Quickstep to Murder Page 22

  “There is that,” Tav admitted. “All right, then, we will focus on Bazán.”

  “We?” Did I look like Emma Peel or that cop Grace Something played by Holly Hunter? My hair hadn’t looked that ratty since I was twelve.

  He gave me a serious look. “The police will stop investigating as soon as your Phineas Drake hands over Victoria. They will mark the case ‘closed’ and move on.”

  “Maybe that’s for the best,” I heard myself say. Now that I wasn’t a suspect…

  “You do not mean that,” Tav said, his brows snapping together.

  I sighed. “No, I guess I don’t. Sure, let’s go get Bazán. What did you have in mind-rappelling over the embassy walls at midnight, kidnapping him under the noses of the guards, and waterboarding him until he confesses?”

  Tav grinned. “You have been watching too many spy movies. I thought we would invite him for a conversation, someplace public, and see what he has to say.”

  “He won’t come.”

  “He might if he thought you could tell him something about Victoria.”

  “Like what? I’m not going to rat her out and tell him she’s working with the DEA.”

  “No, but you could tell him about searching Rafael’s cabin, or maybe that she used your credit card in Richmond. What could that hurt?”

  I gave it some thought. I didn’t see what it could hurt, but I had no faith that I had thought of all the eventualities. I told Tav that and he laughed. “Sure, you laugh,” I said, “but my dad tried to teach me chess when I was younger and I was always lousy at it… I never thought far enough ahead. ‘If I put my rook here, he’ll move his knight there, and I’ll take his pawn, and he’ll…’ Blecch!” I shuddered at the memory.

  “Well, I am pretty sure Bazán is not a chess grand master, so it should go just fine,” Tav said.

  I smacked him with a throw pillow.

  We agreed Tav would approach Bazán and he left, saying he was close to signing papers on a new import venture. “It might require me to spend more time in Washington,” he said.

  He seemed to be watching for my reaction and even though I felt a bubble of anticipation well up, I kept my voice even as I said, “You should hang on to Rafe’s condo, then.”

  I met up with Maurice in late afternoon to teach a class in the basement of the Presbyterian church one of his students attended. With tables folded and stacked against the wall, the linoleum-floored space worked well enough and I left at the end of class thinking we might have picked up some new students from the congregation. That was good since my voice mail held several calls from students commiserating about the fire and saying they hadn’t intended to take more classes, anyway. I felt a momentary flutter of panic at the financial abyss gaping in front of Graysin Motion, but pushed it aside. The last message on my voice mail was from Vitaly, saying he would meet me at the studio tomorrow for a practice session. “We are needing many more practicings before Blackpool,” he reminded me. As if I needed reminding.

  My phone rang as I deleted Vitaly’s message. “Bazán has agreed to meet,” Tav said. “He is on his way to the consulate in San Francisco and says he will give us ten minutes if we meet him at the airport.”

  “Now?” I felt flustered, unprepared.

  “Now.”

  Chapter 20

  I arrived at Reagan National Airport twenty minutes later and sprinted up from the Metro to the National Hall, which was crowded with shops, restaurants, and travelers in varying stages of excitement, frustration, and bored resignation. Turning right, I found the bookstore where Tav had said we’d meet Bazán. I spotted Bazán immediately, browsing a rack of nonfiction. A dark-haired young man fidgeted at his side and I pegged him as an assistant of some kind. Tav didn’t seem to be here yet, and I didn’t want to approach Bazán alone. I was about to phone Tav when Bazán looked around and saw me, beckoning me over. He then said something to the aide or flunky and the young man scuttled off as I approached.

  Bazán raised the book he’d been examining. “Have you read This Republic of Suffering, Miss Graysin? Or may I call you Stacy?”

  “Sure,” I said. “And, no, I haven’t read it. I’m more of a fiction reader.” Truth to tell, I wasn’t much of an anything reader, outside of ballroom dance publications and the occasional fashion mag. A book about suffering didn’t exactly sound like the upbeat and escapist fare I preferred on the rare occasions when I bought a book.

  “It’s written by the president of Harvard University,” he said. “It’s about how the unprecedented number of deaths in your Civil War changed the nation. Do you do much thinking about death, Stacy?”

  Not until recently. “No.”

  His dark eyes studied my face. “You should.”

  Why did that sound like a threat? And where the hell was Tav? This meeting was his idea.

  “Death comes to us all. And, despite the author’s contention that a massive number of deaths in a short period presents special challenges for a nation, it probably doesn’t matter much to the individual whether he-or she-dies alone and unnoticed by history or as part of a mass die-off that history notes, like the Black Death, the Holocaust, or war.” He slotted the book back onto the shelf.

  “Aren’t you going to get that?”

  “I’ve read it.” He faced me squarely and I felt like I was confronting a wall or some other immovable object. A boulder, perhaps. A muscle twitched at the corner of his eye, making me wonder if he was nervous or stressed. “Where is my wife?”

  Mindful of Tav’s instructions, I said, “I don’t know where she is right now, but she tried to use my credit card at a hotel in Richmond last night. The credit card company called me.”

  His brows drew together. “Richmond? What in the world would she be doing in Richmond?”

  A Japanese man in a suit jostled me as he reached for the latest Lee Child thriller. I shrugged. “I have no idea,” I said. Not sure how else to keep the conversation going, I added, “I went out to Rafe’s cabin, where Victoria stayed, to see if I could find anything.”

  “And?” Anticipation lit his dark eyes.

  “Someone had searched the place. Maybe a couple of someones.”

  “My men found nothing when they went out there,” he said, waving a dismissive hand. “In fact, I can hardly believe Victoria stayed there, if what my men said about the place is true. She’s what you Americans call ‘high maintenance.’ Wooden cabins with no electricity are not her style.”

  I was disappointed with how easily he admitted to searching the cabin. He didn’t sound like a man with anything to hide. Something over my shoulder caught his attention and I turned to follow his gaze, hoping to see Tav. Bazán’s aide stood at the door, pointing to his watch.

  “I must catch my flight,” Bazán said, shifting his weight to move past me.

  “Wait!” I put a hand on his arm, feeling the slabs of muscle even through his suit. My mind revved as I sought desperately for some way to jolt him into betraying himself, into telling me the truth about the night Rafe died. “The police found Victoria’s fingerprints on the gun that killed Rafe,” I blurted.

  He froze in place and I could feel the shock run through him, an involuntary tremor in his muscles. A split second later he surprised me with a bark of laughter. “Ha! So Victoria killed him? I could have told him not to turn his back on her. That woman would slip a knife between your ribs as soon as kiss you.” Shaking my hand off his arm, he straightened his sleeve. “I’ll have someone show her photo around Richmond, but she’s probably long gone from there. I can make it worth your while to let me know if Victoria tries to use your credit card again. Call me.” Without waiting for me to reply, he strode toward his assistant and they headed for the security checkpoint.

  I immediately phoned Tav, but got his voice mail. Hoping he’d still show up, I browsed the books, trying to decide if I’d learned anything from Bazán. His shock when I told him about Victoria’s fingerprints on my gun almost convinced me he hadn’t killed Rafe. O
r maybe he was surprised because he had killed Rafe without knowing Victoria had previously handled the gun. I tried to piece together a timeline.

  If Victoria was telling the truth, Rafe tried to give her my gun the afternoon he died. She handled it, getting her prints on it. Bazán could have discovered she was gone that evening and guessed she was with Rafe, either because he’d had her followed or because he knew about their prior relationship. Heck, Victoria could even have told him-in a note?-that she was leaving him for Rafe. He confronted Rafe at the studio that night, I theorized. Rafe pulled out my gun, Bazán wrested it from him and shot him. Maybe his prints were on the gun, too, or maybe he’d had the foresight to wear gloves. Or maybe Bazán was right and Victoria really had done it. My head ached. I rested my forehead briefly on the book turned face out on the shelf in front of me. Straightening, I shined the cover guiltily with my shirttail, hoping I hadn’t gotten sweat or makeup on it. It was a mystery by someone named Brad Parks and the cover intrigued me. On impulse, I took it to the cashier. Paying for the book, I looked around one last time for Tav, and then headed for the Metro.

  My phone rang just before I got on the escalator and I stepped away from it to answer. Tav greeted me with apologies, told me the Metro car he’d been on had stopped underground for no discernible reason, and he hadn’t been able to call me. He sounded frustrated. “Did you see Bazán?”

  “Oh, yeah.” I gave him the Reader’s Digest version of our conversation.

  “So we are no further forward then we were,” he said, sighing. “And if Bazán is leaving town, who knows when we will get the chance to speak with him again.”

  A woman edged past me onto the escalator, pushing a stroller with a toddler in it, and juggling a slice of pizza on a paper tray, a can of soda, a diaper bag, and a rolling suitcase. “Let me help you,” I said. “Gotta go,” I told Tav when the woman smiled gratefully and passed me the diaper bag and pizza.

  The Metro was crowded with late rush hour travelers and I had to stand all the way to my stop. I’d bobbled the pizza on the ride down the escalator and gotten a smear of pepperoni grease on my blouse so I smelled like a pizzeria. Trudging down the hot sidewalks to my house, I greeted my quiet entryway with relief and headed to the kitchen to sponge at the orangey stain on my shirt. I gave up and stripped it off, tossing it on the laundry room floor. Anxious to see if the refinisher had made more progress, I headed upstairs after grabbing a clean blouse out of the dryer. I had it halfway buttoned when I reached the top of the stairs and heard faint strains of quickstep music and a woman’s voice saying, “The lockstep should go like this.”

  Solange.

  Maurice must have let her in; he’d had a private session scheduled for earlier this afternoon. Furious that she had the nerve-the gall!-to waltz in and use my studio after all that had happened, I banged through the door and stomped to the small studio. The door stood open and I reached down and unplugged the stereo. The couple stuttered to a stop when the music died, Solange facing me.

  “What the hell are you doing here?” I spat. “Out. Now.”

  “My partner and I are getting in some rehearsal time,” she said, not one whit embarrassed by my appearance. “And since we’re-I’m-going to be part-owner of the studio soon, it seemed foolish to wait on all that paperwork. That look’s a little blatant, don’t you think?” She nodded at my partially buttoned shirt, which, I saw, was displaying way too much cleavage and half of my sheer, flesh-colored bra.

  My fingers fumbled with the buttons as my stomach roiled at the thought of sharing the studio with Solange. I couldn’t do it. If Tav sold out to her I’d start over again, change the name… anything rather than work with the scheming bitch.

  Solange’s partner turned around and I gasped. “Mark?” My hands dropped to my sides.

  Mark Downey’s gaze grazed my chest and then he tilted his chin up as if daring me to say something. “Now that Solange’s ankle is doing better, she and I have entered the Emerald Ball in LA next month-too bad it’s too late for an invitation to Blackpool this year-and we need a place to practice. Surely you wouldn’t be so petty-”

  Oh, yes I would. I was prepared to scale new heights of pettiness, not that I thought it was petty to kick this conniving couple out of my dance studio. My mind snagged on something Solange had said. “What did you mean ‘we’ are going to be part-owners of the studio?”

  For the first time she looked flustered, her eyes darting from me to Mark. “I just meant that we-you and I-were going to be partners.”

  “No, you didn’t.” I advanced on her.

  “We might as well tell her,” Mark said, stepping into my path. He looked smug. “I’m Solange’s financial backer. We’re going in together to buy Rafe’s share. We weren’t going to say anything until after it was a done deal-I was afraid you’d try to put a wrench in it since you didn’t seem to want me involved-but what can you do, after all? Solange got a list of all your students and their contact info-you really ought to practice better computer security-and we’ve already talked to some of them.”

  “That’s what you were doing in my office?” I asked Solange. “Stealing our client list?”

  She looked furious with Mark for mentioning it, but nodded curtly.

  Another thought came to me. “You went to Rafe’s, too, didn’t you, to search his laptop? The day after he died?” I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised that he’d given her a key.

  Her eyes narrowed. “That was you that came in? Shit, you almost gave me a heart attack.”

  Mark tossed a lock of limp hair out of his eyes, reclaiming my attention. I couldn’t believe I’d danced with him, taught him for three years, and I hadn’t seen what he was really like. This was turning into a nightmare. “You’ll be sorry you passed up the chance to partner with me,” he said in a low voice.

  Something in his eyes made me back up a step and a horrifying thought came to me. “I’m only sorry I ever accepted you as a student. You can do better, Solange,” I said.

  “I’ve been out of action too long with my damned ankle,” she said, rotating it. “The established male pros are already committed to other partners. I think Mark is worth taking a chance on.” She sent him a smile.

  “You’ll be taking a chance, all right,” I said, narrowing my eyes. “He shot Rafe and poisoned Vitaly in order to become my partner. Now he’s using you to-”

  “You’re insane,” Mark said. “Don’t listen to her, Solange. She’s losing it.”

  He sounded confident, but a furtive look in his eyes convinced me I was on the right track. “Did the police check your alibi for the night Rafe was shot? Probably not, because they were convinced I did it. And I’ll bet they find your fingerprints on the grapefruit juice bottles-”

  “I got rid-” Mark stopped himself, but it was too late.

  I think my mind had made the connection between Vitaly’s sudden illness and the missing grapefruit bottles subconsciously. Someone-Mark-had deliberately removed them after Vitaly fell ill. “You did… you killed Rafe.”

  “I was thrilled when someone bumped him off, but it wasn’t me,” he said. “You should have turned to me then, let me help you through the rough time, taken me on as your partner. I wanted to be there for you. But, no. You paired up with Voloshin. So I put a little laxative in his juice. Big deal! I thought with him out of action, you’d surely ask me to fill in. But he didn’t stay down long enough. And then, with the fire, I thought you’d be forced to turn to me for help to keep the studio afloat. I was going to come to you in a couple of days and offer to pay for the repairs. I knew how happy you’d be. Stacy, I love you-just give me a chance.” He lunged forward and grasped my hands, a pleading look on his face. “We’ve had a good thing going for three years. Don’t throw it away because I made a little mistake.”

  “We haven’t had anything going, Mark!” I exclaimed, trying to free my hands. “You were my student. That’s all.”

  “I could feel more than that when we danced,” he in
sisted, drawing me closer. His warm breath fanned my cheek. “You deny it, but you felt something for me. The way you pressed against me, the way your hand clasped mine. If it hadn’t been for Acosta-”

  “You’re totally delusional,” I said. “Let me go!” I struggled against him, but he was far stronger than I was and caught me in a bear hug with my hands trapped to my sides. I whipped my knee up, aiming for his groin, but only smacked his thigh because he held me too close. He let out a soft uh, and shifted position slightly. I stomped on his foot, but my espadrille made little impact.

  “Don’t make fun of me,” he growled. His lips made a slimy trail up my neck. “You can love me back if you just try. I-” His grip suddenly loosened and he staggered back from me, then dropped to his knees. Blood dripped from the back of his head and he groggily reached a hand to his skull.

  Solange stood behind him, dance pump gripped tightly in her hand, the heel bloodied from where she’d whacked it against Mark’s head.

  “Thanks,” I said, gasping.

  “The ick factor was just getting too high,” she said with a grimace. “Who knew he was a psychotic stalker? I guess now I’ll have to hold auditions for another partner.”

  “Don’t think saving me means you get to keep dancing here,” I said, dialing 911, “because I have a hard-and-fast policy against client-stealing, fiancé-poaching sneaks, even when they save me from certifiable whackjobs.”

  Uniformed police showed up quickly and seemed inclined to arrest Solange for assaulting Mark Downey. I told them she had hit him to save me and suggested that Mark had killed Rafe. That got them on the radio to summon Detective Lissy, who arrived as the EMTs were carting Mark off to the hospital for some stitches and observation. He looked even more annoyed than usual, and kept a hand pressed to his side as if he had a stitch. He talked to Solange first and finally let her go.

  “If I’d known it was going to be this much hassle, I’d just have let the nutcase have her,” I heard her grumble as she descended the stairs barefoot, the police having confiscated her one shoe as evidence.