Murder in Vegas

by Connelly, Michael

  “Me?”

  “You heard Marty’s name. It’s tough luck for you. What can I tell you? I mean, I didn’t know you weren’t the guy.”

  “But I am the pool guy. Exemel Knapsdale. That’s me!”

  “Not for the damned pool! The guy who was supposed to off Ted. He was killed on 215. All burned up. He was in Marty’s car.”

  “This is the Marty who used to work with me?”

  “No! The guy with the car! Will you pay attention?! Marty owns the Pleasure Garden! I used to work there. He hooked me up with Ted. I pretended to be just off the boat and the sick bastard married me. Marty said he’d arrange it. He knows people.”

  “Okay,” said Exemel. “Okay. But what’s this got to do with the pool?”

  She ground her teeth in frustration and closed her eyes. “Never mind! It wasn’t a black guy. You broke in, looking for drugs or something. Ted tried to defend me. I ran for the gun. You killed Ted. I killed you.” She licked her lips. “That will work. Yeah.”

  “Well, I did kill that dude,” said Exemel. “That dude is Ted, right? It was an accident, but it’s still, like, killing. So it’s like karma coming back on me or something. I started work on a game called Karma once, but they pulled the plug on it because like Hindus or somebody might get the wrong impression—”

  “Will you shut up?!” The gun wobbled, but she gritted her teeth and squeezed. Nothing happened. She looked at the gun in astonishment and tried again. Nothing happened. “What the—?”

  “Some joke,” said Exemel, taking one step toward her. “That wasn’t funny! You really had me going there!”

  The woman’s face twisted in fury. It seemed to morph and massage itself, and Exemel hesitated at the sight, waiting for her to turn into an American Werewolf or just explode like in Scanners. Before he could react, she snatched the chef’s knife off the dinette table, raised it, and charged him.

  This was no joke, dude. His sneaker went out from under him as the glass pellets skidded. He stumbled over the patio door sill and dropped to one knee. He covered his face with his hands and braced to feel the knife in his back. He stared into the darkness of his hands to see what Death or God or Shiva or whatever it was really looked like.

  But there was only the pain in his knee and a strange noise: whee! whee!, like the sound of a tiny, distant bird. He spread his fingers and saw the woman sitting in the glass pellets. She had slipped on them as well. The noise was her breathing, growing weaker and weaker. The knife was buried deep under her rib cage.

  “Lady!” said Exemel. “I’ll get a doctor.”

  Her eyes rolled up to look at him. Her mouth gaped. She seemed to want to say something to him, and shook her head. “The jackpot,” she said and her pupils rolled up like cherries on a slot machine. She fell back white-eyed.

  “Lady?” he asked. “Lady?” He looked at her and wondered what she would have looked like with clothes on. He’d never see that now. She was seriously dead. He crossed the room. Ted was even deader than he’d been a while ago. He thought about the envelope of money in his back pocket, and about Marty, and about the dude who was burned up on 215 and blocked the traffic going both ways. If he could write a will for Ted, he’d be rich! Dude, would that be stupid. Greed is not good, no matter what the evangelists say. He thought about DNA, and blood spatter stuff, and he was glad he hadn’t taken her up on the offer, which he’d really wanted to, but not with the dead guy watching.

  He concentrated. It wasn’t easy because he wasn’t in, like, that stoned way that makes you understand everything real clear. After thinking for what seemed a very long time, wandering through several mental detours about whether Shiva could materialize and be a witness, he picked up the woman’s phone.

  “Man,” he told the woman who answered, “something’s happened at the house down here! Dude, it’s like Sharon Tate or something!”

  A short while later, under the pergola by the pool house, the detective lifted his stetson and set it on the chaise lounge next to him. “Okay, Mr. Knapsdale—”

  “My friends call me Exemel.” He had brought a bucket of granular chlorine from the truck and was using it as a stool.

  “I’m not your friend, Mr. Knapsdale.”

  “I thought—” He was going to say that the police were supposed to be our friends, at least that’s what they taught him in elementary school. “You can call me Exemel, anyway. If you like. My real name is Herbert.”

  “So you’re sure she said ‘Marty’?”

  “I think so. Sir.”

  “She didn’t say a last name?”

  Exemel narrowed his eyes and thought.

  “Well?”

  “No. Just ‘Marty.’” He nodded.

  “And you don’t know who this Marty is?”

  “There used to be a Marty who was my boss, but he moved to the coast a year ago.”

  “And do you know his last name?”

  Again, Exemel narrowed his eyes and thought. “No. Just ‘Marty.’”

  The detective scribbled on his note pad.

  “You think Marty knew these people?”

  Exemel shrugged. “If we did their pool back then.”

  “They moved in here seven months ago.”

  “Marty was already gone. The good life in L.A., you know. I used to live in the Silicon, you know. Ever play Galaxy B72?”

  The detective adjusted his underwear at the crotch and stood. Another detective, much younger, approached. “Mr. Knapsdale, when you went inside, what did you touch?”

  Exemel thought. “I don’t know, man. I was, like, freaked out. I came around the corner with this bucket of chlorine—” he touched the container he sat on “—and the hose and saw the glass was smashed in and then I saw her on the floor and I ran inside and I saw the dead dude and, I don’t know, I was checking her out and him out and—”

  “Yeah, yeah, so you said. Did you move anything? It’s all pretty much as you found it?”

  “I might have moved something when I was checking them out, but I didn’t take nothing.”

  The detective nodded. He spoke to his older partner. “It’s her, all right.”

  “I knew it was her,” said the older man. “I busted her and Marty Grego bailed her. I figure he rolled her john, too, but the vic wouldn’t come back from Pennsylvania to testify. I made sure his wife found out about it, though.”

  “You think Grego did this?”

  “He or one of his goons.”

  “The killer comes around back, maybe by the desert. There are some four-wheeler tracks out there, but the wind has been blowing. He grabs a bucket of chlorine tablets by the filter over there and smashes the patio door, surprising the couple, who are in the bedroom cleaning up after their afternoon recreation: untying, taking off the perv outfits. Out comes Ted Bigelow. They struggle, the killer smashes him in the head, then stabs him with something.”

  “I think he used the statue for that, too.”

  “That’s pretty weird,” said the younger detective. “The wound could be a bullet hole or some kind of knife.”

  “The lab will figure it out. Either way, then out comes the missus with the gun.”

  “She wasn’t able to fire it. It was loaded and the safety was off, but she didn’t jack a bullet into the chamber. Goon knocks it away, stabs her with her own knife. Or maybe he had a gun and forced her to put hers down.”

  The older detective pulled at his lip. “Marty Grego would normally use Paul Champion, but he was killed in a car accident today.”

  “There was an untraceable .22 in the car and the car was Grego’s, but it was coming this way.”

  “Maybe Champion left here, went somewhere south, then turned back north. Make sure about the time of death. Of course, I’d rather pin it on Grego. A dead Champion is a little less likely to squeal on Grego than a live one, but only a little less.”

  The younger detective suddenly cocked his head. They had forgotten about Exemel. The older detective turned to him. “You got big ear
s, Knapsdale? You been listening?”

  “Huh?” said Exemel.

  “You know a man named Marty Grego?”

  Exemel narrowed his eyebrows. “I don’t think so. He the guy who moved to the coast?”

  The detective shook his head. “Look, Knapsdale, you don’t breathe a word about what you’ve seen here. Anything about this crime scene gets out and you’re looking at obstruction of justice. You got me?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “I’ll bet if we had a reason to get even with you, we wouldn’t have any trouble finding an illegal substance or two,” said the younger detective.

  “You’ll get no trouble from me, sir.” Exemel stood up and hefted the bucket of chlorine. “If you need me for anything, you can just call Desert—”

  “Goodbye, Mr. Knapsdale,” said the detective, picking up his stetson.

  Exemel was relieved the questioning had ended. He didn’t know how long it might take the money in the envelope, buried in the granular chlorine, to get all burned up or bleached out. He felt like some fine weed had kicked in. Dude! He now had possibilities. Sweet possibilities! Maybe start up his own game company, and finish Karma. Maybe he could go to India and work the deal there. It would take some thinking how he could spend that ten thou, but you can’t spend it if it’s all eaten up or bleached white. He was also thinking he wouldn’t buy any more of Iggy’s stuff. Back to Chuckster and the tried and true. Iggy’s stuff was way too weird.

  “Loser,” whispered the younger detective.

  “To the problem at hand,” said the older. “Let’s find out how Grego spent his day.”

  “He’d better have an explanation for every minute,” said the younger.

  “Every minute,” repeated the older. “If Marty Grego even stepped out for a phone call—”

  “Toast,” said the younger.

  A TEMPORARY CROWN

  SUE PIKE

  Dolores shuffled into the Solarium looking for the paper cups the nurses used to distribute the meds. It was a hobby of hers, collecting the tiny, fluted cups. She liked to put treasures in them and line them up on the windowsill of her hospital room.

  Leonard was slouched on the sofa watching TV and scratching his head. Leonard was always scratching his head. It was sort of a hobby of his, Dolores thought. She spotted four abandoned cups on the card table, but just as she was gathering them up her attention was caught by an image on the TV. She sucked in her breath as Bryce and a young woman drove onto the screen riding a huge black motorcycle, the pink sand of the Nevada desert glowing behind them in the evening sun. They skidded to a stop, pulled off their helmets and waved at the camera. The woman shook her head, catching Bryce full across the face with a sheet of long blond hair. Bryce brushed the hair away, threw his arm around the blond girl’s shoulder and laughed. Then Leonard started laughing and Dolores had to flap her hands to shush him so she could hear the commentary.

  “Bryce Campion, best known for his role in Worlds Apart, and Marie-France Lapin, of Jazz Hot, the all-girl band from Paris that’s been making waves all over the country, announced their upcoming nuptials today in Las Vegas. Bryce is currently headlining a brand new show at the Three Crowns … .”

  Her knees wobbled and she dropped into a chair, sending the paper cups skittering to the floor. That made Leonard laugh some more, but when she started to shush him again she caught herself. His eyes had that glittery look that meant something crazy was going on in his head and she’d better watch out.

  She leaned closer to the screen. “The wedding will take place next week in the Little White Wedding Chapel, a Las Vegas landmark.”

  Dolores began to hum two notes over and over. It was something she did when she could feel her heart beating too fast. She was going to have to decide what to do but she couldn’t think in here with the TV and Leonard scratching his head and laughing too loud in all the wrong places. She grunted as she leaned over and picked up the cups from the floor and then she pulled herself to her feet and shuffled away as fast as her swollen legs would carry her.

  Back in her room, she tore a sheet from the steno pad Dr. Bradford gave her at their first session. She was supposed to be using it for a journal, writing about all the times she felt angry and all the times she felt sad. But the pages were mostly empty and every time he asked her about it she just hummed a bit and stared at the floor while he gripped the desk so hard his fingers went white.

  She reached between the mattress and the box spring and fished out a silver pen she’d found on Dr. Bradford’s desk one day when he was looking at something in her file. After scribbling a few words on the paper, she reached into the crevice under the radiator where she’d hidden the blank stamped envelope she’d found a few weeks ago at the nursing station when the matron had gone to the bathroom. She addressed it to Bryce Campion, Three Crowns Hotel, Las Vegas, Nevada, and then tucked it into the zippered compartment of her bag. They were releasing her to the group home tomorrow and she’d be able to slip out and mail it once the social worker was through talking to her. She sat on the edge of the bed for a minute or two and then reached behind the radiator again to check the money hidden in there. She liked to think of it as her nest egg. That’s what her grandmother had called the money in the cookie tin she kept high up on the shelf over the icebox. Dolores had stood on a chair and reached for the tin one day when she thought her grandmother was lying down in the next room. It slipped out of her fingers, and the coins had clattered to the floor. Her grandmother had shot into the room and yanked the chair right out from under Dolores making her crack her head on the table as she fell. The social worker had asked how she’d hurt herself, but she never said. Not that time. Not ever.

  Dolores stepped out of the cool of the Greyhound Bus Terminal onto South Main and caught her breath. The noise and heat and brilliant sunshine jumbled together inside her head and made it hard to think clearly. She shuffled a few blocks before she dropped her pack onto the sidewalk and leaned against the wall of an office building. She put both hands behind her and pushed hard against the wall, feeling the stucco bite into her fingers, trying to read the bumps as if they were Braille. She took a deep breath and tried to think about the mantra Dr. Bradford had taught her, but sounds and images were jittering around in her mind so fast she couldn’t remember how it began. After a while she rummaged in her bag for a jam jar of water and with a few sips she felt strong enough to push away from the wall and pick up her pack again. She stood for a moment and tried to get her bearings. In her letter she’d described the donut shop where he should meet her. It was one she’d discovered last year when she’d come here to be with him. But she didn’t want to think about that time and had to hum very loud to keep it out of her head only the trouble with that was it kept the location of the donut shop out of her head as well. But it was on the Strip, that much she could remember, so she set off again humming even louder to take her mind off her heartbeat and her sore ankles.

  When she’d gone to the group home the social worker had watched her unpack her bag and fold things into the dresser drawer. Dolores smiled, remembering how easy it had been to push everything back in the bag and drop it from the window the next day. When she walked out the front door she’d called to Stella, who was in the kitchen making lunch, and told her she was just going for a walk and then she’d gone around back, picked up her pack and walked to the bus terminal. It took most of her nest egg to buy the one-way ticket.

  Dolores walked on, stumbling a bit every once in a while, holding onto the walls of buildings when she was afraid she might fall. She thought about Dr. Bradford and how he made everything he said sound like he was talking to a child. “Doris,” he’d said, always calling her Doris even though she’d corrected him so many times. “Doris, sometimes people think they have a connection to people they’ve never met. Especially celebrities. Some even believe they’re married to well-known men like Bryce Campion.” He’d looked sad when he said it, like it was one of the big tragedies of the world. “
You understand you’re not married to him, don’t you?” He’d twisted his pencil between his lips, making it squeak and then he’d pulled it out with a wet popping sound and leaned forward, trying to catch her eye. “You can get rid of this obsession, Doris. You have the power to make yourself better.” She’d had to hum hard into her pillow that night, remembering the little frown between his eyebrows that made an upside-down V like the pitched roof on her grandmother’s hen house. But she didn’t really blame Dr. Bradford. He didn’t know any better. He hadn’t seen the look Bryce had given her that night in the movie theatre. He hadn’t been there the night Bryce had asked her to marry him. She could still remember it as clear as day. She was sitting in the second row and he was looking down at her from the shiny, pebbly screen. There was a hurt look on his face, as though afraid she’d refuse. “Dolores,” he’d said, “Marry me, Dolores. Please.” She’d said yes right there, out loud. Some people in the audience laughed, but she didn’t care. He’d said the words she’d been waiting to hear all her adult life. After that she’d watched every movie he ever made. And she’d gone to the library and looked through all the movie and entertainment magazines in hopes of finding a photo of him. When they stopped making musical films he’d taken a job in Las Vegas, singing in one of the smaller hotels. And she’d gone along last year to be with him. But it hurt to think about that right now.

  She’d managed to make her way to the area known as the Strip with its confusing jumble of moving lights and jangly music that hurt her head. The pack was scraping against her so she put it down on the sidewalk and slumped onto it, splaying out her legs.

  “Hey, watch it.” A young girl veered around her, her roller blades screeching on the sidewalk just inches from Dolores’s worn plastic thongs. The girl flipped her hair and a barrette dropped to the sidewalk.

  “Watch it yourself,” she shouted back, scooping up the barrette and running her fingers along its surface. It was just the right size to fit into one of the fluted paper cups she had stacked in her bag. She shoved it into a side pocket and struggled to her feet again. She had to find the donut shop fast in case Bryce was waiting for her. She stared along the Strip, humming to keep her heart from pounding. It was packed with people looking in shops and restaurants, but they weren’t looking at her so that was okay. She walked on, stumbling a bit with fatigue and confusion and then she spotted it, just a little way down a little side street, nestled between an adult video store and a newspaper shop.