Identity Crisis (Sam McRae Mystery 1)

So Tom died in the apartment. “How awful,” I said.

He belched loudly. “You bet it is.”

More alcohol and garlic. I tried not to breathe too deeply.

He rambled on about our horrible society, and how no one is safe anymore. I smiled and nodded politely, and was about to excuse myself when he said, “You looking for Bruce? He’s probably working out.”

“Oh, right,” I said. “Now, what was the name of that gym?”

“Kent’s Gym. Right down 197.”

I snapped my fingers. “Of course. Kent’s Gym. Thanks.”

Creepy guy. I could feel him staring after me as I walked downstairs.

The Mustang coughed to life with some encouraging gas pedal footwork on my part. I couldn’t make a left when I hit the main road, so I went right and maneuvered over quickly to pull a U-turn at the next median break.

Behind me, someone honked his horn, long and loud. I looked back and saw a big, black car with dark windows trying to move to the left lane, holding up traffic in the process. I could picture a blue-haired lady or an old man in a hat hunched behind the wheel. I made the U-turn and noticed the black car did the same.

Out of idle curiosity, I kept my eye on the car. It was a Lincoln, gleaming like it had just been driven from the dealer’s. I turned in at the entrance to the parking lot, watching to see if the Lincoln followed. It did.

Could it be following me? Why? Nerves, I thought. The heat must be getting to me.

Kent’s Gym was in an old shopping center on Route 197 with a discount grocery and a place that sold ninety-nine-cent greeting cards. I wove through the lot and found a space near the gym. As I was putting the car’s roof up, I saw the Lincoln again. It came down the aisle, at a leisurely pace and with a slight bobbing motion, as if it were floating. Maybe it was my imagination, but it seemed to slow a little as it neared me. The big car had a gaudy, chrome hood ornament and chrome trim. Something about the design suggested a rolling, black casket. I shivered and my skin popped goose bumps, despite the evening’s warmth.

I also noticed it had New York tags.

The car glided away, never stopping, back to the street, where it merged into traffic and disappeared into the evening haze.

Chapter FOUR

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The front of Kent’s Gym was a huge plate-glass window with treadmills and cross-trainers lined up so the whole world could admire the sweaty backsides of everyone using them. The ambiance was chilly and loud, overrun with a post-work-hours crowd that was busy flexing and extending its way to better health on various weight machines. ESPN and MTV competed on two TV sets. In the free weights section, a radio played head-banging music, and a man doing bench presses grunted so loudly with each rep, you would have thought he was giving birth.

I had no idea what Schaeffer looked like, so I asked a young girl reading at the front desk whether he was there. “Wow, he’s popular tonight,” she said. She had short, spiky black hair and marble green eyes, which did a quick sweep around the room. “He was just here, talking to someone. They might have gone back to the exercise room.”

“OK if I take a look?”

“Sure,” she said, like she was surprised I asked. She pointed me toward a hall off the main gym and delved again into her paperback.

I walked down the short hall, past some closed offices, toward the entrance to the dark exercise room. As I approached, a woman inside the room yelled, “You bastard!”

“Keep it down, would you?” a man hissed in reply.

Casually, I leaned against the wall near the entrance, as if waiting for someone, then stole a quick peek inside. Three people were in there—two women and one man. One of the women glared at the man. The second woman watched them. It was hard to see their faces, since the only light came from a walk-in storage closet across the room. But I recognized Miss Anger Management in the halter top.

“You’re lying,” she said.

“Why would I lie about such a thing?” he said.

“He can’t be dead. You son of a bitch. You’re just trying to protect him.”

“We’re going to get kicked out if you don’t shut the hell up.”

In the gloom, I made out her expression in profile, a mixture of disbelief and rage. For a moment, she was still. Then she threw herself at the man, wailing and pounding his chest like an infant having a temper tantrum.

The man was tall and well-built. He seemed able to take it, but he was struggling to catch her flailing arms. The other woman kept taking hesitant steps toward them, then back.