Lust, Loathing and a Little Lip Gloss (16 page)

“Wait.” I held up my hand to stop him. “Why does Maria showing up at the Specter Society meeting incriminate her?”

“It’s kinda obvious she came because she knew Enrico wouldn’t,” Zach said with a shrug. “Why else would a woman purposely go out of her way to go to the same event her ex is hanging at?”

“Ah, young Zach, women do things like that all the time,” Marcus lamented. “It’s one of the reasons I’m so grateful to be attracted to men. But it is possible that Maria wasn’t a stalker or a murderer. Has Maria’s appearance changed at all since she split with Enrico?”

Zach considered this for a moment. “She did lose a lot of weight.”

“So then the attendance at the séance doesn’t incriminate her,” Marcus said matter-of-factly. “Anyone who has dropped a few dress sizes knows how fabulous it can be to run into an ex who dumped them before they got cozy with Jenny Craig. Do you have anything else?”

“Yeah, duh! Maria was the one who tried to set it up so Anatoly and Sophie discovered the body first. She totally knew there was a body in that condo. That story she gave you about wanting you to go over there to make sure Enrico was okay?” Zach rolled his eyes. “That was so lame and
so
obvious. Then again, you fell for it.”

“No, my boyfriend fell for it,” I protested. “And that’s only because Maria paid him $300 to fall for it!”

“So Anatoly’s naiveté can be bought?” Marcus asked. “How very disturbing.”

The waiter came back with three spritzers. It seems he wasn’t completely unable to take a hint because he ran off as soon as he placed the drinks on the chrome surface.

“I think we inadvertently insulted our server,” I offered as I watched the waiter talk to other patrons, his back studiously turned to us.

“No,” Marcus said. “There was nothing inadvertent about it.”

Zach picked up his drink, which looked suspiciously like a Shirley Temple, and sipped it through his purple straw. “I don’t like it. It’s too sweet.”

“Shocker,” I said, removing the bright red cherry in the middle of my drink and placing it delicately on a napkin. “Who else knows about what Enrico did, Zach? Do your parents know?”

“No, they’re idiots. They think I’m mad at Enrico because he screwed up some major gig for my dad. Dad wanted Enrico to recommend him to the Kimpton Group. Kimpton’s always opening new restaurants and putting new floors into the ones they already got. That account would have made my dad’s career. He even told me that as soon as he got it I would be going to private school. Like that’s something I would have wanted! Enrico’s a fuck-faced bastard, but he’s sharp. He knew my dad’s business couldn’t have handled an account as big as the Kimpton Group, so he told them not to sign with him.
That’s
my parents’ problem with Enrico. A lost business deal! They have no fucking idea what went on under their own damn noses!”

“But your sister was pregnant when she died,” I pointed out. “How did they explain that?”

Zach took a much longer sip of the drink he proclaimed to dislike. “My parents think that my sister was knocked up by Ian, this dumb kid that Deb used to hang with. Dad even went to the school and said that they should expel Ian. Like a public school was going to kick some kid out just for taking sex ed into his own hands.”

Marcus wiggled his foot under the table. It wasn’t one of his normal ticks, he was trying to tell me something, but unless the message was, “check out my shoes, they’re Prada,” I wasn’t getting it.

Zach’s drink was almost gone and he was now eyeing the door. “I don’t want to talk about this anymore.”

“Okay,” I said. “I get that.”

“I’m gonna head out.”

“Sure, let me just get the check—”

“Nah, I’ll take the bus.”

“Don’t be silly. I took you here, I’ll take you home.”

But then something in Zach’s look stopped me. Perhaps he felt he had said too much, but what was clear to me was that he absolutely did not want me to take him anywhere and I got the distinct impression that I had pushed him as far as he was willing to go.

“Zach,” Marcus said, his voice determinedly light and casual, “when I was your age I was confused. That’s what they call it when you’re gay and a teenager. Anyhoo, I used to wish that I could have a Gay Big Brother type to hang out with. Someone who I didn’t have to pretend with and who could tell me how to properly tweeze my eyebrows. If you ever feel the same—”

“I’m not gay!”

“Of course not,” Marcus soothed. “But perhaps you need a queer eye to help you get things in order.” He took one of his business cards out of his wallet. “Call anytime you like. I’ll be your Professor Higgins.”

Zach wrinkled his brow. “Who the hell is Professor Higgins?”

Marcus blinked in surprise. “You honestly don’t know?

Maybe you are straight after all. But that doesn’t make you any less in need of a haircut and a makeover.” He pressed his card into Zach’s hand. “Seriously, call. You won’t regret it.”

“Whatever.” But I noticed how carefully Zach handled the card as he put it in the inside pocket of his jacket.

As he walked out of the restaurant I let my hands fly up to my temples. “I could never give him up,” I said aloud. “Even if he did do it.”

“God, no. That would be like turning in a POW child for killing the soldiers who offed his parents.”

“Okay, that’s a bit extreme…actually, no, I take it back. It’s a good metaphor,” I said, quickly correcting myself. “Maybe I could just tell Kane about the rape. No one knows about that, so I could have gotten the info from the grave.”

“You’re going to use Zach’s dead sister’s rape as a tool to keep you in that house?”

“Not
that
house,
my
house,” I snapped, but my defiance wasn’t quite strong enough to withstand my tugs of conscience. “No,” I continued reluctantly. “But I really need something, Marcus. I can’t lose, not this time.”

“Well, yeah, it would be a ginormous inconvenience and financially…”

“It’s more than that,” I said.

Marcus tipped his head to the side, causing his little locks to point down toward the chrome bar. “You’ve got a real emotional attachment going on, don’t you, darling?”

“To my home? Yes, yes I do.”

“Lots of people lose their homes, Sophie. These days it’s positively de rigueur.”

“I’m not losing my home,” I said stubbornly. “I won’t throw Zach under a bus, but I will find something to give to Kane.” I toyed with the straw in my drink. “Why were you wiggling your foot earlier?”

“You didn’t catch on to the meaning behind the foot wag? I was trying to point out that Zach’s faith in his parents’ ignorance may be unwarranted. Maybe they figured it all out and they’re the ones who are guilty.”

“You were trying to say all that with a foot wag?”

“I have very expressive feet.”

“Okay, fine. Maybe it was Zach’s parents, but…” I let my voice trail off.

Marcus bobbed his head up and down in an understanding nod. “Throwing Zach’s parents under a bus isn’t really a good way to spare Zach from anything. All right, then, who do you want to be guilty? I mean, if you could choose?”

I chewed on this for a minute. “I wouldn’t mind seeing Venus go down.”

“You mean on something other than your ex?” Marcus laughed.

“I honestly don’t care about that. She can do whatever she wants to him, but she’s been on my case from the minute that she laid eyes on me, and if you met her…” I shook my head. “She’s weird, Marcus, like creepy weird. I wouldn’t be surprised if she did kill Enrico.”

“Well, there’s nothing wrong with a little wishful thinking.” Marcus swiveled back and forth on his candy-colored bar stool. “Why don’t you see if you can back it up with any evidence? Anybody else on your hit list?”

“Well, Kane obviously tops that list off. He’s the one messing with me.”

“Does he have a motive? And if he does, would it help you? You may be able to get him locked up, but he’ll still have the right to sell his house to somebody else.”

“I’ll find the evidence and I’ll use it against him. I’ll blackmail him until escrow goes through and then I’ll turn him in.”

Marcus leaned back, his dark eyebrows tilting down toward the bridge of his nose. “Who
are
you?”

“Excuse me?”

“
Blackmail,
Sophie? You’re going to blackmail a murderer instead of immediately turning him in to the police?”

“Escrow will go through in just five days!”

“Right, and what harm could a man with a lethal weapon do in five days, right?”

“Marcus, this house, it’s like, it’s like it’s a member of my family. I need it. I need it the way I need…the way I need Mr. Katz.”

“Hello?”
Marcus stammered. “You’re talking about your fur baby!”

“Exactly,” I said. “So now you know I’m serious.”

Marcus sighed and did some more swiveling. “So Venus and Kane are the preferred suspects. Well, I guess we can look into that.”

“We?” I asked hopefully.

“Don’t look a gift-stallion in the mouth. I said I’d help, and I will.”

“Marcus, I love you.”

He smiled and dropped his arm around my shoulders. “Of course you do. What’s not to love?”

“I want to get into Kane’s house. I’ve got to find a way to get him to invite me over and then, when he’s not looking, I’ll be able to look around and hopefully find something useful and/or incriminating.”

“Won’t he notice that you’re searching the place while he’s entertaining you?”

“That’s where you come in. If you come with me then I can keep him distracted while you snoop and vice versa.”

“And what’s going to be your excuse for bringing me? I don’t know the man.”

“I’ll come up with something. I’ll say you’re my guru or—”

“Excuse me?”

“There are worse things than having a guru…I’m not sure what they are, but I’m sure there are a few,” I said. “But Kane’s into weird stuff so I’ll need a weird reason to explain your presence away. Guru might work, or my…my…my psychic! That’s it! I’ll say you’re a psychic and you’re helping me channel the spirits in my house! Kane will love that! We could go over there tomorrow morning!”

“So now I’m your psychic.”

“You got it.”

“Wonderful. Let me start by predicting that tomorrow is going to be a fiasco.”

I smiled and squeezed his arm affectionately. “You see? You have a real knack for this.”

14

You probably shouldn’t base an entire relationship on sex alone…but it might be fun to try.

—
The Lighter Side of Death

IT WAS RAINING BY THE TIME I GOT HOME. THE CLOUDS HAD BLOCKED
out the stars and the moon so now the only sources of light in the city were artificial. These were usually the kind of nights that made me want to head to the movies, but not this time. This time, the only place I wanted to be was in the comfort of my own home. I had driven around my block three times before pulling into my garage. The cars parked along the street were all empty and familiar: the Scion that belonged to the teenage girl two doors down, the van painted with the insignia of a stereo installation company of yet another neighbor, the gas-guzzling Hummer that took up two spots and made me want to become a guerilla warrior for Greenpeace. But there was no sign of either the electric car driven by Venus or the Mercedes I had seen Kane driving, and I felt confident that I hadn’t been followed. For this one night everything was as it should be, or almost. I noticed as I flipped on the living-room overhead lights that Anatoly’s jacket remained draped over that chair under my father’s picture, completely untouched from when he had left it yesterday. We had originally planned to go to a movie tonight, but I had forgotten about it until a few minutes ago and he certainly hadn’t called to remind me. I took my cell from my handbag and pulled up his number, but quickly changed my mind. After he called me with an apology I would admit that I had been both harsh and overly sensitive, but until he made that call I would have to give him the silent treatment. I wasn’t about to jeopardize my reputation as a stubborn, high-maintenance girlfriend by making the first conciliatory gesture.

I shrugged off my own coat and worked my way through the maze of boxes until I reached the sofa. Each unpacked box was a horrible reminder of how precarious my position was in this house. This wasn’t supposed to be a pit stop. This was where I was meant to end up.

I sat on my sofa and stared resentfully at the mess around me and then, without really thinking about it, I jumped to my feet and started unpacking in earnest. I was tearing the Bubble Wrap off of vases and trinkets. I threw books into the built-in bookcases. This was
my
place. It didn’t matter that I had only been here for a short while. It was mine, mine, mine, mine!

After I emptied a box I kicked it aside and went for another. More books were in there and I was determined to unpack every single one of them immediately. Unwilling to take the time to look for a pair of scissors I used my car keys to tear open the tape then tossed the keys toward the chair under my father’s picture.

The keys landed with a clink, the sound you would expect if one small metal object had hit another. I looked up and discovered that Anatoly had left more than his coat. On the chair was a small metal tin. I dropped from my crouched position by the box onto my knees and sat back on my heels as I reached for it.

This wasn’t Anatoly’s at all. It was a tin of Strawberry Shortcake strawberry lip gloss.

I slid open the lid and sniffed. I knew that smell. I knew it from the night that I had followed Mr. Katz down the stairs.

If I had chosen to freak out at that moment it might have been justified. But the tin didn’t scare me. It was entirely possible that Venus had planted it here during her last late-night visit. After all, she was probably the one trying to gaslight me. But oddly enough, even that idea didn’t bother me. I rubbed my finger against the lip gloss. The surface of it was smooth and unused. Still, I shouldn’t spread it against my mouth. I didn’t really know who had touched it before me…and yet…

I put the lip gloss on. It smelled of childhood innocence. Maybe Anatoly had bought me this, although why any guy would buy his girlfriend a tin of Strawberry Shortcake lip gloss was beyond me. Maybe it was the new trendy hipster thing like Hello Kitty or Betty Boop. Still, I couldn’t imagine Anatoly buying this.

I looked around the room again. The boxes didn’t seem so offensive anymore. They would be unpacked in time and the issues with the house would be worked out, but right then, in that moment, I felt safe, a sensation so rare that not pausing to savor it would have been practically obscene. I closed my eyes and when I opened them I was looking at my father. He was smiling, the younger me happy in his arms.

“You’re here, aren’t you?” I whispered.

For a moment the house seemed to get quieter, which was ridiculous since there had been no previous noises. But this quiet had a different quality. This was the quiet of a paternal embrace. I closed my eyes again and as I did so I felt something, a slight pressure against my back, gentle but insistent. I caught my breath and turned around.

Mr. Katz looked up at me with quizzical eyes, his body pressed against the back of mine. He was the only other one in the house with me. So why didn’t it seem that way?

That night there were footsteps in my dreams. I didn’t like the sound of them and for a moment I feared that they weren’t in my dream at all. They seemed somehow outside of my sleep-induced world, dragging me into consciousness. But my father told me not to worry about it. I should just relax. “I love you,” he said.

And that’s all I could remember when I woke up hours later. I lay there, my eyes still closed, vaguely aware of the morning light, trying my damnedest to recall that dream. But it was beyond me. The more I reached, the further removed my dream became and after a few minutes I resigned myself to making do with the crumbs of memories it had left in its wake.

I could feel the warmth of Mr. Katz lying by my side and, without opening my eyes, I moved my hand so as to place it on his back.

But what my hand touched wasn’t fur. It was another hand.

I gasped and tried to jump out of bed. Instead, I got tangled in my sheets and fell with a loud thud to the floor.

It was in the midst of my descent down to whack the hell out of my funny bone that I realized the person sitting on my bed was Anatoly.

It took me a second, but I eventually got to my knees in order to peer over the top of my mattress. Anatoly was just sitting there trying unsuccessfully to suppress a grin. “Are you okay?” he asked.

“
What the fuck!
How the hell did you get in here?”

“You gave me a key.”

I managed to untangle myself from the sheets enough to get back on the bed. “I still didn’t invite you. I could throw you out.”

“You could,” he agreed, clearly not worried.

I tried to give him the evil eye, but I couldn’t manage it. He was too damn sexy in his fitted black T and well-worn jeans, looking like he owned the place, or at least the bed. It was like trying to get mad at someone for putting vodka into your lemonade without asking even though you had been secretly craving the extra kick.

“Are you here to apologize?” I asked.

“I’m here to call a truce,” he said carefully. “I brought you a peace offering.”

“What would that be?”

He reached over to the bedside table and handed me my gift. “It’s a Venti Light Mint Chocolaty Chip Frappuccino with extra whipped cream.”

I couldn’t help but smile as I took the cup. This was one of the big differences between Anatoly and Scott. Scott knew I liked Frappuccinos, but Anatoly knew what
kind.
Scott would have asked why I wanted a light Frappuccino if I was going to have extra whipped cream, but Anatoly understood the delicate balance I maintained between my indulgences and my justifications. Anatoly knew the details of me.

“I spoke to Maria this morning,” he said.

“Oh?” I kept my eyes firmly on my drink. “Have you made any progress on Maria’s case?”

“Not much. I met with her earlier this morning. She says hello.”

“Hello? That’s it?” I asked warily.

“Yes, what else did you expect her to say?”

“Nothing,” I said, secretly relieved that she hadn’t ratted me out. “I mean, it would be nice if she apologized for dragging me into her domestic drama, but hello’s good. I’ll take hello.”

Anatoly’s eyes narrowed slightly. I needed to change the subject immediately.

“We were supposed to go to the movies last night,” I said quickly. “I missed you. I missed you a lot.”

“I missed you, too.” He let his eyes drop to where my oversize T-shirt hit my bare thigh.

“You think I’m just here to have sex with you whenever you want it?” I asked, reading his intentions.

“No, but a man can dream.” I sucked in an unsteady breath as his hand touched my knee and started a slow journey up until he was slowly inching up my T-shirt.

I didn’t know if he still wanted me to move out of my new house, and if he did, I didn’t know how he would handle my refusal. I did know that I couldn’t tell Anatoly about my latest dealings with Kane or my conversation with Jason, Zach, Maria or any of the other Specter Society members without instigating a huge fight on par with the battle of Waterloo. It was too early for all that drama. My mind wasn’t fully awake yet, but my body sure was, so it seemed logical that I engage the latter first.

I put my drink down by the side of the bed. “Your shirt’s dirty,” I said.

Anatoly wrinkled his brow in confusion, but his hand continued to slowly push its way up. “What are you talking about?”

“It’s got lint all over it. You need to take it off before it gets on my bed.”

Anatoly flashed me a wicked grin before removing his hands just long enough to pull off the shirt. Now it was my turn to grin. I used my index finger to trace his beautifully defined six-pack. “We have another problem,” I said.

“Do we?”

“Yeah, your jeans. Very dusty. ’Fraid those are gonna have to go, too.”

Anatoly stood up and removed his jeans, revealing his fitted boxer shorts, which showcased an impressively large protruding bulge. He slipped one finger inside the elastic waistband and raised a questioning eyebrow.

“Did you really think I was going to let you get in bed with me wearing nothing but your underwear?” I asked with mock indignation. “Uh-huh, you’re going to have to get out of those.”

And just like that, they were off and he was standing in front of me in all his naked glory. If there was any argument for God being a woman, it was that she provided us gals with men like Anatoly to ravage.

He knelt down on the bed and this time both hands went to the edge of my T. “This is filthy,” he said. “Fair’s fair.”

In one fluid motion he had my shirt off and had pinned me to the bed. He held my arms at my wrists above my head and he used one knee to spread my legs apart. Slowly, he let his eyes take it all in. “I meant what I said. You are mine.”

“Well,” I hedged, “I’ll certainly let you rule me in the bedroom.”

“It’s a good place to start.” In what seemed like slow motion he lowered himself so his lips were touching my neck. “This is mine to kiss,” he said while demonstrating his point. He then moved down while still firmly holding my arms in place. “These,” he said as he used his mouth to explore each breast, “are mine to touch.” And then he released my wrists and moved even farther south. “This,” he said, his hands seizing my hips and positioning me for his pleasure, “this is mine to taste.”

I clutched the headboard and arched my back. This was the best wake-up call
ever.

Unhurriedly he coaxed and teased me until all the anxieties of the last few weeks were pushed forcibly from my head by tidal waves of ecstasy. Trembling, I used my last vestiges of strength to push him off and then immediately rolled right on top of him. “Your turn,” I breathed, and used my hand to further entice him before gently guiding him inside me. Anatoly held me by my waist and moved me to a rhythm that was purely ours. I looked down to see that his face was drawn into an expression I was intimately familiar with.

“No!” I shouted. “Not yet, two more minutes.”

“Sophie—”

“Think of baseball or whatever sport you Russians are into…figure skating! Think of that!”

“That’s it,” he said, now rolling us both over so he was on top again. “Now you’re going to get it.”

“Thank God,” I laughed. I closed my eyes and let myself get lost once again in our lovemaking.

In the time it took him to call out my name in the final throes of passion I had managed to squeeze in two more mind-blowing orgasms.

I relaxed under the full weight of his body, sweaty and totally satisfied.

“So we have a truce?” Anatoly asked.

“Absolutely.” I felt a slight shaking of the mattress and looked over to see that Mr. Katz had jumped up and was looking at me with his feed-me-now glare.

“Oh, give me a break,” I said, using one hand to wave off my pet. “Just because I got up early doesn’t mean you get an early breakfast.”

“I think your cat’s in the right,” Anatoly mumbled, his face still in the pillow beneath us. “It’s got to be after 10:00 a.m. by now.”

“What!” I pushed Anatoly off me and stared at my bedside clock—10:06 a.m. Marcus would be arriving any moment to take me to Kane’s. If Anatoly knew that I was going over to Kane’s—Kane who has been following me and might possibly be a murderer—if Anatoly knew I was going over to Kane’s
house
in the hopes of finding information that I could either trick or blackmail him with, Anatoly’s beautiful head might literally explode. I sat up and swung my legs over the side of the bed, but before I could even get up I heard the doorbell ring.

“Are you expecting someone?” Anatoly asked.

“No, I mean, yes. Marcus and I are…um…going to brunch.”

Now Anatoly was sitting up, too. “If you’re just going to brunch with your friend why do you suddenly seem nervous?”

“I’m not nervous, I’m just…shaky, you know, from all the physical exertion.”

“Sophie,” Anatoly said warningly. But before he could finish his thought the doorbell rang again and I was on my feet, snatching up a robe that I had draped over a suitcase. “Can’t keep him waiting!” I chirped before rushing out of the room.