L..A. Blues II:

by Maxine Thompson

Genres: African American; African American Urban

Synopsis

Life hasn't always been easy for Zipporah "Z" Saldano, but at 35, she's finally come to grips with some of her demons, and things are looking up. She's moved beyond mourning the loss of her LAPD job, her partner, and her murdered nephew. She has a new love, Detective Romero Gonzalez, and she's dedicated to remaining sober. Her new business, Saldano's Private Investigations, is thriving. Just when she thinks she has a handle on life, though, her older brother, Mayhem, is kidnapped. His involvement with the Crips leads Z to believe that a Mexican gang has something to do with his disappearance. Chaos returns to Z's life when she discovers that the gang has ties to her boyfriend's family. Will Z be able to get her brother back? Will her relationship with Romero survive? Things are going on that are not right. Nothing is as it seems, and once again Zipporah Saldano will have to contend with mystery and mayhem in the City of Angels.

Release date: June 1, 2012

Publisher: Urban Renaissance

Print pages: 288

Sample

“Oh, no,” I groaned, putting my palm to my forehead as I read my mother’s text message on my latest state-of-the-art iPhone. I was sitting in a white stretch limo in front of the Hollywood Kodak Theater with my man, Detective Romero Gonzalez. I was surrounded by my foster sister, Chica, her husband, Riley, my frenemy, Haviland, and her live-in boyfriend, Trevor. Our various perfumes were mingling and rivaling with one another’s, casting a heady mix of Egyptian jasmine, iris, and gardenia throughout the limo.

Romero, arm draped around my shoulder, was seated next to me. We were facing the other two couples who sat across from us. He reached out, gently touching my hand. “What’s the matter, mamí?”

I shook my head, too overcome to speak. I hadn’t told my lover about my latest dilemma. I moved my hand away, grasping my phone.

“Go ahead,” I urged Romero as I beckoned my head toward the door. The chauffer opened the door and Romero was the first to step out. “I’ll catch up with you.”

My hands trembled as I tried to type back an answer. I felt like the sun was burning my hand, as if I were sitting in the eye of the devil. This was serious when my moms–Venita, an OG who didn’t play–was calling me by my middle name, I Love (which happened to be the same as hers). This was also another way of her playing her trump card: the mother’s guilt card. Not that she had any right to play that card, but that’s another long story. All I knew was she was pulling out all stops.

I typed back: What money? I can’t help you. I’m sorry. “It’s really crazy being the responsible one in the family,” I hissed through my teeth, speaking to no one in particular as I shut off my phone, not wanting to hear my mother’s next plea. I shook my head. What did my moms expect me to do–rob a bank to get the ransom money?

Anyhow, what money? I had no idea what she was talking about. Now, what in the sam Twinkie (yes, you heard me right; I don’t cuss as part of my twelve-step program) did Venita expect me to do? I ain’t God. I just solved a messy case with my nephew Trayvon’s murder and was trying to get my bearings. As long as I worked with strangers, I could remain objective, and effectual. But when you worked with loved ones, it was hard to be detached. Your heart got in the way. Besides, when did I ever catch a break? I just want to live out my life in peace. I wanted a quiet life. Forget this mess.

I was dressed to the nines, trying to forget my problems, and getting ready to take pictures of my friends as they walked the red carpet. I just wanted to snap pictures and stay in the background. Was that too much to ask? I had a press pass and a professional Canon digital camera in tow. Besides that, I had a covert reason for being there. I was also looking for information on a missing starlet, Lolita, for a family member. They thought she might have been one of the victims of the black serial killer, the Grim Sleeper, but so far we hadn’t found any trace of her. She’d been missing for over a year. She was last seen with actor Justin Howard, who’d been interrogated but released. As a hunch, I was just snooping around here. Kind of to kill two birds with one stone.

Earlier, we’d attended the balloon releasing ceremony for the mothers of murdered children, so this was ending the day on an upbeat moment. That was, up until I received a call earlier from Venita. Now she was sending this text since my ringer was off. Absently, I shook my head. No, I just couldn’t get involved. No telling what Mayhem could be involved in. I wasn’t getting killed fooling with him.

On top of everything else, I had a license as a private investigator to protect, and, although I didn’t always walk the fine line of the law, I tried not to be shady. (One thing I must admit, though, is sometimes the line between good and evil did get a little smudged for me.)

“Who were you texting?” Chica asked.

“My moms.”

Chica leaned in, a look of deep concern furrowed on her brow. “Any news on Mayhem?”

I shook my head. I hated the fact that my brother got caught slipping. What happened to all his bodyguards? I wondered. Especially his lieutenant, that big dude who looked like Michael Clarke Duncan. Where was he when this kidnapping went down?

“Are you sure you can’t help?”

I didn’t answer Chica. What could I say? My brother, Mayhem, the Crips kingpin, had been missing for a day so far, and I couldn’t put off what I’d planned. After all, I had a life.

“Who was that?” My friend, Haviland, the fashionista of the three of us women, interrupted before we got ready to exit the limo.

“Venita.”

“Well, what are you going to do? Why don’t you go to the police?” Haviland gave me a probing look.

At any rate, I wished I hadn’t even told her at the Mothers for Murdered Children March earlier that day what was going on, but she’d overheard me and Chica talking about it. “I can’t go to the police.” I shrugged my shoulders.

I bit my bottom lip to keep from cussing Haviland out and relapsing from my profanity-free Lent fast. I caught myself in time. Instead, I just glared at her as if she’d sprouted two heads. “Which part of my brother is a drug dealer don’t you understand?”

“Well, excuse me for asking.” Haviland sounded miffed.

Didn’t she have any street smarts? I guessed not. Born of a black father and white mother, she was adopted at birth and raised in Beverly Hills with a white family, who, (unfortunately for her) since the father’s death, had disinherited her.

Now, poor Haviland had to get her hustle on for the first time in life. No longer the trust fund baby, she had to get off her butt and grind like the rest of us. Truth be known, I didn’t think she was doing everything legit now that she had to carry her own little dookie bag, either.

“Is there a problem?” Trevor, the white liberal, leaned in and whispered toward me as he was easing his way to the door.

“Mind your own beeswax,” Haviland snapped. She really was mad at me, but was afraid to talk smack to me.

“Why are you always so cantankerous?” Trevor whined on his climb out of the limo.

“Eat shit and die,” Haviland sniped, sounding like a white girl in a black girl’s body. She stuck out her chin defiantly. “Don’t start nothing with me today.” She gave Trevor the finger as he stood outside the limo.

Trevor, who was a younger Brad Pitt look-alike and up-and-coming soap opera star, stood at attention outside the limo, posing on the red carpet. He acted as if nothing had happened. He was grinning a bright Colgate, capped-tooth smile.

“Why don’t you go catch up with your boyfriend ?” I shooed Haviland with my hands so I could step out the limo before the brawl was on. “I’m going to do my thing.”

Just as quickly, Haviland slid back into her Hollywood façade, stuck out her hand daintily, and waited for the escort to help her out the car.

“I don’t give a frizzuck about that little dick fool,” Ms. Hollywood (as Chica and I called her behind her back) whispered under her breath as she stepped out the limo. She strutted a few steps as skittish as a young colt before she got ready to be escorted down the red carpet. She turned to the cameras, flashed a bright TV-COMMERCIAL smile, then hooked her arm into Trevor’s inner arm like they were Hollywood’s happiest couple. I watched her sashay down the red carpet as if she owned the world.

Chica and I glanced at each other, then burst out laughing. We shook our heads at the same time. No need to say it. Haviland is crazy. Privately, I cringed inside. See, people like Haviland give black women a bad rap. She would cuss out her white boyfriend at the drop of a dime whenever we’d double date. Sometimes I wished Trevor would just call Haviland the B word, or the N word, and get it over with.

As far as I was concerned, Trevor was too politically correct. Haviland would cut up so bad, all in the name of “relationship transparency.” I wished she’d go to the opposite extreme. Sometimes she just gave too much information. She told all of Trevor’s shortcomings in the bedroom, when we were out in public as couples on double dates. Let’s just say, maybe there was something to be said for fronting as a couple.

Because of the disrespectful way Haviland acted toward her man, Romero was always uncomfortable to be around them as a couple. He didn’t like the way Haviland emasculated her man in front of people. A year ago this wouldn’t have bothered me at all. I would have called Romero machismo and a male chauvinist. But, for the first time in my life, I had no problem letting a man wear the pants in the relationship.

Romero told me when we first started seriously dating, “I know you’re a strong woman, Z, but both of us can’t wear the pants in this relationship.”

Ironically, this had never become a problem either. Romero kept me purring like a kitten. Yes, I had to admit it. I was whipped. Everyone said they’d never seen me act so submissive or content with a man. They all said Romero brought out my softer side. He also treated me like a queen.

Chica turned to me as the escort was getting ready to help us out the car. “Mija, you pimping that dress,” she complimented me as Riley was climbing out.

“Thanks. You’re banging the mess out of yours too,” I said. “LYLAS,” I mouthed to her (love you like a sister) when it was her turn to climb out of the limo.

“Me, too.” Chica blew me a kiss.

Actually, we were closer than sisters. Although she was a Latina, she was family. Which made me think of my dilemma again. Mayhem. Isn’t he family too? What am I going to do?

I forced my mind to think about my dress. I knew Chica was sincere with her compliment and that she was telling the truth about my dress. I looked hot in this dress, the way it clung to my curves. The back was out on the dress and I didn’t have any washtub rolls on display, thanks to the tae kwon do I’d been taking. I blushed as I remembered how Romero had torn the dress off me and made passionate love to me before we left home. I guessed he would agree the dress was sexy too.

But a little voice inside of me kept beating me over the head with a stick. How can you be at the Academy Awards when your brother has been kidnapped? It wasn’t like I cared who won the awards. As far as I was concerned, this was a big favoritism party anyway.

Well, one side of me wanted to help, but the other side of me was totally against it. I just couldn’t get in trouble fooling with my crazy brother and his madness. Why should I stick my neck out? First of all, I had this night planned for months. Plus, I had two free tickets to the Academy Awards, so that we could get some PR for our upcoming reality show about our three businesses. I had signed on for a part in Haviland’s reality show, which would surely bring me big fat paychecks from Hollywood stars needing a private eye. I’d already warned Chica not to get into cat fights with us or we’d bounce in a heartbeat.

Our show would be called Women in Business. I would expose some of my duties as a private investigator, Chica’s role as a bounty hunter, and Haviland, the lead actress, a former child star turned wedding planner, would show the world of Hollywood marriages. Recently, we had rented an office space together in Santa Monica where we planned to film, as well as at Haviland’s Hollywood Hills mini mansion. We were even thinking of spinning off a business magazine by that same name for women in business.

So, as you see, I had too much to lose. I’d been sober for over two years. My new business, Saldano Private Investigations, was thriving. I had a good relationship with my man, Romero. I didn’t need any extra stress or drama that might make me fall off the wagon.

“I feel guilty that I’m out having fun like this.” Chica’s words interrupted my reverie as I stood next to her, with Romero’s arms around me. Riley was on Chica’s other side, his arms embracing her. . .