The Retro Look Read online

  “Harold Lax,” said Diana.

  “I wouldn’t know.”

  “I think you do. I think you’re one of his, I don’t know, models.”

  Tina looked puzzled, and Diana didn’t think it was an act.

  “You’re crazy,” said Tina.

  She started to brush past Diana, who gripped the woman’s left wrist.

  “Get your hands off me.”

  Diana held the woman as she tried to pull away. Tina tried to pivot and punch with her right fist, but she didn’t know how. Diana pulled hard on Tina’s wrist and then pushed. Tina lost her balance, and her fist flailed without making contact. Diana spun the woman around and shoved her toward the grimy wall of the garage. Tina caught herself before her face hit, but Diana pressed her against the wall with her shoulder.

  “Stop fighting me,” Diana said. “We’re going to talk.”

  The woman whimpered. Diana looked up and saw Tina squeezing her eyes shut. Tears glistened on her cheeks.

  “Shit,” said Diana.

  She let Tina go and stood back. There was no threat here.

  “When did it happen?”

  “Six months ago.”

  “Here?”

  “No. Near my place. But he pushed me up against the wall just like that.”

  Diana’s apology failed to reach her lips, not because she wasn’t sorry, but because she didn’t deserve to be forgiven. She had meant to scare Tina into cooperating with her. If Diana had succeeded too well, it was her fault. Not knowing that the woman had been raped didn’t make what she had done less terrible.

  Tina finally pushed herself away from the wall and turned around. Cheap white paint from the wall had smudged her short black skirt. She tried to look defiant, but she couldn’t sustain the effort. Diana decided that the best thing she could do for the woman was to get her information and leave her alone.

  “I think you know the guy I was talking about,” said Diana.

  Tina nodded.

  “Did you know about his quirk?”

  “What quirk?”

  “He’s an ass man.”

  “Well, yeah. He told me about my great butt a few times, until I told him to keep his gutter mind to himself.”

  “That’s all? You didn’t take his money to let him see more?”

  “I’m no whore.”

  It was looking as if Bergsten was right. Tina was in business with Lax.

  “Okay,” said Diana. “Tell me how you know him, and you’re out of here.”

  Tina looked down sullenly.

  “Come on,” said Diana. “Whatever your scam was, it’s over now. The casino is onto you.”

  “Figures. Find a way to get ahead, and it always turns to shit.”

  Diana kept staring and putting the pressure on.

  “We have a system. Me and Harold and Paul, the dealer.”

  “How does it work?”

  “I keep an eye out for bosses or anybody else who might catch us at it.”

  “What else?”

  “Paul gives me a signal. Not every time, because they’d catch on. Just often enough. I tip Harold off by arranging my cocktail napkins in certain ways. Shit. It should have gone on a long time.”

  “Why did you spill the drink on me?”

  “I figured I’d see if you cared more about the dress or staying to watch us. If you stayed, we’d know you were from the casino.”

  It sounded plausible.

  “Now what?” said Tina.

  “Now you go back to work. Or wherever. I don’t care about the casino.”

  “Then what’s this about?”

  “The cops think my date and I are involved in your scam.”

  “So you’re going to fuck me over.”

  Diana didn’t want to do that. She owed this woman something.

  “Maybe I can pin it all on Lax.”

  “Why do you care about me?”

  “Okay, I don’t.”

  Tina started to say something, but pride wouldn’t let her beg.

  They didn’t bother with goodbyes. Tina headed back to the casino. She would need to change her skirt. Diana couldn’t think of anything to do but go back to the suite and tell Jeffrey what she had been doing and hope he didn’t put her out in the hall.

  But in the elevator she chose Lax’s floor instead of her own. Again no one answered her knock, but when she tried the knob, this time the door opened.

  “Hello? Harold?”

  Diana knew everything about hotel rooms, and this one was telling her that no one was home. She thought for a moment and decided to go in. If Lax came back and caught her, he wouldn’t call security. He had too much to hide.

  Lax hadn’t tidied up at all. The towel was still draped over the chair he had used for his scenario, and the notebook still rested on the bed. Diana started flipping pages to see what else the book might tell her.

  A second look at the drawings, including the ones she had skipped to indulge his haste, told her again that the woman was from the nineteen-seventies and probably European. The artist had even stippled the woman’s legs with dark hairs that had never seen a razor.

  And in the last picture she was still dead.

  Diana turned the page. The same hand had executed a single word in large gothic letters. Not a word, exactly. A name.

  Roswitha.

  Doodles and decorations surrounded the name, as if the artist had spent many hours communing with the calligraphy.

  Diana shut the notebook and stood. She caught herself running to the door, and she stopped herself. It was more than twenty years too late to panic.

  Cold Case Files to the rescue. Who knew?

  Her nerves kept prodding her to hurry. The elevator took a few seconds longer than she could bear to wait, and she turned and went to the stairwell instead.

  That was a lucky break or a big mistake. At some point she would decide which. The first thing she saw as she started to descend the stairs was Harold Lax sprawled on the landing below. The angle of his neck told the story. Nature didn’t do things like that. Violence did. He was as dead as the woman in his drawing.

  Diana pondered her calm as she stepped over the body. It didn’t bother her to look down and make sure she wasn’t going to trip herself.

  Oh, she thought.

  The fall had probably broken his neck, but something else had killed him. A puckered wound marred the back of his neck. It had bled very little, and that reminded her of something.

  Many of Diana’s clients were military veterans. Some of them avoided the topic, while others talked about nothing else. She knew one ex-Marine who never tired of knives and their uses. The wound on Lax’s neck reminded her of a silent sentry-killing technique the client had described in ghoulish detail. She remembered working hard to hide her queasiness from him.

  The technique might be the same, but this wound had looked too small for a knife. An ice pick?

  She looked up and over her shoulder, but she couldn’t find a security camera. It didn’t surprise her that a place like this would cheap out where few would notice.

  Diana opened the fire door and walked down the hall. She inserted her key card in the lock, but the door swept open before she could turn the handle. Jeffrey confronted her. He didn’t look pleased.

  “Where have you been? I checked all the shows.”

  “Just a moment, Jeffrey.”

  He started to snap at her, but her expression stopped him. He stepped aside. She went to the phone and punched in the extension that Bergsten had given her. The security chief picked up immediately.

  “There’s something you need to see.”

  She told him where to go.

  “Jeffrey, I’m going to have to ask you to wait here.”

  “Hell, no. Something’s going on, and it’s on my nickel.”

  She studied him. He was usually her most docile client, but about once a year something happened to make him dig in. This was obviously the occasion for this year, and she had to admit that she ha
d given him more justification than usual.

  And sooner or later, she would have to explain everything to him. She might as well get started.

  She led Jeffrey to the stairwell. Bergsten and a younger man in a tuxedo had already found the body. The retired cop had a head start on his anger, and the sight of Jeffrey pushed him into full tantrum.

  “What the hell did you bring him for?”

  Diana didn’t get time to answer. Jeffrey was inept with women, but he handled other men just fine.

  “I’m part of the package. Deal with it.”

  Jeffrey turned to Diana and jerked his head toward the body on the floor.

  “Who is that?”

  “A client, Jeffrey.”

  “I’m your client.”

  “You know I work for other men. I’ve never tried to hide it.”

  But of course he saw the flaw in her argument. She worked for other men on their time, not his. His expression said they would discuss it further.

  She could wait.

  “Call Slatella first,” Bergsten told his young assistant. “Then call the cops. In that order, clear?”

  “Clear.”

  “When you talk to the cops, hold out for Detective Novotny. Don’t let them send just anybody. Use my name. She’ll come.”

  “Got it.”

  The young man departed. Bergsten looked down at the body. Diana inched closer, but Bergsten glared until she retreated.

  She knew he had seen the wound, and she wondered whether he was also thinking of an ice pick.

  “We’ll be going back to our room,” Jeffrey said.

  “The hell you will. You pushed your way into this. You’ll wait for the cops right here.”

  “I don’t think you know who you’re dealing with. How much money did you raise for Republican candidates last year? Not as much as I did. The governor takes my calls. Your Mr. Slatella will take hers.”

  Jeffrey took Diana’s arm and led her through the fire door into the hall. They walked in silence to their room. Inside, Jeffrey leaned against one of the dressers with his arms folded.

  “You said you were going to take in a show.”

  “I didn’t, Jeffrey.”

  “Obviously.”

  “I just wanted to watch some TV. Do you understand, Jeffrey? I’m as boring as everybody else. That’s why you don’t want to marry me. Not just because I’m a whore.”

  He winced as if she had slapped him.

  “Then this guy offered me five hundred dollars for an hour. And you know what? He never touched me.”

  “For five hundred? I can’t believe that.”

  “I only lie to you when you want me to.”

  There. She had won. It had been necessary, but it made her feel terrible. Jeffrey stretched out on the bed and stared at the ceiling. He was making a point of not talking to her. She didn’t feel entitled to join him. She took the uncomfortable chair at the desk and waited. The night was just getting started.

  Someone knocked on the door. Jeffrey got up to open it, and an attractively tough blonde woman in her thirties stood in the doorway, ready to knock again.

  “I’m Novotny. Atlantic City Police.”

  Neither Diana nor Jeffrey replied.

  “Okay, Mr. Pope, I need you to leave me and Ms. Andrews alone.”

  Jeffrey started to speak, but Novotny was ready.

  “Yes, I know the governor takes your calls. I also know the governor won’t interfere in a homicide investigation. If you go down to the bar for a while, maybe I won’t have to take your girlfriend to the station.”

  Jeffrey glared, but his mother won again. He couldn’t stand up against a woman. He did jostle the detective just enough to make it possibly an accident. The door slammed behind him.

  “I lied,” said Novotny. “Let’s go downtown.”

  “I take it I’m a suspect.”

  “We’re just going to talk.”

  “Right. What about Lax’s partners? Are you taking them in too, or was the casino watching them the whole time?”

  Novotny’s stony look made it clear what she thought of amateur investigators, especially those who guessed right.

  “We have you in Harold Lax’s room by your admission. Not to mention a witness who puts you there.”

  “That other hooker. You believe her?”

  “We know her better than we know you.”

  “I left him alive.”

  “So you say. The problem is, we can’t pinpoint the time of death.”

  “No security cameras.”

  “You noticed that, did you?”

  Diana shrugged. “I always check for them. Situation like this, cameras should have ruled me out.”

  “No such luck.”

  Novotny made a disgusted noise.

  “Typical casino. They spend millions spying on their own employees, but they cheap out everywhere else. So we have to do things the hard way.”

  “We can go downtown,” Diana said, “but I don’t think you want to do that.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because if we go up to his room, I’ll tell you who did it.”

  “You’re going to confess?”

  “That’s not what I said.”

  Novotny studied her. “Okay, we can go downtown anytime.”

  They took the elevator. Evidence technicians were probably at work in the stairwell. More technicians crawled through Harold Lax’s room and photographed, scraped, prodded, or tweezed everything they found. Novotny spoke to a Tyvek-suited woman, who shut her vacuum off.

  The notebook still lay on the bed. A young man took one last photograph and stepped away. Novotny put a pair of latex gloves on. Diana tried not to wince. She had touched the notebook, and she was going to have to admit it. She could see no way of getting out of this mess without giving up her fingerprints, which until now no police department had ever taken.

  Novotny paged through the book. Her expression didn’t change.

  “You’ve seen this?”

  “He paid me to do those poses. So yes, I saw it.” Diana wasn’t about to admit coming back a second time. “Look at that name.”

  “Rose-with-a.”

  “Rose-vee-ta, they say in German.”

  “You speak German?”

  “Not exactly. I’m a true crime fanatic.”

  Novotny closed the notebook. “Let’s go.”

  “I’m telling you, you want to hear this.”

  “Make it quick.”

  “American Justice, Cold Case Files, City Confidential—I watch them all.”

  “Your point?”

  “Roswitha Loschky. She was German, and she was a prostitute, which is why it made a special impression on me. It always does when somebody in my line of work meets the wrong guy.”

  “When was this?”

  “Twenty-some years ago, in Fort Lauderdale.”

  “Get real. This has got nothing to do with anything.”

  “The woman in those drawings is European. You can tell. And she’s from the seventies. You can see that too.”

  “Our victim was, what, twelve years old?”

  “Exactly.”

  Diana told Novotny about her hour with Lax.

  “Sexually, he was a case of arrested development. Trust me. It’s not the first time I’ve seen it. In that department he was still a twelve-year-old boy.”

  “Or he was like you. He saw the case on TV and got obsessed.”

  “Maybe, or maybe he was there. You can call Fort Lauderdale and check.”

  “Let’s go.”

  Diana hadn’t really expected to avoid a trip to the police station.

  They drove through the real Atlantic City, the one behind the casinos. Diana didn’t want to look too closely. Novotny put her in an evil-smelling interview room. The detective didn’t bother telling her to wait. What else could Diana do?

  Over an hour later Novotny came back. She wore a thoughtful expression.

  “Our victim is Harold Lax Jr. Fort Lauderdale t
ells me that his father was a suspect. They just had no evidence.”

  “He’s your suspect, too.”

  “That’s a stretch.”

  “At least see if he’s in town.”

  That led to more waiting. An hour became two, and then three. Jeffrey was never going to speak to her again. Or worse, he would, and she would owe him for ruining the weekend.

  Novotny came back.

  “Get up.”

  “What?”

  “You’re under arrest for the murder of Harold Lax Jr.”

  “Are you out of your mind?”

  Novotny wasn’t kidding, or talking. She walked Diana through the booking, the mug shot, the fingerprinting, all of which were firsts for Diana. She decided she hadn’t missed anything.

  Finally they were back where they had started, in the interview room.

  “All right,” Diana said, “what’s this really about?”

  “We have a case. I told you, a witness places you in the room around the time of death. More evidence will come.”

  “Not unless you invent it. I guess I gave you too much credit.”

  “Maybe I gave you too much.”

  “I just told you who did it.”

  “You were right about one thing. Harold Sr. is in town. All the way from South Dakota. He used his debit card, and we know where he’s staying. Problem is, none of that is illegal.”

  “Ahah.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “It means you want my help. You could have just asked, without the drama.”

  “Forgive me if I don’t trust a hooker to be on our side.”

  “What do I need to do?”

  “Now we’re getting somewhere.”

  “But it’s going to cost you. Since you couldn’t be bothered to talk to me like a human being.”

  “You’re in no position to bargain.”

  “I’m already under arrest. Would I be in this job if I was afraid of jail?”

  “Okay, what?”

  “I want to watch you tear up that fingerprint card.”

  “I would do that anyway, if you’re in the clear.”

  “Forgive me if I don’t trust a cop to be on my side.”

  “Okay.”

  “What do I need to do?”

  “I want you to wear a wire and talk to him.”

  “Me? What do I know about interrogating anybody?”

  “We call it an interview.”

  “That’s my point. I have no experience at this.”