You Don't Know Jack (6 page)

No, no, no. I don't do men. Particularly that man. I would not seek him out. I would only watch Bruce. And Apollo. Apollo? Oh, God, where was he? Oh, there. Still dancing, his starburst tie flapping as he hopped to a rap song. Before the relieved breath left my lungs, a throaty laugh to my right tightened my gut. I whipped around. Yikes. Dinah was moving from table to table, greeting her patrons. I lurched to my feet.

The sooner I found out something on Bruce, the sooner I could get Apollo to leave. I sidled away from Dinah, scooting toward the bar. But Frankie was at the bar. I stopped in my tracks, frozen with indecision, and as I did, something cool seemed to grip my neck as if I'd been grabbed by icy fingers.

I twisted around. No one staring at me, and yet, the sensation lingered; an evil permeating the immediate air as though I stood next to death. I glanced left, right, and studied the people at the nearest tables as though half expecting to see one of them wearing a sign:

It's me, Jack B.

The Black Boutonniere Killer.

Choosing my next victim.

Instead I saw an empty chair with an untouched cocktail. Nothing to cause goosebumps, but they rose over my flesh as though the person who'd been sitting there a moment before was the embodiment of malevolence, and all that remained of him now was a wisp of malignant spirit as elusive as smoke rising from an ashtray.

Apollo! There. Still dancing. I blew out a relieved breath and made up my mind. I was going backstage, spying on Bruce, then taking my friend and getting the hell out of here.

I stole through the
Employees Only
door and into a long hallway containing several doors. At the one marked "star," I paused and pressed my ear to the panel. I'd know that whine anywhere. Bruce. Arguing with someone.

A man resembling Marilyn Monroe caught my arm and whispered in a breathy voice, "Wow, honey, you're the best Parton I've seen in years. You're on in two."

On in two?
On
?
As in on stage?
In two?
As in two minutes?
I felt the heat leaving my face. Oh, shit. Oh, shit. I muttered, "Gotta pee."

"Be quick about it, honey."

Yeah, Jack B quick.

As soon as Marilyn hit the stairs leading to the stage, I spun on my heels and ducked through the door beyond Bruce's. Another dressing room, this one shared by several of the performers judging by the number of costumes and make-up stations.

Luckily it was empty. Even better, the walls were paper thin, I discovered as I heard Bruce say, "Don't try to—"

To what? To what? But that was all I got.

I dug in my purse for the recorder, a high tech gizmo advertised to catch a hummingbird fart at 60 feet. I pressed it to the wall. Who was Bruce arguing with? What were they arguing about? I didn't hear another voice. Maybe he was on the phone.

Damn. Why didn't this wall have a one-way mirror?

But on closer examination, I realized it had something almost as good. Coat hooks. Or rather holes where coat hooks had been. Small round holes. Light was coming through the holes. I chose the most eye level one and moved in as close as I could get, given my boobs, and peered at the hole. I feared encountering an eye looking back. Instead, the double long false lashes Apollo insisted finished my outfit created an unexpected obstacle. It was like looking through a pin-striped veil.

I needed X-ray vision.

Or a hand drill.

I pressed my ear to the wall, wanting to hear what the recorder was picking up.

"You think. Knew. And. Damn."

I froze. The other voice rivaled the deep timbre of a bass guitar. Stone. Oh, God. Panic flushed through me. First thought: run. Second thought: make up excuse for being here.

Bump! I spun toward the wall to my back. Eyes wide. The pulse in my throat at a gallop. No one was in my room, but someone was in the room beyond this one. Two someones. I heard scuffling, then a grunt that sounded... sexual... or violent... or violently sexual.

I grimaced. A moment before I'd been delighted to discover the walls were paper thin. Now, not so much. It was one thing to love sex and quite another to be a voyeur, especially an unwilling voyeur.

The noises stopped abruptly. A door closed. I stole to the dressing room exit, and peered into the hallway just in time to see the outside door shutting, but not who had gone through it.

This was too unnerving. The hell with it. I couldn't make out what Bruce and Stone were discussing. I could only hope the recorder had caught it. Nothing I'd signed with Lars obligated me to speak to Stone tonight. Or with Bruce. I'd put in the required appearance. Done the promised snooping. With luck the proof to satisfy Lars was on the recorder. If not, I'd follow Bruce in the daylight. Right now, I wanted to get Apollo and leave before I was discovered. Before Marilyn dragged me on stage.

I hurried back into the club. Apollo was not on the dance floor. Not at our table. Not anywhere that I could see. I told myself not to panic. I hit speed dial on my cell. No answer. I sent a text. No response. Now I was panicking. Where could he be? The men's room? Of course. God, let him be in the men's room.

I stopped at the restroom door, my pulse hip-hopping to the beat of the music. I have often thought my
Cheatin' Hearts
investigations give me the opportunity to observe men in their natural habitats. I have never thought an assignment would find me pretending to be a man — in an actual men's room — there to do what actual men actually did there.

I braced and shoved inside. I'd been in a couple of men's rooms before, accidentally and not so accidentally, and the accouterments were pretty standard. A couple of sinks, a urinal or three, and some stalls. This one was more elegant. Smelled better, too.

But here the women outnumbered the men.

I recognized an almost Liza, an almost Barbra, and an almost Kathy Griffin, except...  Eek! They were heeding nature's call as no women before them had done. It isn't that I'm unfamiliar with full frontal male nudity. There are times when it's my favorite vision. At this moment, however, peeing seemed more intimate than sex.

New rule: Keep your eyes on faces.

Addendum to new rule: No matter what, don't look down.

My cheeks burned, melting my makeup. I resisted the impulse to mop at it. I had bigger worries. If Apollo was here, he had to be in one of the three stalls. I couldn't very well peek under them to see if I recognized his shoes, and since he'd warned me not to talk, I couldn't give him a shout out. No telling who might be in the other stall. Stone?

But it was a risk I had to take. Apollo was missing.

My Dolly Parton impersonation notwithstanding, I called in my best Robert De Niro gangster, "eh, Apollo, you in here?"

That bagged a couple of sideways glances from the three women, er, guys at the urinal, but I kept my gaze high. I moved closer to the stalls. Only the end one, I realized, was occupied. I slipped into the middle one, pretended to drop something, then squatted as if I was picking it up. My gaze was locked on the shoes in the next stall. Black patent, size fourteen fuck-me pumps. Just like Apollo's, except one of the six-inch stilettos had a rusty, gooey smudge. Not Apollo. His shoes wouldn't dare attract goo.

Damn. Where had he gone? Backstage looking for me? I sent another text. Dialed his number, too. No response. I sneaked backstage again. I could hear the band playing Britney's "Womanizer" and felt certain Bruce was on stage and not in his dressing room, but checked anyway. Empty. I thought about snooping for clues, but the need to find Apollo dragged me to the eavesdrop room. A couple of performers were there changing costumes and repairing makeup. No Apollo.

As I reached the violent-sex room, I heard someone behind me say, "Has anyone seen Dolly Parton? She missed her number."

My heart skipped. I shoved inside the dressing room and pressed my ear to the door. Footsteps nearing. Yikes. Hide! I pivoted away from the door and my mouth dropped open. What the hell? Makeup and brushes were strewn everywhere. Chairs were overturned. Costumes had been tossed into a heap on the floor. If wrecking a room is part of violent sex, count me out. I'm not into pain. Or destruction.

I bent to right the nearest chair and froze as I realized the swatch caught on one of the metal legs was a starburst tie. Apollo! My heart felt ice-packed. With trembling fingers, I freed the tie — the dead man's tie — praying
that
wasn't an omen. My lungs ached for a breath I couldn't pull in. I began to stand and bumped my foot against a shoe. My scalp prickled. I wasn't alone. I looked down. A black patent leather heel was attached to a foot which was attached to legs poking from beneath the costumes that had fallen or been dumped onto the floor.

I whimpered and dropped to my knees, praying it wasn't Apollo. I grabbed at a handful of fabric, but something tacky adhered to my palm, to the costumes. A dark, rusty looking liquid like splattered paint.

No... blood.

A scream climbed my throat.
Get help!
Get help!
I scrambled up and wrenched the door open. Another performer, a transvestite, the first ugly one I'd seen, blocked my exit. I yelled, "Help!" At least I meant to. But nothing came out.

Then I realized the ugly drag queen had very familiar green eyes — eyes that could "cure" a woman of everything but her addiction to him.

Stone? No. I had to be imagining it. The hysteria making me wish he were here when he wasn't.

She, er, he said, "What's wrong?"

Bass guitar voice. It was Stone. My knees buckled.

My love/hate relationship with Stone Maddox started when I was five-years-old. He was seven, sure of himself the way a lot of cops' kids are, confident that he could handle whatever situation came along, then proving it by saving my kitten, Buttercup, from a vicious neighborhood dog.

I've been crazy nuts for Stone ever since. He feels the same about me. Sometimes. Sort of. So, why have I married two guys who aren't Stone?

Commitment issues. Not his. Mine. According to Stone my incomplete tattoo had nothing to do with lack of pain tolerance. According to Stone the half heart is symbolic of something much deeper: my inability to give my whole heart to anyone. Stone wants my whole heart or nothing. Crazy nuts, huh?

I want a man who doesn't make me crazy nuts.

A man who's
safe
.

Okay, so Lars wasn't safe.

Okay, so Endré wasn't either.

I blew out a shuddery breath. What if I do hold back a part of myself? Maybe I have to. Maybe I can't help it. Maybe losing the one man I loved unconditionally at age eight scarred me. Left me distrustful. Afraid of being abandoned. Or hurt. Or both. It's not a crime. Stone can't lock me up and force me to talk about it. Or to analyze it. Or to get over it. Though I suspect he'd like to do all of the above.

"What's wrong?" Stone repeated, jerking me back from the edge of hysteria, back to the room where Apollo lay dead beneath a pile of feather boas and sequined evening gowns.

Oh, God, I wanted to disappear — like Endré — go wherever the hell he'd gone.
Anywhere
would be better than here. I glanced down at the black patent heels poking from beneath the costume heap and amended the thought. Anywhere that wasn't deceased.

"T-there," I said, pointing. "A-A-Apollo." My chest ached as though another piece of my heart was gone, snipped off with jagged shears.

Stone swore. I wanted to run. He recognized the look. "Oh, no, you don't."

He pushed into the room, forcing me to back up. He locked the door, locked us in with the corpse. Oh, God. I cringed against the wall. I couldn't watch him uncover that body, couldn't bear to see my BFF dead, couldn't hold myself upright. My knees buckled again. My eyes were blurry. Tears or dizziness. I was too numb to tell which. And some insane bitch was keening like a banshee. Why didn't Stone make her shut the hell up?

He bent over the body for a moment, then came back to me, gently gripping my upper arms, leaning close, his eyes kind, his words kinder. "Sweetheart, it's not Apollo. Stop crying, okay?"

He hated when I cried. Wait! Me? I was the banshee? Wait! Did he say it wasn't Apollo? I swear I heard an angelic voice whisper in my ear, "
And the truth shall set you free
." The pain in my chest lifted. The flood of tears retreated. The sorrow sucking me under released its hold. I snuffled and held out the starburst tie. "B–B–But he was wearing this."

"It's not Apollo," Stone repeated.

"But... dead, right?"

"Yes."

"Murdered, right?"

"That's my guess."

"B–Black Boutonniere Killer?"

"Don't know."

I didn't believe him, but I wasn't going to argue. Murder was his day job. He might not look like a homicide cop tonight in the ebony beehive wig and ruby lip gloss, but I'd bet he was packing heat under that crimson, triple X sequined evening gown.

Stone looked like he wanted to hold me, comfort me, but his fake boobs and my real ones nixed the idea. He reached a hand to my face instead, but inches from a gentle caress that I could really use right now, he pulled back — put off I imagined by the butterfly eyelashes dangling off my cheeks, by the mascara and blush running onto my chin.