Nine Lives

“What’s wrong?” he asked. “And don’t give me no runaround. We’ve known each other too long for that.”

Cat swallowed past the knot in her throat.

“Mimi is missing. I think something bad has happened to her.”

“Oh hell, honey. I’m sure sorry to hear that. You go to the cops with it?”

“Yeah.”

“Well, that’s good. That’s good. Still, I’ll bet she shows soon, and you’ll see that you was all worried for nothin’.”

Cat shoved a hand through her hair as she unlocked the door to her SUV and got in. The cops were as useless to her as a third tit, and Art’s “it’ll be all right” attitude was no better.

“Yeah, sure,” she mumbled.

“So, I’ll be faxin’ that info to you now. Call me if you run into trouble.”

“Okay,” Cat said, and hung up, then headed home.

She was moving fast when she got back to her apartment. She hurried to her office, grabbing the fax that had already come through. She picked up a couple of other pages that had obviously been faxed earlier and walked to the window for a better look.

As always, they were of men with tattoos. She had a network of people all over the United States who, on a regular basis, faxed her mug shots with rap sheets. She was determined to find the man who’d killed her father. So far, she had yet to get a hit, but she wasn’t going to give up.

She tossed the two sheets into a box on the floor that was already overflowing with similar papers, made a file from the papers Art had faxed her regarding Charity Kingman and walked out of the room. She hurried to her bedroom, packed the bag she normally took on a stakeout and left without thinking to check the answering machine in the kitchen. It was a quarter to eleven in the morning. Even though her world felt as if it was coming to an end, the day wasn’t even half over.

* * *

Charity Kingman considered herself streetwise and sharp, although she was facing a second stay in lockup for bad paper, which even she knew didn’t really back up her opinion of herself. However, she knew she was looking good. Her skirt was short; her legs were long. She had rock-hard abs, and what nature had shorted her on, she hid with what she called “personality.”

She knew Art Ball would be mad about yesterday, but she’d never intended to show up for court. She didn’t have any defense. She’d written the hot checks, and she’d gotten caught. But what else was a girl to do when she needed to look good and was a little short on cash? Besides, she had a plan. All it was going to take was a quick make-over at a cushy day spa and she would be set to go.

Cat read the particulars on Charity Kingman while eating most of a breakfast burrito in her car. She passed a lot of time and had a lot of meals in there, and was finishing her coffee as she finished the file Art had sent her. As the last swallow went down, she reached for her cell phone. Her first call was to the nail salon Charity normally frequented, the second was to her landlord. When she found out that Charity was behind on her rent, Cat knew she wouldn’t be hiding out in her apartment. The call she made to the salon where Charity had her nails done was revealing as well. Charity had a standing appointment, but she’d called in and canceled yesterday. After a couple of follow-up questions, though, her nail tech had let it slip that Charity was planning a trip.

The timing added up. Charity Kingman needed to make herself scarce. All Cat could hope for was to catch her before she ran.

But where had she gone?

She went back to the file again and began to study it. Charity was from the Midwest, a little town outside of Cleveland. Since coming to Dallas six years earlier, she had never held a job for more than six months. She’d been arrested for soliciting, for bad checks, and for busting the windshield of a boyfriend who’d dumped her for another woman. She wasn’t what Art called a “bad ass,” but she was constantly in trouble and dumb enough to keep getting caught. The way Cat looked at it, finding Charity had to happen within the next twenty-four hours or it was probably going to be too late to find her easily. She didn’t strike Cat as the kind of woman who would go running home, so she mentally crossed off Ohio as a place she would go.

Halfway through the file, she ran across a notation regarding a former roommate named Danni Chester, and an old address on the south side of the city. It was the only thing in the file that could be construed as a permanent link to another person. It was almost a year old, but it was a place to start.

She checked her cell phone for messages, but there were none. As she was gathering up her trash, it occurred to her that she hadn’t checked the answering machine at her apartment. She got out of her car, dumped her trash, and was just about to call home to check it when her cell phone rang. When she saw who was calling, she decided not to answer it, but then changed her mind.

“Hello.”

Wilson winced. The clipped tone of her voice didn’t bode well for this becoming any kind of a pleasant conversation.

“Cat, it’s me, Wilson.”

“What do you want?”

He winced again.

“I thought maybe I could come by with your charm.”

“I’m not home. I’m working. Call me later.”

She hung up in his ear.

He disconnected. Then, disgusted with her and also with himself for still trying to connect with what appeared to be a certified bitch, he threw his cell phone on the bed and kicked a throw pillow that had fallen on the floor.

Wilson’s call distracted Cat enough that when she hung up, she forgot she’d been going to call home. Instead, she got back in her vehicle, slammed the door and drove out of the parking lot in a huff, leaving rubber behind as she went.

* * *

Charity considered her new look a sure cure for the warrant that was bound to be out for her arrest. Her long blond hair was now short and red. She’d had her eyebrows dyed to match, and was wearing five earrings on each ear, the fake kind that looked pierced but really weren’t. She’d traded her designer clothes for an off-the-rack mini-skirt and little-bit-of-nothing top covered by a white fake fur coat that barely cupped the bottom of her backside. She’d found a pair of high-topped black boots in a thrift store that went over her knees, and for a last bit of flash, wrapped a thin red scarf around her neck.

Finally she was ready to split. All she needed to do was pick up her stuff from Danni’s apartment and get to the bus station. After that, her troubles would be over.

Cat hadn’t been outside Danni Chester’s apartment building for more than fifteen minutes when she saw a cab pull up to the curb. She tensed, leaning forward as she watched the door open, but when she saw the female getting out, she leaned back. Wrong woman. She noted that the cab didn’t leave, then went back to watching for Charity.

A few minutes passed, and then the same redheaded woman came back out, this time carrying a small suitcase. Another woman walked out with her, her arm over the redhead’s shoulder. When they hugged, Cat’s focus moved from the redhead to the other woman.

She grabbed the file on the seat beside her and thumbed through the pages until she found a mug shot of Danni Chester, who’d been arrested more than once for prostitution. After a couple of glances, she recognized the woman standing by the cab as Danni Chester, which told Cat she needed to check out the redhead, if for no other reason than to exclude her from the hunt.

She checked the mug shot of Charity one more time, then tossed the file onto the seat beside her and got out of her car. She patted the outside of her coat, making sure her gun and handcuffs were still in the waistband of her pants, and then started across the street.

The closer she got, the faster she went. By the time the redhead was opening the door to get into the cab, Cat was at the back rear fender.

“Hey, Charity…love your new do,” she called out.

Charity Kingman was smiling as she turned. It wasn’t until she saw that Cat was a stranger that she realized she’d just given herself away. Then she saw Cat’s badge and the handcuffs in her hand.

“Well, shit,” she muttered.

Danni Chester started to shove Charity into the cab when Cat pointed at her.

“What? You in a big hurry to go to lock up with her?”

Charity sighed. Danni was a friend. She didn’t want to get her in trouble, too.

“Don’t, Danni. You don’t want to fight Cat Dupree.”

“Never heard of her,” Danni said, giving Cat a rude lookover.

“She’s Art Ball’s bounty hunter. Everyone knows her,” Charity said.

“Never heard of you, either,” Cat said and pointed at Danni. “Get out of my way.”