Third You Die (Kevin Connor Mystery)

by Sherman, Scott

  “What do you mean?” I perked up.

  “False alarm, darling. Wrong boy.”

  “How so?”

  “Oh, angel, it was so silly. It happened on my very first call. There I was, at my desk—my work desk, darling, not my makeup table—eating a jelly doughnut, with the notes I jotted down after you left. Just as my first contact picked up the phone, I took a bite of my little snack and—wouldn’t you know it—just as my friend picked up, half of the doughnut’s filling squirted out the back and landed—splat!—right on the paper. Covered up everything. Très embarrassing.

  “Now, I could have wiped it up, but it was half the jelly, darling. I couldn’t let it go to waste. Not when there are starving dieters right here in my building. That would be wrong.

  “But I couldn’t very well lick it up while on the phone, either. I have a reputation, darling. God knows what my friend would have thought I was up to!

  “I couldn’t remember the name you’d given me, but I did the best I could working from memory. I told him I was looking for a young guy who used to work for SwordFight. Early twenties, blond, boyish. I said he might be hustling, working for another studio, or hooked up with a sugar daddy. Did he have any ideas?

  “Wouldn’t you know, right away he said he knew exactly who I was looking for. I was so excited, darling. He gave me the boy’s name and told me where he was. Sure enough, the smart kid got himself set up in style. Living with a rich patron in a building known not just for its grandeur but for its security and discretion. I wrote everything down and thanked my friend profusely. I couldn’t wait to call you with the good news! I felt like a proper lady detective, I did.

  “Then, the moment I hung up, I scooped up the errant doughnut filling to discover—much to my chagrin—that a terrible mistake had been made.”

  I held my breath, anxious to hear what she’d gotten wrong. Maybe there was something she’d discovered I could use—even if the connection wasn’t clear to her.

  “The bakery had given me a blueberry jelly doughnut. Blueberry? I’d requested grape! I get a grape doughnut there every day—how could such a thing happen?”

  She sounded near tears.

  “And . . .” I prompted.

  “And?” she asked. “And what? I mean, whatever happened to customer service? To loyalty? To . . . oh, you mean about your friend?”

  “Yeah,” I said. “Not that I don’t sympathize with the whole doughnut debacle, but—”

  “Quite right,” Mrs. Cherry interrupted. “I’m afraid I did lose track for a moment. Yes, well, after I forced myself to choke down that blueberry filling—which, by the way, really wasn’t that bad—I looked at my notes from the other day and realized I had the wrong boy! I’d been so sure. A former SwordFight model, the right age and coloring, how many of those could there be? But the names were different, darling. What a disappointment. And none of my subsequent calls turned up a ‘Brent Havens,’ either.”

  I wasn’t so sure Mrs. Cherry hadn’t gotten it right, though. I knew Brent had changed his name at least once for professional reasons. Maybe he’d taken another alias. Or, more likely, now that his work was no longer in the public eye, maybe he was using his real name. My heart beat faster with the sudden conviction I was right.

  “The boy you found,” I asked, “he wouldn’t be ‘Richie’ something, would he?”

  “No,” Mrs. Cherry said. “I have a ‘Richie’ working for me, so I’d remember that.”

  “You do?” I asked. Could Brent have a second job? “Maybe—”

  Mrs. Cherry read my mind. “He’s been with me for two years, dearheart. He’s a black gentleman in his forties. I don’t think he’s your boy.”

  Well, so much for that theory.

  I guess I hadn’t found Brent. Or made any other progress.

  “No,” Mrs. Cherry lamented. “I’m afraid I’ve been no help to you. The boy my friend was talking about was . . . oh, where did I put those notes . . . ?”

  She paused and I heard the rustle of paper. I hoped she hadn’t eaten them.

  “His name was something like Larry. Lucky. No . . . wait. Here it is! Lucas Fisher!” Mrs. Cherry was thrilled to have found her notes, then remembered that wasn’t the name I’d given her. “I’m so sorry, my love.”

  Lucas Fisher. The first boy who’d gone missing from SwordFight. I was afraid he’d suffered whatever fate I feared had befallen Brent. That he was another victim of whatever was going on.

  I was glad to hear he was okay. In a way, it gave me hope for Brent.

  On the other hand, knowing his obsession with Brent had me initially suspicious of him. Now that his whereabouts were accounted for, he’d gone full circle from suspect to victim to suspect again.

  “Actually,” I told Mrs. Cherry, “I’ve been looking for Lucas, too. He was a friend of Brent. He might know where he is. This is great. Can you give me the info you got on him?”

  “Absolutely,” Mrs. Cherry gushed. “So, I was helpful after all?”

  “You were amazing,” I assured her. “No one else had any idea where to find him. I was just about to give up.”

  Mrs. Cherry gave me Lucas’s address and phone number, sounding quite pleased with herself.

  “Now, you will remember to be discreet, won’t you, darling? Mr. Fisher’s patron pays quite handsomely to keep his dalliance with this young man out of the public eye. I don’t know how far he’d go to protect his privacy.”

  I’ve seen firsthand how far famous people went to hide their clandestine affairs. No secrets that they were willing to die for, but a few they’d kill someone else to keep. I didn’t take Mrs. Cherry’s warning lightly.

  “I owe you flowers,” I told Mrs. Cherry. “Thank you so much.”

  “No bouquets, please,” Mrs. Cherry said. “They just die and depress me. But I’d be happy to give you the number of my local bakery. Just tell them to get the order right, okay?”

  29

  Bodyguards

  And so it was that, less than an hour after I promised Andrew I’d stick around the office, I was sneaking out again.

  What else could I do? When I wanted to talk to Brent’s boyfriend, Charlie, I had to wait till he went on shift at the bar. My “audition” with SwordFight took even more elaborate planning.

  But getting to Lucas should be easier. I knew where he lived. I could call first, but if he were involved in Brent’s disappearance, it’d probably be best to take him by surprise. I didn’t want to give him time to come up with any excuses, or, worse, make a run for it.

  I didn’t want to put it off. I had no idea where Brent was. But if there was chance it was somewhere unpleasant, if he were being held against his will—and I couldn’t imagine another scenario in which he at least wouldn’t have told Charlie where he was—time was of the essence.

  BTW: I’ve always wanted to use the phrase “time was of the essence.”

  Of course, there was always the risk Lucas wouldn’t be home. I mean, what does a kept boy do all day? Go to the gym, I’d imagine. Shop. Play video games. Maybe he was in school.

  I remembered Lucas’s sexy slacker vibe, though, and struck that last possibility.

  Whatever Lucas was up to, and whatever he knew about Brent, I planned to find out soon enough.

  On the way over, I called Freddy. Partly to fill him in, partly to let him know what I was about to do and make my increasingly frequent request of him to call Tony if he didn’t hear from me after a few hours.

  “I’m coming with you,” Freddy said defiantly. “There’s no way I’m letting you go into this one alone.”

  I was touched. Freddy and I had been through a lot together, and the degree to which he wanted to protect me proved what a loyal and true friend he was.

  “I’m afraid seeing two of us will scare Lucas off,” I said. “And you know I can handle myself if he gets physical. I’ve taken down bigger guys than him. But I really appreciate your looking out for me.”

  “Who said anything about loo
king out for you? We watched him on video together, Kevin, so I know you’ve seen that world-class ass. There’s no way I’m passing up the chance to get into that little hottie’s pants.”

  Okay, I retract all those warm and fuzzies. Freddy was a pig.

  “This is not,” I said firmly, “about getting into someone’s pants. This is about finding a missing friend.”

  “You want Lucas to talk, right? Well, I’ve learned,” Freddy observed blithely, ignoring the annoyance in my voice, “that with the right kind of boy, a good and thorough plowing has a positive effect on the flow of social . . . intercourse. Loosens him up, so to speak.”

  “Huh. And you’re prepared to make this sacrifice in the interests of helping to locate Brent?”

  “No, I’m prepared to make this sacrifice in the interests of burying my dick so deep inside his butt that he feels it against his tonsils. But, if it helps find Brent, then, hey, all the better, right? Never let it be said I’m selfish.”

  “You’re selfish,” I said.

  “I thought I made it clear never to say that, bitch. Where should I meet you?”

  “You shouldn’t. But, I’ll make you a promise—if I can’t get him to talk, we’ll try your approach.”

  “Really?”

  “Probably not. But you can dream, which is better than nothing, right?”

  “Barely.”

  “Besides, you’ve got Cody. What would he think about your shameless pursuit of a retired porn star?”

  “As you well know, Cody and I have an open relationship.” Freddy affected a haughty disregard.

  “On one side.”

  “Hey, he can screw around if he wants to.”

  “That’s the point. He doesn’t want to. He just wants you.”

  “So do a lot of other people. What am I supposed to do? ‘Just say no’? Do I look like Nancy Reagan to you?”

  “Only when you wear red,” I said. “And, yes, saying no is an option, Freddy.”

  “One minute you’re calling me selfish, the next you’re saying I shouldn’t share this magnificent body god gave me with as many men as I can. Make up your mind, Connor.”

  Maybe I didn’t have ADHD. Maybe my friends were conspiring to make me crazy.

  “Whatever. I’m texting you Lucas’s address. If I don’t call you in two hours, you try me. If I don’t answer, call Tony and have him send the cavalry. Okay?”

  “Why do I have to be the middleman on this? Wouldn’t it be easier if you called Tony now and told him yourself when you might need rescuing? He can watch the clock as well as I can. Probably better.”

  “Because if he knew what I was sticking my nose into, he’d kill me. Which would make the whole ‘rescuing’ thing kind of moot.”

  “Fair enough. Okay, I’d wish you luck, but since your success makes it less likely you’ll let me have a go at Lucas, I’ll just hope you don’t get yourself killed.”

  “Thanks,” I said. “That’s very generous of you.”

  “See?” Freddy pointed out. “So not selfish.”

  I arrived at the address Mrs. Cherry had given me and immediately recognized the building. It was a tall, skinny sliver of a high-rise condominium that seemed constructed of nothing but glass and steel. It looked more like an oversized piece of jewelry than a place where real people lived. Chic, minimalistic, almost spindly, it was hard to imagine it could withstand a strong breeze, let alone hundreds of people and all their stuff. Yet, despite its seeming fragility, it was considered, in many ways, one of the most secure buildings in the world.

  It was called El Santuario. I’d read about it somewhere, the New York Times, maybe, or the New Yorker. Something with “New York” in it. It was described as the city’s most exciting new building, an architectural wonder. As high-tech inside as it looked from the street, every unit was wired for automation and the ultimate in home security. Despite the fact that the walls were almost all floor-to-ceiling windows, you could see out but you couldn’t see in. Some kind of special one-way coating gave the residents the best views in the city while also delivering total privacy.

  The entrance was set back from the street, flanked by two doormen. You couldn’t tell from looking, but I remembered from the article that the doormen were armed. It was also one of the few buildings in the city with an underground garage that allowed residents to pull in and have access to an elevator that would take them straight to the floor on which they lived, bypassing the need to pass through a lobby. This wasn’t so much a security design, I’d read, but one instituted to ward off paparazzi, who typically clustered around the city’s other high-end developments, hoping for a shot of someone rich and famous.

  Given its many protections, El Santuario was home to several celebrities, financiers, and heads of state. People who wanted not only the elegance and status of living in one of New York’s most desirable addresses, but the ultimate in protection from prying eyes and the other dangers of city life.

  I hadn’t asked Mrs. Cherry who Lucas’s patron was. I was kind of glad not to know. Whoever it was, he was rich enough to have an apartment here. I had no desire to get on the wrong side of anyone with that much juice.

  A man with that kind of money and power . . . now, there’s someone who’d kill to keep his secret.

  Forget Lucas.

  Maybe the real guy I should be worried about was his sugar daddy.

  I was glad I had dressed nicely for work today. The armed guards nodded as one opened the door for me. One even smiled.

  There are times when being five feet three with boyish features and a slim build are an advantage. I’m not particularly threatening.

  Once inside, I faced a long counter, behind which stood a man with the face of friendly bulldog. “May I help you, sir?”

  Like most everything else in the lobby, the reception table was silver and glass. I noticed an odd omission of seating. No couches or chairs for visitors. The message was: You’re either on your way in, or on your way out. Hanging out was not encouraged at El Santuario. Another reminder that people weren’t here to be seen.

  “Hi,” I answered, in my most disarming manner. “I’m here to see Lucas. In . . .” I forgot the apartment number. “One sec.”

  I reached into my pocket for the folded sheet in my front pocket and noticed the receptionist’s eyes darken. Surely he didn’t think I was reaching for a . . .

  I’ll never know, but suddenly, another guard materialized to my left. He stood a few feet away, but I caught him in my peripheral vision. I heard a slight whirring noise and looked up. A video camera, discreetly tucked into a row of track lighting, slightly adjusted its lens. I imagined another guard in an unseen room zooming in on me to see what I was about to withdraw.

  Yikes.

  I pulled out the paper and opened it, my hands shaking slightly. The receptionist, however, seemed to relax slightly and dropped his shoulders.

  “Umm . . . twenty-two F,” I said. “Lucas in twenty-two F.”

  I purposefully didn’t give Lucas’s last name. I had no idea if he used the same one he used for films, but I bet not. For that matter, he might not have been using the same first name, but it was all I had.

  “Of course.” The bulldog moved his lips into an approximation of what would have been a smile on a human face. He picked up a phone and pressed some numbers. “Mr. Ford,” he said. “There’s someone here for your apartment.” He paused for a moment, listening. “One moment.”

  “Mr. Ford wasn’t expecting anyone,” he said to me. “Your name, please?”

  Shit. I hadn’t thought of that. Dumb.

  If I told him my name, then what? Would he ask the guard to inquire why I was there? What would I say? Anything close to the truth ran the same risk as calling ahead would have. Now that I was here, it seemed even more risky to set off his alarms. Forget being kicked out—I had the probably paranoid but unshakeable feeling that if I said the wrong thing, they’d shoot me.

  The few seconds these thoughts ran through my h
ead seemed much longer. I felt a bead of sweat run down my back. I wanted to scratch it, but was afraid any sudden movement would get me thrown to the ground and handcuffed. Unless I was mistaken, the guard to my left was a foot or two closer.

  “Brent,” I answered, hoping the answer wouldn’t get me killed. “Please tell Mr. Ford it’s Brent Haven.”

  The guard relayed my name. He listened again and his brows knitted together. “Of course, Mr. Ford.”

  He punched some buttons on a keyboard I hadn’t noticed under his desk.

  “Would you mind looking there, sir?”

  He pointed at the lights where I’d seen the video camera hidden. A surveillance system. He must be able to patch the feed into the residents’ apartments.

  I said Brent Haven was here, and Lucas didn’t believe it. He had to see it with his own eyes.

  What did that mean?

  A number of people who’d known Brent remarked how much I resembled him. At least, on first glance. By the second one, though, I imagined the differences were clear.

  I had a feeling Lucas would be looking very closely.

  I’d been in other apartments with video cameras for visitors. The feeds were always grainy and indistinct. But this was the exceedingly high-tech and high-security El Santuario. The video was probably hi-def. Maybe even 3D. Who knew?

  I faced the camera, but as slightly as possible. I shifted my weight from one foot to the other and subtly shook my head back and forth. Maybe some movement would make my image blurrier.

  The bulldog listened to the voice on the phone. His eyes narrowed.

  “Mr. Haven,” he said to me.

  “Uh-huh?” I didn’t turn to face him. I could see him in the corner of my eye and that was enough. I could no longer remember why I’d thought him a friendly bulldog at first. Now, he seemed quite growly. Maybe even rabid. My nerves were out of control. If I had to meet his eyes again I was afraid I’d fall to my knees and confess everything.

  That wasn’t the only reason I didn’t want to turn my head, though. If Lucas was buying me as Brent, I didn’t want to chance that seeing me in profile would ruin the illusion.