The Dark Side of Town

by Sasscer Hill

  The address led me to a large wooded lot at the end of a cul-de-sac. A single-story stone mansion with large chimneys at either end rose from the middle of the property. Tall, elegant windows were laid in granite walls beneath a slate roof. The builder had left several massive conifers and deciduous trees flanking the house. Red roses and carefully trimmed evergreen bushes partially surrounded a circular drive that was paved in flagstone.

  I parked next to a large black Mercedes, but when I climbed out of my Mini, it was the red Maserati convertible that seemed to scream, “I’m your mother’s car!” Yes, sirree, she had made quite a life for herself.

  I walked over the stone pavers to a heavy wooden door and rang the bell. I expected a butler, or at least a maid, to respond and was caught off guard when Joan opened the door. I barely saw a flash of polished skin around beautifully made-up eyes before she threw her arms around me.

  “Oh, sweetie! It’s been so long.” She put her hands on my shoulders and stepped back. “Fia, don’t stiffen like that. Let me look at you.”

  I felt like a child again, like she was making sure I’d washed my face and tied my shoes correctly. Thank God I’d removed the Goth makeup and earrings, and was wearing a simple pair of jeans and a plain sweatshirt.

  I hadn’t forgotten the acid comments I’d received from her as a child.

  She was still gorgeous, and somehow, I felt obligated to comment. My mother had that effect on people.

  “Mother—I mean, Joan. You look great.”

  She responded with a quick smile and a slight shrug that seemed to say, “Of course I look great.” Tall, with midlength brown hair gleaming with blond highlights, she was toned and thin. She’d obviously received good cosmetic surgery, and didn’t appear a day over forty. But I knew she was fifty-six.

  Her eyes slid up and down my body, assessing me like a dress on a hanger at Saks Fifth Avenue. I struggled not to squirm.

  “Didn’t I say you’d turn into a lovely woman?” Her sudden frown was almost imperceptible on her Botoxed forehead. “But why do you wear your hair so short like that?”

  “I like it this way.” She should have seen it before I let it grow three inches.

  “You need a better sense of style, Fia.” She sighed. “I suppose that’s my fault.…” Then she brushed the thought away. “But you were always such a tomboy. Never interested in clothes, or pretty things. Always wanting to go the track and those horses.”

  She’d spit out the word “horses” like it was dirtying her mouth.

  “I still love them.”

  “But you’re working at some stable here in Saratoga?”

  “Yes, I told you that.”

  “Well, don’t get all defensive. Come in. Let me show you the house.” She led me through her home, her silk tunic flowing like a river of blue over black leggings and jeweled flats.

  Twelve-foot ceilings soared overhead, and the six-foot windows emitted long shafts of yellow light. Richly hued silk and wool carpets dotted polished stone floors. The living room boasted a massive granite fireplace and at the other end of the house, I later discovered, its twin dominated the master suite. The kitchen should have been in Architectural Digest. Richard Gorman had made a lot of money with his tech company. I was curious to meet this guy.

  “Let’s sit here, in the living room,” Joan said, waving at one of two beige couches. “Rich and I so enjoy the view.”

  I glanced out the tall windows to where a large stone-paved patio met the lawn that swept gently down to a stone wall fronted by cypress trees, dogwoods, and more roses. A gardener was busy with clippers.

  “Very nice,” I said, as I sat and brushed my fingers against the rich, velvety texture of the upholstery. “You’ve done well for yourself, Joan.”

  She made a small sound of irritation. “I did want Rich to put in tennis courts.” Her mouth turned down, showing her disappointment with Rich’s apparent failure to do so. “But I’m working on that.”

  I remembered that tone. She’d always been working on something.

  She rose from the couch and walked to a long antique credenza and opened the bottle of wine sitting on top. At one end of the credenza stood a magnificent bronze statue of a rearing horse, at the other end, a huge silver vase of red roses perfumed the living-room air. Joan poured the white wine into two crystal glasses and brought them to the couch.

  She handed me a glass. “Oh, Fia, you should relax. Let’s enjoy our afternoon together.”

  And then we can cook a pot roast and sing camp songs by the fireplace.

  “Sure,” I said, taking a good dose of wine. I needed it.

  “I want you to meet Rich,” she said, kicking off her flats and folding her long legs onto the couch. “We’re having some people over for cocktails Saturday evening. I want you to come.”

  “Don’t know if I can.”

  “Nonsense. You work at a barn. Of course you can come.” She took a sip of wine. “You people and your horses. I wish I could get Rich away from those damn things.” Again the down-turned mouth.

  You married him.

  “Anyway,” she continued, “you certainly have time for a party. Do you have anything to wear?”

  “Not really.”

  “God,” she said, her lips curling with annoyance, “you’re just like your father.”

  I boiled over. “I can’t believe you would—”

  Her eyes got the cold edge I remembered as she cut me off. “Let’s forget about that, Fia.” She gave me a brilliant smile, gleaming with capped teeth. “I’m sure we’re the same size. I’ll lend you something of mine.”

  “No. Don’t. I’ll find something.”

  She shrugged. “If you must.” Her gaze dropped to my boots. “I see you still wiggle your foot. You can’t learn to control that?” She made an effort and smiled. “So, tell me about your work as a policewoman.”

  Was she really interested in my life or just making conversation? I was pretty sure it was the latter, but she was about to regret bringing it up.

  “After Dad was murdered…” I felt my jaw slacken with the disbelief I’d felt eight years earlier when I’d found his body. “I still can’t believe you didn’t come to his funeral.”

  She looked away, spoke to her wineglass. “I was in California. Richard’s business was totally consuming my time…”

  “Of course,” I said, and took a breath. “So, with both you and Dad gone, I was at loose ends, and angry at the world. Can’t imagine why I was angry.” By now, I was afraid my foot jiggle was wearing a hole in Joan’s Oriental. “Anyway, I went back to school and got a degree in criminal justice.”

  “You have a college degree?” She sounded thrilled. Probably because I’d changed the subject.

  “So I became a Baltimore city cop, but had to leave after I killed a man.”

  “What? You killed someone?” She clutched her wineglass and, for once, was speechless. But she recovered, her eyes narrowing, becoming calculating. “But that happens sometimes in the police force. I mean, sometimes it’s necessary, isn’t it?”

  “Yes, but my supervisors didn’t like it. They worried about bad press and lawsuits.”

  “Oh, for heaven’s sake,” she said, waving the problem away. “Everyone worries about bad press and lawsuits. Rich was always concerned about that before he sold Horizons Unlimited.” She studied me closely, her eyes shrewd. “Tell me, why did you kill a man?”

  I gave her an abbreviated version, telling her about the woman who was almost dead from strangulation before I’d shot the guy. I didn’t tell her about the repercussions or my weird connection to the perpetrator.

  Joan gave me a curious look. “Was it hard? Killing a man, I mean.”

  “No, it wasn’t. Not under the circumstances.”

  “Interesting,” she said, and seemed to stare at something inside I couldn’t see.

  “So,” I finished, “I gave up being a cop and went back to what I love most.” I wasn’t about to tell her I worked for the TR
PB. I’d trust the Saratoga mob with a secret before I’d trust her.

  Her mouth pinched with disapproval. “The damn racetrack. Fia, you could do so many other things! Rich has excellent connections—”

  “Leave it, okay? Just don’t.”

  She shrugged and sipped her wine. Her long manicured fingers slowly twisted the crystal stem. “I’d just hate to see you turn out like your father.”

  “Screw you,” I shouted. All these years and I’d I never said a word to her. Inside a dam was breaking. “I loved Dad. I’d be proud to be half the person he was. And you treated him like shit!” I felt the sting of tears in my eyes.

  “Fia, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that.”

  “No, you shouldn’t.” The smell of her roses had become cloying. I felt like I couldn’t breathe, and stood up.

  “I said I was sorry, Fia. Please don’t leave.”

  “I’ve got to go to work.”

  She stood quickly, stepping back into her jeweled flats. “Let me walk you out.”

  “Whatever.”

  “I want to make all this up to you, Fia,” she said, hurrying to keep up as I rushed toward the front door. “Please come to the party this Saturday. Please?”

  “I wouldn’t miss it,” I said. “I really want to meet this guy. See what he’s got that made you walk out on us.” I stopped, glanced around her entry foyer, where I stood on what was probably a shockingly expensive Oriental rug. I waved at the paintings on the wall, the long, ornate mahogany chest. “But it’s obvious, isn’t it?”

  I beat it to the front door, rushed outside, and slammed the heavy wooden door behind me.

  10

  The next morning, about the time most of our chores were done, I stood with Becky Joe on Pizutti’s shedrow, watching an eighteen-wheeled commercial van roll up to our barn. The air brakes hissed and the smell of diesel filled the air as the carrier ground to a halt.

  Moments later, Javier led a horse off the van and into a stall we’d made ready for the new arrival. Named Glow West, the chestnut colt had previously been stabled at Belmont Park with another of Pizutti’s assistant trainers.

  Becky Joe handed me the Daily Racing Form she’d been studying, and as I examined Glow West’s past performances, an alarm bell rang in my head.

  The Form had posted two brilliant works for the four-year-old colt, who was coming back from a layoff after suffering a foot abscess. He was entered to run that very afternoon, and Pizutti had named Stevie on the horse.

  “This colt is going to go off favorite,” I said to Becky Joe, keeping my voice soft. “Did you see these works, and the races he won last year?”

  “Yeah, I saw.”

  The name of another entry in the race caught my eye, raising a red flag that waved in time to my mental alarm bell.

  “Becky Joe, look at this! Pizutti’s got Dodger running in the same race.”

  “Saw that, too. I think Mars is up to his dirty tricks.”

  I was surprised she admitted that much to me. Then again, I’d covered for her when she’d had that sick hangover. Maybe I’d earned her trust. My attention shifted back to the Form. Dodger belonged to Savarine, and though the colt’s stats showed slow works, rumor around the barn had it that he was way faster than he appeared on paper. Was he already earmarked for Savarine’s hedge fund?

  “Pizutti’s not going to let Stevie win on Glow West, is he?” I said.

  “That’s how I see it,” Becky Joe said. “Nice setup for old Mars and Savarine to bet the wallet on Dodger and walk away with the bank. Gonna leave poor Stevie to pretend he’s riding Glow West to the wire, and if the stewards catch on, it won’t be pretty.”

  I hoped we were wrong, but the pieces were in place on the board, just waiting to be moved by Pizutti. The “slow” Dodger would go off at long odds, then surprise the fans by running second or third, possibly even winning. Having studied the Form and knowing what I knew about Dodger, I’d bet Glow West was his only serious competition.

  Stevie had already told me, if Pizutti ordered him to, he’d keep the horse from winning. I thought about the girl that reminded me of a tiny ballerina and her innocent eyes. I couldn’t really blame Stevie.

  “You’re not on Facebook, are you?” Becky Joe asked.

  “What? Facebook? No way.” I could see it now, Fia Mckee, undercover agent for the Thoroughbred Racing Protective Bureau. With pictures of me in various disguises.

  “How come?” she asked.

  “Not my thing.”

  “Maybe you should try it,” she said. “I’ve got, like, a thousand friends who are racing fans and you should hear the things they say about Pizutti. They hate him.”

  “Then NYRA should read their comments.”

  Becky Joe went on about the wonders of Facebook until I told her I had to make a call. As soon as I was able to move out of her hearing range, I rang Calixto.

  “How is New York’s most beautiful Goth this morning?” he asked.

  “Troubled. Look at the fifth race this afternoon. Savarine has a ringer in there named Dodger. Stevie’s going to be on the favorite, Glow West, and I think he’s going to pull the horse.” I’d already told Calixto about my visit to Stevie’s apartment and how I’d met Lila.

  “Hold on while I look.” A moment later, he said, “I see what you mean. Are you finished over there?”

  “Yes.”

  “Good, I’m bringing you a gift,” he said, and disconnected.

  A gift? This could work for me, this bearing of presents every time he saw me on Pizutti’s shedrow.

  A few minutes later, he strode down the aisle wearing lizard boots, black jeans, and a Western shirt. He held a small box in his hand. When he passed Pizutti’s office, the trainer stepped out and stared after him.

  “Hey, Coyune, nice boots, babe. Why you always gotta look like you walked off the cover of GQ?”

  “I like to keep the fans happy.”

  Pizutti grinned. “Yeah, well don’t go stealing my help, okay? We like Fay right where she is.”

  “I’m not here to steal her,” Calixto said, stopping next to me, “I’m here to win her love.”

  I knew his words were bullshit, but they still jolted my heart.

  Pizutti gave an eloquent shrug. “Yeah, whatever. Just let her do her job, okay?”

  “No problema.” Calixto turned his back on Pizutti and handed me the box.

  “You want me to open it now?”

  “Yes, querida.”

  “Aw, jeez,” Pizutti said, and went back into his office.

  The box was wrapped in shiny black paper with a dark red ribbon. “You’re catching on to my Goth look,” I said, untying the bow.

  “Wait until you see what is inside.”

  “What you got there?” Becky Joe asked, heading down the aisle toward us. She stopped about two feet away from me and watched as I tore the paper off and opened the box.

  A necklace lay in sheets of black crepe paper. Black titanium bat wings were attached to a center medallion. The wings hung from a dark chain. A dazzling black stone was set into the medallion. I couldn’t quite grasp what I was looking at.

  “Is that a diamond?” Becky Joe asked.

  “No, of course not,” I said, “it’s—it’s a…”

  Calixto leaned forward and withdrew the necklace from the box. “A black diamond, two carats.”

  “Holy shit!” Becky Joe said.

  If Becky Joe hadn’t been there, and if Pizutti hadn’t just materialized from his office again when he heard her exclamation, I would have said, “I can’t keep this!” Instead I said, “Wow.”

  The piece was attractive in a kind of dreadful way. And the little gleam I saw in Calixto’s eye told me he was amused that my Goth act had resulted in me receiving an expensive piece of frightful jewelry.

  I could wear this to Joan’s party …

  “What are you thinking, leona? You have an evil look in your eye.”

  “You don’t want to know.”


  He shrugged. “Then would you be so kind as to turn around?”

  After a brief hesitation, I did, and Calixto fastened the clasp made of two titanium skeleton hands. When his warm fingers touched the lock of hair on the nape of my neck and brushed against my skin, my body responded. Traitor. I stepped away quickly.

  “Fay, babe,” Pizutti called from his office doorway, “sell the fucking diamond.”

  Calixto glanced at the trainer, his face expressionless. “Mars, can you not display a little class?”

  “Not as easily as you do that smarmy act. Man, you’re something.” He waved an annoyed hand at Calixto and disappeared into his office again.

  “I’d sell that diamond in a New York minute,” Becky Joe said.

  “I love it. I’m keeping it. Calixto, thank you.”

  “Thank me later,” he said, and Becky Joe snorted.

  “I need to talk to you about something,” I said to him.

  Becky Joe made a rude noise. “I bet you do.”

  I’d had enough of the comments and glared at her. “Could you excuse us for a minute?”

  I grabbed Calixto’s arm and pulled him off the shedrow onto the grass. “This romance thing is getting out of hand,” I said.

  His penetrating stare ruffled my composure. Then he leaned forward and touched the diamond where it rested in the hollow of my throat. “I find it to be the best part of the job.”

  Was he serious? “Whatever,” I said, taking a half step back. “Can we please return to the matter at hand? Did the agent talk to Stevie? Because I’m thinking Stevie could wear a wire. We could catch Pizutti telling him to pull Glow West.”

  “The boy will not cooperate. Our agent, Turner, got nowhere. Stevie insisted he didn’t know what Turner was talking about, and Turner told me he didn’t want to push any harder. He was afraid he’d tip the boy off that someone close to him is watching.”

  “If he didn’t already. If only we could get Stevie to work with us. The way he’s going, he’s headed for jail.” What would happen to Lila?

  As we quietly discussed the problem, Pizutti’s vet arrived in his white pickup truck. Short, fair-haired, with a boyish face, I figured Doctor Paxton for about thirty-five. He hopped from the driver’s side and threw Calixto and me a smile.