Gigolo Murder

by Hadley Knox

  I glanced at Ben, who just stared back at me with a horrified expression. I had yet to share the information from Derrick that I had received about Leighton’s proclivities with him. In another time, I might have been nervous, but standing there in front of my jerk boss, I felt empowered, because I was the one that held the real cards there.

  Taking a few steps towards Leighton, I started shaking my head. When I was just a foot from him, he started backing away a little, and I knew that he was more nervous than I was.

  “Let’s get something straight,” I said. “I know about you. I know what you really like when you leave the walls of this office.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “You know exactly what I’m talking about, so don’t play stupid with me.”

  “I have no idea – ”

  “Denial won’t get you very far,” I said. “I know that your wife doesn’t interest you very much. I know about the true company that you keep.”

  “How could – ” He stopped, realizing that he had just gave himself away. It didn’t really matter though, because I wasn’t bluffing.

  “Let’s just say that I have eyes and ears everywhere,” I said.

  “Are you blackmailing me?”

  How ironic. I had been blackmailed twice, and now I was turning the trick around on someone else. There was a difference between the situation at hand and the two previous ones, but it was still blackmail, nonetheless.

  “No, not in the traditional sense,” I said. “I don’t want anything from you, so I don’t feel bad about this. My only demand is that you leave me the hell alone. Don’t interrogate me, don’t belittle me, and don’t speak to me unless absolutely necessary. And even then, you better be nice to me.”

  “Then do your job,” he stuttered.

  “See, there you go,” I said. “That’s what I’m talking about. I may be a lonely editor here, who just trudges through the slush pile, but my job is still important. You may think what you want, but when it comes to expressing yourself towards me, you had better treat me with respect. I will continue to perform and meet all of my deadlines. You can reprimand me if – and only if – I miss a deadline.”

  “What will you do if I don’t comply with your demand?”

  I shook my head as I stared at the asshole in front of me. “That’s your problem, Leighton. All I’m asking is for you to treat me with respect, but you have trouble with just that small thing. What did I ever do to you?”

  “You ran Jeremy Towers off.”

  “No, he left of his own accord.”

  “No, you went out on a date with him, and then suddenly, he just cancels his contract and runs off. There’s only one explanation for that.”

  “Why do you care about Jeremy Towers so much?” I asked.

  “Because he was supposed to be my bonus. His next book was going to be a hit, and I was going to get a bonus bigger than your annual salary.”

  Ben started laughing. I knew the source of his amusement.

  “So the company is hurting, and you were going to get a large bonus?” I asked. “That could explain why this company is headed for bankruptcy. If Weatherington continues rewarding douche bags like you for doing absolutely nothing, then there’s no hope.”

  “I have an important job here.”

  “No, you have a nice name plate and a little authority. But you have no leadership qualities and nobody respects you because you throw your weight around.”

  “I don’t need leadership advice from you.”

  “No, you just need to stay out of my way,” I said. “The terms are clear and simple. If you so much as give me a dirty look, I will tell your wife what you’ve been up to.”

  “I’ll deny it.”

  “That’s fine, because I have proof.”

  “You couldn’t have proof.”

  “You had a little rendezvous just the other night. I was standing at the window taking pictures.”

  “You don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “Were you with a tanned, blond haired little number?” I asked. I could see in his eyes that he believed me after that. “That’s what I thought. Now run along before I call dear, sweet, unsuspecting Mrs. Leighton.”

  His face contorted into a mask of rage, and he opened his mouth to say something to me, but then he turned and walked off.

  “That was awesome,” Ben said. “Was any of that true?”

  I turned and faced him. “You remember that male client that Derrick entertained the other day? Well, that was Leighton.”

  “Oh crap,” he said.

  “Yeah. I’ve debated telling his wife anyway, but I’m not sure exactly how to do it or if that is the right thing.”

  “Yeah, a woman would want to know if her husband was running around on her with men.”

  “I need to figure that out,” I said. He was right though. It bothered me that a man like Leighton could cheat on his wife, and it bothered me even more that he was being dishonest with her when it came to a fundamental part of who he really was.

  But of course, I could just add that to my ever-growing list of mysteries, to do’s, and general frustrations.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  I ended up leaving work right after lunch and spending the rest of the afternoon working on manuscripts at home. Adam came over right before dinnertime, and for two days, everything was back to normal. Pearl even stayed with us both Monday and Tuesday night. We had a great time.

  But all of that changed Wednesday afternoon. When I saw Ryan’s name on my caller ID, I was ecstatic. I loved hearing from him, and every time we talked, it reminded me of how little we do actually talk.

  “Hey, Ryan,” I said when I answered the phone.

  “Are you at your computer?” he asked. He didn’t even bother saying hello.

  “Um, hi to you too.”

  “Sorry,” he said with a chuckle. “I’ve just discovered something, and I’m a little anxious to tell you about it.”

  “Oh really. About what?”

  “Your dead gigolo.”

  “What?” I almost dropped the phone. “What have you found out?”

  “Okay, now I have to warn you. It may not be anything at all, but there is definitely something odd going on.”

  “Okay, just tell me.”

  “Actually, maybe I better come over. I need to show you on a computer.”

  “Okay, how quick can you get here?”

  “Fifteen minutes.”

  “Hurry.”

  He ended the call. I let out a string of curse words, barely containing myself. I wished he would have just told me what he found out, but the more sensible part of me wished he hadn’t called at all. My life had just calmed down, and Adam and I were working our way back to normal. Did I really need this murder mystery back in my life, upsetting the balance, albeit a precarious one?

  I didn’t have long to contemplate the idea because Ryan arrived quicker than he had estimated. I knew the moment he walked in the door that I would hear him out and see whatever information he had discovered. But I wasn’t prepared for how it would change my perception of everything.

  We sat down at my kitchen table, and he opened my laptop. He accessed that popular social networking site. I had created a profile for the site over a year ago, and had only accessed it twice. Pearl was practically obsessed with it, but I just couldn’t handle the constant updates, most of which I didn’t care anything about.

  I pursed my lips when I saw him click his cursor on the search field and type in the words “Erica Sanchez.” He looked at me, but I had a hard time getting a reading on what his eyes were saying. I detected a little excitement, but also a little somberness.

  “So I put this whole business out of my mind since we talked last,” Ryan explained. “Or so I thought. The more I tried not to think about it, the more I did think about it. So this morning, I was stalking friends online and looking at their most recent vacation pictures, and it occurred to me that I didn’t know anything about all
of these people that were affiliated with the victim.”

  “His name is Hugh.”

  “Huh?” he asked.

  “The ‘victim’ has a name. It makes me feel better to think of him as a person.”

  “Oh, okay. So Hugh. Well, I decided to start looking them all up. I found an article in the paper, so it wasn’t hard to find Hugh’s page on the website. From there, I found the others since they were all linked.”

  “So I’m assuming that you found something on Erica’s page.”

  “Yes,” he said. He pulled up her profile, and then went to the section that contained nothing but photos.

  One folder in particular caught my eye. It was labeled “My Boys.” He double clicked, and I nearly gasped when I saw all of the photos. There had to be hundreds in there. Each one showed Erica, Hugh, Kirk, and various combinations of two.

  “It’s so weird seeing his face again,” I said. “I can’t believe that he’s really dead.”

  “I didn’t think you knew him that well,” Ryan said.

  “Well, I didn’t, but I can’t help but feel responsible for all the guys that work for me,” I said.

  “So I started looking through these pictures, and then I noticed a few strange things.”

  He enlarged the first picture. It was one of Kirk and Erica standing on a balcony somewhere at night. He had his arm around her and they kissed while their bodies faced the camera. They looked so incredibly happy, as if they had no care in the world. I didn’t know the date on the picture, but I knew that the Kirk and Erica in that picture had no idea the heartache that awaited them in the future.

  “Okay, so they’re kissing.”

  “I just wanted to show you that one to prove a point,” Ryan said. “Per their pages, Kirk and Erica are in a relationship.”

  “Yes, they are.”

  “So look at this one,” Ryan said as he enlarged another picture.

  I grimaced, trying to make sense of what I was seeing. Hugh had Erica in his arms, holding her tightly against his chest. At first glance, it appeared nothing more than a friendly picture, but then I noticed that Hugh was pressing Erica up against his body. I assumed that Kirk would have been taking the picture and had to wonder what the man thought of his best friend holding his girlfriend like that.

  “That’s a little strange,” I said finally.

  “You think?” Ryan laughed. “You haven’t even seen the weirdest one.”

  “Oh no,” I said.

  He scrolled down the page a little until he came to another picture. This one was of Hugh and Kirk, but no Erica. I assumed that she was holding the camera. The pair was on the same balcony that all the others had been taken on.

  The picture, just as Ryan had said, was very unusual. Kirk and Hugh faced the camera, yet their bodies were pressed together, and they were holding each other.

  “Maybe they’re just playing around,” I said.

  “There’s three more just like this one,” Ryan said.

  He pulled each one up in turn to show me what he was talking about.

  “Maybe they’re all just really close,” I said. “These pictures don’t prove anything.”

  “They’re not proof,” Ryan nodded. “But it does cast a cloud of doubt on this whole thing.”

  “So what’s your theory?” I asked.

  “I don’t have one,” he said. “I don’t think we or anyone else has all the facts here. Judging from these pictures, there was more to the friendships in this trio.”

  “So what do you think we should do?”

  “Go talk to Kirk and Erica,” Ryan said.

  “We don’t have enough to go on,” I said. “We can’t just show up at their apartment and tell them that we saw some pictures where they were pressing their bodies against Hugh, and now we think you know more about the murder.”

  “There’s one more thing,” Ryan said. He clicked on another folder that pulled up a bunch of status updates. Each one was written by Erica. Sliding the computer mouse, he went down the page to an update that was dated to two days before.

  “She’s pregnant,” I said as I read the update.

  “Yes,” Ryan said.

  “That’s still not enough to go on.”

  “But it’s enough that we can go and talk to them. We have to at least do that, or I won’t be able to sleep.”

  “You realize that Adam is going to find out that I went and talked to them,” I said. “This is going to start up our fight again.”

  “Maybe not.”

  “I’m sure it will,” I said. “Everything has been great, but it’s only because we’re not dealing with this murder business. The minute that it rears its ugly head, I’m sure we’ll be back to not speaking.”

  “So do you not want to go?” he asked.

  “Of course not,” I said. “We’re going. I’m just as curious about this as you are. Probably more.”

  We decided to take my car. I offered Pearl twenty bucks if she’d pick the kids up from school. At first, she said she’d do it for free, but then she didn’t refuse the twenty I set on the desk in front of her. She also didn’t ask me where I was going, but I could tell by the look in her eyes that she knew exactly where I was going.

  Ryan got their address off the internet somehow. He plugged it into my GPS, and soon we were on our way to the little apartment where the stripper couple lived.

  I knew before we arrived there that Adam and I were going to have problems over this. Adam’s anger at me would be the least of it though. If his initial method for handling tension returned, then my anger would dwarf anything he could throw at me.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Luckily, their apartment wasn’t a gated community, so we could pull right up to theirs. I stopped the car and waited a minute before turning it off. I reconsidered whether or not this was a good idea.

  “What’s wrong?” Ryan asked.

  “Are we doing the right thing?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I get this feeling that we’re starting something. I can’t put my finger on it, but we’re headed down a road that I don’t think we’re coming back from.”

  “I’m here with you,” he said.

  “I appreciate that and it does make me feel a little better.”

  I turned the car off and then opened my door. We walked, side by side, up to their apartment. Their unit was located on the third floor and after what felt like a ton of stairs, we arrived at their door.

  Taking a deep breath, I knocked on the door. I glanced nervously at Ryan, who gave me a reassuring half-smile.

  The door opened, and we were greeted by Erica. I smiled and looked her up and down. The first thing that anyone noticed when they saw her was her extremely large breasts. Like always, she wore a small t-shirt in which the fabric over each of her breasts was stretched so thin to make it almost completely sheer. I couldn’t see a baby bump, but then again that might take a little longer in the pregnancy to see since it would have a ways to go to get past her breasts.

  “Hello, Lana,” she said. I tried to gauge her reaction to my arrival at her apartment, but it was difficult to tell. She looked upset, but for some reason I suspected that it had nothing to do with my presence.

  “Hey, Erica,” I said. “This is my brother, Ryan.”

  “Hello,” she said politely. “What can I do for you?”

  “I wanted to talk to you for a moment. Is Kirk here?”

  “Yeah,” she said. “He’s in the bedroom.”

  “We’d like to talk to both of you,” I said. “Do you have a minute?”

  “Sure,” she said.

  Clearly, she was naïve. Who just welcomes another person, someone who was practically a stranger, into their home with little or no explanation? I almost felt bad for taking advantage of her naivety.

  She stepped back and beckoned for us to enter. Once Ryan and I were both inside, she shut the door behind us.

  “You can sit down,” she said motioning towards the co
uch.

  I glanced at Ryan, and he nodded. The two of us sat on adjoining cushions of the couch. Erica poked her head into the bedroom and announced our arrival.

  “What the hell does she want?” I heard from the bedroom.

  “We just want to talk a minute, Kirk,” I said. I couldn’t see him, but I knew he could hear me.

  He walked into the living room wearing only a pair of basketball shorts. He stared at Ryan and me for a moment, surveying us as if trying to ascertain our intentions.

  “What do you want?”

  “We just want to talk,” I said again.

  “About what?”

  “Hugh.”

  “I’ve already talked to the cops.”

  “I understand,” I said. “We’re not investigating you or accusing you.”

  Erica put a hand on her boyfriend’s shoulder in an obvious attempt to calm him down. It seemed to do the trick though because his arms relaxed a little and he bowed his head slightly. She guided Kirk to the chair next to the couch. He plopped down, never taking his eyes away from my brother or me.

  “So what do you want to know?” he asked.

  “This may sound strange, but Ryan and I saw Erica’s profile on a social network site,” I said.

  “So?” Kirk shrugged.

  “What was the exact nature of your relationship with Hugh?”

  “We were friends,” Kirk said. “Everyone knew that.”

  “But the website had photos that painted a different picture,” I said.

  “So what’s your point?” he asked.

  “We just want to know if there was something else there.”

  “How is that any of your business?”

  “Because it might be important,” I said.

  “Why do you care what happened to Hugh?”

  “He worked for me part time.”

  “So?”

  I took a deep breath. “I feel responsible for all the guys that work for me. It’s almost like I’m their mother, and it’s my responsibility to keep them safe. Even though Hugh’s dying wasn’t my fault, I don’t think I can rest easy until I know what happened to him.”