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“Esquire Club.” The husky female voice that answered on the third ring was one Elizabeth recognized. She’d talked to Tracy on the phone several times, and they’d met once in person. Elizabeth had recognized Tracy’s type immediately, and she’d tried to warn her sister, but as usual April had blown off the advice. Red-haired and curvaceous, Tracy Kensington had been the most popular dancer at the club—until April’s arrival. In that business, the younger the girl, the better the tips, and Tracy was a few years older than April. To make up for that she vied with April for the top spot, the best time, the hottest music. Despite that, April had always been friendly toward her and still was, but Tracy didn’t return the favor. Every time she had a chance, she tried to sabotage April.
“Tracy, this is Elizabeth Benoit, April’s sister. I was wondering if you’ve seen April today?”
“Haven’t seen her,” Tracy replied, her west-Texas drawl replacing some of the sexy purr but not all of it. “Your sister gone missin’?”
“She’s not missing. I just can’t get an answer at her place. She works tonight, doesn’t she?”
“I guess so.”
“What time is she supposed to be there?”
“I’m not sure.”
Elizabeth tried to stifle her irritation. The dancers were all very tight-lipped, not just to people who weren’t part of the life, but among themselves; there wasn’t a lot of sharing. Elizabeth suspected that it was simply a result of the competitiveness of the work, each dancer playing her cards close to her chest so as not to give anyone else an edge. It did not, however, make Elizabeth’s situation less frustrating. She was April’s sister, for God’s sake, not some weirdo stranger.
She kept the annoyance from her voice. “Could I talk to Mr. Lansing, then, please?”
Without replying, the woman dropped the phone and walked away—Elizabeth could hear her high heels clacking on the hard floor at the club. Then she heard Tracy call out, “Greg! You there? Phone call!”
Elizabeth tapped her pen against her desk impatiently. After an interminable wait, Greg Lansing, the manager of the club, picked up the phone and said hello. His voice was as gravelly as Tracy’s, but raspier, the result, Elizabeth was sure, of too many years of booze, cigarettes and shouting over hundred-decibel rock music for hours at a time. They’d never met, but she’d seen him one night when she’d worn glasses and a scarf and sneaked into the club to watch April dance.
Elizabeth could see why April found him attractive. Tall and well built, he had long blond hair and radiated the kind of bad-boy attitude some women found really appealing. Not Elizabeth. She’d met too many men just like him, and she could easily recognize the sleaze beneath the thin veneer of handsomeness.
“Mr. Lansing, this is Elizabeth Benoit. I’m looking for April.”
“Haven’t seen her.” His voice started fading even before he finished speaking. She realized he was about to hang up.
“Wait—wait, Mr. Lansing! Please…”
There was a second’s silence and she thought she’d lost him. Then he said, “What?”
“What time is she due in tonight?”
“I don’t keep track of when the different girls come on.” She heard him pull on a cigarette. “Probably around twelve, one. Something like that.” Above the clink of glasses and laughter, music throbbed in the background. An old Aerosmith hit, the bass rumbling out with a downbeat rhythm.
He was lying, of course. He kept track of everything at the club, down to the last penny and the closing minute. She ignored his prevarication and concentrated on finding out more. “I thought April was more than just one of the girls to you.”
He hesitated for a moment, then his voice went into an even lower-pitched growl. “Your sister’s a nutcase. I’m trying to stay away from her, and if you had any sense, you would, too.”
Elizabeth tensed. “What are you talking about?”
“April’s gettin’ into some bad shit. She don’t watch out, she’s gonna be in some serious trouble.” Again he drew on the cigarette, the sound harsh in her ear. “The kind of trouble that hurts. Permanently.”
Elizabeth’s fingers stilled, her pen clattering to the desk. “What are you saying? What’s going on with April?”
“She’s your sister. Ask her if you wanna know.” He paused and drew yet again on the cigarette, this time even more deeply. As though she were standing in the darkened club beside him, Elizabeth could almost feel the music, almost smell the smoke.
When he spoke, his voice was so full of warning Elizabeth shivered. “But don’t wait too long to ask her, or you might lose your chance.”
SHE WORRIED until she could stand it no longer. Late that night, she gave in and called the police. The woman who took the information was polite, but just barely. They covered the basics—name, address, age—then she asked a few more questions.
“How long has your sister been gone?”
“I saw her last night. She slept at my place, but this morning, when I got up, she had left.”
“Less than twenty-four hours….” The woman spoke as if to herself, obviously filling out some kind of report.
“Does that matter?” Elizabeth asked anxiously. “Does she have to be gone a certain length of time before you’ll start looking?”
“No. That’s just on TV. We’ll start looking immediately if it’s a serious report.”
“And what makes it serious?”
“Suspicious circumstances, primarily. Do you have cause to believe something’s wrong?”
Elizabeth bit her bottom lip.
“Ma’am?”
“I don’t know for sure that anything’s happened to her, but I’m worried. I mean Houston’s a dangerous place, right?”
“But do you have a specific reason to believe she might have been harmed?”
“Well, her boss—he’s an ex-boyfriend—told me she might be getting into serious trouble. He wouldn’t say more.”
“And he is…?”
Elizabeth spelled out Greg Lansing’s name, then in a halting voice, told the woman where he worked.
“He runs the Esquire Club? And your sister works there?”
“What difference does that make?” Elizabeth heard the defensiveness in her voice.
The woman on the other end of the phone hesitated. “Well, it does put a different spin on things, doesn’t it?”
“You mean if she ran an oil company, you’d start looking for her, but since she’s an exotic dancer, you’ll give it a few days first?”
“I mean, Ms. Benoit, some people have more stable lifestyles than others. It’s more significant when they disappear because of that. Has your sister ever done this type of thing before?”
Elizabeth closed her eyes. “Yes,” she said quietly. “About two years ago. She went to the Caribbean for a week without telling me.” With a man she didn’t know. She’d sent Elizabeth a postcard, but then at the end of the week, she’d called Elizabeth collect. Crying and desperate, she said the man had abandoned her. He’d turned out to be different than she’d thought was her only explanation. Elizabeth had sent her money for the fare home, and April had assured her of one thing—she would never disappear that way again. She promised she’d tell Elizabeth if she was leaving town, and she had done so faithfully.
Until now.
Elizabeth tried to explain but she could almost hear the investigator’s mind slam shut.
“Why don’t you give it a few more days, Ms. Benoit? If you haven’t heard from your sister by Tuesday or so, then call us back. That would probably be the best way to handle this.”
Elizabeth thanked the woman and hung up. There was nothing else she could do.
CHAPTER TWO
JOHN STOOD in the breezeway of the town homes Wednesday evening, by the mailboxes, and watched old Mrs. LeBlanc totter away, a polite smile plastered on his face as he asked himself, for the umpteenth time, why he didn’t just move. The place had a few people his age, but most of the residents were ancient tiny women who were constantly trying to fix him up with divorced grandnieces or granddaughters who had five kids. Before he’d come here—after Marsha had gotten the house—he’d lived in an apartment, an anonymous place where no one spoke to anyone. Then his mother had passed away and left him the town house. It’d seemed easier to move in than to sell the place, and it was in a safe neighborhood. He never worried about bringing Lisa over.
There were the little old ladies, though, and women like Elizabeth Benoit to contend with. He took two steps and was tossing the junk mail from his box into the nearest trash container when the woman in question came around the corner.
She had her briefcase in one hand and her purse in the other. Tucked under one arm was a dark blue folder with the words “Benoit Consulting—Personal and Confidential” printed on the outside in silver script. His eyes went to Elizabeth herself. Her dark gold suit, like the black one she’d had on the last time he’d seen her, looked as though it’d been made for her, the jacket hugging her figure—but not too tightly—and the skirt ending at a tantalizing point just above her knees. The color was just right for her, her ivory skin glowing from its reflection, reminding him of his mother’s translucent plates still sitting in the china cabinet in his dining room. Everything about Elizabeth Benoit was polished, perfect and gorgeous—except for the ferocious frown marring her forehead.
Seeing John, she pulled up short. Her frown vanished and was replaced with studied politeness.
Normally he would have nodded, turned on his heel and left, but instead he stood and stared at her. She was the first to break eye contact. John told himself to walk away, but his feet seemed fixed to the sidewalk. She leaned past him and unlocked her mailbox. Her key ring, he noticed, had a Mercedes-Benz symbol on it. She reached inside but her fingers came out empty—she hadn’t even received the junk mail he had. When she straightened, she looked so crushed he spoke without thinking.
“No mail?”
She lifted her gaze, and he was shocked into silence. A smart-aleck reply, a cold shoulder, even a curt go-to-hell wouldn’t have surprised him as much as the sight of her exquisite dark eyes filling with tears.
Before he could react, Mrs. Beetleman from 10D came around the corner. She glanced curiously at Elizabeth, then turned her twenty-thousand-dollar face to John and seemed about to speak. Nodding quickly, John engineered their escape, taking Elizabeth’s elbow and leading her away before the old woman could ask what was wrong.
They crossed to a nearby iron bench, which was shaded by a huge pin oak. Elizabeth Benoit sat down heavily, and John, shielding her from Mrs. Beetleman’s puzzled stare, took the seat beside her, pulling his handkerchief from his pocket and handing it to her. She nodded her thanks and dabbed her eyes.
When she finished, she stared at the square of white cotton for a second, then finally looked up. “I haven’t seen a man with a real handkerchief in his pocket since my father died.”
Her voice was a throaty contralto and it washed over John with a heavy warmth. “I’m a cop,” he said without thinking. “Always gotta be prepared.”
She nodded as if his ridiculous answer made perfect sense. For a moment they sat side by side in the hot twilight. The traffic noise on the side street and the cries of children playing in the neighborhood park kept the moment from the awkwardness of total silence.
Finally he spoke. “Is there something I can do for you? You look upset.”
To his horror, her eyes filled up again. She shook her head, then answered unexpectedly, her voice huskier than before, the words tight and angry. “It’s my sister,” she said. “I can’t find her. I thought she might have at least sent me a postcard.”
“Are you saying she’s missing?”
She nodded. “Yes. She came over to my place for a birthday celebration. Then we…we had an argument and I haven’t seen her since. And I’m really worried.” She looked down at her hands and shook her head, speaking again, this time softly. “I can’t believe I’m telling you this.” She made a motion as if to get up. “I’m sorry—I shouldn’t be bothering you…”
He reached out and put his hand on her arm. She seemed startled by the touch and he instantly pulled back, but not before his brain had registered the sensation. Skin so warm and soft it was sinful. “Please…don’t leave. Tell me.”
She hesitated, then after a moment she sank back down to the bench. “I know you’re a policeman. Mrs. Shaftel told me.”
She blinked suddenly, as if she’d given away a secret. And maybe she had, he thought. She’d obviously had a conversation about him with her neighbor. Did that mean she’d been as aware of him as he was of her?
She spoke again, quickly this time. “What kind of cop are you?”
“I’m a detective,” he answered. “Homicide.”
She nodded, almost to herself.
“How old is your sister?” he asked. “Is she a juvenile?”
“No…no.” She shook her head. “She’s my age. We’re twins, identical twins. We turned twenty-eight on Sunday.”
Warning bells sounded in his head. Twenty-eight. What was he thinking? His thirty-seven suddenly seemed ancient. He was surprised she hadn’t called him sir. It always killed him when they did that.
“Twenty-eight,” he repeated. “So she’s an adult. No runaway situation. Maybe she took a trip. Went somewhere for a while and just didn’t say anything to you.”
“She’d tell me first, probably even borrow money from me.” She licked her lips, then pulled her bottom one in between her teeth. “She took my car, too.”
He kept his expression neutral. “You could file a stolen vehicle report.”
“I don’t want to do that.” Her voice was stronger now, more in control. He could see the shell of her usual demeanor coming back into place. “I’ve reported her missing. That’s all I’m going to do. I don’t want her hauled in or anything.”
He shrugged. “Might be the easiest way to find her.”
“No.”
No further explanation, no other words to back it up. Just “no.”
“Does she live with you? I don’t think I’ve seen her around.”
“She has her own apartment at The Pines. On lower Montrose.” She sent him a quick glance, then looked back down at her hands. Lower Montrose was a long way from where they sat—not in miles but in financial terms. It wasn’t the best part of Houston. “She works…over by the Galleria.”
John waited a moment, then spoke again. “Do you think she’s in trouble?”
Her eyes jerked to his, the gaze narrowing. “Why do you ask?”
“You’re awfully worried.”
“Wouldn’t you be if your sister had disappeared?”
For one short moment his muscles in his chest tightened painfully, making it hard to breathe. He didn’t have a sister. Not now. When Beverly had been alive, though, he hadn’t really appreciated her. What he wouldn’t give to have that time back so he could redo it, make it right, so he could love her as Elizabeth obviously loved her sister. He pushed the thought away.
“If I had one, and she was twenty-eight, I’d figure she’s old enough to know what she’s doing.”
Her expression softened. “I should, too, I guess, but April’s not…a responsible twenty-eight.”
“Who is in their twenties? Thirty-something maybe…forty-something probably, but twenty?” He shook his head. “I don’t think so.”
She bristled. “I’m twenty-eight and I’m certainly responsible.”
He sent her a measuring stare and silently agreed. There were shadows in those beautiful dark eyes and a tenseness in her face he hadn’t noticed before. Hell, she’d probably been responsible when she was eight, much less twenty-eight. Why? What demons did she have no one else knew about?
“I can see that,” he said finally. “It’s obvious or you wouldn’t be worried about…” He waited for her to supply the name.
“April,” she said reluctantly. “April Benoit. And I’m Elizabeth.”
“I’m John Mallory.”
With the exchange of names, her attitude shifted and became even more remote. A thick silence grew between them, then she broke it by speaking stiffly. “I’m sorry, Detective Mallory, to dump all this on you. The strain’s getting to me, I guess. Believe me, I usually don’t tell strangers intimate details of my life like this.”
“It’s John,” he said, “and don’t worry about it. I’d be happy to look into it for you.”
