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PART III
GLADYS

81

TREY DROPPED ONTO his divan, exhausted. He was driving himself harder than he ever had because he wanted to forget, he wanted not to hope, he wanted …

He wanted Marina.

He wanted her happy, to make her happy, and she couldn’t be happy without cringing all the time, waiting for the other shoe to drop. She’d been trained to feel nothing. Dot was the only happiness she’d been allowed and even then, not completely. Then Dot had turned on Marina the second she married Trey.

He groaned at the knock on his office door. “Come in.”

“Telegram.”

That was unusual, but Trey was too exhausted to think about it. “Turn on the light and give it here. There’s a fiver in the desk, top right.”

“Thanks, Mr. Dunham!”

Shoot, Trey didn’t even care if the cat took a ten.

He tore open the envelope.

MAKE DOT WRITE

That was all. It was from his grandmother.

Trey’s brow wrinkled. It had been a month and a half since he’d taken Marina to St. Louis and Dot hadn’t written? Surely that couldn’t be true.

He heaved himself off the divan and trudged upstairs. He shook Gio awake as quietly as he could so as not to disturb Ida, and pulled him out into the hall.

“Look at this,” he demanded.

Gio, grumpy and yawning and rubbing his eyes, took it, blinked, blinked again, and pulled it closer to his face. “What the hell,” he whispered.

“Yeah, that’s what I’d like to know. Get dressed. You’re coming with me.”

“Where are we going?”

“Albrights’.”

Gio opened his mouth to protest that he wasn’t allowed on the Albrights’ property without explicit permission, but took one look at Trey’s face and did what he was told.

It was six a.m. when Trey banged on the front door. “Albright!”

Quickly enough, it opened to Albright himself, dressed in overalls, work boots, and heavy overcoat, his doctor’s bag in his hand.

“What the hell!” he barked.

“Look at this,” Trey barked back, handing him the telegram.

Albright’s mouth tightened and he gave it back. “That’s Dot’s business. I’m not getting in the middle of it. And you—” He pointed at Gio. “—are not supposed to be here.”

“He’s my boss,” Gio said apologetically.

“Lemme talk to your wife.”

“LIZ!” Albright roared, then turned back to them. “Move! I’ve got a pack of sick border collies to tend.”

Sister Albright scurried to the hall while Albright brushed past them to go to his truck with ALBRIGHT VETERINARY stamped on the doors.

“What is going on?” she demanded.

For the third time, Trey presented the telegram and said, “Look at this.”

Sister Albright’s brow wrinkled. “Uh … why … we had been getting regular letters from her, but … ”

“I want to talk to Dot. Right now.”

“She’s asleep.”

“I do not give a good goddamn.”

She bristled. “Now, listen, you foul-mouthed hooligan. You keep your mouth clean in this house. Do you know what I see? I see a little girl whose best friend deserted her without a word. Just picked up one night, got on a train, and went to see people she doesn’t really know for who knows how long. Dot’s cried herself to sleep as much over that as she has over—” She waved a hand at Gio and glared at him.

“Did it occur to anybody here that Marina had no choice? I’m her husband. I say what she does and does not do.”

“You allow Marina to do exactly what she pleases.”

“Not this time,” he snapped back. “I promised her I wouldn’t talk about our private business, but I’mma break that promise. This is why I packed her up and took her to St. Louis.”

Sister Albright’s mouth slowly dropped open and her eyes widened as Trey ranted. He could feel Gio’s horrified stare.

Sister Albright’s trembling hand went to her chest. “Oh, goodness,” she whispered, stricken. “Oh, my goodness gracious. Come in, come in. Both of you. Oh, dear. Oh, dear.” She led the way into the house and pointed them to the parlor, scurrying to the back and running up the stairs, shouting, “Dorothy Anne Albright!”

“Why didn’t you say anything?” Gio demanded.

“What good would it have done?” Trey snapped. “You think I’m proud of it? God, I wish Albright were here so he could get his bullwhip after me. I’d stand there and take it, too.”

Gio said nothing, but presently they heard, “WHAT?!” and then running feet. Soon there was Dot, standing in the threshold of the parlor in a long nightgown, her chest heaving. “She—”

“If she was writing to you but you didn’t write back, she must not have told you why. You didn’t even write to ask why?”

“I—” she squeaked, her bottom lip trembling.

“Not sure she would’ve told you,” he grumbled.

Her eyes glittered and her cheeks glistened. “I’m sorry,” she mewled, clutching the telegram to her chest. “I’m so sorry.”

Trey’s throat bobbed, suddenly thoroughly in sympathy with Dot. “Look, Dot, we got our problems, you and me, but between us, we’ve got her tipping into a grave. We gotta work together to get her out. She don’t wanna hear from me. My grandparents tell me to leave well enough alone when they see fit to say anything to me at all. I do not know how she’s doing because they don’t tell me anything. But could you write to her and … I don’t know. Gossip or whatever it is you do. Just don’t let it out you know why she’s there. Although, at this point, I don’t know if she cares.”

Dot winced and began to cry in earnest and she glanced at Gio, who pursed his lips and shook his head. “Don’t look at me.”

“Gio!”

“I’m disappointed. That’s not the Dot I know. Or want.”

“Gio,” Sister Albright said firmly.

“I’m not going to say I’m sorry. I didn’t know any of this, but ever since they got married, Dot’s made sure Marina knows how angry and jealous she is even though it wasn’t Marina’s fault. I haven’t said anything, but I don’t like it. Her loyalty disappears the second her feelings get a little hurt. So I wonder if she’s going to do that to me too one day.”

Sister Albright didn’t reply, but Dot broke out into ugly bawls. “Oh, it’s true!” she wailed. “I’m such an awful friend!”

Trey and Sister Albright rolled their eyes at the same time.

“A’ight,” Trey said, heading toward the door, Gio following. “We got that settled?”

Dot threw herself at Trey and sobbed into his shoulder. He sighed and patted her back and rubbed it while she cried for forgiveness. “A’ight, a’ight,” he said testily. “You and me are in this together. We’ll get through it. Somehow.”

He and Gio returned to the speak to find two of his hired guns waiting for him, twisting their caps in their hands. “What,” Trey barked.

“There wa’n’t nobody to meet us at the quay, Boss,” one muttered. “We waited. Nobody showed.”

Trey thought he was hearing things. “Are you saying you don’t have my heroin?”

“No,” said the other one. “I mean, yeah, that’s what we’re saying. No boat, no men, no trucks, no … nothin’. No ideas, either.”

Trey’s jaw ground as he considered the possibility one of these lugs had hijacked his shipment, but Trey paid well and in the four years they’d been working for Trey, they had never given him any reason to suspect they might not be on the up’n’up.

Then again, somebody loyal to Trey had drugged Marina, so he wasn’t going to assume much.

What to do, what to do.

“A’ight,” he growled with a wave of his hand. “G’on outta here now. Keep your ear to the sidewalk and see if you can’t rustle up some names. Start with Seamus Byrne.”

81

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