Bone Dance (26 page)

“I've been hired to look into your husband's death,” I said.

She glared at me as she dropped a handful of ice into her glass, poured three fingers of Scotch and added a slice of lemon on top. “I'd offer you a drink,” she said, “but I don't like you.”

“That's okay, ma'am.”

“So, that woman hired you.” Mrs. Chicago looked me over. “She must be desperate.”

I forced a smile. “Can I ask you about your husband's activities on the day of his death?” The alcohol vapours coming off her were making me dizzy.

“He got up in the morning like usual and went to work.”

“Did he seem different in any way? Was he nervous? Anxious?”

She swirled the liquor in the glass, the only sound was the tinkle of ice cubes glancing off crystal. Finally she looked at me, her face lined with sorrow. “I don't know. I was still in bed.”

“What's going on here?” I whirled around at the sound of a voice directly behind me.

“Oh, Amanda, I'm glad you're here.” Mrs. Chicago pointed a finger at me. “She's here about your father's murder. She's a private eye. A private dick.” She uttered a short, harsh laugh and stumbled out of the room.

The woman standing behind me had to be six feet tall and built like a linebacker. I glanced down. I could see the can of pepper spray, nestled against my wallet, waiting for its chance to shine. I shifted the tape recorder to my left hand.

Dark, glittering eyes fixed me to the spot. “What are you doing here? Why are you bothering my mother? Who hired you?” The questions came short and fast.

“My client's name is irrelevant,” I said.

She laughed. “Let me guess. That stripper he was running with, right?”

I didn't respond.

She tossed her briefcase on a chair. “What a joke.”

“So you know about your father's girlfriend. Did your mother? Before this, I mean.”

“Of course, we knew.” She gathered the lemon slices and dropped them into the garbage. “She wasn't the first.”

“How many were there?”

She turned toward me and shrugged. “Who knows. He did manage to survive the other relationships, though.”

“There must be other suspects,” I said.

“Like who?”

“Your father had some very shady clients. Do you think any of them would want him dead?”

Amanda Chicago leaned back against the counter and crossed her arms. “Why would they want him dead? He performed a service for them. You don't kill off your service workers.”

“Maybe he knew too much.” I looked around the huge, gleaming kitchen. “Maybe he was shuffling a few cards from the bottom of the deck.”

She shook her finger at me. “No! My father had some less than respectable clients, but everything he did was strictly above board! He was well compensated for his knowledge, that's all. Everything he had, he earned.”

“Okay!” I held up my hands in surrender. “It was just a thought.”

“You're wasting your time. She did it. It's obvious.”

Amanda herded me toward the door. “I'm sorry my mother and I couldn't help.” She paused. “Actually, I'm not sorry. She did it. I just wish we still had the death penalty in this country.”

I stopped half in and half out of the door. “It's all circumstantial. They won't convict her on a little bit of lipstick that can be bought from any drugstore in the country.”

Amanda smiled. “I'm told that it can take months for the police to put together a critical mass of evidence. Eventually, it all stacks up. The fingerprints, the cigarette butts, the note—they all come together in time. My mother and I are patient people. We can wait.”

I swung onto the Queensway and headed for home. All that remained of the sunset was a ribbon the colour of tomato soup in my rear-view mirror. Deep in thought, I crested Kanata Hill,
barely noticing the lights of the city spread out below.

Everyone wanted to point the finger at my client. Abe Ivanov couldn't wait to see her charged. But, in reality, he had inherited a lot of big-money clients.

The family. They had plenty of motive, but could they actually do the dirty deed? Not mama. Amanda? She could have, but why? She seemed fond of her father, and apparently this wasn't his first affair.

Then there was Bolino. Had Chicago known too much? Was he stealing?

I sighed. Amanda Chicago had been right about one thing—all available evidence pointed to Dawn Rapture.

I pulled into the parking lot behind my apartment building. My brain itched with the knowledge that I was missing something. I ran through Ms. Rapture's version again: arrival, body, phone, leave. Closing my eyes, I chanted it like a mantra—arrival, body, phone, leave.

I rewound the tape of my interview with the Chicagos and hit the
PLAY
button.

I never did make it to my apartment. Instead, I headed downtown to have a little chat with Dawn Rapture.

“You ever been here before?” Dawn asked.

“No, can't say I have.”

“Women come to the show sometimes. Usually with their husbands. I guess they figure it's better to be embarrassed than bored.”

I shuddered. Even backstage, you could feel the thick aroma of loneliness and desperation pressing in from the other side of the curtain.

“I wanted to ask you about the message Gary left for you to meet him at the hotel.”

“Okay.”

“Do you still have it?”

“No.”

I stood back as Dawn caked her head in hairspray. “You erased it off your answering machine?” I asked.

“It wasn't a phone message,” she said. “It was a note. He must have dropped it off when I wasn't home. He'd been writing me little love notes for a few months.”

My mouth went dry. I fumbled through the contents of my purse before remembering that my phone had been turned into Toyota toe-jam.

“I'm up next.” Dawn headed for the door.

I snagged the cellphone that was sticking out of her purse. “Can I borrow this?”

“Knock yourself out,” she said.

It was impossible to get reception inside, so I weaved my way through the bar and out onto the street.

I dialled Sophie's home number. As I waited for her to answer, I paced back and forth between the club and the neighbouring deli.

“Hi, Soph,” I said when she answered.

Static stuttered in my ear. “God, this is a bad connection,” Sophie said.

I walked a bit farther from the building. “I'm at Muffinz, that strip joint where Dawn Rapture works.”

“What do you want now?”

“When we were talking yesterday, you said the evidence consisted of fingerprints and cigarette butts, right?”

“Yeah.”

“What about the note?”

“Note? There wasn't any . . .”

A large figure dressed in black charged at me from the doorway of the club. I cried out as strong hands pushed me backward into the dark, narrow space between the buildings. The phone clattered to the pavement.

“Help!” I yelled as I landed hard on my tailbone.

A big, gloved hand came down over my face. My assailant straddled me, holding my legs down.

I fumbled at my purse, but it was jerked off my shoulder and dumped onto the asphalt. The contents scattered.

My captor picked up the little canister of pepper spray. The face slowly lowered toward mine, the pepper spray held between us.

“Is this what you were looking for?” Amanda Chicago asked. She was dressed in black motorcycle leathers with a fuzzy mustache decorating her upper lip.

“Maybe I should use it on you.” She pointed the canister at me.

Clamping my eyes shut, I held my breath.

She laughed. “Relax.”

The hand lifted off my face, and I let my breath out in a whoosh.

“You have something that I want.” She settled more heavily on me. “I think you know what it is.”

My respirations were reduced to grunts. “The tape.”

“Smart, smart, smart.” She tapped my forehead with the pepper spray canister.

“It was in my purse. It's on the ground somewhere.”

She reached into a pocket and pulled out a small, black revolver. Standing up, she said, “Then I guess you'd better find it.”

On my hands and knees, I sifted through the detritus of
city life and quick, fevered love. I felt nauseous. “Why did you kill him, Mandy? That's what he called you, wasn't it? His little Mandy.”

“Shut up.”

I sat back on my heels and looked at her. My heart pounded at the back of my throat. “You could have killed her instead. She's just a stripper. Who would care?”

“Keep looking!”

I continued moving garbage back and forth.

“You have no idea what it was like to watch my father turn into a simpering fool. Over a stripper! He belonged to me!”

“Maybe he loved her,” I said.

“He did not love her! He loved me! Not her.” Amanda kicked me in the ribs. I lay on my side, gasping.

She kicked me again. “Get up! Keep looking.”

It was all beginning to make sense. The little mustache. I hadn't recognized her until she'd spoken. Anyone could be forgiven for mistaking her for a man. I wondered if she made a habit of visiting the club.

“Really clever with the cigarette butts.”

She smiled. “Weeks ago, I came here to kill her. Then I saw the way the old men drooled over the dancers, and I realized he'd come back. I couldn't kill them all.”

“Did you talk to her that night?” I asked.

“I bought her a drink. She was flirting with me. Unbelievable. I helped myself to a few cigarette butts on the way out. Now all will be well,” Amanda continued. “She'll be in jail. You'll be dead. Daddy will never give his love to anyone else again.”

I shifted a little farther down the alley.

Amanda's toe touched something. She picked up my tape recorder and held it up for me to see. “Look what I found.” She played back the last few seconds of the tape, popped it out
and tucked it into a pocket.

She smiled at me. “I guess this is it. Too bad for you.”

“Wait,” I said. “I need to know one thing. How did you get him to the hotel room.”

“I suggested to Sal Bolino that my father needed a little bonus. Something special to make him relax. He'd been under too much stress lately. So it was arranged.”

“Were you there? Did you watch?”

“I waited in the closet. I just kept telling myself it would be over soon. After the girl left, he went into the bathroom to clean up. I walked over and said ‘Hi, Daddy', and shot him.”

“In the heart because he broke yours.”

She stared at me.

I inched away from her and felt around for something to use as a weapon. “Then you wrote the note to Dawn Rapture? So that she'd come to the room and leave evidence?”

She laughed. “You're just too damn smart. For all the good it's going to do you.”

“Where is that note? Dawn's note?”

“She leaves her car windows open. How stupid is that?”

She crouched down directly in front of me. “I want to watch your face when it happens. My dad looked so surprised.”

She raised the gun.

I glanced down as my hand touched a cool cylinder. The dark blue hairspray can was nearly invisible in the poor light.

“Bye, bye,” she said.

I twisted to the left. There was a sharp “crack”, and the breeze of the bullet buffeted my cheek. I jerked the little bottle up and pressed the button.

Amanda yelped and staggered backwards, wiping at her eyes. I launched myself at her. She waved the gun wildly as we bounced back and forth between the walls of the buildings. I
grabbed her hand and scraped it along the brick, pressing with all my strength, leaving skin behind.

The gun hit me on the shoulder, and we both dived for it, elbowing each other. She kicked it, then threw herself forward. I fell on top of her. Digging a knee into her kidneys, I lunged past her and snatched it, leaving her empty-handed.