“No,” I said. “But don’t feel bad. I’m sure he doesn’t know or care who you are either.”
Brody laughed, loud and from his belly. “I like her, Juan,” he said to Barbaro, as if Barbaro was presenting me as a prospective concubine. “She’s got sass. I like sass.”
“It’s your lucky day,” I said. “I’m overflowing with sass.”
“Elena worked with Irina Markova,” Barbaro said.
Brody didn’t miss a beat. He must have been something at the bargaining table. “Irina. Nice girl. Terrible shame what happened.”
“Yes,” I said, though it had become quite clear to me that “nice girls” didn’t run with this crowd. “We’ll miss her. I understand you saw her that night she went missing.”
Brody nodded as he took a sip of his thirty-year-old scotch. “She was at the party at Players. I think she gave me a dance, but I have to say, as the guest of honor, I was having too good a time to remember much.”
“You don’t remember if she was at the after-party party?” I asked. I could have been a hell of a poker player myself.
“There was no after-party that I know of,” Brody said. He looked away from me as he dug into the breast pocket of his aloha shirt.
“I must have misunderstood,” I said. “I thought someone told me there was. I guess she could have said maybe there was an after-party.”
“Who’s that?” he asked, glancing at me from under his brows.
I shook my head. “Not important. Obviously I misheard.”
“Tony Ovada drove me home. We sat and smoked cigars,” Brody said, pulling one out of his pocket like a magician pulling a rabbit out of a hat.
“Are you sure you’re not your father’s daughter?” he asked. “This is sounding a lot like an interrogation.”
“I’m sorry,” I said, sitting back. I took a sip of my vodka tonic. “What can I say? That’s what passed for conversation in our house. I grew up thinking cross-examination and redirect were normal components of social intercourse.
“Irina was a friend. I want to see her killer brought to justice.”
“So do I,” Brody said.
“I just think someone who saw her that night might know something, might have seen something and not even realized it.”
Brody made a motion with his cigar. “Juan was there. Did anything strike you as odd, Juan?”
“Elena and I have already had this conversation,” Barbaro said. “I wish I could say I saw something, heard something, but I was busy having a good time, like you, like everyone.”
Brody lit the cigar, took a big pull on it, and exhaled, looking up at the smoke.
The attraction of cigars is entirely lost on me. They smell like burning dog shit.
“Maybe we should establish a reward of some kind,” he said. “Money talks-or makes people talk.
“I’ll do that,” he said, making the executive decision. “I’ll call that detective. What was his name?”
“Landry?” I asked.
“What’s a good amount for a reward? Ten thousand? Twenty? Fifty?”
“I’m sure that’s up to you,” I said. “That’s very generous of you, whatever you decide.”
He waved it off. “It’s the least I can do. I feel responsible in a way. After all, she was last seen at my birthday party.”
“Except by her killer,” I pointed out.
The doors to the bar opened and Bennett Walker stepped in. His hair was slicked back, and he wore a pair of black Gucci wraparounds, despite the fact that the sun had already begun to slip over the horizon. He was halfway to our table before he realized I was sitting there. He hesitated, but I didn’t give him a chance to escape.
“What interesting timing you have, Ben,” I said dryly.
Barbaro frowned at me.
Bennett sat down across from me. “The joke’s on me, I guess.”
“Something like that.”
He waved a hand at the waitress, and she turned and went back to the bar to get his drink without having to ask what he wanted. A regular. Maybe too regular. He looked a little rough around the edges.
“Surprised to see you here, Bennett,” Jim Brody said, his face neutral.
Bennett shrugged. “A guy’s gotta be somewhere. Why not among friends?” He looked directly at me and said, “Exception noted, Elena.”
Brody raised an eyebrow. “You two know each other?”
“In a past life,” I said.
I could see the wheels turning in Brody’s head. He would be all over this. He hadn’t made his fortune without knowing the background on every client-and every adversary-he had: their mother’s maiden name, the date they lost their first tooth and their first job and their virginity. He had probably known before anyone that Dushawn Upton was capable of having a pregnant woman killed.
He would have the story on my relationship with Bennett Walker with the snap of his fingers. He now knew my father was Edward Estes. He probably knew that my father had been Bennett’s defense attorney. Not hard to put the pieces together. My life was a jigsaw puzzle for ages nine and up.
“Mr. Brody has decided to offer a reward for information leading to the arrest of Irina Markova’s killer,” I said to Bennett.
“Good thinking,” he said, glancing at his friend.
A vaguely strange response, I thought. Good thinking because it would help the case, or good thinking because it would take away suspicion? Was Jim Brody’s generous offer tantamount to the Alibi Club version of O.J. hunting for the real killer? In that case he could make the reward as extravagant as he wanted, because he knew he would never pay out.
“You might as well write the check to Elena,” Bennett said. “She claims to have a nose for this kind of thing.”
“What kind of thing is that?” I asked, not quite able to keep the edge out of my voice. “Knowing a criminal when I see one?”
The waitress arrived with his drink and gave him the same treatment she had given Barbaro. Bennett shoved his sunglasses back on his head and gave her his undivided attention, but there was a coldness in his eyes that made my skin crawl.
“Elena was a police detective,” he said, as the woman walked away, with his eyes on her ass.
“Are you surprised I would know that?” he asked, turning to look at me.
“I’m surprised you would bother to,” I said flatly. “Am I supposed to be flattered?”
Brody set his cigar down and stared at me. “A detective? What kind of a detective? Homicide?”
“Narcotics.”
“Oh, no,” Bennett said, without emotion. “I’ve broken your cover.”
“I don’t need a cover. I don’t have anything to hide,” I said. “Besides, I’m not in that line of work anymore.”
“Then why are you here?” he asked pointedly.
“I was invited for my charming company and witty repartee. Why are you here? Besides soaking your liver in vodka for the third night in a row-that I know of.”
From the corner of my eye I could see Barbaro looking unhappy or angry or both.
“I’m surprised you didn’t go into sex-crimes investigation,” Bennett remarked. “Rabid as you are on the subject.”
Barbaro leaned toward him, raising both hands in front of him.
“Enough,” he said quietly. “None of us came here to have a bad time. Enough.”
“I didn’t start it,” Bennett said, petulant.
“No. You’re never responsible for anything,” I returned. “You pass gas and it’s someone else’s fault.”
“Jesus Christ,” Brody said. “The two of you sound like you’re married.”
I looked away from Bennett, pulling in a slow deep breath, trying to rein myself in. I am and always have been my own worst enemy. I should have kept my cool with him. I should have at least pretended not to be affected by him. But my emotions regarding Bennett Walker had been held inside me like a festering abscess for a very long
