If it Bleeds, it Leads (An Avery Shaw Mystery) Read online

  Lexie is one of those people that is always consistent. By that I mean you can always rely on her to be jumping from man to man and passion to passion. She never does one thing for more than a short period of time. She can’t be bothered with everyday life because she never has a set life that she revisits everyday.

  A few months ago, she had called me to inform me she had found her true passion and was returning to school to be a medical transcriptionist. A week after that she called to say she had changed her mind and she was going back to school to be a paralegal because they performed drug testing in the medical transcriptionist program.

  “I don’t feel the need to change my lifestyle,” she proudly announced.

  Now I’m not a pot hater. If I weren’t randomly drug tested at my job I would probably be a recreational user. It’s not something I’m fanatical about, though. A lot of people tell me I need to chill – and pot is the easiest way I know to chill.

  When I told Lexie that she would probably be drug tested before getting a job at a law firm, her response was surprising – even for her.

  “Do you know how many lawyers smoke? They’re down here all the time buying. That won’t be a problem.”

  You really can’t argue with that logic.

  While she got state aid to return to school, Lexie was still working part time while putting herself through school. Last week she told me she got a job at a local deli – so it wasn’t a given she would be home.

  Javon didn’t seem to recognize me when he opened the door. His red-rimmed eyes and the haze of smoke following him led me to believe he was baked like a potato. I could have been wrong, though.

  After realizing who I was – it took him a full two minutes, no joke – he said that Lexie was at her new job. Apparently the deli didn’t work out. She was working at the coffee shop about a block down the road -- if I really wanted to see her, that is.

  I most certainly wasn’t going to sit around waiting with Javon and his hand-blown glass bong. Call me crazy, but I didn’t think I could muster the effort to make small talk with him.

  As I was leaving, I couldn’t help but appreciate Javon’s bulging muscles and washboard abs. While Lexie’s love interests were usually losers – they were also fine male physical specimens. Even I had to marvel at Javon’s cocoa skin as he moved to let me out of the apartment. He looked like a really big and pretty panther.

  I can’t remember the last time Lexie dated a white guy actually. She’s one of those people who immerses herself in whatever culture she happens to be living near. When she moved down to Detroit at the age of 18, she started braiding her hair in cornrows and talking like a little ghetto beast. She’d often rail at “the man” and how he was keeping the black population down. She even embraced stereotypes about the U.S. Government getting black men hooked on heroin in the 1960s.

  “Why you try to keep a brother down?” That had been her favorite saying at the time. It was really annoying.

  When she moved to Florida (she was fleeing an outstanding warrant for frequenting a drug house) at the age of 21, she somehow developed a Cuban accent and started dressing in weird floral patterns. Then her political point of view was pointed towards immigration issues and Castro histrionics.

  When she returned to Detroit two years later, she went back to her black roots (thankfully minus the cornrows). She’d been the whitest 4’11 black girl living in the D – south of Eight Mile for the unwashed -- for the past two years. She fit in the community, though, so that was fine with me.

  When I made it to the end of the block, there was only one coffee shop to choose from. It was ironically called Black Coffee. Given its rundown nature, though, I doubted that the clientele that frequented the place were the type to get the irony. If they did, they were probably too baked to care, I figured.

  Inside, the shop was fairly tiny, with only seven tables and a small counter area. Lexie happened to be behind the counter chatting with a Shemar Moore lookalike. I wondered how long Javon’s shelf life would be. Lexie is never without a man. Sometimes, she even overlaps them at times.

  Lexie brightened up when she saw me. I was relieved to see that she wasn’t wearing any of the NWA wardrobe she had been sporting the last time I saw her. I didn’t think the black population – no matter how liberal Lexie’s belief system – appreciated her actually thinking she was black.

  Lexie greeted me with a bright smile and a wary eye. She was probably wondering what I was doing here. She knew I avoided Detroit like the plague. I bought a large café mocha from Lexie and asked if she had a minute to chat. Might as well not drag things out.

  “As long as a customer doesn’t come in, we’re fine,” she said, sitting down at one of the small café tables with me and sipping from a Chai latte. “What’s up?”

  I told Lexie about Darby’s death.

  “Yeah, I saw that on the news. When they said a woman had been found dead in the parking lot of your paper I thought for sure it was you. You tend to piss off a lot of assholes.”

  That was true. Better than dating them, I thought. I didn’t think it was a good thing to bring up to Lexie, though.

  “The news said she was a nice girl. That’s how I knew it wasn’t you. No one ever uses the word nice to describe you. Slutty. Loud. Bitchy. Then I would have known it was you.”

  That was also true.

  I didn’t want to tell Lexie too much, but if it was accurate that Darby had ties to the drug trade I would need her help. Believe it or not, I don’t fit in with the recreational crowd. They think of me as a really nosy Barbie doll – and everyone knows that Barbie doesn’t embrace “the life.”

  I started to tell her an abridged version of things, but before I knew it I had told her everything. Lexie listened intently. I noticed that her eyes seemed to spark in recognition when I said the name Kevin Walker.

  “You know him?”

  “Yeah, I know him. He lives in the apartment building next door.” Lexie was choosing her words carefully – that was never a good sign. Apparently she didn’t have the same aversion to lying to me that I had when lying to her.

  I decided to choose my words carefully, too. “Are you tied up with him – selling drugs? Because if you are, you better stop now, because I am going to take him down and I’ll take you down with him if I have to.” Okay, I didn’t choose them that carefully.

  I’ll give her credit, Lexie manages to pull off incredulous when she wants to. She actually seemed flabbergasted and hurt that I would dare suspect her of anything of the sort.

  “Why are you asking me that? I don’t sell drugs. Why do you naturally assume the worst about me?” She pushed her bottom lip out in a faux pout. If I didn’t know her better, I might have believed it. I’d grown up with her, though. I knew when she was faking emotional outrage. Since I had grown up with her, though, I was used to all her tricks. I wasn’t going to fall for it.

  “Lexie, I’m not joking. Whatever you’ve got going with him, stop it now. I don’t have the power to protect you – and I don’t have the ability to just walk away from this. This is going to blow up in your face and I’d hate to see you end up in jail.” I wouldn’t be upset to see her end up in rehab, though.

  Lexie bit her lower lip. “Can’t you just leave this alone?” That was a sincere request.

  I had a sincere answer for her, too. “No.”

  Lexie let loose one of her patented long-suffering sighs. I think she’d learned it from my mother. Or maybe even her mother. Most of the women in our family had some version of it. Somehow I knew that I was going to end up in the wrong here – at least in her mind.

  “It’s not me anyway,” she started. I’m warning you now, the story she’s coming up with in her head is going to be a doozey. The problem was, the actual story was probably going to be worse. That is a frightening and sobering thought, huh?

  “Javon?” I was trying to give her an out.

  “It’s not his fault.” It never was. Lexie just had bleeding tragic taste
in men. I can’t remember the last time she’d made a good decision when boyfriend shopping. It had to have been in high school, though.

  “He hurt his back doing lawn care maintenance this summer.”

  “Lawn care maintenance? You mean like mowing lawns?” She really does drive me crazy. Lawn care maintenance my ass.

  “No, I mean lawn care maintenance. You don’t have to be so snotty.” I could tell she was distancing herself from me.

  “I’m sorry, he was doing lawn care maintenance. Go on.”

  “He hurt his back and they gave him some Oxy for the pain and he got hooked. You know that drug companies do that on purpose, right? Especially to black men. They make the drugs more addictive if you have black skin. It’s something pharmaceutical.”

  I nodded sympathetically. What a load of shit.

  “Anyway, he needed something just to take the edge off. So he went to Kevin.” Lexie did her patented eye shift. That’s a dead give away that she’s lying.

  I sipped my coffee, letting her fill the uncomfortable silence instead of me. It’s a reporter’s trick.

  “Anyway, Kevin gave him some pills.”

  “What kind of pills?”

  “Mostly Oxy.”

  Meaning mostly oxycontin – or hillbilly heroin as it’s known on the street. It’s what Rush Limbaugh was addicted to. I had a feeling, though, that wasn’t the only thing Javon had gotten involved with. I looked at Lexie expectantly. I wanted the whole truth from her – even though I knew, no matter how hard I prodded – that I wouldn’t get it.

  “And some other prescription pain killers,” she finally supplied. She looked guilty when she said it.

  “And then what happened?” I knew there was more to the story.

  “Then he started giving him some other stuff.” Lexie looked to the left when she said it. Another tell – only we weren’t playing poker.

  “Like what?”

  “Some pot, acid, shrooms, a little coke – nothing major.”

  I guess by nothing major she meant he drew the line at heroin.

  “What about meth?”

  Lexie averted her eyes to the floor this time. “No meth.”

  “You’re lying.”

  “I’m not lying!”

  “Yes you are. I’m the one that taught you to lie. I can always tell.”

  “You cannot. I’m the one who stole your bracelet back in high school, and you never even suspected me.”

  I knew that, by the way. Okay, I really didn’t.

  “Lexie, I’m not dicking around with you. Now you tell me exactly what’s going on, and don’t leave anything out.” I don’t know what it is about Lexie, but no matter what happens I feel the need to try and protect her. She’s the closest thing I have to a sister. Of course, I would have killed myself if I had to live in the same house with her. “And I want that bracelet back.”

  “I’m not involved.” I wasn’t sure I believed her. “But Javon got into some trouble with Kevin and he owed him a lot of money. He ran up a tab and Kevin told him he could help if he started cooking for him.”

  My eyebrows nearly shot off my head. “Cooking?” I think my voice had raised an octave. “Tell me you’re not cooking meth in your apartment! Do you know how dangerous that is? They did a whole episode of ‘Grey’s Anatomy’ about how dangerous that is. Your apartment could go up in flames and you can get high from licking the walls.”

  “No!” Lexie was indignant now. “I wouldn’t allow that. They do it in a warehouse somewhere a few blocks away. Those places explode all the time; I wouldn’t let him do it in the apartment.” She paused for a second. “You can get high from licking the walls? Really?”

  “What warehouse?”

  “I don’t know.” Lexie must have sensed my distrust. “I honestly don’t. I don’t want to know either. If I don’t know, I can’t be tied to anything. If I know, then I’m a accessory.”

  That was always the bottom line with Lexie wasn’t it? At her heart, she was a survivor. She did just enough to protect herself and no one else. I kind of admired that about her.

  About this time, I noticed two guys sitting at a table a few feet away intently listening. They were both pasty white, wearing jeans that were clearly two sizes too big and matching red plaid shirts. If they weren’t white, I would have thought they were gang bangers.

  The good-looking one was about 6’1” tall and had dark shoulder length hair that was tucked behind his ears. He had a glazed over look – baked to within an inch of his life if I had to guess – but I could tell he was still listening.

  The other looked like he was 18 years old – but I could tell he was just one of those people who looked perpetually young. His gaze was a lot clearer. He didn’t even bother hiding the fact that he was listening.

  “Can I help you gentleman?”

  Lexie waved her hand dismissively. “That’s just Cameron and Little Tony. They’re friends.”

  “Are they involved in this?” I’m naturally suspicious by nature. It comes along with being naturally nosy. I’m also perennially bossy and quite often bitchy. It’s a potent combination.

  “Define involved.” Lexie was averting her gaze again.

  Christ. “How involved are they?”

  “They just handle some local distribution.”

  Great, dealers. “Of meth?”

  “No,” the smaller blonde one answered. “Just pot, acid and shrooms. I don’t want to get involved in the heavier stuff. My ma would kill me. I’m Cameron, by the way.” He stuck his hand out to shake mine.

  I took it warily. “If you’re Cameron, then that makes the big guy Little Tony. How did that happen?”

  Little Tony looked confused. He was clearly skating through life on his looks. “My mom always called me that.” His IQ may be low, but his hotness factor was definitely high. I figured, in his case at least, it was a good trade off.

  “You’re an adult now. You know you can change that right?”

  Little Tony was back off staring into space, so I turned my attention to Cameron. “How close are you to Kevin Walker?”

  “Not very,” Cameron shrugged. “I pick up product every two weeks and I drop off the money when I pick up new product. I don’t have anything to do with production. And I don’t want to.”

  “Can I ask you something? Why are you talking to me?” This business breeds suspicion. If someone volunteers too much information, that’s always a warning sign that you’re being led to one story and away from the bigger one. I hadn’t fallen for it in years, but I often pretend to as a defense mechanism.

  “I’ve been looking for a way out. I figure if I just sit back and let you go after Kevin, maybe it will work out for me, too.”

  “Why don’t you just quit?”

  “You don’t quit Kevin. I want to live.”

  I wondered if Darby quitting Kevin had something to do with her death. Cameron seemed to read my mind.

  “I met that Darby girl once. She seemed nice. Pretty, too. But, like I said, Kevin doesn’t take well to people quitting him.”

  I pursed my lips as I digested this.

  “Does he have a gun?” I figured it was a legitimate question.

  “Yeah, he has a piece. He carried it under his shirt.”

  “You know what it is?”

  “Nah, I don’t know guns. It’s a handgun. That’s all I know.”

  I nodded. I didn’t really know guns either, but I did know people that knew a lot about guns, and only some of them were policemen.

  Cameron and Little Tony were getting to their feet and leaving the coffee shop when I looked back up. Cameron stopped and turned back to me, tucking a piece of his overgrown dirty blonde hair behind his ear. “I’d appreciate it if my name was left out of this.” It seemed like a reasonable request.

  “Good enough. By the way, what are you going to do when you get out?”

  “Start a pizza shop. I’ve always wanted to do that.”

  Who hasn’t really? Ready acce
ss to pizza 24 hours a day? Sounds like heaven to me.

  After they left, I turned my attention back to Lexie. “I thought you were working at a deli.”

  “I had to quit.”

  “Why?”

  “I have a disability.” Oh, this will be good.

  “What disability?”

  “I can’t work in a racially charged environment.”

  Huh, never what you think.

  “The women at that deli were jealous of me. Both white and black. The white women are racist and think I shouldn’t be dating a black man and the black women are mad that I’m stealing their men. So I had to quit. People don’t understand the pain I go through in situations like this. They really don’t. It’s awful to have people be prejudiced against you.”

  Made perfect sense to me.

  Seven

  I left Lexie soon after the departures of Cameron and Little Tony. She promised she would return the pilfered bracelet at the family dinner the next day. Somehow I had my doubts. If that thing hadn’t been pawned or lost in the past few years, it would be a small miracle.

  I hopped in the car to return to the office. I didn’t really have a story to file today – mostly because I was nowhere near close enough to prove anything about Darby’s ties to drugs or Kevin Walker’s guilt in her death. I knew if I didn’t at least make an appearance, though, my boss would have a fit. He was sort of old school. He didn’t really much understand the idea of mobile reporters. Of course, he still thought you met sources in the bar in the middle of the afternoon and then could go back to the office tanked. Evolution was an alien concept to him.

  I hopped on the interstate – luckily I-94 is a straight shot from Detroit to Mount Clemens – and thought about my meeting with Lexie. I was worried she was a little more involved than she let on, but I wasn’t sure how I could protect her in this situation. The good news was that Lexie was a survivor. The bad news was that she didn’t have a problem taking everyone else in the room down in her stead. I wasn’t sure if that would include me. She was loyal, but her fight or flight reflex was profound.