Bleed for the Camera

Chapter 20

         It took me walking calmly out of that apartment with Peter beside me for the others to calm down. It was decided that the best course of action was for Peter to go to the police station. Since the others were too close to him, I volunteered to drive him.

        Leonard was looking much better by the time everything was decided, except for a knot on the back of his head and a slightly bruised eye. Carl was looking a bit better too. I apologized again for hitting him with pepper spray and he in turn apologized for scaring me so bad. He was surprisingly chill about the whole thing. Turns out he wasn't the scary kind of drug dealer that would shoot you in the face over a bit of meth, he was the hippy kind that sold weed to college kids and middle-aged pot-heads.

        And so the three of us drove to the downtown precinct after swinging by Carl's house to pick up Derek.

        Three days later and both of them were still in custody. On my lunch break I hit downtown and waited outside Hirsch and Ashworth. It was cold for once. Well, Florida cold anyway. I'd broken out the heavy jacket and gloves but admittedly it was still only about thirty-eight degrees and predicted to get warmer as the day went on.

        It wasn't long before Chelsea came hustling out of the gold trimmed doors.

        "Mrs. Greer-Gonzalez, " I called after her as she began her usual lunch time power walk. "Evie Harper. I'm the—"

        "I remember you." She said while looking down her nose at me. I wasn't sure if that was because she considered me as beneath her or because she was so tall, she literally had to. "What's this about"

        "Business." I said with a smile. "I have a case for you. "

        "Absolutely not."

        "He needs help. Both of them do."

        "This is not my problem."

        "Well no—"

        "Can he even pay?"

        "Probably not."

        "So what incentive do I have to stick my neck out for someone I haven't known for over a decade? "

        "Considering the deceased, it's going to be a pretty high-profile case." I said with an over-the-top shrug. "Probably a lot of news coverage. Might do wonders for the career of whoever takes it."

        She stared at me for a moment with one impeccable eyebrow raised. "You're quite the negotiator."

        "So I've been told."

        "I'll look into it." She dug through her purse before handing me a business card. "Oh, and Ms. Harper. Next time just call."

        By Friday, Hirsch and Ashworth had taken on both Peter and Derek as clients. By Saturday night I was beat. With the money Rachel had promised me in hand, I had swung by an ABC liquor store and picked up a couple of bottles of wine to celebrate a job well done. Manny and I had spent the afternoon together, mostly just lazing around his house. It was about eleven pm and we lounged half-dressed in his bed while we laughed, talked, and threw back glasses full of cabernet. Bertie lay comfortably on the ground on my side of the bed, half asleep.

        "We need to talk about you and that privacy shit," I said. "Following me out there was a little crazy. You know that, right?"

        "I know. That's why I apologized. Sometimes I get in this headspace and I can't turn off the detective part of me. A lot of times I can tell when you're up to something and get curious and start digging without thinking."