by Julie Kenner
Chapter
34
JENNIFER
“I t was him, wasn’t it? The assassin did this?” I was still sitting on the curb, numb, ignoring the hand that Devlin had offered to help me up.
He stood there for a moment, then he bent down to sit beside me. He didn’t answer, but that was answer enough.
We both were quiet for a while. I don’t know about Devlin, but I was fighting a whole whirlwind of emotions. Euphoria that Brian wasn’t dead. Anger and desolation that Fifi was. And guilt. Lots and lots of guilt.
Most of all, though, I was scared. There was a man in there—dead—by the hand of the same person who had me on a hook. Who had a gun aimed at Devlin’s heart.
And who was still looking for Brian. Or, maybe, had already found him.
No. I couldn’t—wouldn’t—believe that. Brian was safe. And since I was the one who got him in to this, I was the one who was going to get him out.
I started rummaging in my tote bag, found my cell, and began to dial. Once again, Devlin ripped it out of my hands.
I glared at him. “You’re starting to make a habit of that.”
“We need to get another phone.”
“Excuse me?”
“Think, Jennifer.”
Okay, now that just pissed me off. But I thought, and it only took me about two seconds to understand what he meant.
“Oh.”
“Oh is right,” he said. “If the assassin came after Brian, it’s because somehow he found out about your phone call. Found out that Brian helped you with the clue.”
“And how could he have done that unless he’s intercepting my cell calls,” I added, a statement, not a question.
“Exactly.”
“There could be a bug in your apartment,” I suggested.
“Possibly,” he said, easily. “But since we don’t know for sure, we should probably avoid using your cell. Or mine, for that matter. If you call Brian, the assassin’s going to hear. And if he doesn’t already know Brian’s still alive, he will then.”
He was right, of course, but I didn’t want to waste any time. “We need a phone.” I pointed randomly into the crowd that was starting to dissipate now that they knew there wasn’t going to be a raucous arrest or a violent shoot-out. “Ask someone for a phone.”
“And drag someone else into this mess? No way. We find a pay phone.”
He had a point, but I didn’t know where a pay phone was. For that matter, for all the times I’d come to Brian’s place, at the moment, I couldn’t even remember where the closest deli was. I stood up, turning in a circle as I scoped out the neighborhood. “Dammit, this is New York. Why is everything closed?”
“This is a pretty residential street,” Devlin said. “Come on. There’s got to be a twenty-four-hour diner nearby.”
“Yes!” Thank God the mush I call my brain was starting to gel again. “Yes, there’s a little coffee shop around the corner. I’m almost positive it’s an all-nighter.”
“Let’s go.”
The place really was just around the corner, and we were settled in a booth in no time. I pulled my notes about the clue out of my tote and slapped them on the table in front of him. “I never got the chance to tell you what I figured out,” I said, then ran him through my thinking about “Memory” and Cats and the fact that One Thing After Another, The Love Set, and When in Rome were all old shows. “And Candide is a musical, of course,” I added. “But I haven’t put it all together yet.”
I hauled out my laptop again and pushed it to his side of the booth. “Maybe you’ll have better luck.”
While he got the computer going, I rummaged for some change, then headed off to warn Brian. In a perfect world, he’d answer his phone, I’d tell him calmly and firmly to go take a Club Med vacation, he’d do it (and screw the Broadway debut), and I’d return to the table to find that Devlin had solved the clue.
Needless to say, I was not living in a perfect world. I couldn’t get through to Brian, and Devlin’s frustrated expression when I returned suggested that he’d made no progress whatsoever.
“Nothing?” I asked, just in case he was, you know, teasing me. Maybe he’d figured the whole thing out, located the assassin, and took him out of action.
He looked up, but didn’t say anything. Didn’t have to.
“Well, hell,” I said as I slid into the booth.
“How about you? Any luck?”
“No, goddamn it. I left him a message. Told him not to come home, to lay low, and that I’d call him back soon.” I ran my fingers through my hair, then twisted it into a knot that I held in place with the pencil sitting across Devlin’s notes. “We have to get another cell phone. One of those pay-as-you-go things.”
“Stores aren’t open yet,” Devlin said. He leaned across the booth and plucked the pencil from my hair, then tapped the paper with it. “This is our priority right now.”
He had that right.
The truth was, I didn’t even know if Brian was still alive. But if he was—and I hoped to hell he was—the only way he’d stay safe was if we played this game to the end.
A waiter swung by and delivered two sodas and a basket of fries, food I assumed that Devlin had ordered while I’d been on the phone.
I grabbed a fry and munched on it, my thoughts in a scramble. “Memory” leads to Cats leads to…Man of La Mancha? That just didn’t make sense.
I tapped my pencil against the table top, looking at the clue again. “The knight’s production,” it said. Okay, sure. But what does that mean? Did Don Quixote put on plays? He did in the story, but—
That’s it!
“It’s not Man of La Mancha,” I said, practically yelping. “It’s Andrew Lloyd Webber. He’s the knight who put on Cats.”
His grin shot straight down to my toes. “Awesome,” he said. “That’s got to be it.”
I sat back and took a long sip of my soda, feeling almost smug. We’d worked our way through the first part, and now we were on something of a roll. The rest, I thought, would be easy.
Chapter
35
JENNIFER
F amous last words.
Five minutes later we’d gotten nowhere.
“We have to approach this methodically,” I said. “Step by step.”
“Agreed.”
“Right.” I sat up and straightened my shoulders. “So this part here talks about how the answer is on the knight’s production. So it’s on Cats. Backstage, maybe? Or something during the show?”
“I doubt it’s backstage. The show’s not on Broadway anymore, and I doubt we’re supposed to chase touring productions. The clue has to be hidden someplace where we can get to it. Someplace whoever is setting us up can get to as well.”
“So maybe it’s backstage at the original Cats theater.”
“Do you have any idea how tight security is on Broadway since 9/11? Getting backstage would be damn near impossible.”
“I know a ton of people,” I said. “We could call someone. Get a tour.”
He just stared at me.
“Oh. Right. Never mind.” Getting other people involved in my little drama was not a good idea. “Okay, so maybe it is on-stage. Something that happens during the show? A clue made out of one of the songs? The stage direction? Something?”
“I don’t think so,” he said.
“Me neither,” I admitted. For one thing, since the show had closed on Broadway, how could we see the staging? For another, even if it were playing, the curtain would go up at eight, way too late for my personal version of High Noon (or High Ten, anyway). If I had to see the show to save myself, then someone had an even sicker sense of humor than I already thought.
“Let’s keep going,” Devlin said. “The rest of the message is obviously going to flesh out the first part. That’s why it says ‘And will be found by following.’ Right?”
“I guess…”
“By following One Thing After Another,” he said. “That was on Broadway, you sai
d?”
“Right. I found it on the Internet. Short run in the 1930s.”
“Hmmm. Any idea what to do with that tidbit?”
“Nope. Maybe we should focus on Candide. At least that’s a show I know.”
“So who was the patroness of that show?” he asked.
“Ah. Um, well, I don’t know the show that well.” I made a face. “Actually, I don’t even know what a patroness is.”
“Maybe the producer was a woman?” he suggested.
“Maybe.” Since the answer wasn’t going to come to either of us without divine intervention, I reached for the next best thing. Honestly, how did people survive without the Internet?
“Since The Love Set and When in Rome were on Broadway, too, maybe there’s some connection between all the shows.”
“We can check.” The browser was open, and I typed “Candide” in the ibdb search box, deciding to start with it because I knew the show a little. The computer did its whirring thing, and then I was rewarded with two hits, both musical versions of the story. I slid the pad of paper we’d been using over to Devlin.
“Write down all the women,” I said. “Unless you have a better idea where to start.”
“None,” he said, and then he made a quick list:
Lillian Hellman (book)
Dorothy Parker (lyrics)
Genevieve Pitot (music, second version)
“It’s all very clear to me now,” he said, staring at what he’d written.
“At least it’s only three names,” I said.
“But what about them?”
I shook my head. “I don’t know. Cross reference them with the other shows, I guess.”
“Click here first,” he said, tapping the screen. “That should get us more info about the show.”
“Yeah. The theater, run dates, list of songs. Pretty much the whole nine yards.” I clicked, then looked at him as I waited for the page to come up. “What do you expect to find?” I wasn’t challenging him or anything. I just wanted us to be thinking simpatico.
“The songs Parker wrote,” he said.
“Why?”
“Because she wrote short and pithy. So unless you know how to pull secret messages from music, or unless you want to read the entire script, then she’s our best bet.”
“Right,” I said. “Cross your fingers.”
We both did, and then skimmed the web page. Apparently, that version had been staged three times. Feeling decisive, I clicked on the first one. Revivals are nice and all, but always go with the original if you can.
“Well, hell,” Devlin said as the page opened.
I agreed. No list of lyrics. “I could have sworn this database has the lyrics. I guess that’s somewhere else.”
“See if you can find them,” he said, but I was already typing. And as soon as Google came up, I entered: “Dorothy Parker Candide Lyrics.”
The list of hits that came up sounded pretty promising, and I clicked on the first one.
Bingo.
The page focused on one of the revival performances, but I didn’t care because there, at the bottom of the page, was a section called “Lyric Credits.”
“There,” Devlin said, pointing to the screen.
“ ‘The Venice Gavotte,’ ” I read. “Lyrics by Richard Wilbur and Dorothy Parker.” I looked up at Devlin with a frown. “What the hell is a gavotte?”
“No clue. But I’ll take an educated guess that it’s some sort of dance.”
I headed over to Dictionary.com to check out that little theory. Sure enough, a “gavotte” is a French peasant dance. And as soon as I read that, I tossed my arms around Devlin and planted a wet one on his mouth.
“Mmm,” he said. “If we keep making such great progress on this clue, we’re going to end up rolling around naked by the time ten rolls around.”
“So long as we’ve made sure that my pretty little ass is safe,” I countered, “that’s perfectly fine with me.”
Our eyes met and held, and a wonderful burst of lust tingled up my spine. I remembered the way he’d felt against me in the hotel, not to mention the heat I’d seen in his eyes. Wow.
I sighed and made a conscious effort to move two inches away. So not the time. “We have to be good,” I said. “The clue. Solve the clue and then we’ll talk. Or more.” I spoke more cavalierly than I felt, but what else could I do? Blush bright red and hide under the table? Not damn likely.
“Such incentive,” he said. He shot me one more quick grin, then focused on our notes. I exhaled, relieved to be back to the status quo. At least I knew how to act in my freaky PSW scenario. I mean, how hard is hysteria? But I’m never sure of the role I should play when dealing with men. Especially men I’m hot for. (I know the theoretical answer is that I should just act naturally. Trust me. That one never works.)
“So now we know that the thing we’re looking for is at the gathering place of Dorothy Parker,” he said.
“That makes no sense whatsoever.”
“Agreed. Did she ever do a play at the Winter Garden Theater?” he asked, naming the theater where Cats played for years.
I typed a search into Google, then surveyed the hits. “No, but West Side Story opened at the Winter Garden, and both it and Candide were by Leonard Bernstein.”
“I have no idea where that takes us,” Devlin said.
“Me either.”
We stared at each other, then Devlin shook his head slowly. “Just write it down. We just need to keep going. Something else will jump out at us.”
I nodded and made a note. But there was light seeping through the windows now, and ten was barreling down. If something was going to jump out at us, I sure hoped it would do it soon. More, I hoped it was an answer…and not an assassin.
Chapter
36
DEVLIN
J ennifer hunched over the computer, and Devlin felt a pang in his heart. This girl—this flighty woman who’d never faced anything more serious than a run in her pantyhose—was digging in and focusing like a pro.
Even more, as much as she was working to save her own ass, he knew she was also intending to save him, too. Could she? That didn’t really matter much. What got him in the gut was that she wanted to try. She didn’t even know him, but she was damn sure going to try to save him. And he had a feeling she wanted to save more than just his life. This girl wanted to save the man.
Who else in his life could he say that about?
“Okay,” she said, tapping the computer. “I’ve got two screens open. One with the entry for The Love Set and the other with When in Rome.”
His earlier musings vanished, and he leaned in closer. “Anything overlap? Cast? Crew? Opening dates? Theater?”
“Working on that.” She did some more clicking and dragging, then ran her finger slowly down the screen as he followed along.
Nothing.
Nothing.
Nothing.
And then, “Wait!” He stared at the screen, certain that what he was seeing was no coincidence. He leaned over and took over the track pad. “Here,” he said, pointing the arrow to “Morgan” in the One Thing After Another list. “And here.” He manipulated the track pad again, moving the arrow over “Catiline” from When in Rome.
“Kenneth Daigneau,” she said.
“Somehow he’s important.”
“Type his name into the search box,” she said. “What shows has he been in? Candide, maybe?”
Devlin angled the computer toward him so he could type, and in no time at all the search engine spit back a result: The Love Set, When in Rome, and One Thing After Another.
“No Candide,” Devlin said. “But all the others are there.”
“Yeah. So what does that mean?”
He wished he knew. More and more, he wished he could just spit out all the answers and make this woman safe. But all he could do was play the game and hope that in the end that was good enough. “If we read the message literally, the place we’re looking for is a gathering place. Maybe
a restaurant or a hotel or something. And Dorothy Parker went there. So maybe this Kenneth guy went there, too. And that’s the connection between Candide and these other plays.”
“Maybe,” she said, though she didn’t sound convinced. “But what about Cats?”
“No idea,” he confessed. “Hopefully we’ll figure that out.”
“What time is it?”
“Don’t think about it,” he said. But he couldn’t help himself. He looked up at the clock: Approaching six. Damn.
“Right.” She lifted her chin. “I’m not going to think about it. I’m just going to focus.”
“Good girl,” he said as she typed “Dorothy Parker Kenneth Daigneau” into the search box.
“Nothing much,” she said, scanning the hits that came up.
“Try just entering his name,” Devlin said.
“Whoa,” she said as the first hits came up. “This has got to be it. Spamalot!”
“Holy shit,” he said. “You’re right.” Kenneth Daigneau, as about eight million sites announced, had won a contest back in the thirties to name a processed meat product: Spam.
“We eat ham and jam and Spam a lot,” she sang. “The Knights of the Round Table. Arthur, Camelot—”
“And Dorothy Parker,” he said. “The famous writers’ round table at the Algonquin Hotel.”
“That’s got to be it. It’s a perfect fit.” Her brow furrowed, and he knew she was remembering the other piece of the puzzle. “Except for Cats. That doesn’t fit at all.”
“Sure it does. Andrew Lloyd Webber’s a knight, and in Camelot there were the knights of the round table, right?”
“True,” she admitted.
“And there’s more,” he said, feeling just a little smug. “About four years ago, I went to a benefit at the Algonquin. Guess who the guest of honor was.”
“I have no idea,” she said.
“Matilda,” he said. “The house cat who lives in the Algonquin Hotel.”
Chapter
37
JENNIFER
I don’t speak cat, so I had absolutely no clue how a cat was supposed to help us figure this out. Was it a trained cat, who’d respond to my voice, then rush across the lobby, press his paw on a secret button, and open a hidden compartment?