by Wally Duff
“After I put Macy down, I’ll check out Zhukov online.”
And call my computer expert, Linda, for help.
6
An hour later, I was in our lower-level computer room. Our home is three floors, all above the ground, so I have two full-sized windows to gaze out of, but I’m usually busy focusing on the computer screen and rarely find a reason to open the blinds.
Since I didn’t have much time, I needed to get rolling as fast as I could, and Linda was the solution. She finished her undergraduate studies at the University of Chicago with a degree in computer science and accounting. She went on to graduate from their law school and worked as an attorney until she began having babies. She is my best friend in Chicago and knows how to garner background information on people faster than anyone I know.
We met at our neighborhood’s Hamlin Park, and that encounter with her, Cas, and Molly led me back to reporting after a frustrating four-year hiatus. Initially, I wrote a monthly fluff column in our free neighborhood newspaper, the Lakeview Times.
Why did I stoop to doing that? Simple. No one else in the industry would hire me, and it was the only writing job I could find. A year later, somewhat by accident, I began to write actual investigative stories.
Initially, my three friends began by helping me with small assignments, and then they dove in full-force. We had fun, and the experiences, especially the dangerous ones, brought us closer together as friends. One of the central characters in the first story christened the four of us the Hamlin Park Irregulars. I wouldn’t consider doing another article without them.
Now that I was dusting off my investigative chops once again, I texted Linda to call me if she had time. My cell phone rang ten seconds later.
“That didn’t take long,” I said.
“Are you ever going to start writing again?” Linda asked. “I’m praying you have a story to work on, because there are only so many charity functions I can attend before I lose my mind.”
Linda has two kids: Sandra, almost four, and Jason, sixteen months. You might think all of her time would be consumed with taking care of them, but she’s a member of the lucky sperm club and her parents have banks full of money which they lavish on her. She has a full-time nanny who lives in their guest house.
“Funny you should ask,” I said. “Ever hear of Alexis Zhukov?”
“I have, actually,” she said. “A couple of years ago, he gave a PowerPoint presentation on his investment concepts at my parent’s country club. He said it was the first time he’d solicited anyone to invest with him.”
“The first time? How the heck did he get his clients before that?”
“Word of mouth from the Russian Jewish community.”
“Did you put any money in with him?”
“No, and my parents didn’t either, but several of the club’s members did.”
“Any impressions?”
“He’s brilliant, assertive, and suffers fools poorly. He has bright red hair, pale skin, and is disgustingly obese.” She paused. “But he does wear expensive clothes and jewelry.”
Linda is also into designer everything, so she knows what she’s talking about.
“How expensive?”
“He wore a bespoke Kiton slate blue windowpane suit and a pair of Louis Vuitton Manhattan Richelieu wingtips. There was a gold Rolex President on his left wrist and a large, pink diamond on his right little finger.” She paused. “Considering how heavy he is, the suit fit beautifully.”
Like I said, she’s into expensive fashion.
She paused. “Hold on a second.”
I heard clicking on her computer’s keyboard. It didn’t take long.
“I just sent you his bio.”
My computer screen lit up.
“It was emailed to us before the meeting at my parents’ country club, and I saved it,” she continued. “As you can see, Zhukov is seventy-four, has a wife named Ellen, and two sons, Daniel and Ariel. They’re both married and have children of their own.”
“The man I’m going to interview is a grandfather?”
“He is, and in spite of his physical size, he made it clear he’s into fashion.”
“Meaning?”
“Dust off your power suit and high heels.” She paused again. “Now that I think about it, maybe you should have Molly help you update your whole look.”
“What!?”
“My impression from Zhukov’s presentation is that he enjoys talking to young, fit females who are properly dressed.”
“So noted.”
“And, Tina?”
“Yes.”
“One other thing. While I do a complete background on Zhukov, you also need to do something about your hair.”
I hated to admit that she was right, but she was.
7
On Sunday, Linda emailed to me detailed background information on Zhukov. Monday morning, I made the call she’d suggested. Two hours later I was in the Creative Hair Salon in Northalsted, which is an LGBTQ section on Chicago’s North Side.
David Scott, the man who was going to cut my hair, and Rick Carey, his husband who subspecializes in coloring hair, own the salon.
After helping us out on a story, David and Rick became the newest members of the Hamlin Park Irregulars. I had been in their salon to discuss stories with them but never to have my hair done. Now I was.
Their establishment’s interior looks like it was decorated by a designer on hallucinogenic drugs. Picture bright orange and dark brown with canary yellow and glistening purple as the basic color scheme.
Today, the sound from the background music — which usually makes my chest vibrate and my ears ring — was more subdued, replaced by Bette Midler singing Broadway tunes.
David’s hand touched my shoulder, nudging me forward toward his chair. I sat down. The aroma of his Bvlgari’s Man cologne enveloped me. He has short brown hair, which today was slicked back instead of his usual spiky ‘do’. He wore a long-sleeved, salmon-colored, silk shirt with billowing yellow pants. The cuffs of the shirt were folded halfway up his forearms. The diamond earring in his right ear had been replaced by a small ruby.
“Remember, I’m all about my hair,” I said.
Or I used to be before I had two kids. This was the first time a new stylist would cut my hair since I moved to Chicago over six years ago. Previously, I waited to have Tiffaney do it on my trips home to Omaha, but after Macy was born I didn’t have time, and thus, my hair was a mess.
“Madam Thomas, I do,” David said. “That’s all you jabbered about while Christi washed your hair.”
“And why did you finally decide to come in?” Rick asked, as he paused from cleaning up his station.
His hair is streaked with gray as is his carefully trimmed goatee. His eyebrows are bushy, and when they elevate, there are deep wrinkles in his forehead. He has glasses with tinted lenses and hearing aids in both ears but no earrings. Today he wore all black.
“I want to impress the man I’m going to interview tonight, so I need a great cut and style,” I said.
“Who is he?” David asked. “We’re dying to know.”
“Alexis Zhukov,” I said. “He apparently doesn’t like the press, which is why I want to look my best.”
“I read about him,” Rick said, as he swept up the hair around his chair. “He’s one of the wealthiest money managers in the world.”
“He made his fortune by investing the funds from Russian immigrants who came to the U.S.,” I said. “Carter said there’s a rumor that his clients aren’t happy with his recent returns for them.”
“Oh, my,” David said. “I hear that unhappy Russians are not nice people.”
An elderly client sat down in Rick’s chair, and he got busy snipping and styling. I shut my eyes and tried to relax.
8
It seemed like my haircut took forever before I felt David’s hand on my shoulder indicating he was done. “Open, open, sweetie.”
Peeking out of my right eye, I glan
ced in the mirror. My previously too-long, scraggly brown hair was now hanging to the top of my shoulders. The cut was perfect. The sprinkles of gray were still there, but being a breastfeeding mommy of a seven-month old, I didn’t have time today to have my color done. That would have to wait until next week.
Opening my other eye, I waggled my head. The bouncy strands flipped back and forth.
“It’s perfect,” I said, raking my fingers through my hair and shaking my head.
“Not quite perfect,” Rick added.
“The gray hair?” I asked.
“You got it,” he said. “But I’ll take care of that little problem next week.”
He finished up with the lady in his chair. She turned and inspected me through large, round, black-rimmed glasses that magnified her black eyes.
“David did a marvelous job,” she said. “I think you look wonderful, whomever you are.”
“Oh, Marcia, you are too kind,” David said. He stepped back and pointed at me with his manicured right index finger. “This is Tina Thomas, a fabulous investigative journalist.” He turned to the woman. “Tina, this is Marcia Peebler, one of our best customers.”
“Indeed she is,” Rick said. “We see her every single day.”
She studied me. “For whom do you write, dear?”
“Tina doesn’t exactly work full time, at least not right now, what with being a mommy and all,” Rick said.
“But that’s only a technicality,” David said. “She was also blown up a few years ago, and her husband doesn’t want her to work on features he considers dangerous.”
Marcia would have raised her eyebrows, but none of the muscles on her face moved. She probably had a standing appointment with her plastic surgeon too.
“I don’t understand,” she said.
David and Rick have no idea of the many close encounters I’ve had throughout my career — even in the last few years — but they knew about me shooting the fingers off the hands of the man who tried to kill Linda and me. I glared at David but I knew it was hopeless. He loves to tell stories.
“While I worked on the last story, a man tried to kill my friend and me,” I said.
“What happened?” she asked.
“I shot him.”
9
Mrs. Peebler appeared to be a card-carrying member of AARP and probably had been for a long while. Her poofed-up, dyed-black helmet hairstyle was part of my grandmother’s generation, which meant David or Rick had to use lung-toxic amounts of hair spray on her after they blew out her hair.
She stood up and smoothed out her dark blue Chanel skirt. She didn’t weigh as much as my backpack and was barely five feet tall. Her skin was the porcelain white of a china doll, a stark contrast to her jet black hair and eyebrows.
Covering her mouth, she emitted a death rattle cough, evidence that she didn’t believe the Surgeon General’s warning that smoking was hazardous to her health. Her bad habit explained her gravelly voice.
“You shot someone?” she asked.
“I did, but only in the hands.”
She paused as she ingested that information.
“Are you good with guns?”
“I am.”
“Do you ever do work on the side?”
“I’m sorry?”
“There are several people I can think of that I would like to remove from the face of the earth. With your experience, you would be perfect for the job.”
David and Rick glanced at each other but didn’t say anything.
“By the way, I couldn’t help but overhear you mention Alex Zhukov,” she continued.
“Do you know him?” I asked.
“We’ve met at dinner parties. He has been to our home a few times. My husband, Alan, is one of his investors.”
Bingo.
“May I talk to him about Zhukov?” I asked.
“Alan doesn’t like to talk to people.”
“I promise I won’t use his name as a source, but the more people I can interview about Zhukov, the more accurate and fleshed out his story will be.”
David checked his appointment list on his iPad. Rick turned his back and began cleaning up his station.
“Alan is a dear friend of ours, but he stays at home most of the time,” he said over his shoulder.
“That’s okay,” I said. “I can visit him there.”
“What they’re afraid to say is that Alan has mad cow disease, as he calls it when he is able to speak coherently.” She coughed up a mucus plug and daintily spit it into a Kleenex. “I call what he has brainy-BOOM! and that’s why I said I need to hire you. Alan needs to be put down.”
10
“Marcia, please, that isn’t funny,” David said.
“Why shouldn’t I have Tina put Alan out of his misery?” Marcia asked. “And while she’s at it, we can hire her to shoot Charlie Sullivan, the worthless builder we both use. Maybe we can get a group discount.”
“I have to say, your suggestion about dealing with our builder might have some merit,” Rick mused.
“Anyone who has ever built a house wants to kill their builder,” she reminded him. “You’ve said to me often enough that you want to kill Charlie Sullivan.”
“Whom you suggested we hire,” David reminded her.
“And I’m sorry I did,” she said.
Builder?
Picking up one of the hand mirrors, I studied the back of my head in the reflection from the front mirror. “I didn’t know you guys were building a home,” I said.
“Not building, exactly,” Rick said. “More like remodeling.”
“Totally gutting would be a better description,” David said.
“It’s on West Henderson,” Rick said.
“Close to Molly,” David said.
“No kidding. Won’t that be a problem?”
“A problem?” Rick asked.
“You know, like culture shock moving from where you are now?”
Their condo is in the building next to their salon.
“Dearie, we don’t have to live in a gay community,” David said. “We can coexist with your kind.”
I felt my face flush. “I am so sorry,” I said. “I didn’t mean to imply that you couldn’t live in our neighborhood, but you have to admit it might be a little boring.”
“We want boring,” David said. “It’s what parents do for their children.”
I whipped around to face them. “Children?”
“Yes, you know, little people,” Rick said, holding his hand down to the level of his knee.
“Tiny,” David said, holding his hands two feet apart.
“Guys, am I missing something?” I asked. “As I remember my biology classes, you need a boy bird and a girl bee to produce kids.” I paused. “Or is it the other way around?”
“Honey, you’re so yesterday,” David said. “We’ve hired the girl bee, as you put it.”
“And she is carrying our child,” Rick said.
Marcia blinked and cleared the mucus from her throat again. “I need a cigarette. I’ll be right back. Don’t say anything important while I’m gone. I don’t want to miss one word of this.”
With Rick’s assistance, Marcia slipped on her matching dark blue Chanel jacket over a royal blue silk blouse. She grabbed a pack of cigarettes from her blue Mahina leather Louis Vuitton purse and walked out the front door. When I saw the purse, I thought about what Linda told me about Zhukov’s shoes. Marcia and my Russian interviewee had serious money.
“Guys, I would love to stay, but I have to meet Molly at Neiman’s. She and Linda declared that I needed to update my look.”
David glanced at Rick and nodded. “We agree. Too bad we’re so busy. We would love to go along and shop with you.”
“But maybe next time,” Rick said.
I would have to think about that one, but I sensed a potential story. “I can’t wait for Marcia, guys,” I said. “Tell me what’s going on with your construction business.”
