The Naked Detective

by Laurence Shames

  "Mickey Veale?" She said it like she'd bit into something rotten.

  For the moment I was on a roll. I worked it. "I don't know. Is that his name?"

  Instead of answering, she brought her glass up to her lips. She didn't drink from it, though, just slithered her tongue along the rim a couple seconds. Finally she said, "Pete. I ask you a question and all you do is ask a question back. Are you always such a tease?"

  Candidly I said, "I don't get to be a tease that often so I try to make the most of it."

  She pulled her glass in close to her and touched its frosty base to her chest. "This back and forth, this sparring—you find it sexy?"

  I didn't know how to answer that, so I didn't try.

  "I do," she went on. "The restraint. The squirming . . . But I still want an answer to my question."

  "But then the foreplay would be over," I pointed out.

  "And the real thing could begin," she purred.

  My throat slammed shut and I drank some scotch to scour it open. I glanced at my hostess's chest. I thought dirty then tried to think practical. I remembered Kenny Lukens' matchbook and took a guess. "Okay. Let's say the business was water sports."

  Bad guess. Or rather, a good guess but a bad answer. Lydia didn't like it at all. Her shoulders tightened, her lips flicked back from her teeth, and she said, "So you are with Mickey Veale!"

  Confused now, I moved to deny it. I didn't deny it fast enough, and Lydia Ortega threw her drink at me.

  She didn't throw it at my face. She threw it at my crotch. Iced vodka stung my thighs; I couldn't tell if it was the cold or the alcohol that gave rise to a vivid but not pleasant tingling in my privates. Squirming, slapping ice cubes off my lap, I finally managed to say quite clearly that I didn't even know who Mickey Veale was.

  This gave rise to an uneasy silence. Then Lydia laughed. It was not a pretty laugh and I wouldn't swear that it was sane. It was the hard laugh of a mean child, half proud of, half embarrassed by her bad behavior. She cackled for a moment, then bit it off quite suddenly. "My mistake," she said, without remorse. "So tell me, Pete: Just who the hell are you, and what the hell is going on?"

  With a lapful of booze it wasn't easy to maintain either the bantering tone or my composure, but some vague and maybe perverse instinct told me not to tip my hand just yet. "Ah," I said, "I've made you curious."

  "Yes," she admitted. "But now you're starting to piss me off, and that isn't a good thing to do."

  This did not sound coy. There was conviction in it. However tardily, it dawned on me that there was no percentage in playing cute with someone dangerous. Since I didn't know what else to say, I said, "Then I guess I'd better go." I took a last swig of my giant whiskey, then put my glass on the coffee table and started standing up.

  I didn't get very far. She shouldered me across the thighs and knocked me backward, then threw herself on top of me and gave me one hard, assaultive kiss, for which I wasn't ready. My lips were locked against my teeth, pinned down as helplessly as a losing wrestler's shoulders, and I could neither kiss back nor escape. Her breasts squeezed down against my shirt; her loins briefly wriggled in my soaking lap. Then she pushed up with a wicked shove against my arms, and suddenly was standing over me.

  Her blouse was twisted, her chest heaved, and there was fury in her eyes. In a voice that whistled slightly through bared teeth, she said, "You don't toy with Lydia. Lydia toys with you." Her hand shot forth in an imperious gesture that pointed toward the door. "Now go."

  People being animals, I was no longer so sure, after that bizarre and violent kiss, that I wanted to. But the decision had been made. I was being banished. For the best, no doubt, but something nagged at me, something that I couldn't figure out. Through the whole interview with Lefty's daughter; I thought I'd handled myself pretty well. Kept my wits about me, got some information. So was it only my wet, cold shorts that made me feel sheepish and defeated at the end?

  Like a woozy fighter; I got up slowly from the couch. I didn't say good night and my hostess didn't move to walk me to the door.

  But as I was crossing from the living room to the foyer, she called my name. I stopped and turned to face her. Her hands were on her high Cuban hips. In an age-old combination that everybody knows spells doom and that guys always fall for anyway, her eyes had softened, wide and dreamy, but her lips were curled into a snarling dare. "Come back some time," she said. "When you're feeling less like a tease and more like a man."

  13

  We've all had evenings when it's 8:30 but feels like 1:00 a.m.

  This has to do not with fatigue but with bewilderment, sometimes helped along by a titanic cocktail in place of dinner. At such junctures, it seems that time has hiccuped, that the world is a formerly familiar room in which the furniture's been moved; as with a jazz record started in the middle, you're tantalized but can't quite find the tune. This is how I felt as I dragged my damp ass out the front door of 2000 Atlantic.

  What the hell had gone on in there? Lydia had probed me, aroused me, jumped my bones, and ended the performance with a credible attempt to crush my masculinity. Along the way, I'd learned— what? That she was a nympho, maybe, but a tough cookie for sure, and the heir to Lefty's little empire. And that there was a guy named Mickey Veale, presumably involved in water sports, who she didn't like at all.

  Fine, but where did it get me? It got me back onto my bicycle, in underpants by Stoli. Underpants that would not dry quickly in the humid air. At least the evening was warmer than the refrigerated condo.

  I rode. Gingerly, I addressed the question of where I was riding to. The sane course, as always, was retreat. Home to a bathrobe and some music, some simple food and bed. I knew that but I didn't go there. Feeling utterly peculiar, smudged beyond my own outlines, I found myself pedaling toward Redmond's Boatyard. I needed to see Maggie.

  But wait—needed to? Why? I barely knew her. And the idea of needing someone was as scary as any of the things I'd fretted about that day. Still, that's how the thought broke over me: I needed to see her. You can't undo a thought; once I'd thought it I was stuck with it.

  So I headed from the ocean to the Gulf. It's a short ride; it reminds you how tiny Key West is, how comfortingly insignificant. Except this evening I was having a tough time feeling comforted. The notion was scratching at me that there are things that matter even in places that don't.

  I got to the street-side gate of Redmond's and saw that the police barricades were already down; so much for a detailed investigation into the death of a Latvian. I cruised right in. Residents were strolling here and there among the cradled vessels, or listening to music, or sitting on cut-off oil drums and drinking beer. Except for the yellow crime-scene tape around Dream Chaser, there was no evidence of recent violence, nearby tragedy. If a pall remained, it was of a kind that festered underneath the surface and didn't so readily show itself, the kind that went with a forever damaged sense of safety.

  I rolled up to Maggie's trawler and, not without difficulty, climbed off my bike. The stars were out; the brighter ones were nested in little puffs of mist that looked like dandelions. I cleared my throat and called her name.

  A long moment passed and then she finally appeared on deck. Her boat had a steep shear and high gunwales, and I had to crane my neck way back to see her; it was a little bit like crooning up to someone on a balcony—had that same absurdity and romance. I said hello.

  She was wearing another of her T-shirt dresses, all smoothness and ease and unrestricted flow. Her curves were framed in stars. She seemed surprised to see me and didn't answer right away.

  I asked her to invite me in.

  She pointed toward the stern, then unfurled a rope ladder that clattered against the transom as it fell. I started climbing up. Rope ladders are unstable in the best of times, and this was hardly that. I swung; I wobbled; I felt a little seasick as I swung a leg into the cockpit. Maggie watched me climbing in, and the first thing she said was "Your pants are wet."

  This w
as embarrassing. I wanted to explain it away as fast as possible. I said, "Lefty's daughter."

  "Lefty's daughter?"

  "She got 'em wet. Can we sit down awhile?"

  The yoga teacher stared at me a second, then turned toward the companionway and led me down a short and narrow flight of stairs into the main cabin, which was cozy as a puzzle. Furniture was painted peach and aqua, and everything fit into something else. The galley counter was hinged into a table; the back of the settee became a bookcase. There was about the place the serenity that goes with lack of waste. The lighting was soft and yellow; there was a restful background noise of water lapping gently at caulked planks. . . . Then I remembered that the trawler was on land.

  "Am I crazy or do I hear waves?"

  "It's a tape," said Maggie. "Soothing, isn't it?" Then she added, "You have lipstick on your teeth."

  On my teeth? Shit. I'd heard of lipstick on the collar. But the teeth?

  "Want some tea?" she asked, lifting a cutting board to reveal a miniature stove top.

  I nodded then sat and took a moment to reflect on what a fiasco I was making of this visit. I don't think I seemed drunk, but I couldn't have appeared too sane or sober either. Not with wet pants and red teeth. Now that I was sitting still, I thought I detected a trace of Lydia's perfume on me too. How could I redeem this mess? Drop to my knees, confess to Maggie that although another woman had gotten me sexed up, it was her I really wanted? If you thought about it, that was quite a compliment. But even I understood that certain compliments were better left unsaid.

  Maggie brought the tea. It was herb tea and it smelled like strawberries. She took hers and sat down smoothly on the companionway stairs. "So," she picked up, "you spoke with Lefty's daughter. Seems to've been a successful interview."

  I sipped. It burned my lips but I hoped that it would sear away the lipstick. "I learned a couple things."

  "I'll bet you did."

  She was probably only ribbing me, but there was something in her tone and in the set of her jaw that allowed me to imagine that maybe, just possibly she was jealous. The idea thrilled me but I didn't have the nerve to test it. I stuck to the detective stuff. "Seems she's running Lefty's businesses now."

  "Ah."

  For a moment I was stumped as to how to continue. Ocean sounds came through hidden speakers and I had a faint and false sensation of the trawler rocking. Then, suddenly, I knew the real reason I'd needed to come here and what I had to say. I was still casting about for a tactful way to bring it up, when I heard myself blurt out, "Look, since yesterday I've had this shitty feeling that you know more than you're telling me."

  Maggie rearranged her legs; her foot bumped against a stair. In anyone else this would have seemed a negligible fidget, barely noticeable, but it was such a violation of the yoga teacher's bodily precision that I found it painful to behold. She looked down at the floor, then up at me again. "You're right."

  I blew out some air and leaned forward with my elbows on my knees. "So tell me."

  "I'm not sure that I can. Kenny made me promise not to tell anyone."

  "Kenny's dead."

  "Still, it was a promise." Her calm gray eyes narrowed just a bit; her voice caught and I thought maybe she would start to cry. "A promise to a friend."

  Weirdly, my throat closed down in turn. Not in honor of Kenny Lukens or even in sympathy with Maggie's affection for him. No, what put secret tears behind my eyes was something more selfish and helpless and embarrassing to admit. Hurt feelings, pure and simple. "A friend," I echoed. "Very loyal. Very nice. He was a friend. So what am I? Unpaid help? Someone you use to—"

  She cut me off, but very quietly. Her lips seemed infinitely careful as they formed the words, "I don't know what you are, Pete. Or what I want you to be. I've been trying for days to figure it out. Can't you see that?"

  Some detective. I hadn't seen it, and my lack of seeing now shut my mouth and pinned me where I sat. I stared at Maggie. The light was soft and she was very tan but still I thought I saw her flush. I imagined the warmth climbing up her neck and throbbing at the tender place behind her ears. We were maybe six feet from each other, and I think there was a moment when I might have wafted up from the settee and taken her in my arms and we might have become lovers then and there. But the moment passed before I quite believed in it.

  When Maggie spoke again, it was in a tone that was trying real hard to be businesslike. "What I haven't told you," she said, "is that someone found Kenny on Green Turtle Cay. Someone, maybe, from that water sports place."

  I sat still and waited for more.

  "Small world down here," she said. "Guys get rock fever. They get tired of drinking in Key West, they jump in a skiff and go drinking in the Bahamas. Same life, different island for a while."

  "And one of these guys," I said, "just happened to show up at the bar where Kenny was working?"

  "Seems that way. Maybe it was just bad luck. More likely he'd been looking for him. Who knows? But it was someone who'd been a regular at Lefty's. He recognized Kenny before Kenny saw him and could bolt."

  "They talked?"

  "The guy talked at Kenny. He was very drunk. He kept going back and forth between making threats and trying to cut a deal."

  "A deal?"

  "He told Kenny that Lefty still wanted to have him killed. But he had no loyalty to Lefty. He hated Lefty. He just wanted what was in the pouch. For himself. Said he'd pay ten thousand dollars for it. Said that was way more than it was worth to Kenny anyway."

  "And Kenny said?"

  "Kenny said nothing. Kenny wouldn't even admit that he was Kenny. He claimed he didn't know what the guy was talking about. Claimed he'd never been in Key West in his life." She shook her head and gave a sad, small laugh. "You know Kenny."

  "No," I pointed out, "I don't know Kenny."

  "A terrible liar," she said. "But he kept on trying."

  "So this guy—"

  "Got drunker. Scrawled the Key West number on a matchbook and told Kenny to call and just leave his name when he wanted an easy ten grand. But then he got more threatening, like he'd decided he better take care of Kenny then and there. Kenny was terrified. Went to fetch ice and just kept going. Out the back door, to his dinghy. Sailed off to a different island and never went back."

  "But kept the phone number," I said. "Did he ever call this guy?"

  "I don't know. He never said."

  "Ever mention his name?"

  "I don't think he knew it."

  "Physical description?"

  Maggie shook her head. "Big and drunk is all he said."

  I sipped some lukewarm tea and realized that I had a headache. It was too soon for a hangover, so I concluded it was just plain overload. Scotch, foreplay, wet underwear ... Two dead guys, a presumptive nympho whom I did not crave, a demure yoga teacher whom I did. And now clues. It was a lot for one evening. "How long ago was this?" I soldiered on. Maggie thought a moment. "Three months or so. It was January."

  I rubbed my temples. "Ten grand would have gone a long way toward fixing up his boat."

  "If he believed he'd really get it," Maggie said. "The whole thing could've been a setup. Lure him with the money, kill him anyway."

  I thought back to my one meeting with Kenny Lukens. He was jumpy, all right. Thought he was being followed. Offered me way too good a deal to fetch a pail and shovel and dig the pouches up for him. Or get strangled in his place. "So he passed the setup on to me."

  Maggie bit her lip and looked away. "I knew you'd think that. That's partly why I didn't want to tell you. Or even admit to myself that maybe that's what Kenny did. I mean, he lied, he stole— but I don't think he would've knowingly put someone else in danger."

  I thought that over, and managed not to take it personally. On paper, at least, I was a private eye. And that's what private eyes did, right? Stood as surrogates for people getting clobbered, threw themselves in front of the onrushing trains of other people's screw-ups and calamities. Defended and avenged . . .
Me? It would have been unseemly to start simpering about it, but Jesus, what a crappy line of work.

  Not without dread, I said, "Is there anything else you'd like to tell me?"

  She shook her head and took a breath that didn't come in quite as smoothly as her others. In a soft voice that would have melted tundra, she said, "You still mad at me?"

  I didn't answer right away. I couldn't. Not that I had to think very hard about the question. Rather, I had to choke back a reply that was exorbitant, sophomoric, absurd, and dangerous. I had to stop myself from staring into her serene gray eyes and saying that not only was I not angry with her, but that I longed to be her hero. "I'm not mad," I said at last.

  I badly wanted to make love to her then, and understood I couldn't. With my preposterous damp shorts and the residue of Lydia still clinging to me, it would have been a desecration. I sighed, and said that I should go.

  Maggie didn't beg me to stay. But when I'd risen and was moving, sideways and reluctantly, toward the stairs that were the only exit, she floated up and kissed me quickly on the cheek. I didn't see it coming and I still don't know exactly how she closed the distance between us so smoothly and so silently, and with such precision that nothing touched except her lips brushing light and cool against my face.

  I felt their outline as I climbed up to the cockpit then down the rope ladder in the warm and slightly misty night.

  14

  I've said it before, I'll say it again: I should have gone home. I intended to go home. I was already on my bike and pointing it toward home.

  So why didn't I go home?

  Near as I can guess, it was some crazy mix of chivalry, testosterone, and simple curiosity. I was wired from lack of food, and sex thwarted by compunction. I wanted Maggie to be proud of me, impressed with my involvement; I wanted to have some accomplishment or at least adventure to lay at her feet.