thirty-one

“Poor Nic owns this place?” Bear set his drink on the table. “Do you know who he is?”

“Yes, I know all about him. And he doesn’t own it. Granddad does.”

Bear let his eyes catch hers. “Your grandfather?”

“This club is his dream.” She smiled and sipped her champagne. “Keys is the only family I have. My mother ran off when I was little and as I said, my dad died in the eighties. This place is really his, but I run it. Poor Nic is a silent partner—he’s the money behind us.”

I laughed. “Never fails, Bear. If there’s a scheme simmering in town, Poor Nic’s holding the ladle.”

Poor Nic claims to be retired from gangster life and enjoying the fruits of his hard-earned retirement benefits. And thank my stars, too, because Nic was pretty helpful a year ago when we had to stop a killer trying to keep Russian mob secrets still secret since 1939. Very helpful, in fact. I think at least one FBI agent and a couple other folks owe their lives to him. Angel did.

Poor Nic ain’t such a bad guy—not really—once you get beyond that whole mobster-killer thing.

Bear gave Poor Nic another nod and returned his attention to Lee. “Nice place—a real charm. You build it yourselves?”

“Yes, we did. It took a year.”

I said, “They didn’t find any bodies buried here, did they?”

Bear almost spit his drink down Lee’s cleavage.

“Or maybe they buried a few.” That wouldn’t be the first time for Bear and me.

“Bear?” Lee asked, laughing a little. “Are you all right?”

Bourbon threatened to come out of his nose. He grabbed a napkin and wiped his face. “Sorry.” He changed the subject. “Tell me about William.”

“Do you dance, Bear?”

Now I wished I had a drink. “Well, Bear? Do you?”

His face flushed. He took a healthy swallow of bourbon and looked at Lee over the glass. “No.”

“No dance, no interview.” She stood and extended her hand. “Come on, Bear, live a little. Calloway said you needed to loosen up. I think I got the right parts to help you do just that.” She looked over at Cal who was just lowering his saxophone. She patted the air.

Cal swapped out his sax for a clarinet and soon had Lee’s curvaceous body swaying to Glenn Miller’s signature “Moonlight Serenade.”

“Bear, if you don’t dance with her, I will.” And I would. I’m just not sure she would have let me lead.

“All right, Lee.” He stood and finished his second bourbon. “A deal’s a deal, right?”

“It is, I swear.” She took his hand—hers lost in his massive paw—and walked him to the dance floor. In a few more bars of Cal’s sweet melody, Bear looked like he forgot he was a cop and became the teddy bear I always knew he was.

His body moved awkwardly but Lee gave no notice. I sat at the table and watched my best friend melting in the arms of a beautiful woman for the first time in my life. With every step, his eyes closed a little more and her cheek sought the comfort of his chest.

Deep down, I was jealous as hell.

“Boy, she’s a real peach, ain’t she?”

“Huh?” I spun around. Ollie stood behind me, leaning against the wall. He smoked a cigarette and watched Bear and Lee among the half a dozen couples on the dance floor. “How long have you been here, Ollie?”

“Oh, about sixty years. Give or take.”

“No, I mean …”

“I know what you mean, kid.” He tipped his ball cap back. “Keys’s girl is a dish, ain’t she?”

“A dish? Oh, yeah, she’s hot. Do you know her?”

“I think so. She looks real familiar. She reminds me of this gal I chased around the USO back in ’43. Man, could she dance. One night we were dancin’ it up when this local tried to cut in. I busted his—”

“Yeah, okay. What are you doing here?”

He laughed and blew a smoke ring—he was a Bogie fan, too. “I do like swing. It takes me back. Way back, you know?”

Huh? “What’s that mean?”

Ollie walked out on the dance floor and stood close to Bear and Lee. I followed.

He said, “Doesn’t matter. She must be doing all right in this place, huh? Must have cost her a wad of dough.”

He was playing games with me. “Poor Nic bankrolls them. He’s …”

“A gangster. Just like old Vincent Calaprese. Of course, Vincent was one of the originals. Watch your gangster, though, kid. He’s slippery—just like his new partners.”

He was trying to tell me something, but like Doc, he wasn’t going to tell me. “I get that. So, are you going to tell me why you’re hanging around? There’s always a reason. Doc says I can learn from you and maybe I can help you, too.”

Bear made a turn on the dance floor. Lee, crushed to him, laughed and said something that made Bear laugh, too.

Bear, laugh?

Ollie wandered over to the bandstand and stood watching Keys playing the piano. “This old guy can play. He reminds me of …”

“Come on, Ollie, what brings you here?”

“Same as you, kid.”

“And that would be?”

“A killer.”

Obviously. “Don’t start on Poor Nic, Ollie. Every time a body drops in this state, everyone points the finger at him. So far, he’s been innocent.”

He stuffed his hands into his pockets and turned to me. “Innocent and involved are two different things. You’re a cop, you know that.”

“I do. But, he’s an all right guy. Even Angel likes him. And Poor Nic likes her, too, so …”

“Yeah, and your lady’s a dish. You, Poor Nic, and that guy have good taste. Yes sir, you all got good taste.”

That guy?

I followed his gaze across the dance floor to a couple just sitting down at a table. The tall, dark, handsome man in an expensive suit pulled the chair out for a beautiful auburn-haired babe in a long black evening dress. She laughed as he moved a chair around the table beside her.

Son of a—

Franklin Thorne.

And my Angel.

“Terrific. And I suppose he dances like Fred Astaire, too.”