by Клео Коул
The drink came, I paid for my eleven-dollar cocktail, and snagged a stool at the bar, watching and waiting for Billy Benedetto’s mysterious backer to arrive.
Five minutes passed. Then ten. Then fifteen. But not one soul entered that room. While I kept watching the door, I’d been nursing what turned out to be a blueberry martini. After twenty minutes of very slow sips, my tapered glass was finally empty. I was about to order again when a sweet, male voice spoke close to my ear.
“I’d like to buy you another, if I could.”
I turned. Beside me at the bar, a fashionably dressed man at least fifteen years my junior smiled down at me. He was model handsome, far more striking than the Hollywood celebrity I’d collided with earlier. He was tall and tanned with black hair worn slicked back like Wall Street’s Gordon Gekko, only this guy was closer in age to Gekko’s son.
“Simon Ward,” he said, offering me his right hand. I shook it, and he rested his left hand on top of mine. I got the distinct impression he’d done that so I could see the Rolex on his wrist.
“My name’s Clare,” I said.
“Clare.” His smile broadened. “Clare. I like that name.”
Upon second glance, I decided that the man’s tailored suit was much too trendy for a stodgy brokerage house, and he was far too young to be a power player in the financial world, anyway. I figured him for a scion of a wealthy family, some trust fund baby who’d come to the new Club Flux on a lark. New York City was full of that type: young, well-educated, sophisticated urbanites who never had to do a lick of work, unless boredom with partying set in. Why? Because they were smart enough to come out of the right birth canal.
“Now, how about that drink?” he asked.
“I think I may have had enough,” I replied, charmed and somewhat bemused by this too-young man’s attention but also aware that my thoughts were turning edgy. Probably a result of this relentless dance music pounding through my head.
Simon Ward frowned, but the expression of eagerness never left his bright eyes. “Come on, the night is young! Have another drink, on me.”
I sighed. There was still no sign of Benedetto’s backer.
Clearly, I had a stakeout on my hands, and I could almost hear Mike Quinn’s voice: You’re not going anywhere at the moment, anyway, Cosi. So talk to this guy. He’s a good cover. And this bar’s not exactly democratizing its luxury, so let the man pay.
I glanced up at Simon. “Sure. If you’d really like to treat me, why not?”
“That’s the spirit.” He took my nearly empty glass, slid it across the bar, and ordered another.
I managed to avoid his unwavering gaze while we made polite conversation. At one point, I spied a woman at least my age, in a too-daring banana-yellow tank dress with a short skirt and plunging neckline. She was fairly tall and strongly built with severe features, and her ebony hair was slicked back into a tight ponytail. To my surprise, the woman was openly glaring at me.
Whoa, what is her problem? She can’t possibly be jealous. This kid’s not much older than my daughter!
That’s when I remembered Tucker giving me the lowdown on a recent social trend. Tadpoling, he’d called it, insisting older women were hooking up with young men all the time now.
Simon passed me the drink, and our fingers touched. I looked up and met his gaze. His eyes widened, and he took a breath.
“Sorry,” he said, seemingly embarrassed.
“What are you apologizing for?”
“I was struck a little speechless, that’s all,” he replied sheepishly. “Yeah, I know it sounds corny to someone as sophisticated as you obviously are.”
“Excuse me?”
He nodded. “Your beautiful hair, your wonderful clothes…I’m a fashion designer, and I knew from just one look at you that you possessed an impeccable taste—”
I nearly choked on my martini. The irony was hilarious. It wasn’t my taste he was admiring. It was Madame’s. And I had to agree with him on that score. Her taste always had been impeccable.
“Just look at those green emeralds around your neck. See how they shimmer. Do you realize those gems are an exact match for the gorgeous green shade of your bright eyes?”
I gulped a hit of my martini. This guy’s really pouring it on. Has he been drinking excessively?
That’s when I noticed a man finally going through the mirrored doors next to the bar. It wasn’t an employee. And it wasn’t an unknown. The man going in to see Billy Benedetto was Anton Wright.
Anton Wright is Benedetto’s backer.
My God. I’d scored big coming here. Huge. I was now absolutely sure I’d found Keitel’s killer. Benedetto wanted Keitel dead, but I was willing to bet that Anton Wright was in on it somehow, too. What else could Benedetto possibly have on Anton?
I’ll talk to Mike first thing tomorrow, I decided. With his help, I’m sure we can come up with a plan to collar Billy Benedetto and free my baby girl!
A grin split my face, and I felt like celebrating. Simon glanced over, saw my expression. “Hey, now,” he said. “Look at that beautiful smile—”
Just then, someone tapped me hard. I turned. An Amazon of a woman in a dress covered in red rhinestones placed a manicured hand on my shoulder.
“There you are, girlfriend!” she gushed. “I see you’ve hooked up. So have I. But before I go home, I want you to join me in the powder room.”
I blinked, baffled. Did I know her? Was she a customer from the Blend?
I took a closer look at the woman. My goodness, she was large. Was there a WWF for women? If there was, she’d have mopped the floor with every opponent. In her late thirties, she had a longish, slightly horsey oval face, and she wore her very short blond hair in tight curls against her scalp. I didn’t recall seeing her at the Blend, and I certainly would have remembered this Wonder Woman stand-in.
She smiled, batted her heavily made-up eyes.
“Look!” she cried, acting a little tipsy. “There’s my guy, over there.” She clutched my shoulder and pointed insistently.
I looked in the direction of her gesture, and my body froze. The man she’d pointed to was Mike Quinn. The lieutenant was waving at me from across the room.
Mike? I blinked, more than a little confused. What in heaven’s name is going on?
Twenty-Four
I moved to go to Mike, ask him what was happening, but the blond Amazon acting like my best friend actually restrained me with a fairly powerful grip.
“Come to the ladies’ room with me, please, Clare,” she said.
How does she know my name?
Before I could ask, Wonder Woman turned to my eager young suitor. “You don’t mind, do you?” she asked. “I promise, Clare will be right back as soon as we’re done with our girl talk.”
I glanced at Mike again, and he nodded. Something was going down here. He wanted me to play along.
“Okay,” I said, nodding to the big blond. I handed my martini to Simon Ward. “Would you hold on to my drink, Simon? I’ll be right back.”
“Please hurry,” he replied, appearing a little annoyed.
I followed the woman across the room to the ladies’. But as soon as we stepped through the door, I turned on her.
“Okay, what’s going on?”
She immediately reached into the bodice of her rhinestone dress and pulled out a gold shield. “Detective Lori Soles, NYPD. I’m on Lieutenant Quinn’s task force.”
“You’re hunting the May-September gang?”
I could have kicked myself the second I’d blurted that out. Mike had told me that in confidence.
The woman blinked, surprised. “Lieutenant Quinn told me you were a private detective. You are, right? You have a license?”
“I, ah—”
“Quinn also told me to tell you that he thinks you can handle this. He said I should emphasize that for some reason. Something about a conversation you had with him at a crime scene recently?”
Oh, God.
“He also told me tha
t you solved some pretty hairy homicides, and this should be a walk in the park. Are you up for it?”
The door opened again, and another woman entered. I recognized her at once: the jealous one with the too-daring banana-yellow tank dress and the slicked-down ebony ponytail. She’d glared at me earlier, when Simon first began talking to me. I noticed she was clutching an oversized black handbag under one arm that in no way matched her outfit.
“This better work,” she grumbled. “I turned on the charm for forty minutes, then she walks in and the freakin’ perp dumps me!”
She appraised me, shook her head. “The little bastard is obviously going for the emeralds.”
Detective Soles rolled her eyes. “This is my partner, Sue Ellen Bass,” she said.
“Well, is she going to do it?” Detective Bass demanded.
“Calm down,” said Detective Soles. “I haven’t explained the sting yet.”
Before I could ask them, “What sting?” or even make an educated guess where this conversation was going, given Quinn’s current task force goals, the door opened, and two exceedingly tipsy young women entered the ladies’, tittering loudly.
“Into my office,” Detective Bass commanded. She shoved us into a marble-walled bathroom stall and locked the door behind us. The stall was quite spacious, a mercy, considering there were three of us crammed in there.
“Are you going to wear the wire?” Detective Bass whispered to me.
“The wire? What for?”
“That guy, the one who was chatting you up? He’s our prime suspect.”
“That kid, Simon? You’re telling me he’s a May-September gangster? He said he was a fashion designer—”
Bass snorted. “Simon, huh? And he’s a fashion designer? That’s real funny, because he told me his name was Richard, and he worked on Wall Street.”
“Sounds suspicious to me,” Soles agreed.
“Or the SOB is married,” Bass replied. “In which case, the situation’s even more pathetic than I originally figured, because it means I can’t even get a lowlife scumbag to be straight with me.”
“Please, Sue Ellen…” Soles shook her head. “Let’s not delve into your dating habits—”
“Easy for you to say. You’re a happy newlywed.”
Soles rolled her eyes. “And you’re the one with the commitment problem!”
“True.” Bass shrugged. “But there are too many cute guys on the force. Like Lieutenant Quinn out there. He’s pretty hot, but word is he’s taken.”
“Already?” Soles asked. “He just split with his wife.”
Sue Ellen shrugged. “Whoever the lucky lady is, the man’s got it bad for her.”
Oh, Lord.
Her partner hushed her, faced me. “Look, Ms. Cosi. We really need you to do this. Lieutenant Quinn told me to tell you something else. He said he wouldn’t ask if he didn’t need this.”
I nodded. The man had gone out on a limb enough times for me. The least I could do was return the favor. “Okay. I’ll do it.”
“There’s a risk,” Detective Soles warned. “These guys have been violent in the past. We’ll be on you like glue, but you could still get roughed up if we drop the ball—”
“We won’t,” Detective Bass declared.
“But it’s a possibility,” Soles added.
“What do you want me to do?”
Detective Soles glanced at her partner. “I told you she’d do it. This one can take care of herself.”
“You’re going to wear a wire, honey,” Sue Ellen Bass said as she reached into her bag. “Ask simple ‘Simon’ out there to escort you home. You live in the Village, right? We’ll monitor your conversation after you leave the club. We’ll follow you, too. If he tries to rob you, or rape you, or even look at you funny, we’ll know it and come running.”
“What if he’s innocent?”
Sue Ellen yanked a radio, battery pack, and a tiny microphone on a long wire out of her bag and untangled it. “Then you have nothing to worry about.”
Detective Soles fumbled with the buttons on my blouse.
“Excuse me? What are you doing?!”
“The wire goes under your clothes.”
It took several minutes, but eventually I was ready. The transmitter was tapped to my belly, the microphone wire running up, under my bra, to the microphone itself, which was nestled between my breasts.
“Did you bring a coat?” Bass asked, checking out my breasts.
“Of course. It’s freezing outside.”
“Well, don’t button it; you might cover the mike.”
“Okay, Ms. Cosi. Say something.” Soles commanded, slipping a headset over her tight blond curls.
“Say what?” I asked.
Detective Soles listened and nodded to her partner. “It works. Now we need a panic phrase—”
My eyes widened. “A what?”
“Something you say that lets us know that you’re in real trouble,” Sue Ellen replied in an exasperated tone, as if I should know this stuff already.
“Oh, sure, a panic phrase,” I replied flatly. “How about ‘Help, help, I’m being mugged’?”
Detective Soles rolled her eyes. “That won’t work. What if he’s holding a knife on you? If you yell that, he’ll just finish you off.”
“Can’t you just follow me and see that I’m in trouble?” I said.
“We can try to keep a visual on you,” Soles said, “but what if he pulls you into the shadows where we can’t see you? Or takes you into some private lobby, where our presence would tip him off?”
“We have to rely on the wire,” Detective Bass insisted.
“And the panic phrase,” Lori Soles reminded her. Then she looked down at me (a long trip) and put her large hand on my small shoulder. “If something bad starts to go down, and you want us to rush in, you have to say something that’s not at all appropriate, something that will confuse the perp long enough for us to move in. We’ll need about fifteen seconds, at least, and that’s enough time for a guy like this to kill you.”
“Okay, I’m convinced,” I said. “Like what?”
“Just say ‘Carnegie Hall,’” Soles replied. “We’ll understand.”
“Carnegie Hall?” I smirked. “Are you sure I don’t have to practice first?”
Soles laughed, glanced at her partner. “This one’s quick. I think she’s gonna do it for us.”
“Okay, honey,” Sue Ellen Bass said, slapping me on the back. “Get out there and break the little scumbag’s heart, so I can crack his skull.”
Detective Soles and I left the bathroom together. I could tell she was relieved to see that Simon Ward was still waiting where we left him. She made a big show of saying good-bye, making sure to mention that I would be going home alone now.
“Thanks, Clare,” Detective Soles said, squeezing my shoulder reassuringly as she pecked my cheek. “I’ve got to go find my man.”
I took the blue martini from Simon and drained it in one gulp.
“You’re friend seems a little…scatterbrained,” he said.
“She is.” I nodded. “She might be a little tipsy, too.”
“You’ve finished your drink in a hurry. You may feel a little tipsy soon, too.”
“That’s why I’m going home,” I told him. Simon frowned—until I took his arm and added, “But not alone, I hope. You know, I don’t live far at all, but I could use a chaperone on the walk home.”
Simon grinned and patted my hand. “I’ll be your escort—how’s that? I have far too many designs on you to be an effective chaperone.”
I laughed, only half faking it. I had trouble believing Simon was anything more than a charming young man who had a way with the ladies—which was also (eesh) a fairly accurate description of a May-September gang member, come to think of it.
We waited a few minutes at the coat check. Simon retrieved our stuff. As he helped me into my coat, he leaned close and gave me a light kiss on the back of my neck. I stiffened, remembering Mike was watching th
is—or, at the very least, listening.
Outside, the line was still long, but it was colder than I remembered it. We stepped onto Fourth Avenue, and a blast of arctic air hit us.
“Too cold.” Simon groaned, reaching for a cell phone. “I’ll call my driver.”
He hit a speed-dial button and waited a moment. “Bring the car around. I’m outside Flux on Fourth Avenue.” He paused. “What do you mean, traffic?” He faced Fourth Avenue. It was jammed with cars. “Fine,” he said, sounding annoyed. “I’ll meet you on Broadway.”
Simon pocketed his phone and took my arm a little roughly.
“This way,” he said, leading me down shadowy Eleventh Street. It was late, and all the businesses were closed. A block ahead, I could see traffic moving along Broadway, but where we were now, between Fourth and Broadway, it was the twilight zone, completely deserted.
“So where do you live, Clare?” Simon asked, his tone back to upbeat and pleasant.
“Above a coffeehouse, actually. On Hudson Street. I’m—”
The sucker punch came out of nowhere—which is probably why they call it a sucker punch. One second I was walking along, chatting away; the next I was reeling, down on my knees, thrown by force into a shadowy alley.
“Ca—” I began, but couldn’t get the word out! In about a nanosecond, strong hands grabbed me, lifted me up. A forearm was shoved against my throat. I can’t talk! Simon’s face loomed close. “Don’t fight,” he whispered, jamming a knee between my legs. I could smell his alcohol-soaked breath, hear the sound of a car pulling up.
“Come on, man! We got your back!” I heard someone call. “Bash her head in and let’s go!”
God, this guy was strong. He had me pinned against the wall like a butterfly to a board. But then his free hand moved toward my neck. He’s going for Madame’s emerald’s! The pressure on my windpipe finally loosened. Now was my chance.
“Carnegie Hall!” I shouted.
“Huh?”
“Carnegie Hall! Carnegie Hall!”
The hard smack seemed to come a moment later, a fist striking flesh, and my attacker was sprawled on the ground. Free now, I stumbled, almost going down myself when a pair of strong hands caught me.
