But Freddy was also right.
Why give a damn?
He grabbed his wallet and the change he had sitting on the dresser and began to place them in his pants pockets. Then he looked at his cousin through the mirror. “How you doing?” he asked him.
Freddy smiled. “Better than you apparently.” Freddy sat up. “What’s up? I know you didn’t ask me to drop by your house for the hell of it.”
“I need you to talk to Fritz,” Boone said.
Freddy was puzzled. “Fritz Hollingsworth?”
“He’s the only Fritz I know.”
“What you need me to talk to him about? He gave me the latest info on that killing over at the school, unlike my police chief whose job it is to keep me informed.”
“I need you to talk to Fritz,” Boone said again.
“What about?”
“The new dean of students over at Saint Chris. Her contract stipulated that the board of directors would select and pay for housing during her first year under their employment.”
Freddy nodded. “That’s the standard contract all of their senior staff gets. They’re supposed to get her an apartment, or a house if they prefer. But that’s up to them. What? They didn’t provide housing for her?”
“They provided it alright. They got her an apartment in Low Town.”
Freddy frowned. “Are you serious? They put their dean of students over there?”
Boone nodded. “That’s exactly what they did. And we both know why,” Boone added, looking through the mirror at his cousin again.
Freddy shook his head. “They need to cut that crap out,” he said.
“You’ll talk to him then?”
“Of course I will,” said Freddy, frowning. “I don’t play that either.”
Then he continued to stare at Boone. “I saw that video,” he said.
Boone glanced at him.
“Billy Ray Rogers has hired an attorney. He says he’s going to file a lawsuit against the town for police brutality.”
“He won’t--”
“Don’t intimidate him, Boone,” said Freddy. “Stace already dropped the charges against him. When he does decide what he wants to do, we plan to settle out of court, if he’ll take it, for twenty thousand bucks.”
Boone exhaled.
“If that happens, you’ll owe the town twenty thousand bucks.”
“Wait on it,” Boone said although Freddy knew he’d pay up.
“It’ll just be two less suits you buy next year,” Freddy said. “You can handle it.”
But then Freddy looked as Boone sat down on the bed beside him and began putting on those expensive, well-shined dress shoes he had mentioned. “But getting back to that dean,” Freddy said. “The question is,” he added, “why are you so concerned?”
“Don’t know what you mean,” Boone said.
“I mean what I said. Why are you so concerned about where they housed her?”
“She doesn’t need to be in any crime-infested area like that.”
“And what else?”
“It’s not safe.”
“And?” Freddy asked again. He knew his cousin far too well.
“And that’s it,” said Boone. “Tell Fritz and that gang to do better than that.”
Freddy stared at Boone.
Boone, feeling exposed, frowned. “What are you staring at me for?” he asked as he put on his second shoe and stood up.
“Who says I’m staring?”
“I say it.”
“Sorry,” Freddy said as he continued to stare at his cousin.
“Kiss my ass,” Boone said, and began leaving out of his bedroom.
Freddy laughed. “You forgot to comb your hair,” he reminded him.
Boone, at first, kept walking, which was exactly what Freddy expected him to do. He also expected him to tell him what he could do with that comb.
But then, to Freddy’s total shock, Boone didn’t say a word. Boone, instead, returned to the dresser, grabbed the comb, and actually combed his thick brown hair in place. Then he tossed the comb back onto the dresser, glanced at his cousin as if he dared him to say a word to him, and left.
Freddy smiled and shook his head. “Wow,” he said. He’d never known his cousin to fall this hard for anybody. And he knew that was what was happening, even if Boone didn’t know it himself.
Then Freddy stood up, too, and began heading out of Boone’s bedroom. Who in the world, he wondered as he walked out, is this dean?
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
She was stepping out of her apartment just as he had gotten out of his car and was heading for her front door. Boone smiled. Most women would see a man coming but wouldn’t dare open the door before he knocked. They didn’t want to look desperate, was how they rationalized it. But to Boone they were just being pretentious. They knew he was coming to pick them up. Why not come on out?
But that was why he liked Charly. There didn’t appear to be a pretentious bone in her nice, shapely body, he thought, as his eyes couldn’t help but to trail down that body.
She wore a very nice bright-blue, form-fitting dress that showed off every inch of her curves. Criss-crossed at the top, it also showed off her big breasts. Boone realized he was getting hard just watching her.
“Hey,” he said, smiling, to keep her eyes focused on his eyes and not his suddenly expanded midsection. “How are you?”
“I’m good,” Charly said, smiling too. And she meant it. She actually liked the idea of going out for a change. “And you?”
“Good,” Boone said. “Thank you for being on time,” he added.
“Thank you for being on time,” Charly said, since she tried to be a stickler too. They both laughed.
But as Boone escorted her to his car, he also took a peep at the young men a little further away that sat on a car smoking and drinking beer, listening to rap music, and watching them.
But Charly wasn’t thinking about those guys, despite their long rap sheets. They weren’t bothering her at all. Her thought was in front of her. He was the one she was most worried about, as he opened his front passenger car door for her.
She realized, when he first drove up, that he was driving a different car. It was already surprising that a policeman could afford a Ferrari. But a Mercedes too? And not any Mercedes. An elegant, black, S-class Maybach. Such extravagance reeked of corruption to Charly. “Where’s the Ferrari?” she asked him.
Boone looked at her. “Say again?”
“This is a Mercedes,” Charly said. “What happened to your Ferrari?”
“Nothing’s happened to it,” Boone said. She looked so serious, he thought. “I figured you’d have more leg room in this.”
“Oh. Okay,” Charly said, as she got into the beautiful automobile.
But she still couldn’t get pass it. What kind of police chief, she wondered, could afford a Ferrari, let alone what looked like a nearly-brand new S-class Mercedes? Was he some corrupt cop who took graft to make ends meet? She’d be shocked if that was true. There was something too strident about the man to be in anybody’s pocket. But she didn’t know him like that. He could be as crooked as Darryl.