Free Laura Lippman by Tess Monaghan 04 - In Big Trouble (v5) Page A

direction, literally and artistically, but it was really her fault.”
    Crow’s mysterious female companion again. “Blond girl? With features like a china doll?”
    “Blond, sure, but I don’t know about any doll,” Gary said, rubbing his chin, as if trying to stimulate growth in the wispy, halfhearted goatee there, a new affectation. “Unless you’re talking Chuckie, from those slasher movies. She Yoko’ed us but good. Once Crow met her, it was like I didn’t even know him anymore. He suddenly wanted to do all this indigenous shit. He even asked me if I could learn to play the accordion. I told him he could take that Lawrence Welk shit and shove it up his ass.”
    “When was this?”
    “Summer, I guess. Like it’s not summer now. I remember it was hot. Then again, it’s been hot since we got here in May. July? August? I don’t know. A while. The other guys went back to Baltimore. I thought I’d give Austin a try. I mean, the winters here gotta be better, right?” He was pleading, his voice as urgent as any panhandler’s. “A whole summer gone, and I haven’t had a single steamed crab.”
    Tess had no patience for seafood reveries. “Where is Crow now? Is he in a new band? What’s the name of this blond girl?”
    “You know, I never knew her full name. She called herself Emmie, just one fucking name, like Madonna. She was performing under the name Lady M when we met her. But she had a place out in the Hill Country, I know that much. She and Crow crashed there sometimes. She said Austin wasn’t the place to be anymore, and he believed her. He believed every stupid shit thing that came out of her mouth.”
    “Where’s the Hill Country?”
    “It’s the area west of Austin and it’s a pretty big place. LBJ’s home,” Maury put in. “You’re going to need more than that to go on.”
    Gary glared at Maury, as if this strapping young Texan was responsible for everything that had gone wrong for him in the Lone Star State. “I know that. I’m not stupid. It began with a B.”
    “Boerne Tess asked, remembering the postmark on Crow’s note to her.
    “Naw, but somewhere like that. Bingo? Boffo? Blanco! He’s in Blanco, OK? Or near there. I remember because of the White Album. But I think the town was called something like Two Sisters.”
    Tess was still mystified, but Maury nodded, smiling. “Now that’s something to go on. Twin Sisters’s a small enough place so a stranger might stick out.”
    Two lucky breaks in fifteen minutes—finding Gary, finding a lead. Tess just hoped she hadn’t blown her serendipity account for all eternity.
    “Okay, I’ll head down there tomorrow.”
    “But what about dinner tonight?” Maury put in plaintively.
    “Sure, fine, your pick.”
    “Barbecue. Chili dogs? Barbecue.”
    “Barbecue’s good here,” Gary said, his tone grudging.
    Maury inspected the dejected drummer. He was wearing a Mencken’s Cultured Pearl T-shirt with the sleeves ripped out and his arms were scrawny and sunburned. He had managed a haircut recently, but that only called attention to the white stripe on his bright red neck. “You want to join us? My treat, because I hate to hear of someone having a bad time in my hometown. Don’t you know this is Eden?”
    “Yeah, well, the snake and the broad with the apple have already been here and gotten me kicked out,” Gary said. “But I could go for some barbecue, I guess.”

     

    There was precious little that was white about Blanco County. The hills were brown, with outcroppings of rock, the highway black, the cloudless sky above so blue, and so huge that Tess felt paradoxically claustrophobic, as if a gigantic sheet had been thrown over her. It seemed she could drive for days and days and never arrive anywhere.
    Still, it was a relief just to be alone for a while, no one but Esskay for company. Not that solitude had come easily. Maury, sensing a payoff might be near, had wanted to continue on his whole Bwana trip. She had wanted to