“You’re not going on that interview.”
“If you don’t invite me I’ll tell her people about the time you signed a petition supporting the death penalty, and then you know she’ll refuse to see you.”
“You wouldn’t dare.”
Anatoly raised one eyebrow and then strolled out onto the street, leaving me seething in frustration.
It wasn’t until I was back up in my apartment that I realized that I had just insisted on doing something that I didn’t want to do.
I cursed under my breath and plopped myself down on the love seat where Mr. Katz was sleeping. What if the cat message on the phone had been a death threat after all? What if the caller was actually Eugene’s killer and now he had decided that I was going to be his next victim? I should call Anatoly right now and tell him I’d changed my mind.
Then I thought about the smug expression he would be wearing if I did that.
No. I couldn’t back out now. There were very few things in this world that were worth risking your life for. Pissing Anatoly off was definitely one of them.
6
Politicians are like cartoon characters. With a few charming one-liners and a lot of corporate support, they persuade people to excuse their violent and stupid behavior and learn to love them.
—C’est La Mort
“Did I hear you correctly?” Marcus asked as he ran his fingers through my hair, his handsome brown face scrunched up in confusion. “You are going to investigate Eugene O’Reilly’s murder, even though you don’t want to, and now Darth Vader is threatening your cat?”
I sighed and studied Ooh La La through the mirror in front of me. One of the things I liked about the salon was that the stations were far enough apart and the music just loud enough so that you were able to converse with your hairstylist without worrying about being overheard. That and the fact that they served free cappuccinos and mimosas.
“I didn’t say he was Darth Vader, although now that you mention it, the synthesized voice did kind of have a Darth Vader-like quality, so who knows? It’s as likely as anything else at this point. But he didn’t threaten my cat. Whoever called really likes cats. He was emphatic about that,” I said. “And I do want to investigate this. I just don’t think I want to.”
Marcus shook his head hard enough to make his short, well-groomed dreadlocks jiggle. “You lost me.”
“What I’m saying is that I want to do it more than I don’t want to do it. I just have to figure out why that is.”
“I thought you were helping out your mentor.”
“That was the original excuse, but I’m not sure that holds up anymore. She asked me to get her in touch with Anatoly so she could hire him to investigate. I was the one who suggested that I do my amateur-sleuth thing. So technically Anatoly was right when he said that my obligation to her ended as soon as he took the case.”
“Technically he was right? Honey, he was completely right. He was absolutely right. Pick any positive adverb, place it in front of the word ‘right’ and that’s pretty much what Anatoly was.”
“Fine,” I said through gritted teeth. “But I’m still not going to stop investigating this case.”
“Because you want to.”
“Yes.”
“Even though you don’t think you want to.”
“Don’t ask me why, but I feel like I need to do more for Melanie than what I’ve done for her so far.” I tried to turn to face him but Marcus held my head in place, so I was forced to talk to the mirror. “Besides, if I stop investigating now Anatoly will think it’s because he told me to stop. I can’t give him the satisfaction.”
“So you’re proving a point.”
“Kind of.”
“You realize that’s insane.”
“No, it’s not,” I insisted. “Do you remember what you told me right after I caught my dear ex-hubby screwing that dancer?”
“I said that he was an asshole.”
“Yes, but you also said that someday I would be an incredibly successful and famous writer and I would be able to flaunt that success in front of Scott. You said he would suffer every day of his life because he would know that he blew his chance to reap the rewards of my accomplishments and that I would gain an enormous amount of satisfaction from that.”
Marcus grinned. “And look at you now. C’est La Mort was on the New York Times bestseller list for five weeks straight. I am wise and all-knowing.”
“No, you’re not because Scott fell off the face of the earth so I have never had the chance to rub it in his face. He’s probably living like a king in some third world country where they have legalized gambling and women waving around I-will-hook-for-food poster boards. Living well is only a good revenge if those you’re trying to get revenge on know you’re living well.”
“And this is pertinent because…?”
“Because I don’t repeat my mistakes. I’m seriously pissed at Anatoly and I want to show him that I’m better at his job than he is. This is my chance to make him miserable and I just can’t pass up an opportunity like that.”
“Okay, right now you’re putting out a ‘Kathy Bates in Misery ’ kind of vibe.”
“I’m not crazy!” I snapped. “But I’ll admit that maybe I sound…well, a little bit less than sane. If I were to give one of my characters this motivation, Publishers Weekly would tear me apart. That’s why you need to help me come up with a good cover story. Melanie has left me five messages asking me to leave this whole investigation to Anatoly and I have to find a way to change her mind about that.”
“But aren’t you too busy for these kind of games? Shouldn’t you be writing a book or something?”
“Well, yeah. But, Marcus, did it ever occur to you that investigating this case is going to help me write my next book? What better way to research a cozy mystery than to start volunteering as a real-life amateur sleuth?”
“This has nothing to do with research.”
“Of course it doesn’t, but if anyone else asks me about this, that’s what I’m going to say. There! That’s my reason. Or does that sound dumb?”
“Don’t underestimate yourself, you’re way past dumb, now you’re moving toward idiotic.” Marcus plugged in a curling iron. “Honey, think about what you’re getting yourself mixed up in. You said it yourself, this murder could have been politically motivated. Eugene could have pissed off the wrong Democrat.”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” I said with more conviction than I actually felt. “Democrats don’t kill people.”
“Are you sure about that?” Marcus asked as he parted my hair at the side. “Maybe this is the party’s new strategy for getting the support of the NRA. And then there’s that cat message. Sounds like code-speak to me and code-speak is something government agents are likely to use. You know how they talk—” he bent down so he was ear level and said in a low, dramatic voice “‘—the eagle has landed—shoot the moon.’”
“What the hell are you talking about?”
“It’s from an old Sean Penn movie…at least I think that’s how it goes. Nonetheless, the cat thing probably means that you’re dealing with a politician who’s coveting the support of fanatical animal rights organizations, and as it so happens, Ms. Brooke recently announced