my baby brother!”
    “Hey. Daniel.” She spoke almost in a whisper, low and soothing. “He’s not going to be hurting anyone anymore. And Isaac’s going to be fine. It’s over now.”
    “Isaac told me to ask for you, but, fuck, any cop would have done fine. I asked for you for one reason and one reason only. I’ve seen the news. I want to know what really happened in that room. You were there; you tell me.”
    “You have something for me?”
    “Hell, that ain’t how it works. I’ve made up my mind. I’ve got something for you whether you talk to me or not. But my mother and my father were both in that room. Sounds like they tried to kill each other. If you’re halfway decent you’re gonna tell me.”
    Skip told him, glad she could honestly say that Rosemarie had put out the lighter, finishing up with the fact that neither she nor Karen, in all likelihood, would ever be charged with any of their crimes.
    “Mmm. Mmm,” Daniel said. “Serves him right. Serves him just goddamn right.”
    “What do you know, Daniel?” She spoke in her give-it-up cop voice.
    He put out his cigarette, lit another one. “Daddy did a little favor for my mother once. Took care of that superfluous husband for her.”
    “Ah.”
    “He didn’t think I knew, but I did. I put it together, anyhow. See, Bettina has a very talented friend. You know Bettina?”
    “Oh, yeah. Teflon Bettina. Everybody goes to jail; not Bettina. Know her well.”
    “Bettina used to brag about this guy, offer him to Daddy in case he needed somebody whacked.” He let out his derisive honk again. “’Course Daddy had his own trained assassins.” He stared at his cigarette to avoid looking at Skip. “I ought to know.” He flicked his gaze back to her face. “But some things you just can’t ask your firstborn son to do. Even if his mama needs a favor. Lobo came up in a gang outside L.A. Learned lots of stuff there, some of it kind of subtle, I’m gathering.”
    “Lobo who?”
    “Lobo’s all I know. Anyway, what it’s worth, I always thought Daddy got him to off Rosemarie’s husband.”
    “Now what made you think that?”
    He shrugged. “Besides common sense? One thing, a cash withdrawal Daddy had me make. I know he gave the cash to Bettina. And the time was right. Look.” Daniel squared his shoulders, tapped the cigarette impatiently. “Y’all pretty much broke Daddy’s whole well-oiled machine. That’s why it took him so long to come back. Soon’s I heard that Mr. Right shit, heard he was in Dallas, I knew exactly what happened. He had to play the Rosemarie card ’cause it was the second to last one he had left. But Rosemarie couldn’t fix him up with an assassin for his second and most poorly loved son— he never gave a tinker’s damn about Isaac! If she knew one, she’d have offed her
own
fuckin’ husband. You see where I’m goin’ with this?”
    “Yeah. You think he played the Bettina card.”
    Daniel wiped all expression off his face; his work was done. “Shouldn’t be that hard to find; name’s Bettina Starnes. Got a kid.”
    “I think we can find