“His methods is a joke… is only fitting for the sociable dancers, not for competing.”
“Well,” I said, “ballroom dancing is becoming a much more popular social activity. The numbers of dancers have grown a lot in the last five years.” I bent to pick up a stainless-steel water bottle one of the women had left. “If Ingelido’s methods help-”
Vitaly, facing the door, drew in his breath with a hiss. “Speaking of the devils-”
I spun around to see Marco Ingelido on the threshold, surveying the ballroom with an expression that hovered between appreciative and assessing. In his early sixties, he was beginning to put on weight around his middle, but was still a good-looking man, with thick, dark brows over deep-set eyes and an aquiline nose. He’d been balding for years and had finally shaved his head, telling people that if it was good enough for Kojak, it was good enough for him. He’d been moderately successful as a professional ballroom dancer but gave up competing five or six years back, shortly after I started winning, to concentrate on expanding his business.
“I heard you two partnered up,” he said, his gaze going from Vitaly to me. “Anya dump you, Voloshin?”
Vitaly bristled. “I am moved to Baltimore and Anya is not wishing to leave Russia,” he said.
“And of course we all know what happened to your partner, Stacy,” Ingelido said. “I don’t think I’ve seen you since Rafe died. Didn’t I hear something about you being arrested for his murder?” Malice gleamed in his dark eyes.
I chose to ignore his question. “Can I help you with something, Marco?” I asked, convinced his showing up like this was not a coincidence. Not after last night.
“You can give me what you found last night,” he said, his voice flat. “At Corinne Blakely’s.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Ingelido smiled coldly. “My son-in-law is a cop. He ran your license plate for me.”
“Your word against mine.”
“Hm, I think your credit card says otherwise.”
He thinned his lips, clearly wishing he’d taken the trouble to retrieve the snapped credit card. “I didn’t come here to quarrel with you. I can’t imagine what Corinne had on you-you’re so young-but I know you were after her manuscript. I want it. Or”-he held out a placatory hand-“I want your assurance that it’s been destroyed.”
“What is Corinne having on you?” Vitaly asked, eyes bright with curiosity.
Ingelido hesitated, then finally said with an air of great honesty, “We were lovers. I was in my late thirties. Corinne was… older. I was between wives, so it’s only… embarrassing. I’d just as soon not have the affair publicized. We were discreet at the time. I don’t know why she decided to go public with it now.” His voice was a growl of frustration.
“How did you know she was going to write about you?” I asked.
“She told me!” He paced like a trapped tiger: three steps away, three steps back. “I had the impression she was giving everyone she was writing about ‘fair warning.’ That’s what she called it when she told me.”
“I didn’t find the manuscript,” I said, feeling a twinge of sympathy for Ingelido. “And her housekeeper said she never wrote it, that she only had an outline.”
Ingelido’s chest expanded as he took a deep breath and held it. He blew it out. “That’s that, then.” His shoulders sagged with relief. I debated telling him what I’d learned from Angela Rush, but before I could say anything, he said, “This is a nice little studio you’ve got here. If you signed on with Take the Lead, we could turn it into a profitable enterprise. My franchisees are seeing a twelve percent return on their investment in the first year and up to thirty percent in the second year.”
“I’m perfectly happy with my income now,” I said.
His smile said he knew I was lying. “If you change your mind…”
“She won’t changing her mind,” Vitaly said. “Stacy and Vitaly is buildings most successful studio on East Coast.”
I appreciated his positive thinking and shot him a smile.
“An ambitious goal,” Ingelido said in a voice that suggested he thought we’d have more chance of winning a Nobel Prize. “If-”
Before he could finish the thought, Maurice entered the ballroom, stopping abruptly at the sight of the other dancer. “Ingelido,” he said in a cold, un-Maurice-ish voice.
“Goldberg,” the other man replied, equally cool.
The temperature in the room went down to levels a penguin would enjoy, and Vitaly and I glanced at each other, wary of the animosity between the two men.
“Shouldn’t you be making license plates or something? I read that you’d been arrested. I debated sending a congratulatory note to our men and women in blue.”
“To paraphrase: ‘Reports of my incarceration have been greatly exaggerated,’” Maurice said. “Sorry to disappoint.”
“Ah, well.” Ingelido loosed a dramatic sigh. Giving Maurice a considering look, he added, “You and Corinne went back decades. She must have known where all your skeletons were buried.”
Maurice flinched almost imperceptibly, and I was startled to see fear skate across his eyes before he banished it. An uneasy thought crossed my mind: Could Maurice have something to hide?
He rallied. “At least my skeletons-if I had any-are decently buried. Some of yours are still walking around, hm?”
Ingelido flushed red and then paled. “I have no idea what you’re talking about. Let me know if you want more information about the franchise opportunity, Stacy.” He handed me a business card with the stylized, top-hatted logo of Taking the Lead with Ingelido, and left.
Vitaly followed on his heels, exclaiming, “I am late for meeting John.”
Left alone with Maurice, I raised my brows and asked, “What in the world was that about?” Before he could answer, I said, “You can tell me while I work. I’ve got to clean the bathroom.” Since our bottom line was a little shaky, we saved money by doing the cleaning ourselves. It wasn’t too onerous, but I looked forward to the day we could hire a janitorial service again.
Maurice followed me to the powder room and watched as I liberated cleanser, a sponge, and rubber gloves from the under-sink cabinet. I squirted cleanser under the toilet rim and motioned for Maurice to start talking. “Marco Ingelido is a cad,” he said. “He hurt Corinne very badly some years ago. She was in love with him-why, I’ll never know, except she had unfortunate taste in men-”
“Present company excepted.”
A slight smile eased his frown. “Thank you, Anastasia. Anyway, Corinne loved him and he threw her over for Marian, the woman he’s married to now.”
“Is that what you meant when you said his skeletons were still walking around?” I looked up from scrubbing the sink to see a crease appear between his brows.
“He has a niece, Sarah. Sarah Lewis. She’s a photographer… must be almost thirty now. Marco dotes on her. They’ve always had a close relationship, much closer than your average uncle and niece. Anyway-”
“He had an affair with his own niece? How very Woody Allen of him. No, that was his stepdaughter, wasn’t it?” I wrinkled my nose, sloshed the brush around the toilet, and flushed away the foamy water. I’d had a crush on my cousin Tom when I was fifteen or so and he was nineteen. We’d sneaked a few kisses (okay, it was really several hours’ worth of nonstop, volcano-hot kissing) during a family reunion at a lake in the Poconos, and I’d had a hard- to-explain case of bristle burn that made my chin, lips, and cheeks raw. We’d returned to our separate states and Tom had moved on to an eighteen-year-old girlfriend before we got too serious, but I’d moped about him for several months. I sighed at the memory.
“He-”
Clicking noises from the hall approached quickly. Moments later, Hoover skidded to a stop with a woof. He wedged his head between Maurice’s leg and the doorjamb, nearly knocking Maurice over as he wriggled into the small bathroom. I patted his heavy head as Mildred Kensington’s voice fluted, “Hoover, you bad dog. How many times have I told you it’s not polite to interrupt someone in the loo?”
Hoover ignored her, nosing at the minifridge’s door in an attempt to open it. “Hello, Mildred,” Maurice said, backing out of the bathroom doorway.
“Maurice! Oh, I came as soon as I heard. Thank goodness you’ve been released.” She threw her plump form at
