And Now She's Gone(37)
Yeah, a good life, until …
On this morning, Dominick Rader gave Victor a shave, changed his catheter, and emptied his bag. Then he sat in the armchair beside the bed and told tales about the latest Bureau fuckup, about this girl Allison and that girl Vanessa. He whispered details that neither Natalie nor Faye could hear in the living room. Both men roared with laughter, though. Laughter was good.
Once Victor had fallen asleep, Natalie joined Dominick on a drive for burgers.
“You’re exaggerating.” His eyes bugged at the college student seated across from him.
Natalie shook her head. “They played for six hours straight. No seats, all standing. I swear I got a contact high, there was so much weed smoke in the air. I will never, not ever, listen to a George Clinton–Parliament album ever again, you can’t make me, no, I won’t do it, not after last Saturday night.”
Dominick swirled French fries through a puddle of ketchup. “I didn’t think you were into P-Funk like that.”
“I’m not.” She took a big bite from her burger. “Not like that. Six fucking hours?”
“Lemme guess: you went because of a guy.”
Natalie blushed. “He likes horns. Parliament; Tower of Power; Earth, Wind and Fire…”
“And after?”
“And after, nothing happened. I stood for six hours and I didn’t get a hug, didn’t get a kiss, didn’t get one damned thing. Fucker.”
He cocked an amused eyebrow. “Obviously not.”
They laughed big, like he had laughed with Victor. Just a normal college student with her father’s favorite FBI agent.
He drove Natalie back to Lyndon Street, where healthy green trees shot up, up, up into an impossibly blue sky softened by sea salt and the everlasting roar of waves. Before driving back up to San Francisco, Dominick checked on Victor. Then he hugged Faye and walked with Natalie back to his Ford.
“It means the world to him,” Natalie said, tears bright in her eyes, “you visiting him like this. You’re like a son to him.”
He watched the swaying branches of the pine trees. “Twice a month doesn’t feel like it’s enough. It isn’t enough.”
She smirked. “Because you have so much free time.”
“I know. Still…”
“It’s not gonna be long now.” Those words were sludge in her throat. “Mom wants me to go back to school, since I’m graduating, but I have a feeling it’ll be a turnaround trip.”
“You’ll call me?”
“He’s making me memorize your number.”
“Forwards and back?”
“Yup.”
“I’ll be here,” he said, meeting her gaze. “Always.”
19
Gray’s mind clicked back to her visit to Isabel Lincoln’s condo. Those clothes on the floor of the spare bedroom—did they belong to Noelle Lawrence? Were Noelle and her thug boyfriend somehow involved in Isabel’s disappearance?
Gray didn’t know, although she did know that Rebekah Lawrence was tired of her daughter’s nonsense. Trouble still followed the put-together woman like the stink of wet trash on her designer pumps. Despite the Cadillac and the expensive purse, the pantsuit and the hair, Rebekah Lawrence was still dealing with hood shit—all because of Noelle. And now, Noelle’s friend Isabel, the stable one, had disappeared and some random P.I. had showed up at her house?
“Hood shit,” Gray said.
The sun was high and heat spiked through the Camry’s windows. Not only had Gray not talked to people from yesterday, she had added another name to her list: Noelle Lawrence.
And despite Black Family, it was still strange that Rebekah Lawrence didn’t really know Isabel even though her picture now sat in the missing woman’s condo and workplace.
One more glance at ORO—no recent notifications—and Gray sped out of Inglewood.
Mount Gethsemane AME Church was known for its rocking services but also for its location—across the street from the best soul food restaurant in Los Angeles. Dulan’s on Crenshaw had been a blessing on those nights when Gray needed comfort food. The kind of food Miss Francine, another one of her foster mothers, had cooked. Miss Francine specialized in yams thick with butter and brown sugar. Tart collard greens speckled with gifts of cubed ham. Smothered chicken that singed tongues and filled bellies.
Pastor Bernard Dunlop had consumed plenty of pork chops and black-eyed peas. The large man wore many-gemmed rings on both thick ring fingers, and a cross as big as a stop sign dangled from a gold rope around his thick neck. He had a nice smile, though, which told Gray that she could tell him anything and that anything she told him, he would personally take to God in prayer. He had done that for Isabel Lincoln even though he really didn’t know her.
“I do know she’s a friend of Sister Tea’s,” he said, stirring Splenda into his cup of tea. “They met right after Tea’s parents died in a car accident, back in 2017. Both she and Sister Isabel came down during an altar call once, after I’d shared a word about freedom in truth from the book of John, eighth chapter. How Jesus forgives and encourages us to walk from darkness into the light. ‘For if you do not believe that I am He, you will die in your sins.’
“Sister Isabel was taken with this message, and she just … wept. I understood why Sister Tea was crying, and I admit, I thought that Isabel was in an illicit relationship and that my words were getting to her. I’m not here to judge, though. I’m just God’s usher.” He reached for the plate of cookies on the coffee table. “Help yourself. You look like the cookie type.”