The Sassy Belles. Beth Albright

it. Vivi, now revived, sat on the side of the bed sipping water from one of those little square glasses from the motel bathroom. Harry moved toward her and Sonny stepped fully inside the room.

      “Hey, Blake. How are ya?” Sonny greeted me with a quick kiss on the cheek. He sounded happy with his deep baritone, honey-dripping, slow Southern drawl. Seriously, he had me at “Hey.”

      I swallowed instead of speaking and smiled at him. But I couldn’t stop myself. I stood.

      “Hey, Sonny!” I stepped in closer and gave him a hug. That’s how Southerners say hello. We hug everyone, all the time, both hello and goodbye. It’s bad manners not to. In fact, it’s downright hurtful. I heard the heavy Southern drawl in my hello. When I’ve had a few drinks or I’m feeling a little flirtatious, my accent seems to intensify. And Sonny, well, I guess he just brought out a tinge of my inner redneck. We all have some. Inner redneck, I mean. There’s someone in everyone’s family that’s a teeny bit red. Think about it. For me, it came from my dad’s side. Way back in his line were the moonshiners. Yep. I know. Unreal, huh? My mom’s family is a bunch of lawyers. One story has the moonshiners on my dad’s side being defended by the lawyers on my mom’s side. And of course, if you think about it, you can imagine what the payoff was—yep, fresh whisky, right from the backyard! I’m not from stupid lawyers!

      As I stood, Harry caught Sonny’s reflection in the mirror. He left Vivi and came over with his hand extended. Harry’s not a hugger anyway, but he would never hug Sonny. This was my cop, remember?

      “Hey, Sonny. Thanks for coming.” Over the years, these two men I loved had come to an understanding through work. This was not the first case they had worked on together and I’m sure it would not be the last. Harry and Sonny stepped outside into the late afternoon sun and I sat down on the bed next to Vivi.

      “You okay, hon?”

      “Oh, I’m just fine, but you’re lookin’ a little red,” she teased.

      “Oh, stop it,” I said.

      “He does it to you, doesn’t he?” She scooted back on the bed to make room, but kept one eyebrow cocked.

      “He who?” I shot back as if shocked at the insinuation.

      “You know, there was a time I thought you’d marry that boy.” She looked at me, seeing right into my soul as only Vivi could.

      “I’m taking the Fifth,” I said, grabbing her water and taking a swig. I decided to get the conversation back on track. We needed to talk about the body, or lack thereof. This was no time to be gossiping about my love life.

      Just then, in walked Bonita Baldwin, the newest investigator on Sonny’s team. She was African-American, plus-sized and drop-dead gorgeous. Sonny had just hired her from Mobile and it was in all the papers that she’d be joining the force. The daughter of Tuskegee professors, this apple sure didn’t fall far from the tree. She’d graduated top of her class and her loud, opinionated mouth had all of our attention, as did her designer shoes. She could size things up in seconds, and she wasn’t afraid to tell it like it was. That’s why Sonny hired her.

      “Hey, Blake, how are you?” She leaned in and gave me a hug. I had met her at a function at City Hall for the police benefit the month before. “We’ve got us a squirrelly little situation here, I see,” she said as she quickly took in the room.

      “I know,” I said. “Vivi is just a mess because of it.”

      “Well, look here, Vivi, not to fret. We’ll get to the bottom of this before long. Just trust me and Sonny. We got this, okay?” she said as she snapped on her latex gloves. And with that, she bent over and began looking all around the bed, lifting the bed skirt until…

      “Oh, my good God in heaven above. What in all hell is this?” And up she came with Deputy Dick in her hand, holding it like it was the Olympic Torch.

      “Vivi, you recognize this nasty thang?”

      Vivi turned ten shades of crimson, threw back the last sip of her water and choked.

      “We’re gonna need us a big ole’ plastic bag for this. Just somebody get over here quick and take this disgusting thing from me!” She was holding it by two fingers, her face contorted somewhere between fear and nausea, turning in circles in the tiny motel room looking for anyone to take the rubbery blue dildo from her perfectly manicured, and thankfully gloved, hand. “Ooh, Lawd have mercy, I need to have my hands sanitized after this!”

      Vivi leaned into me and said, “That’s Deputy Dick.”

      “Well,” I said, “I am so happy to finally meet him in person. He is certainly a lovely shade of blue.” Vivi smiled and that relieved her embarrassment, but only for a second. Another officer came in with a bag and Bonita dropped the “deputy” into it.

      “Have mercy, I ain’t never seen such a big ugly thing as that. It’s gonna give me nightmares….” She went to the sink, tossed her gloves and washed her hands, muttering to herself as she primped in the mirror. Her makeup was a thing of perfection. She looked like a doll with the most beautiful hair and all of it in place, all the time. She, too, was a former pageant queen and knew how to carry herself, plus size and all. Her weight never seemed to matter—if anything, Bonita gave curves a good name. All anyone ever noticed was her beauty and her spunk. As a detective, she was able to avoid the uniform—which was a good thing, since her sense of fashion would never stretch to black polyester. Today, she was wearing one of her many Chanel suits, cream and trimmed in black. She was stunning to the eye.

      Vivi had gathered herself and was wiping her face with the wet cloth Bonita had handed her when she finally spoke.

      “Uh, yes, to answer your question, Bonita, I do recognize that, um, item. It is mine and I had it with me here in the room.” Vivi let out a huge breath as if she had just admitted she knew the secrets of the Vatican.

      Bonita finished cleaning and primping herself and came over to Vivi. “Now don’t you go worrying yourself over this, Vivi. All of us got our kinky little secrets.” She winked at her.

      Vivi smiled up at her from where she was still sitting on the bed.

      “Certainly this one is a good bit…shall we say…bigger than most, but it’ll all be okay.”

      Sonny and Bonita stepped to the doorway and planned their next steps. Vivi was too out of sorts to notice them chatting, but I strained to listen.

      “Sonny, what do you make of this?” Bonita asked.

      “Well, at the moment, none of this is gonna make any sense till we talk to Miss Vivi. Maybe she saw something out of the ordinary, or maybe we can jog her memory when we talk to her.”

      “Do you need me to question her or do you wanna do those honors?” she asked sarcastically. It was clear Bonita would rather hear any story other than the one Vivi would be telling.

      “No, you go on. I’ll talk to her. I’ve known her a long time and she can be, shall we say, difficult. She enjoys being difficult. I’ll handle her.” Sonny kept thinking and talking. “I think you ought to check the usual spots—the hospitals, coroner’s office. Maybe someone already moved the body and this is all just a problem of miscommunication. But just in case, maybe get together a list of Lewis’s coworkers at the university that we can talk to. Somebody’s bound to know somethin’.”

      “No problem, Sonny. I swear, this may be the craziest case I’ve ever worked on and we’re just getting started. That Vivi, she is sure somethin’ else. I don’t believe I’ve ever bagged evidence quite like that little blue friend I found.” They both laughed and shook their heads.

      “Okay, I’ll keep ya posted. Have fun talkin’ to Vivi. Almost wish I could be a fly on the wall for that one, but I’m already gonna have nightmares after meeting the little blue man in there.” She laughed.

      Bonita was a good soul, even if she did talk too much. She did one last mirror check of her lipstick, then hugged me and Vivi and headed