Dead by Any Other Name Read Online Free PDF Page B

overlook the bullshit oozing out of their ears. Tosh said her Mom was trying to help her, but then why didn’t they just cut her a check so she could move the fuck out to LA? She had contacts out there, big-time like.” She got quiet and something hardened around her mouth, the tears were over, she was already moving on to the next class at her personal school of hard knocks. “Poor Tosh. She’s gone. … What’s it to you, by the way?”
    â€œI met her, I liked her.”
    â€œShe was a great kid, wasn’t she?”
    I nodded.
    She scrutinized me, as if for the first time. “You look like a really nice person. You’re pretty, too. I always wished I had green eyes.”
    â€œIs there anything else you can tell me about Natasha’s life?”
    Her eyes went down, she bit her lower lip. Then she looked up at me, almost innocent, and said, “No.”

eleven
    I tooled down 212 toward Sawyerville in a less than a great mood —I couldn’t believe I was letting myself get sucked into another murder, or whatever it was. This was supposed to be my time, the years when I took it easy and pursued my long-ignored quasi-interest in things like painting, Asian history, joining a reading group, and just doing a whole lot of nothing. I did not want to get sucked into some swirling vortex of a lost girl, her narcissistic parents, shady boyfriend, kinky sex, and murder. No way, no how. I had paid my dues to the human race, my footprint was light, leave me be.
    Then I heard a faint echo: Natasha’s voice singing Love by Any Other Name … the kindness in her eyes—and the fear. It was that fear—combined with everything I’d learned about suicide during my psychotherapy training and practice—that made me think somebody killed her. I couldn’t let that sit. I just couldn’t.
    I hit the accelerator.
    I dropped into Abba’s. George was sitting at the counter, wearing jodhpurs. He stood up and modeled them for me.
    â€œIt’s a hot look, don’t you think?” he said.
    â€œIt’s a look.”
    â€œYou know, Janet, you really are a wet dishrag in human form. You feel threatened by passion. Antonio is my lover and my life, his world is my world—I start my riding lessons today.”
    â€œHey, that’s great, where?”
    He sat on his stool, took a sip of coffee and said casually, “Emerson elementary.”
    â€œYou’re starting your riding lessons at an elementary school? Do they have horses there?”
    â€œYou’re so literal .”
    â€œWell, you do need a horse to have a riding lesson, don’t you?”
    â€œI’m starting out on a playground horse because I suffer from severe equinophobia ! I was profoundly traumatized by a horse as a child.”
    â€œI’m sorry, I didn’t know that. What happened?”
    â€œI’m trying to remember … but I’m sure it had something to do with my father’s penis.”
    â€œHow’s the Van Wyck campaign going?”
    â€œI spent an hour calling voters today. His wife, Alice, dropped into headquarters with a wicker basket of tea sandwiches and cookies, it was a bit noblesse oblige , but whatever. They were good.”
    Abba came out from the kitchen and joined us. I filled them both in on my day.
    â€œDo you know anything about two English sisters who live down in Stone Ridge?” When it came to the Hudson Valley, Abba was a font of history, the latest news and the juiciest gossip.
    â€œOh sure, the Bump sisters, Octavia and Lavinia, I’d say they’re fiftyish, from some fancy British family, a lot of money, their dad was a lord or a knight or something, maybe minor royalty. Apparently they’re pretty strange, so strange that the family basically pays them to stay on this side of the pond.”
    â€œHave you met them?”
    â€œNever have. They mostly stick to their estate, it’s on Leggett