Free Twin Cities Noir by Julie Schaper Page A

wife. She just pretended in order to lure Lester to your house to be murdered.”
    “I’m hanging up,” he said. But he didn’t.
    “Ask the woman with the long black hair,” I urged him. “Ask her about the gift she gave to Lester. Here’s a hint. It’s black and silky and small enough to be an eye patch for a pygmy. Ask your beautiful friend about it. I’ll call back in a while.”
    I hung up without giving him a chance to respond.
    When I called back, we didn’t bother with civilities.
    “What do you want?”
    Justice for Kid is what I should have said. What came out of my mouth was, “One hundred grand.”
    “And for one hundred thousand dollars, what do I get?”
    He sounded like a man used to wheeling and dealing. According to the paper, he was a financial advisor. I advised him: “My silence.” I let that hang. “And the panties.”
    “You could have got panties anywhere,” he countered.
    “She’s beautiful, your mistress. Who is she, by the way? Your secretary?”
    “Christine’s personal assistant. Not that it’s important.”
    “But it is important that she’s not very bright. She took the panties off her body and gave them to Lester. A DNA analysis of the residual pubic hair would certainly verify that they’re hers. I’m sure the police would be more than willing to look at all the possibilities more closely. Do you want to take that chance?”
    “Meet me at my house,” he suggested. “We’ll talk.”
    “I don’t think so. Your last meeting there with Lester didn’t end well for him. We’ll meet on the High Bridge,” I said. “I get the money, you get her panties.”
    “The panties I can verify. What about your silence?”
    “I talk and I’m guilty of extortion. Jail doesn’t appeal to me any more than it does to you. The truth is, though, you have no choice but to trust me.”
    “When?”
    “Let’s make the exchange this evening just after sunset. Say, nine o’clock.”
    I wasn’t sure he’d be able to get the money so quickly, but he didn’t object.
    “How will we know each other?” he asked.
    We’ll have no trouble, I thought. We’ll be the only cockroaches on the bridge.
    The High Bridge is built at a downward angle connecting the bluffs of Cherokee Heights with the river flats below Summit Avenue. Although it was after dark, the sodium vapor lamps on the bridge made everything garishly bright. I waited on the high end. Coming from the other side of the river, the rich man would have to walk uphill to meet me. I found that appealing.
    The lights of downtown St. Paul spread out below me. At the edge of all that glitter lay the Mississippi, curling like a long black snake into the night. The air coming over the bridge smelled of the river below, of silt and slow water and something else, it seemed to me. Dreams sounds hokey, but that’s what I was thinking. The river smelled of dreams. Dreams of getting back on track. Of putting my life together. Of new clothes, a good job, and, yeah, of putting the booze behind me. I didn’t know exactly how money was going to accomplish that last part, but it didn’t seem impossible.
    The evening was warm and humid. Cars came across the bridge at irregular intervals. There wasn’t any foot traffic. I thought for a while that he’d decided I was bluffing and had blown me off. Which was a relief in a way. That meant I had to do the right thing, take the evidence to the cops, let them deal with it. Kid might yet get his justice.
    Then I saw someone step onto the bridge at the far end and start toward me. I was a good quarter-mile away and at first I couldn’t tell if it was him. When the figure was nearly halfway across, I realized it wasn’t the rich man. It was the personal assistant. She stopped in the middle of the bridge and waited, looking up at the Heights, then down toward the flats, uncertain which way I would come.
    What the hell was this all about? There was only one way to find out. I walked out to meet her.
    I