Dead by Any Other Name by Sebastian Stuart Read Free Book Online Page B

mine!! Ciao-shalom, dear girl, no time to chat, must go paint, my vagina is adamant !”
    She raced into the house in a fit of … Octavianess.
    I got in my car but instead of heading down the drive, I turned up the service road and parked behind the garage, out of sight of the main house. I got out and ducked into the garage.
    Inside were a dusty Bentley, a Jaguar, and a Land Rover; there were also ancient croquet sets, tennis rackets, saddles, and the like. Clearly these gals didn’t get out of their hothouse too often, and they also clearly had more money than they knew what to do with.
    I climbed a staircase at the back of the garage and opened the door into a large loft-like room with a peaked ceiling. It had unpainted wood walls, a vintage kitchen at one end, a woodstove, simple windows, and was furnished in a minimal masculine way, with an enormous roughhewn table, an iron-frame bed, Mission-style chairs, a few bleached animal skulls, a Navajo blanket, wooden candlesticks—the effect was kind of macho chic, like a magazine spread on the weekend house of two gay guys who work in fashion.
    There was a picture of Natasha on the refrigerator door and several of her CDs were on the table, along with a small pile of maps of the Hudson Valley, including a nautical map of the river; a bunch of vitamin and supplement bottles were on the kitchen counter. Otherwise the place was without much character, I couldn’t get any real sense of who Pavel was, except maybe a certain primal simplicity—or the pretense of same.
    I was about to head into the bathroom when I heard the sounds of an approaching motorcycle. I looked out a window—the bike pulled to a stop near my car, the rider swung his long leg over the machine and pulled off his helmet, took a step toward my car and eyed it. Then he walked into the garage.
    I tried to compose myself as his footfalls echoed up the stairs. He got to the top, saw me, and stopped. Then he smiled, a slightly lopsided smile, the power of which he was well aware.
    Yes, Pavel lived up to his billing—tall, lean and muscled, with a hank of the thickest brown hair on the planet, tawny skin, a killer jawline, a full mouth, and green eyes that just pulled you in, soulful and full of some ineffable promise—a better world, maybe? Or was it just the best sex in history? Stunning as the parts were, the whole was greater, it was his grace, aura, the off-kilter smile—and he was just so hot . Beauty and sex appeal are two different qualities—I had clients no one would call pretty who spent their lives fighting off advances, and great-looking clients who had a hard time getting laid—Pavel was the ultimate fusion of the two.
    Yup, the Gods had smiled on this dude; he had landed at Bumpland and might very well become lord of the manor—clearly those green eyes were not as guileless as they seemed. I reminded myself that the Gods are fickle.
    â€œHi,” he said.
    â€œI assume you’re Pavel.”
    â€œThat is me.” He had a pretty strong Eastern European accent.
    â€œI’m Janet Petrocelli.”
    â€œHello, Janet Petrocelli.”
    â€œYou’re probably wondering what I’m doing in your house?”
    He shrugged. Clearly he was used to people showing up at his house, wherever he lived.
    â€œI’m a friend of Natasha,” I said, ready to clock his reaction.
    He smiled again. “I cannot reach Natasha. Did she send you to give me a message?”
    If he was acting, he was doing a pretty good job. Either way, the next step was to tell him—and keep an eagle eye on his response.
    â€œNo, she didn’t send me. I came on my own.” I moved toward him. “Pavel, I have some sad news about her.”
    He cocked his head, quizzical.
    â€œShe’s dead.”
    His face grew very grave. “Natasha is dead?”
    â€œYes.”
    He stood dead still for a moment, before asking, “How did she