Who by water, p.11
Who by Water, page 11
Dame smiled. The poor woman had been translating Rosie’s id and Dodge’s ego all day, and she wasn’t about to begrudge her some adult conversation. But when they all sat down for dinner, Dame found she didn’t have much to say. Luckily, Rosie had plenty.
“Grampa stinky,” she informed the table from her high chair. “Grampa make stinky smell.”
Dame raised an eyebrow.
“Grampa toot! Pee-ew!”
The old man frowned.
“It was the burrito you had for lunch,” Fatima said. “You know those beans don’t agree with you.”
Dodge grumbled and changed the subject. “M-Mari-Marinetti.”
“Oh,” Fatima remembered, “they mentioned that Marinetti man on the news today.”
“Phillip Marinetti?” Dame said.
“I hope they put all of those real estate thugs in prison,” Fatima said. “I hope they catch that Beckers woman, too.”
Dame also hoped ‘those real estate thugs’ would go to prison, but she knew it was unlikely. When Anton Felski botched Dame’s murder and got himself a sixteen-year sentence, he rolled over and named a lot of names. Suddenly, all these reputable developers — bigwigs like Chuck Moffat at Okusha Corporation, Sandra Grant at Titun, Jimmy Tanaka at Neos — were linked to the biggest arson conspiracy in the city’s history. Still, they were careful. They had expensive lawyers and enough junior staffers to throw under the legal bus. They made sure they were never in the wrong place at the wrong time. None of them spent a minute behind bars.
And more important than all the names Felski could name was the one he couldn’t. The one he didn’t know. The name of the man who, on Peggy Beckers’ orders, had murdered Dame’s mother when Dame was just eleven years old. Kind of strange looking, Felski had told her. Has two different-coloured eyes. It was hard to care about a bunch of white-collar real estate criminals when the man who killed her mother was still at large.
* * *
As usual, Mr. Kirby sat waiting in the bus shelter outside the LCBO, a bottle wrapped in brown paper by his feet.
“Hello, lovelies,” he said as they approached. “How are we this fine Thursday?”
“We’re good, Mr. Kirby,” Dame said. “How are you?”
The old drunk raised his face toward the setting sun. “You know, Dylan Thomas told us to rage against the dying of the light.” His dark glasses flashed. “Frankly, I don’t see what there is to be so angry about.”
Dame laughed.
“Miss Rosie” — he directed his attention to the little girl in the stroller — “are you being good for your mama today?”
“Yes,” she said soberly.
“You’re not raging against anything?”
She shook her head. “No.”
“Well, that’s good to hear. Now” — he looked up at Dame — “is there any possibility that I could trouble you for whatever excess change is weighing you down?”
Dame reached into the zippered pocket under Rosie’s stroller and produced her usual blue bill. When she leaned in closer to put it in the man’s front pocket, she noticed a series of red scratches across his cheek.
“You pick a fight with a thorn bush, Mr. Kirby?”
He put a trembling hand to his face. “Ah,” he said, smiling, “one of the many hazards of being flesh and blood in a world of sharp edges.”
Dame adjusted her glasses. “You take better care of yourself, okay?”
“Of course,” he said. “I have my modelling career to consider, don’t I?”
Dame smiled. “Have a good night, Mr. Kirby.”
“You too, my lovelies.”
* * *
“Kuh-bee stinky,” Rosie said as Dame freed her from the confines of her stroller. “Stinky like Grampa.”
Rosie wasn’t wrong. The old man had a bit of an odour to him. Some combination of mothballs, sweat, and a brand of aftershave that Dame was pretty sure they didn’t make anymore. She wondered if this was one of the inevitable symptoms of old age. She’d noticed that Dodge was getting a bit smelly as he got on in years. Even when he wasn’t eating bean burritos.
Dame plunked Rosie down on the sidewalk, and the little girl wobbled and held on to her pant leg for balance. It was quiet outside their house on O’Hara, and the sun was starting to sink below the horizon. As Dame struggled to collapse the plastic stroller, she smiled at a young couple pushing a tiny newborn in a massive, armoured pram — an Escalade compared to her little Chrysler Neon. She watched as they continued on, dominating the sidewalk, a little army and their own private tank. There were days, certainly nights, when she wondered what it would be like to have a partner again. Someone else to hold the door open while she fumbled through it. Someone else to put Rosie to bed, or get up with her in the middle of the night. Someone else to help carry the weight. For Dame, the concept of romance had curdled like three-day-old breast milk, but division of labour still made her swoon.
“Come on,” she told her daughter. “Let’s get you inside.”
Backpack on her shoulders, diaper bag around her neck, stroller under one arm, she used her one free hand to help Rosie navigate her way up the stairs. When they got to the top, she let go of her daughter to fish around in her pocket for the key.
It was Rosie who made the discovery.
“Door open, Mama.”
She was right. It was open. Not hanging wide open in the way her previous landlord would leave it — inviting rats and raccoons and the whole neighbourhood to room with her. It was just open a crack. Nothing you could see from the street. No sign of forced entry. Just open. Unlocked and open. A sudden cold crept through her body. She grabbed her daughter’s hand, just a little tighter than before.
Chapter Twenty-One
“Aki?” Dame called out. “Is that you?”
It wouldn’t be the first time her landlord entered her apartment without permission. But in the last couple years, Aki had been pretty good about giving her a heads-up beforehand. What worried her more was the memory of finding Lewis in her front hall, beaten unconscious by Anton Felski. She picked Rosie up into her arms and held her close.
“Hello?” Dame stepped inside.
Her daughter looked up at her, confused. “Nobody home, Mama.”
The little girl seemed to be right, but to make sure, Dame made a cursory scan of each room. The bedroom, the bathroom, the nursery — everything seemed to be in order, until she found her way into the kitchen.
“What the hell?”
On the counter, her plastic watering can stood half full. Dame couldn’t remember the last time she’d used the thing, but she was sure it hadn’t been that morning. She walked over and pressed her finger against the monstera’s soil. It was still damp.
Someone had been in her house. And not that long ago.
Dame checked the door to the back porch. It was also open. So was the exterior door.
She shifted Rosie’s weight to her other arm. “You keep holding on tight, okay partner?”
“Okay, Mama.”
Dame stepped out into her tiny backyard. Aside from a recent dandelion infestation, nothing seemed particularly out of order. She pushed open the back gate and followed the narrow laneway that ran parallel to her street. Still, nothing out of the ordinary. Just the usual detritus of fast food wrappers, cigarette butts, and — hold on. Lying not far from an empty Capital Espresso cup was a pair of relatively new and relatively expensive-looking sunglasses. Dame crouched down, her knees very aware of the extra thirty pounds of toddler they were bearing. The shades were in good shape — not scratched or covered in laneway grime — which meant whoever lost them lost them recently. What’s more, they looked familiar. Who did she know that owned tortoiseshell Gucci sunglasses? An image of a woman wearing a slim-cut leather coat and fuck-me boots came to mind. Radovich.
Dame stood up. Hargrove had called Connie Radovich “really tough” and “really honest,” so why was she breaking into her apartment without a warrant? She hung the sunglasses from her collar and immediately Rosie tried to snatch them.
“Sorry, partner. I might need those for later.”
Dame went inside, put Rosie in her booster seat, and put the shades on the coffee table. She went back and collected the letters and fliers from her mailbox. There was yet another envelope with a Penetanguishene return address. She sighed and filed it away with the others above the fridge.
Dame fixed herself a glass of El Silencio, and after she felt the reassuring burn of it in her belly, she made a phone call.
“Hey!” Rachel said when she answered. “How’d it go on the island yesterday? You figure anything out?”
“Uh, maybe.”
For the past few years, Rachel had brought her nothing but bad news. Dame thought there might be some small, cruel pleasure in returning the favour. She was wrong.
“I think it would be better if we talked about it in person.”
“That bad, huh?”
Dame avoided the question. “Can I stop by after work tomorrow?”
Rachel was quiet for a moment. “Okay,” she said finally. “Zoe will drop off Luka around five thirty, so if you could come before then, that might be best.”
* * *
The next day, Dame left work a little early and took transit to the east end of the city. Rachel let her in and guided her to the kitchen. With a quiet formality, she poured them both a short glass of cheap tequila. “Okay, Polara,” she said as they sat down, “what’s up?”
Dame sighed and took out her phone. “It didn’t make sense to tell you this before,” she said, “but Grace Maxwell found this pencil drawing stuffed in the liner of Adam’s guitar case.” She slid the phone across the table. Rachel picked it up, and Dame watched as understanding fell across her face.
“Who drew this?”
“A woman named Maudie Beresford. She’s the groundskeeper at Beacon Point Arts Centre.”
“This woman, she” — Rachel zoomed in on some part of Adam’s anatomy — “she slept with Adam?”
“I — I think so,” Dame said gently.
“And you think she had something to do with Adam’s death.”
“I’m not sure. But I’m going to find out.”
Rachel kept staring at the image. “She did a good job, at least. Looks just like him.”
“Guess we’re kind of in the same boat, now.”
“What boat?”
“The I-Got-Cheated-On-By-Adam-Hoffman Boat.”
“Is that what you think?” Rachel handed the phone back.
Dame took another look at her ex-husband in all his nude glory. “Uh, kind of?”
“Polara, Adam and I had an open marriage. He was free to see people as long as he was safe and told me about it. I don’t care if he was with someone before he died, but if that someone killed Adam, then that’s a different story.”
“An open marriage?”
“We had a few rules. No friends or mutual acquaintances. And no one who lived in our neighbourhood.”
“Jesus. I thought —” She wasn’t sure how to finish her sentence.
Rachel smirked and seemed to enjoy Dame’s confusion. “Well, maybe that’s why Adam chose me. I wanted to be with him; I didn’t want to own him.”
Dame felt the heat of the day crawl up her collar. “I didn’t want to own him, Rachel. Monogamy’s a pretty standard arrangement in most marriages.”
“Yeah, and as you well know, most marriages end in divorce.”
Dame was trying her best to stay calm. “At least I didn’t turn him into something he wasn’t.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“I mean the desk job, the Range Rover — that wasn’t Adam.”
“I thought you said you didn’t know who he was anymore.”
“I know you shoved all his music equipment into the spare bedroom.”
“Oh, grow up, Polara. We’re almost forty. Do you think I was going to spend the rest of my life tripping over guitars and staring at some hideous sculpture of Neil Young? That stuff belongs in a spare room.”
“You always hated Adam’s music.”
“What are you talking about? I paid for his studio time.”
“Well, maybe if you let him play music at home, he wouldn’t have died on Toronto Island.”
Rachel stood up so fast her chair tipped over. “Oh, so now it’s my fault?”
It was at that moment that Ben Suarez walked into the kitchen. “Whoa. Easy. What’s going on?”
“My old friend here is blaming me for my husband’s death.”
“I’m not blaming you for his death” — Dame stood up — “I just think you ruined his life.”
“What the fuck do you know about —”
Ben quickly stepped between the two women. “Okay. Everybody take a breath. Why don’t we all just sit down for a sec.”
The two women eyed each other warily and did as Ben suggested.
“Now, it sounds like maybe you’re wrestling with each other instead of wrestling with the actual problem.”
“Leave the psychobabble at work, Ben.”
“Hey, you can get mad at me all you want if it makes you feel better — but what’s this really about?”
Rachel sighed. “Dame’s looking into what happened to Adam.”
“That’s right.” Ben snapped his fingers. “I forgot about your whole Veronica Mars thing.”
“And even though it’s a day late and a dollar short,” Rachel continued, “she figures she has a lead.”
“Which is?”
Dame cleared her throat. “Adam was getting cozy with some Toronto Island gardener before he disappeared.”
Ben nodded. “Well, I can see how that might open some old wounds.”
Rachel poured herself another drink.
“All this bullshit aside,” Dame said, “there’s something that’s been bothering me.”
“What?” Rachel asked.
“The guy who runs the recording studio — Jesse Maracle — he told me that Adam packed up and left around nine o’clock on Monday night. Said he wanted to get home early and sleep in his own bed.”
Rachel frowned. “He texted me Monday night, remember? He was going to spend the night on the island.”
“Can I see the message?”
Rachel sighed. She flicked through a few screens and gave Dame her phone.
Can’t wait to see you tomorrow, the message read. Love you!
It had been sent at exactly 11:32 p.m.
“So” — Ben crossed his arms — “what happened between nine o’clock and eleven thirty-two that made Adam want to stay on the island?”
“I don’t know,” Dame said.
“Maybe Adam wanted one last visit with his gardener friend,” Ben suggested.
“But then why would he call his ex-wife at” — Rachel looked at Dame. “When was it?“
“About quarter to ten.”
“He called Dame?” Ben raised an eyebrow. “Why would he do that?”
“I’m not sure we’re asking the right questions,” Dame said.
“What do you mean?”
“Look.” Dame held the phone out to Rachel and Ben. “When was the last time Adam used lower case letters in a text? That guy used all caps all the time. Remember?”
Rachel squinted at the screen. “Jesus. You’re right.”
“So, maybe the question isn’t why he sent this message. Maybe the question is who sent this message.”
Chapter Twenty-Two
Dame checked her watch as she made her way down the front steps of Rachel’s house. It was getting late, and she didn’t want to keep her daycare provider waiting. But when she looked up, she saw Rachel’s son and his babysitter walking toward her.
“Oh, hey,” she said. “I don’t know if we were ever properly introduced. I’m Dame.”
“Zoe.”
“I’m sure you’re both in a bit of a hurry — but could I ask you a couple quick questions? I have a two-year-old daughter, and I was thinking about hiring someone to help out.”
Zoe bent down and smiled at Luka. “Hey buddy. Show me how you can go into the house all by yourself, okay?”
The little boy did as he was told, slamming the door shut behind him.
“He reminds me so much of his father,” Dame said. “Did you know Adam pretty well?”
“Kind of.” Zoe took a package of gum out of her pocket, unwrapped a stick, and popped it in her mouth.
“Mind if I bum a piece?”
The girl held out the pack, and Dame took it in her hands.
“So, how long have you been working for Rachel?”
“About six months.”
“Just after school?”
“And some weekends.”
Dame unwrapped the gum. “Rachel said you usually charge twenty-five dollars an hour.”
“Yeah. Works out to about four hundred dollars a week.”
“Wow. That’s what I used to pay in rent.” Dame put the gum in her mouth and chewed. “Hey, listen — were you babysitting on the Monday night that Adam didn’t come home?”
“No. I would’ve dropped Luka off around five thirty. Ben’s usually home by then.”
“And what did you do after that?”
Zoe frowned. “Went home, maybe? I don’t really remember.”
Dame nodded. “You’re fifteen? Sixteen?”
“Fourteen.”
“God, I remember being fourteen. I hated being at home. Always wanted to be out with my boyfriend. Do you have a boyfriend, Zoe?”
She hesitated. “No.”
“Sorry. None of my business.” Dame took a step back. “Well, I should probably let you go. Nice talking with you.”
