"You tried to get me to tape it. I remember you asking that. Then it went off. Only you were gone and the body that Andy Llewellyn'd gotten for you was next to the phone."

Shelly smiled, and Rune thought it was a smile of admiration. "You know about him? You found that out too?"

"I saw his name on your calendar. Then I saw a story in the paper the other day about a murder. It mentioned that he was a medical examiner. I figured he'd be a good source for a body."

After a moment, Shelly said, "The body ... I remembered this guy--Andy--who'd picked me up at a bar one time. He was really funny, a nice guy--for someone who does autopsies all day. He was also making a nice low salary, so he was happy to take thirty thousand cash to get me a body and arrange to do the autopsy and fake the dentals--to identify the corpse as me. They aren't all that hard to come up with, did you know? Dozens of unidentified people die in the city every year."

She shook her head. "That night I was on some kind of automatic pilot. The body was in the room at Lame Duck where Andy and I had put it that evening, before I came over to your place for the taping session. The bomb was in the telephone. You were outside. I called to you, then went into the back of the studio and pressed a couple of buttons on this radio transmitter. The bomb went off.

"In my bag I had what was left of my savings, in cash, an original-edition Moliere play, a ring of my mother's, some jewelry. That was it. All my credit cards, driver's license, Citibank cash card letters, were in my purse in the room at Lame Duck."

"Aren't you afraid somebody here will recognize you?"

"Yes, of course. But Chicago's different from New York. There are only a couple adult theaters here, a few adult bookstores. No Shelly Lowe posters, like you see in Times Square. No Shelly Lowe tapes in the windows of the bookstores. And I had the surgery."

"And dyed your hair."

"No, this is my natural color." Shelly turned to her. "Besides, you're talking to me now, a few feet away--what do you think? Do I seem like the same person you interviewed on your houseboat?"

No, she didn't. She didn't at all. The eyes--the blue was there but they weren't laser beams any longer. The way she carried herself, her voice, her smile. She seemed older and younger at the same time.

Rune said, "I remember when I was taping you, you started out being so tough and, I don't know, controlled."

"Shelly Lowe was a ballbuster."

"But you slipped. Toward the end you became someone else."

"I know. That's why ..." She looked away. They started walking again, and Rune grinned.

"That's why you broke into my houseboat and stole the tape. It gave away too much."

"I'm sorry."

"You know, we thought Tommy was the killer."

"I heard about it. About Nicole ... That was so sad." Her voice faded. "Danny and Ralph Gutman and all the others--they were just sleazy. But Tommy was frightening. That's why I left him. It was those films of his. He started doing real S & M films. I left him after that. I guess when he found he couldn't get off on just pain alone he started doing snuff films. I don't know."

They walked for a few minutes in silence. Shelly laughed sadly, then said, "How you tracked me down, I'll never understand. Here in Chicago, I mean."

"It was your play. Delivered Flowers. I saw it on Arthur Tucker's desk. He'd crossed out your name and written his in. I thought ... Well, I thought he'd killed you--to steal your play. He really had me fooled."

"He's an acting coach, remember. And one of the best actors you'll ever meet."

"He gets an Oscar for that performance," Rune said. "I remembered the name of the theater. The Haymarket. It was written on the cover of the play. I called the theater and asked what was playing. They said Delivered Flowers."

Shelly said, "That was his idea, the play. He said that we'd pretend he wrote it. A play by Arthur Tucker would be a lot more likely to be produced than one by Becky Hanson. He sends me the royalties."

"None to the AIDS Coalition?"

"No. Should he?"

Rune laughed and said, "Probably he should. But things've changed since we made our deal." Thinking: Damn, that man was a good actor.

"Arthur got the company here to produce it and arranged for me to get the lead.... I thought about it afterward. It was very strange.

Here, I'd had the chance to direct my own death. My God, what an opportunity for an actress. Think of it all--a chance to create a character. In the ultimate sense. Create a whole new person."

They walked along Clark Street for a few minutes until they came to a Victorian brownstone. Shelly took her keys out of her purse.

Tags: Jeffery Deaver Rune Mystery
Source: readsnovelonline.net