Smoke Screen (A Miranda and Parker Mystery Book 7)

by Linsey Lanier

  But the waiter shook his head. “Always cash. And he was a big tipper.”

  Miranda dismissed the group and marched over to Santiago who’d been standing silently in the corner the whole time watching the proceedings. Under the muted lights the silver satin of his open shirt playing against the gold of his chains and rings.

  “Where’s Yolanda? And Dolly and Bambi?” she demanded.

  The gangster’s hardened face grew harder. He wasn’t pleased with her lack of progress. “They are getting ready for the show. Yolanda said they had already spoken to you.”

  That didn’t mean they didn’t have anything else to contribute. But she knew better than to argue with the drug lord. Instead she turned on her heel and headed out of the room and toward the backstage area.

  She found Dolly, Bambi and the stage manager in Yolanda’s office.

  The room was filled with tulle and satin and glitter and perfume and hair spray. Dolly and Bambi stood back-to-back in the corner on a tiny round platform. Yolanda sat on the platform, pins in her mouth, adjusting the short hems of the matching costumes.

  “You three missed me meeting,” Miranda announced gruffly. She wasn’t in the mood for games.

  Bambi’s big eyes grew round. “There was a meeting?”

  She was playing dumb. Her standard MO, Miranda was staring to realize. She put a hand on her hip. “What’s wrong with you? One of your co-workers is missing and you don’t want to help?”

  Dolly stared up at the ceiling as if Miranda wasn’t here.

  “If there’s some crazy killer out there, one of you could be next.”

  Yolanda took the pins out of her mouth and glared at her. “They know better than to go off with a customer they barely know.”

  “Is that what happened to Nitro, Yolanda? How do you know that? What haven’t you been telling me?” The woman was holding something back. Miranda knew it.

  Yolanda’s dark eyes went hard. She got to her feet and made a shooing gesture toward the door. “Out of here, you two. I want to talk to the detective myself.”

  The girls stared at each other a moment then scampered out without a word of protest.

  When the door was shut, Yolanda shot Miranda a hateful look. “You have a lot of nerve coming in here and scaring them. They are under enough pressure.”

  “What kind of pressure? What kind of things do these girls have to do?”

  “It is not like that.”

  “Isn’t it?”

  Yolanda went around to her desk, sat down and turned to her computer. “I don’t have time to talk to you. I have work to do. The show will be starting soon.”

  Miranda stomped across the little space and slammed her palms down on the desk so hard, the butts in the ashtray jumped. “You’re holding out on me, Yolanda. Tell me what you know.”

  Yolanda stopped typing and focused on her cigarette pack. She reached for one and lit it, no doubt wishing she could blow Miranda away with a puff of smoke.

  “What is it you want, detective?” Sarcasm dripped from her lips.

  “I want to know about the man in booth number three.”

  The woman frowned unconvincingly. “Booth number three? I do not know what you mean.”

  Was she going to play dumb, like Bambi now? “I think you know exactly what I mean.”

  Yolanda took an extra long drag of her cigarette and blew the smoke over Miranda’s shoulder, just missing her face. “Very well. I do know about this man.”

  “Who was he?”

  “A customer. An admirer of Nitro.”

  “His name?”

  She raised a careless shoulder. “Chuck, Bill, Sam. They are all the same.”

  Not in this case. “Yolanda, what the hell was his name?”

  Yolanda’s dark eyes flashed with anger. “I do not know his name. All I know was that I overheard the girls talking about him. For a while he came every night to see Nitro. He was crazy about her.”

  Nothing she hadn’t already heard. “Go on.”

  “The girls thought he had a crush on Nitro. So one night I went out to see for myself. I peeked through the curtain and observed him.”

  “And?”

  She flicked ashes into her tray. “And it was true. He watched her every move. I know that look. He was completely smitten.”

  She’d been right. This guy was her man, but a funny feeling gnawed at the pit of her stomach. “What aren’t you telling me, Yolanda? What the hell did you do?”

  The woman put down her cigarette, turned to her computer again as if she had nothing more to say.

  “What, Yolanda?”

  Her fingers froze on the keyboard. For a long time she just sat there. Then at last, the admission came. “I encouraged Nitro to start up a relationship with this young man.”

  Dear God. “With a stranger? Someone off the street who could have been a complete psycho?” And who probably was.

  “Nitro was a smart girl. She could take care of herself.”

  “Apparently not.”

  Yolanda looked away, her mouth tight. Miranda couldn’t be sure, but it looked like the woman was having a stroke of conscience. She dug in.

  “Did you know Nitro had a boyfriend?”

  Her eyes flashed again, this time with shock. “No, I did not.”

  “Did you know she broke up with him because of this guy?”

  She shook her head. “No. I did not know about her personal life. Except where this man in booth three was concerned.”

  “Who was he?”

  “I do not know.”

  “A relative? Someone you paid?”

  “I do not know. He was a customer. A stranger.” She reached for her cigarette took another drag, her fingers now shaking. “Nitro, she was such a big flirt. So full of herself. She craved attention. More than anyone I’d ever seen.”

  “So? Didn’t that make her good at this so-called job? Didn’t that bring in money?”

  A strange expression came over Yolanda. Anger, bitterness, regret. Miranda couldn’t tell which.

  “Dolly deserved to be the headliner,” she said through gritted teeth. “She was the popular one before Nitro came along.”

  Now it was making sense. “And Dolly is…?”

  Yolanda glared up at Miranda, this time there were tears in her dark eyes. “She is my niece. My sister’s kid by a third marriage. We scrapped and saved to send her to college and then she dropped out.”

  “I thought she graduated from Tech.”

  “That is what we tell people. The truth is she went there for three years and quit. The pressure got to be too much. And she did not believe she could get a job without graduate school. We could not afford it.”

  So that was it. After a crushing end to her dreams of higher education, Yolanda wanted her niece to have the choice spot on the stage. She wasn’t going to let some upstart take it away from her. It was a case of stripper nepotism.

  Yolanda put a hand to her head. “I never meant any harm to come to Nitro. I thought she would fall for the customer. Marry him, get pregnant. I swear to you. I do not know who that customer was. He was just a guy.”

  So she let the dancer go off with some guy and nobody even knew his name. “If the man in booth three’s got Nitro, this is on your head, Yolanda.”

  “Please do not tell Carlos.”

  “Tell me what?”

  Miranda turned to see Santiago standing in the office doorway. On impulse she decided to cover for Yolanda. “Nothing. We were just having a little girl chat.”

  Santiago’s bitter look told her he didn’t believe a word of that, but he had other things on his mind just now.

  He gestured to a young man at his side. “This is Rafael Rodriguez. He has something to tell you.”

  Miranda looked him over. Another youthful staff member dressed in black. He wore sideburns and had his dark hair cut in an attractive fringe over his forehead. His deep brown eyes were intense.

  “What is it, Rafael?”

  He leaned for
ward as he spoke, like a singer pouring his soul into his act. “I do not know who the man you are looking for is, but I know he was here at the club.”

  Miranda’s heart sank. “We’ve pretty much established that.”

  His head went back and forth. “That is not all, Ms. Steele. I remember when he was here.”

  When? That could be helpful. “Last week?”

  He nodded. “Yes. And the week before that. Every night.”

  Okay. She dared to get her hopes up a little. “What about the last Thursday night Hannah worked here?”

  “Yes, then too. They went out to the parking lot several times that night during Nitro’s breaks. Once I saw her get into his car.”

  Just like Dolly had said. The current star of the show must be going through a doozey of a guilt trip. But that still didn’t give Miranda anything she could use to hunt down the dude.

  She thought a moment, then turned to Santiago. “Do you have video of the parking lot?”

  “I do. Not very good quality, I am afraid.”

  No doubt figured he didn’t need it with his bouncers. Plus he wouldn’t want whatever they did with rowdy customers caught on disk. “Maybe we can see the car on it. It’ll take some time to go through it, but if there’s a chance we can get a license plate, we can start tracking this guy.”

  Again Rafael shook his head vehemently. “That will do you no good.”

  “Why?” Miranda barked. She was getting a little tired of being second guessed.

  He raised his palms as if exasperated she didn’t understand him. “Because the man in booth three is no longer in the car.”

  Miranda folded her arms. “How do you know that?”

  Rafael paced over to the corner and back again. Miranda was beginning to think he was one of Santiago’s substance abusers. Through the walls she could hear rocky music pounding. The show was getting started. She didn’t have time for these antics.

  Rafael turned and glared at her, a wild look in his eyes. “Because when I came in to work tonight, I saw it.”

  “Saw what?” She’d had just about enough of the histrionics. One more wacky statement and she was going to tell the boss to toss this guy out.

  That was, until it suddenly hit her what the emotional staff member was trying to say.

  He gazed at her with a watery stare. “The car that belongs to the man in booth three. It is parked two blocks down from the club.”

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  The block Rafael had indicated was a too-long walk down a series of zigzagging back streets lined with ominous looking apartment buildings and parking decks. Several streetlamps had been broken out and in some spots the sidewalk was pitch-black. But with Santiago, the waiter, two bouncers, and her trusty Berretta in tow, Miranda felt safer than in her own bed.

  And considering where she was living now, she probably was.

  Under a row of Chinese elms alongside a shadowy wrought iron gate, they found the car.

  It was a Hyundai, all right. Light gray. Maybe three years old. A dent in the right rear fender.

  “You sure this is the vehicle?” Miranda said to Rafael.

  He nodded. “I am positive. I remember the dent. And the mirror.” He pointed at the window to something shiny on the inside.

  Through the windshield Miranda spotted a rabbit’s foot hanging from the rearview mirror. The guy in booth three must have been superstitious.

  She took out her phone, snapped a photo of the tag, then strolled around and peered through the passenger window at the glove compartment.

  One of the bouncers fisted his oversized hand and began removing his jacket to wrap it. “We can get in there for you, Ms. Steele.”

  She held up a palm. “Not necessary.”

  A break-in would generate too many questions if the police got involved. Instead Miranda reached into her pocket for her picks. After her trip to Marty Jenkins’s house, she’d decided to keep them on her.

  She pulled out one of the thin rods along with a tiny flashlight. As she stepped toward the passenger side lock, instinctively Santiago and the bouncers turned their backs and formed a protective wall around her.

  Must know the drill.

  She bent down, worked at the lock and after another minute or two, popped it open. She was getting better at this, she thought as she used the tail of her jacket to open the door.

  Inside the air was stale and warm from the day’s heat, scented with the smell of citrus air freshener. She scanned the cream colored leather seats with her flashlight. Clean, new looking. No sign of blood that she could see. No signs of a struggle.

  Again she used her jacket to pull down the latch of the glove compartment.

  She reached into the space and pulled out a neat stack of papers. The guy was tidy. She sifted through the stack. Maps, brochures to local sights, a concert ticket, and finally—the motherload.

  Not only the Hyundai’s registration but a genuine Georgia driver’s license.

  Miranda was stunned at her sudden stroke of luck. Why would the guy leave his driver’s license here?

  She stared at the card. At last she had a name.

  Thomas Anthony Drew.

  The picture was bad, as DMV photos tend to be. Dark, curly hair that fell down to his chin line. A dark pencil thin mustache under his nose. That was where the resemblance to Marty Jenkins ended. Even with the grainy shot, she could tell the guy was good-looking, as Crystal had claimed. And this dude was muscular. Big shouldered bodybuilding type, she’d say. Kept himself in shape.

  She scanned the rest of the information. Birth date put him in his early thirties.

  Once more she squinted at the photo. There was something vaguely familiar about it, but she couldn’t put her finger on exactly what it was.

  Keeping the papers she closed up everything, went around to the back, and checked the trunk. Nothing in it but a spare tire and a jack.

  Staring down at the empty compartment her stomach jolted with a queasy, jittery sensation. If Thomas Anthony Drew’s car was here and clean, what had happened to Hannah’s car? Did he take her away in it? If so, she needed to find it. Fast.

  Under her breath she cursed her slow GPS tracker.

  Santiago must have read her mind. He turned around, craned his neck to take a look at the license still in her hand. A rumble came from deep in his chest. It didn’t take much to see Hannah Kaye aka Nitro could be in a world of trouble.

  His eyes glowing darkly Santiago put a finger in her face, “Find my dancer, Miranda Steele,” he demanded.

  Somehow she had to do just that.

  At least she had a better chance of fulfilling Santiago’s command than she’d had before. Hurrying home with the new information, Miranda sat down at her card table and checked the GSP tracker she’d left running on her laptop.

  Seventy-two percent.

  Damn. At this rate, by the time she found Hannah Kaye’s car, she’d be ready for retirement.

  Resisting the urge to write an angry email to the application’s creators, she opened a new window and began searching for more information on Thomas Anthony Drew.

  This time she got speedier results. After only a minute she had several pages of data. She scanned the details on the first screen.

  No rap sheet. No arrests at all. Drew had lived at the same address in a high-rise apartment on Ponce de Leon for the past three years. He worked for Phelps Supply Company in Decatur as a truck driver.

  Really? What was he doing off the road and going to a strip club every night for the past two weeks? Had he lost his job? Maybe he was a local driver.

  She scrolled to the next page. No record of a marriage. No record of a family of any kind. And then…? Nothing. She pressed the down arrow several times, but the rest of the page was blank.

  Maybe this app wasn’t as good as she’d thought.

  She opened another one that she hadn’t used yet. This one was really pricey, so it had better give her something good. She had to get the ID numbers from the ot
her screen. And she had to consult the Help file several times. But after twenty minutes of electronic finagling she found a single account for Thomas Anthony Drew. A small sum in a local bank that hadn’t been touched in three years.

  What the heck? What did he live off of?

  She sat back and rubbed her eyes. Was she seeing things? Before three years ago, it looked like Thomas Anthony Drew…didn’t exist.

  A frosty shiver went through her.

  She recalled sitting in a chair in the manager’s office at a nursing home in Evanston, Illinois a few weeks ago. She and her police detective partner had been searching for the suspect in the Lydia Sutherland case.

  They thought they had found him, but the records of the man in the nursing home had been doctored. It had turned out to be a ninety-one-year-old man.

  She bent down and took off the bracelet she’d clasped around her ankle on the other night. The light caught the dull sheen on the heart-shaped pendant. Miranda stared at the initials.

  A.T. Adam Tannenburg. Lydia Sutherland’s lover.

  Tannenburg, the man she’d been searching for, had transferred his identity to the man in the nursing home and disappeared. Had someone likewise borrowed Thomas Anthony Drew’s identity?

  The idea made the hair on the back of her neck stand up. Feeling suddenly chilly, she rubbed her arms and tried to shake off the sensation.

  At least she had data now. She had a place of employment, and a residence. She’d track them both down in the morning. Whoever Thomas Anthony Drew was, she’d find him.

  She put the bracelet around her wrist, printed out her research, and shutdown her laptop. She gathered up all her papers, put them in her briefcase for the morning and moved into the bedroom. Her hopes started to rise.

  Disregarding the missing information from three years prior, there was nothing in anything she’d found on Thomas Anthony Drew to indicate he was a weirdo. Maybe he had really fallen in love with the explosive Nitro. There was probably a reasonable explanation for the lapse in his records. Probably issues with her applications. And maybe Hannah Kaye had gone off with Drew for a fling, as Crystal had said back at the club. Maybe they had flown to Vegas to get hitched and were on their honeymoon right now. That was what Yolanda had hoped for.