Amanda nodded.
‘I’m on the third floor, tucked up in my crib, so it takes me a little while to get down. Place is a goddam deathtrap. Before I’m out the door, I hear a car streak off, like burning rubber.’
Will bit his lip so a curse wouldn’t slip out. Jane Doe had gotten there too late.
Amanda clarified, ‘You heard a car leaving the scene?’
‘That’s right.’
‘Did you see the car?’
‘Sort of. Looked black, with some red along the bottom.’
Angie’s car was black with red stripes.
Jane said, ‘But there was another car in the parking lot. White, kind of foreign-looking.’
Dale Harding’s Kia.
‘And, so, I go back up to my crib, right? Don’t need to get involved in that shit with cars running off in a hurry. I been out there on the street long enough to know a deal gone bad when I see it.’
Will felt a moment of disappointment, but then Jane started talking again.
‘So I’m back up in my crib, just lyin’ there, and I get to thinking, well, shit, you know what I’m thinking. Maybe I got it wrong. This is a transactional kind of neighborhood. I got some scratch in my pocket. There’s a car outside that building, another car just screeched off, it seems like there’s gonna be a dealer inside, right? Simple economics.’ She pushed herself up in the bed again. ‘So I mosey on back across the parking lot, go inside the building, and it’s dark as shit. Windows are tinted or something. I’m walking around blind and then my eyes get with the program and I see there’s this gal on the floor. At first I thought she was dead. Started checking her pockets, but then she moved and I was like, “Whoa.” ’
Amanda asked, ‘This is the bottom floor, not the upper level?’
‘Correct-o-mundo.’
‘Where was she lying on the floor, exactly?’
‘Shit, I dunno. I’d need a map, right? Not like I was paying attention. I just walked into the building and boom, there she was.’
‘What did she look like?’
‘Dark hair. White gal. She’s laid out on her side. Can’t move her arms and legs, can barely move her head, but she’s making this moaning sound so I’m like, “All right, that’s it. I’m gettin’ the fuck outta here,” only I can’t because there’s another car pulls up in the parking lot.’
‘The same car?’
‘Yeah, but I seen it for real this time. Square nose like an older car. But I ain’t no car expert, right?’
Angie’s Monte Carlo was black with a square nose. Why had she returned to the scene? Why had she left in the first place?
Amanda asked, ‘How much time had passed since the car first peeled off?’
‘Mebbe ’bout thirty minutes? I dunno. Don’t have to punch a clock in my line of business.’ Jane continued, ‘So, the car is out front, so I booked it to the back. Hid behind that bar thing. Peeking out, like . . .’ She elongated her neck. ‘And I see this second bitch comes in. Tall. White. Long hair like the first one. Thinner. Don’t ask me what her face looked like because who the hell can see in that place? Like a fucking tomb.’ She pointed to the pitcher on her bedside table. ‘Gimme some of that, will ya, honey?’
Will was closest, so he poured some water into a Styrofoam cup.
Jane took a drink, drawing out the tension with a loud gulping sound. ‘Okay, so the second bitch comes in, and she’s just fucking furious, right? Kicking things around. Cursing. Motherfuck this. Motherfuck that.’
Definitely Angie. But why was she mad? What had she screwed up?
‘She goes upstairs like she’s marching against Hitler, you know what I mean? Feet just pounding.’ She put down her cup. ‘I hear her upstairs, doing what, I don’t know. Throwing shit around. Going in and out of rooms. Leaving shit. Moving shit.’
Staging the crime scene.
‘She’s got a flashlight. Did I tell you that?’
Amanda said, ‘No.’
‘One’a them little lights that’s real strong. That’s why I’m not leaving my cover, right? Didn’t want that light shining on me. Who knows what the bitch would do?’
She went silent.
Amanda repeated, ‘And?’
‘Oh, well eventually the bitch came back downstairs. She says another couple’a three motherfucks, kicks the chick on the floor. Real hard. And the chick, she moans loud-like: “Uhhhhhn.” That’s when it got interesting.’
Again Jane went silent.
Amanda warned, ‘Don’t draw this out.’
‘All right, I’m just trying to have some fun here. I don’t get to talk to people much.’ Jane took another drink of water. ‘So, bitch just stands there listening to her moan for a coupla minutes. Staring down at her like “You piece of shit.” Then, wham, bitch just grabs the chick by the leg and starts dragging her out of the building. And man . . .’ She shook her head. ‘That chick was moaning before, but when the bitch yanked on her leg, that’s when the screaming started.’
Will felt a pain in his jaw. Had Angie dragged her own mortally wounded, paralyzed daughter out of the building?
‘Then, bitch comes back in again and starts kicking things around again.’
Hiding the fact that she’d dragged a body across the floor.
‘She leaves for real this time. Next thing I hear something like a car door slamming. Lots of car doors slamming.’
Faith asked, ‘Could it have been a trunk?’
‘I don’t got, like, radar ears, bitch. It was just lots of things slamming shut on a car.’ She looked exasperated. She didn’t like Faith asking questions. ‘Anyway, then there’s this whoosh! like I don’t know what. Big whoosh. And I look up at the windows—now the windows are blacked out, right, but I see these flames shooting up like a Viking funeral. Just . . .’ She waved her arm around. ‘All over the place.’ She dropped her hand. ‘That’s it. The car pulled away.’
Amanda asked, ‘Did you see anyone else?’
‘Nah, that’s the truth. Just the bitch and the chick and the fire.’
‘No children?’
‘What the hell would a kid be doing there? It was the middle of the night. Should be tucked up in bed.’
Amanda asked, ‘You didn’t go upstairs to see what the first woman did up there?’
Jane licked her lips. ‘Well, I might’a. Just out of curiosity.’
Amanda rolled her hand, indicating she could continue.
‘There was a dude up there. Not dead, but just as good as. The light was better on account of the windows are right across from the balcony.’
‘And?’
‘Bastard was a fucking whale. Sleeping real sound, but like I said—not dead. But close. You could tell. Or at least I could. I seen some people die in my time. Pissed himself already. Had a doorknob in his neck. Like that guy from TV. You remember that show?’ She snapped her fingers twice, like in The Addams Family.
Will provided, ‘Lurch, but I think you mean Frankenstein.’
‘That’s right.’ She winked at him. ‘I knew you were the smart one, honey.’
Amanda said, ‘I’m waiting to hear where the coke came in.’