Killer Riff

by Sheryl J. Anderson

  “That pleases me,” Claire said politely. “We’ll leave your name at the door. What was it again?” She knew, but if she needed to mark her territory, I could play along. I repeated it for her, and she nodded, her arm sweeping in the direction of the front door, like a Realtor who had decided I couldn’t afford the property she was showing and it was better to move along before anyone’s time was wasted any further.

  Olivia frowned at her. “We’re not ready to leave.”

  Claire bounced her key ring in her hand. “What else are you going to do?”

  Olivia made a high, unhappy sound in her throat. “This is my home,” she managed.

  “You couldn’t be here when your father needed you, but you can be here now? How convenient. For you,” Claire shot back.

  “Don’t you blame me,” Olivia said, on the verge of losing control. I stepped forward instinctively, realizing a split second later that I was concerned she was going to accuse Claire too early, before a persuasive case could be made. Guess Olivia was getting to me after all.

  “You’re the therapist, sweetheart,” Claire said, mockingly maternal. “You’re well versed in how often people blame someone else because they can’t handle their own guilt.”

  I could feel the knowledge radiating off Claire like heat. Claire knew that Olivia suspected her. A quick glance to Olivia showed she was unexpectedly pale and quiet. Was this her first brush with Claire’s awareness? How close to the bone was Claire cutting? And what did Olivia have to feel guilty about? She was so vehement about her dad being clean, maybe he had had a problem that she hadn’t been willing to recognize. But did that make her suspicions of Claire any less valid? Or was this really just a case of everyone pointing fingers at everyone else because no one could accept the fact that Russell had killed himself, intentionally or accidentally?

  “Please leave,” Olivia said in a voice I hadn’t heard yet—small, young, and tired.

  Claire bounced her ring in her hand again, weighing her decision and not the keys. She looked at me, and I tried to concentrate, for the article to come and for my own peace of mind, on how vibrantly green her eyes were, not how cold they seemed. “Has she told you about finding her father?”

  I started to answer that she hadn’t had a chance, but I stopped, wondering why I was feeling pressed to defend Olivia. Just because she was the first one to point a finger didn’t mean she was right. She might even be wrong that it was murder. But she’d raised Claire’s hackles, which raised my suspicions.

  “Please leave,” Olivia repeated with increased urgency.

  Suddenly, Claire held out her arms to Olivia and, when Olivia didn’t respond, swept her into a large yet perfunctory hug. “Don’t be late tonight.”

  In response, Olivia stared at the floor and said nothing while Claire’s heels punctuated her anger all the way out the front door. Once the door rasped closed, Olivia looked at me expectantly. I wasn’t sure how I was supposed to react, so I tried not to, which thrust the burden of comment back on her. After a few moments, she said, “Would you like a water? Coffee? I should’ve asked earlier.”

  “No, thank you.” She seemed smaller than when we’d first met, as though interacting with Claire had made her shrink down into herself, like an anemone recoiling from a brush with a barracuda. I wanted to turn our conversation back to the tapes, but first I had to ask, “What should I know about your finding your father’s body?”

  “I didn’t find his body, I found him,” Olivia said grimly. “He was still breathing when I got here, so Claire says it’s my fault he died. That I should’ve gotten help for him more quickly than I did.”

  “What do you think?” I asked, self-conscious that I was sounding like a therapist and treading on her toes.

  “I couldn’t think. He’d called me and asked me to come over, but he was sounding crazy. He’d been drinking. So when I first came in, I thought he’d just passed out. I figured I’d just tidy up, sit with him, talk to him when he woke up.” She gestured to an armchair with a deep seat and a long matching footstool, almost like a two-piece chaise longue, and I understood this was where her father had been sitting when she’d found him.

  The end table beside the chair was a heavy disk of hammered brass resting on a column of monkeywood. It was Thai; I’d seen them when I was growing up, in the home of friends whose parents had been stationed at the embassy there. There was a circular stain on the brass, just about where you’d put a glass if you were sitting in the chair. I rubbed at it with my finger, but the stain didn’t lift. The circle was so perfect, it had to have been the same glass, night after night. A ritual.

  There were also four scratches marking the corners of a rectangle on the table. The scratches were brighter than the ring. Newer. An ashtray? No, something bigger. But I didn’t want to get distracted, I needed to get the story out of Olivia. “Your father drank.”

  Her nostrils flared in irritation. “I never said he didn’t. I said he didn’t do pills.”

  “Okay. Did he drink heavily?”

  “Not so much anymore. Said he was getting too old for the hangovers. But every once in a while …” She shrugged. “Don’t we all?”

  “What happened to make you think this was different?”

  “His breathing started to sound funny. I tried to wake him up, but I couldn’t. So I called.”

  “Nine-one-one.”

  “No. Adam.”

  “Adam Crowley?”

  She bobbed her head in agitated assent. “He’s my … This is going to sound stupid, but he’s like my brother.”

  “Has he ever been anything else to you?” I asked, remembering Claire’s slam about “screwing the boys.”

  Her head snapped up, and she looked at me with narrowed eyes. “Claire’s a bitch, and you can’t believe half of what she says.”

  “That’s not an answer.”

  “No, we’ve never been anything else.”

  I couldn’t tell if the anger in her voice was specific to that statement or about the whole situation, but I decided to press on. “Okay, so what happened when you called him?”

  “He was finishing up rehearsal for this play. He told me he’d be right over, but he was coming from the Upper East Side.”

  “He didn’t tell you to call 911?”

  “You don’t understand, I didn’t want anyone to see my dad that way.”

  “Unconscious?”

  “Messed up.”

  I started to express my objection to that line of thinking, but she cut me off. “Anyway, while I was waiting, Dad’s breathing got more distressed and I got scared, so I called 911 anyway.”

  “But they didn’t get here in time?”

  She swayed a little as she searched for the proper description. “Barely. They did their thing and rushed him in the ambulance, but he stopped breathing once on the way, and by the time he was in the ER …” She shuddered at the memory. “They asked me if he’d taken anything, and I said of course not. I didn’t know …” She made a shooing gesture, but I wasn’t sure if it was directed at me or the memories.

  “But now you’re sure. Why?”

  “Because I’m an idiot. Claire came over when she heard the paramedics, but I told her she didn’t need to come with us. So she was in here with all kinds of time to clean up and hide evidence and do anything else she needed to do.”

  I rubbed the circle on the brass table again. “Did she say she cleaned up?”

  “Of course not. She claims she went back to her apartment and waited by the phone.”

  By the phone. I looked at the suggestion of a rectangle on the brass table again. “Where did you go to call Adam?”

  Her breath clicked in her throat in irritation at my change in focus. “I didn’t go anywhere. I had my cell in my purse.”

  “What happened to this phone?”

  Olivia looked down at where my finger was tapping the brass table and blinked slowly, then looked around the room. “It’s …” She looked back at the table, perplexed
. “I don’t know.”

  “Was it there that night?”

  She gazed at the table for a long beat, as though replaying the scene in her mind frame by frame. “No,” she replied slowly. “His glass and his headphones. That’s all. It didn’t even register … That’s so odd.”

  If someone had indeed laced Russell’s nightly cocktail with a pharmaceutical kicker, it would be logical to remove the phone so he couldn’t call for help. But had it been removed before or after Russell called Olivia?

  “What did your dad say when he called you?”

  She waved her hands dismissively. “He was drunk.”

  “In vino veritas.”

  She paused uncomfortably. “I don’t remember.”

  “Then I can’t help you.”

  She walked away from me suddenly, as though that would put distance between her and my question. Perching on the edge of a sofa, she laced her fingers in her lap and was quiet so long that I almost thought she was waiting for me to leave. Finally, she said in a crisp, detached tone, “Everything had turned out to be a lie, and what was most precious to him had been used against him.”

  That would be hard to hear anyone you care about say, much less your father. And then when it turns out to be the last thing he says to you, ouch. I gave her a moment before asking, “Do you know what he was talking about?”

  “Guess,” she said unhappily.

  “You.”

  She gave me a withering look, thinking I was making fun of her, then looked away when she realized I was serious. Watching her face, I could see her censoring the answer until there was almost nothing left. “His work.”

  “How could that have been used against him?”

  “I don’t know. It didn’t make any sense to me. But I know it has something to do with Claire. Everything has something to do with Claire. She’s been his work since Micah died. I mean, Dad took care of her, got her back on her feet emotionally, watched over her in every possible way.”

  “Then why would you suspect her of having something to do with his death?”

  “I think she came to resent it. Him. That more and more over the years, people talked about how important Dad was, not how important she was. And after Adam’s career tanked, Claire blamed that whole thing on Dad, and things eroded from there.”

  “I thought Adam decided to quit performing.” After he wowed everyone at the memorial concert for Micah, Adam had recorded an album under Russell’s tutelage. My recollection was that it had been successful. I owned it, though truth be told, I hadn’t played it in ages. But I did remember reading about Adam giving up his music and moving on to other pursuits, and I hadn’t heard anything about him in a couple of years.

  Olivia managed a smile. “That was Dad’s magic, putting everything in the best possible light. Adam’s album was actually pretty strong, but when everyone’s expecting the Second Coming, anything else is a disappointment.”

  “It hasn’t hurt Jordan.” Jordan’s album had come out eighteen months ago, torn up the charts, and was still getting decent airplay. It was eerie how much he sounded like Micah, as both a singer and a writer. Even more so than Adam. Jordan had captured those of us old enough to remember and adore his father, as well as the teenagers who embraced him as the next rock legend. Critics and the public were clamoring for his new album.

  “Which drives Claire crazy. That the ‘other son’ is the one to inherit Micah’s crown. Something else she blamed on Dad.”

  “Because he produced the album.”

  “Because he treated Adam and Jordan the same.”

  Claire struck me as the kind of mother who could turn tigress and devour anyone who threatened her young, but I needed to fill in some of the gaps in my knowledge of this intriguing group before I could decide whether there was something to Olivia’s theory or not. And how the tapes fit in.

  “Who has the tapes?” I asked.

  “I do.”

  “Where?”

  “I don’t see how that’s relevant.”

  “Fine. But you know they’re safe, secure.”

  Olivia rose, hands clamped to her sides. “You think the tapes have something to do with this?”

  “I don’t know what I think yet. That’s why I’m asking so many questions.” I smiled, wanting to end our first encounter on a somewhat positive note, to ensure there would be a second. “I need to go back to the office, but I would like to continue our conversation.”

  “Of course. I’ll see you tonight, make sure you meet the right people.”

  “Thank you.”

  Olivia let out a long breath, as though we’d crossed a finish line. “Thank you. For listening. I wasn’t sure you would.”

  I nodded. “I’d suggest you be cautious about discussing this with anyone else.”

  “And spoil your exclusive?”

  “I’m more concerned about how it would play on Page Six.” Every gossip column in the city would have orgasms over Olivia accusing Claire, and it just wasn’t smart.

  “Point taken.”

  I still wasn’t convinced any of this was a motive for murder, but I was intrigued. Out in the hallway, staring at the call button for the elevator, I wondered about the strain of living in the public eye, with paparazzi charting your every move, mood, misstep. It had to take a thick skin, and a skin that thick would get hard to shed over time, might even become your regular coat. Combine that with the ballistic power of artistic egos, and small wonder relationships went sour, marriages faltered, and families got weird.

  I was in the middle of trying to figure out what I’d be like if I’d grown up with rock stars when a slender hand grabbed my upper arm with viselike strength. I came close to literally jumping out of my shoes, but that didn’t faze Claire in the least.

  “You do understand that she only sees her side of the story,” she said darkly.

  “Pretty common affliction,” I said, trying to ease my arm away from her. But she wasn’t going to let go until she’d had her full say. I hoped I’d still have use of my fingers at that point.

  “Olivia has a particularly flexible relationship with the truth,” Claire continued urgently. “Her grief over what’s happened makes it even more difficult. I don’t want you to take her fantasies and present them as fact. She’s a very troubled girl, and she should be allowed to come to terms with her responsibility in private with the help of the people who love her.”

  “‘Responsibility’?” I asked, no longer caring that my arm was numb. It wasn’t just Olivia’s imagination or guilty conscience.

  Claire released me abruptly. At first I thought she was being coy, then I realized she’d genuinely said something she hadn’t intended to say. I was willing to bet that was a historic event. “Poor choice of words on my part.”

  Still, it gave me an opening I couldn’t resist pushing at a little harder. “Unless you think Olivia had something to do with Russell’s death.”

  Claire ran her tongue over her top teeth, pushing out her pursed lips even farther. She was waiting for me to continue or, better yet, to change the subject, but I wasn’t about to let her off that easily. Finally, she said, “His death was an accident.”

  “Not a universally held opinion.”

  “The official decision.”

  “What do you think?”

  “What exactly is your article about?” she said, putting on the practiced smile of a public person.

  I’d gotten as much as I was going to get at the moment.

  “Olivia as gatekeeper of her father’s legacy.”

  The last thing I expected from Claire Crowley at that moment was laughter, especially the throaty laugh of the bitterly amused. Before I could ask her what was so funny, the doorway at the other end of the hall opened, framing Olivia. Claire saw her but made no effort to quell her laughter. Olivia stepped out in the hallway, but Claire turned back to me and said, “We should talk. So our lawyers don’t have to,” and walkedback into her apartment without another look at Olivia or me. As s
oon as Claire’s door closed, Olivia withdrew and closed her door. I was left standing in the hallway, rubbing the hairs on the back of my neck and wondering exactly what I’d thought was wrong with being an advice columnist.

  4

  “You can’t go alone.”

  “Thank you for being worried about my safety.”

  “Oh. That too.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “Okay, I admit it. I love Jordan Crowley, and you’re denying me the opportunity to see him up close, all sweaty and artistic and magnificent.”

  It was nearly déjà vu. We were in my bedroom, with Cassady going through my closet with the precision of a U.S. Marine on a search-and-destroy mission, Tricia sitting on my bed clutching a pillow to her chest and proclaiming her affection for a rock star, and me standing in front of the dresser and wondering if I wouldn’t just be better off shaving my head since I’m never happy with my hair. For a moment, we were suitemates in college again, and it was rather gratifying that those days didn’t seem out of reach. At least completely.

  “You need to bring along someone who’s really into him and can give you a genuine reaction to meeting him in the flesh for the first time,” Tricia continued. She twirled a lock of hair around one finger and smiled at me beseechingly.

  “You meet celebrities all the time,” I said. The events she planned were often star-studded and brushed her up against many hot personalities of the moment.

  “The ones I meet aren’t necessarily the ones I crave,” she replied, letting her smile slide into wicked territory.

  “I’m not really going because of Jordan. I’m going to try and understand Olivia better.” They both looked at me with large, intent eyes until I added, “And figure out if she really thinks Claire killed Russell or if she wants to cause trouble for Claire for some other reason.”

  “Perhaps because Claire harbors a suspicion or two about Olivia?” Cassady frowned deeply at one of my favorite pairs of black slacks, then shoved them dismissively back into the closet.

  “What’s wrong with those?”

  “Nothing. If you’re staying home,” she answered, continuing her search.