by Elaine Viets
“This case is cold,” Phil said. “The records—if there are any—could be lost or missing.”
Gus pulled out a checkbook. “Your landlady said you were the best. Margery is one smart lady. Here’s two thousand dollars. There’s more where that came from.”
Gus signed a contract and the paperwork giving Coronado Investigations permission to act as his agent.
“We’ll need the names of your brother’s friends,” Phil said.
“I’ve already made a list and included Mark’s Social Security number, the hospital and the funeral home. Here’s an old video of Mark’s thirtieth birthday party at a Lauderdale bar called Granddaddy’s. You can see my sister, Mark, me, Mark’s friends and Ahmet. All the major characters.”
“Digging into family history is dangerous,” Phil said. “Are you sure you want this investigation?”
“I need to know,” Gus said.
On the drive back home, Helen was the first to break the silence. “Are you worried we won’t find Mark’s killer?”
“The job is impossible,” Phil said. “And if we succeed, Gus may be sorry. Remember Marcie, my first case?”
“The girl who died,” Helen said.
“Her parents wanted to know the truth. I had to tell them their baby had become a coke whore. I watched them die in front of me.”
“Maybe Mark’s story won’t end like that,” Helen said. “Let’s get the facts first.”
Helen and Phil watched the old VCR tape that night. Helen snuggled next to her husband on the black leather couch in Phil’s living room. She had Gus’s list of names on a clipboard.
The homemade tape started with a burst of sound and static. Then the video camera righted itself and panned the room.
The walls were painted dark blue and hung with glowing beer signs. Granddaddy’s Bar, Helen thought. A neighborhood bar with chrome stools and a long, polished lane of dark wood. The bottles on the lighted back bar were a skyline of liquor, a promise of good times. A neon palm tree proclaimed it was a Florida bar.
“We are definitely in the mid-eighties,” Helen said. “I see the styles I coveted as a teenager: headbands, frizzy hair, purple-red lipstick, blush like racing stripes. I wore blush like that, and my mother made me wash it off.”
“For once, I agree with your mother,” Phil said. “You don’t need makeup. Your skin is naturally beautiful.” He kissed her cheek, then her ear. His kisses traced the long line of her neck down to her open shirt collar.
“We should be working,” Helen said and sighed.
“We’re newlyweds.” Phil put the tape on pause. “I like making love to married women. This will help me forget my troubles.” He took her in his arms, and Helen’s clipboard slid to the floor.
A half hour later Helen and Phil went back to the tape of Mark’s birthday party. They were still captivated by the outrageous eighties fashions.
“Look at the brass earrings on that woman,” Phil said. “They’re like something in National Geographic.”
“How about the rhinestone chandeliers on the brunette?” Helen asked.
Most of the women were twentysomething. They showed off their lean bodies with crop tops, ripped jeans, leggings and tiny flared “ra-ra” skirts.
“What does that blonde have on her legs?” he asked. “They look like leg sweaters.”
“Those are leg warmers,” Helen said. “After Flashdance we all dressed like we’d just come from a dance studio. Check out the guys’ hair—more mullets than a fish shop. Half the men are wearing Members Only jackets.”
“I had one. I liked it,” Phil said with a touch of defiance.
“You were young,” she said. “You didn’t know better.”
The camera panned the glowing jukebox. Kool & The Gang sang “Celebration” at full volume. Phil turned the sound down a notch. Men waved beer bottles and danced with women drinking wine coolers or pale peach drinks.
“What’s in the highball glasses?” Helen asked.
“I think the women may be drinking Sex on the Beach,” Phil said.
“I snuck one at a graduation party,” Helen said. “Sex on the Beach was peach schnapps, vodka and some things I can’t remember. I never forgot the hangover, though. I spent the next morning worshiping the porcelain goddess.”
The music switched to “Every Breath You Take.” The Police promised “I’ll be watching you” when a woman with red-gold hair cruised past the beer-swilling mullets.
She was arresting, even in the grainy video. Her hair glowed like a bonfire. She had snow-maiden skin, a black leather jacket with shoulder pads, wicked leather pants and a bra the same fiery color as her hair.
Every man in the room swiveled to stare at her.
“Damn. Gus wasn’t kidding,” Phil said. “That has to be Bernie. She is breathtaking.”
“The guy with her isn’t bad, either,” Helen said. “I bet that’s Ahmet, the drug dealer. He looks like a young Omar Sharif. Lovely olive skin, eyes like twin pools of chocolate.”
“Corn as high as an elephant’s eye,” Phil teased.
“I’m just saying the man is eye candy,” Helen said. “No wonder Bernie fell for him. They make a striking couple. Both know how to dress. She looks like a rock star. He’s wearing Armani with a black T-shirt.”
“How do you know the designer when you can’t see the label?” Phil asked.
“Years of working retail,” Helen said.
A doll-like dark-haired woman walked carefully through a back door, carrying a birthday cake with candles. She held the cake out to keep the icing away from her sparkling cobalt blue top.
“Sequins and shoulder pads,” Helen said. “Wouldn’t be the eighties without them.”
The shoulder-padded woman set the cake down and lit the candles.
The camera panned to Bernie. She was wrapped around Ahmet, kissing him. The partygoers chanted, “Go! Go! Go!”
Someone turned down the music, and another mullethead yelled, “Hey, Danny, put that videocam on a stand and come here. We’ve gotta sing ‘Happy Birthday’ to old Mark. Where is the birthday boy and his brother? Mark? Gus? We need you.”
A broad-chested young man crowned with red-gold hair entered, his arm around a thin, fashionably frizzy-haired blonde. He had the dazed smile of a man in love.
“Is that Gus?” Helen couldn’t hide her shock.
“Hi!” The red-gold prince waved to the partygoers. “You all know my Jeannie. Mark will be in, soon as he parks his car.”
“You’re looking at Gus with fifty less pounds and a lot more hair,” Phil said.
“You don’t have to sound so happy.” Helen felt sad that Gus’s good looks were gone.
The cheers grew louder.
Helen and Phil stared at the man striding on-screen. “That has to be Mark,” Helen said. “He looks like a young god.”
The crowd parted for Mark. He towered over everyone. Helen couldn’t tear her eyes away. Mark’s face was sculpted perfection. The man was a Viking warrior in a pink Italian sport coat and artfully wrinkled white linen pants.
He should be holding a sword, Helen thought.
“Mark is wearing Ray-Ban sunglasses at night,” Phil said. “The man was a player.”
“That’s all you can say?” Helen asked. “He’s the most beautiful man I’ve ever seen.”
“Hey!” Phil said.
“You don’t even notice Gus next to him,” Helen said, “and Gus was no slouch. It’s hard to believe someone as vibrant as Mark is dead. No wonder Gus still grieves for him.”
Someone handed Mark a frosted mug of beer. He shouted at the camera: “Hey, Danny Boy, get your ass over here, so I can blow out these candles.” Mark’s grin took the sting out of his command.
“You can’t talk to me like that in my own bar,” a reedy voice called back. Danny Boy’s speech was slightly slurred. A small rodent with slicked-down black hair appeared next to Mark. Danny Boy barely came to Mark’s shoulder, even in his red cowboy boots.
&nb
sp; “I’d wear sunglasses, too, if I had to stand next to Danny Boy’s Hawaiian shirt,” Phil said.
Helen studied Gus’s list on her clipboard. “He’s the bar owner. Gus says he’s Mark’s best friend.”
Danny Boy swayed in his cowboy boots and poked a finger at Mark’s massive chest. “Hurry up and blow out your candles, before the fire inspector shuts me down. Damn. Thirty candles. You’re old, man.”
Danny led the crowd in an off-key version of “Happy Birthday.”
Mark, smiling, golden, glowing, blew out his candles and bowed. His friends shouted, “Speech! Speech!”
Mark held the beer mug aloft in a toast. “May you live forever, and may I never die.”
Then Mark blew out the candles on his last birthday cake. The screen went dark.
CHAPTER 5
“Jack the Dripper, I’m gonna break your face. I want you out of this gym! Out!”
Debbi’s shriek made Helen drop the notebook she’d been studying behind the desk at Fantastic Fitness.
Yesterday, the young bodybuilder had battled for the TV remote. This morning Debbi was boiling over with fresh rage. Her eyes bulged with fury. Her face was as hard as her muscles. “Carla, dammit, do something!”
“What did he do this time?” Carla asked. Helen was grateful the receptionist stepped up to handle this complaint.
“What he always does,” Debbi said. “Jack won’t wipe down the weight bench. It’s disgusting, the way he sweats. Look at my hand. It’s wet with his sweat.” The furious bodybuilder flicked the drops at Carla.
“Hey!” Carla said. She ducked, but not fast enough.
Jack the Dripper ambled over to the desk. He was pale as a cooked noodle and about as muscular.
“What’s she complaining about now?” he asked. “You’re supposed to sweat at a gym. Real men sweat.”
“Real men wipe down the bench when they finish,” Carla said. “That’s why we have sanitary wipes here. Unless you’re too weak to lift one.” She stared pointedly at his concave chest.
“Hey, I’m a member here,” Jack said.
“We can change that,” Carla said. “You have ten seconds to wipe down that bench, or I’ll revoke your membership.”
Jack reluctantly returned to the weight bench and gave it a halfhearted swipe.
“Thank you,” Debbi said. “It’s about time.” She forced a smile, but it looked like it hurt. That set of muscles was underused. Then she adjusted the weight bench and began a ferocious set of power sled chest flies.
“Good thing those weights are made of metal and rubber,” Helen said. “Debbi is slamming them hard.”
“I just hope the weights are the only things she hurts,” Carla said. “That woman scares me.”
“She does have a temper,” Helen said.
“She’s out of control,” Carla said. “Debbi is going to kill someone. I wish Derek would talk to her about her anger. As the manager, he might be able to get her to listen.”
“She seems to be taking it out on the free weights now,” Helen said. “It’s only six thirty-five in the morning and we’ve already had our first crisis.”
“You ain’t seen nothing yet,” Carla said.
Fantastic Fitness quickly settled back into its regular routine. Men ran nowhere fast on treadmills. Women pumped iron. Helen heard the tock! of racquetballs hitting the walls. The workout music pounded. She hoped this distracting medley would shake her sadness. Watching Mark’s final birthday video last night had left her feeling depressed.
So far, Helen had checked in three guests under Carla’s watchful eye. One of them was her client’s husband. Her face didn’t even twitch when Bryan Minars said his name. No wonder Shelby was upset that she wasn’t having sex with her man, Helen thought. Bryan looked rock hard, but his physique hadn’t crossed the line from Gibraltar to grotesque.
He had other endearing qualities: His dark wavy hair formed a question-mark curl over his eyebrow. His trainer, Jan, was putting Bryan through his paces with the barbells. Jan was a fortysomething brunette. She had muscles but still looked softly pretty.
“Come on,” Jan said to Bryan. “You can do it. One more dead lift and then you can do thirty minutes on the treadmill.” The trainer made it sound like that half-hour run would be relaxing.
Carla caught Helen staring at Bryan. “He’s easy on the eyes, isn’t he?”
“Definitely,” Helen said. “Does Bryan have a girlfriend?”
“He doesn’t act like it. No woman’s dropped twenties on me to find out if he’s at the gym. His wife works out here, too.”
Rats, Helen thought. I knew it wouldn’t be that easy.
Suddenly, the tocking, clanking and humming seemed to stop. The gym doors whooshed open to reveal a goddess wearing two wellplaced scraps of spandex. The goddess wafted through the front door. Her hair was blond silk. Her breasts were twin cantaloupe halves. Her bottom was two honeydew globes.
“That’s Paula,” Carla said. “Watch Paula’s suckers.”
Paula paraded down the aisle of treadmills, each whirring machine topped by a sweating man. As Paula passed the men, they automatically sucked in their guts and kept running. Even Shelby’s husband pulled in his six-pack of muscle. Helen wondered if Paula was the reason Bryan was killing himself at the gym.
“See how the dudes sucked in their guts when she walked by?” Carla said. “Watch what happens next.”
Paula ignored the men. She made a left at the end of the treadmill aisle and turned into the hall to the women’s locker room. Once she was out of sight, the guts flopped back into place. Fat, red-faced men gave small, relieved sighs. The well-built ones like Bryan relaxed a bit.
“I hope she has the same hypnotic effect on the judges at the upcoming East Coast Physique Championships,” Carla said. “Paula is training for the bikini competition.”
“She doesn’t have muscles like Debbi,” Helen said.
“She doesn’t need them,” Carla said. “Not with that body. The bikini contestants look like regular people.”
Who stepped out of a centerfold, Helen thought.
A trim fiftysomething woman with pretty gray hair waved to Carla and Helen as she headed out the door with a full gym bag.
“Did you check in Evie this morning?” Carla asked.
“Nope, just three guys.”
“Hm,” Carla said. “I didn’t check her in, either. Must be something wrong with her card. Remind me to check it when she comes back. She usually works out in the morning and again before closing. Are you okay?”
“Sure. Why wouldn’t I be?”
“Usually after a new receptionist encounters Debbi in one of her rages, she quits.”
“I’ve seen worse,” Helen said. “I like it here. Might even work out on my break.”
“That’s coming up,” Carla said. “You’ll get fifteen minutes. If you’re new to exercising, try riding the bike on a low setting. And don’t be late. When you return, you have to fill in at the Xtreme Shop.”
Helen pedaled the stationary bike for four minutes and felt good, even invigorated. She decided to step up her workout and punched the buttons to the highest setting. Pedaling at that level was harder, but not that hard.
I’m in better shape than I thought, she congratulated herself. She was surprised when the timer dinged and she had to return to the reception desk.
Carla was waiting for her. “Hurry! Kristi is going on break. You have to watch the Xtreme Shop for her.”
“What do I do?” Helen said.
“Ring up the members’ purchases on the cash register. Everyone puts them on their gym account, so you just run their membership cards through the machine. Be careful around Kristi. She’s in training for a bodybuilding competition. She and Tansi are Debbi’s mentors.”
“Do you have to have a name like a Playboy centerfold to be a female bodybuilder?” Helen asked.
Carla pushed Helen into the Xtreme Shop, a cubicle stocked with protein powders and bodybuilding supplement
s. “Promotes skin-tearing muscle pumps!” screamed a drum of “muscle amplifier.” A fat bottle declared it was a “pre-contest physique repartitioning compound.”
Sexual metaphors abounded: “explosive strength,” “increases powerhouse pumps,” “extreme stimulation.”
I’ve spent too much time on my honeymoon, Helen decided. I need to get my mind out of bed.
“Extreme” was definitely the word for Kristi. She showed off her muscles in yellow spandex. The grotesque development looked like a set of clothes. Kristi had a shelf of muscle on her shoulders. The sides of her chest were like an insect’s carapace. She was so deformed by her shoulder and upper-arm development, she walked slightly hunched.
A grumpy Kristi glowered at Helen. “You’re late,” she said. “I’ll be back in sixteen minutes.”
“Nothing wrong with that girl a good meal wouldn’t fix,” Carla said as Kristi scuttled to the free weights.
“Wow,” Helen said. “Kristi has some serious muscle.”
“Serious is right,” Carla said. “She and Tansi are going out for the Women’s Muscle title in the upcoming East Coast Physique Championships. They’re training Debbi for the Women’s Novice Muscle title. They think she’s a shoo-in.”
“Do they get paid for mentoring her?”
“No. They get the glory if their protégé wins,” Carla said. “If they rack up enough winners, they can call themselves ‘trainers to the pros’ and make big money. I wish Debbi’s two mentors didn’t start her on steroids.”
“Aren’t those illegal?” Helen said.
“We don’t allow steroids at our gym,” Carla said. “But some of our bodybuilders inject. You can tell who uses them. Take a look at Kristi’s back and you’ll see the telltale acne.
“And talk about ’roid rage. Kristi saw me eating a burger and nearly bit my head off. She said I was deliberately trying to make her lose the competition. I was just eating lunch.”
“Can’t she eat, too? I thought workouts made you hungry.”
“They do,” Carla said. “But right before a competition, some serious builders go into starvation mode to show every muscle fiber. They live on two ounces of chicken.”