The Lover's Children novel Chapter 62

JAMES

Klempner sees Stanton out, but returns to find Charlotte, waiting with me, wearing her ‘rebellious’ face. Close to combative in fact. Her jaw is set, almost aimed, at her father, “You should have done it. Agreed to help.”

“Charlotte!”

She starts at my bellow, but Klempner raises a finger my way, gives a short shake of the head. “Jenny is entitled to an opinion on this…” She smirks… “…aside from the detail that she shouldn’t have heard that part of it so was clearly eavesdropping…”

The smirk fades. “Okay, I was listening in. How else was I supposed to know what was going on? And it doesn’t change anything. You should have agreed to help him.”

Klempner’s tone remains cool. “I refused because it would have upset your mother. You saw how she was when she thought Stanton was coming after me. I don’t want to see her in that state again.”

Charlotte Hmmms, sucks in her cheeks, inspects her feet. “I could do it. Some of it anyway. Talk to the girls. Ask Stanton’s questions for him.”

My stomach flips. “Absolutely not!”

Klempner flashes me another look…

Calm down…

… jabs a finger toward her. “And that would upset Mitch even more. You exposing yourself to trouble.”

Charlotte scowls. “I’m not scared of trouble. And the killer’s not interested in me.”

“No?” Klempner cocks a brow, perches a hip on the back of the settee. “He might be,” he drawls, “If you start rubbing shoulders with street hookers. He’s targeting prostitutes.”

Her eyes shoot arrows. “I can handle myself.”

“I know that. But I’m not aware you’ve ever come up against a psychopathic misogynist set on raping, then disembowelling you?

Her face tightens. “And you have?”

“You might be surprised at what I’ve come up against. The last one who wanted to disembowel me planned on using a machete. And correct me if I have my facts wrong, but aren’t you pregnant? Your…” Casting a look my way, he flounders for a moment… “… Your other husband might have something to say about that.”

“This one too,” I growl.

Charlotte hesitates, bites her lower lip.

Klempner’s not finished. “… So shall we call that the end of the conversation? You all pay your taxes to fund the police department. They shouldn’t have to come running to me to handle something like this. That’s their job. It’s what they’re for.”

She doesn’t look happy. “Maybe you’re right,” she mutters.

“Maybe I am. And while I’m happy to face down machete-wielding maniacs with an attitude problem, I don’t intend to be the one explaining to your mother why you’re haunting the City streets risking the same thing.”

In the background, Cara raises a wail. Klempner flicks a glance to the door. “I believe your daughter wants her lunch.”

Hunching, Charlotte nods and exits. As her back turns, Klempner rolls eyes my way. I roll back.

*****

PAT

From my cafe table across the street, I watch the entrance of the Sapphire Club. Just before ten, the dancers arrive, trickling in by ones and twos. The hulk at the door lets them in. Lily and Ginny arrive a few minutes later, exchange a few words with him, then vanish inside.

So, my way is clear.

Assuming there’s no roommate.

It doesn’t take long to reach Lily’s apartment. Some old bag carrying groceries gets me inside. I even get to climb the first two storeys with her as she rattles out some crap about her grandson never visiting.

It’s a cheap and nasty building full of cheap and nasty apartments. On the third floor, I pad along the corridor, the soles of my shoes peeling from the carpet with each step. Stale cigarette smoke hangs in the air, not quite masking the funk of second-hand beer, piss and vomit.

At what I reckon to be the right spot, I find a pair of shoddy, plywood doors, facing each other across the corridor. Lily’s isn’t in good shape. The paint’s peeled and cracked. Around the lock and hinges, the wood’s splintered, obviously patched and repaired, more than once probably. The remains of bootprints dent the cheap timber.

Kicked in…

Boyfriend?

Drugs bust?

Who knows?

But disappointment bites….

If this is how you live, perhaps you’re not right after all…

The door’s locked of course, but the lock’s just standard pin-and-tumbler, as second-rate as the rest of the door, and it’s obviously not the original.

Oh, Lily…

You should look after yourself better…

Anyone could walk in…

Landlord should be ashamed of himself…