Dead In Red (28 page)

“Margarita had an ulterior motive for
ratting on Veronica. Until this week,
she
was the headliner. With Veronica out of the
picture—”

Richard eyed our surroundings with disdain.
“Talk about a big fish in a small pond. What’s our next move?”

“Sleep on it. I don’t know about you, but
I’m tired. Maybe tomorrow I’ll come up with an idea.”

I pushed back my stool and stood again,
taking in the bar and its patrons. Still no sign of Veronica.

I followed Richard out and we walked back to
the car. I kept looking over my shoulder, but the darkness
swallowed details. Anyone could’ve watched us leave, could’ve
followed.

We got in the car and Richard started it,
pulled away from the curb. I nearly broke my neck straining to see
if anyone had pulled out behind us. If they did, I didn’t see their
headlights—didn’t hear the roar of a motorcycle. All the way home I
kept checking the side mirror, kept looking over my shoulder.
Richard noticed, but didn’t say anything. He parked the car in the
garage, and we walked in silence into the house.

“See you in the morning,” Richard said, and
headed out of the kitchen and into the hall for the stairs.

I locked up and waited for his footfalls to
disappear. Richard had been right. Now that Veronica knew I was
onto her I’d have to watch my back, and Richard’s,
twenty-four/seven.

I slipped off my shoes and retraced his
steps, diverting to the darkened living room. Peering through the
leaded windows, I surveyed the quiet street in front of the house.
No sign of a car or a motorcycle. No sign of movement. No sign of
anything.

Veronica was out there somewhere, and within
days she’d attempt, and probably succeed in killing Gene
Higgins.

Find the truth.

I’d found it. Now to figure out how to use
it.

# # #

CHAPTER 23

It took hours for me to fall asleep. I woke
up late the next morning feeling marginal again. I wasn’t sure if
it was because of an impending migraine or the growing uneasiness
inside me. Time was running out and I had no idea how to nail Walt
Kaplan’s killer.

I let my new routine rule; I took my meds
with a cup of coffee, ate a bowl of cereal, and headed off for
work.

“We missed you,” Tom called when I came in
the back door. The bags under his eyes told me he’d probably had to
man the bar alone the day before.

“Dave work last night?” I asked.

“Nope.”

Major guilt. Especially since I’d spent the
day either in bed or dozing.

“I’m assuming you’ve made some progress?”
Tom asked. He didn’t have to specify what he meant.

“I’m getting close.”

He didn’t ask any more questions.

I usually liked the daily tasks
necessary to gear up for the day’s customers, but not that day. The
words
find the truth
kept
eating into my brain, along with a new refrain:
cover your ass.
Covering my ass meant talking to
someone about Walt’s death. My first choice wasn’t the Amherst
Police.

The lunch crowd was just beginning to leave
when Sam Nielsen strolled into the bar. Again, he sat down at the
farthest stool from the taps, setting a steno notepad down in front
of him as he waited for me to finish up with a customer. I grabbed
a beer from the cooler, cracked it open, and snagged a clean glass
before heading down to see him.

“You ought to serve sandwiches,” he said as
he focused on our one remaining customer. “Might be a boon for
business.”

I handed him the beer. “It’s on the back
burner. Thanks for stopping in.”

“So who’s your murderer?”

“A drag queen named Veronica Lakes.”

Sam raised an eyebrow, then poured his beer.
“Oh he, or she, of the custom-made shoes?”

“Not exactly. But that’s what got me started
on her trail.”

Sam sipped his beer and listened,
occasionally making a note but not interrupting, for the next ten
minutes as I gave him an abbreviated version of what I’d been
pursuing for the previous two weeks.

“And your plan now?” he asked at last.

“I don’t know. Something’s going to break
soon. But until Gene makes up his mind to tell the cops what he
knows, he’s in real danger from Veronica. She’s going to have to do
something to protect herself, and it’s gonna happen before
Saturday.”

“Another one of your insights?”

I nodded.

“What do you want me to do?”

“One of the other drag queens said Veronica
had squeezed her other sugar daddies. Can you find out if any other
gay men have been stabbed to death?”

“The answer’s no. There were two other
homicides of gay men in the past three years, but neither fit this
MO, both solved. One was a robbery gone wrong, the other was a
domestic dispute.”

“Then the good news is our murderer isn’t a
serial killer. But where does that leave us?”

“I’ll do some digging on your drag queen.
Past history, arrests, the usual. I’ll also dangle a carrot in
front of my source at Amherst PD, see what kind of reception I
get.” He got up from his stool. “I’ll give you a call this evening,
let you know what I’ve found out. Maybe we should go together to
see Veronica’s debut tonight.”

Excellent. Then I wouldn’t have to involve
Richard. He could stay home, nice and safe.

“Thanks.” Again Sam reached for his wallet
but I waved him off. “On the house.”

Sam smiled. “You’re never going to get your
cell phone if you keep buying drinks for the general public.”

“Get out of here and start your
digging.”

He gave me a salute as he exited through the
bar’s side entrance.

Time dragged for the rest of the afternoon,
while the tension within me mounted. I poured beer, washed glasses,
and tried not to think about Gene sitting alone up at the Holiday
Valley house, and how easy it would be for Veronica to pick him off
if she found out he was staying there.

It was almost three and I’d been polishing
the taps with such vigor they glowed, when Tom called to me.
“Phone.”

Tossing aside the rag, I dipped into Tom’s
office and picked up the phone on his desk. “Jeff here.”

“It’s Richard. I just heard from a frantic
Cyn. She said she got a call from a man saying Gene had been in an
accident and was critical. She wanted me to meet her over at the
ECMC Emergency Room. I tried to tell her Gene was in Holiday
Valley, but she hung up on me. I called Dana Watkins, and she said
Cyn had just flown out the door.”

The vision of the bloody hands exploded
across my mind.

He continued. “I asked how Cyn had found out
about Gene’s so-called accident. Dana said the call came in on the
café’s voice mail, which Cyn had had forwarded to her cell
phone.”

“When did Cyn leave?”

“Less than five minutes ago. Dana said she
tried to tell Cyn the call could be phony, but Cyn said she
couldn’t take the chance it wasn’t.”

This was happening much too fast.

“Look, I’ve got to go. I hope I can get to
Cyn before Veronica does.”

“I want to talk to Dana, then I’ll meet you
there.”

“See ya.” Richard hung up the phone.

I borrowed Tom’s phone book once again,
called Dana’s number. “Cyn?” she answered, breathless.

“No, it’s Jeff Resnick. Tell me what
happened.”

She did, in an amazingly calm voice, despite
the evident worry within it. “And then she jumped on Black Beauty
and was outta here,” Dana finished.

“Black Beauty?” I asked.

“Her motorcycle.”

It all made sense. Cyn hadn’t wanted me to
prove Craig Buchanan didn’t kill Walt. That would mean the cops
would start asking harder questions—questions she didn’t want
answered, about Walt’s lifestyle, about his relationship with Gene.
Maybe she hadn’t believed Gene was innocent, but she didn’t want to
see him go to jail. She’d followed me to the Backstreet Playhouse,
and maybe other places, and called me with the voice-altering
device. She’d managed to crank up my paranoia, but not high enough
to stop me.

“I thought Cyn was angry with Gene. That she
wanted nothing more to do with him.”

“You don’t abandon your child when he’s in
trouble,” Dana said.

“Child? I thought he was her nephew.”

Dana sighed. “We’ve had a lot of time to
talk in the past two days—we may have even become friends. Gene is
Cyn’s biological son. He doesn’t even know it. But that’s the
reason she’s always been so close to him. Cyn wasn’t up to being a
single parent. Her sister adopted him because she couldn’t have
children of her own.”

My mind was racing. “I’m meeting Richard at
the hospital. Will you be at this number later?”

“Yes, and please call. I’m afraid for both
of them.”

I said good-bye and hung up.

“Tom!”

Tom, who’d apparently been eavesdropping,
poked his head around the office door as I was untying the apron at
my waist. “Something’s come up. I have to go.”

“Does this have anything to do with Walt’s
killer?”

“Yes.”

He didn’t hesitate. “Go.”

* * *

The light
ahead turned red and I braked. Even in heavy traffic,
Richard’s house was only minutes from the hospital, much less at
this time of day. He’d get there in plenty of time to intercept
Cyn, who had at least a twenty-minute ride from Cheektowaga.
Rich
would
make it there on
time.

Oh yeah? If I believed that, then why did I
feel so antsy?

The vision of the bloody hands assaulted me
once again. I squeezed my eyes shut. When I opened them again, the
light went green. I hit the gas.

The should-haves started circulating through
my brain. I should have contacted Sam sooner, I should have
insisted Gene go to the cops.

The light at Eggert turned red. Goddamn the
timing on these things.

I hung a left at Bailey Avenue, nearly
sheering off the bumper of a Volkswagen Jetta, and stepped on the
gas. I ran the first couple of lights, but got caught in traffic
and had to wait. At this rate, I’d get to ECMC after—

Bloody hands, glistening—rivulets of scarlet
cascading—

Yeah, yeah, yeah. The same old scene was
getting tedious.

I gunned it, weaving around cars, SUVs and
minivans, their horns blasting me from every direction.

I didn’t bother with the hospital’s parking
lot, pulling right up to the Emergency entrance. Richard was there,
waiting for me, hopped right in the passenger side of my car.
“She’s gone. Head for the Thruway.”

My wheels spun on the asphalt. “Tell
me.”

“I flashed my ID and told the receptionist
Gene was my patient, that I’d been told he’d been taken to the ER.
She said Cyn had been there only minutes before looking for him,
but told her no one by that name had been admitted. A tall,
skinhead approached Cyn, spoke to her in low tones, and then they
left together.”

“What makes you think they’re going to the
Holiday Valley house?”

“Thank god for smokers. They had a brief
conversation outside the door, one of the nurses heard Cyn say
Holiday Valley. Then they walked to the parking lot, got in a car
and drove away.”

“Wow, you’re getting good at this
investigation stuff.”

“Must be your influence. Can’t you go any
faster?”

I was already breaking the speed limit, but
I pressed harder on the accelerator, giving myself another five mph
and hoped like hell the Amherst cops were all on a donut break.

“So how much of a lead do you think they’ve
got?” I asked.

“No more than five minutes.”

“Did your smoker mention Cyn’s emotional
state?”

“She said Cyn seemed to go willingly.”

“Sure, if I had a knife sticking in my
ribs—and that’s Veronica’s, or Myron’s favorite weapon—I might
appear to cooperate, too. Did your smoker say who was driving?”

“I didn’t think to ask.”

“I’ll bet it was Cyn. If she’s smart,
she’ll crash the car, but who knows what cock-and-bull story
Veronica told her. And by the way, Dana Watkins told me Gene is
Cyn’s biological son—
not
her
nephew. She had the unfortunate timing to have her baby out of
wedlock and her sister adopted the boy.”

“That ups the ante,” Richard said.

“She might’ve been angry with him on Sunday,
but now she’s on a quest to save him. Cyn probably doesn’t even
know that Myron is Veronica.”

We hit the Thruway ramp, headed south.

“It’ll take at least an hour to get there,”
Richard grumbled. “You got a map?”

“Glove box.”

He hit the button, pulled out a New York
state map, spent far too long unfolding and refolding it to the
right section. “You know where this house is, right?”

“Yup.”

Richard kept staring at the map. “How weird
is this? I hadn’t seen Cyn for thirty years, and now I’m rushing to
try to save her life.”

“That’s pretty weird,” I said. Then again,
since I’d been smacked in the head with a baseball bat, a big
portion of my life had gone majorly weird.

Richard set the map on his lap, looked at
his watch. “What are we going to do when we get there? We can’t
just drive up the driveway and yell ‘Surprise!’”

“No shit. I figure we’ll park on the street
and go in on foot.”

“And do what? Threaten Veronica with a
stick?”

“You got your cell phone?” I asked.

“No, dammit. That lets out calling the cops.
Unless we find a pay phone.”

“Cyn’s house isn’t in Ellicottville.
It’s up in the hills; there aren’t any pay phones nearby, and cell
coverage is probably spotty, too. And anyway, what would we say? We
think someone
may
be plotting
murder at this location—meet us there. And what if we find Cyn,
Gene, and Veronica sitting around the pool drinking gin and tonics
and chowing on nachos?”