by Lisa Fernow
“Did you see where he went after you left him on the dance floor?”
“No. I asked him about it this morning. He told me he didn’t remember where he’d gone and when I pressed him he got mad and threw me out of his apartment. That’s the truth.”
“Feel better?”
Funny, she did, somewhat.
Detective Morrow signaled for more coffee and the waitress refilled his cup, smiling at him for some reason. Maybe because he’d kept his part of the table clean. Or maybe she wanted to flirt. He probably got that a lot. “Ms. Blakeley, you seem to want to take an active part in the investigation.”
That was better than saying she’d tried to interfere with it.
“Somebody drove a knife into Nathalie LeFebre’s back in the middle of a dance floor without anyone seeing it. I want to understand how they pulled that off. You’re in a unique position to help.”
“Me?”
“You know the people. You know tango.”
“And I can go places and do things you can’t.”
“Whoa, Bessie, I said help, not break the law.”
Whoa Bessie—that’s what he said at Shawna’s when she’d nearly fainted. She’d heard him say those words before that, but where? Then it hit her. She bounced up in her seat. “I know where I saw you, besides when you came to the studio about Miles Rothenberg, I mean. You were at El Abrazo the night Eduardo introduced us to Nathalie. I cabeceoed you and you looked away and later you almost stopped a fight: you said, ‘Whoa, Bessie.’”
“You’ve got a good memory.”
“What were you doing there?”
“Just what you said. Stopping a fight.”
“No, really. What were you doing? Spying on Roland? You asked earlier if Nathalie had known Miles Rothenberg. Was it something to do with Miles?”
“I can’t tell you. Who could have stabbed Nathalie while she danced? Roland?”
“No. Both his hands would have been occupied.” She thought for a second. “But he could have stage-managed the collision and stabbed her when he was taking her to sit down.”
“Where would he have hidden the weapon, in that case?”
“I don’t know, up his sleeve maybe. His left forearm would always be vertical, holding her right hand in proper dance position, so a knife wouldn’t have fallen out.” She held up her left forearm to demonstrate but something about the explanation didn’t feel right. She settled back into her seat and sipped her coffee which by that point had cooled to room temperature. “Let me ask you something. Could the murderer have just wanted to take a swipe at Nathalie, not meaning to kill her?”
“Why would you think so?”
“Even if you danced with the same partner to the same music no dance is ever the same. So it would be impossible for the murderer to predict where anyone would be on the dance floor. If I wanted to kill someone I’d have found a much more dependable way.”
“Tell me more.”
“Well, some people call tango ‘the vertical expression of a horizontal desire’—‘one body with four legs.’” Antonia stopped, flustered. Why on earth did I say that? I must be losing it. “It’s totally improvised. It would be too risky to attack someone and be sure to hit the right spot or even the right person.”
Detective Morrow sipped his coffee, eyeing her over the rim of the mug. “It’s possible Roland Guest may have been the intended victim. What do you think of him as a target?”
“I’m all in favor.”
He grinned.
“No, not really,” she said. “I just don’t like him.”
The waitress came to clear, saw the mess of used napkins, and confiscated the dispenser.
He said, “I want to recreate the conditions of the night in question.”
“You mean reenact the crime, like a whodunit?”
“This isn’t fiction but something along those lines. When’s your next dance?”
“There’s a milonga at my place two days from now.”
“I thought you said a milonga was a type of dance.”
“It also means a tango event. Like El Abrazo. Our community isn’t that large so we often hold them in our houses.”
“What time?”
“Nine thirty, but it doesn’t really get going until after ten. What do you want me to do?”
“Can you get everyone who was at Shawna’s party there?”
“Are you kidding? Tango is an obsession. Nothing short of nuclear war will stop them.”
“Just make sure they come. I can’t get them there unless I ask officially and I don’t want to do that at this point.”
If Christian didn’t do it the reenactment would clear him. But Morrow could still get it wrong, unless she controlled the situation.
She leaned forward and put both hands on the table. She looked him dead in the eye. “I’ll do it. But since we’re going to be working together, Detective Morrow, shouldn’t I know your first name?”
Detective Morrow looked back and gave her a slow-cooked grin. “Nope.”
CHAPTER 35
Antonia Blakeley Cleans Up
11/3. 2130 hours. Antonia Blakeley’s house, Brookwood Hills.
MORROW ARRIVED AT HER DOORSTEP promptly at nine thirty. She answered the bell holding a broom and wearing a knockout lace dress that clung to every curve of her athletically toned body.
“Hello, Detective Morrow.” She greeted him with a peck on the cheek, smelling the way women did when they took all day to get ready.
Whoa Bessie. “Hello, Ms. Blakeley.”
“We kiss everyone hello and goodbye, both sides, like in Argentina, Detective, as you have no doubt observed,” she murmured as she went for the second cheek. Damned if the wench wasn’t deliberately trying to take him off balance. Before he could speculate on what she might be up to she about-faced and led him up the half flight of stairs to the hall landing that connected the dining area with the living room, moving fluidly despite her impossibly high heels. His knowledge of women’s shoes being mainly concerned with the type of prints they left, it was hard to see how she expected to dance in them.
On his previous visit the built-in cabinet that served as an entryway table had been strewn with unopened bills and circulars. The mail was still there, massed into a heap, making room for two stacks of short plastic cups, cans of Diet 7Up chilling in a large bowl of ice, an open bottle of Argentine Malbec, a squat candle nearly at the end of its life, and a box of safety matches.
She propped the broom against the wall and, without asking, poured a glass of wine and tried to get him to take it.
“No, thanks.”
“Think of it as a disguise,” she said as she opened a door in the cabinet and stowed the mail. “If you’re drinking people will think you’re off duty.”
“No thanks.”
“You need to give them some explanation for your presence.” She picked up the broom and invited him to follow her into the living room. “We’ll be in here. I don’t know if Christian will come. I asked Shawna to work on him—he likes dancing with her.” She didn’t seem to expect an answer so while she buzzed around sweeping what appeared to be a perfectly clean wood floor he scouted the terrain.
Her living area was larger than Shawna Muir’s dining room but the space was otherwise appropriate for the exercise and free of obstructions. On his right a built-in seating area with fitted, flat cushions ran the length of the wall. Above it a recessed shelf held a CD player, several days’ worth of newspapers, and stacks of home-burned CDs—many out of their jewel cases. Whoever was working the music would probably sit there. Along the far wall a ledge supported a modern built-in fireplace. On his left, two sets of French doors opened out to a backyard deck which was dark except for the illumination spilling from within. Blakeley obviously didn’t believe in security lighting.
About thirty people were expected. He hadn’t asked what it had taken her to get everyone together so soon after the murder. The sofa offered the best sight lines but the armchair and
coffee table had already been moved out onto the deck so it might be going too. He opted for the ledge and sat.
By this point Blakeley had turned her attention to the newspapers. “You have to give some reason for being here,” she said as she scooped them up and stuffed them into the fireplace. “I could tell them you want to learn to dance.”
“They know who I am. I don’t need a reason.”
“Give you a free lesson right now to get you started.”
“Let’s stay focused, okay?”
She stopped what she was doing and put one hand on her hip. “Don’t tell me you’re afraid of a little dance. Is tango too intense for you?”
It was a pretty ballsy comment considering what he did for a living.
She marched to the upholstered couch and punched the pillows to fluff them. “I’ll give you fifty dollars if you let me teach you a basic walk in front of everyone, right here tonight.”
“I’ll give you a hundred bucks if you settle down and let me do my job.”
Blakeley circled around to the far side of the sofa. “Maybe I should tell them we’re old school buddies—” She tugged at the sturdy, old-fashioned piece, apparently intending to drag it single-handedly across the room.
“Want help with that?”
“ —and I was surprised as anything to see you at Shawna’s because at the last reunion you told me you were studying for the priesthood.”
He laughed, despite himself.
“And you came tonight because you’re my—” she gave one last heave and the sofa moved a few feet, “—father confessor. Of course that won’t work since I don’t know your first name. I can’t very well call you Father S. She straightened up and wrinkled her nose at him. “I bet when you were born your parents took one look at you and decided not to give you a first name. Just the initial.” She leaned on the arm of the sofa to readjust the strap of her shoe. “I should have done this before I put on these heels.”
“Where do you want it?”
“Outside.”
Of course the woman wanted it outside. Together they maneuvered the furniture through the French doors and positioned it so it faced the back yard. The night air had turned pleasantly cool. No moon. Without security lights the sky was clear enough to see the Pleiades.
“Here’s the drill,” he said. “I’ll sit over near the fireplace and observe for about twenty or thirty minutes to see how everyone dances normally.”
“Fat chance they’ll do that. Not with you watching.”
“After a few minutes they’ll forget I’m here.”
“But—”
“This isn’t your show, Ms. Blakeley. You sit with me. Explain what people are doing. Watch for anything that looks out of place. I especially want you to look for opportunities where someone might have used a concealed weapon. I’ll take it from there. Any questions?”
“You’ll want the exact song that was playing that night, then.”
“Does it matter?”
She rolled her eyes. “A milonga has a totally different rhythm than a tango and besides that, each song with each orchestra is distinct. We were dancing to Pedro Laurenz’ ‘Milonga de mis Amores.’”
“Do you have a copy?”
She gave him a withering look. “It’s a classic.”
“Good. Thank you.”
“Do you think the murderer will crack?”
Mostly what he wanted to see was how someone could have struck Nathalie on the dance floor. If the reenactment provoked the murderer to confess, all the better.
Blakeley started to pace up and down the length of the deck. “Jiminy, I’m as jumpy as Hamlet before the dumb show. You know, Hamlet has the players do a pantomime that just happens to be exactly like the crime—”
“—‘Speak the speech, I pray you, as I pronounced it to you, trippingly on the tongue.’” He recited the famous monologue. When he finished he bowed with a flourish, taking off an imaginary plumed hat. “My mother taught high school drama.”
“I need a drink. Sure you don’t want one? I bet Hamlet had a few before he coached the players.” She started back into the house, paused inside the French doors, and turned to him, her silhouette backlit by the lights inside, her features shrouded by the night.
The doorbell rang.
“I’m sorry,” she said in a small voice. “I just have a case of the jitters.”
He knew she was still worried about her nephew but there was nothing he could do to reassure her. He’d told her the truth—female victims were most likely to have been killed by a husband or boyfriend. The competing statistic, which he hadn’t mentioned, was that most murders were committed by men in their twenties.
CHAPTER 36
The Play’s the Thing
MORROW OPENED THE FRONT DOOR to find Shawna Muir victorious from the Winn Dixie wars, judging from the plastic grocery bags hanging from her arms. She’d evidently hauled a trunk-load of bottled water up the front steps in one go. She was dressed simply in a black sleeveless top, knee length skirt and flat shoes.
“Let me, ma’am.” He relieved her of her bags and saw that their plastic handles had left white ligature marks around her wrists.
“Thanks. Antonia told me you wanted to see one of our milongas; welcome.” Morrow couldn’t tell if she was feeling unsure whether to treat him professionally or socially, or if her watchful expression hid some deeper anxiety.
“Thanks for having me.” He held the door ajar with his body to let her pass into the house ahead of him.
“Hey, Ant,” she called out as she headed up the stairs, “they were out of Poland Springs so I bought Pellegrino. And I picked up a liter of Coke and some extra limes; I hope that’s enough. Nobody else drinks beer besides Christian, do they?”
Blakeley’s voice carried into the hall accompanied by the sound of a door slamming shut. “I should never have let him have alcohol in my house. Now if I tell Christian not to drink and dance he’ll just get plastered to spite me.”
Morrow followed Muir up to the main floor. She turned left at the landing and passed through the dining room into the kitchen. He found Blakeley rummaging in the cabinet under the sink, nothing but her perfectly toned ass poking out.
“Nuts, I’m out of paper napkins,” she said, oblivious to his presence.
Muir muscled two liters of water into the already-packed fridge. “No you’re not, you put them in the pantry the last time, remember? I’ll do the music while you look.”
Blakeley came up for air. “Find ‘Milonga de mis Amores’ for me, will you?”
The doorbell rang again. Since his hostesses were occupied Morrow went to answer it. A woman in a pink halter-top, breasts proudly cantilevered out over her ribcage, kissed him on both cheeks, greeted him in a magnolia-laced accent, and swept past. A trio of dark-haired women followed. Hola, hola, hola. Each kissed him matter-of-factly on the cheek as they entered the house. It was a pleasant and disorienting change from the way he was normally greeted on the job, where the civilians he met on duty were more apt to take a swing at him.
Looking out at the street he saw other guests converging on the house so he figured he might as well continue to man the door. He recognized Sanchez and nodded a greeting as the Argentine mounted the steps to the front door.
Sanchez thankfully didn’t try to kiss him. “Good evening, Detective Morrow. Do you have any news of Nathalie?”
“Nothing yet, I’m afraid.”
“You must think it strange that we should meet like this so soon,” Sanchez said. “But for us tango is a way of cheating death.”
“I think I understand,” Morrow answered, noting the dark circles under the Argentine’s eyes.
The music came on, the orchestra managing to sound both melancholy and cheerful, and Morrow was instantly transported back to El Abrazo.
The noise level rose as more people streamed in, some casually dressed, some more gussied up, many bearing offerings of brownies, fruit, or wine, and nearly all of them carrying cloth
shoe bags. Most kissed and hugged each other, including the men, as he’d seen people do at El Abrazo. With the ruckus in the hall Morrow could barely hear the music but he could sense when each dancer heard or felt it because their bodies answered the beats with unconscious movements and pulses of their own in a collective tempo.
Christian Cookerly slipped through the door and offered up a sullen nod. Barbara Wolfe and Bobby Glass followed, the former holding a Tupperware container and the latter carrying a six-pack of tonic water. The professor seemed genuinely pleased to see him. “Ah, Detective Morrow, you’re here, are you? Come to see us in our natural setting?”
“What are you doing here?” Wolfe covered her mouth with her fingers and quickly removed her hand to reveal a wary smile. She wore the same orange-red shade of lipstick they had found on the wine glasses at the crime scene. “I’m sorry, that was rude.”
“Your hostess offered me a bet to learn tango.”
“That’s right, fifty bucks, if he’s got the nerve.” Blakeley had snuck up behind him. “Use the cooler out on the deck, Bobby, the fridge is packed.” As soon as the couple drifted out of earshot she added in a low voice, “This isn’t going to work.”
“Yes it will. Settle down.”
She looked out at the street. “Any sign of Christian?”
“He got here a few minutes ago.”
“I knew it. He’s avoiding me. But at least he came.” Blakeley fiddled with her ponytail and smoothed her dress, neither of which needed fixing. He recognized the signs of nervousness, the prebattle checking and rechecking of equipment. Treat every weapon as if it were loaded.
Guest arrived carrying a bottle of red wine and kissed Blakeley on each cheek. “Madame looks ravishing tonight, as always.” He ceremonially presented her with the bottle. “Silver Oak cab—let it breathe for at least a half an hour before you drink it.”
“That’s very generous, Roland,” she said. “That deserves a real glass. Let’s see if I can find the decanter.”
