Ink Flamingos

by Karen E. Olson

  Jeff Coleman stood just inside the door, his hands in his pockets as he stared up at Ace’s most recent works of art. When he saw me approach, he grinned.

  “Quiet around here, Kavanaugh.”

  Jeff was an inch or so shorter than my own five-nine, with a salt-and-pepper buzz cut. A life lived hard showed in his face. He’d been in the Marines, served in the first Gulf War, and taken over his mother’s tattoo shop about ten years ago. He used to smoke like a chimney but gave it up recently. There were some allusions to drinking and drugs, but by all appearances, he wasn’t into all of that now. At least not that I’d seen.

  “Let everyone go early,” I said. “I’m leaving shortly myself.” I glanced quickly out the glass door to see if Harry was around yet, but I didn’t see him.

  “Expecting someone?” Jeff asked, coming toward me.

  I shrugged. “I sort of have a date. But I have to cancel.”

  “That’s harsh, Kavanaugh. Canceling when he shows up. Why don’t you just call him?”

  “I can’t. I don’t have his number.”

  He frowned, but to his credit didn’t say anything. “What are you doing here?” I asked.

  “Maybe I want to check out the competition,” he said. “See how the other half lives.”

  Jeff liked to try to get under my skin about how I had a more upscale shop, where we did only custom tattoos, as compared to his street shop where he only did flash, the stock tattoos that lined the walls of his shop. I hate to admit it, but it usually worked.

  Not tonight, though. I was too distracted by Harry’s impending arrival.

  “Really, Jeff, why are you here?”

  “Maybe I’m a little worried about you. You know, those pictures on that blog. I got the sense that it shook you up a bit.” He noticed I was looking outside again. “Are you expecting the doc?”

  He meant Colin Bixby. I shook my head. “No.”

  A wide smile spread across his face. “You have a new boyfriend?”

  I made a face at him.

  “A new girlfriend?”

  I rolled my eyes. “Just tell me why you’re here.”

  The smile disappeared. “I was worried about you, like I said. I don’t like the idea of pictures of you showing up on that blog, that someone’s saying you’re to blame for that girl’s death.”

  I studied his face, looking for any sign of a joke, that he was teasing me. But he really seemed sincere. Stranger things have happened, I’m sure, but I couldn’t think of any right at the moment. “Tim’s on top of it,” I said. “In fact, I don’t even need to go out anymore—that’s what I have to tell Harry.”

  “Harry?”

  “Harry Desmond.”

  Jeff’s expression was incredulous. “Harry Desmond? That’s who your date is?”

  “What of it? You know him?”

  He barked out a laugh. “You surprise me, Kavanaugh.”

  I had no clue what he was talking about.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Don’t tell me Harry’s been hanging around here these days?”

  I made a face. “He’s been here almost every day for the last month or so.”

  “I wondered where he went.”

  It began to dawn on me what Jeff was talking about. “He hung around Murder Ink, too?” I asked.

  “He didn’t just hang around, Kavanaugh. He worked for me.”

  Now this was something I hadn’t expected. “Worked for you? How?”

  Jeff cocked his head to the side, studying me for a second. “How would you think? I own a tattoo shop. He worked for me. Do you think maybe he was one of my artists?” It came out way too sarcastically, but I didn’t call him on it. I was too shocked.

  “He’s a tattooist? He told us he got laid off.”

  “Well, that’s not exactly accurate. I fired his ass.” Jeff’s face grew dark, and I wondered what it was Harry had done. But I didn’t have to wonder too long. “He botched a tattoo. Pretty bad.”

  My chest constricted.

  “He hasn’t asked you for a job?” Jeff asked.

  I shook my head.

  “He probably knows you’d need some background on him, and I’d tell you what he did.”

  “He told us he was a blackjack dealer.”

  “As far as I know, he never worked a casino. I wouldn’t go out with him, if I were you,” Jeff said.

  Despite my newfound misgivings about Harry, I didn’t like it that Jeff was deciding now whom I should date and whom I shouldn’t. I stood up a little straighter, so I was even taller than he was, and said, “I can date whomever I want.”

  Jeff chuckled. “Okay, right, Kavanaugh. I forgot you’re all grown up and can take care of yourself.”

  “That’s right.”

  “Does he know about me?” Jeff asked.

  The tone in his voice made it sound like there was something Harry should know, which of course there wasn’t. Jeff and I didn’t have that kind of a relationship. Granted, I wasn’t quite sure what kind of relationship we did have, but it hadn’t ever veered into any sort of romance.

  He started to laugh. “You make it way too easy, Kavanaugh. You know what I mean, right?”

  “He must know we’re friends,” I said. “He’s probably been here when you’ve called, or someone’s mentioned you. So yeah, he must know about you.” Although I couldn’t be sure. He spent most of his time talking to Bitsy, and sometimes I’d run across him with Ace at that oxygen bar. Until today, he hadn’t really spent too much time with me, but that was usually because when he was here, I was with clients.

  “So there would be no reason why when he saw me in here talking to you that he’d take off, right?”

  Chapter 11

  I instinctively looked out the glass door. “You saw Harry?” Jeff Coleman had powers of detection I hadn’t been aware of, because I certainly hadn’t seen him.

  “He came around the corner, spotted me, and started back in the other direction,” Jeff said.

  So maybe he didn’t know about Jeff, after all.

  Jeff cocked his head at me again. “Ready to go? Maybe we can catch up with him, find out what his problem is.”

  I grabbed my bag off the front desk, and we scooted out the door. I locked it, Jeff pulled down the gate for me, and we turned left, the direction Harry had run in, according to Jeff. I couldn’t see Harry anywhere, though, so I took one of the footbridges two steps at a time and stood at the top, scanning the canal and the walkway up ahead. I spotted Harry skirting around a couple of last-minute shoppers. I bounded back down the steps and grabbed Jeff’s hand, pulling him along with me.

  “He’s up ahead,” I said, then realized I was holding Jeff Coleman’s hand and instantly dropped it.

  Despite having shorter legs than me, Jeff kept up easily beside me, our strides in sync. It seemed that Harry didn’t think we’d come after him, because he’d slowed down and we weren’t that far behind him when he pushed open the door to the outside.

  The door swung halfway shut by the time we reached it, but Jeff shoved it open farther and we went out into the night.

  It was a crisp February night, the lights on the Strip making it seem almost like twilight.

  We were right behind Harry now.

  “Harry,” I called out.

  He stopped and whirled around, sheer shock crossing his face, his mouth open in a wide “O.” He shut it again, clearly trying to get his bearings.

  “Brett,” he said flatly as his eyes slid over to Jeff. “Jeff.”

  “Why’d you take off?” I asked, standing in front of him now, my hands on my hips. “I thought we had a date.” So maybe I had been preparing to cancel that date, but he didn’t have to know that right now.

  “I, um, well . . .” His eyes flicked from Jeff to me and back to Jeff. “I saw him in your shop. I figured three’s a crowd.”

  “Three’s a—” I stopped, looking at Jeff, wondering why he wasn’t saying anything, but he was looking at me, as if I was supposed
to take care of this on my own. Okay, fine. “Harry, Jeff and I are friends. He just stopped by. He does that sometimes, like you stop by the shop. He did tell me, though, that you’ve been a little creative with your background.”

  Harry cast his eyes to the sidewalk and shifted from one foot to the other. “I thought you’d kick me out if I told you.”

  “Damn straight she would.” Wouldn’t you know Jeff would decide to speak up now. “What’s your angle here, Desmond?”

  Nice to know I wasn’t the only one he called by their last name, but it was a little disconcerting knowing that he didn’t like Harry. Jeff and I hadn’t liked each other in the beginning. Was this little quirk of his about my name a leftover from that time?

  Harry finally stopped moving and straightened himself up. “No angle, Coleman.”

  Or maybe it was a guy thing.

  “Brett and I had a date,” Harry continued. “We were going over to Cleopatra’s Barge to hear someone sing.”

  Jeff looked at me, his eyebrows high in his forehead, a smile tugging at the corner of his lips. “Music, Kavanaugh? Really?”

  Jeff knew I was tone-deaf.

  “So happens that Dee Carmichael’s replacement in the Flamingos is singing tonight,” I explained.

  The smile came out full force. “So you were taking Harry along while you did your sleuthing? I’m hurt, Kavanaugh, that you didn’t ask me instead.”

  I felt my face flush and hoped that because it was dark, or semidark, he wouldn’t notice. “Harry knows Sherman Potter, the band’s manager. He invited us.”

  Jeff was nodding. “Okay, then what are we waiting for? Let’s take a walk.”

  “Not so fast,” I said. “My brother told me to stay away.”

  “So when did that stop you before?”

  Okay, so it hadn’t ever stopped me before. Except this time Tim was going to be there, and I wouldn’t be able to get away with it. I said as much.

  “And I was going to tell Harry, here, that I couldn’t go after all,” I said, trying to look apologetic when Harry’s eyebrows shot up in surprise.

  “You don’t actually have to go in, you know,” Jeff said.

  “What do you mean?’

  Harry grinned. He knew what Jeff meant. “Brett, you can just walk through to the casino and hear the music.”

  “But wasn’t the idea of this to talk to Sherman Potter, who will actually be in the nightclub?” I asked. “It sort of defeats the purpose.”

  “Your brother doesn’t know me,” Harry said softly.

  No, he didn’t.

  Jeff was nodding, and even though he had warned me off Harry, he said, “That’s right. Harry can go in. We’ll hang out outside, and he can see what he can find out about this Ainsley.”

  Harry looked like he wanted to do anything except be the third wheel.

  “You owe me, Desmond,” Jeff said in a low, threatening tone that would’ve worried me if I were on the receiving end of it.

  Harry pursed his lips and gave a short nod. “All right, I’m in. But only for Brett.”

  “Fair enough,” Jeff said.

  They both looked at me expectantly, until I finally shrugged and said, “Okay. Fine. But if I see Tim there, I have no idea how I’ll be able to explain.”

  Neither Jeff nor Harry seemed to care. We fell into step along the sidewalk, sidestepping people carrying two-foot-long, thin glass containers with cocktails in them, college kids with the names of their schools blazoned across their T-shirts, and girls with low-cut jeans and high-cut tops to show off their belly rings and tattoos.

  Which reminded me of something I wanted to ask Harry.

  “So you hang out at my shop, and you worked for Jeff, but I’m wondering why you don’t have any tattoos.” Harry wore shorts and short-sleeved shirts every day, but I hadn’t seen any sign of any ink. Of course he could have one in as private a place as Ainsley had her rose, and it was none of my business. But because it was my business, I couldn’t help but ask.

  Harry gave a nervous look at Jeff before answering. “Not into it, I guess.”

  There was more to this than he was saying, but I didn’t press the issue. Not everyone wants a tattoo; I can live with that. Enough people did want tattoos, though, to keep me in business, to keep me fairly comfortable financially, as well as my staff. Even in hard economic times.

  It always surprised me that I’d get someone in my shop who had lost a job and was paying me from an unemployment check. While the businesswoman in me was happy to have the client, the woman in me wanted to tell them to keep their money and come back when times were better, when they’d found a job, when a tattoo wasn’t going to take food or rent money out of their pocket.

  Jeff and I had had this conversation; he tended to think we shouldn’t get emotionally involved in it. If someone were out of work and down on his luck, maybe getting a tattoo would give him a little more confidence. Jeff liked to think of it as his good deed.

  We dealt with it in different ways, but when it came down to it, I did the tattoo, too.

  It was a little bit of a walk down to Caesars, but it was a nice night and we walked in companionable silence. We crossed the Strip and saw the fountains at the Bellagio start to dance. Part of me wanted to join the crowds that had gathered, cameras on tripods, to watch. I still worried that Tim would see me and I’d catch hell from him.

  We reached Caesars and made our way through the Forum shops. It was as surreal as the Venetian as we passed the Trevi Fountain, complete with a statue of Zeus. The “sky” had darkened overhead, and I spotted a kiosk selling brightly colored scarves. Again I was distracted and wanted to browse.

  We heard the music as we got closer, but it was a familiar tune sung by deep voices.

  “Beatles cover band?” Jeff asked, frowning as we approached Cleopatra’s Barge.

  I had moved ahead of him a little and turned toward him when he spoke.

  And slammed right into someone.

  I turned back, my heart pounding when I saw who it was.

  Tim.

  Chapter 12

  He was not happy with me. Other people who didn’t know him might not recognize the crease in his forehead that only appeared when he was really furious about something. But I saw it. I knew what it was. This had totally been the wrong thing to do.

  “You must be Brett’s brother.” Harry made it worse by stepping toward Tim and holding out his hand.

  Tim’s eyes flicked toward Harry, then Jeff, then back to me.

  “I should’ve known. And now you’re even adding to your contingent.”

  Jeff reached into his front breast pocket and pulled out a pack of cigarettes, tapping one out and sticking it between his lips before putting the pack back.

  “Is she here?” I asked, figuring while Tim would still be mad at me, he might actually slip up and tell me something.

  Turned out, he didn’t have to. Before he could answer, Flanigan came off the barge.

  “Wild goose chase,” he said to Tim before he spotted me standing there. “What are you doing here?”

  “Keeping my ear to the ground, like you asked,” I said, trying to turn the tables on him. “What do you mean, wild goose chase?”

  Tim put his hand up to keep me quiet, but Flanigan, to my surprise, said, “What does it matter now?” He turned to me. “She’s not here. She never showed. Neither did that manager. Are you sure they said they’d be here tonight? Because the bar manager says he’s never even talked to a Sherman Potter.”

  “That’s what he said,” Harry spoke up. “He said they were going to be here. He invited us.”

  “That’s right,” I said. “I don’t know what’s going on.” Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Jeff Coleman taking a pack of matches out of his pocket.

  “You quit,” I scolded, reaching over and taking the matches and the cigarette out of his mouth. He grinned.

  “Mr. Coleman,” Flanigan said. “What are you doing here?”

  “Wherever my si
ster goes, Coleman goes,” Tim muttered.

  I wanted to argue with him, but sometimes it was true. I didn’t want to get into that. “So where are we now? Square one?”

  “More than you know,” Flanigan said. “Potter checked out of the Venetian shortly after your visit.”

  “So you have no idea where he is,” I said flatly.

  “We’re heading out,” Tim said, indicating himself and Flanigan. “If you want to stick around, be my guest.”

  I glanced over at Harry and Jeff. I didn’t really want to have to deal with the two of them. But at the same time, I still didn’t like the look in Tim’s eyes, which told me that once he got me home, he would go on and on about how I had to stop getting involved in police business. He was a broken record, and maybe a cocktail might not be a bad idea before I went home to face him alone.

  “I’ll be home later,” I said as casually as I could.

  “Suit yourself.” And Tim and Flanigan walked off.

  “He’s not happy,” Jeff said softly.

  “No kidding. How about a drink?” I indicated Cleopatra’s Barge, which was rocking as though it really were on the Nile, the oars slapping against the fake river.

  Jeff glanced at Harry and then back at me. “I’m not going to step on any toes, here. So you two kids go off and have fun.”

  That was a total turnaround, and I wasn’t quite sure why. Just half an hour ago, he was warning me off Harry. And now he was giving us his blessing?

  He gave me a crooked smile and punched me lightly on the upper arm. “See ya around, kid.” He sauntered off, without a look behind him.

  I stared after him, uncertain now just what to do. I hadn’t really wanted to go out with Harry. I’d only wanted to use him to get to Sherman Potter. I supposed I was getting what I deserved. At least that’s what Sister Mary Eucharista would tell me.

  Harry was beaming. “Glad he’s gone. I can’t believe you’re friends with him.”

  “Why?” I bristled.

  “Well, it’s just that he’s so, well, so old. And you’re not.”

  “He’s not that old,” I said, although I wondered why I was getting so defensive about Jeff Coleman. Usually it was me who was saying disparaging things about him.