Always Kiss the Corpse (22 page)

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Kyra stopped the Tracker by a van with a side plate: Rudy's Plumbing. “Looks like he's here.” Noel opened his door, glanced down. “Pull up a little? Or do I swim to shore?”

She drove on ten feet. “Happier?”

“Much. See you in there.” He tracked his way through yellow mud to a foot-wide plank and walked along it to the front entry. Kyra found a longer, less mucky way around. Inside was dry but windows hadn't been installed yet, and gusts of wind whooshed through. She inhaled the smell of a new construction site: wet sand, fresh concrete, and especially the pungent sawmilled conifers. She loved these smells.

A man wearing fingerless gloves ripped an inch off a two-by-six board. When his saw had whined into silence, Noel asked, “Where do we find Rudy Longelli?”

“The plumber? In the basement.”

“Thanks.” Noel found a hole in the floor, a ladder leading down. Kyra caught up with him. He pointed: “Supposed to be down here.” He didn't care for precipices. He shouted, “Rudy?” No answer. Oh well, for the good of the case. He grabbed the top of the ladder, his foot found the rung, he tested it, it held his weight, he swung on and stepped down. It's true, the first step is the hardest. His foot touched solid ground. Above him Kyra swung onto the ladder and ran down backwards.

Beyond an open partition they found Rudy. Noel said, “Hi again.”

Rudy swung around. In his right hand an acetylene torch blasted four inches of flame. In his left, a wrench. “Jesus, you scared me.”

“Sorry,” said Kyra. “We need to ask you more questions about Sandro Vasiliadis.”

“You and everybody's brother. What's the matter with Sandro?” He lay the wrench on a crossbeam, turned off his torch and set it on the ground. “Can't all of you just leave him dead?”

“All of you?” Noel glanced quickly at Rudy's face. It looked mottled red as if the blood had drained from it and was coming back unevenly. “Us and who else?”

“You and that big mother— A Greek guy.”

Noel felt Kyra's silent demand: proceed with caution. “Greek? Who?”

“He said he represented the Vasiliadis family and he threatened to break my fingers if I talked about Sandro.”

Kyra said, “What happened?”

Rudy told them. “I still don't know what he doesn't want me to talk about.”

“Maybe for now,” Kyra said, “don't talk about Sandro at all. He's right, you will be safer.”

“But what's this procedure business about?”

Kyra glanced at Noel. He nodded.

“What are you guys saying?”

“Nothing, really.”

“Hey, it's my fingers.”

“It's complicated,” Kyra said. “Sandro was in the process of having himself transgendered. He was becoming a woman.”

“Sandro?”

“Yes.”

“No way.”

“It's what was happening. His beard hair was gone, his face was softer, you didn't notice he was getting a bit rounder, breasts starting?”

“Sandro with breasts? Come off it.”

“This guy who threatened you, he must've thought you knew. And now that you do, you can keep quiet about it.”

“I woulda kept quiet anyway. He scared me.” He glanced from Kyra to Noel and back again. “You're serious?” They both nodded. “Jesus Christ.” Rudy clanked the windshield down on his welding mask. Up again. “Is that why I thought Sandro was using one of those hair solvents on his beard? Dilapatory or whatever?”

“You were thinking that?”

“I wasn't really thinking that, but I was thinking I was going to be thinking that, if you get my meaning.”

Both Noel and Kyra nodded.

Kyra drew in a big breath of moist construction smells and said, “We don't know this guy who threatened you. But we think he's serious.”

“Damn right.” Rudy banged his helmet faceplate again.

Noel leaned in. “Our question about Sandro—”

“Shit,” Rudy whispered, “I can't believe it. I bowled with him, for chrissake.” He stared at the cement floor. “In the men's league.”

“There's something you can maybe help us with.”

Rudy released a balloon of air. “Yeah?”

“You have any idea where Sandro could've bought heroin?”

“No. I don't know those things.” He glanced beyond Noel and Kyra. “And I would've thought Sandro didn't know either. I thought I knew Sandro. A little. I guess I didn't at all. Shit.” His bit his lip.

Kyra patted his elbow. “Thanks. If you don't talk about Sandro, the Greek guy won't be back.” She started across to the ladder.

“Okay.” He looked around. He seemed dazed, but found his wrench. He grabbed it tight. Then he said, “Oh shit.”

Noel turned. “What?”

“I just been talking to you about Sandro.”

Noel shrugged in acknowledgement. “You can talk to us anytime. We're safe. But we'll shut up too. Not a word to anybody.”

Did that relieve Rudy? They left him banging his wrench into his other palm.

Back in the Tracker they sat in silence. Finally Kyra laughed a little and said, “You know what we're doing?”

“What?” The windows began to fog.

“Exactly what this guy's warning others not to. He isn't going to like us.”

“The least of our worries.”

“Yeah?” Kyra turned on the engine to blast air onto the windshield. “What else?”

“Our Greek charmer isn't on his own. He keeps saying, on behalf of the family. Sandro's family. Who're they?”

“Maria? His uncle what's his name?”

“Andrei Vasiliadis. I faxed the report and bill yesterday, remember?”

“Yeah. The—” she stuffed the words back down—“who phoned last night. Represented the family at that funeral home.”

“Maybe we should pay him a visit.”

“What're you thinking?”

“Maybe he figured he could get rid of the embarrassing Sandro problem by getting rid of Sandro.”

“Pumping him with heroin?” Kyra shook her head. “There are easier ways.”

“Maybe it's not sex change. Maybe it's basically heroin. Maybe Sandro learned his uncle was moving heroin around. Uncle gets rid of him, heroin as some kind of ironic justice.”

“Maybe maybe maybe. We better talk with Andrei.”

“Seattle tomorrow?”

“Looks like our friend's got the viewing list too. Let's see if he's met up with Ursula, and Brady, and the doctor from that clinic. But remember Ursula saying Sandro thought his father could actually kill him? This Andrei is the father's brother.”

“Hmm,” said Noel.

In the fifteen-minute drive from Oak Harbor to Coupeville the rain stopped and started up again three times. They parked in the hospital lot. “Okay,” said Noel, “we go to the coroner and the pharmacy.”

“Yes.” She turned to him. “But first you get to use your cellphone.”

“What for?”

“To check with Dr. Stockman Jones.”

“You know him. He'll talk to you.”

“It's just a phone, Noel. Go on, call.”

Noel folded his arms. “You said he was hard to get to. Come on, use your connection.”

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Dawn Deane buzzed Dr. Jones' office, told him Kyra Rachel was on the line, it was important. Stockman took the call. The detective asked if he had been threatened by a Greek-looking man, telling him not to speak of the Sandro Vasiliadis case to anyone. Dr. Jones assured her he had not been threatened by anyone. As she knew, the Vasiliadis case like all WISDOM's cases were confidential. Ms. Rachel thanked him. He thanked her for the warning, he set the phone down.

Damn! What the hell were those Vasiliadises doing? He'd better tell the others— Tell them what? He thought for a moment, then picked up the phone again and asked Dawn to track down Andrei Vasiliadis in Seattle.

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Kyra glanced at her watch: 3:10. Fifty minutes till Ursula's half-shift ended. “We have time.”

The pharmacy was a simple high counter with a lower shelf to drop off prescriptions, another to pick them up. No obvious entryway, must be a door at the back. Of course you could leap over the counter— Not Sandro's kind of thing, they agreed. Each time a patient put in his order, one of three pharmacists would walk through a safe-like door at the side and disappear; the dispensing room had to be back there. They tried to walk around but the rear was an outer wall. Kyra volunteered to go out into the thin rain. She found a door, well locked. Easily break-into-able with lock picks, but likely not part of Sandro's training. Dubious Sandro found his heroin here—if the pharmacy even had any.

The coroner's office was in the morgue. And that would be where? In the basement. The coroner was Dr. Ferrero. They walked down a flight of stairs to a hallway and many half-glass doors. Noel tried a couple of handles; locked. At the far end a sign said, Morgue. Kyra knocked. No answer. She listened. Music? She tried the handle. It turned. They went in. Chill pervaded the space. The inside light revealed a man at a desk, and a radio.

The man saw them. He opened a half-glass door. “Yes?” He wore a sweatshirt and jeans.

Noel said, “Are you Dr. Ferrero?”

“No.”

Noel waited. “Is Dr. Ferrero around?”

“No.”

“When will he be back?”

“Maybe tomorrow. If they need him.”

“Who, the corpses?”

“The hospital.”

Noel took a card from his shirt pocket. “We were supposed to meet Dr. Ferrero here this afternoon. Get him to call us back, okay?”

“Okay.” He took the card and started to close the door.

“Will you do that this afternoon?”

“No.”

Noel was disliking this young man. “Why not?”

“He's sailing.”

“In this weather?”

“Sure.”

“It's very wet out there.”

“So's the ocean.”

Noel chuckled. “When can you get him my message?”

“Tomorrow. Maybe.”

“Thank you.”

THIRTEEN

Noel and Kyra headed back through the rain, heavy again, and climbed into the Tracker. Two more hours of this aqueous twilight before it would be completely dark. Four or five other vehicles in the parking lot dimmed as the windshield steamed up. After a few minutes Ursula tapped on the passenger window. Noel unlocked the back door. She climbed in. She looked pale, and worried or scared. “What's up?”

She sat and closed the door. “Oh jeez, you wouldn't believe—I was accosted and—threatened.”

Kyra half-turned. “Who by?”

“I don't know.” Ursula was struggling to hold herself together. “A man, a big young guy, dark hair, mustache, well enough dressed—”

“When did this happen? And where?” Kyra asked.

“He was waiting outside X-ray just after my break. He asked if I'd hired two detectives and when I said, ‘Who wants to know?' he ordered me to unhire them. You.”

“Why?” asked Noel.

“He said too much information was floating about, the family just wants to get Sandro buried and remembered properly. They don't want any detectives picking over Sandro's bones.”

Kyra mused. “How much do you know about Sandro's family?”

“Just that he wanted to stay as far away from them as possible. Sandro had a fair mass of cousins.” Ursula drew a tentative deep breath. “He said he'd be excommunicated from his family if they found out about the sex change.”

“How,” Noel inquired, “was he going to keep it secret?”

“Yeah, well—I guess when it was a
fait accompli
, they'd have to like it or lump it.”

“If it's any comfort, Sandro's friends Rudy and Cora had visits from this guy today. He's going through the viewing guest book.”

Kyra turned to face Ursula. “What did you say when he ordered you to unhire us?”

“Just that Sandro was my good friend and we had to find out why he died. He looked like he was going to haul off and sock me but my supervisor passed by just then and the guy scrammed. He did say, ‘Watch it, you're walking close to the edge.'”

“So,” Kyra said. “Do we continue or quit?”

Some color was returning to Ursula's cheeks. “My call says you continue. It's not even been a day yet. Oh! Maybe he got to Brady! Come on!”

“What?”

“If he's threatened her—”

Kyra turned on the ignition. “Sheriff's office?”

“She's due out in minutes.”

Two blocks down to the municipal offices. Ursula with her new worry seemed to pull herself together. Kyra parked again and peered at the front door through whipping rain. Ursula got out, her umbrella exploded wide, she galloped to the sheriff's office. Kyra and Noel waited. After a couple of minutes Brady came out, followed by Ursula. A man in a gray Taurus in front of them opened the door and put a leg out, then pulled it back. Brady and Ursula walked to the Tracker, each with an arm about the other, talking earnestly.

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Vasily saw it all. Miss Brady Adam kissed the other woman on the mouth. Totally fucking disgusting. An island full of perverts. Usually he could tell the queers, Seattle had more than its share. But on this island everybody was either a faggot or had a crewcut. Or green hair. And some, like Sandro, didn't know what they were.

But that Brady Adam, what a waste. She should know better. Had to know better. With a body like that she probably did know better. Maybe this was a tryout thing with her. Because she was a man's woman. Vasily knew about these things. When this Sandro stuff was settled he'd come back here and remind Brady Adam that deep inside she was meant for other things.

Damn! Not when he was done with Sandro, but right now. Tell her to keep her mouth shut. Stupid telling Andrei he didn't need her home address. Too clever by half. So follow them, get her when she was alone.