by Kyra Davis
“But…London was crazy,” I said weakly as Ms. Dogz yanked me toward a spot of grass with an apparently interesting smell. “He was a mess. He was manic. He was—”
“Being poisoned,” Jason said, finishing the sentence for me. “Look, you may not believe all the so-called conspiracy theories you hear about Big Pharma or the government, or corporations and modern-day robber barons plotting for world domination but there’s a reason so many of us do. Years ago, if someone told you the government was monitoring your emails and phone calls you’d assume they had a tinfoil hat in their closet. Now you’d just assume they read the latest New York Times article about the NSA.” He pointed to my drink that Marcus was still holding. “And don’t think Starbucks is so innocent. You think you’re drinking a Frappuccino. But in reality, when you wrap your lips around that straw you’re sucking the toxic nectar from the teat of corporate America.”
Marcus immediately tossed the Frappucino in the nearest trash can.
“Okay, I get it.” I stopped at a dry well house, resting my weight against the only intact structure of the crumbled estate. “What about Zipcars? Or the practice of putting invisible tracking devices on cars? Can you make sense out of all that too?”
Jason stared down at the grass, his forehead scrunched up like he was pondering a particularly difficult math equation. “Maybe…maybe not. What we really need to do is break into the apartment again,” he finally said.
“Um, no. Nuh-uh!” I raised my hands in protest. “I had an excuse last time. I had to rescue this girl.” I gestured to Ms. Dogz who had begun grazing on a weed. “I have no valid reason to go in there again. If I was caught, it would be very, very bad.”
“Then let’s not get caught!” Marcus suggested.
I looked over at him, stunned. “You can’t possibly think this is a good idea.”
“Well, like you said, you have the key.” Marcus leaned up against the well with me and offered his most encouraging smile. “It does seem like a good place to start.”
“I already started there!” I protested. “I’m not going in again! It’s illegal and more importantly, I don’t own a hazmat suit! Seriously, the air inside that place is…crunchy.”
Marcus wrinkled up his nose in disgust. “Crunchy?”
“Yes,” I said, stubbornly. “The air in there felt crunchy. Like it’s so stale it has texture. I’m Not. Going. Back.”
“Dena said there were papers in there,” Jason said, authoritatively. “She thought they might be printouts of articles? Maybe blogs? We need to read what he was reading. We need to know what he was researching. Whatever it was, he was killed for it.”
“Not necessarily!” I shot back.
“Yeah, it could have been the wife,” Marcus said with a nod. “It’s always the wife, or the husband, or the butler in the library with a candlestick. Always one of those three”
“This is serious, Marcus!” Jason said, lamentingly. “This really could be the work of The New World Order. You can’t be joking about butlers.”
I sighed and let them continue to argue about who the most likely suspect was as my eyes scanned the park. It was one of my favorite places in San Francisco and yet I hadn’t been here in years. Why was that? What keeps us from doing the easy things that brighten our lives? I couldn’t claim to be too busy. I wasn’t. And are you ever really too busy to just take a half hour every week or so and…
My thoughts floated away as my eyes rested on the very outskirt of the park where there was a man, standing very still, looking in my direction.
He was wearing a black baseball cap.
Slowly, I pushed myself off the well. Marcus and Jason were too busy debating useless things to pay any attention to me. I took a step forward, in the direction of the man. Ms. Dogz looked up at me curiously and then followed my gaze as I watched him. I took another step. Then another.
The man in the hat turned and started walking away.
I knew him. I don’t know how or even how I could know that considering that he was too far away for me to make out any of his features. Still, the very sight of him set off alarm bells that were currently clanging noisily in my head.
“Come back here,” I said under my breath. Ms. Dogz looked up at me, the only one of my companions who had actually heard me.
“Come back here!” I yelled, my hand tightening its grip on Ms. Dogz’ leash.
“What?” Marcus said and Jason added something along the lines of “Are you talking to me?”
There was too much distance between me and the man in the black hat for him to have possibly heard me.
And yet he broke into a jog, toward the street.
He was running away from me.
I didn’t think, didn’t calculate, I just started running, running after this man. I yanked Ms. Dogz after me, dragging her at first. But as soon as she understood what we were doing she quickly overtook me and started dragging me. The man was moving faster now but so was I…too fast. Ms. Dogz was going too fast.
“Whoa!” I cried out, grasping at the first animal command that popped into my head to absolutely no effect. And the man was still running.
I tried to pick up my pace to better match Ms. Dogz as I watched the man leave the park and turn onto the sidewalk. He was not going to get away. I managed to increase my speed even more. Ms. Dogz did too. The wind was blowing through my fabulous hair. The few people left in the park turned their attention to me as we raced over the grass. I was running faster than I ever had in my life! I was going to catch him!
And that’s when it happened.
A squirrel.
A friggin’ squirrel ran across our path toward a tree and Ms. Dogz completely Lost. Her. Mind.
With a bark, she did a ninety-degree turn to chase her new furry target. “Stop!” I cried half a second before I fell face first into the grass as Ms. Dogz yanked away from me, running to the tree trunk where the squirrel had scampered up, barking at it like she was a police dog cornering a drug dealer.
There was grass in my mouth. Dirt in my nose. My knee was stinging
“What the hell was that about?”
I looked up to see Jason, out of breath, standing over me. I turned my head to the street where the man had been. He was gone.
“What did you see?” Jason pressed
I scanned the street to the left and right. Nothing.
In my peripheral vision, I could see that Marcus had managed to get the dog back and was dragging her my way. “I saw a man.” I put my hand up to my hair, wondering how badly I had managed to mess up Marcus’ work. “A man in a black hat.”
“As in a cowboy hat?” Marcus asked, stepping up just in time to hear my last remark. “Was he riding a horse?”
I shook my head and got to my feet, pulling a few blades of grass off my face. My jeans were torn and I could see drops of blood on my kneecap, but other than that I was fine. Ms. Dogz was wagging her tail stub, cocking her head to the side, looking deceptively innocent.
“Are you sure you’re okay?” Marcus asked. I could tell the question was meant to pertain to both my physical and mental state.
I blinked at him and then looked back out at the street. “Yeah, I’m okay.” I vainly tried to brush the dirt from my clothes. The man in the black hat had been watching me but he also ran from me. He hadn’t come to hurt me. He had come to scare me…possibly to scare me away. I turned to face Jason, feeling a renewed sense of determination. “When will you be available to help me go through London’s apartment?”
Jason’s eyebrows jumped up into his hairline and then he gave me a slow, Cheshire Cat grin. “Hell yeah!”
“A blue sky without clouds is pretty but ultimately uninteresting. Such is a life without heartache.”
--Dying To Laugh
Jason had the next two days off from the medical marijuana store he worked at so he declared he would spend the first of those days casing London’s apartment, seeing if anyone matching Anita or Catherine’s description came in or o
ut of there. He’d also try to gauge when the lowest traffic times were for the building and the area as a whole. Then we’d use that information to plan our entry into London’s apartment the day after that.
The very term “casing,” sounded so…well, criminal. Spontaneity never felt criminal. I had initially entered London’s apartment on a whim. I happened to have had the key to his place and so I used it. Surely that wasn’t so bad. But casing the apartment building…now I was going deep. I could get in real trouble. That should have worried me.
But as I drove home from Sutro Heights I realized, it really didn’t. If anything I found the very idea of the risk…energizing.
I had just pulled into my driveway when I heard Anatoly’s Harley pulling in after me. I stepped out of my car, headlights still reflecting off the closed garage door just as he was removing his helmet. His eyes widened slightly as he took in my torn, grass stained jeans and shirt. “What happened?”
I pulled Ms. Dogz out from the back seat by her leash. “There was a squirrel. Ms. Dogz doesn’t like squirrels.”
Anatoly’s mouth twitched at the corner. “I see. Who won?”
“The squirrel gets to live another day.” I looked down at my pants. “My jeans do not.” My headlights switched off automatically, leaving us only the faint glow of a distant streetlight.
“Your hair looks great,” he said, kindly.
“There is that,” I conceded.
Ms. Dogz’s stub of a tail was wiggling like crazy as she strained at her leash to get to Anatoly. He bent down to give her some love. “Need a drink?” he asked. I presumed he was talking to me even though it was the dog that seemed to have his attention.
“Desperately.”
He straightened up, tucked his helmet under one arm and draped the other over my shoulder as the three of us walked up the front steps to our home.
“Any luck tracking down Anita?” I asked.
A slight flicker of concern, maybe irritation, but then Anatoly’s face was smooth and happy again. “She’s been quite good about protecting her privacy. I’m not finding much of anything on her online.”
“Not much of anything would imply you’ve found a little of something,” I noted as he held the door for me. Mr. Katz strolled out of the living room to say hello. He took one look at Ms. Dogz and did a one-eighty, flicking his tail in disgust.
“All right, I didn’t find anything,” Anatoly admitted. “But I did track down the number for London’s landlord’s cell phone.”
“Oh?” He wasn’t able to find any information on this woman? The man was a private detective for God’s sake. Something was very wrong here.
I freed Ms. Dogz from the dreaded leash and tossed it in the corner. “Has the landlord, um, been in that apartment today?”
“No, he hasn’t been in there since London moved in,” he said, putting his helmet down and walked through the dining room to the kitchen. I trailed after him, my concerns momentarily pushed aside by the joy of seeing him take out a chilled bottle of white. “That was nine months ago.”
“But now that London’s dead--” I began.
He placed the wine on the counter with a certain degree of ceremony. “He didn’t know London was dead until I called.”
“Anita didn’t call him?”
“He’s never heard of Anita,” he replied with what seemed like deliberate casualness.
I sank down onto one of the stools by the kitchen island. Never heard of her? “He wasn’t married,” I said, almost more to myself than to Anatoly. “Anita London doesn’t exist.”
“No, I’m sure he was and I’m sure she does. You’re not required to disclose marital status on a rental agreement or credit check.” He took out two wine glasses and a bottle opener. “All we know is he didn’t volunteer the information about Anita, and why would he?”
“But you do think it’s weird, right?” I pressed. “That neither his landlord nor his neighbor knew he had a wife and kid? And that you can’t find any information on her?”
“No, I don’t.” The splash of wine sounded lovely as it hit the bottom of the empty glasses. “As we’ve already determined, the two of them appear to have been separated. Anita will probably get around to calling London’s landlord eventually. And the truth is, I didn’t try too hard to find Anita. Just a Google search and an attempt at a very basic background check. I didn’t file any requests with the records office. I didn’t call in any favors with my contacts at the DMV.”
“But why?” I asked, baffled. I had never known Anatoly to be half hazard about anything…except maybe housekeeping.
“There’s no need to do more,” he said simply. His tone was so nonchalant. But his shoulders seemed stiff, his jaw set. The contradictions had me completely baffled. “All we need to do was find out if she wanted this dog and make sure she doesn’t charge you with breaking and entry in order to kidnap her.”
“I assume you mean kidnap the dog, not Anita.”
Anatoly allowed himself a small smile at the quip. “I had a good talk with the landlord,” he went on. “I told him London had given you the key to the apartment and you had taken Soph…Ms. Dogz to care for her. I left him our number and gave him permission to pass it on to any of London’s next of kin if they express interest in making further arrangements for his pet. So now, even if Anita finds out you were there, she won’t be able to spin it as a breaking-and-entry. She will also have a way to contact us if that’s what she wants to do.”
I chewed on my lower lip as Anatoly handed me a filled glass. “Will the landlord be clearing out the apartment tonight then?” I asked, trying to keep my voice even. “Or will he wait until tomorrow?”
“Neither. I reached him while he was in New York. He won’t be home for another three days. He’ll take a look at the place then….What’s that smile about?” Anatoly asked as he leaned against the kitchen island.
“Hmm?” I sipped my wine, looked away.
“You’ve got this mischievous smile on your face. The kind you get right before you’re about to do something you know you shouldn’t do.”
I waved my hand dismissively. “That’s silly.”
“I haven’t seen that smile for a while,” he admitted. “Makes it all the more suspicious now.”
“I’m smiling because I like the wine.” I stepped forward and lifted myself on my tiptoes in order to give Anatoly a light kiss.
He pulled away and studied me for a moment, then gave me his own grin and shook his head. “I’m going to throw together dinner.”
“What are you thinking?” I asked.
“Something simple…maybe lamb loin chops with Dijon and fresh herbs along with an arugula salad. Take me about twenty minutes.”
I laughed and shook my head in awe. “Yeah, that sounds acceptable.” Anatoly was the only one I knew who could whip together a gourmet meal in a half hour or less.
“I’m going to have to spend tomorrow night tailing a man who may or may not be faking a workplace injury in order to bilk his employer,” He stepped forward and linked his finger around my belt, pulling me forward so there was only half an inch of space between us. “So let’s not allow tonight to go to waste. Go upstairs, clean yourself up, put a little Neosporin on that knee and let me use the rest of the evening to take care of you.”
“You’re going to make me feel better?”
“To start, yes.” He leaned down and touched his lips to the nape of my neck, tasting my skin, sending a little shiver through me. “I’m going to serve you a meal that will make you want to scream with pleasure. And while we eat,” his hand moved to the small of my back, pulling me even closer so my body was pressed tightly against his, “you’re going to tell me every detail about your day.”
“Am I?” I murmured, my pulse rate rising steadily.
“You are. And then,” his mouth was at my ear now, his tongue flicking at the lobe, “after our meal I’m going to make you feel more than better. I’m going to make your whole body sing.” His voice,
which had already gone to a low growl, slid into a whisper. “I’m going to make you lose control.”
I bit down hard on my lower lip. Slowly he released me, bringing his own glass of wine to his lips as his eyes ran over me one more time until they settled on my hair. “I do like this style,” he mused. “It makes me want to pull it, arching your neck back for me to kiss.”
It took a second to find my voice. “Oh baby,” I said, softly, “over Marcus’ dead body.” His eyebrows went up and I saw the corners of his mouth twitch. “Anyway,” I went on, placing my palm briefly against his chest. “there are better uses for your fingers.” I turned and walked out of the kitchen, wine glass in hand, as his soft laughter followed me. I headed upstairs to our bedroom and, more importantly, to the Neosporin.
There was no doubt in my mind that Anatoly knew I was keeping things from him. The intensity of his seduction was designed to seduce my secrets from me, but perhaps also to distract himself from…something. Something he didn’t want to share with me maybe?
My cell started vibrating in my purse and I pulled it out as I reached the top of the stairs. It was a number I didn’t recognize. “Hello?” I answered as I made my way to my bedroom.
“Ms. Katz,” said sexy-bored lady. “I have Gundrun Volz on the line for you.”
I froze, right in the middle of the hallway.
“Ms. Katz, are you there?”
“Yes, um, yes of course,” I managed, now talking in a hushed voice.
“I think you’re fading out,” the woman noted. “Am I losing you?”
“No, no,” I quickly made it to my room and closed the door behind me, leaning my back against it. “I’m here,” I said in a slightly louder voice now.
“Good, I’ll connect you now.”
I moved away from the door. I could hear Anatoly banging around in the kitchen. The sound insulation in this place was not as good as it should be.
