Dan Sharp Mysteries 4-Book Bundle (52 page)

“Welcome to
Casa delle Candele
,” he intoned with a bow.

Dan presented him with a bottle of Chartreuse. Donny took it with an expression of admiration and disbelief. He turned to Trevor.

“I’m sure I have your civilizing influence to thank for this. Before meeting you, the only thing he ever brought over was a two-four of beer and an occasional litre of Scotch when things weren’t going so well. So, to you, I say a heartfelt thank-you.”

“You’re most welcome,” Trevor replied.

Dan shook his head. “We can’t all afford your standards,” he said. “But just this once.”

He looked past Donny’s shoulder into the condo.

“I’m dying to know who the mystery guest is.” He lowered his voice. “I hope it’s not some old trick of yours.”

Donny smiled mysteriously. “Speak friend and enter.”

He led them down the hallway to the sitting room, where a woman bedecked in a sequined pantsuit and feather boa sat waiting. Her skin was burnished bronze, her lips pomegranate red and her hair a white Amazonian flag thrust straight up. On seeing Dan,
she smiled and stood.

“Hello, Daniel.” The voice was throaty, warm.

Dan’s mouth fell open in a clichéd expression of surprise.

“Domingo Rhodes,” he managed at last.

“You haven’t forgotten.”

“No, of course not.” Dan turned apologetically to Trevor. “Domingo, this is my partner, Trevor James.”

“Delighted.” Domingo took Trevor’s hand and held it, gazing coolly into his eyes.

“A pleasure to meet you, Domingo,” Trevor said, sensing heightened emotion in the room but not recognizing the reason for it.

“Domingo’s an old friend,” Dan said after a moment.

“And former neighbour,” she added with a laugh, finally releasing Trevor’s hand. “We go back a long way. Way before your time.” She glanced up at Donny. “Or his.”

“Always proprietary,” Donny chided. “Have a seat.” He turned to Trevor. “What’ll you have? Domingo’s drinking a crantini. I’ve also got lychee and mango, if that’s of interest. Gin or vodka. Otherwise, there are the usual pernicious concoctions.”

“Summertime and the living’s fine,” Trevor said. “I’ll try a lychee martini. Gin, please.”

“Excellent,” Donny replied, before turning to Dan. “
Et pour monsieur?
”

Dan’s mouth twitched but nothing came out.

Donny rolled his eyes. “Right — you’ll have a beer, as per usual. I’ll see what I’ve got in the back of my fridge.”

He left the room.

Domingo looked at Dan, sizing him up in a series of visual snapshots. “It’s been a long time, Dan. It’s really good to see you again.”

“And you,” Dan said, hoping he didn’t sound as stilted as he felt. “It must be what … four, five years since you moved?”

“More than that. We last celebrated Ked’s eighth birthday together.”

“Seven, then. He turns fifteen next month.”

“There you are then.” Domingo’s eyes sparkled, as though everything were a source of merriment for her.

“Are you still with…?”

“Adele, yes. We’re still together. It’ll be twenty years next summer.”

“Congratulations. And the hair looks terrific, by the way,” Dan added, gazing at her white ruff. “When did you start dyeing it?”

Domingo gave him a wistful smile. “Not dyed, but thanks anyway. It’s the chemo, hon. It grew back like this.”

Dan made a little noise of helpless acknowledgment. “I’m sorry,” he said at last. “I hadn’t heard.”

“It’s all right. I didn’t tell anyone.”

Donny returned with Trevor’s martini and a beer bottle with a napkin tied deftly around its neck for Dan.

He picked up his own glass, raising it to the room with a nod. “To friends, old and new!”

Dinner was going well. The flames wavered and glowed brighter as evening came on. Donny leapt up from time to time to check on something or stir a pot, managing to perform both chef and host duties to perfection. A bocconcini and basil salad followed the
gnochetti in brodo
, a light, flavourful soup. They’d just started in on the
risotto ai funghi
— it was a decidedly Italian-themed evening — when Domingo asked about Lester.

“He’s gone home,” Donny said, matter-of-factly, though the forlorn look on his face told another side of the story.

Dan suddenly flashed back to Ked’s comment. He sat up in his chair. “Wait a minute. By ‘home’ do you mean he went back to his family in Oshawa?”

“Yes, he left yesterday. I haven’t told anyone yet.” He turned to Domingo. “I keep secrets too.”

Dan was floored by the news. “How did this
happen? Because this” — he looked around him — “
this
is his real home. I thought he knew that by now.”

Donny shrugged, avoiding eye contact with the others around the table. He would not betray his real feelings.

“Lester knows he’s always welcome here, but he’s turning sixteen next month and he misses his mother. Cow that she is.”

“Children always miss their mothers,” Domingo said sympathetically. “No matter who else we have in our lives, no matter how fortunate and blessed we may be, we have just one birth mother, and it’s important to get that relationship right.”

Donny’s eyes flickered. “Lester said something like that, only not quite so articulately. It turns out he phoned her on Mother’s Day. They’ve been in touch every other week.” He shrugged. “He misses her and wants to reconnect. It’s as simple as that.”

“Are you saying he’s gone back to live with them for good?” Dan asked, still struggling with the news.

Donny twirled his glass, looked away. “I am. He has.”

“What about the stepfather?” Dan asked. “Won’t he be a problem?”

Donny sighed and set the glass down. He gestured helplessly, as though to say there was nothing he could do. “I have no doubt you’re right,” he said, “but it’s not up to me.”

Dan recalled the garishly dressed, crudely spoken couple he’d met the previous year while working on a missing persons case involving a young man named Richard Philips. He hadn’t been at all impressed with the mother or stepfather, but the real dilemma came when he located the fifteen-year-old, rechristened Lester and working in the city’s porn industry with falsified ID. Dan was forced to choose between returning him to what was surely a terrifying and destructive life for a young gay man and finding a better place for him. Donny had stepped in to fill the breach, offering Lester temporary sanctuary, but ended up taking him in as a surrogate son, albeit covertly. The law was not on the side of runaways and their keepers, however well-meaning.

Dan looked at Donny. “What will he say about where he’s been living for the past year? Aren’t you afraid this might bring a lot of trouble for you?”

Donny shook his head. “He told her he’s been living with friends, but he kept it vague. It could have legal ramifications for me for helping him hide, but on the other hand I know the kid well enough by now. He’s not going to give them my name or address. He’s anxious to get back to school and not miss another year. He knows he’s falling behind. And in another month he’ll be legal, so he can return here any time to visit.”

“Your tutoring is probably far more valuable than anything he’ll learn in high school,” Dan snorted.

“Well, yes, I agree that everyone should know about Lennie Tristano and the history of jazz, but it’s not exactly going to guarantee him a job when all is said and done, is it?”

Dan put down his drink. “I don’t like it,” he said. “I met those people. They were horrible. As much as I might feel for a mother and child who’ve been separated, it was doing him no good to be living with them. That stepfather was a homophobic monster. The way he talked about Lester made me cringe and I hadn’t even met the boy then.”

“I know, I know,” Donny said. “I don’t like it either, but I have no choice.”

Trevor spoke up. “Maybe once he turns sixteen he can mention you. It might help his case with the parents if they know he has you standing behind him.”

“Probably not,” Donny said. “The truth is, they’re having a hard enough time dealing with the fact their kid is gay. He’s not going to back down on that one. I doubt it would improve matters by telling them he’s been living with a ‘person of colour.’”

Dan turned to Domingo. “What do you think?”

“I’ve met Lester a few times. He’s a very nice boy. But like any kid, he has to make his own mistakes. Live and learn.”

“That’s right,” Donny said. “I won’t be the surrogate dad who kept him apart from his blood family. But as far as I’m concerned, I’m his chosen family. I told him he’s welcome back here any time, even if it’s just for a weekend stay-over.”

They sat there silently contemplating this.

Donny stood. “Time for dessert,” he said, heading for the kitchen.

“Seems kind of hard,” Trevor ventured when Donny had gone. “Donny’s looked after the boy for a year and now he just wants to leave.”

“It’s ingratitude,” Dan said, colouring. “I don’t like it.”

Domingo looked at him sympathetically. “It’s not ingratitude, Dan. It’s a fifteen-year-old boy wanting to be a part of his family before it’s too late. Don’t judge him for it. Time will tell if it’s the right thing or not.”

Trevor put a hand on Dan’s. “In any case, Donny has been both generous and courageous in having Lester here with him this past year. Let’s hope it works out for the best.”

“Oh, it will,” Donny said, flouncing back into the room with a tray of tiramisu. “Anyway, that’s me — social issues galore. But having that boy here has given me a new lease on life. No regrets — and I have you to thank for it, of course,” he said, looking at Dan. “Anyway, I’d rather not talk about it any more, if you don’t mind.”

Domingo excused herself to use the bathroom. When she was gone, Dan turned and hissed at Donny. “What is she doing here?”

Donny gave him a baleful look. “She called me up last week and said she wanted to get in touch with you. I thought it was time you two talked, so I offered her your phone number. Then I remembered you were coming over this evening, so I invited her to join us. And here you both are.”

Dan shook his head. “I didn’t even know you’d kept in touch with her.”

“I’ve kept in touch with all your cast-offs.” He affected a mock-shiver. “There were so many of them I thought at one point I’d have to open a shelter.”

Trevor grinned but turned away so Dan wouldn’t see.

“There’s nothing for you to worry about,” Donny told Trevor. “You’re one of the few he’s met who were worth keeping. Apart from moi, of course.”

Domingo returned. Donny refreshed everyone’s drink.

Trevor looked over at Donny. “Dan said you’d started a new job.”

Donny’s face lit up. “Yes! You are looking at the official buyer for Mondo Beautique. It’s a very upscale specialty chain where they purposely price things higher than necessary to discourage non-exclusive clientele.
I fit right in.”

Glasses were raised all around the table.

“Are you still in the private investigation business?” Domingo asked Dan.

“More or less. I’ve been on my own for the past year, though. It’s been tough.”

Donny looked over. “But not so tough that he would ever reconsider the offer to go back to his old firm.”

Dan shook his head. “It was time for me to get out. As for the sort of cases I’m handling now, you don’t want to know.”

“Why is that?” Domingo asked.

Dan shrugged. “It’s mostly a lot of chasing down child support evaders.”

Trevor shot Dan a look to say he was being needlessly disingenuous, but he was not going to spill his secrets for him.

Donny caught the look passing between them. “Tell,” he said. “You are doing something besides chasing deadbeats. What is it now? Chimney sweep? Rat catcher?”

“Nothing so innocuous,” Dan said. “In fact, the opposite.”

He told them briefly about his unsuccessful attempt at tracking down Darryl Hillary.

“He was sent to jail eleven years ago for dating a fourteen-year-old girl. He was nineteen at the time. They were serious about each other, apparently, till his father turned him in for statutory rape. He ended up doing two years in jail.”

“And now he’s dead,” Domingo said.

Donny shook his head. “Seems a bit harsh when you consider Michael Jackson dated a fourteen-year-old boy and didn’t do any time at all. But maybe boys don’t count.”

“I agree with you,” Domingo said. “It’s reverse discrimination. Had it been a fourteen-year-old girl sitting on Jackson’s lap, he would have ended up in jail on charges sooner. But because boys are supposed to be tougher than girls, people weren’t freaking out as much, especially not in the arts community, where homosexuality is taken as a matter of course.”

“It’s true,” Dan said. “But the issue here is whether it’s immoral for two people who want to have sex to do so no matter what their ages.”

Donny nodded. “I always wonder if Liz Taylor knew. She defended Jackson to the ends of the earth. I can’t believe she’s naïve about such things. All those rumours about child molestation can’t have passed her by.”

“She’s a smart woman and apparently they’re very close,” Trevor said. “Remember how she went to Singapore to bring him back to the States after the charges were laid?”

“I think she believed they were in love,” Domingo said. “And that they were entitled to it.”

The others turned to look at her.

She shrugged. “After all, the boy was an adolescent, not a child. Jackson might like ’em young, but that doesn’t make him a child molester.”

“I agree,” Dan said. “I don’t think he’s a child molester. Not in the way we think of it. He was dating a younger man, not unlike what happened to my client and his girlfriend. If it were such a dirty secret, Jackson wouldn’t have dated the boy in public. He even brought him to the music awards. He just misjudged the public’s ability to tolerate such things.”

Donny nodded. “Jerry Lee Lewis married his thirteen-year-old cousin, for god’s sake!”

“What did that make him?” Dan asked.

“A pariah. It pretty much ended his recording career for nearly a decade. He also claims to have been fourteen when he married his first wife, who was seventeen. They just did it young down there.”