Please! It’s just a desk, and frankly, I can’t believe they left it empty this long, space being at such a premium around here.” She watched Sanchez unpack her belongings, noting with approval the neatly labeled files and the framed family photos, knowing that she was talking too much but made verbose by the opportunity to put someone at ease instead of making them uncomfortable. Was Sanchez divorced or never married? Not that workplace romances were ideal, but the female detective would be a huge improvement over Frank’s usual choice of date… Theresa moved behind Frank and patted her cousin’s shoulder. “If he gives you any trouble, just call him Francis. That slows him down. If that doesn’t work, you can add the middle name, L-”
“Hey!”
“Okay, okay. I’ll save that tidbit to blackmail you with later.” Glad to see a genuine smile on her cousin’s face and vaguely aware that it might have something to do with her own, she donned her coat and prepared to leave. “I’ll be calling later.”
“Should that worry me?”
“Not at all. I just meant I’ll give you a ring when I figure out how Evan Kovacic murdered his wife.”
CHAPTER 20
Soft notes tinkled from the baby grand in the corner, over the crystal and china set at the tables; the place settings and their linen napkins were ignored, however, in favor of the bar at the other end of the room. At least ten couples mingled there, some by the floor-to-ceiling windows that looked out on downtown Cleveland and the lake from twenty-five stories up. The women-girls, really-were slender, well built, and uniformly coiffed in long hair of varying colors. The men all wore suits and had gone gray years previously, whether they let their hair show it or not. The restaurant’s name, Macy’s, decorated each pane of interior glass that closed off this private room from the rest of the facility. Theresa had never been there before. From the prices on the menu she had perused while waiting, she never would be again.
She watched as a waiter whispered a message to George Panapoulos, who promptly glanced behind him to where she stood behind the lettering on the glass. He frowned, said something to the redhead next to him, and left the room.
“What the hell are you doing here?”
“I wanted to ask you a few questions. I also wanted to see how this works. Those are your girls?”
“Yes. They look like cheap little sluts, don’t they?”
The women wore dresses of clingy, swishy fabrics, but none were exceptionally short; low cut, but not obnoxiously so. Stiletto heels, but nary a fishnet in sight. “They really are beautiful.”
Her tone must have sounded wistful to him because he softened enough to ask, “So what can I do for you?”
“I’m still working on Jillian Perry.”
“I told you-”
“Mr. Panapoulos, I don’t believe you killed her. I don’t believe you had anything to do with her death. But she had a very limited circle of friends and acquaintances and I have run through all of them except for you.”
“And what do you think I can tell you?”
“Who she was. What she was. What went on in her mind-”
“Sheesh, like I’m gonna know. Kid, stop a minute.” He held his hand out to slow down a smooth-faced young man with a black jacket and a tray of champagne, and snatched one of the delicate glasses. “You want one-sure, yeah, you do, have one. Okay, that’s it, you can go now.” He handed the glass to Theresa and let the boy get the door for himself.
She sipped it immediately. She was thirsty, and she liked champagne.
He watched her. “None of that line about not drinking on duty?”
“I’m not a cop. Besides, I never turn down free food or free booze.”
“Good philosophy. Now, Jillian. I wouldn’t have the slightest idea what went on in her head, Ms. MacLean, and I wouldn’t waste a lot of time on it if I were you. Jillian wasn’t some deep, troubled soul, she was a pretty, nice, few- lights-short-of-a-marquee-sign girl. That’s it. What you saw was what you got.” He leaned against the glass and polished wood and focused on his sparkling wine for a moment before looking directly into her eyes. “I know what you’re thinking, that I’m one step out of the cave and should be wearing a fur pelt. But I’ve spent most of my day, every day, for more years than I care to count now with women, looking at women, talking to women, telling women what to do. I dress them. I undress them.
So maybe you should consider that I know my subject.”
Theresa considered herself lucky that he didn’t sell used cars, or she’d have been signing on the line for a used Audi sportster right then and there.
“Jillian Perry didn’t have a dark side, or a flip side, or any side but the outside. She had no secrets.”
“Then who is Cara’s father?”
“Except that one.” He sipped the champagne, frowning. “Okay, that’s the exception in her life that proves the rule. I just know it ain’t me. Beyond that, I don’t care.”
“What if it were a client?”
“That’s his lookout, not mine. Though I’d be a little peeved-I go through all the trouble of hiring these girls, coaching them a bit, and then some idiot knocks her up and she’s out of work for months? Yeah, I’d be peeved. But that’s the great circle of life and all that crap.”
“Did Jillian have a relationship with any of your clients?”
He drained his glass. “Nope.”
“You seem sure of that.”
He leaned back a bit, away from her, as if he no longer cared if she bought the Audi or not. “I am. The girls don’t freelance, it’s a rule. Sure, some break it and I fire them, but not Jillian. She didn’t seem all that enamored of my clientele. It was just a job to her.”
“No one she liked…in particular?”
“Not that I know of. Tell you what, you can talk to Vangie if you want. I’ll tell her it’s okay. I know women, yes, but I also know that they talk more to each other than to me sometimes.”
“Thank you.”
“You’re welcome. You ought to do that more often.”
“What?”
“Smile.”
“Any clients that Jillian particularly
“Whoops, there it went. Okay, Jillian, disliked…she got along better with Hispanics than Asians, and hated it when old guys would pinch her, but aside from that, nothing sticks out.”
“Her mother says her father called the agency once.”
“Oh, yeah. Daddy dearest thought he’d be clever and check up on his little girl. He requested Jillian, then kept asking for details, would she do this, would she do
“And you told him she would?”
“No. Not exactly.” He cast about for a place to set the empty glass, then gave up and hung on to it. “I may have given him the impression that, well, they could work that out between themselves. You know, like when the furniture store advertises leather couches on sale for three hundred bucks and you get there and there’s only one at that price, and it’s teal.”
“I see. Simple salesmanship.”
“Sure.”
“So your girls
“I wouldn’t know. That’s up to them.”
She made sure her skepticism showed on her face. “I’m sorry, but I need to know. If they do, then you’re a pimp, which isn’t my problem. If they aren’t supposed to but do anyway, and take in money that you’re not getting a cut of-”
