“I know—sort that shit now, please. And don’t get it mixed up with the stuff that’s already priced.”
The old rebel gave Cinnamon an aggravated, affronted look. “All of ’em?”
She said, “Pretty please?” and he grumbled, made his way to the back, looking harassed. When he was out of earshot, Cinnamon turned to me and hard-whispered. “I’ll meet you later.”
“Where?”
“Not here,” She was edgy, frantic. “The Bootlegger, at midnight. My husband has a night shift.”
I nodded cool, pulled the CD from my coat pocket, and handed it to her—THE DAILY TELEGRAPH DEL CYD in fast black Sharpie—she held it like kryptonite. Then she made a firm head motion for me to split.
28
The Bootlegger was a refurbish of the old Don the Beachcomber—red and warm and lantern-lit, still crowded with the chatty and the Hawaiian-shirted. Over the loudspeakers, Alex Keack, Surfer’s Paradise. I took the last empty booth in the far back, ordered a Navy grog, and watched and waited. It was a comical place to sit alone—carved wooden tiki faces loomed from every corner—but I wasn’t feeling comical. I was too keyed up for any kind of paradise, surfer or otherwise.
Cynthia “Cinnamon” Persky, now per Google Deborah Summers, owner of the Dogs of Yesteryear, came in thirty-five minutes after midnight in a long brown patchwork coat. She got in across from me and stared me down. Her eyes were wet, eyeliner a little smeared, but her color was high, kinetic, just this side of anger, and she already smelled of drink. She twirled a big, loose button on the coat and studied me.
“I wasn’t going to come.”
“I’m glad you changed your mind.”
“I remember you,” she said somberly. “You were just a little boy.”
“Cinnamon,” I said, “Deborah. I don’t mean to barge in, and I don’t—”
“Why are you doing this, Adam? This is some bad shit you’re stirring up—and it’s the past.”
“I know but—”
“What do you hope to get out of unearthing all this ugliness?”
“I didn’t unearth it,” I said. “Devon Hawley did, and look what happened—”
“Exactly,” she said, leaning in. “Which means someone very dangerous is out there.”
I leaned in too. “Before he got killed, Devon went to Mr. Elkaim and said he could prove Emil’s innocence, he said he—”
A waitress with a bright smile and a giant red orchid in her hair appeared at our table and we stiffened, quickly scanned menus and ordered—a Zombie and another Navy Grog, tropical truth serum. As soon as she was out of earshot, Cinnamon said, “We gotta switch seats, I need to watch the door.” We got up and maneuvered around each other. “My husband can’t know about any of this.”
“You can’t confide in him?”
“No. No, I can’t. He’d kill if he caught us here.”
“Me or you?”
“Let’s get this over with. How did you find me?”
“That doesn’t matter.”
“Well, then tell me why I should say anything to you?”
“Maybe you shouldn’t, but—”
“What are you gonna do, Adam? Out me? Put me in mortal danger just so you can speculate on something that happened thirty-five fucking years ago?”
“No, of course not. But Charles Elkaim is dying, he—”
“He is?”
Her voice hit a confused register—memory and surprise. The world had not sat still.
I nodded. “He called on me.”
She stared me down with an impatient scowl, almost vibrating with the news. She clutched at the table like she might make a run for it—but she didn’t.
“He’s not well,” I said.
“How not well?”
“Dying. He’s got pancreatic cancer. And…this is his last request. Even if nothing comes of it, I gotta do something. I owe it to him. And to my late uncle.”
A deadly silence passed between us, then the drinks arrived in tiki mugs that frowned at us both. She put her liquor away like cough medicine. I swigged too, let the hard vapor soften my nerves.
Her voice dropped to a terse whisper. “So Mr. Elkaim is really going?”
“Soon.”
“And…he wants you to look into all this.”
