“The guy was working hard to better himself,” I said.
Beneath the bookshelves were closed cabinets. I squatted and looked inside. More books. But of a very different bent. There were several paperbacks on how to attract women, a few more on how to seduce them. And a sprinkling of books with titles like How to Get Filthy Rich Before You’re Thirty. There was also a stack of vintage Hustler magazines.
“Here’s his secret stash,” I said.
“Drugs?”
“Porn.”
“Anything good?”
“Depends on your definition. But I’d say our guy is straight.”
Next to the magazines was a beautiful four-by-five copper box. I opened it, then got to my feet. “Business cards.”
I joined Bandoni at the library table, and together we laid out the cards. There were more than thirty. Most were for auto- or home-repair businesses along with a mix of home-remodeling companies. A couple were for managers from high-tech firms, and there were cards from headhunters—Noah’s software skills were no doubt in demand. There were also two cards for housecleaning services.
“These might explain the condition of the house,” I said.
“Add them to your list. He had a cleaner, she might know who came and went. Who left their toothbrush overnight.”
The remaining cards were random—the kind you might pick up at a convention or at a bar during casual conversation.
Except one.
I picked up the final card—it had been at the bottom of the rubber-banded stack. It was heavy card stock, embossed, with a dark-brown background and ivory lettering. It said simply, THE SUPERIOR GENTLEMEN. Right below was a second line, A PRIVATE CLUB. And below that was the stylized silhouette of a nude man and woman.
“Doing the dirty,” Bandoni said.
There was no other information.
“The Superior Gentlemen,” I said. “Like on the back of the photo.”
“So these guys were in some kind of secret club involving women.”
“Like a porn group, you mean?”
He shook his head. “Men don’t need a special group for porn or strippers. That’s just Friday night. It’s something else.”
“Like what?”
He kept shaking his head. “Our job to find out.”
I gazed around the immaculate room, the polish, the staging. The sense it gave of a man determined to be seen a certain way. How did that mesh with gutter punks and men rioting in the streets? And the sign over his computer—our anger is righteous.
And how did any of this fit with the image carved on Noah’s body—the symbol of a man with a line below it, and then the symbol for a woman?
I frowned. “The pieces don’t fit.”
But Bandoni gave a tight-lipped smile. “You’ll learn, Parnell. Pick any person you pass on the street. In all this world, there’s no greater contradiction than what you find in the heart of a human being.”
I considered my own heart. I couldn’t argue.
“The real question is . . .” Bandoni added the business card to our pile. “Which contradictory part of Noah Asher got him killed?”
CHAPTER 11
They try to step on you, Rosie girl? Then you become the gum on their soles they can’t scrape off.
—Effie “Grams” Parnell. Private conversation.
Our task now was to build, piece by piece, a complete picture of Noah. No matter what his contradictions.
While I focused on the comics angle, Bandoni would talk to his contacts in Denver’s LGBTQ community to see if anyone knew of Noah Asher. Then he’d check in with his sources in the sex business—maybe there was something on the street about the Superior Gentlemen. Forensics was on their way to Noah’s home to commandeer his computers. At headquarters, a detective helping out from the Fraud Unit would start on Noah’s credit cards, bank accounts, and phone records just as soon as we got the warrants.
And Smith and Wesson—Detectives Brian Smythe and Bill Weston, but they’d been saddled with the nickname as soon as they teamed up—would meet with people at Water Resources to learn what they thought of their recent employee. Smythe had a degree in geology, which gave him a scientific edge over the rest of us. If Noah’s coworkers started spouting hydrology lingo, he’d at least be able to hum a few bars.
Then, if anything set off Smith and Wesson’s alarm bells, Bandoni and I would march in like an army following the scouts.
Perhaps most important would be our conversation with Noah’s family, once they’d been notified by a victim advocate.
I dropped Bandoni off at the police carpool so he could get a set of wheels, then stopped in at the department’s print service to get copies made of Noah’s drawings and the photographs of the gutter punks and the Superior Gentlemen along with their business card. While Clyde and I waited, I called the numbers on the cleaning-services business cards and introduced myself. The first place had no record of Noah Asher. But when I dialed the second business, Top-A Cleaning, a bored receptionist named Candy told me that Noah had used their cleaning service between November and February. The last cleaning they’d done for him was three weeks earlier. Which meant there should have been a little bit of dust. Unless Noah had become Mr. Domestic. Or found another service.
“How often did you clean his house?” I asked.
“He had the weekly. Everything but the basement. We also did laundry and linens.”
“Do you know why he canceled your service?”
A sound that might have been gum popping. “There’s nothing in the file. Usually it’s a cost issue. Most people like the idea of getting their house cleaned, but after a few months they realize they can’t really afford it.”
“Any complaints about the work?”
“Nothing in the file.”
“I’d like to talk to whoever cleaned his house.”
Definitely gum popping. “Sorry,” Candy said. “Can’t help you with that. We don’t assign our cleaners to specific clients. It’s just whoever’s available that day.”
“Even if a client asks?”
“Even if.” She sighed. “It would be too hard. Our cleaners are contractors. They come and
