The Chemistry of Death

Chapter 37

Vivian waited to do her official daily check out with Mr. Kazakov. Katrinka was curled up in one of the oversized chairs, looking like a sad little girl, which she probably was. She must have rehearsed that play for months, and neither parent had bothered to come.

“I liked the play,” Vivian said.

Katrinka rolled her eyes. “You mentioned that.”

Vivian shrugged. The girl wasn’t really mad at her. She was just a convenient target.

“Whatever happened with that purse and lipsticks?” Katrinka asked.

Vivian hesitated, deciding what she could tell her. “The police are looking into it.”

“I bet you looked into it first,” Katrinka said. “For your millionaire boyfriend.”

“Not my boyfriend.” And probably a billionaire, not a millionaire. “But, yes, I did.”

“And? Was I right about the purse?”

“You were. It was a one-of-a-kind, and it led us straight to the woman who’d owned it. She was hit by a subway train under suspicious circumstances.”

“There were lots of lipsticks. Doesn’t that mean lots of victims?”

“Ten, by my count,” Vivian said. “And I think he’s not done. I think he’ll kill another woman this week. So watch yourself — make sure no one puts anything into your drinks.”

“I always do,” she said.

That was true. Most women were on guard these days. This guy had to be very convincing to get women to let their guard down.

Vivian’s phone rang, and she excused herself to take it. “Torres.”

“Dirk here. Are you up for an adventure?”

She was tired from staying up all night, watching out for Tesla, and still sore from horseback riding. “Sure.”

“I thought I’d head over to Club Calypso in a while, ask some questions, buy some drinks on the department’s credit card. Want to join me?”

“Club Calypso?” She looked at her watch. “When?”

Katrinka perked up on her chair.

“Meet me in a half hour?”

She wouldn’t have time to go home to change. “Meet you by the front door.”

“They won’t let you in like that,” Katrinka said. “It’s a trendy club.”

“I’m not a customer. I’m a cop, or at least with a cop, and they’ll let me in.”

“You’re going with the blond god?”

“Mr. Norbye. Yes.”

“Then you definitely can’t go like that!” Katrinka scrambled to her feet. “I’ve got the perfect dress for you. I’ve never even worn it, and it’s a little big on me.”

“That wouldn’t be appropriate,” Vivian said. “But thank you for the kind offer.”

“Just let her.” Mr. Kazakov spoke from the doorway. “Give her something constructive to do — make someone else up for a nightclub she cannot visit on her own.”

From the way Katrinka had talked about Club Calypso, Vivian was willing to bet that she had visited it herself.

“Please,” Katrinka wheedled. “It’ll be fun.”

Vivian thought of the girl’s long, disappointing day and gave in.

Katrinka morphed into a no-nonsense stylist. Soon Vivian was dressed in the unworn black dress, and her face had been made up, although she hadn’t been allowed to see the results. She was worried about the dress. It clung to her body like a second skin, inky black and shimmering, and it felt expensive.

Katrinka eyed her critically, then flipped the mirror back around so Vivian could see herself.

Vivian did a double take. She didn’t recognize the woman looking back at her. The dress was daring — it showed every curve and fell lower in the front than she would have chosen, but she had to admit it flattered her. She twirled around. The back looked good, too.

“You will conquer the blond god before the sun rises tomorrow,” Katrinka prophesied.

“Dirk and I are just friends. He’ll probably have a good laugh over this… costume.”

“No man is going to call that a costume.”

Vivian pursed her lips.

“Think of it as a uniform,” Katrinka said hurriedly. “To let you fit in at Club Calypso.”

Vivian was starting to have some misgivings, but she didn’t have time to change back. If she wasn’t there on time, Dirk would go in without her.

She splurged on a cab that dropped her at the club’s entrance. A long line snaked down the block from the closed front door. Great. A club you couldn’t get into unless you were one of the beautiful people.

Dirk’s badge should take care of that. Vivian shivered, wishing she’d accepted Katrinka’s offer of a jacket.

“Viv!” Dirk called from somewhere near the door. “Over here!”

She hurried over, Katrinka’s fancy shoes clicking against the sidewalk.

“I was about—” Dirk stopped midsentence and stared at her, open mouthed.

Vivian felt a blush coming on and hoped that the bad lighting and her dark skin would mask it. “Too much? Katrinka had me basically playing dress up. I can change.”

Before Dirk could answer, the bouncer by the door answered for him. “No, ma’am, that is not too much. Looks about right to me.”

He stepped aside and opened the door for them, starting a chorus of protests from those in the line.

Dirk put his warm hand on the small of her back and escorted her to the door.

“Wait,” Vivian said. She brought up a picture on her phone and showed it to the doorman. It was the woman who had died in the subway. Her face had been cleaned up. “Do you know her?”

The bouncer stopped staring at Vivian’s breasts. “Don’t recognize her.”

Vivian held out her wrist, and he stamped it. She showed the stamp to Dirk — a crescent-shaped palm tree. They were in the right spot.

Dirk followed her into the noisy, dark club. “You look great, Viv.”

Vivian smiled. “I got past the bouncer, even at my age.”

“He wasn’t checking you for wrinkles.”

Loud calypso music came from a stage on one side of the room. Sweaty men in Hawaiian shirts played their hearts out, and Vivian’s foot started tapping. Like any act in this part of town, they had to be good.

Tall tables littered the edges of the room, and a mahogany bar lined the back wall. Most of the space was given over to the crowded dance floor.

They skirted the dancers and sidled up to the bar, where Dirk showed the roly-poly bartender his badge and the picture of the murdered woman.

“I’ve seen her before,” the bartender raised his voice to be heard over the music. “Name’s Emilia.”

“Do you know her last name?” Dirk asked.

“No.” He shrugged. “Just the first one.”

“Maybe from a credit card receipt?” Vivian wondered how he knew her first name.

“She wasn’t a woman who had to pay for her own drinks,” he answered.

Vivian usually paid for her own drinks, but she didn’t say anything.

“Do you have surveillance cameras?” Dirk looked around, his eyes stopping as he spotted the cameras.

“They’re monitored in the back.” The bartender took them to a wall that had wooden wainscoting below and emerald green paint above. It took Vivian a second to realize that a door was set into the middle, camouflaged to match the wall. The bartender knocked four times, then turned the knob and ushered them inside.

As soon as the door closed behind them, the volume dropped by half. Vivian missed the music.

They went down a short corridor. An open door on one side led to a small bathroom. On the other side was a closed door.

Dirk knocked on the second door, and a chubby guy opened it. He was short and round and dressed in a lemon-yellow suit that would have looked ridiculous on another man, but looked fine on him. “Can I help you?”

“I’m Detective Dirk Norbye.” He showed his badge. “And this is Miss Torres.”

The guy’s eyes ran up and down Vivian’s dress, and she restrained an impulse to smack him.

“Ricardo,” he said. “Nice to meet you.”

“We would like to look at your surveillance tapes from last night. We’ll start with from ten to midnight.”

“Why?”

Dirk showed the photo again. “Do you know this woman?”

Ricardo peered at the phone like a man who needed glasses but was too vain to wear them. “Can’t say I do.”

“She was at your club last night, maybe met a man here. Then she ended up dead.” Dirk hadn’t mentioned how she was hit by a train, or how they had no proof of foul play.

Ricardo gestured back to his computer. “I’ll show you what I have.”

An hour later, Vivian was regretting agreeing to Dirk’s adventure. Her neck hurt, her eyes ached, and she wanted to curl up on Ricardo’s none-too-clean couch and go to sleep.

Still, it had been worth it. They’d been through most of the footage, and had seen the murdered woman, establishing that she’d been here. Maybe they’d find someone who knew her. The man she was with wore a straw fedora pulled low across his brow. In the subdued lighting, she couldn’t make out a single detail about his face, no matter what angle he was filmed from. He’d either known the position of each camera, or he was the world’s luckiest bastard.

Dirk rubbed his temples. “If you could make me a copy of this, I’d like to take it back to the station for analysis.”

Ricardo looked up from the couch where he sat reading a paperback. “Can do, but it’ll take a while to get them all burnt. Half hour or so.”

Vivian straightened up, and her spine cracked in three places. Then she leaned back over the screen. She had five minutes left on the last camera, and she stubbornly watched every frame. Her patience was rewarded.

“Dirk!” she called.

He looked over her shoulder. The camera had caught the man as he pulled up his hat to brush his fingers across his forehead. It was a grainy side view, but it was the best they’d seen so far.

“Maybe Tesla can work his magic on it,” she said.

“It’s evidence,” Dirk said. “I can’t show it to him.”

“He’s got that facial recognition program. Maybe he can get a match.”

“It’s not through official channels,” Dirk said. “I’ve already bent too many rules for him. Hell, you shouldn’t even be here.”

“What if you showed it to him to see if it looked like the man he saw in the tunnel?”

Dirk considered this. “Maybe. But I have to ask.”

She made a mental note to follow up so Dirk wouldn’t try to wriggle out of it.

“Do you want that copy?” Ricardo asked.

Dirk snapped a photo of the man’s face, and Vivian was tempted to follow suit, but Dirk gave her a look. The man’s profile looked hauntingly familiar. She couldn’t tell if she knew him or if her brain was putting together pieces from all the footage she’d seen.

“We’ll wait out in the club,” Dirk said.

Dirk went to buy drinks, and she found a table. The band played as enthusiastically as they had when she and Dirk arrived. While she waited, she checked out the other men in the club. Lots of blond guys in the right height range. Was one of them the subway killer? Not likely. No hats.

A guy broke out of the pack and headed over to ask her to dance, but he was too short to be the guy she was looking for, so she told him no.

Dirk appeared soon after and handed her a whiskey. “I like your new look.”

“Katrinka gets all the credit.” Vivian sipped the drink. The New York Police Department had bought the good stuff. She was so tired it went straight to her head. She swayed from side to side in time to the music.

“How about a dance?” Dirk asked.

She looked at him in surprise. They’d gone jogging in the wilds of Central Park. They’d covered each other’s backs during more than a few firefights in Afghanistan. They’d schlepped packs through the desert heat together.

But they had never danced.

“Shouldn’t we be asking around?” she said.

“We did our work,” he said. “I suppose we could use you as bait for this guy, but you’re not his type.”

“Young, desperate, and hot?” she asked.

“You’ve got the hot part covered,” he said. “But you’re not a blond bird with a broken wing.”

Like Katrinka. But he was right. Vivian was as far from that description as possible. She had her broken parts, sure, but she would never be a helpless bird — easy prey. She downed her whiskey in one swallow. “Let’s dance.”