The Perfect Suspect

by Margaret Coel

  The hesitation was so long that Catherine was certain the woman would refuse. Her heart was leaping around now, knocking against her ribs. Finally, the clerk said, “I don’t know if it’s possible. One moment.” She picked up the card and disappeared around a wood paneled wall behind her.

  It was a couple of minutes before she returned. “Mr. Winston suggests you come upstairs,” she said. “Room 814. Elevators on the right.”

  Catherine made her way to the elevators and rode to the eighth floor, not sure of what had happened. It was possible she was on her way to another room where a telephone call had been cut off, except that the call hadn’t been cut off. The caller had hung up.

  The red patterned carpeting grabbed at her heels as she walked down the corridor. She stopped in front of the door with the brass numerals “814” above the peephole, held her breath, and knocked. From the other side came a shuffle of footsteps, then the door swung open. The man in front of her was in his fifties, bald with a maze of tiny blue veins across his nose and cheeks, lips parted in a smile that registered somewhere between anger and acceptance. He had bright, intelligent blue eyes. She could feel the heat of his gaze running over her.

  28

  “So you’re the replacement,” the man said. “Not bad, not bad at all. I like the ethnic look. What are you? Indian? Hispanic. Hell, it doesn’t matter. Bellman bringing up your bags? You’d better come in.” He stepped sideways.

  “Mr. Winston,” she began.

  “Can’t stand around talking in the corridor.” He rolled his shoulders to motion her inside. “Don’t need a bunch of busybodies listening in on my business.”

  “I believe there’s a mistake.” Catherine remained in the doorway. “I’m looking for the woman who called me a short time ago. I was told she had called from this room, but the receptionist must have made a mistake.”

  He was still craning his neck and looking up and down the corridor. “Step inside now,” he said, his tone low and proprietary, as if she were one of his servants. “I’m not a monster. I won’t bite you.”

  Catherine took another moment before she stepped past him into a suite that looked larger than her house. A living room that resembled the lobby, similar overstuffed chairs with decorative fringe, luxuriouslooking sofa, marble tables arranged here and there with bouquets of fresh roses that spilled from crystal vases, a flat-paneled TV against one wall. A wall of windows framed the Daniels and Fisher Tower on the Sixteenth Street Mall. Beyond the double doors on the far wall, she could see the large poster bed, tangled blankets and sheets dropping onto the floor. The door snapped shut behind her. She swallowed hard. Thank God, he didn’t throw the lock.

  “So Kim called you,” he said. “Complaining about what? I was too generous, too many gowns and fancy events for trailer trash like her?”

  Kim. The caller’s name was Kim. “Is she here?” Catherine said, glancing at the double doors and the closed door across from the bed that most likely led to the bathroom.

  “Don’t pretend you don’t know she ran out on me, the ungrateful bitch. You wouldn’t be here if the agency didn’t send in a pinch hitter. Or is that why Kim called you? You and she good buddies? You doing her a big favor? Don’t even think you’re gonna get what I said I’d pay her. I’m cutting way back for the inconvenience. I don’t have time to get to know a new girl. What do you like, what don’t you like? What do you want to order for dinner? Spare me the hassle. Just keep your mouth shut and do your job. I’ll have to look at what you brought, make sure you have the right kind of gown for tonight. Otherwise I suppose we’ll have to go shopping. I told you, I don’t need the hassle. Where the hell’s the bellman with your bags?”

  Catherine stared at the man. The whole scenario was starting to make sense. Kim was a call girl on her way to David Mathews’s house the night he was murdered. No wonder she refused to give her name and didn’t want to get involved. A call girl would be the perfect murder suspect.

  “What? You want to check things out first, look me over, see if I’m the type that beats the crap out of girls like you? That the idea? Get the lay of the land before the bellman brings up your bags? Well, spill it out. You staying or you gonna run? I would appreciate knowing before I lay out any more money. I need a companion for an event at the Hyatt tonight. Front row tickets at the Buell Theater tomorrow night. Afterward, little intimate dinner with business associates. You’ll look beautiful and keep your mouth shut. You’re not in, I want to know now.”

  “Look, there’s been a misunderstanding,” Catherine began. “I’m Catherine McLeod . . .”

  He waved a hand between them. “I don’t give a damn what you call yourself. I’ll call you anything I please. You’re nothing to me, you understand? I don’t need your history or your long, sad stories. I heard enough from Kim to last me a lifetime. This is a flat-out business deal, no more, no less. You in or not?”

  “Did Kim give you her real name?”

  He turned his head and studied her out of the sides of his eyes. “So happened, I liked her real name. Catherine, I have my doubts about. Maybe I’ll call you Kit. Or Kitty. Yeah, Kitty works.”

  “I’m a journalist with the Journal,” Catherine said.

  The man looked as if she had struck him. He flinched. Then he stepped backward, looking at her straight on, reappraising her, pink lips and blue eyes bulging from his pale face. He reached around and grabbed hold of the back of the sofa to steady himself, and for an instant she thought he might collapse. “What’s this all about?” His voice was shaking, croaking. “Some kind of a sting? My business competitors paid off Kim to bring you here?”

  “I’m not here to see you,” Catherine said. “I assure you, I don’t care who you are or what you do. You’re not the story. I came here to talk to Kim. She’s in danger.”

  “Danger! Who the hell’s she been hanging out with? Drug suppliers? What? She owe them money? She’s behind on her payments, so she sold me out to some business rivals? Oh, they’d love to get a story like this in the newspaper. Ruin me in this town. They gave her a wad of cash, she calls you up, and now you’re gonna get the Pulitzer bringing down an oil company CEO. How dare that low-class bitch do this to me.”

  “You can be the CEO of hell, for all I care. I told you, this has nothing to do with you, but if I don’t find Kim, she could end up dead.”

  “Get out.” He pushed himself off the sofa and wove toward the door, like a drunk, Catherine thought, or a man with a concussion.

  “Where did she go? How can I reach her?”

  He opened the door and was nodding her through it. “Get out.” He hissed the words.

  “Do you understand what I’ve told you? She’s running for her life. What’s the name of the agency she works for?”

  “I will grab you by your hair and throw you out.” The color in his face had ripened to bluish red; a pair of veins pumped in his forehead.

  Catherine walked past him into the corridor. The door slammed shut behind her.

  The doorman was holding the cab door for a tall, wiry man in khakis and navy blue tee shirt intent on a conversation with his cell phone. Gradually he seemed to grasp the opened door and move toward it, nodding at the doorman and slipping him a folded bill, not missing a beat of conversation.

  The doorman closed the door, then opened the front passenger door, leaned inside and gave the driver an address. “Afternoon,” he said, turning to Catherine. He had a moonlike face, fleshy and red-hued with jowls that waddled when he spoke, and a thick neck that bulged inside the collar of his white shirt. “May I get you a taxi?”

  Catherine shook her head. “I was supposed to meet someone at the hotel a little while ago,” she said. “I’m afraid she’s already left.” The doorman observed her out of narrowed, suspicious eyes. “Attractive woman.” The doorman’s gaze seemed to soften with a memory, and Catherine hurried on. “Carrying a bag.” She wondered if Kim had taken the time to pack.

  “I believe so.” He nodded, smiling. “She
took a taxi.”

  “Can you tell me where she went?” Catherine saw her mistake by the curtain that dropped over the doorman’s narrowed eyes and the offended look he gave her.

  “Listen,” she said, digging inside her bag for her wallet. “I know this is unusual, and I wouldn’t ask if the girl weren’t in serious trouble. It’s important that I find her. I’m the only one who can help her.” She managed to extract a bill, fold it twice and hold out her hand. The exchange was like magic, she thought. The bill next to her palm one instant, and next to his the next. He slid it inside his shirt pocket.

  “She was going to the Baker neighborhood,” he said, and he gave her an address.

  It was good to be driving the BMW, Kim thought, the engine purring around her. Almost comforting, as if she were safe in the leather seats, the cool air blowing over her arms and legs. Those people were safe—she always thought of the drivers of expensive cars as “those people.” Nothing could touch them, rock their world. The fancy cars—black was the richest color; she had always wanted a fancy black car—were only the first layer of safety, and beyond that stretched layers of fine houses, influential friends, exclusive clubs, champagne and caviar and you name it. Oh, she had watched the friends of wealthy men like Arnold Winston slip in behind the wheels of the fancy cars the valets brought around and drive off like princes to their palaces and safe worlds. She had felt like Cinderella at the ball when she was with Arnold, or Harry or Mark or Luke—the names and faces blurred together. David Mathews, oh, yes, for a little while, he had made her feel like Cinderella.

  She shook away the train of thought, pulled herself upright and tried to focus on the traffic moving down Speer Boulevard. How had she gotten to Speer? She couldn’t remember. She had taken the cab over to Misty’s place, picked up the keys, and backed out of the garage—she remembered that. Somehow she must have threaded her way through the side streets and onto Speer.

  She struggled to grasp hold of the plan forming like mist in her mind. She had to get out of town. A police detective, a murderer, was looking for her. Detectives had ways of finding people, and sooner or later, Beckman would find her. Beckman had already framed Sydney Mathews. It wouldn’t matter what Kim Gregory had to say. Who was she? No one. A high-priced whore with a cocaine habit who probably had delusions. Kim heard the quiet, nervous laughing and realized she was laughing at the idea that whatever she might say could matter.

  But it would matter. The truth of it was like a presence in the passenger seat. Beckman wouldn’t be after her if it wouldn’t matter, and Catherine McLeod wouldn’t be at the hotel looking for her now. She had to make a plan. Yes, that was what she had to do. She had to erase her trail and make it harder for Beckman to follow. She had to give herself enough time to get the metal box under the floorboards in her condo. Twelve, thirteen thousand dollars now, and the few pieces of jewelry she had managed to sneak out of hotel rooms in the linings of her bags. Then she would get out of Denver, drive down to Arizona and look for Mama. She was probably around somewhere. She shoved the idea away. Sooner or later Beckman would locate Mama.

  Later she would decide where to go.

  29

  Kim huddled against the painted blue door, thumb tight on the buzzer. The ringing inside sounded like a bell wrapped in cotton. The small, discreet bronze plaque above the buzzer said Morningtide LLC. There was no sound of footsteps, no sign anyone was here. Just a vacant space like the other vacant spaces in the strip mall, with faded signs for Insurance, Nails, Tarot Readings hanging at odd angles in the dusty windows. She held the buzzer down. Now the muffled ringing noise sounded cracked and worn out. Ericka had to be here; she was always here. Unless she’d gone to lunch, dashed off to soothe some dissatisfied client—God, Arnold had called and complained. She could almost hear him shouting over the phone. Bitch walked off on me! What kind of business are you running? I’ll ruin you! No reputable businessman’s gonna call you again. You’re gonna close up shop and disappear, like that bitch.

  “Who is it?”

  Kim jumped back, as if a fist had reached through the small metal box beside the door and punched her in the stomach. “Kim,” she said. Her voice came back to her, breathless and shaky.

  “Wait!” There was a loud clicking noise and the door opened about six inches. Ericka, in her short-cropped blond hair and nose earring and those wide, blue innocent eyes, peered out at her. “What the hell are you doing here? You’re supposed to be with Winston. What happened? He turn weird or something?”

  “God, Ericka. Let me in!” Kim glanced back at the stretch of vacant asphalt in the parking lot and scattering of cars at the far end where the taco café was still serving lunch. She had wedged the black BMW next to a truck in front of the café. It was almost invisible. Out on the street, traffic streamed past. Beckman could turn into the lot at any moment.

  The door started to move, and Kim threw herself past the blond woman into the outer office with the desk no one ever occupied and the two easy chairs no one ever sat in. Ericka ran the business on computers and telephones in the back office. A couple of times when she had gone out of town to settle some dispute with a client, she’d asked Kim to babysit the office, answer the phone, check e-mails. The storefront office and furnishings and girls Ericka occasionally asked to cover for her were nothing but stage props for the landlord or building inspector or nosy cop who happened to drop by. Therapist, was how Ericka billed herself. Trained and experienced in the hard school of the streets. You couldn’t put anything over on her, she said. Don’t even try. She had seen it all, done it all.

  “Start talking.” Ericka slammed the door. She made no movement toward the back office. This was a matter she could dispose of easily. If Kim had offended one of the best clients, Kim would be gone. A line of girls waited to take her place: Russians and Ukrainians and Lithuanians and girls from a lot of places Kim had never heard of.

  “I need your help,” Kim said.

  “Where’s Winston?”

  “I don’t know. At the hotel or someplace. For godssakes, can we forget him?” Kim clamped the strap of her bag over her shoulder. “You’ve got to do something for me right away.”

  The look on Ericka’s face registered somewhere between alarm and concern. “You’d better come into the office,” she said, crossing the small space toward the door in back. She flung it open, walked over and sat down behind the desk. “Start at the beginning.” She motioned Kim onto the chair a few feet away.

  “There’s no time.” Kim stationed herself in the middle of the office. Behind the desk, a window looked out over an alley littered with debris and, across the alley, the lower floor of a brick building with boards tacked over the windows. A door led to a small bathroom, and inside the bathroom, she knew, a back door opened to the alley. “You have to delete my name from the records,” she said.

  “Have you gone mad? What have you done? Killed somebody?” Ericka half rose out of the chair and gripped the edge of the desk. She leaned forward. “My God, you killed Winston? What? He knocked you around so you killed him?”

  “No. No.” Kim realized she was shouting. She stopped and struggled to regain control. This wasn’t going the way she had hoped. Beckman could burst in while they were having this stupid conversation.

  “You can do it. Just tell the computer to delete my name and all my personal information. No one can know my address or cell number. No one can know how to find me. Please, Ericka. You have to do it right away.”

  “Let’s get something straight. I don’t have to do anything,” Ericka said. “Besides, why would anyone want to find you?”

  Kim felt like she was choking. Her mouth was dry, her tongue flopping against her teeth. “Someone wants me dead,” she managed.

  “What have you done to my business?” Ericka was still half standing, listing sideways, jaw tight with anger.

  “Look,” Kim said. “No one can connect me to David Mathews if you delete my name and contacts.” She thrust a fist at the compu
ter screen. “It’s all in there. You sent me out with him last year.”

  “The guy that was gonna be governor? He was murdered, Kim. What did you have to do with it?”

  “Nothing. I swear to God, nothing. Just get my name out of the computer.”

  “Why would I do that?”

  “Because . . .” Kim struggled with the words bunching in her throat. “I saw the murderer, and she’s looking for me. Please, please,” she said. The walls had started moving in on her, and for an instant, she felt as if she might pass out.

  Ericka jerked herself up straight, picked up a ceramic cup filled with pens and threw it across the room. There was the shattering, clanking noise of broken things that could never be repaired. “I’ve got the picture now,” she said. “HD, bright Technicolor. You’ve been holding out on me, cheating on me. I fixed you up with a big spender like Mathews, and after that you set up your own assignments.” She threw out an opened hand. “Don’t deny it! How many more times did you service Mathews? Let’s see.” She bent down and started tapping on the keyboard. “Two, three times a week—we’ll go with three—for the last year. My goodness, that comes to a very nice figure, which you will pay me, you conniving bitch. You really think I wouldn’t have figured it out eventually? All those dates you were too tired, too busy, too hungover or coked up, you were off to your little rendezvous with Mathews. Is that when you saw whoever killed him? On your way for a private date?”

  “I’ll pay you,” Kim said.

  “You’re damn right. No one cheats me. You were nothing, a common streetwalker hopping in cars on Colfax Avenue. I cleaned you up, brought you into the business, gave you an opportunity to pull yourself out of the gutter. Pretty face, good hair and teeth, a great body and a classy look—I thought you had potential. I should have known better. Once in the gutter, always in the gutter.”