The Anteater of Death (15 page)

I needed to find out who’d really murdered Grayson. Especially since that closed-minded sheriff wouldn’t do it.

***

The fateful day for my date with the zoo director dawned without any morning fog. As I fed a crushed banana to an unhappy Lucy, I pondered how far was I willing to go to get her released from the holding pen. First base? Second? Third? A home run? Definitely not a home run. Nor third base, either. Or second. But then what? More eyelash batting?

This quandary remained uppermost in my mind throughout the day, right up until I was back on board the
Merilee
, surveying wardrobe choices for the evening.

I owned a sum total of three dresses: my basic black, the lavender gauze, and the yellow-and-orange Donna Karan. Deciding that a dress might seem too eager, I briefly considered my beige pants suit, then changed my mind. Too “businessy.” And what about footwear? My one remaining pair of Jimmy Choo pumps? My Valentino flats? And hair—down or up? If I dressed too conservatively, my wiles might not work, and Lucy would remain in the zoo’s version of lockup. If I overdid the vamp thing, I might have trouble fending Barry off.

In the end I chose beige linen slacks (purity), a black cashmere sweater open to the third button (wickedness), the Valentino flats (Barry wasn’t tall), fluffed my red hair down around my shoulders (more wickedness), and slicked on a peach-toned lipstick (more purity).

Time for the
pièce de résistance
: Caro’s necklace.

The four-carat square-cut diamond sat in the center of a white gold pendant, with four smaller diamonds perched at each corner. While some might consider it vulgar, the thing could excite a dead man.

***

Barry, dressed in yet another expensive-looking sports coat and reeking of too much aftershave, was waiting at a secluded corner table when I arrived at Zone Nine. As he pulled out the chair for me, I murmured with as much sincerity as I could muster, “Such a gentleman.”

He gave me a carnivorous smile, but riveted his eyes on my necklace. “And you are the loveliest of ladies.” Smarm meets smarm.

We chit-chatted while waiting for our server, and I was again reminded why so many of San Sebastian County’s wealthy widows turned to putty in his hands. He knew exactly what to say and when to say it.

When our waiter arrived, I opted for a not-too-expensive Riesling and what turned out to be a tasteless ziti in an ersatz Romano sauce. Barry chose a steak so rare it dripped blood. With a few drinks, his thin veil of courtly manners began to slip. He’d started on a relatively harmless Pinot noir to go with the steak, but when we ordered dessert—a tarted-up peach strudel served “tall”—he switched to bourbon straight. As the alcohol built up in his system, his teeth seemed to grow longer and sharper at the same rate of speed that his brain diminished.

Then, as the tipsy are prone to do, he talked about his ex-wives, both—according to him—gold-digging, adulterous bitches.

“Sounds like you need a woman who appreciates you,” I said.

With an exhale of bourbon, he leaned across the table and took my hand, all the while staring at Caro’s necklace. “You are so right. Let’s talk about you. Given your sophistication, why are you working at a dirty old zoo? It’s such an odd career choice for a pretty little socialite.”

I tried not to grind my teeth too obviously. “I’m not a socialite.” Nor pretty. Nor, at five-foot-five, particularly little. Concerned that my tone might sound sharp, I flashed a smile. “I’m like everyone else at the zoo, working for a living and happy to be doing it caring for animals.”

“But you don’t have to work, right?”

Ordinarily such blatant gigolo-ism infuriated me, but the memory of Lucy’s misery funneled my ire into a fib. “My family believes in hard work.” I delivered this whopper with a straight face.

He nodded so strenuously that a lock of tan hair fell over his tan forehead. “That’s what old families like yours are all about, the sterling qualities that made America great.” While I stifled my guffaws, he snapped his fingers at a passing waiter. “
Gar
ç
on!
Another Maker’s Mark for me and another Riesling Beblenheim for the lady.”

I leaned forward and tapped him playfully on the hand. “So decisive! No wonder Grayson hired you!” I almost gagged on the words.

He wriggled with pleasure. “Not everyone recognizes my leadership qualities.”

“That’s because you’re so subtle. Which reminds me. Now that the heat’s died down over the mur…er, unfortunate event at the zoo, isn’t it time we put the anteater on exhibit again? The visitors have been asking about her, which means we can turn all this bad publicity to our advantage.” By calling our recent media coverage “bad publicity,” I’d grossly understated the problem, since several newspapers and one local TV station had started calling us, “The Zoo of Death.”

Before Barry objected, I added, “Kim could rework that puppet show she was planning to debut at the fund-raiser to take into account our problem. I’ve even come up with a new plot. When the curtain rises, Lucy has been accused of eating Little Red Riding Hood’s grandmother. Hood, who’s a private detective, discovers that the anteater is merely hiding Grandma to keep her safe from Mister Wolf. In the end, they chase Mister Wolf out of the forest and everyone lives happily ever after.”

I forestalled argument by fiddling with my mother’s diamond necklace until it caught the candlelight. Rainbow prisms danced across his face.
See how much money I represent? Don’t you wish you could get your hands on it?

He stared at the necklace, his eyes almost as large as the steak he’d just finished. “That’s, wow, pretty.”

“This old thing?” I hunched my shoulders forward to make my modest bit of cleavage thrust the necklace closer to him. The ploy worked, and I could almost hear his hormones screaming, “
Boobs! Diamonds!”

Sweat popped out on his forehead. “You’re so…so…”

Confident that he was tipsy enough not to realize he was being played, I took his hand. “Now, about that anteater…”

“Put her back on exhibit!” He actually shook with excitement.

I almost wept with relief. Tomorrow I would drive to the zoo at dawn, spruce up Lucy’s exhibit, then free her from the holding pen. The evening’s objective secured, I made a great show of looking at my watch.

“My goodness, it’s ten o’clock already! If we want to get to work on time tomorrow, we’d better leave.”

He looked at my necklace again, flames of avarice burning in his eyes. “Let’s go to my place for a nightcap.”

Here came the most delicate part of the evening. Not only did I want to free Lucy, but I wanted to keep her free, too. If Barry ever saw through my act, he might lock her back up out of spite. Something told me he was a spiteful man.

“Let’s not move too fast, okay? This is only our first date.” To remind him what the stakes were, I flashed the necklace again.

Eyes glued to it, he fell silent and stayed that way until we reached the parking lot. There, fueled by diamonds, boobs, and bourbon, he lunged at me as I was about to open the door to my truck. Before I could dodge out of the way, he pinned me against the door and groped at my breasts, such as they were. Since the anteater’s fate hung in the balance, I pushed him away more gently than he deserved.

“Good
night
, Barry!”

“There’s this spark between us, can’t you feel it?” He grabbed at me again but this time I moved away quickly, and he came up with a handful of Nissan instead of a handful of Teddy.

I slid to the side and positioned the front fender between us. “Let’s talk about this tomorrow. For now, I have to get home because I want to be at the zoo by five.” To spring Lucy from anteater jail.

His next words would have been more convincing if he’d addressed them to my face instead of the necklace. “If that’s the only problem, come in late. Hell, take the day off! I’ll tell everyone you’re working on a special project.”

He started toward me again.

This is what happens when amateurs try to act the part of
femme fatale
. Biting back a curse, I scuttled around the Nissan’s front bumper toward the passenger’s side. Fortunately, I was able to open the door, spring in, and locked up before he reached me.

He pressed his face against the window, an unlovely sight. “Don’t go, Teddy! I have so much I want to say…”

I crawled over the gear shift to the driver’s seat and turned on the ignition. Rolling the window down a hair, I called out, “See you tomorrow!”

I peeled rubber out of the lot.

***

The next morning Lucy rushed into her roomy enclosure with a joyful bound. I leaned against the railing and watched her run back and forth to each of her faux logs, then start the circuit all over again. Seeing her caper like this was worth every minute of the ghastly evening I’d endured.

“You go, girl!” I called, my heart lifting to see her happiness.

She spun, reared up on her tail so high that I could see her protruding belly, and pointed her long nose at me.

Grunt, grunt!

Then she gave a hop and buck, and sped around the enclosure again, her tail waving behind her like a furry flag.

***

The wages of sin came due when the zoo closed for the day and I rang the squirrel monkeys’ dinner bell, signaling it was time for them to return to their night quarters. As I led them toward their spacious, two-story-high cage, Barry emerged from the underbrush, making Marlon shriek in alarm. The zoo director looked as sleek as usual, give or take a bloodshot eye or two.

“Please accept my apologies for my behavior last night,” he said nervously. “I don’t know what came over me.”

A diamond necklace and several bourbons, that’s what came over you.
For Lucy’s sake, I swallowed my irritation. Setting down the monkey’s water bucket, I said with as much tolerance as I could muster, “We all have our off nights.” I gestured toward the monkeys swarming around our feet. “By the way, never approach animals so quickly. When startled, they might bite.”

He threw Marlon a contemptuous look. “They don’t scare me. After all, how much damage can a two-pound monkey do? Anyway, I wanted to say how much I enjoyed being with you.”

“I had a nice time, too.” Pretending that I was merely brushing away a fly, I felt my nose to see if it was growing longer. Nope. Still the same short, bumpy thing.

Hoping to get away from him, I ushered Marlon and the girls into the night quarters and followed close behind to turn on their heat lamps. Barry hurried along, too, but in his haste bumped hard against Lana, one of the younger females. When she gave a frightened scream, the monkeys scattered. All except Marlon, who froze beside an empty water bucket.

The zoo director ignored the monkeys’ fright. “Let me prove my contrition by fixing you a great big sirloin at my place tonight.”

Like previous zoo directors, he lived in a house in a secluded area at the rear of the zoo, a place where—as the movie line goes—no one could hear you scream. I wasn’t about to let him lure me there.

“Tonight?” To give myself more time to think, I poured fresh water into the monkey’s bucket.

I was still scrambling for an excuse when Marlon, furious at Barry’s rough treatment of Lana, darted forward and nipped him on the ankle. Barry responded by aiming a kick at the monkey, who deftly dodged it.

“Don’t!” I warned.

Too late. Several enraged squirrel monkeys leaped on the zoo director, nipping at his hands, his ears, his cheeks—everywhere their teeth could find exposed flesh. For a moment I just stood there shocked. Such orchestrated violence among squirrel monkeys against humans was rare, which is why we allowed them to roam freely with children in the exhibit. Monkey-against-monkey violence was more common, but although the females often ganged up on Marlon, they apparently didn’t want anyone else doing it.

Barry flung a few of his attackers away, but for every one he got rid of, two more took its place.

“Get them off me!” he yelled.

Careful not to step on tiny monkey toes, I waded into the melee but had no more luck peeling them off him than he did. Defense was the only possible strategy. “Cover your face and hold still. And for God’s sake, stop yelling.”

He didn’t listen.

Yelling curses that would horrify a gangsta rap star, he swatted at the monkeys, which only enraged them further. Every now and then, his hand or elbow would find its target, but not often enough to make any difference. Worse, Marlon, now recovered from the affront to his dignity, joined the females and gnawed at Barry’s ankle with renewed gusto. As the monkeys swarmed over him, the air in the cage grew musky with the scent of urine—the monkeys, I hoped. A humiliated zoo director might be even more dangerous than a bitten zoo director.

Fearing that he might hurt one of my little friends, I stepped away from the brawl, picked up the water bucket and upended it over everyone, drenching the director in the process. With a chorus of screeches, the monkeys—who loathed getting wet—fled into the corner of the cage. I took advantage of their retreat by pushing Barry out the cage door and locking it behind us.

When I patted his arm, water squished through my fingers. Still, I tried for a smile. “That wasn’t so bad, was it? We keepers routinely suffer far worse injuries than monkey nips.”

Now that it was too late to do him any good, Barry covered his scratched face with his hands. “I want you to put those little rats down. All of them!”

“Euthanize the monkeys?”

“Wring their nasty necks, give them lethal injections, shoot them, feed them to the crocs, I don’t care.”

He was being hysterical, I decided, and didn’t mean it. Then again, maybe he did. While I knew Dr. Kate would rather be fired than carry out such a Draconian order, Barry did have the power to make life hell for everyone until the situation sorted itself out. Meanwhile, it was obvious that he was in pain. When he lowered his hands, I saw a long red mark across his cheek. It resembled a dueling scar, which in a way it was.

“Euthanize them, I said! Or do I have to do it myself?”