Night vision

CHAPTER 11

There must be uglier stretches of suburbia than Miami's Bird Road-maybe the outskirts of Calcutta. From Dixie Highway westward toward the Glades, Bird Road is six lanes of potted asphalt flanked by strip shopping centers, miles of wall-to-wall, plug-ugly, flat-roofed stacks of concrete blocks. Plastic pennants and helium balloons proclaim each new project, and with it, yet another gun shop, XXX video, and rental-furniture store. No matter how many vacant storefronts next door, no matter the foreclosures up the street, local bankers awash in doper cash fall all over each other to make lousy loans to shaky speculators. And downtown, the county zoning guys never met a builder they didn't like.

Sign ordinance a problem? Hire the mayor's lawyer. No prob-lema.

Can't meet the parking-space requirement? Paint the lines to a Yugo's dimensions and let 'em park on the median strip. Who's counting anyway?

Concrete, asphalt, noxious fumes, and blaring horns. Bird Road has it all. Everything, it seems, but birds.

The concrete-block-and-stucco house had been turquoise with yellow-trimmed shutters. Now the colors blended into the same off-white. It was two blocks north of Bird, and you could still hear the bleat of traffic, the occasional police siren. Nick Fox had bought the place when he was a cop, and after several lean years in night law school and a civil servant's salary in the state attorney's office, he never had the bucks to move east into the Gables. There was something reassuring about the house, a testament to the fact that Nick Fox might be the last honest public official in the county.

I parked the old convertible in the driveway next to a child's red bicycle. It was growing dark, the humidity hanging heavy in the air. A miniature backboard and basketball rim was propped in the yard, a child-size soccer ball lay against the trunk of a bottle-brush tree. The compressor of the central air conditioner whined from a concrete pit at the side of the house, and a rusty water stain streaked the stucco wall. The garage door was open. Inside sat an eight-year-old Toyota, pleading for a wax job.

There are a hundred thousand houses just like this one in our town. The domestic suburban middle-class cliche. From the outside, familial bliss, folks who can handle a VA mortgage and pay off the credit cards over time, but no frills. Inside, a thousand secrets-fractured marriages, wandering husbands, boozing wives.

The doorbell didn't work, but my fist did. She answered on the third knock. Priscilla Fox was a tidy package in leotard, tights, leg warmers, and a wide belt that didn't hold anything up but accentuated her flat waist. The leotard was low cut in front with a tiger motif that matched her eyes, nut brown with a touch of gold. Her hair was cinnamon, and she hadn't been born that way. The smile was wide and inviting.

"Come in, Mr. Lassiter," she said, leading me through a tiny foyer. In pink sneakers, she moved like a cat. All in all, one of those women who looks better at forty-two than at twenty-one. "You'll have to forgive me. High-impact aerobics after two hours of racquetball. I must look a fright."

"I'm not scared a bit."

She turned and winked at me over her shoulder, then showed me into the living room. I eased into a beige sofa that was worn in the seat. I declined coffee but said okay to something cold. She excused herself and came back a moment later with bottled water from Maine and a bowl of grapes. Ten years ago it would have been potato chips with sour-cream dip, and something alcoholic to wash it down. I popped a few green grapes into my mouth, took a swig of the bubbling water, and felt gloriously healthy but in need of something salty and greasy.

Priscilla Fox reached down and peeled the Velcro straps from her sneakers. Maybe it's old-fashioned, but I'm opposed to sneakers without laces. Digital watches and pocket calculators, too. Gizmos that make life easier and dull our minds. Besides being unable to read or write, today's kids have trouble telling time, multiplying nine times seven, and tying their shoes.

Freshly un-sneakered, Priscilla Fox gracefully lowered herself into a wing chair and tucked her legs beneath her. She studied me a moment, and I returned the look. Beads of perspiration formed between her breasts, and she shivered in the air-conditioning. She excused herself again and returned this time in red nylon shorts and a tight T-shirt with a drawing I didn't understand until I read the caption: "A woman without a man is like a fish without a bicycle."

She opened the conversation. "Nick told me about you, but he neglected to mention how damned attractive you were."

"Funny, he seemed to forget the same thing about you."

"Has he ever! Oh well, I don't sit around waiting for him to come back. I've seen too many of my friends do that. A woman turns forty, her husband trades her in for two twenties. Let the prick go and get on with your life. That's my philosophy."

"There are other fish in the sea," I agreed, gesturing at her T-shirt, where a salmon tried to ride a Schwinn.

"You got that right. A woman has to be independent these days. You can't depend on a man, because a man's not dependable."

"Expendable," I said, "but not dependable."

"You got that right," she repeated. "Now, I enjoy a man's company as much as the next woman. More than most. A bottle of wine, a hot tub. That's all fine. But in the morning, get the hell out, I've got things to do."

"A modern woman," I said.

She smiled, straightened her legs, and pointed her sweat-socked toes toward the ceiling in what seemed to be a tummy-tightening exercise. "How much you weigh, anyhow?"

"What?"

Now she was twisting her torso, attacking the love-handle zone. "Your weight, honey. What do you tip the scales at? Two hundred, two-oh-five?"

"Two-twenty-five, give or take."

"Oooh. You carry it real well. All that height helps. Nick goes about two-ten, but he's a lot shorter than you. Built like a bull and hung like a stallion. Strongest man I ever knew. We could make it standing up, he'd just grab me under the butt, lift me up, I'd wrap my legs around his hips. Never showed any strain, and could hump from here to Sunday. Takes a strong man to do that."

I didn't disagree. I just sat there, and she cocked her head, as if waiting for me to flex my biceps or otherwise challenge the Nicholas G. Fox Olympic Stand-Up-Humping Record. I thought about it and felt a twinge between the L3 and L4 vertebrae where I once took a knee from a pulling guard.

"Not that I miss him," she volunteered. "Except…except the wimps I've met lately. Sheesh. Noodle necks and pencil wrists. Half the time they can't get it up, other half, you wish they hadn't."

"You meet these guys on the computer?"

"Oh, that's why you're here, right? What some monster did to Marsha. I hope you nail the bastard."

I nodded gravely and let her think about Marsha. Priscilla Fox's smile disappeared, and for a moment the pretty face sagged and nearly showed its age.

"The computer club," I reminded her.

She seemed to shake herself awake. "Forty Something."

"What?"

"That's my handle. Forty Something. You'd think it'd scare a lot of guys off, you know, looking for young stuff. But you'd be surprised."

"You spend a lot of time online?"

"Too much. The computer helps pass the hours when you can't sleep and the batteries are dead in the vibrator."

"What about the men? Anyone ever threaten you? Anyone talk about killing a woman?"

She thought about it. "I don't remember that. One guy wanted to tie me up and spank me. Leather Lizard, I think. Unless it was Bondage Bill."

She smiled sweetly and pulled off her sweat socks and leg warmers, then wiggled her toes at me. "My feet are killing me," she said, kneading the palm of her foot with one hand. Then she got up, walked over, and plopped onto the sofa next to me, swinging her feet into my lap. "There's nothing like a foot rub from a man with strong hands."

Before I could figure which little piggy went to market, we were interrupted by a squeal. "Mommy! Mommy, you didn't tuck me in."

The boy wore Fred Flintstone pajamas and had a good set of shoulders for a five-year-old. There's no substitute for genes.

"Nicky," Priscilla Fox said, swinging her legs smoothly to the floor. "Say hello to Mr. Lassiter."

He gave me a wordless sideways look that other men on the same sofa had doubtless seen. "Hello, Nicky," I said. "You look like a little fullback. You play football?"

He wrinkled his nose. "Football sucks. Soccer's rad."

Priscilla got to her feet and marched Nicky off to bed. I used the time to wander around. Just off the living room was a small study. A metal desk, shelves with law books. On the wall, plaques from every civic group in town. The room had been Nick's, but a feminine hand was creeping in. A lacy blanket covered the love seat in the corner. A flower vase with plastic tulips sat on the desk next to the computer.

She found me as I was studying an old black-and-white photo in a plastic frame. Nick was bare-chested, dog tags around his neck, the left hand holding an M-16, the right draped around another soldier's shoulder. Both wore grins and were clean-shaven and muscular, and something in their eyes said they hadn't yet seen combat.

"Wasn't he something?" Priscilla asked, the tone just this side of wistful. "Look at those pecs."

"Great pecs," I agreed.

"He and Evan were best friends. They met at OCS. Served together in Vietnam. In all Nick's letters, Evan did this…Evan did that. Nick looked up to him."

"Evan?"

"Lieutenant Evan Ferguson."

"They still keep in touch?" I asked, knowing the answer.

A cloud crossed her face. "Evan never came back. He was killed in an ambush or something. They were trying to save a Vietnamese girl. Nick and Evan were leading their battalions-"

"Platoons."

"Whatever. A bunch of American boys with rifles playing soldier. Something happened. Evan got killed and Nick got a medal. He doesn't like to talk about the details."

There was no way to avoid wading right into it. "Would he have talked about it with Marsha?"

She looked at me with those nut-brown eyes and seemed to consider the question.

"Doubt it. Like most men, he doesn't say boo about himself. About what he's feeling, I mean. Marsha would ask me about the war, and what Nick was like when he came back. She and I got to be close. She'd come over, we'd drink white wine and have a little pajama party, gabbing all night."

"About Nick?"

"Yeah, and other things." She thought about it. "But about Nick, a lot, sure."

"What did he tell you about the war?"

She looked away, mulled something over, and didn't let me see it. "Not much. Oh, he'd talk about liberty in Japan. But what happened on patrol, the fighting, not much at all."

"Did Marsha ever tell you she was investigating Nick?"

That stopped her a moment. "Investigating? No. Why would she do that?"

"For television. Like Mike Wallace, put him under the lights and grill him."

"Just the opposite. She wanted to do a profile, a puff piece to make him look good."

"Nick didn't tell me."

"He didn't know. At least he wasn't supposed to. She asked to see his mementos. You know, uniforms, photos, that kind of thing. There isn't that much. But she was sort of mystical about it. She'd stare at a picture or just lay her hands on his moldy old duffel bag."

"Why? Did she tell you?"

"She wanted to surprise him. Nick would come on live for an interview about some boring case in the office, and Marsha would have a profile all prepared about his childhood, the war, the crime-fighter stuff, his political life…"

"This Is Your Life," I said.

Priscilla laughed. "That's what I told Marsha, but she didn't know the show. Too young."

As she talked she straightened up a bookshelf, then dusted the desk with the palm of her hand. Even the modern woman can't fight a millennium of tradition.

"Maybe you could show me Nick's war memorabilia."

She hesitated and looked at me sideways. "Not without asking him first."

"Don't bother. I'll mention it to him myself. By the way, he told me you introduced him to Marsha."

There was a touch of sadness in her smile. "I knew she would never get serious with him. She wanted to use Nick, meet all the judges and lawyers and cops you need to know in her business. She wanted to get out of the mold they created for her at the station. Get onto hard news, then move to a bigger television market, like L.A. or New York. To her Nick was just a power fuck. And to Nick, she was just…"

"A sport fuck."

"You got that right."

"So there was a better chance of Nick coming back than if he found some divorcee looking for commitment."

She seemed to sigh. Her look spoke of lonely nights, of the anguish Nick caused her, of the love she still had for him. The brave front was crumbling. "It was almost as if I still had him. I liked Marsha. She'd tell me what they did, what he said about me. Usually he complained. I was always pushing him, he'd say, which was right. I pushed him to go to law school, to run for office. I pushed him to become the man he is."

"And then he left."

She nodded and turned her head away.

"Life never goes the way you plan it," I said.

I got that right, too.