I smiled at the women. “My name is V. I. Warshawski. I’m sad to see you destroy the angel. It was stunning. And amazing that you could create all these images in one day.”
“It’s ephemeral art. Like Goldsworthy, only even more ephemeral than leaves along a lakeshore.” Karen spoke gruffly, but she turned away from me, as if to hide any pleasure in my compliment. “This is Rivka, who did the tedious work of painting the designs on me and now is doing the equally hard part of removing them again. She’s my most reliable aide-de-camp when I’m doing serious work of my own.”
The younger woman flushed, and said, “You have to take them off, even though they’re so beautiful, because it’s hard on the Artist’s skin if she sleeps in the paint.”
“That’s Vesta on the stool.” The Artist didn’t pay any attention to Rivka’s interjection. “She’s a third-degree black belt.”
“Did you bring her to protect you from overeager fans, or from Rodney?” I asked.
“I think she was just trying to impress you,” Vesta said. “I’m not a bodyguard.”
She sat easily on her stool, with a kind of confidence in her bearing that I’d seen in other experienced martial artists-no need to be aggressive in the world. I’d learned to fight the hard way, on the streets of South Chicago, and it made me too pugnacious, too willing to believe the worst in the people I met. Although someone like Rainier Cowles and his friends demanded that one think the worst. I asked the Body Artist if Nadia had ever talked about him.
“I hardly knew her,” she said, her back still turned to me.
Rivka said, “I thought you said she came to you because-”
“Rivka, darling, don’t think so much. It will put wrinkles in your forehead.”
The younger woman’s neck turned pink at the crude put-down. When the Artist realized Vesta and I were both looking at her in disapproval, she turned and kissed Rivka on the mouth.
“I just mean,” the Artist added, “you must have misunderstood something I said.”
“Why did Nadia seek you out?” I asked, as if the interruption hadn’t taken place.
“She didn’t,” the Artist said. “Rivka mis-”
“Girl, enough of the lies,” Vesta said. “Nadia is dead. Allie is dead. Who else is going to die?”
“You knew Allie?” I asked. “Tell me about her.”
“There’s nothing to tell,” the Artist said. “We met at a music festival. She was deep in the closet, and wouldn’t see me back in Chicago because she was afraid someone would tell her parents. She’d only go to remote places, like festivals, to pick up women, and then she’d hop home like a frightened rabbit, back to mass, back to being a good hetero girl. End of story.”
“Not quite. How did you find Nadia?”
“Shoe’s on the other foot. Rivka, I’m freezing. Can you start cleaning and stop looking as if your dog just died?”
Rivka flushed again and resumed her scrubbing, working on the Artist’s vertebrae with the intensity of a sailor sanding a ship’s deck.
“How did Nadia find you?” I asked.
“Don’t know. She never said. Just showed up and started painting her designs. I was surprised-it’s not very often that someone with actual ability paints me. I was even more surprised when she asked me about Allie.”
“What did you tell her?”
“I didn’t remember Allie’s name. That pissed off Nadia, but what was I supposed to do? Keep track of every fucked-up woman who crawled into bed with me? It got her more pissed off to know I hadn’t kept track of Allie. I didn’t know the woman was dead. It was like the whole world was supposed to worship at Alexandra Guaman’s shrine, and, when I didn’t, it made me a cold bitch in Nadia’s eyes.”
In the mirror, I saw tears spilling down Rivka’s face. When she realized I was watching her, she started scouring even harder, which led the Artist to utter a sharp complaint. The Artist turned inside Rivka’s grip, took the sponge from her, and brushed her hair out of her eyes.
“Take a break, Rivulet. It’s been a long, hard day. I’ll work on my front while you get yourself some juice or a glass of wine.”
Rivka rubbed her eyes with the back of her hand, smearing paint across her face. She opened a small refrigerator tucked under a ledge and pulled out a bottled smoothie.
Karen spread cream over her breasts and started removing Nadia’s face. “It’s almost like a metaphor for life, isn’t it. One minute you’re here, the next minute you’re not.” Her voice was toneless. It was impossible to tell if she had any strong feelings about Nadia or Rivka, or even herself.
“Did she ever mention Rainier Cowles to you?”
Vesta flipped the brushes she’d been playing with onto the counter and looked at me. “Who is Rainier Cowles?”
“A lawyer,” I said. “He claims a special interest in the Guaman family. He may still be out front-he came here tonight with a tableful of corporate types. He said he wanted to examine the strip joint where his protégé’s daughter spent her last night.”
“The Body Artist isn’t a stripper,” Rivka cried. “How could you say such a thing? And then to pretend you admired the angel-”
“Whoa, there,” I interrupted. “I’m just reporting what he said, not my own beliefs.”
“Vesta doesn’t need to be my bodyguard while I have Rivka,” the Artist said.
The younger woman flushed again. Her slender neck, with little tendrils of hair curling from sweat, made her look as vulnerable as a daylily.
Vesta had slipped out of the room during Rivka’s outcry. She came back in now to report that the house was still rocking. “I think your corporate guys are there. Near the back of the room, left side? Go take a look, Buckley. Maybe it’ll refresh your memory.”
“I don’t need to refresh a memory I don’t have. If that’s why you came, Ms. Detective, I’m exhausted, and I’d like to finish paint removal so I can go to bed.” The Artist didn’t stop sponging her breasts while she spoke.
“I’m tired, too, between the weather, and death, and people lying to me,” I said. “Tell me what Nadia told you about Chad Vishneski.”
“She didn’t tell me anything,” the Artist said. “Rivka, finish my shoulders so I can put on a sweater. It’s freezing in here.”
Rivka jumped up and began scouring the cypress branch and pomegranate away from the Artist’s shoulders. “Vesta, can’t you help? Can’t you see how she’s shivering?”
“You’ve got her covered, or uncovered, Rivka,” said Vesta, “you’re doing fine.” She leaned against the counter and started fiddling with the brushes again.
“Chad Vishneski,” I repeated. “Every time Nadia painted on the Artist here, Chad exploded. If all Nadia cared about was her sister, then I’m guessing Chad knew her sister, right?”
“You’re the person making up the story.” The Body Artist put on a camisole and then pulled a heavy sweater over it. “Something about Nadia bothered him so much he shot her, and it could have been her cunt, since that’s what most guys see when they look at a woman.”
“And so you display yours as a defiant statement: If that’s all you think I am, that’s what I’ll be?” I asked. “Nadia found you because you’d slept with Allie. But how did she learn about your affair?”
“She never said, or, if she did, it was after I stopped listening to her.” The Artist slammed her palm against the dressing table. “She was more fucked up than her sister, if that’s what you want to know. She pretended she wanted to have sex with me, when obviously she was a virgin or at least not a dyke, and backed away into a corner when I started kissing her. And then she laid this heavy trip on me about her sister as if it was me, not God, who chose Allie’s sexuality.” The Artist pushed her straggling hair into a clip. “I told Nadia to go home and get a dildo and leave me alone, but she kept coming back to the club and doing her stupid painting. I am so bored by her and her hang-ups, and her crush on her sister, I can’t tell you how uninterested I am in all those girls.”