by Jada Ryker
At the same time, Russell’s ponderous tones interjected, “Leaving the scene of a crime is a crime in and of itself—”
“Stop it!” Marisa bellowed.
Diana put her trembling hands to her face. “Zoe…Zoe Walker is her real name…has missed work the past couple of nights, maybe longer.” Diana nodded toward a stocky man walking through the club. “The boss is really upset over it. Zoe pulls in a ton of money with her Gothy Vampire act. Wow, I can’t believe Zoe is dead! What happened to her? Did one of her customers take the vampire thing too far and kill her?”
As the loud rock music vibrated through her, Marisa took Diana’s trembling hand. “We’re not sure of the details, Diana. What can you tell me about her?”
Diana tugged at her raven black ponytail with shaking fingers. “Not much, really. She was a very secretive girl. I heard she was offering the men in here private ‘sessions’ with her.”
“Sessions?” Russell interjected.
“Sex in a grave yard, for a price. Prostitution. Against the rules of the club, not to mention illegal. That’s why I thought one of the whacked-out vampire wannabes might have taken the dark fantasy too far and killed her.”
Marisa drew her breath to speak.
“What about Jonah Graham? What was her connection to him?” Russell’s eyes were intent behind his glasses.
“Jonah came into the club a couple of times a week. I got the impression he didn’t really come in to watch the show. I thought he was here to …” Diana looked around to make sure no one was listening. A group of young men, already intoxicated and laughing, were unsteadily herding themselves toward the stages. Diana glanced sideways at Marisa, and then peeked at Russell through her heavily blackened lashes.
“I know Jonah trafficked in information. He probably blackmailed people he saw in here, men and women with families or careers who didn’t want other people to know they frequented a strip club.” Russell turned to Marisa. “From following you tonight, I can see you’re definitely well-known here at the club. I would have to guess Jonah knew you from here. He also must have seen you at the nursing home, when he was visiting his grandmother and you were spending time with Mrs. Flaxton. Now let’s suppose for the sake of argument you were at the center of the reason for his upset. What if Jonah knew you had murdered the dancer, Ms. Adair?”
Marisa opened her mouth, but Russell waved his hand. “Let’s assume you knew about the cemetery-based activities of Zoe Walker, aka Vamparina. You waited in the woods until she’d finished with her … client. When she was alone in the cemetery, you killed her. Suppose Jonah was in the woods for reasons of his own, perhaps taking photos of his next victim with Zoe, and he saw you kill her. After the argument with his grandmother, Jonah had to have driven straight from the nursing home to the trauma hospital, given the timeline of events. When he confronted you at your work, you had to kill him and blame an unknown assailant.”
The accusations hung in the air like glaring red exclamation points.
Diana rose to her full height of nearly six feet and loomed over the defiant man. “Why on earth would Marisa kill a dancer she barely knew? I never saw them exchange more than a few words in here.”
His eyes widened behind the thick lenses and he snapped his fingers. “Mrs. Flaxton! I know from our records Marisa is not a relative.” He turned toward her, ignoring the other woman. “Why are you so concerned about the conservative Mrs. Flaxton? Could it be you found some easy pickings? You pretend to be so concerned about a wealthy old lady who happens to not have any living relatives so that you can get your hands on her money—”
“You stop right there!” Diana was furious. “Marisa loves Mrs. Flaxton! Why, Mrs. Flaxton saved her from—”
“Stop, Diana! It’s none of his business!”
Russell was relentless. “What if the Goth stripper decided to tell Mrs. Flaxton about your colorful past? She saw you here at the club. She could have threatened your relationship with the staid and upright old woman—”
“You’re way off base. Marisa would never kill anyone.” Her head snapped up as the speakers drowned out the music.
“And now, it’s time for our amateur contest! Come on, ladies out in the audience, and strut your stuff and maybe win $500…”
Diana put her arm around her friend. “I’m sorry, Marisa, I have to get back to work and help judge the so-called contest. Since it’s usually girls from other clubs competing against drunken female customers, it’s easy to judge. Please keep me updated and for goodness sake, don’t do anything dangerous!” She leaned over and kissed Marisa at the corner of her mouth.
Marisa rose. “I’ve had enough of your accusations, Mr. Meeks.”
Russell picked up the cocktail napkin on the table in front of him. He stood, and then gently swiped Diana’s lipstick marks from Marisa’s face. “If you don’t want to tell me anything, I’ll just have to take my suspicions to the police. They may be very interested in hearing what I have to say.”
Marisa clenched her teeth. “You just don’t give up, do you?” If he kept dogging her footsteps like a determined bird dog on the scent of an elusive quail and baying out questions, he’d find out anyway. “What do you want to know?”
“I’d like to know why you’re here. Are you a former stripper?”
Marisa smiled. “I’ll take that as a compliment. No. I’ve never been a stripper. My life pretty much splits into two sections. BR, aka ‘before rehab’ for my addictions, I used to spend my nights here, drinking and talking to the girls and having a great time with them. Now, AR, aka ‘after rehab,’ I stay away from my old haunts. Except for tonight, of course. Once I recognized Zoe as a dancer, I had to come here and ask questions.”
Russell crumbled the cocktail napkin in his fingers. “There’s obviously a strong… friendship between you and Diana. Are you in a relationship with her?” He tossed the lipstick-streaked napkin in the center of table, as if he was a determined prosecutor and the napkin was exhibit A in a capital murder trial.
Marisa opened her mouth to order him to mind his own business. She clamped down both her lips and her anger. Since Jonah had spent time at the nursing home visiting his grandmother and Russell worked there, the payroll coordinator could have valuable information. She couldn’t afford to piss him off. “Diana used to be known as Diana the Huntress, from Greek mythology. She used to stride on stage in a little sparkly silver outfit, and a silver bow and arrow. She’d pretend to get different people in her sights. When the customers thought it was funny to change the H in Huntress to a C, she changed her stage persona to what it is now. The g-string-as-a-basketball-goal throwing game seems to go over well with people.”
Irritated, Russell wadded the lipstick-soiled napkin into a ball.
Marisa sighed. “Diana and I are just friends, nothing more. Sure, lots of the dancers are lesbians, and several of the regular female customers are as well.” Marisa looked over Russell’s shoulder to the packed stages. “BR, when I was drinking, going to the strip club was fun and exciting. I wore skirts so short they were barely legal, needle-thin spike heels, and skimpy tops. I suppose I was a sort of exhibitionist…”
“You used the venue of naked dancers to meet guys?” Russell’s face was perfectly blank.
“No, I didn’t. I wanted to have fun and be looked at and desired, but I didn’t want to act on it with anyone from the club. The feeling of excitement, the euphoria, and sheer joy stemmed from the combination of drinking, music, dancing naked females, and the men watching me. For the most part, I kept my conquests separate.” Marisa braked to a stop. Cooperating to find out what he knew did not mean full disclosure. “I have no idea why I’m telling you all this.”
Russell smiled, his teeth flashing eerily bluish white in the club’s special lighting. “It could be you find me a non-threatening geek.”
Marisa narrowed her eyes. “I make it a point not to jump to conclusions. As a matter of fact, Diana is an excellent example. When I first saw her in here,
I thought she was just a mindless stripper. It was a great lesson in not making assumptions about people. Diana has a wonderful sense of humor. She is very intelligent. She owns her own home. She’s studying real estate in her spare time, for goodness sake. She never told me her real age, but I’m guessing she’s a little older than me, in her early forties. Even though she’s very talented and very fit, she knows her time as a dancer won’t last forever. A year, two years, five years…she won’t be able to cut it anymore. She worried about her future, and she planned for it. She and I are actually a lot alike, and we became friends.”
“Your point is well taken. I made the same assumption.” He leaned forward, his hands flat on the table. “And you met Jonah here?”
“Yes. I saw beyond his exterior of cold calculation, and he saw beyond my party girl trappings.”
“The connection between Jonah and dead girl is this club. What was their relationship?”
Marisa bit her lip. “I wish I knew. The Goth Girl routine started shortly before I checked into rehab. Since my treatment for addiction, I can’t hang out here anymore.”
“Because you need to stay away from alcohol and addictive situations.” It was a statement, not a question.
“The dancers weave their fantasies for the men and women who want their bodies and their sexuality without thought for the minds and hearts beneath the undulating curves and valleys of flesh. Without the blur of alcohol and drugs, I can recognize it.”
“Like getting engrossed in a play, feeling the emotions and sensations of the actors, then going backstage and seeing props made of cardboard and paint.”
Marisa leaned across the table and tried to see Russell’s eyes through the thick lenses. “I’m impressed by your insight, Russell.”
“Regardless of my insight, I still don’t know what Jonah said when he rushed like a maniac to the hospital this morning to see you. What was so important it got him killed?”
Marisa shrugged helplessly. “It didn’t make sense. Jonah was obviously in a foaming lather when he practically broke into my office. His disjointed references to the cemetery and vampires and mist didn’t make any sense.”
“That’s why you were skulking around the old cemetery?”
“I do not skulk. After I had a chance to actually think about Jonah’s words, I decided to check out the cemetery behind the nursing home.”
“Can you start at the beginning when he came to see you and tell me exactly what happened?”
Marisa considered Russell through narrowed eyes. “Why are you so interested in this?”
“The murders appear to have some connection with the nursing home.”
Cha-ching, thought Marisa. Now we’re getting somewhere.
“I spoke with Mr. Napier, the resident who was the last person to see Jonah at the nursing home this morning. Mr. Napier witnessed an argument between Jonah and his grandmother. Mrs. Graham ordered Jonah to tell the authorities what he knew. He refused. Not long after the argument with his grandmother, Jonah was shot in your office. After Jonah’s murder, when we went to Mrs. Graham to tell her about her grandson, she was dead.”
Marisa gasped. “That’s right! Althea told me that Mrs. Graham was found dead in her bed. Was she murdered?”
Russell tilted his head. “Supposedly a natural death, such as a heart attack. Now, I want to do whatever I can to discover the identity of Jonah’s murderer.”
Marisa’s eyebrows flew up in disbelief. “Isn’t that the job of the police?”
“Especially with the murder of the dancer, it’s possible something is going on at the nursing home.”
“You think the residents are in danger!” Marisa’s hand flew to her heart. “Althea!”
Russell put his hand on her arm. When his fingers collided with her skin, she jerked at the sensation of physical, masculine energy. “I just think we need to cover all bases. Now, please tell me exactly what happened this morning.”
Marisa rubbed at her tingling arm where his fingers had touched it. She was surprised at the physical reaction. Perhaps it was time to lift her self-imposed restriction on dating, if this unprepossessing specimen could have such a jarring effect on her senses. “This morning, I had to meet with the auditor who is going over our financials at the hospital.”
“You met with an auditor?” Russell’s head was tilted to one side, his face a mixture of surprise and disbelief. “You go to addiction meetings and a strip club. Don’t tell me you do something dull and prosaic for a living. I refuse to believe any vocation which doesn’t involve death defying risks or dare deviltry.” One corner of his mouth lifted slightly.
“I’m a human resources director.”
Russell parodied taking a direct hit to the stomach. Behind his clunky glasses, his eyes were laughing.
Marisa reluctantly smiled at his antics. “Actually, my job is fraught with danger. One of my responsibilities is to analyze market data and recommend positions for pay increases. Not surprisingly, the employees who don’t get an increase in pay are mad at me.”
“Since I am a poor, pathetic, underpaid payroll coordinator, it makes perfect sense to me.”
“Ah, but the employees who do get an increase are mad, too! Their panties are in a wad because it’s not enough of an increase!”
Russell chuckled. “And then what? They hold you hostage with their pens and pencils, and threaten you with paper cuts?”
“Worse! I have to be careful in the crosswalk in front of the hospital. Sometimes I hear engines gunning!”
Marisa laughed with him. Abruptly, she stopped and put her hand to her mouth in horror. “Oh, my God, how could I have forgotten for even one second what happened today!”
“Marisa. We’re human. We feel horror, shock, disbelief, sorrow. In a crisis, our humor, happiness, our sense of fun gets pushed away. It’s as if we feel an obligation to sustain the state of unhappiness, as if we’re betraying the dead if we don’t. But, thankfully, we can’t sustain it. The uplifting feelings, the hope, come back to us, sometimes in gentle ebbs, sometimes in floods. Have you ever been at a funeral? People talk. Many times, they haven’t seen each other in years. They laugh, they reminisce and, even in those circumstances, they can enjoy themselves.”
Russell leaned toward her. Gently, he touched her hand. “Don’t beat yourself up for being human.”
She pulled her hand away and blinked at the tears. As shouts from the crowd rose to a deafening crescendo, Marisa pulled herself to her feet. “Sounds like they have identified a winner for the amateur contest, which means the rock music will start up again. I’m going to head home.”
Russell rose, and blocked her path. “How about we make a deal? You tell me what happened with Jonah, and I won’t tell the cops I found you standing over the dead stripper.”
“Just a few minutes ago, you had the gall to accuse me of murder.”
“I don’t think you killed anyone. I’ve seen you around the nursing home, visiting Mrs. Flaxton. You couldn’t have two such diametrically opposed halves to your personality. I want to know what happened with Jonah. And I’ll just keep hounding you until you tell me.” He smiled, his teeth appearing extra white in the lighting.
As the classic rock music blared, Marisa grimaced. “Let’s sit in my car.”
In her car, parked in the alley next to the building, Marisa shrugged helplessly. “It didn’t make sense. Jonah was practically hysterical when he barged into my office. His disjointed references to the cemetery and vampires and mist didn’t make any sense.”
Russell twisted in the passenger seat to face her in the dim, flashing multi-colored lights from the club’s sign. “Can you start at the beginning when he came to see you and tell me exactly what happened?”
Marisa related the events with Jonah from the time Jacobs left through the young man’s violent death in her office. When she finished the recital, she spread her hands and twisted her head to meet Russell’s gaze. “Someone took an incredible risk to ensure Jonah never told anyone
whatever it was he knew. I overheard the police interviewing Brandon Proctor, our hospital receptionist. He was visibly upset. The policeman tried to calm Brandon down, but the receptionist was nearly incoherent. The poor officer managed to extract information from Brandon bit by bit. From Brandon’s position behind the counter, he had a clear view of the doors to the corridor leading to my office. At the other end of the corridor, which opens onto the parking lot, the door is always locked from the outside, due to security reasons.”
“I think I see. So a person can leave through that door, but not gain entrance by it, correct?
“Exactly. That door is locked, and no one can get in unless he has a swipe card. By the time the officer asked Brandon if he’d seen anyone, the poor guy seemed to be at the end of his tether. I think when Brandon stated he didn’t see anybody, the policeman was nearly pushed over the edge. He gave up on Brandon, and when I was leaving, I heard the officer ask the head of security to show him the surveillance recordings. We have cameras within and outside the hospital and on the grounds.”
Russell slouched nearly into a ball in the passenger seat and muttered, “Perhaps the policemen weren’t asking the right questions.”
Marisa was perplexed. “What do you mean? It’s a simple question.”
“Never mind.” Russell tapped his strong fingers on the dashboard, his brow deeply furrowed in thought. “How could the killer have known Jonah hadn’t told you anything? He took a terrible risk of discovery in shooting Jonah in a busy hospital. How could he be absolutely sure Jonah hadn’t already told you before the murderer shot him?”
“I told you about the rustling noises I heard. He stood outside my door and listened!”
“He killed Jonah, knowing he had not told you anything of importance. He took a risk, though, standing in the hall in full view.”
As his words, Marisa’s eyes widened. “Russell, there’s an outer office between the hall and my office. After my assistant was laid off in the wake of the last round of budget cuts, the office remained vacant.” Marisa put a shaking hand to her forehead. “The murderer must have stood there, listening to every word.”
