Chapter 26- Oxygen
Another wave of nausea. The deep, foul taste of bile rose up in her throat and she tried like hell to suppress it, but it was no use. Grace pitched forward over the toilet, violently sick. She sat up and gasped quietly, hoping no one walked in. The last thing she needed was her female colleagues knowing that the butterflies in her stomach had decided to jettison her breakfast. She grabbed some toilet paper and wiped her mouth. Goddammit. Why did she feel this nervous? It was just a case. She just had to go in, do her job, and get out. It shouldn't take more than a few weeks, tops. Wayne would always be nearby and Cherry would be there to help her. What was so awful that she actually threw up with worry?
She took a deep breath and stood up. There. All gone. Puking butterflies were hereby banished and nerves of steel would take their place. Strength in, doubt out. She flushed the toilet and stepped out. After a quick rinse of water for her mouth, she strutted out to the bullpen.
Cherry was already in deep conversation with Lisbon. The boys sat around the meeting table and listened intently, raising points and questions throughout. Grace sat down quietly, praying her absence wasn't particularly noted.
Lisbon gestured to the table, which was covered with more gadgets. "We have more cameras here as well as mics. We need them everywhere, anywhere you can get to. Especially Royko's office." She paused. "What were your impressions of him?"
Cherry turned to Grace, deferring to her. Grace appreciated that. "The man has a very calm exterior, but I don't think it goes very deep. He gave a distinct controlling vibe. Smart too. I don't think flattery will work on him. I think our best strategy is the sweet little redneck girls who don't know the rules. We should be able to get into different areas, at least for the first few nights. They'll chalk it up to us being newbies."
Lisbon nodded. "Cherry? Your thoughts?"
Cherry gazed down at the desk pensively. "Mr. Royko is indeed a very controlling man. He's married. He has at least one child. Neither of whom have ever been to the club. He wouldn't allow it, he'd consider his profession too unclean for his family. He puts women in two categories: whores and saints. His mother, wife and possibly daughter would fall into the second. No one else. He has the persona of a confident and well-do-to gentleman, but he feels acutely inferior around other men of power. This makes him dangerous. He won't tolerate disobedience of any kind."
The team glanced at each other in surprise. Cherry continued.
"The girls sold in the slave ring won't be anywhere near that place. He'd find that distasteful. But the meth lab might be. It's a big enough building and the outer supports suggest there is a basement." She paused and looked at Lisbon. "Has your narcotics team looked for the venting system outside?"
Lisbon looked at Cho. Cho shrugged. "We're not sure. Why?"
Cherry shrugged in return. "Johnny from my troupe is from Fresno, the meth capital of the world, they say. He says that the biggest problem for meth labs is the smell. Ventilation is the most obvious sign of a lab nearby."
The team was silent.
Cherry's eyes widened a bit, as if she'd spoken out of turn. "I was just curious."
Jane spoke up. "I'm interested to hear how you drew these other conclusions about Mr. Royko."
Cherry looked over to him. Their eyes met and held. Their knacks for razzle-dazzle and astute observation rose up in recognition of each other. The fake psychic and the burlesque dancer already knew the answer to his question, but he wanted her to explain out loud, for the rest of the class. She smiled.
"The third finger on his left hand has a ring indentation, but no tan line. Hence, he doesn't wear his ring during the day at the club, but slips it on when he goes home. This suggests that he doesn't want his employees to know much about his personal life. It also suggests that he doesn't want his job to taint his marriage, even symbolically. He's insecure around men of power because he keeps weaker men at his side. If Eddie is any indication, his other male employees will be all bravado and no real threat to him."
Jane smiled knowingly. "And the child?"
Cherry lowered her gaze again. "Royko is old school. In his mind, men of power are also men of virility. Children would feature heavily into his identity. Sons in particular. He has kids, that much I know."
Lisbon's eyes narrowed. Jane knew that look. He was on the receiving end often enough. It meant she believed Cherry, but didn't like her chain of reasoning. It was too vague, yet too assured. Grace's observations may not be as deep, but they were based from fact. Cherry's observations were startlingly specific, but stemmed from intuition. Cops hate that. Lisbon hated that.
She questioned it now. "How sure are you?"
Cherry casually rested her elbow on the table. "Very."
"You know strip club owners that well?"
Cherry rested her chin in her palm. "I know men."
Cho snorted. "We're that easy to read, huh?"
Cherry was instantly contrite. "No disrespect meant, Agent Cho. I mean to say that I've studied men as my target audience my entire life and have come to certain conclusions about them."
Rigsby smiled. "Meaning we're simple-minded when it comes to women?"
Cherry smiled back. "Simple-minded is the wrong phrase. Men are forthright when it comes to women. Direct. There are only a few buttons that need pushing, so to speak."
"Like a toaster?" Jane offered helpfully.
Cherry chuckled. "Yes, a little. If a woman is toast, then men are definitely toasters. Direct, as I said."
Lisbon, remembering this conversation with her team so long ago, couldn't help herself. "Soooo, women would be like…?"
Cherry squinted at her question. "Women as toasters? Oh, no. Women would be much more like…let's see…some ridiculous contraption…"
A smile cracked on Grace's lips. "An accordion?"
Cherry brightened. "Yes, exactly. An accordion. Head-spinningly complicated with lots of bells and whistles."
The whole team chuckled while Cherry looked on confusedly. "What?"
Grace patted her hand. "You just agreed with Jane on the complexity of men versus women."
"Did I now?" The psychic and dancer appraised each other again.
Lisbon tapped her pen on the desk and everyone came back to the original discussion. "Anyway," Cherry said. "We'll keep our eyes open. My guess is that we won't even see Royko that much during business hours. I can't see him sullying his reputation by sitting amongst his horny clientele. Eddie and the other bouncers. These are the men we need to keep sweet."
Rigsby couldn't hold his pained curiosity back any longer. "So, just how much stripping is involved at a place like this?"
An uneasy silence fell over the group. They all had varying degrees of knowledge about who was dating whom at this table. The women's nudity felt like an embargoed topic. Leave it Rigsby to blow through an embargo when it came to worrying about his girl.
Cherry saved them from too much discomfort. "At worst? We'll be required to strip down to bare tits and a thong on stage. Forgive my language. As for lap dances, clubs usually have a quota for girls to fill each night she works. Usually two or three. For that, we can probably keep more on. By the way, the House will provide our underwear for the duration of this job. I'll make sure Gray wears outfits that do the job but keep as much covered as possible."
Grace blushed. God, did she hate her nudity being discussed in the cold light of day by her colleagues, boss, boyfriend and sister. It was like a nightmare. The kind of nightmare where you show up to school naked without your homework. She kept her chin up though. If Cherry could blithely mention their bare tits, then by God, she could listen to it without wilting like some scandalized Victorian prude with a case of the vapors.
Well, that was it. Nothing was left now except to wait for night to fall. Cherry stood up. "If it's all right with you, Teresa, Gray and I will head over to the House to practice and suit up. We can meet you back here at 9:00 to grab the camera equipment."
Lisbon also stood up and offered her hand. "That's fine." The women shook hands. "Thank you again, Cherry. You have no idea how valuable your help has been."
Cherry waved her off. "It's nothing. I'm glad to be of use."
The sisters gathered their things, passed furtive glances with their respective men, and left the bullpen. They had a job to prepare for.
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Grace and Cherry drove in relaxed silence, Cherry behind the wheel, her eyes never leaving the road. To anyone else, they were just two women staring blankly out the windshield. But Grace knew better. Cherry had that weird talent of watching people without looking at them. She knew she was being quietly scanned. She cursed inwardly. Growing up with Cherry had been exactly like starting work with Jane. When she met him at the CBI for the first time, she couldn't believe that, after finally escaping the nosy, sweet intuition of her sister her whole childhood, she had to share an office space with a man of the same ilk. Were these people suddenly growing on trees? Seriously.
Not that Grace didn't love her sister. On the contrary, she and Cherry were very close. But she felt acutely uncomfortable with her professional and familial worlds colliding like they had in the last few weeks. Around Cherry, she'd always felt like the kid sister. The kid sister who blushed when her big sister knew she bought cigarettes and smoked exactly two of them behind the gym before gagging and throwing the pack away. The big sister who knew from the minute Grace walked in the door that she'd kissed a boy for the first time. The big sister who knew…everything. It used to drive her crazy. Then the whole Kevin disaster happened and Cherry suddenly became her protector as well as her mind reader. She rooted herself even more deeply into Grace's life. Her parents should have protected her, only Cherry did. Her lovers should have tried to understand her better, and before Rigsby, only Cherry did. Her friends didn't tease her and try to bring her out of her shell, only Cherry did.
She played so many roles in Grace's life. And Grace was grateful. And annoyed. And flattered. And suffocated. But then she got her job at the CBI and started to build a life separate from the life she had with Cherry. It was very liberating. Now Cherry was involved in that too. She wasn't sure how to feel about that.
The air was heavy with Cherry's scrutiny. Grace didn't feel like waiting for her question.
"Just ask me, Cher."
Cherry glanced over quickly. "Has he asked you to marry him? Is that why you've been so distracted these passed few days?"
Grace sighed. "Yes, he has. He loves me, I'm crazy about him, and he wants to get married and have kids asap." She paused and shot a small smile at her sister. "He wants to make kids exactly like Lila, he said."
Cherry's eyes melted. "He wants to make kids like you, Gray. That man loves you so much, it hurts to look at him. It pours off of him, you can almost see it. Especially when he's looking at you." She glanced at Grace again. She noticed her younger sister's blush.
"What did you tell him?"
Grace sighed. "I asked for time."
"Why?"
"You already know why."
It was Cherry's turn to sigh. "The job?"
"The job."
"So, what's the best of the bad scenarios?"
"The best?" Grace snorted. "The best scenario is that I leave the department and find some nice, safe IT job somewhere far away from the CBI. I can marry the sweetest man alive, have his kids and know I won't get shot while I'm carrying them. Meanwhile, I give up my badge and try not to die from disappointment."
Cherry winced. "And the worst scenario?"
Grace's chest instantly went tight and achy. "I continue to see Wayne on the sly with no hope of taking our relationship further…or... I give him up completely."
Cherry's chin jutted and Grace smiled wanly at one of her sister's few tells. Anger. Her chin always jutted in righteous anger. "You can't give him up, Gray."
Grace looked down at her lap. "I know. It would kill me. I couldn't bear it…I'd…" She felt tears welling up. "I couldn't live without him. He's my…" She couldn't think of any word strong enough. "He's my oxygen."
Cherry smiled sweetly. "Your oxygen. I like that."
Grace gave a small laugh. "Why?"
"Because," Cherry explained. "Because you're obviously his fire. His hot, lively, red fire. He's an arson specialist, after all. You attract him on such an elemental level that I doubt he's even aware of it. You warm him, alight him. And if you ever left him, you'd burn him beyond recognition. He'd never recover. He needs you. But, you need him just as badly. Fire needs oxygen, or it dies."
Grace absorbed her analogy and found it spookily accurate. "So where does that leave me?"
"It leaves you with a good man, an understanding boss, and a job that you love. There has to be a way to make them all work together. We just have to find it." Cherry reached over and squeezed her hand.
Grace smiled. She couldn't help it. Big sis Cherry to the rescue. Again.
"Cher?"
"Yeah, babe?"
"Sometime soon, not now cuz it would be weird, I want to hear about your relationship with Jane."
Cherry inhaled slowly. "Yes, I owe you that. But you're right, it's for another time. Right now, let's just dress up like trashy skanks and have the House boys shove dollar bills in our underwear."
Laughter filled the car as they turned onto West Washington Avenue.