Quickstep to Murder (27 page)

“You’re a god,” I told him, sinking into a chair and sipping the steaming tea. I choked and coughed, unprepared for the healthy slug of bourbon he’d doctored it with.

“You looked like you could use a pick-me-up.”

“And how.” I took a more cautious sip and looked at him. Calm and debonair as ever, he leaned back in his chair, long fingers wrapped around the warm mug.

“I stopped by to see how you are doing. It looks like they’re making good progress on the studio.” He tipped his chin toward the ceiling.

“Are they? I haven’t been up there. I just couldn’t face it. I saw it last night, after the firemen put the fire out, and looking at the floor, all crackled and blackened, I felt like someone had flayed me.”

Concern lit Maurice’s eyes. “It’s ugly and frightening,” he said. “Do the police have any idea who did it?”

“Lissy seems to think it might’ve been me, despite the fact I’ve got an alibi.”

“The man’s an utter fool. Do you think this is tied in with what happened last week?”

I snorted lightly, almost amused by the delicate way he referred to Rafe’s death. “I don’t see how.”

“Maybe someone is set on forcing you out of business,” Maurice said. “A competitor or someone with a grudge.”

“Come on,” I objected, pushing my empty mug aside.

“The arson, maybe. But killing Rafe? It’d take a psycho ballroom dancer to think that was the best way to up his—or her—odds at a competition.”

“I’ve met more than one psycho in my years on the ballroom circuit,” Maurice said half-jokingly, “and people have killed for less understandable reasons. But that’s not what I mean. What if someone has a grudge against you, personally, and is doing whatever he can to hurt you.”

“Why not kill
me
, then?” A shiver tickled down my spine as I said it.

“It was a stupid idea,” Maurice said, collecting the mugs and taking them to the sink. “I’d be happy to sleep here for a couple of nights, despite the smell”—he forced air noisily out of his large nose—“if you would feel more comfortable.”

I was touched. “Thanks, Maurice,” I said, rising to hug him. “If I get nervous, I can go to Danielle’s or my mom’s. But I appreciate the offer.”

“I’ll be back first thing tomorrow,” he said, “and we can talk about where we’re going to hold classes in the interim. The YMCA may have space we can use, and one of my ladies mentioned that her church would be happy to let us use their basement.”

“You’re approaching this a lot more intelligently than I am,” I told him ruefully. “I don’t suppose you’d like to buy Rafe’s share and be my new partner?”

“Alas, dear Anastasia,” he said, “but no. I’m past the age of wanting the responsibilities that come with owning a business. Dancing and teaching—yes. Billing and recruiting students and worrying about insurance and taxes and payrolls—definitely no.”

“It was just a thought.”

I closed the door behind him.

 

The doorbell dinged at a ridiculously early hour the next morning—six thirty, I saw when I cracked an eye open. I pulled the sheets up over my head, ostrichlike, hoping whoever it was would go away.
Ding-dong! Ding-dong!
With a sigh, I flung my legs over the side of the bed, thrust my arms into the sleeves of my ratty green terrycloth robe, and shambled toward the door. Peering through the peephole, I was surprised to see Taryn Hall and Sawyer Iverson standing there.

I pulled open the door. “Is anything wrong?” I asked. The fresh breath of morning wafted in.

“We came to say good-bye,” Taryn said, and Sawyer nodded. “You’ve been so kind to us . . . well, we didn’t want to disappear and not have you know what’s going on.”

“Come in.”

They crossed the threshold and Sawyer looked around curiously.

“Coffee?” I offered. “It will only take me a moment to make some.”

“No, thanks,” Taryn said, patting her abdomen. “I’m off caffeine.”

Remind me never to get pregnant if you have to give up coffee.

“Do you have a soda maybe?” Sawyer asked. “Mountain Dew?”

“Didn’t you have some in the fridge upstairs?” I asked. When he nodded, I said, “Let’s go up and get some.”

I led the way up the staircase to the locked door leading to the studio. Undoing the dead bolt, I pushed it open. The smell of charred wood overlaid with cleaning solvents and sawdust smacked us.

“Shit!” Sawyer blurted. “Uh, sorry, Miss Stacy. What’s that smell?”

“You didn’t hear?” I told them about the fire. “The only thing damaged was the ballroom floor, so it’s perfectly safe to be up here.” I ducked into the bathroom and opened the fridge. It seemed less crowded than usual and I stared into it for a moment, the cool air chilling my bare feet, and realized all Vitaly’s grapefruit juice was gone.
Huh
. I tried to remember if he’d taken them with him when he got sick. I didn’t think so. I sighed. It must be time to post a little reminder about the honor system. Pulling out the lone Mountain Dew, I crossed the hall to where Taryn and Sawyer hovered on the ballroom’s threshold, looking at the floor stripped mostly bare by the refinisher. It looked naked, defenseless without its shiny coats of polyurethane, and I hugged my robe more tightly around myself.

“Geez,” Taryn said.

“You’re lucky you didn’t burn up in your sleep, Miss Stacy,” Sawyer said, pulling at the hoop in his ear.

“Sawyer!” Taryn punched his shoulder.

“What? All I said was—”

“Let’s go back down,” I said, interrupting the squabble and handing Sawyer his soda.

The teens sat side by side at the kitchen table, perched on the edges of their chairs, obviously ready to go. I busied myself dumping Kona coffee into the machine and adding water. When the strong scent began to filter through the room, I joined them and said, “So, what’s this about good-bye?”

“I’m taking Taryn down to South Carolina today,” Sawyer explained. “She’s going to live with the people who are adopting the baby until it’s born.”

“What’s your dad think of that?” I asked Taryn.

She shook her head and I wasn’t sure if she meant he didn’t know or he wasn’t in favor of the plan.

“He kicked her out,” Sawyer said, putting an arm around her shoulders.

“I think he was really hurt that I thought he might have killed Rafe,” Taryn said in a small voice. “When we got home from the competition, he marched me down to the Holborns’ house—they live down the block—and Mr. Holborn told me they were playing poker the night Rafe got killed, until past midnight. Daddy told me I was disloyal, and a liar. He called me an ‘ungrateful whore’ and . . . and—” She began to weep quietly and Sawyer stroked her hair.

I sighed inwardly, not knowing what to say. I looked at Sawyer. “And you?”

“I’ll come back and finish high school. I graduate in June, you know. Then I’ll get a summer job in Sumter—my folks are okay with that—and then we’ll see.”

“I need to finish high school; I’m hoping I can earn my GED over the summer,” Taryn said. “And then we both want to go to college, but I won’t have any money, so I may have to work awhile first.” The resolute look on her face made me think she’d carry through.

“We’re going to look into all the financial aid options,” Sawyer put in. “And my folks say they might be able to help Taryn some. They really like her and they’re pissed about the way her dad’s treated her.”

“Marriage?”

They both shook their heads. “Not now,” Taryn said, reaching up to squeeze Sawyer’s hand where it rested on her shoulder. “We’re too young. Maybe later.” She gave the youth a shy smile.

“Well, if you end up back in this area, you could always come teach at Graysin Motion,” I said.

“Really?” Taryn’s eyes sparkled. “Thanks, Miss Stacy.”

Sawyer rose and helped Taryn to her feet. A lump formed in my throat at the sight of his tenderness with her.

I walked them to the door. “Good luck.” I hugged Taryn tightly. Sawyer, looking teenage-boy awkward, leaned down to give me a hug. I waved from the portico as they climbed into Sawyer’s Honda and drove away. Somehow feeling both sad and inspired, I headed back into the house to get dressed, giving a cheery wave to a neighbor heading off to cubicle hell.

After showering, dressing, and breakfasting, I marched upstairs, determined to get some work done in my office. I had students to contact, arrangements to make for temporary lesson locations, calls to make related to Blackpool, and a host of other tasks I’d ditched yesterday for the abortive trip to West Virginia. Throwing open the windows in my office, I hesitated only briefly before crossing the sanded floor of the ballroom to open all the windows in there, too. At one window, the sheers were nothing but burned strips of fabric and I pulled them down easily, leaving them in an ashy pile on the floor. The familiar scents of Old Town—car exhaust, the Potomac, and the sweet fragrance of blooming fruit trees—began to chase away the odors of fire and restoration.

A clanging noise behind me made me whirl, but it was only the cleaning team clanking their metal buckets up the stairs. “You need to see about the lock,” the white-overalled supervisor said after we exchanged good mornings. “It doesn’t latch properly.”

“That’s because the fire department had to bust the door in,” I said. “I’ll call a locksmith today. Thanks.”

With a nod, she herded her team into the ballroom while I returned to my office and got to work. I took a break at noon to attend my ballet class—rarely had I needed to dance more—and was walking home, pleasantly tired and sore, when a familiar white limousine glided to the curb beside me. Phineas Drake. The rear window purred down and I was surprised to see not the lawyer, but Victoria Bazán.

I stopped dead, causing the man behind me to bump into me. He shouldered past with an annoyed grunt.

“Miss Graysin. Stacy,” Victoria said. “Do you have time to talk to me for a minute? Mr. Drake loaned me his limo so that we could have a chat.”

“You stole my wallet,” I said from the sidewalk.

“I’m sorry.” Her dark eyes pleaded with me.

“Oh, all right,” I said ungraciously, curiosity more than anything else propelling me to the limo’s door.

Victoria sat on the back bench usually occupied by Drake, dressed in jeans and a white shirt, her dark hair loose. A suited man I didn’t recognize sat beside her, short hair and a stern face making him look like Hollywood’s idea of a federal agent. He gave me a sharp glance as I climbed in, then returned to contemplating the view out the side window.

“My minder,” Victoria said.

That didn’t exactly clarify things, but I sat opposite them, feeling compelled to apologize for my sweaty leotard and tights. “Ballet class,” I explained.

Victoria waved my apology aside. An awkward silence fell, as if she didn’t know where to start, so I prompted: “You were going to tell me what the heck is going on. How did you hook up with Drake?”

She laughed mirthlessly. “He caught up with me last night when I tried to use your credit card at a hotel in Richmond. His investigator, a woman named Mary—”

“Pearce. We’ve met.”

“She found me and . . . kidnapped me!”

“Really?” I said, politely disbelieving.

“Well,” Victoria amended, “she fingerprinted me and made me go with her to see Phineas. He’s something else,” she said, admiration and disgruntlement mixed up in her voice.

It hadn’t taken her long to get on first-name terms with the lawyer, I noted. “What did he do?”

“He told me that my fingerprints were on the gun that killed Rafe—”

“What!”

“Stop interrupting,” she said pettishly. “I guess I didn’t tell you the whole story the other night. Rafe tried to give me a gun on Wednesday when he drove me up to the cabin. He handed it to me, so my prints were on it, but I didn’t want it, so I gave it back to him.”

“Really?” I let my disbelief bleed into my voice.

“Yes, really!” Her voice dropped to a whisper. “I was afraid. Afraid I’d kill Héctor. I didn’t want to be tempted.”

“How did Phineas Drake know your fingerprints were on the gun?”

“He faxed my prints to the police.”

I was sure that even if her prints hadn’t been on the gun, he’d have found a way to incriminate Victoria anyway. Phineas wasn’t above lying or manufacturing evidence, in my opinion. But Victoria had lied, too, at least by omission. I didn’t know whether or not to believe her, so I made a “go on” motion.

“Phineas said he could use the prints on the gun to prove I’d killed Rafe. I wouldn’t end up in jail because of diplomatic immunity, but I’d be deported to Argentina, where Héctor would find me within minutes. I’d be dead within two hours of landing at the airport.”

“I’m assuming there’s an ‘or’ in here.”

She nodded. “Or I could talk to your DEA”—she nodded toward her minder—“and provide details about Héctor’s business dealings, and they would help me reestablish myself somewhere else, maybe in Canada or Australia.”

“The witness protection program?”

“Something like that.”

“So your husband’s a drug dealer?”

“He has many business interests,” Victoria waffled. “He—” She stopped as her minder shook his head sharply. “You’re safer not knowing the details.”

The sincerity in her voice made me shiver. That’s all I needed—an Argentinean drug lord thinking I was clued in on his smuggling routes or something. “I don’t want the details,” I said hastily. “What does all this have to do with me, other than I assume you’re going to return my wallet?”

“Phineas has your stuff,” Victoria said. “Part of the deal is that he’s sharing my fingerprints with the police. Since I can’t be tried here, anyway, and I’ll be set up somewhere else, it can’t hurt me and it will get you off the hook for Rafe’s murder.”

I leaned back against the cushy leather, stunned. “But . . . did you kill Rafe?”

“Of course not!” Victoria’s eyes flashed.