Dead Man Waltzing

by Ella Barrick

  Faking a composure I didn’t feel, I talked him through a few steps, for the benefit of the watching couple. He moved gracefully, with the balance of an athlete. That didn’t surprise me greatly, because I knew he had played soccer seriously in college and now played with a league in D.C. a couple of times a week. Too aware of the muscled strength in his chest and thighs where they touched mine, I whispered, “There’s supposed to be more space between us.”

  “Where is the fun in that?” His smile was devilish, and his hold tightened.

  Resisting the temptation to melt against him, I ended the “lesson.” The engaged couple applauded when I stepped back and dropped into a curtsy.

  “See? Easy.” I smiled as they let Tav sign them up for a series of lessons. My stomach growled, and I motioned to Tav that I was going to grab something to eat in the concession area. I’ll bring you something, I mouthed.

  Serpentining through the maze of tables, booths, and displays, I made for the concession area and the tantalizing aroma of hamburgers and onion rings. I couldn’t afford to eat either one-Vitaly would kill me if I gained an ounce-but I could bask in the smell without worrying about weight gain. In the row adjacent to the roped-off concession area, with its rickety tables and folding chairs, I spotted a photographer’s booth with a poster-sized photo of a bride and her father sharing a private moment before the ceremony. I stepped closer to examine it, and read the photographer’s sign: SARAH LEWIS PHOTOGRAPHY.

  The name seemed familiar… with a start, I realized she must be Marco Ingelido’s niece, the one Maurice had mentioned. Curious, I studied her as she spoke with a potential customer and what looked to be the bride’s parents. I could see a faint resemblance to Ingelido in the sweep of her cheekbone, the aquiline nose, and something about the eyes. Dressed casually in jeans and a shirt with the sleeves rolled up, her dark hair in a loose braid, she looked like she’d be more at home photographing wildlife in the Galapagos than persuading a wedding party of twenty to all smile at once.

  On impulse, I crossed to her and introduced myself as the bride and family left. “Aren’t you Marco Ingelido’s niece?” I asked. “I was chatting with your uncle just yesterday.”

  “Nice to meet you.” She smiled easily; she was attractive in an athletic, outdoorsy way. “You know, I’ve photographed you before.”

  “You have? When?”

  “I freelance for dance magazines at ballroom competitions. I also do a lot of publicity photos for people in the business, as well as recital photos for dance studios. In fact, I prefer that to this”-she gestured to the bridal fair chaos-“but weddings pay more bills. Let me know if you need photos-you’ve got a new partner, right? I heard your former partner died suddenly. He called me once, wanting to know my rates for doing recital photos. He never got back to me, and I didn’t understand why until I heard about his death. I’m very sorry.”

  “Thanks.” I bit the word off, infuriated to think that Rafe had been going ahead with his plans to broaden the studio’s offerings and put on a recital behind my back. I’d wanted to build Graysin Motion’s reputation as a world-class ballroom dance studio; he’d wanted to rake in the bucks with tap for tots and beginning ballet classes, to become a recital mill like Li’l Twinkletoes. If he hadn’t already been dead, I’d’ve killed him.

  Sarah gave me a funny look. “Sorry,” I apologized. “My mind drifted. Vitaly and I do need some publicity shots-do you have a card?”

  She handed one over. “It seems strange,” she said. “Two prominent ballroom dancers dying so close together, and both murdered, from what I hear.”

  I was pleased she’d brought up Corinne so I wouldn’t have to find a way to work her into the conversation. “It’s sad. The deaths aren’t related, but even so. Your uncle mentioned Corinne yesterday. I guess they used to be close?”

  “So family rumor has it,” Sarah said, her face closing down a bit. “It was before he married Aunt Marian-at least thirty years ago-so I don’t know much about it. I heard him and my mom going at it once, and Corinne’s name came up, but I didn’t pay much attention. One doesn’t think of older relatives that way, does one?”

  My mind flashed to Uncle Nico and conversations I’d heard between my mom and dad about Nico’s womanizing. Ew. One certainly didn’t want to think of one’s relatives that way, especially not the Uncle Nicos. Trying to blot from my mind the image of Uncle Nico with one of his much younger model-type girlfriends, I blurted, “Marco seemed okay with Corinne’s memoir not getting published, now that she’s dead, I mean.”

  “I didn’t know she had a book coming out.” Sarah looked no more than mildly interested. “I’d’ve thought he’d be pushing for it if he was in it. He’s always looking for publicity, especially for Take the Lead with Ingelido. He’s become a workaholic in his old age, my mom says.”

  Her mom must be Ingelido’s sister. Sarah certainly didn’t sound as if she cared about what Corinne might have had to say. Well, why would she? She was single, if her ringless finger was anything to go by, and even though the uncle-niece thing was a bit icky, they were both consenting adults. It looked to me like Ingelido had a lot more to lose if the affair became public than Sarah Lewis did. “So, you never wanted to be a ballroom dancer yourself?” I asked. “Even with a ballroom dance champion in the family?”

  She laughed. “Uncle Marco tried hard to turn me into a dancer, as a matter of fact. But I’ve got the proverbial two left feet. My sister was better than I was, and our brother was better than both of us. Now she’s a stay-at-home mom of four kids who complains she hasn’t been out dancing since her first pregnancy, and Zach married a born-again type who doesn’t approve of dancing, among other things. Poor Uncle Marco.” She shook her head in mock sadness.

  “I’m sure he got over it.” She seemed completely unself-conscious talking about him, not guilty or furtive, like I’d have thought if she’d had an affair with him. Still, many and many an affair started on the dance floor. Stories of pros and students hooking up, or pros with other pros (regardless of marital status), abounded in ballroom circles. “Well, thanks,” I said, pinging her card. “I’ll give you a call.”

  “Nice to meet you, Stacy.” She turned to greet an engaged couple in their fifties, hovering nearby as they waited for us to finish.

  Still thinking about Ingelido’s relationship with his niece, I bought a limp Caesar salad for me, with fat-free dressing and sans croutons, which really made it a heap of Romaine lettuce leaves, and a burger and fries for Tav. I snitched two of the fries on my way back to our table.

  Tav was seated at our table, checking e-mails on his phone. “Thanks,” he said when I handed him the burger.

  Between bites of salad, I told him about talking to Sarah Lewis, then backed up and filled him in on my conversations with Marco Ingelido and Lavinia Fremont. “I was hoping Lavinia could point me toward someone in Corinne’s past who might really have something to lose if the book got published, and she named Greta Monk.” I explained.

  He eyed me thoughtfully. “Avoiding prosecution for a crime would be a strong motive. But is there not a statute of limitations?”

  “I don’t know. I also don’t know how long ago the embezzlement-alleged embezzlement-happened. I can ask Phineas Drake about the statute of limitations. Maurice is supposed to meet with him this afternoon and he wanted me to go with him.” I realized I still hadn’t talked to Detective Lissy about what Angela Rush had said. “Oh, and I need to call Detective Lissy.”

  Since no bridal couples were fighting for the opportunity to sign up for ballroom dancing lessons just then, I whipped out my phone and dialed Detective Lissy’s number. It was still in my cell’s memory from when he’d been trying to pin a murder on me.

  He came on the line with a weary, “Yes, Miss Graysin?”

  I told him about locating Corinne’s literary agent, Angela Rush (although I didn’t mention searching the Blakely house), and suggested that he might want to get a copy of whatever the literary agent
had of Corinne’s book.

  There was a lengthy pause when I stopped talking. “Detective Lissy?”

  “Miss Graysin-”

  I imagined him folding in those too-red lips.

  “I’ve been doing this job for-”

  “Yes, I know, twenty-seven years.” He might have mentioned that two or eight times while investigating Rafe’s murder.

  “-and I assure you that I don’t need your help. In fact, if you wanted to help, you could have refrained from aiding and abetting a suspect.”

  “I let a friend sleep at my place for a night. That’s hardly aiding and abetting,” I said, rising to pace around our tiny display area. I bumped the stand-up of Rafe and me and we teetered. I steadied us. I realized that arguing with Lissy was not going to help Maurice’s case. “Look, Detective Lissy, I know you know how to do your job. It’s just that I’ve talked to a few people-”

  Lissy groaned.

  “-and it seems to me that Corinne Blakely stirred up a lot of old… animosities when she set out to write her memoir. Lots of people, it seems to me, had much better motives for killing Corinne than Maurice did. Why, he doesn’t even have a motive.”

  “That we know of. Yet. Moreover, he had means and opportunity, which are much more important. Now, it seems to me, Miss Graysin, that you should stick to dancing and let me do the investigating.”

  I tried to rush in a question before he could hang up. “What were the means, exactly? I mean, how did she d-”

  He hung up, leaving me staring at the disconnected phone. “Well!”

  Tav gave me a quizzical look. “No success with your favorite police detective?”

  “You’d think he’d be grateful for a little citizen involvement,” I said, flouncing back to my chair. It’s easier to flounce in a satin ball gown than in, say, a pair of jeans. “The police are always asking people to get more involved, to join neighborhood watches and all that.”

  “Ungrateful. That is what they are.” The corners of his mouth dented in, in a way that told me he was holding back a smile.

  “You’re laughing at me!”

  “Never.” He shook his head unconvincingly.

  “I’ve got to help Maurice.” I was prepared to get mad at Tav if he objected.

  “Of course you do,” he agreed. “It is one of the things I most appreciate about you-your loyalty to your friends.”

  “Really?”

  “Really.”

  “Appreciate” didn’t light me up as a verb choice-I’d have preferred “like” or “find attractive”-but I felt a warm glow nonetheless.

  A managing mother-of-the-bride type sailed up just then, hapless daughter in tow, so we turned back to the business of convincing people that ballroom dance could change their lives. Or, at the very least, that it would impress the heck out of their friends and family when they performed a graceful waltz or foxtrot at their wedding reception.

  Chapter 14

  Late afternoon found me trapped in traffic on I-66, trying to drive into Crystal City, where Phineas Drake had his offices, to get to the meeting Maurice had asked me to attend. I’d planned on zipping home to change first, reckoning that traffic going toward the city should flow pretty well on a Friday afternoon, but an accident had snarled things up, and I didn’t have time to go home after leaving Tav to man the fort at the bridal fair.

  As a result, I walked into Drake’s conference room twenty minutes late, traffic-frazzled, wearing the orange gown. I attracted quite a few stares and whispered comments as I crossed the marble-floored lobby and rode the elevator to the twenty-sixth floor. When the elevator door opened on the offices of Drake and Stoudemire, the hum of conversation, phones ringing, and keyboards clicking, muffled by plush carpeting, told me plenty of lawyers were still at work at past six on a Friday. Drake’s well-trained receptionist didn’t blink an eye at my attire, merely leading me to the small conference room with a wall of glass looking over the Potomac and into D.C. I didn’t feel quite so out of place when Drake rose to greet me and I saw he was wearing a tuxedo, complete with tartan bow tie and cummerbund.

  “I see you got the memo about formal wear for this meeting,” he greeted me, smiling behind his mustache and bushy brown beard streaked with silver. He looked more like a modern-day fur trapper or logger than a lawyer. He had a barrel chest and a rounded stomach, and his hand completely swallowed mine when we shook. “I don’t suppose you’re going to the bar association gala this evening?”

  I laughed. “No, just coming from a bridal fair.”

  Drake’s brows soared. “Should I wish you happy?”

  “Heavens, no. Graysin Motion bought space at the convention to entice brides and grooms to learn to dance before their big day.”

  “I don’t know why we didn’t think of doing that sooner,” Maurice said. He was on the far side of the table, back to the windows, and wore his usual navy blazer and crisp shirt. He gave me a welcoming smile, although he looked tenser than usual.

  “Tav has some good promotional ideas. Where’s your daughter?” I asked Phineas Drake as we sat. My orange skirt billowed around me and I smoothed it down. “I thought she was handling Maurice’s case.”

  “We’ll be working on it together,” Drake said. “She’s flying to Bermuda as we speak, a working flight with one of our corporate clients. Now.” His tone turned businesslike. “I’ve counseled Maurice that it’s not in his best interest to have you here. I recommend against it.”

  I must have looked hurt, because he continued. “You’re not subject to privilege. You can be compelled to testify.”

  “Since I don’t plan to admit to killing Rinny, it’s not going to be a problem,” Maurice said. “I want Stacy here.”

  “Very well.” Drake opened a folder that lay on the gleaming wood table in front of him. “Before you arrived, Stacy, I was telling Maurice that I got a copy of the autopsy report this afternoon. It seems Ms. Blakely died from a myocardial infarction.” He paused.

  “A heart attack?” I looked from Drake to Maurice, confused. “Then why…?”

  Drake looked pleased, as if I’d come up with the response he was looking for. “Not so fast. The MI was caused by an overdose of epinephrine, apparently ingested in a capsule that was supposed to contain Ms. Blakely’s heart medication. Epinephrine raises blood pressure and increases heart rate, which triggered the heart attack.”

  “Rinny took a pill soon after I arrived at the restaurant,” Maurice said, leaning forward with his forearms on the table. “She had a minor heart attack four years ago and has been on medication since. She dropped the bottle and it rolled under the table. I crawled under there to get it for her.”

  “An excellent way to account for your fingerprints on the pill bottle,” Drake said, nodding approvingly. “We’ll find someone on the restaurant staff who remembers seeing you retrieve the bottle.” He made a note.

  Maurice continued, as if he were thinking aloud. “If the epinephrine was in the capsule, it proves I couldn’t have killed her. I never left the table after I arrived; I didn’t have the opportunity to doctor the capsules.” Relief softened the tightness in his jaw.

  “Not so fast,” Drake said, raising a cautionary finger. “You were at Ms. Blakely’s house last Thursday, you said. Did you have access to the medicine cabinet at that time?”

  Maurice’s silence answered for him.

  “On top of that, the police have a record of you buying an epinephrine-based product at the Walgreens nearest your house two weeks ago. Not enough to start your own meth lab, which is, of course, why you can’t buy those meds now without signing for them, but certainly enough to send Ms. Blakely’s ticker into overdrive.” His look invited Maurice to explain.

  “I had a cold! I bought some decongestants.”

  “He did have a cold,” I said, remembering a sniffling Maurice. I’d sent him home from one class so he could rest.

  “The police are testing all the capsules in Mrs. Blakely’s bottle,” Drake continued, “to se
e if any others were tampered with. I guess that will tell us how quickly someone wanted her dead.”

  “It sounds like a pretty iffy way of killing someone,” I said. “What if she didn’t take the doctored pill? What if she noticed that someone had tampered with it?”

  “Perhaps the killer didn’t have a specific time line,” Drake suggested. “He or she could afford to wait until Ms. Blakely ingested the poisoned pill. And who looks at their pills before they take them? I take a handful each morning-blood pressure, cholesterol-and I certainly don’t examine them. I spill ’em out and pop ’em in.” He mimed dumping pills in his hand and tossing them in his mouth. “At any rate, our job’s to prove that Maurice here didn’t do it, and the killer’s made that an easier task for us.”

  “How so?” asked Maurice.

  “Anyone with access to Ms. Blakely’s house during the time period since she last refilled her prescription-hopefully a month or so ago-could conceivably have put the epinephrine in the capsule. The DA will have a much harder time of hanging this on you,” he said with grim satisfaction, “with such a large window of opportunity for, I imagine, a healthy number of folks.”

  “What about Turner?” I asked. “Her grandson. He lives at her house now, and he’s going to inherit everything, right?”

  “Oh, believe me,” Drake said, eyes narrowing, “I’ve got an investigator prying into every corner of young Mr. Blakely’s finances and lifestyle as we speak. And into the housekeeper’s. She had unparalleled access to the prescription bottle.”

  “Mrs. Laughlin wouldn’t do anything to hurt Rinny,” Maurice said. “They’ve been together for nearly fifty years.”

  “The same could be said of many married couples until the wife snaps one day and puts a bullet into hubby dearest, or he loses it and has at her with a poker. In my experience, living with someone for a long time makes you less tolerant of their… foibles, shall we say?… than more tolerant. You can leave the toilet seat up only so long before it’s wood-chipper time.”