3.
Stan was content, at least as content as a man living with someone as tempestuous and troublesome as Barbara Moore could be.
He had just eaten a nice dinner. He was seated on a comfortable sofa in a nice house that was worth a bundle (though if they sold it, they’d have to fork over an outrageous amount for another place). He had some money in his account, left over from their best-selling book about the Bronx Crux Murders, a sum that had actually grown a fair amount in the last year.
It wasn’t enough to buy a private island in the Caribbean and recruit a bunch of hot students to cater to his every whim, but it was enough for him.
True, the Yankees were losing again, but when Barb came out of the kitchen, with a glass of wine in her hand, looking fetching in her cut off shorts, her legs bare below them, and her Wisconsin Badgers T shirt, he didn’t mind so much. He turned the sound on the TV down.
She sat down next to him. He ran his hand along her thigh. “So, Goldman, how did you finally identify the Goth Girl?” she asked. “You said her name was Sheena, so I’m assuming you, or more likely your partner, Benny, did identify her in the end.”
Stan took a sip of his beer and looked at her. “Why would you assume that Benny was the one?”
“I’m assuming he was the smart one in the partnership, like yours truly was in ours,” she replied.
“Listen, Moore, just because you had an idea that happened to work out and helped solved the Bronx Crux case doesn’t make you Detective Einstein. Remember, who saved your tight little in the end. And you were in no position to help me find you, hanging up on that cross.”
She turned and looked at him. “Yeah, OK, Goldman, you have a point.”
“So what makes you think my partner was smarter than me. You knew Dick Leary. Do you think he carried me all those years?”
She shook her head. “No, I don’t think that.”
“Anyway, why are you so fascinated by this old case? You were in primary school in Minnesota when it happened.”
“I don’t know. I’m thinking of that poor girl lying dead in an alleyway.”
“And imagining yourself in her place.”
“No, not really. But, I’m kind of curious about who she was and how she got there.”
Stan smiled. “Curiosity killed the cat,” he warned.
“Meow!” Barb replied.
Stan sighed. “Well, I started thinking about her clothes.”
“I would have thought you were more into what was under them, Goldman.”
“Cute, Moore. They weren’t just clothes, they were a costume. I figured she didn’t get them at Walmart. So, we started showing her picture around at various costume stores in the Theater District. They certainly had stuff like that, but one of the clerks said that young kids like her were more likely to put their outfits together at thrift shops or ‘vintage clothing stores’ as the more eclectic ones called themselves.”
Barb nodded. “That sounds reasonable.”
“Thank you, Moore. It turned out that it was exactly the right track. There was a store on the edges of Park Slope in Brooklyn where they recognized her. Back then, that area was still gentrifying and there were still a few stores like that hanging on. I’m sure it’s long gone, replaced by some restaurant selling $25 burgers. Anyway, she’d been in there about a week or so before.”
“You weren’t so lucky that she’d used a credit card?” Barb asked.
“Me,lucky?” Stan asked.
“Maybe later if you play your cards right, Goldman,” Barb said.
“The clerk thought she had been in there with a boy who also looked Goth. But they’d paid cash.”
“Too bad.”
“Still, the clerk remembered something that turned out to be useful. The girl had an English accent.”
“So you hopped on a plane and flew to the UK, right?”
“Of course not. I told you when we went to London that I’d never been there before. You think the Department was going to spring for a ticket? No, we faxed her photo over to Scotland Yard. Now, a fax is a machine that sends images over the phone lines. I think you can find one in the Smithsonian.”
“I know what a fax is Goldman. What do you take me for?”
“We’ll discuss that later, Moore. It was a long shot, but we got a hit. Took a few days, but the British cops ID’ed her.”
You’re brilliant, Stan!” Barb exclaimed, smiling broadly at him.
“I know that,” he replied.
Stan continued. “Sheena Rawlings, age 22. Her parents had reported that they hadn’t heard from her for a while, which wasn’t that unusual since they weren’t on great terms as they didn’t approve of her lifestyle. But they’d been trying her phone in London where she lived -this was back in the land-line era- and not had an answer for an unusually long time. So, they’d stopped in at the local constabulary in Nottingham where they lived to see if they would have the London cops check up on her. ”
“Don’t tell me,” Barb said. “The Sheriff of Nottingham. And she was Maid Marian. You’re really pulling this one out of your ass, Goldman.”
“No, I swear. They lived just outside of Nottingham. The funny thing was that the little village they lived in was called, of all things, Gotham. It’s an old village that they tell stories about over there.”
“So, she was the Gotham Goth Girl in Gotham City,” Barb said.
“Yep,” Stan said. “Amazing, isn’t it. The local cops had faxed the pics to London and thought no more about it. Such stories are a dime a dozen. The kids will call Mom and Dad when they run out of money.” Barb nodded.
“But someone over there matched her to the pics I had sent. Anyway, British Air had her on a flight from Heathrow to JFK about a month before she was found dead here and Customs had a record of her arrival. She’d been in the Goth scene in London. She’d recently gotten a small inheritance from her grandfather, who’d had a soft spot for her, so it seems she decided to check out the Goth scene in New York.”
“And the Goth boyfriend?”
“I’ll get to that later,” Stan said, sliding one hand under the bottom of Barb’s shorts and pulling her mouth towards his with his other hand. “If you want to hear the rest, you need to be extra nice to me.”
He kissed her hard, reaching his other hand up to cup her breast.
“I’m always nice to you, Stan. Nicer than you deserve,” she said, before kissing him again.
Stan stood, smiling despite his aching knees, and took Barb’s hand, leading her into the bedroom. He lifted her T shirt over her head and dropped it onto the floor. “Badgers are nasty animals,” he muttered.
Barb stuck her tongue out. “I have some ideas for that tongue,” Stan said.
“In your dreams, Goldman,” she replied.
Stan didn’t say anything. He just kissed down her neck, bending low to nuzzle her breasts. “Mmm,” Barb said, as Stan lowered her gently onto the bed, pulling her shorts and undies off, then doing the same to his.
Soon, he was inside her, moving gently as Barb moaned. She reached into the top drawer of the nightstand where they kept short pieces of rope that they often used to tie each other up. She dangled one in front of him. “Show me what the Goth Girl’s boyfriend did.”
“I wasn’t there,” Stan replied.
“But you have a pretty good idea, I think. Put the rope around my neck, Stan.”
Stan paused in his thrusting. “No, Barb, I’m not going to do that.”
“Why not?”
“There are things you won’t do and there are things I won’t do. I saw you almost strangle once and that’s enough for me.” He began his motions again.
“I just wanted to feel what the Goth Girl felt,” Barb said.
“Sorry. But I’ll tell you what, those marks on her breasts,” Stan said. He bent his head, took one of Barb’s nipples into his mouth and gently, but firmly, nipped at it. Barb’s body jerked and she moaned. “Do that again, Stan, please.”
Stan did as she asked and Barb moaned again. As he quickened his pace, he shifted his attention to her other breast. Soon she was moaning more and he felt himself tingling all over. Then he emptied himself into her as she cried out and he collapsed on top of her panting for breath.
Soon, he rolled off of her. “Now tell me how you found the Goth Girl’s boyfriend and made your case,” Barb said.
“Not tonight, dear. I have a headache,” Stan said. “Tomorrow.”
“You’re not a nice man, Stan Goldman,” Barb said. They drifted off to sleep.
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