Knock Me Off My Feet (11 page)
"I'm not seeing Russell Ketchum anymore, not for six months. We're seven-and-two. And some kook is threatening
to
kill me."
"So I hear." Drew gestured for his sister to have a seat near him in the library. Audie saw that he'd had the Oriental carpets and heavy draperies removed for the summer, just like Helen used to do. The property seemed well tended. Drew seemed to be staying on top of things, wife or no.
"The Chicago Police have already paid me a call—fine public servants they were, too. One of them seemed to be quite interested in your welfare." Drew brought the crystal tumbler to his lips and inclined his head a bit. "The macho Irish one. Finn."
Audie frowned at him. "Quinn. And I didn't know they'd already come to see you."
"Right after lunch today, actually. We spent quite a bit of quality time together, discussing sibling rivalry, my private financial affairs, my ex-wives, that sort of unpleasantness. Mrs. Splawinski was here, so it was like
Warsaw
old home week for the big Polish guy—they were jabbering in the kitchen while she made him brownies. You sure you won't have a drink?"
Audie felt her eyes glaze over for a moment, then tried to refocus. There he was—her brother, her flesh and blood—in his urban-chic eyeglasses, his Ralph Lauren khakis and Polo shirt and his Sperry topsiders, and she felt so little of anything for him.
Audie didn't hate Drew, but she didn't love him, either. He was just some man she never would have tolerated had he not been her brother, had he not shared a childhood with her and was now the only living relative she had in the world.
She saw that Drew's dark hair was starting to thin, leaving a shiny spot on top of his head. His skin was as tanned as it was every summer, but she saw a touch of gray beneath the brown this year. He was drinking too much, obviously, and he looked much older than thirty-three. He also seemed more arrogant and bored than the last time she'd seen him, if that could be possible.
It occurred to Audie that Drew was starting to resemble Helen around the eyes.
Audie studied him carefully. Did he look dangerous? She nearly laughed at herself for even considering the possibility.
"So how is Mrs. Splawinski?" Audie asked, smiling politely. "Any brownies left?"
Drew chuckled. "Yeah, sure. On the counter. Help yourself."
As Audie made the trip to the kitchen, she thought of the family's energetic cook. She'd stayed on with Drew after Helen moved to Lakeside Pointe, and Audie didn't see her often.
"Is her hip doing better?" Audie was back on the couch, two soft, chewy brownies in her hand.
"Oh,
she's the
Bionic Woman
now, zipping around on all her plastic parts. Fit as a fiddle."
Audie smiled. "So what happened with the detectives, Drew?"
He sighed. "Well, I don't think they're quite ready to cart me off to Stateville, but they wanted to see my computer and printer and get my fingerprints. It was quite the
Starsky and Hutch
kind of experience, let me tell you."
Audie leaned back into the soft cotton slipcover on the sofa, crossed her legs, and munched. She watched his expression closely. "I'm sorry about the police coming here."
"Oh, for God's sake." Drew waved his hand around before he took another sip. "I was happy to oblige. It's truly awful. I can't believe you never said one word about it to me. Are the letters still coming?"
Audie stretched an arm along the back of the couch and wiped a few crumbs off her shirt. She'd inhaled those brownies and tried to remember how many were still left in the kitchen. Maybe she could take some home. "Nothing in the last week."
"Are you taking this seriously? I mean, why in God's name would somebody want to hurt you?"
Audie groaned in frustration. "I have no idea. But it's not going away on its own, so I have to deal with it."
"What exactly do the letters say?" Drew's eyebrows arched over the rim of the tumbler while he waited for her response.
She shrugged. "At first it was just snide insults. Now he says he's going to kill me, and apparently he's got a schedule to keep, because he selected September twenty-second to do me in." She ran a nervous hand through her hair. "You might want to keep that day open in case you have to identify my body—next of kin and all."
"Don't be morbid, Audie. Jesus." Drew abruptly got up from the chair and made himself another drink at the long, polished cherry bar. He suddenly turned.
"That's rather clever, actually," he said, grabbing a handful of ice and tossing it in the tumbler.
"What is?"
"The twenty-second of September is the first day of autumn this year—get it? Autumn? Autumn Adams?"
She stared at him blankly.
"How refreshing—a psychopath with a dry wit." Drew relaxed back into the chair, chuckling, and raised his glass to that.
"That
is
pretty weird." Audie shivered slightly and hugged herself across the chest. "I wonder if I should tell the detectives."
"Why not? It could even be a clue—like in
Murder She Wrote!"
Drew cocked his head and blinked at his sister. "So what brings you up here? Not that I don't enjoy our visits."
Audie braced herself. The family's 1905 Herreshoff Yacht was the only reason she ever came to the house and they both knew it.
Helen was aware that Audie loved the
Take a Hint
with all her heart and had worked with her father day and night to refurbish the vintage boat just before he died. Helen also knew that Audie would have traded the apartment, the car, the column—everything—for the forty-three-foot cutter. Yet Helen had left it to Drew.
Audie often wondered why. She still couldn't decide if it was simply her mother's final cruelty or Helen's roundabout way of ensuring her children would have a reason to speak after she was gone.
Audie looked up, preparing herself for Drew's list of questions. "I'd like to take the boat out sometime next week. Would that be OK with you?"
He looked at her with casual interest. "Overnight? For a few days?
Mackinac Island
or something?"
"Oh, no. Just a day sail. I was thinking of inviting a friend along. Will Saturday be all right?"
"Sure." Drew moved his wrist in a lazy circle, watching the ice cubes swirl around inside the glass. "I'll leave the boathouse unlocked. Be sure to wipe down the deck when you're done. Who's the lucky fellow?"
Audie forced herself to remain relaxed. Drew would see them anyway, since he was nearly always at home. It was either now or later.
"The macho Irish cop. If he'll accept my invitation."
Drew's hand flopped down onto the armrest and thin threads of mixed drink splashed onto the slipcover.
"Dear God, Audie! You've run quite the gamut with men lately. What the hell was wrong with Russell Ketchum? I've always thought he was a decent man and a damn good lawyer."
Audie sighed. "Actually, Russell is a—"
"But Jesus, a cop? This would be your first cop, right? I know it's not your first Irishman. What was that slimy Mick politician's name again?" Drew chuckled softly. "At least it's not another Jamaican."
Audie was already off the sofa and headed for the foyer.
"Oh, come on, Audie. Don't be such a cold bitch. Get a sense of humor."
She spun around and stared at him. He looked like a king on his slip-covered throne, his thinning hair a crown, his gin and tonic his scepter.
Maybe he
was
nasty enough to be sending those letters, after all.
"Do you need money, Drew?" Her voice was soft and polite.
"What?" His entire body stiffened.
"I asked you if you need money. Did what's-her-name wipe you out? Are you having cash-flow problems? Is there something you need to ask me?"
Audie watched the superiority drain from her brother's expression. She observed how his entire body tensed. "You cannot possibly be suggesting that I wrote those letters," he hissed.
She tried to feel nothing, but the anger, sadness, and, yes, fear were boiling to the surface, and she felt herself tremble.
"I think you'd better leave," he said.
She turned into the foyer and headed for the door. Her shaking hand reached for the brass latch.
She heard Drew's voice echo through the huge rooms. "Make it Sunday instead, would you? I'm sailing down to the yacht club for a party Friday and may not get back until late the next day!"
Audie slammed the door behind her, got into her car, and turned south onto
And brothers weirder.
"Oh, hell."
She'd forgotten the brownies.
Chapter 5
S
tanny-O was obviously thrilled that Audie let him behind the wheel of the Porsche that night. Though his knees were nearly in his nostrils, it didn't seem to detract from the driving experience.
"What year is this beauty?" he asked, pulling into the southbound lanes of
"A '96." Audie unwrapped her shin guards and fluffed out her hair. "Helen had the dealer custom-paint it this lovely champagne pink. It's your color, Stan."
"Baby, don't I know it," he said, shifting up and taking the curve a bit too fast.
"Hey, careful. There's always a cop waiting for speeders up here to the right."
He shot her a toothy grin framed in goatee and kicked up the speed.
"You're bad, Detective," she said, laughing. They drove for a few moments in friendly silence. During the past week, Audie had come to enjoy Stanny-O's shy, earthy personality. They frequently argued about Cubs statistics and
Chicago
politics and listened to loud rock and roll on the car radio. They went out to Baccino's for deep-dish pizza one night. And another night they went to a movie, and tonight he escorted her to her game. She felt safe with him.
"Hey, listen, Audie. I'm supposed to tell you that I'll be hanging out with you for the next couple of days at least. Quinn's still got a bunch of other stuff he needs to do."
She narrowed her eyes at him. "What do you mean you're
supposed
to tell me? Did Quinn ask you to say that? He's hiding from me, isn't he?"
"No! No! That's not what I meant. Ah, shit." Stanny-O looked over at her a bit nervously. "Look. He's busy with work, that's all. Our commander told us to make your case a priority, but we had
to
clear up a whole bunch of other cases, that's all. Quinn told me
to
explain that to you and tell you he'd see you soon."
"That's it?"
"That's it."
Audie stuck her hand out into the summer night wind and inhaled the lake air. "Does Quinn hit on women a lot?"
Stanny-O's head spun around. "What? God, no. Not at all." He grinned again. "He don't have to."
Audie laughed. "No, I imagine he doesn't," she said softly. "Has he had a lot of girlfriends?"
Stanny-O adjusted himself in the leather seat. "That's the kind of thing you'll need to ask him about, OK? It's not my place."
"Fair enough."
"But not many. He's picky. The last one lasted about three years. I always assumed they'd get married, but she broke it off with him."
"Really?" Audie tried to hide her smile.
"She ran off to
Miami
with another guy."
"Oh."
They were quiet for a moment, and Audie leaned back against the headrest to watch the endless geometric blocks of light pass by, buildings clustered along the lakefront shoulder to shoulder in the night sky. "He's a good man, isn't he?"
"Quinn?
Yes, he's a good man." Stanny-O looked a
bit
surprised by her question. "And a good cop. Why did you ask that?"
Audie shrugged. "I'm just trying to figure him out, I guess. Is he always so quiet? He just doesn't seem to talk very much when we're together."
Stanny-O chuckled under his breath. "He's mostly quiet, but that's because his brain is working overtime and he's listening real careful and keeping his eyes sharp.
"But I've seen him hammered and he can let it rip then, let me tell you. He gets all sappy and tells stories that don't have no endings as far as I can tell, and he sings those gut-wrenching Irish songs that make my skin crawl.
"And you definitely don't want to let him near his pipes when he's like that. God! The sound of those things makes me want
to
shoot myself in the head even when he's sober. But when he's hammered he can't play worth shit and it sounds like somebody's being tortured."
Audie stared at Stanny-O in confusion and disbelief, laughing. She'd just been handed a huge amount of information that didn't jibe with what she knew of Quinn.
And what the hell are pipes?
"What the hell are pipes?" she asked.
"Bagpipes." He turned toward her. "You don't know about his pipes?"
She laughed again. "Guess not. You going to fill me in?"
Stanny-O smoothed down his mustache and looked up at the streetlights along
"Bagpipes?" Audie shook her head. "Like with a kilt and everything?"
"Oh, yeah. Whenever I give him hell about that, he tells me only real men have the balls to wear a skirt." He winced at his choice of words. "Sorry."
Audie laughed loudly. "Well, what do you know?" She took a few moments to try to imagine the masculine Stacey Quinn in a kilt. She just couldn't do it.
"So what's
Garda
mean?"
"Quinn told me it's the name for the police in
Ireland
or something."
"Oh."
They drove for several minutes in quiet. "Hey, Stanny-O?"
"Mmm?"
"What about the women that Quinn meets in his work? I mean like me—one of his cases. Does he … hook up with, you know, get involved … with women he meets by being a cop?"
Stanny-O was slowing down
to
take the exit to Audie's apartment building, looming huge and bright against the dark lake.
"No. Not that I've ever seen, except maybe you," he said, giving her a shy glance. "You're pretty much the first one I've seen him interested in."
"He gave me a really nice present the other day. Did you know about that?"
Stanny-O smiled broadly. "Yeah. They were his mother's."
"What?" Audie nearly jumped out of her seat. She stared at him. "Are you sure?"
"Yeah, I'm sure."
"Oh, crap," Audie whispered, letting her head fall back against the seat. This was too bizarre, and she didn't know whether to be appalled or flattered—and wasn't that just perfect? Wasn't that the perfect gift from Stacey Quinn, the most exasperating man she'd ever met?
"Has he said anything to you about me?"
"He don't have to." Stanny-O pulled into her parking garage. "It's obvious what he thinks of you."
Audie turned to him in the bright fluorescent light of the underground ramp and huffed with impatience. "And what is that, if I may ask?"
The detective sliced into Audie's assigned parking spot and cut the Porsche's engine. He grinned at her, his small blue eyes glittering. "That's another thing you'll need to ask him yourself."
* * *
Quinn opened the door to Keenan's Pub and immediately sensed the soul of the place: the incense of cigarette smoke and spilled ale, the celestial choir of laughter and jukebox reels, the reverence for something transcendent, larger than life.
"Over here, Stace!"
Quinn's eyes adjusted to the dim light and dark paneling to find the smiling face of his youngest brother, Michael, and then, as the other head turned, the grin of his middle brother, Patrick.
"Good evening, Stacey." The bartender had already drawn his pint of Guinness and placed it on the bar to sit. Quinn knew he'd repeat the process three times before he'd achieved the perfect balance of foam and liquid.
"Matt! Good to see you. How have you been?"
"Grand. Just grand."
And Matt did look grand, Quinn thought to himself—the same little spark plug of a bartender he'd known nearly all his life. He gazed around him—the whole place looked wonderful. Most of the usual Friday night flock was already assembled, and as he moved toward the booth he waved at a few of the patrons, slapped the backs of a few more, and shook hands with the rest.
Quinn reached into the booth and briefly tugged at Pat's shoulders before he joined Michael.
"Is Da coming?" Pat asked.
"What? The two of us aren't good enough for you?" Michael edged over in the booth as Quinn pushed harshly against him as a greeting.
"Move your wide ass," Quinn said.
Then he winked across the table at Pat and settled in with a sigh of pleasure. "Da stayed a little late at practice tonight," Quinn said. "He'll be here eventually."
"So is the band ready for CityPest?" Pat asked. "I hope to God you've got some new sets, because we're getting tired of the same old crap every year. Have pity on your fans, Stacey."
Quinn smiled at Pat, realizing it had been six years since his ordination, but it was still sometimes jarring to see his smart-aleck brother in a priest's collar.
"Sure, Pat. We thought we'd do some gangsta rap this year. Maybe a few calypso tunes."
Pat and Michael snickered for a moment before they launched into their favorite pastime—arguing with each other. Quinn sat back and expected to be entertained.
As he observed, he remembered how there'd been more than a few broken hearts in the neighborhood the day Patrick went into the seminary. It was as if God decided only one child would get the very best from the union of Patricia Stacey and James Quinn—and it had been Patrick.
He had Da's eyes—like Quinn himself—but Pat's were softer, kinder, and shaded in lashes that in a fair world would have gone to a girl. Pat's shock of light brown hair was thick and heavy, but it balanced out the elegant bone structure of his face. He had Da's ability to draw you into a tall tale like a lamb to slaughter. He had his mother's soft heart and curious mind but none of her idiosyncrasies.
Those had all gone to Quinn along with her family name, as he'd heard often enough.
Quinn looked over at his baby brother Michael, now vehemently pressing his case about something or other, and smiled. Michael had gotten Patricia Stacey's quick tongue and quicker temper, as well as her pale blue eyes. Yet all those traits dwelled in a carbon copy of Da's big, open face and husky body and were served up with a depraved sense of humor.
Lucky for all of
Chicago
, Michael had found his niche as a
As Quinn half-listened to his brothers, he thought about where he fit in. He was the oldest, the quiet one, as he'd heard all his life. He was the one with his father's stubbornness, fierce sense of loyalty, and love of music—all wrapped up in his mother's need for order.
How many times had Quinn heard it? "If one of those boys were to be a priest, my money would have been on Stacey!" He never quite knew if that was intended as a compliment.
The Quinn boys were now men, ranging in age from thirty-three to twenty-nine, and as Da always told his pals: "My lads can bust 'em, prosecute 'em, and forgive 'em all in a day's work."
Michael and Pat's argument had deteriorated into a dispute over the name of a short-lived family dog from the late seventies. These two could argue about the color of the sky, Quinn knew.
"The damn dog's name was Caesar," Michael said, looking shocked. "I can't believe you don't remember that."
"Caesar?" Pat laughed.
"Do
you really think our father would have allowed an animal with that fruity name into our house? The dog's name was Jake."
"What are you, nuts?" Michael said, laughing. "If we ever owned a dog named Jake, then my dick is the size of the Space Shuttle…
"
Quinn shook his head and wondered again what it would be like if John had lived, if he could sit here in the booth in the empty space across from him, where he belonged. As he did every day, Quinn wondered what it would be like if he hadn't let his baby brother die, and said a small prayer for everyone concerned.