Creole Belle (Dave Robicheaux 19)

“Nothing. She was going to download a bunch of information for me on film schools. I want to make movies. I don’t want to write them or act in them, I want to make them.”

He was stabbing his finger in the air. “What happened with Dupree and these other guys?”

“I beat the living shit out of them. What did you think?”

“Where?”

“In a joint up St. Charles. Don’t make a big deal out of it. They had it coming.”

“You just walked in and walked out and left three guys with their sticks broken?”

“Yeah, I’d say that covers it. No, I take that back. Something else happened. Dupree called me a kike. His grandfather is a Jew. But he uses anti-Semitic language?”

“That’s not the point.”

“You’re right. The point is you need somebody to take care of you.”

“Kicking the shit out of a client’s husband is not a caring activity.”

“I wouldn’t call Varina Leboeuf a client. An easy lay is more like it. Or a one-night punch. Or a sport fuck. Don’t get me started.”

“Get you started?”

She began brushing her hair. “Is there something you’re not telling me, Clete?”

“Not telling you what? I can’t begin to understand what’s in your head. It’s like having a conversation with a hurricane.”

“Whatever it is you’re hiding. I see it in your eyes when you don’t think I’m looking.”

“I like you in a special way. That’s all. We’re a lot alike.”

“‘Special way’? What is that, Sanskrit for ‘deeply weird’? Are you carrying around a lot of guilt about Vietnam and working it out on me? Because if you are, I don’t like it.”

“I don’t want to see you hurt. You went after these guys because of me. You’ve got to choose your battlefields more carefully, Gretchen. From this point on, these guys will know where you are, but you won’t know where they are. You don’t walk around in plain view while your enemy is wearing camouflage and setting up an L-shaped ambush. You know what an L-shaped ambush is? It’s a meat grinder. We had an expression in Vietnam. We’d say, ‘It’s Vietnam.’ Like the rules there were different and whatever happened didn’t count. The truth is, the whole world is Vietnam. You either use your head and carry your own water and take care of yourself and stay true to your principles, or you walk into a meat grinder.”

“What’s the zip code on Mars?”

“Why?”

“Because that should be your zip code.”

He sat down on the bed and gazed at the design in the rug. His skin was beaded with rainwater, his hair pasted on his scalp. “The two guys with Dupree, they tried to take you down?” he said.

“They weren’t art dealers.”

“And you busted up all three of them? Just with the sap? You never pulled your piece?”

“I didn’t need to. They’re amateurs, and they fell in their own shit.”

“In what way?”

“They made fun of me because I’m a woman, even though they had no idea who I was. They have the judgment of people who abuse restaurant employees who cook and serve their food.”

“They’ll be coming after you.”

“Too bad for them.”

“I’ll bring in the roast and fix you a sandwich. Don’t ever run off with my car or mess with my stuff again.”