Kiss of Evil (23 page)

“Magazine, of course. It’s what Demetrius did
inside
I’m talking about. Something he did all on his own.” Hank opens the magazine to page 15 and points to the bottom. “See there? See how that’s circled?” The number 15, in the lower right, is circled in a shaky red ink.

“Yeah,” Paris says. “
Okay
.”

“And look here.” Hank now flips to page 28. Same thing. Then he flips to page 35, where the page number is once again circled very carefully in red. A quick scan of the magazine shows that these are the only pages with circled page numbers.

“Mr. Salters did this, you say?”

“Absolutely. I watched him do it.”

“And it was right after I left?”

“Well, it was right after he was sedated,” Hank says. “Don’t know what you did, but you scared the fuckin’ shit out of him. Literally.”

“Sorry about that.”

“No big deal. We usually have one or two of the boys go nuclear by lunchtime every day.”

“And what do you think it means?”

“No idea. I looked at the pages, at the articles, but they didn’t seem to be about anything, so as I can figure. One is a story about Edie Falco. She was that lady on—”

“
The Sopranos.
Right, Hank. I’m just not sure why you think this has something to do with me.”

“Can’t say, for sure,” Hank says. “But Demetrius doesn’t hardly ever do
any
thing. Ever. So, for him to pick up a pen is pretty weird. This took him almost an hour, you know.”

“Did he say anything?”

“Yeah. Well, kind of. Up until the drugs kicked in, he kept mumbling something under his breath. I got close, but not too close, if you know what I mean.” Hank taps the side of his nose. “But I could hear him saying something over and over again. Like a prayer, almost.”

“What was he saying?”

“Well, I’m not
totally
sure about this. But it sounded like—you’re gonna think this is crazy.”

Paris almost smiles. “Trust me on this one, Hank. Crazy is what I do for a living. What did Mr. Salters say?”

“Once again, I wouldn’t swear to this,” Hank says, looking around the underground lot, as if the very act of entering the Justice Center parking garage had automatically put him under oath. “It sounded like he was saying ‘
secret garden
.’”

36

Randi Burstein had never seen the man at the counter before, but she seemed to recall hearing the name somewhere. On the younger side of thirty-five, she thinks. Too well dressed to be a cop. Too handsome to be a civil servant.

Lawyer.
Definitely.

Who else ever comes in here?

“I can get that file for you right away,” Randi says. “Going to need some ID of course. Social security number at the very least.”

“Of course,” he says, handing her a social security card. “May I ask you something . . .”

“Randi.”

“May I ask you something, Randi?”

“Sure,” she says, hopes awakening. In the fifteen years she had worked in the records office of the Veterans Administration, she had yet to meet a man she had seen, socially, more than twice. Now that she was over forty, and a few pounds south of svelte, the opportunities seem to be diminishing every day. But, still, hope springs and all. “What would you like to know?”

“Have there been other folks requesting these files lately?”

“Now, now,” she says, a little disappointed, but still happy to engage in banter with someone so handsome, someone so much younger than the usual fossils with whom she deals. “You
know
I am not permitted to tell you that.”

“Well, I believe that rule exists because no one ever asks as nicely as I just have.”

“That may be true,” she says, crossing the room, pulling out the file drawer marked
Saar-Salz
. She finds the file, then closes the drawer with a slightly exaggerated bump of her ample hip. She makes a quick photocopy of the requested file. “I am
still
not allowed to break it.” She lays the form on the counter, slashes an X with her pen. “Sign for me there, please.”

The man scribbles a signature with his own pen.

“Any special plans for New Year’s Eve?” she asks, retrieving an envelope from beneath the counter, hoping to keep the conversation going.

“
Oh
yes,” the man answers. “I’m going to have a party.”

“Well, that sounds like fun,” Randi says as she slips the photocopy into a manila envelope, seals it. “Big or small?”

“Huge,” he says. “In fact, I’m thinking of inviting the whole world.”

“That would include me, of course,” she replies, amazed at her boldness. Maybe it’s just the holidays, she thinks. Or maybe the two eggnogs at lunch. She lays her left hand atop the counter with great deliberateness. The hand that sports no wedding or engagement ring whatsoever. “What should I wear?”

The man pauses for a moment, dramatically lost in thought. “A black leather jacket,” he says with a smile. “I think you would look very sexy in a black leather jacket and a little white skirt.”

Two full minutes later, long after the man with the dark eyes and the darker lashes had left without a further word, Randi Burstein finds herself still standing at the counter, a little flushed, a lot intrigued, her mind giddily rummaging through her closets.

37

Detective John Salvatore Paris—whose brain had already formed an exasperating Möbius strip of the numbers
152835
, all wrapped around the words
secret garden
—meets Sergeant Carla Davis in the parking lot at Macy’s in University Heights.

Greg Ebersole and a team of six officers from the University Heights PD stand by in two locations, less than a block from the Westwood address.

The swingers party is a long shot, there had been unanimous task force consent on that point, but, for the moment, it is all they have. The neighborhoods around the two murder scenes had been canvassed and recanvassed. Forensics had uncovered nothing useful so far.

Carla drives the rest of the way to the house on Westwood Road, where she finds a spot on the street that is ten houses east of their destination. The number of cars on the street indicate that this is a rather large gathering.

As they approach the house at the crest of the hill—a stately gray colonial—there is only a dim light on in the curtained picture window; there is no loud music. Nor is there a light on over the side door, where Carla was instructed to go.

From his vantage, at the foot of the drive, Paris stops for a moment, conducts a quick inventory of the house, the neighborhood. Sleepy, bucolic, suburban; mostly brick houses with occasional lavish Christmas displays, surgically plowed driveways. A place where dogs don’t bark after ten and nobody needs a new muffler.

Yet, Paris thinks as he makes his way up the drive, it is also a place that might be plugged directly into a pair of unspeakable crimes.

Carla rings the doorbell, steps between Paris and the door. She had said on the way over that getting in was still a fifty-fifty proposition, even though they had been invited to the party on a probationary basis. But Carla Davis knows what she has and figures, rightly, that if she is the first thing that whoever opens the door sees, they’ll get in. She is wearing a bulky wool coat; her long hair is down around her shoulders and her perfume is driving Paris around the bend. In contrast, Paris is wearing a black blazer, black T-shirt, black slacks, no overcoat. He looks like a gay Johnny Cash.

After a few moments, the door is answered by a short, heavyset white man in his early fifties. His hair, jet black and thinning, is swept into a dramatic comb-over, the individual strands making the top of his pasty head look like a UPC bar code label. He is wearing a green cardigan, the kind that were popular when Paris was in junior high school.

“
Hi
,” he says, very enthusiastically. “You must be Cleopatra.” He opens the storm door.

“Yes.” Carla extends her hand. The man takes it, kisses her on the fingers.

“Charmed, I’m sure,” he says.

They’re not even in the door and Paris is ready to puke.

“My name is Herb,” he says, finally releasing her hand. “But you can call me Dante, my dear. Please come in.” He steps to the side, letting Carla into the small vestibule, deliberately making her pass by him in the narrow doorway so he could achieve maximum friction.

“And let me guess,” he says, looking at Paris. “Marc Antony, right?” Herb laughs at this, as if it were the most extraordinarily clever thing ever thought of.

“You can call me John,” Paris says.

Paris extends his hand, but Herb looks away at the last second, into the kitchen, pretending he doesn’t see it. Clearly an attempt at belittling the new male arrival in front of the new female arrival. “Come on
in
,” he finally says to Paris, as if scolding him. “You’re letting all the heat out.”

“Whatever you say,
Dante
,” Paris replies, wanting to introduce Herb to the back of his hand before asking him about the heating bills here at the Inferno, but opting against it.

For the time being.

Perfectly ordinary kitchen, very tidy. White toaster, white can opener, something that looks like a bread machine, a small dinette table with a frosted glass top. The overhead lights are off, but there are a dozen candles distributed around the kitchen. Paris can hear electronic dance music coming from somewhere, but it is extremely faint.

Carla and Paris bunch together in the small kitchen and wait for Herb. He shuts the door, steps inside, climbs the three stairs to the kitchen, rubbing his hands together. “So, who was it that nominated you for memberships again?”

“Teddy and Sue,” Carla says.

“Oh that’s right,” he says. “Teddy and Sue. Have you swung with them before, Cleopatra?”

“No,” Carla says. “Only some cyber. They like to show, you know.”

“Do they ever,” Herb says. “And Sue is
such
a sub.”

“Really? Every time I cybered with them Teddy was the submissive. Not Sue. Sue was always the dom.”

Paris’s head is spinning with the terms, the Cleavers-in-bondage atmosphere of this kitchen. For a moment, he thinks they’ve been made.

“Is that a fact?” Herb says, staring intently at Carla, his neck craning upward at what looks like a painful angle. Then his resolve breaks. “Sorry. Just testing you a little. We’ve got to be careful, you know.”

“I understand.”

“Sue really
is
the beastmaster around here. There’s a half-dozen guys scared to death of her.”

“I’ll bet,” Carla says.

“But they like it that way,” Herb adds. “Here, let me take your coat.” He steps behind Carla, purposely in front of Paris. Paris can smell the scotch, the breath freshener. Herb also reeks of moth flakes and Obsession.

When Herb slips Carla’s coat from her shoulders, he gasps slightly, an involuntary heterosexual male reaction that Paris himself has to stifle. Carla is wearing a skintight white dress, cut nearly down to her waist in the back, the hem about halfway up her thigh. Her toned back muscles and narrow waist accentuate her hips, her long, sinewy legs; her skin looks smooth and radiant in the candlelight.

She turns to face the two men, taking her coat from Herb. “I’ll carry it, thanks,” she says.

If Herb has an objection, seeing Carla Davis from the front makes it jailbreak his brain. It is just chilly enough in the kitchen to clearly define the contours of Carla’s breasts, the outline of her nipples through her dress. She wears a dazzling silver cross on a delicate chain. Herb is nearly catatonic with lust. Paris isn’t too far behind him. He’d never seen Carla Davis in anything but business suits or blues.

“Oh
my
,” Herb says. “You are . . .”

“I am what, honey?” Carla says, flashing a smile, touching Herb’s cheek lightly.

“You are . . . . going to be
very
popular.”

“You’re a doll,” Carla says. “Now, do you have a little girls’ room where I can freshen up a bit?”

“Of course,” Herb says. “Right this way.”

Paris is left by himself in the kitchen for a minute. The desire to start opening cupboards and drawers and cabinets is almost overwhelming, the need to know what kind of cranberry sauce people who do this sort of thing prefer.

Herb returns, flushed from his interaction with such a new and delicious and by God black and gorgeous amazon female. He motions to Paris to sit at the dining room table, a thoroughly unused walnut French provincial set. Paris sits, knowing that Carla needs a few minutes to activate the small video surveillance camera she’s carrying in her clutch purse.

“So how long have you two been in the lifestyle, John?”

Paris hesitates for a moment before answering. “A year, maybe.”

“First party?”

“No,” Paris says, and leaves it at that, hoping Herb might get the point that he is the strong, silent type. Herb does not.

“Cleopatra is stunningly beautiful.”

“Yes,” Paris says.

“Are you two married?”

“Yes.”

Herb pauses for a moment. “How long?”

“Writing a
book
, Herb?”

“No . . . I . . .” Herb begins, starting to color. “We just like to know a little about the people we let into our homes, that’s all. Surely you can understand that in this day and age.”

Paris actually does understand. He sure as hell wouldn’t want Herb at
his
house. “Five years.”

Herb nods, silently absorbing the notion of five years with a woman like Cleopatra. “You are a very lucky man, John. A
very
lucky man.”

Paris leans forward and smiles at Herb in a man-to-man, swingin’-cat-to-swingin’-cat kind of way. He says, softly: “Luck has nothing to do with it, Herbie. Nothing at
all
.”

Herb, thoroughly outcocked, laughs, but it is a dry, mirthless sound, a sound born of intense envy and plain macho rivalry.