Lust, Loathing and a Little Lip Gloss (18 page)

But when it came to Enrico, Venus was an easier fit. I bet people called her a bitch all the time. Hell, it was probably her high school nickname. I’d have to check with Scott to see if she had opportunity. I would ask him on the phone if possible; I didn’t want to do anything to compromise the trust Anatoly had invested in me.

Still, the problem was that, as far as I knew, the only people who had reason to see Enrico
and
Oscar dead were Al, Lorna and Zach. That was assuming that Al and Lorna knew the truth about what happened to their daughter. If not, that just left Zach. And if Enrico suspected, as I did, that Zach was gay, he might have thought that calling him a bitch was appropriate. It wasn’t, but one couldn’t expect a child-rapist to be sensitive about such issues.

I put my pen between my lips and wiggled it around like a cigar. I was getting ahead of myself. Venus and Kane might very well have fabulous motives for killing Enrico. I just had to figure out what they were, which was why Marcus and I were going to play detective at Kane’s today. We would find something; we always did.

As if on cue, the doorbell rang. I dropped my project and went to greet Marcus at the door. He had on his Armani waterproof leather trench that he had to wear every time it rained in order to justify the price. That, coupled with his perfect self-confident grin, could have qualified him for the cover of
GQ.

He stepped inside and dropped his umbrella in the corner. “Your psychic guru has arrived. As your spiritual leader, I demand that you supply me with a room full of DiCaprio look-alikes. It is God’s will.”

“Really? Because right now I think God may be telling me to smack you upside the head. He says that’s what you get for attributing your hedonistic little fantasies to His will.”

Marcus shook his head in mock sympathy. “Honey, I hate to be the one to break this to you, but those voices in your head? They’re not God. Now go get your bag. I didn’t come to chitchat.”

“My, aren’t we bossy,” I teased as I went to the living room to get my handbag.

Marcus took a few steps in and nodded his approval. “All right, I get it. This place is worth sitting through a few Ouija-board games.”

“Are you kidding?” I asked drily. “I’d stab one of Venus’s voodoo dolls of
myself
and sacrifice a chicken for this place.”

“Thank you so much for the dark imagery. Now, shall we?” He opened the door and bowed slightly in mock deference. I put on my most regal expression and walked out into the wet cold. We had an adventure to get to.

15

They say that those who live in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones. But if the person you’re targeting is in the
same
house, and you have good aim, you might be able to get away with it.

—
The Lighter Side of Death

“HERE’S OUR STORY,” I SAID AS WE SPED TOWARD KANE’S PACIFIC HEIGHTS
home in Marcus’s red Miata. “I’m going to tell him that I’m on the verge of being able to spiritually commune with his parents and that you, being my psychic and all, have advised that I touch something that used to belong to the deceased. You believe that would help me make contact.”

Marcus looked away from the road long enough to give me a derisive look. “Didn’t your
house
belong to the deceased?” he asked. “Why can’t you touch that?”

“I don’t know,” I snapped. “Maybe I have to touch something smaller. Something intimate that they could actually put in their pocket and keep on their person.”

“There are so many juvenile things I could say to that.”

“Then it’s a good thing you’re not juvenile.” I lowered the passenger-side window for some air. “I don’t know what Kane will come up with, but whatever it is let’s hope he has to look for it. Then
I’ll
get to look around while
he’s
looking around.”

“And if he happens to know just the thing you need and hands it over in a New York minute?” Marcus asked. “What then?”

“Then you have to go to the bathroom and while you’re supposed to be in there you’ll
really
be snooping. Pictures of Kane with his parents would be good. Like, if you can find a picture of Kane with his mom holding a fast-food milkshake in front of a carousel, I can say that his mom contacted me and that she loved taking him to amusement parks, but regrets all the time she fed him trans fat.”

“Yes, that’s just the kind of message someone comes back from the dead to relay.”

“I’m pretty sure that people don’t come back from the dead, period. But if I’m going to pretend that they do, then I’ll have them say whatever the hell I want them to say. It’s my story. That’s sort of why I didn’t call ahead. I don’t want him preparing for our visit. The only person who gets to prepare for this is me…I mean us,” I added sheepishly.

“Fabulous,” Marcus said as we turned onto Kane’s block. “I can tell this visit is going to be a huge success. Better than
Cats.
”

I smacked him lightly on the leg. “Oh, shut up and park. This is the address. Be sure that when you’re playing the role of psychic you don’t overdo it. You can be eccentric, but not to the point of being unbelievable.”

“And if he’s not home? How long are we going to wait?”

“Well,” I hedged, “do you remember that time you broke into Anatoly’s place for me? That was kinda fun, wasn’t it?”

Marcus did a quick double take. “You want to break in,” he said flatly. “To Kane’s Pacific Heights mansion. Because obviously, someone as trusting as Kane would never invest in an alarm system.”

“I didn’t say we should pick the locks or anything. I just meant that if, I don’t know, a window’s open or—”

“Right, you don’t want to break in. You just want to climb in an open window when nobody’s looking.”

“Marcus—”

“No. No, no, no, no, and…what was it that I was going to say? Oh, yeah,
NO!
I will be your psychic guru in front of Kane, but we’re
not
going to be doing anything more stupid than that. My ass is way too cute to be messed with by Bubba the Bi-curious Cellmate.”

“Fine,” I snapped. “We’ll play it safe.”

“Thank you.”

We both got out of the car and, hunching under one umbrella, rushed up the front steps. Out of the corner of my eye I could see that there were trees on either side of Kane’s yard. Not evergreens like those of his neighbors, Kane’s trees were bare with gnarled branches twisted up toward the sky like props from a spooky movie.

And then there was the double door that served as the main entrance to his home. It was practically a throwback to the time of King Arthur’s court! He even had a coat of arms carved into each side! Marcus toyed with his keys and offered a bemused smile. “And you were worried about
me
overdoing it.”

I laughed and smacked him again, this time on the arm. It was a harder smack than I had intended and Marcus dropped his keys. It was just as he was bending down to pick them up that the front door opened. A tall Latino man wearing a grungy T-shirt and dirty jeans looked down at him.

“I dropped my keys,” Marcus explained, jingling them in front of him as evidence.

The man at the door immediately brightened. “So you’re Mr. Crammer!” he exclaimed. “I was beginning to think I was going to be doing this entire job without ever meeting you. Not that Gemma isn’t great. I told her as much before she headed out of here a few minutes ago. She’s very polite and very precise when giving your instructions. That’s important. But still, I always like to talk to the real owner of the place I’m working on when I can.”

Marcus opened up his mouth to protest, but I beat him to the punch by thrusting my hand toward the man in front of us. “Hi,” I said quickly. “I’m Kane’s friend Venus. Good to meet you…um,” I looked to Marcus as if I expected him to know the man’s name. As I had hoped the man didn’t give Marcus a chance to fumble.

“Manny,” he said, taking my hand in a firm shake. “I just finished redoing Mr. Crammer’s cabinetry in the kitchen. Would you like to do a final walk-through with me?” he asked, directing the last question to Marcus.

Marcus gritted his teeth. “Fine,” he said irritably, although I knew he was really talking to me, not Manny. “We’ll do a walk-through.”

Manny beamed and led us inside.

I had expected Kane’s home to be in keeping with his barren trees and ostentatious door, but it was nothing of the sort. The soaring ceilings and mahogany furniture were kept from appearing overly grandiose by the moderate clutter in each room. A man’s coat was draped over the sofa in the spacious living room and a large glass mug with a spent tea bag had been abandoned on the coffee table. In the formal dining room, the table was covered with mail sorted in several different piles. The whole place was livable. Or at least it would have been if it wasn’t for the strong smell of varnish coming from the kitchen Manny quickly led us into.

“Your assistant told me how sensitive you are about the smell,” Manny said to Marcus apologetically. “Of course I did the cabinets at my shop so what you’re smelling is the island that I just refinished to match.” He gestured to the island in the center of the room whose granite top paled in comparison to the gleaming wood that held it up. “It’ll be a little better by the night, or are you still planning to stay in a hotel this evening to avoid it?”

“Haven’t decided,” Marcus said absently. He walked up to the cabinets and examined the workmanship. “Good God, these are fabulous!”

And they were. No coat of arms this time. This woodwork was more subtle and infinitely more beautiful. He had carved some rather abstract flourishes to border each hinged door and while it was clear that the work had been done by hand, it also appeared to be perfectly symmetrical. However, the thing that held my attention was the empty dog bowl in the corner. It was one thing to fool a contractor who had never met Kane, but it was unlikely that we would be able to convince a dog. But I didn’t hear a dog, so perhaps Kane had taken him with him.

“So you honestly like them?” Manny asked, clearly fishing for compliments.

“Does Oprah like books?” Marcus turned to him and smiled. “You’re an artist.”

“Thank you, Mr. Crammer!” Manny beamed. “Looks like my work here is done.” He shook my hand one more time before turning to Marcus. “If you ever want more woodwork or cabinetry done I hope you’ll consider my services again.”

“How could anyone not consider hiring you?” Marcus said, cleverly sidestepping the pitfall of making a promise as Mr. Crammer.

“Great! Then I better get going, I have another job scheduled.”

“I’ll walk you out,” I offered.

As we retraced our steps to the front door I kept my eye out for a dog, but didn’t see anything. Manny leaned over conspiratorially. “When I asked Mr. Crammer’s assistant what Mr.

Crammer was like she said he was stylish and a bit dark. I thought she meant metaphorically dark, I didn’t think she was actually talking about skin color.”

I smiled without answering.

“Don’t get me wrong,” Manny said quickly, apparently unnerved by my lack of response, “I think it’s great that this neighborhood has a little color. Really great, hope to make it here one day myself.”

“Don’t we all,” I said smoothly, opening the door for him. “You really did a great job. Thank you…on behalf of Mr. Crammer.”

Manny nodded and I closed the door as he made his way down the steps to the street. I counted to ten and then ran back to the kitchen. “We’re in! We’re in Kane’s house! Unchaperoned! We
so
rock!”

“This is not a good idea,” Marcus said, shaking his head. “What if Manny-dearest ever gets around to really meeting Kane? If Manny gives a description of you, you’re toast, darlin’. You’re not exactly the nondescript-girl-next-door. And in case you haven’t noticed, that bowl belongs to a dog.”

“But that’s the beauty of this whole thing. Manny’s done his job so the chances are he won’t ever meet Kane, but if he does he’s not going to admit that he let two strangers into his house. It will be in his interest to keep quiet. As for the dog, if he was here he would have made himself known by now.”

Marcus tapped his index finger against his chin. “You may be right about that. Still—”

“We don’t have time to debate this. It sounds like Kane might not be back until tomorrow, but we need to do this search quickly just in case he decides to come home to pack up some stuff.”

“I have news for you,” Marcus said, “I’m not staying more than forty minutes. I want to be long gone before ghost-boy even thinks about coming home. Now, what am I searching for again?”

“Anything that will give us insight into Kane’s parents’ life. Why don’t you look around and see if you can find an office or a study or something and I’ll check out the bedroom.”

I left Marcus to find his way around the house while I made my way to the second floor, where I imagined Kane’s bedroom would be. At the top of the staircase was a somewhat stark hallway. In fact, the only thing in the hallway was a long, narrow rug that served to mask the sound of my footsteps.

To either side of me there were rooms with doors left wide open. I spotted one bedroom so bare and pristine it could only be a guest room, and not a frequently used one at that. There was also a room that had been turned into a makeshift gym, complete with a treadmill, strength training machine and free weights. To my right there was a spacious bathroom, and in front of me, at the very end of the hall, was what had to be Kane’s bedroom. The door was partially open, allowing a sliver of sunshine to shed its light on the floor in front of it.

My heartbeat picked up speed. Marcus was right, if we got caught sneaking around in this house we would be seriously screwed. But this was my best chance of getting answers. Without allowing myself to think too much about the possible consequences, I walked in.

I took a moment to absorb it all. The dark wood bed frame was both masculine and appealing. He had a wardrobe that could have easily been purchased at Sotheby’s, considering the craftsmanship that had obviously gone into it. And then there was the original abstract painting he had hung on his wall which was every bit as compelling as it was disturbing. Violent sweeps of paint left textured evidence of the artist’s passion and anger. Just left of center was a large, dramatic splash of red paint that had been allowed to drip down to the bottom like blood. It was probably worth a fortune, but it begged the obvious question: who in their right mind would want something like that in their bedroom? Was Kane’s goal here to covet nightmares or to simply avoid sleep altogether?

Unable to answer these questions, I let my eyes drop to an attractive but more mundane dresser. On top of it were several photos in matte silver frames. I stepped closer to get a better look.

There were no pictures of Oscar in the photos. One was of a much younger Kane, standing alone in front of one of the buildings at San Francisco State University. That surprised me a little. SF State was a perfectly respectable school, but I would have thought that someone with Kane’s resources would attend a private university along the lines of Stanford or something. Of course, there was always the chance that his grades were low enough to make that impossible, but even so, SF State was rarely the backup school for the millionaire set.

The other photo was of Sutro Heights. I smiled at this. It had been ages since I had been to Sutro Heights, but as a child I had picnicked there with my family on a fairly regular basis. It was the ruins of what had once been the estate of the once powerful Sutro family, long since been made into a small national park. Not many tourists knew about it and it wasn’t exactly considered a hot spot by the majority of San Franciscans, but that was what made it so wonderful. A lovely park, the ruins of a fabulous mansion, a spectacular view of the ocean and it is never overcrowded. How could you not fall in love with the place?

And yet, when I thought about it, the fact that Sutro Heights had made an impression on Kane bothered me. As far as I was concerned, the less Kane and I had in common the better.

I moved on from the photo and examined the next one. It was a picture of a woman with a thick mane of red hair that tumbled down her back. Her skin was wrinkled, but her numerous and prominent freckles made me wonder if that wasn’t from sun exposure rather than age. With that in mind, I guessed her to be in her midforties. She might have looked even younger if she had been smiling. But instead, her lips were pressed together in a tight line as she blankly stared at the camera. Sitting at her side was a boy of about eleven or twelve. It was easy to identify the adolescent as Kane. His arm was around the woman and his head was on her shoulder. It had to be his mother. But if so, she didn’t look like she had been the maternal sort. In the photo she barely seemed aware of her son’s presence.