Dirty Laundry (8 page)

“I am so sorry,” he murmured, stroking at the back of my hand. “Most of my customers are shorter. Their legs… they are not so long. Maybe you would like to go into my living room instead?”

“No, no. I’m good.” The last thing I wanted to do at the moment was cross that fabric barrier, even if it meant I could get a better look at the man’s living space. I wasn’t sure what I was more scared of, being put into a compromising position on the man’s couch or my eyes bursting from the flood of color leaking off the walls. “I only have a few questions. I don’t want to take up too much of your time.”

“Anything for the police.” Gyong-Si inclined his head.

Again, I didn’t correct him. People often told the cops more than they’d share with a private investigator, Ms. Yi aside, and I’d take any advantage I had in getting Gyong-Si to talk. I used to wear a badge. I kept telling my conscience that, but it snickered back at me.

“I’m here about Eun Joon Lee.” As I spoke, his face turned tragic, a mask of sorrow so deeply carved into his skin, I was afraid it would stick that way. “I imagine that you’ve heard of her passing.”

“I did hear. Bad news always travels fast.” He made a steeple with his fingers. If it was supposed to make him look wise, I wasn’t seeing it. “Terry, my assistant, lives near to Eun Joon. He informed me of the troubles visited upon her family. I sent her husband my regrets. I am sorry to say that I saw nothing in her fortune that told me of her death. I divined the I Ching for answers, but so far, nothing has been revealed to me. I’m not sure what I can tell you.”

It was easier to just lay my metaphorical cards on the table, especially since my knees seemed to hone in on the one in front of them. “Mostly, I was wondering if you knew Mrs. Lee was also seeing Madame Sun? Did she share that with you?”

There was the barest flicker of his eyelid, so faint I would have missed it if I hadn’t been looking for it. Nothing else in the man’s face changed, not even the beatific smile he’d plastered on his face. The light in his eyes dimmed and his nostrils twitched before he tightened his grin further and shook his head.

“No, I did not know that,” Gyong-Si murmured. His hand shook when he withdrew it from my arm. “She must have been troubled far more than I thought.”

“How often did she see you? Can you share with me what was she troubled about?”

“Normally, I would say no, because anything a client says to me is in confidence, but she is… no longer with us. I will do anything to help.” He wiped the spare beads of sweat forming on his forehead, nearly knocking his beret off. “I would see her once or twice a month, but we spoke of so many things.”

“Anything you can tell me is fine. What did she speak to you about mostly?”

“She would come to me to talk about her marriage, sometimes. Eun Joon’s husband felt she spent too much money. They did not have children, and she sometimes would shop to make herself feel better. She felt it was her fault they did not have a son. He wanted her to be more frugal. He would get angry at her sometimes”

As a cop, I’d seen women and some men beaten to almost a pulp turn around and swear they loved their spouses too much to press charges. The “reasons” for the beatings ranged from overcooked food to a new dress. Many of the arguments were started about money, and a few ended in death. It wouldn’t be beyond belief that Mrs. Lee’s murder came at the hands of her own husband.

“Did he… hurt her? Did she tell you anything like that?”

“No, he loved her. He would never do that. She might have spent too much money than he liked, but he would only scold her lightly. She had a good husband. He would yell, but it wouldn’t go beyond that,” Gyong-Si insisted. “Wasn’t it decided that it was a robbery? That’s what I was told.”

“Nothing’s been ruled out.” That was the truth. I didn’t want to rule out anything until I was sure the deaths were merely a coincidence. “Just want to make sure every base has been covered.

“Tell me about Madame Sun… what you can, I mean.” I brought my employer into the conversation. If the two were rivals, he’d want to dish dirt about her, but Gyong-Si wasn’t taking the bait. Shaking his head, his frown turned to an apologetic, almost bashful smile.

“I have no quarrel with Madame Sun. We both were students of a great man, Kung Choong-Hoon. She is a sister to me.”

“So you’re not bothered Eun Joon was seeing her as well?”

Gyong-Si gave me another practiced saintly smile. “Of course not. Sometimes a person can discover so much about themselves by seeing another fortune-teller. Eun Joon sought out Madame Sun for some reason. I am certain she would have told me about it if she needed to.”

His entire livelihood was based on his ability to read people and present them with the image they wanted to see. If anyone was skilled at packaging himself, it was Gyong-Si. From his appearance to his mannerisms, he projected the friendly and safe wise counselor. I wasn’t seeing the real man. I was sure of that.

I played the one card I hoped would shake off the man’s mask.

“Are we almost done?” Gyong-Si glanced at a clock on the wall. “I have an appointment soon.”

“Almost done.” I decided to play the trick I had up my sleeve. It wasn’t an ace, but if it made him flinch, then at least it was a face card. “Did you know a woman named May Choi? She was a victim of a carjacking. You might have seen her as a client—”

He cut me off before I could finish. “No, I don’t think so….”

“I thought maybe you would, since her maiden name was Gangjun.” I shrugged as if it weren’t important. “I thought maybe she was a relative or something.”

This time, there was no hiding his flinch. It rattled his face, a visual tic undulating across his cheeks and down to his mouth, rippling his powdered flesh. Gyong-Si fought to control his features, but the rattle spread, widening his eyes and bringing a gasp to his lips. This time, his perky beret lost its battle against gravity and tumbled to the floor, a spread of red felt on the woven tatami mat beneath the coffee table.

“It’s a common name. Koreans… we have so many of the same names. Who is to say if we were related? Now, excuse me. I need to meditate before my next appointment,” he sputtered, but his eyes remained wild at the edges, even as he regained his placid mask. He stood, taking more than a few steps to the door before I could even get out of my chair. “Terry will see you out. Please feel free to contact me again if you have any more questions.”

Oh yeah, there was definitely something there.

I couldn’t push. I wasn’t actually a cop, so threatening to drag him down to the station would have been just that, a threat. I picked up his beret and paused at the threshold before he could fully shove me out, his hand on the door to close it behind me.

Handing Gyong-Si’s hat back, I leaned closer, as if to gain his confidence. “Anything you tell me, I can promise to keep confidential. Is there something you’d like to tell me? Are you afraid of someone? Maybe whoever killed Eun Joon… or May Choi?”

“Good-bye, Detective,” Gyong-Si hissed as he lightly pushed me out of the door. “Give Terry your number, please. Please excuse me. I have to… prepare.”

Finding Terry seemed like a good idea. Gyong-Si needed to protect his interests, but Terry looked like the kind of guy who was only interested in protecting himself. There was a good chance I’d get more out of him than I did his boss.

The problem was, Terry was nowhere to be seen when I walked out into the front room. I caught a whiff of cigarette smoke coming through one of the side windows, descended the steps, and sought out its source, assuming it was Gyong-Si’s receptionist getting a drag in before the divine Mr. G came out to look for him. All I had to do was follow the smell and I found Terry huddled up against a storm drain spout, inhaling as much of a menthol cigarette as he could in one pull.

What Gyong-Si coughed up wasn’t much on the surface, but there was definitely something brewing under the man’s skin. May Choi hit a nerve, but only after I revealed her maiden name. Strange I’d get a bigger hit from May Choi’s name than his rival’s. It was something I’d have to chase after. As soon as I shook Terry down for information and hit Jae up for some loving.

There’s a split second when walking up on someone when their face is bare of all artifice. What I saw in Terry’s appealing face was cynicism and a weariness I’d only seen on whores way past their prime. There was a tightness to his face, a thin layer of disgust with his job… his life… hell, maybe his underwear chafed, but something was ruffling Terry’s perfectly gelled feathers.

His dark eyes were hooded, and he tilted his head back slightly so a swirl of smoke obscured his lips when he exhaled. It was erotic and obviously staged so often it’d become a habit. He must have used that gesture countless times to pick up guys at a club. If I’d met him a few months ago, I would have bitten on his lure, but a checkup on my cock told me it had apparently moved on to reading
War and Peace
or watching
Wheel of Fortune
. Either way, it couldn’t be less interested in the lean, handsome young man draped against the wall in front of me.

“This in-love thing kind of sucks,” I muttered, stalking up to Terry. “Hey, can I borrow you a second?”

Terry straightened up, stubbed out his cigarette on the sidewalk, and tucked the butt into a sun-bleached soda can. Giving me a nod, he pulled his pretty Asian boy act on, slithering it over his face and body like it was a one-piece bathing suit and he was about to be painted on a WWII bomber.

“Hello again.” From the raspy come-hither in his voice, I expected him to wend his body around my legs, demanding to be scritched behind his ears. “What can I… do for you?”

Having been eyefucked before, I had my
thanks-but-no-thanks
smile on the deck. Pitching it out, it hit home and deflated Terry’s ego gently. He wasn’t really interested. I was just the only warm-blooded male in his orbit, and since he’d figured out I played on his team, I should have been a sure bet.

I wasn’t. But it didn’t mean I didn’t appreciate the mental reach around.

“Hey, Gyong-Si said I should leave my card with you.” I made a show of patting my pants and grimaced. “But I think I left them at my desk. How about if I give you my cell and you can call me if he remembers something about Eun Joon Lee that might be of interest?”

“That would be great.” Terry wasn’t taking the no-thank-you to heart, sidling up to press as much of his body against me as he could. His hand brushed dangerously close to my inseam, and I ducked, slapping at the air as if a bee were buzzing by me. Moving away a few steps, I put enough distance between my uninterested dick and Terry’s wandering fingers.

“Thanks. Really, anything you guys can tell us would be great.” I tore a page out of my mini-notebook, scribbled down the number to my office, and handed it to him. I waited a heartbeat, then looked down into Terry’s face. “Between you and me? I wished Gyong-Si told me more. I got the feeling he knew a lot more than he said.”

Terry rolled his eyes and tapped a cigarette out of his pack. He stopped and glanced at me. “Do you mind if I…?”

“No, go ahead,” I assured him. Resting my shoulder against the outer wall of the bungalow, I glanced back to the front door as if I expected Gyong-Si to come barreling out. Dropping my voice down to a whisper, I said in what I hoped was my most seductive voice, “Anything
you
want to tell me?”

I didn’t have much hope for my seductive voice. I couldn’t get the cat to come to me even when I held an open can of white albacore, so I nearly choked on my tongue when Terry began to sing.

“About Gyong-Si or Eun Joon?” Terry brushed a bit of ash from his arm. “Because I can tell you a
lot
about him.”

“If you want to talk about him, I’m happy to listen,” I promised.

If someone asked Claudia to roll over on me, she’d knife the guy before he could finish his sentence. Apparently, Gyong-Si didn’t inspire the same loyalty. It said much more about Claudia than it did about me, but I wasn’t going to argue about Terry’s lack of commitment.

“You’re not a cop, are you?” He assessed me again, the blatant sexual interest in his eyes changing to something more cunning, more suspicious. “Now that I think about it, you don’t dress like a cop. And your hair’s too long.”

“No, I’m not a cop, but I
am
a private investigator,” I admitted. “I was hired to look into Mrs. Lee’s death. Gyong-Si’s name came up, so I thought I’d come by to ask questions. Sometimes someone knows something they think is really small but it’s the missing piece to a puzzle. I was hoping Gyong-Si might have heard or seen something that could help.”

Terry spat on the grass, aiming away from my feet. “Shit, he doesn’t see anything but himself. He’s an ass. I can’t believe my mom told me to take this job.

“Hell, I don’t care who knows what I think. There’s a job I might get. Pays more, and I don’t have to deal with his shit every day,” Terry scoffed. “He’s not even gay! You know that? He fakes it because the old ladies like it. He even screws some of them too. Someone who knew him back in Korea told me he said it’s to release their inner beauty. It’s all bullshit. I’m glad my mom sees someone else. I don’t want her around him.”

“Was Eun Joon one of the women he hit on?”

Terry’s teeth worried at the tender skin of his lip, and I had my answer.

I prodded gently. “Did her husband know?”

“No, I don’t think so. I’m not really sure if they were doing it,” he said, shaking his head. “She didn’t do anything with him last time, but she was pissed off. She ran out of her last appointment. Gyong-Si came out of the back after her. He had a big handprint on his face. I guess she decked him.”

“Did he try to stop her? Say anything to threaten her?”

“No, he saw me and stopped.” Terry shrugged. “Gyong-Si told me he saw something disturbing in her future and Eun Joon got upset and ran out. I knew it was bullshit, but I needed the job. He only hired me because people would think he was having sex with me. Like I’d touch that.”

“How long ago was that? When Eun Joon ran out?”