Casey Daniels - Dead Man Talking

“Until Jefferson Lamar made sure your visitors were cut off and you were treated just like any other prisoner.”

His hands stilled over his art supplies, and Reno shot a look over his shoulder at me. “You’re too young to know about all that.”

“But not too young to know you must have been plenty mad.”

“You think?” He got back to work, stowing his brushes and his tubes of paint in a plastic carryall. “That was a long time ago.”

“And you don’t hold any of it against Warden Lamar?”

Reno scratched a finger behind his ear. “Warden’s been dead for a lot of years. What happened to him, that doesn’t matter anymore.”

“It might. Maybe to his wife. She thinks he was innocent.”

“What else is a wife going to say? She heard the evidence. Same as we all did. She knows he’s guilty, she just won’t admit it to herself.”

“And if the warden was framed?”

He was done packing his supplies, so Reno turned and gave me his full attention. “Is that what the widow thinks? Did she ask you to come here and talk to me about it? Or is this just something you think?”

“Actually, it’s something I know.”

“Really?” He laughed, then coughed. There was a pack of Camels in his pocket, and he thumped one out, lit it, and took a drag. “Back at Central State, that was back in the day when I hated a lot of people.” The words hissed out of him along with a long stream of nasty smoke that I stepped aside to avoid. “I was angry all the time, you know? I’ve learned to channel my energy. Now, I paint. And I stop and smell the flowers.”

“But back in the day…”

“Back in the day…” He coughed again and spat on the ground. “I didn’t hate nobody as much as I hated Lamar. He thought he could turn Central State into some kind of boot camp. You know, reform everybody. Guess he learned his lesson, huh?”

“Because somebody framed him and he got a taste of his own prison medicine?”

“If that’s what you think.” Reno picked up the crate he’d put his canvas in and hauled it to the blue Prism parked three spaces from my Mustang. I could have been a sport and helped him with the rest of his supplies, but I was afraid if I did, it would give him an excuse to leave. So instead, I waited for him to stow the canvas, then come all the way back.

By the time he did, he was breathing hard.

And I was ready for him.

“If Lamar was framed for Vera Blaine’s murder, who do you think did it?” I asked.

He lit another cigarette. He blew out another stream of smoke. “You think I had something to do with it.”

“I’m talking to everyone I can. You’re one of the people who might have done it.”

“You’re right. I might have.” Reno Bob hoisted the carryall into his arms, his expression as serene as that painting of the tree and those ducks on the pond. “But if that’s true, then you got a hell of a lot of nerve coming here and talking to me.” He turned toward the parking lot. “You could be putting yourself in a lot of danger.”

Was that a nice, friendly warning?

Or a threat?

Since it was the last thing Reno Bob said to me before he got in his car and drove away, I thought about it all the way home. Even then, I still wasn’t certain, not when I got out of the car, slung my purse over my shoulder, and headed for my apartment.

I was still thinking about it when a man jumped out of the alley behind my building, grabbed me, and put a knife to my throat.

“ You’re sticking your nose where it doesn’t belong, Y bitch.”

The man’s words scraped against my ear. The blade of his knife nicked my skin. I felt a wet, warm drop on my neck, and I didn’t have to think twice to know what it was.

Blood.

My blood.

I would have gulped, but I was afraid if I did, my throat would end up even closer to that knife blade.

One of my attacker’s arms was around me, and he yanked me back so fast, my head snapped. “Stay out of it,” he said.

And what did I do? Well, that’s the weird thing, and I guess it means I’ve been in the private investigation business a little too long. Instead of being scared out of my mind like any normal person would be, I was busy trying to think if I’d ever heard his voice before.

I couldn’t place it, and a second after I realized it, I also knew it didn’t matter.

What did matter, see, was me getting out of this little predicament alive.

As far as I could tell, the only way to do that was to take matters into my own hands.

I am not athletic, but remember, I had once taken years of dance lessons. I liked the costumes and, of course, the spotlight, but I could never keep the routines straight, and I hated to practice. Poor Mademoiselle Adrienne, my dance instructor, had despaired of me. Yet somehow, in this the most unlikely of moments, it all came rushing back. In one quick movement (more lurch than en avant ), I shot forward just enough to give myself a little momentum, then stepped back with that little ballon bounce Mademoiselle always wanted from me and never got, and slammed my foot against my attacker’s instep. He was caught off guard just long enough to loosen his hold, and when he did, I darted forward, spun around with as much pizzazz as if I was executing an allegro, slipped my purse from my shoulder, and swung. Hard.

Thank goodness for that box we’d snarfed out of the Team One picnic basket. It was nice and hard, and the one side that wasn’t rotted away had a pointy corner. The guy was wearing a ski mask so there was no way I could see his face. I could, however, watch his eyes spin when I hit him in the side of the head.

He grunted a curse, and I took off like a ballerina bat out of hell. I wasn’t dumb enough to stop and try to unlock the door into my apartment building. Instead, I raced straight ahead to the corner where my street intersected with Mayfield Road, the heart of Cleveland’s Little Italy neighborhood. It was a beautiful Thursday evening in the middle of the summer, and I knew the restaurants and bars up and down the street would be busy with tourists and diners. There was safety in numbers, and feeling safer in an area where bistro tables lined the sidewalks and people all around me chatted and sipped wine, I stopped long enough to look over my shoulder.

There was no sign of the man with the knife.

That was the coda of my little performance.

Mademoiselle Adrienne would have been proud.

The next morning I had a meeting with Ella at Garden View to discuss the art show set up, and I got there early. I sat at my desk, thinking about what I’d been thinking about all night: Who had I offended? I pulled out a yellow legal pad and wrote down my theories while I fingered the tiny round bandage I’d stuck on my neck to hide the nick from the attacker’s knife. Between him and Sammi, my neck looked like I worked the women’s wrestling circuit.

Did Bad Dog Raphael send the guy with the knife?

I wrote that at the top of page one.

Or was it Reno Bob, feeling a little nervous thanks to all the questions I’d asked?

That was the heading I scribbled on page two.

Did the attack outside my apartment have something to do with the box and the coin I took out of my purse the minute I got home and hid under my bed?

I wrote that on page three, then crossed out the line about where the box was hidden, just in case somebody who might be after the coin got a look at my legal pad.

Maybe Team One has a hit man on staff and the nerve to send him to snuff me out because we raided their precious picnic baskets?

Maybe not.

I tore page four from the pad, wadded it into a ball, and tossed it in the wastebasket. At the same time, I stifled a yarn.