CoverBoys & Curses (16 page)

                                             
Chapter
Fifty

Ding
Dong

I
HEARD IT ON THE morning news. Within the hour I would be inundated with phone
calls and maybe even a few nosey reporters at my door. Maybe even a good
old-fashioned barn burning.

           
One thing had already been set
afire. The song in my brain matter refused to end my torment. Worse, I changed
the lyrics without much effort.

           
Ding dong, the priest is
dead.

    
That
nasty priest is really dead.

    
Ding
dong, that filthy priest is dead.

    
He
had his ways with all the boys,

    
He
used them as his own sex toys,

    
But
ding dong, the nasty priest is dead.

I hated
myself for what words I had streaming through my mind. Damn it!

           
My receptionist’s buzzer would be my
interruption. My reprieve. Or so I thought.

           
Not the media, lucky me. Detective
Wray. Unlucky me.

           
“You’re not here to make me feel
guilty this time around, Detective”, I said. “That bastard might as well have
tried to hide himself behind the thin veil of the
Shroud of Turin
.”
       
“You’re
aware the priest has been stabbed.”

           
“Yes. And I’m sorry. I’m truly sorry
for the whole entire world.”

           
He shook his head. “I was never very
good at math when I was a kid,” Wray said. “Stunk at it, actually.”

           
“And why is this relative to me?”

           
“Your priest was stabbed forty-two
times. And his mental health worker—the one that was covering up for him? You
forgot to mention him on my last visit.”

“But you
read the article. He’s a deacon in the church and also happens to be high up
there in the mental health system. He felt it was his duty and right to reveal
the dealings of the dirty priest as the holy man continued to molest more boys.
But I didn’t
print
his name.”

“Well, he’s
not showed up to work yet. My bet is he’s not playing hooky. My bet is someone
connected the dots, just like I did. ”

           
I stumbled and fell back toward my
desk chair. It was over.
CoverBoy
could no longer afford the price of human sacrifice, even in truth.

           
“But let’s get back to my math
issues.”

           
“Sure.”
Let’s just get him out of my office.

           
“You got your model lady. Stabbed
six times. Then we got the good Dr.
Solayman
. Stabbed
eighteen times. The plastic surgeon? Stabbed thirty-six times. Your priest?
Forty-two times.

           
And that all leads me to you. All
those stabbings lead me to you. And it doesn’t take but fifth grade math to
start seeing the pattern.”

           
“I assure you I passed the fifth
grade, but I don’t follow you.”

           
“Damndest thing. Multiples of six.
And they keep growing in violence. Intensity. Sheer number of stab wounds.
Someone has quite an axe to grind. Or should I say—
dagger
.”

           
“The Obeah,” I sputtered.

           
“Say what?”

           
The number six. Evil. Geoff’s dead
Obeah Voodoo grandmother had tried to warn me. Detective Wray didn’t hear my
words. It would have to be another thing gone unmentioned to him for I didn’t
speak of it again.

Chapter Fifty-One

No
Cover for CoverBoy

“I’M GROWING MORE PARANOID,” I
told Sukie after Wray left the building.

           
“Most everyone around this place is
these days,” she replied through stiff lips.

           
I perused some of Sukie’s new work.
Shots she’d taken of male models up in San Francisco. No one would be looking
at the background of the Golden Gate Bridge.

           
“I don’t know how much longer we can
continue, Sukie. I can’t even think straight. I don’t believe my good friend
committed suicide when everyone else tells me she did. I get Detective Wray in
here and he doesn’t want to talk about Tucson. He thinks I need to worry about
what’s happening in my own backyard. And the other night I was in my
therapist’s house and I’m wondering what’s behind some mysterious wall.”

           
Sukie pulled the wire-rimmed glasses
from the bridge of her nose. “Now that one sounds interesting.”

           
“Not what you think. Carly and I
were there and—never mind. It’s a long story.”

“If I’m
unemployed I’ll have plenty of time on my hands.”

“Now I think
I just saw a ghost.”

“Lauren,
you’ve had a lot of shit happen to you in your short life. More death than most
of us will ever see in our lifetimes. You have every right to be jumpy. Even
paranoid. Jesus, you just had a guy attack you at your doorstep while delivering
you a warning.”

           
“I saw an old man in the elevator as
I came down to see you.”

           
“You still have the space rented out
to the geriatric psychologist. We have crazy old people in the elevators all
the time.” Sukie’s voice was calm. Motherly.

           
“Yes. But I recognized him. He
bought me a glass of wine at
Catrozzi's
. I looked up.
He was gone. And just now I swear he was in the elevator.”

           
Sukie’s eyebrows raised up like
pitched tents. “Did you inform security?”

           
I’d already been spooked enough to
broaden the scope of security in both our building and our parking lot.

           
“What do I tell them? Beware an old
man with a shuffled gait, fake teeth, and has a habit of buying people
expensive wines?”

DETECTIVE
WRAY BECAME somewhat of a permanent fixture around
CoverBoy
. He showed up like
Columbo
,
always uninvited and at the most inopportune times. It signified that my staff
and I were still high up on the list of suspects.

           
I didn’t really mind. I considered
him a freebie in addition to the full-time security I hired. And my attorney
advised me to fully cooperate with the man.

           
“Coffee, Detective Wray?” I offered
as I entered my waiting room and spied him sitting in the corner chair.

           
“Whoa! Too damn sweet. You
gonna
be nice to me today?”

           
“You do have an appointment this
time?” I looked over to my receptionist and saw her wince. “Okay. Let’s take a
walk-about.”

           
“A what?”

           
“A walk-about. I can show you our
operations and you can ask your battery of silly questions. Do you have a
problem with that?”

           
“Just the sudden change of heart,”
he groused.

           
“I’m worried about my people that
work here. We’re family. And I’ll be honest,” I said. “I’m worried about my own
butt, too.”

           
“Now there’s my girl,” he said.

With
coffees in hand, the gruff detective followed my lead to the bank of elevators.
We headed down to the dark and dank basement that promised an exciting tour of
a small employee’s cafeteria and Sukie’s photo lab. Sukie gave us a two-dollar
tour, tossing nasty glares my way every time she could without being caught.

“She’s
cute,” Wray said. “Is she gay?”

“I can’t
believe you just asked me that,” I said.

“Hey, I
said she’s cute.”

Good
lord, just wait until he started questioning Queen Geoff.

“Just
between friends,” Detective Wray added.

“We’re
not friends. I’m in a toleration mode.”

We
toured the printing department, the writer’s floor, the finance floor that
housed both sales and accounting. With great interest Wray navigated his way
through our research department.

“You
skipped the tenth floor,” Wray said.

“I’m
with a real sharpie,” I said. “Not my business, nor yours. I have a tenant that
occupies the entire floor.”

“I see.”

He wore
an obnoxious short sleeved dress shirt with his tie in too tight of a knot and
too short on the fall to his bulging waistline. I wanted to send him a courtesy
subscription to
Gentleman’s Quarterly
or something. Anything to help the man dress properly.

“You
annoy me, you know?” A rhetorical question.

“I do most
folks. Don’t worry about it,” he grinned.

“I’m not
worried.”

“What’s
his business?” Wray asked.

“Who?”

“The
tenant on ten.”

“Shrink.
A geriatric psychiatrist.”

“The
entire floor?”

“Must be
pretty hard, getting old in this city of beautiful angels,” I said. “Makes a
lot of people crazy, I guess.”

Detective
Wray scribbled something in his notebook.

“Don’t
worry. I may just need his professional help in a few years, that’s all,” he
smirked.

“I
believe that.”

“I’ve
put extra people on the case. As much as the department can spare and you can
imagine these days that’s not much. We’re looking out for you, but you need to
look after yourself. We have the guys over at VICAP involved.”

“VICAP?”

“Violent
Criminal Apprehension Program. I think these slaughters qualify, don’t you?”

I bit my
tongue.

“It’s a
division of the FBI. That’s the Federal Bureau of—“

“Yes,
Detective. I think I know what the FBI is, even in my shallow safe little
world.”

“That’s
what I’m telling you. Somebody’s smashed the glass on your snow globe. It’s not
safe in that little world of yours anymore. Watch your back.”

We
picked up our pace as we walked back to my office. Geoff would be waiting for
us.

Geoff
didn’t make it through the proper introductions. Neither of them required
introductions. They knew of each other.

“You got
any idea who is doing this? Who is responsible for all this killing?” Geoff
demanded.

Detective
Wray drilled back at him. “You got anything? Some little something you’re
holding back to test me, or something you’re not thinking of?”

I
rescued Geoff. “If he’s not thinking of it, how the hell can he tell you about
it? And for the record it’s not correct to end a sentence with a preposition.”

Detective
Wray fired back, staring down Geoff, “Something you’re not thinking of, Geoff
 
Hayes?”

“That’s
it,” I interrupted. This interview is over. Geoff is a key man here, and I
thought I would make nice and introduce the two of you. We’re through here
today,
Wray.
”

I drew
my finger to my lips to communicate silence from Geoff. Detective Wray said his
goodbyes, looking back not once, but twice.

“Back to
business,” Geoff said. “I see we have the next two issues drafted. They’re
crawling worms of boring. Come on, June Grooms? Athletes and Steroids?”

“We’re
all trying to lay low. Way low. Be prudent for a couple of months.”

“And
lose all of our momentum? Fuck that! So, what’s the new issue idea of yours,”
Geoff flashed me the devilish grin I loved. And he knew me. He knew I wouldn’t
back down for long.

“It’s a
bit of a journey back into the plastic surgery realm, but get this! This time
it’s podiatrists!”

“Feet
fetish thing. Great,” Geoff moaned.

“Geoff,
you just whined that our planned features sucked. I have a new angle, and no
one is going to kill a foot doctor. They might slice off his toes, but they
won’t kill him.”

“Your
humor in the morning is what sucks, Laurs. Blow me the highlights.”

“How
about a group of assholes taking advantage of more Barbie Doll wannabes by
slicing off the tops of their imperfect second toes, or even completely
amputating their little toes? They’re perfectly healthy, beautiful woman that
are led to believe the larger extension of their second toes is a deformity.
Disfigurement. And the reason why they can’t get into to the itsy bitsy
designer shoes is because their little toes are in the way. Women are going in
for surgery to shorten their second toes, all to fit into the fancy designer
shoes crafted of the oh-so-tight and sexy skins of exotic leathers. And for
some the shortening won’t do the job. Those women are getting their little toes
amputated.

“The
surgery is painful. The podiatrist removes both tissue and bone, and thousands
of bucks later, our patient walk away with the perfect eight toes.”

“Or
hobbles away,” Geoff said. “But is it a comeback story?”

“Sukie
already has a photo of a podiatrist dancing at the hospital fundraiser in two-thousand
dollar croc shoes. And I bet he didn’t hack off his toes to get his feet into
them.

“The
essence of
CoverBoy
is truth.
Bringing to light the layers of fallacy in articles that find incongruence amid
our centerfolds. We keep our stories real, fact-based. No trouble. And we keep
the photos real. No digital crap. We use fat bellies, scars, and balding heads.
And the occasional stud muffin.”

“The
story sounds like a sleeper, but it’s your rag. Your run the articles you want
to run. You are going to name names again, aren’t you?”

“You bet
I am.”

“Then
CoverBoy
is back in business.”

Detective
Wray barged his way back into my office. Both Geoff and I knew he had heard Geoff’s
last comment. Geoff bolted.