Downbeat (Biting Love) (13 page)

Nixie didn’t let that stop her. She rammed herself into the molecule of space between his ribs and the broken jamb. He gave with a huff and she scrambled around him. He snorted lightly, as if he found her both cute and exasperating, and followed her.

I kicked in behind them both. “What is it?”

“Another attack,” he said. “More successful.”

At the front of the church was the chancel, a raised stage with a center altar flanked by two ten-foot banners on poles.

One banner was streaked with blood.

I followed the line of blood down with my eyes. Below it, on the steps of the chancel, lay the still, pale form of Dr. Walter Vilyn, our missing concertmaster.

He was on his back, his feet on the top step and his head on the main floor. With his girth straining for the ceiling, he looked like an ocean liner pulled up in dry dock.

Luke sat in the front pew. As I trotted up the side aisle behind Julian and Nixie, I saw a woman sat next to Luke, bent over. His hand rested on the back of her head, pressing it between her knees. I recognized Mrs. Krickente’s teal-tied ponytail. Mrs. Malvenfarbe sat beside her, face very pale against the cheery lilac of her fall coat, blue eyes stark and bruised-looking against her white skin.

Luke looked up as we approached. “I called 911. They should be here shortly.”

“Why aren’t you doing CPR?” I skirted the end of the pew, reviewing my training as I headed for Dr. Vilyn. First step, clear the airway. A red-flowered pink scarf wrapped his neck—it would have to come off.

“Rocky, no.” Julian caught my wrist. “He’s gone.”

I spun on Julian. “How do you know? You just got here.”

“Look at his color. Look at the amount of blood on his chest. He’s already cooling.”

I looked. I shouldn’t have. Even in the dim light I saw how he wasn’t peachy or even gray, but dead white. And his waistcoat was dark red and very wet.

My ears started ringing.

From far away Luke said, “Sit her down.”

“I’ll get it.” Nixie’s hand guided me into the front pew. She settled next to me, her fingers clasping mine.

Events blurred around me. An ambulance came, and a police cruiser, and then more people with cameras and gear bags. All the while Dr. Vilyn lay on the stairs like a broken toy.

Two men in business suits came. While one paced a circuit of the sanctuary, stopping to worry various things with a pen, the other tried to separate us. Julian spoke to him in a dark, echoey voice until the man shrugged and led Mrs. Krickente to the back pew. Julian strolled back too. Five minutes later he returned and tagged Luke. Another five minutes later Luke returned and tagged Mrs. Malvenfarbe. Julian went to talk with the other suited man.

Nixie poked Luke the minute he sat. “So?”

Luke shrugged. It echoed Logan Steel’s graceful, nonchalant gesture but for a mindful overtone; he wasn’t on guard, exactly, but he took nothing for granted. I wondered what had happened in his life that made him so careful. “Nothing yet. Nothing definitive, at any rate. Apparently Vilyn was prone to ulcers, and Mrs. Krickente thinks he suffered from cirrhosis, so the vomited blood may be natural causes.”

“I hear a
but
.”

“But apparently there’s some irregularity with the placement of the body. And they can’t explain the smear on the banner.”

I frowned at Dr. Vilyn laying on the stairs. “They told you that?”

“No, of course not.” Luke followed my gaze and for a moment I saw his ethereal beauty as that of a tortured angel. “I read between the lines.”

Mrs. Malvenfarbe returned, and the two
fraus
left, clinging to each other.

And then it was my turn to be interrogated. My stomach filled with ice as I walked a side aisle that seemed much longer than normal. The detective sat in the second-last pew. I perched tentatively in the small space he’d left open, only to have him slide in, snugging me against the flat side of the pew. My heart kicked up a notch.

“Your name?”

“Rocky Hrbek. Raquel.”

The detective told me his name but in the middle of reciting my address and phone number I realized it had skidded out of my brain as though my neurons were coated in butter, so I asked for a card.

It was the shock of seeing my first dead body outside a coffin, but more—I think even then I knew. Vilyn, a man I’d played alongside for years, had died a violent death. I glanced several times at the detective’s card, curled between my damp palms, during that interview. I still didn’t remember the man’s name.

After I’d told him what I’d seen and heard, he said, “Tell me about Luke Steel.”

“Luke? He’s a friend of a friend. Plays viola.”

“And he just showed up tonight? Don’t you find that odd?”

“He plays viola,” I repeated. When that earned me a blank look I added, “Would you turn away a ninth for baseball? A cash rebate? We always need violas.”

“I see. Well, what about Nixie and Julian Emerson? Why did they happen to join your group tonight?”

Apparently the
fraus
had been gossiping with more than each other. Sure, I’d thought Nixie and Julian’s showing up tonight was suspicious, but they hadn’t hurt Dr. Vilyn. I gave the detective the excuse Nixie had given me, hoping it didn’t sound quite so manufactured (aka lame) coming from my mouth.

“Mmm.” The detective scribbled in his notebook. “Is there anyone who might have wanted the decedent dead?”

“Of course not.”

He stopped scribbling to stare me in the eye. “Are you sure?”

Good grief. The way he lengthened the word and the lift he gave to the last part,
shooo-er
, said he thought I was covering something up. Damn the gossip. One or both of the
fraus
had spilled about Wendy wanting Walter’s position. But soaping Walter’s bow was a long way from shooting him or strangling him, or whatever had happened that he’d come to lay there, broken and bloodstained and pale. I closed my eyes and shuddered. This was horrific. Bad enough Hugo was in the hospital, and then Kevin too…

My eyes snapped open. I jerked my head left-right, an agitated no. “I can’t imagine anyone’s life would be that much better that they would…no, there’s no one.”

“Hmm. Who had access to the sanctuary?”

“Everyone in the orchestra. But no one comes up here.” I suddenly remembered I’d seen Luke head into the stairwell at break, and cringed.

“What?” The detective looked up sharply, pen paused above his notebook.

My breath froze in my chest. My eyes must have been wide as headlights. I deliberately pressed a double whole note’s worth of air out, using the time to relax my face. “Nothing.”

He stared so hard he practically punched a hole through my skull. But one of my friends is a detective and I’d been on the receiving end of a cop glare before, so I managed to wait him out. With a final disgusted growl he flicked eyes back to his notebook. “Tell me about this new conductor. Zadge-ih-seck.”

“Zy-check. He’s…” The burr of wheels on the aisle carpet distracted me.

Technicians steered a gurney past us. Luke, Julian and Nixie followed, Julian’s hand on his wife’s shoulders.

The bag wasn’t fully zipped. I got one good look at Dr. Vilyn’s face. White, bloodless features like a wax model stamped themselves into my memory.

Then the technicians stopped and zipped and wheeled him out.

My stomach heaved. I tried to swallow but my distress stuck in my throat. I buried my face in my hands. “I don’t feel so good.”

“A few more questions. Tell me about this Zy-check fellow—”

“What, exactly, is going on here?” The deep male voice was softly dangerous.

I raised my head. Seared into my retinas was the sight of Dragan striding through the center doors. His firm muscular step was far more forceful than his usual elegant glide. I squeezed my eyes shut against another wave of nausea and blinked out moisture, then wiped the tiny trickles away. I was stupidly glad he was here.

“Can you not see how you’re distressing her?” He came to me and sat at my left, careless of the fact that the detective was already wedged there. Dragan was sitting and the detective was moving or becoming pew
pâté
. Dragan circled my shoulders with an arm that was hot and heavy with muscle, and pressed me to his side. The heat and force of him ate through my shock. I warmed in his embrace.

“Who’s this?” If the detective had glared holes into me, his gaze on Dragan was gunshots.

Dragan turned a contemptuous head and glared back with equal temper. The detective flinched.

I tried to inject a note of civility, and warning. “Detective, this is international conductor, Dragan Zajicek. Dragan, this is the detective investigating Dr. Vilyn’s death.” I blinked. “He’s dead, Dragan. Dr. Vilyn’s dead.”

Dragan turned back to me, instantly solicitous. “It will be all right, Raquel.” He stroked my hair until I relaxed again.

“You’re Zajicek?” The detective clipped the name; he was in full cop-mode now. “I understand you’re conducting here. Just started this week. How’d that happen?”

Dragan looked down his long elegant nose at the detective. “Hugo Banger is a personal friend. Ask him. Now I’m taking Raquel home. She is tired from a long day and has a sensitive nature, and this has distressed her.” He stood. “Come, Raquel.” Directed at me his tone softened, was almost caressing.

“Hey! I’m not done with her,” the detective said.

“Oh, but you are.” Dragan’s words echoed with both anger and vampire compulsion. He helped me to my feet and steered me solicitously out of the pew and through the broken door. We left the church via the front door.

Where we nearly ran into my friend, Elena O’Rourke Strongwell, coming in.

Elena is five-nine of Irish-Latina grit, intelligence and spirit; her long curly hair rivals her in the grit and spirit department. Elena is a police detective, employed by the city of Meiers Corners. She had no jurisdiction here.

She gave me a nod but didn’t stop, disappearing through the door into the church.

On the sidewalk, Dragan turned to me, grasping me by both arms. “What happened in there?”

“It was Walter.” My voice hitched. “Dr. Vilyn. He was laying on the chancel steps…he may have been killed.”

Dragan didn’t say a word; he simply crushed me to him as if he could infuse me with his strength.

I sighed and burrowed into him. Yes, maybe he was light-years beyond me in class and sophistication, but at this moment I needed him and he was here and that was enough.

“Zajicek!” Julian’s shout brought my head up. He was running toward us, carrying his wife, moving so fast he shimmered. He stopped just before he rammed Dragan. “Let Rocky go. She’s under our protection. You’re not doing anything to her.”

“Don’t be ridiculous.” All Dragan’s old-world civility fell away, displaced by his sheer disgust. “I’m not endangering her. Raquel has had a long day and a shock on top of it. I am merely providing support.”

“I don’t believe it,” Julian growled.

“You don’t have to,” Dragan shot back. “Use your eyes. She’s gray and trembling.”

Julian’s violet glare shifted to me. His bared teeth dissolved into a grimace. “You’re right, much as it pains me to admit it. Rocky, come with us. We’ll take you home.”

“I have my car,” I said.

“You’re not driving in your condition.” Dragan didn’t release me. “You have a limousine here, Emerson?”

“Around the corner.” Julian pointed.

“Very well. You will take her and I will accompany you.”

I said, “Don’t I have a say in this?”

“No,” all three of them said at once.

“Remind me why you guys are my friends?” But they
were
my friends so I only grumbled when Dragan slipped my flute bag from my shoulder and slung it over his own.

“I’ll see that your car is returned to your flat.” He wrapped his free arm around me and propelled me into motion. Julian followed with Nixie.

“Thanks. Thanks for getting it last night too. But I don’t need a dozen roses every time.” Last night’s were pink, although after our conversation he’d started getting miniature roses and rosebuds instead of the penis-envy size.

“You’re most welcome.” Dragan didn’t say anything about no more roses. As he guided me surely along the uneven sidewalk he tossed back at Julian, “Who murdered Vilyn?”

“We don’t know he was murdered,” Julian said. “He might have had a stroke and hemorrhaged after. Or a heart attack.”

Nixie added, “Most likely natural causes.”

“Really?” Dragan arched a black brow at her. “With the level of fear I smelled in the air?”

I slanted a look up at him. “Fear has a smell?”

He switched his gaze to me. “More a strong taste. Acrid.”

“You can taste air?”

“I have a rather—extended—sense of smell.”

Silence. I caught Nixie and Julian exchanging a telling look.

I turned front. “Aaaand another call to Iowa is in my future.”

The limo was double parked near the end of the block. As we approached, Mr. Hinz from the Emerson townhouses jumped out of the driver’s side and skimmed around to open the rear passenger door. Dragan nodded to him and packed me inside, sliding in after me. Julian gave Mr. Hinz my address before he climbed in with Nixie, taking the seat facing us. He settled Nixie next to him and fussed with her seat belt.