This was not Lucrezia Panciatichi’s composed, impassive face, then, watching him slyly. This was a beautiful woman, to be sure, but it was a created beauty, not nature given. And a beauty of which she was altogether conscious.

  Unfortunately, it took no prescience to see that Tom did not share his critical assessment. Tom had gotten that gleam in his eyes, a look Stanley hadn’t seen for a while now, not since they’d begun living together, and was far from happy to see return. A way Tom had of looking at certain women that stopped just short of licking his chops, but gave the impression of it just the same. And Stanley could all but smell the machismo, that scent of recklessness that came over him at times like these.

  And what, Stanley wondered, was he to do about it, about this sudden flare up of Tom’s heterosexual predilections? This had been, from the very first, inevitable, notwithstanding that he had tried never to think about it. He was all too aware of the fragility of their relationship, most especially of its newness in Tom’s experience. A man couldn’t be expected to change his lifestyle in so dramatic a fashion without some vestiges of what he had been before. And in Tom’s case, what he had been before was a woman chasing bed hopper. Who, as he’d confessed more than once, had a taste for “big hooters.”

  So, here Stanley was, standing so close at Tom’s side that he’d hardly have had to wriggle his fingers to take hold of Tom’s hand, and feeling as if they were suddenly separated by immeasurable miles, a vast and uncrossable Sahara of emotion and desires.

  Oddly enough, just as their hostess’s initial smile had been for Stanley and not for Tom, it was Stanley now on whom she DEADLY DREAMS 71

  fastened those laser beam eyes. “And you’re Mister Korski, aren’t you?”

  Flirting with me? Stanley wondered. It certainly seemed that way, but it was hard to imagine how she could not read his gayness, which was not exactly a closely guarded secret. Still, to make things clear, he gave his head a little toss, as if to get the yellow curls out of his eyes.

  “Very percipient.” He came unconsciously close to a lisp.

  “And this is my partner, Tom Danzel.”

  Tom, not used to women overlooking him, had noticed too the attention she was giving to Stanley. He moved slightly, not quite putting himself between them, just making his own presence more conspicuous, and gave her one of his sun-breaking-through-the-clouds smiles, which he knew from fruitful experience few women could resist.

  For a strange moment, Stanley saw them as if watching a trio of strangers from the distance, saw Tom actually competing with him for someone’s attention, never mind that Stanley didn’t want the woman’s attention.

  Of all the many things he had imagined might happen at some time or other in his relationship with Tom, the possibility that they might be in competition for some woman’s attention was one he had never imagined.

  Of course, if he thought about it, if competition there were to be, it would have to be over a woman. Tom had no particular interest in other men, was still trying on his interest in Stanley, like a new jacket that he wasn’t quite used to wearing yet.

  Nevertheless, it was beyond rare when a woman came on to Stanley—if, for whatever reason, that was what she was doing.

  But, why would she? Every gay man knew there were women to whom their homosexuality was a challenge; the old, “he just hasn’t met the right woman yet” school of thought.

  There was surely a greater question here, though. It was rare for a woman to rise to that challenge when right there also at hand was a masculine hunk all but drooling over her, and she was certainly not the kind of woman who would fail to notice that.

  72 Victor J. Banis

  Did not, in fact, fail to notice. After the briefest study of Stanley, her eyes slid, reluctantly, it seemed as if against her better judgment, in Tom’s direction. A fleeting glance, but enough, clearly, to like what they saw. Better, obviously, than what she had been seeing.

  “You’re the detectives,” she said.

  “With a mystery on our hands, it seems,” Stanley said.

  “And that is?” One eyebrow went up slightly, but she looked altogether amused.

  “Why we’re here,” Stanley said. He made an expansive gesture.

  “You don’t like modern art?”

  “Oh, yes. Very much,” Tom said, a shade too enthusiastically.

  “Yes, of course I do,” Stanley said, the emphasis on the personal pronoun. “My question was, rather, how did you come up with our names? Why we were invited.”

  “Maybe because you are detectives?”

  “Like, you’re saying you’ve got a job in mind? A detective job?” Tom said.

  That upward tilt of the eyebrow again. “Perhaps.

  Something.” She gave Tom a look into which much could be read with little imagination. At his sides, Stanley’s fingers clenched and unclenched of their own volition. He tried not to think where he’d like to put them.

  Instead, he waved a hand in the direction of a piece of sculpture, nothing but wires and blocks of Lucite. “If you won’t take offense…”

  “I’ll take whatever I can get,” she interrupted him, and the glance she threw in Tom’s direction underscored her willingness. She looked down, then, at their empty hands. “Oh, but you’ve got no bubbly. It’s not bad, really, for this,” she made an inclusive motion with her head, “this kind of affair.”

  She verbally underlined that word “affair.” It seemed to take on a physical essence between them, almost to scent the air, to DEADLY DREAMS 73

  promise something more than an art showing at an out of the way gallery.

  “I’m a big bubbly man,” Tom said, which Stanley knew was a blatant falsehood, unless the bubbles were in the head of a mug of beer. Stanley almost said as much, and bit his tongue. If looking fair won’t woo him, looking foul won’t do it, he reminded himself—although if memory served, Sir John Suckling hadn’t specifically ruled out an elbow in the ribs.

  “Then, we must have some.” She looked around, as if the champagne might be dangling from a thread just within reach, and smiled directly at Tom, blood-stained lips parted to show perfect teeth. “It’s over there,” she said, without moving in the direction of the makeshift bar in the corner. Tom made no movement either. They stood as if they were carved out of stone.

  Which seems to leave me, Stanley thought, and couldn’t think of a single valid reason why he shouldn’t go for the champagne.

  Not, certainly, because he was wanted here.

  “I’ll get it,” he said, and moved quickly away without waiting for anyone to reply, afraid that no one would object to the suggestion, that Tom might not insist that he be the one to go.

  Weaving his way through the crowd of would be art lovers, Stanley had a horrible moment of wondering if either of them had noticed his leaving. And rather thought not.

  § § § § §

  Daniella had noticed, however. She looked after him as he made his way through the throng. The little one had been her instructions. Only, she hadn’t been told that he was as queer as a three dollar bill. Quite clearly, her chances of seducing him were non-existent. But shouldn’t her instructor have known that?

  On the other hand, his companion… Tom kept his eyes resolutely down, looking at his shoes. Looking, in fact, unhappy. When he lifted his eyes, Daniella was smiling at him, a mocking smile.

  “My apartment is just upstairs,” she surprised him by saying.

  74 Victor J. Banis

  Tom did look after Stanley then, his eyes drawn against his will, but Stanley was lost in the crowd. Tom felt torn. Since he’d surrendered to his feelings for Stanley—whatever they were, he reminded himself—he had actually not thought of being with a woman, a fact which had surprised him no end, considering his considerable history with them.

  Now, however, the old habits came back, rose up in him like a fury. He looked at Daniella and felt the blood boil up within him, was afraid to look down, afraid he might see his trousers tenting outrageously—he simply couldn’t help himself, couldn’t help what was happening inside him. It was an act of will not to grab her, fling her to the floor, fuck her right here and now.

  And all his instincts, which had served him pretty much unerringly throughout his heterosexual life, assured him she would not object greatly, crowded room or no crowded room.

  “Daniella…”

  “My friends call me Danna.”

  “Danna.” He tested it on his tongue. “How far upstairs?”

  “They’ll hardly notice we’re gone.”

  He doubted that, doubted that quite absolutely. Stanley would know, would know even before they were gone. He couldn’t help that either, though. There were things you had to do, that held you in so possessive a grip that there was nothing for it but to surrender to them.

  Still, he stood without moving, until she said, “And I really did have something in mind. That you can do for me, I mean.”

  He nodded. What more needed to be said? This was not social, not even a good thing, he wasn’t fool enough to pretend to himself like that. It was animal business, in-heat rutting.

  There was no need to make it more than it was. That kind of lie would surely be more of a betrayal to Stanley than the act itself, wouldn’t it?

  He couldn’t pretend, either, that he wasn’t betraying Stanley, betraying him just by standing here thinking the things he was thinking. He was capable of a lot of shitty things, but that kind of self deception he couldn’t manage.

  DEADLY DREAMS 75

  But, fucking… he’d never thought it mattered all that much in the grand scheme of things. He did it, he liked it, but he didn’t think it was of much consequence. Maybe because, like the rich man with his money, he’d always had it to burn.

  She smiled and nodded back, and turned, walking toward the rear of the gallery, not quickly, but not slowly either, ignoring the greetings of those she passed. Tom followed close behind her, looking at no one, not even at her. Looking, in fact, at something inside himself.

  Something he didn’t much care for.

  § § § § §

  At the bar, Stanley took a single flute of champagne from a dewy eyed bartender who looked too young to be serving it, leaned with his back against the bar, and sipped the wine while he let his eyes rove about the room, carefully avoiding the place near the faux marble column, where he’d left Tom and the faux beautiful Daniella, wondering how long it would be before either of them missed him.

  The glass emptied, and none too quickly, he signaled the bartender for another and, unable to contain his curiosity any longer, looked directly at where they had been when he left them—and were no more. It would have been difficult to miss that crimson silk.

  His heart turned into a chunk of rock, plummeting downward, surely would crash through the floor beneath his feet. He drained the glass in one long swig.

  “Another?” the bartender asked, flashing a flirtatiously sweet smile.

  “No, thanks, I’ve think I’ve had all I can handle.” Stanley set the empty glass atop the bar with such force that the stem broke, making the bartender’s eyes go wide with surprise and wiping the flirty smirk from his face altogether.

  “Charge it to my tab,” Stanley said, sucking a tiny bead of blood—the color of Daniella’s jump suit—off one finger.

  He strode for the door, not bothering to look for Tom and the She Wolf.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  A single flight of stairs, hidden behind a brocade tapestry at the far wall, led to an apartment on the second floor. A surprisingly small apartment, considering that the whole second floor was there to be used, but an enormous mirror that covered most of one wall made the small space appear larger than it was.

  The room into which Daniella led him was decorated in starkly modern pieces: tables made of great slabs of rock, uncomfortable looking chairs that mocked human physique, masses of twisted wire that functioned as lamps.

  “Nice,” Tom said, glancing around.

  Her laugh was like a cat’s purr. “You’re just being polite. It’s grotesque, really. It’s all stuff from downstairs.”

  “But it’s what you represent. In the gallery.”

  “It’s what I sell. Modern art sells well in San Francisco.” She paused to turn the heat off. The apartment was warm, too warm for her tastes. It got cold in Dayton, Ohio, in the winter, and more often than not, they hadn’t been able to pay for heat.

  She’d grown up used to cold rooms. “The moneyed people here don’t want anything too easily understood, that goes for friends and lovers. As for myself,” she slipped off the Pashmina stole, tossed it negligently onto a sling shaped chair, from which it promptly slid to the floor unnoticed, an inky puddle, “I like my comfort. My bed, for instance, is quite conventional. And, really, it is my favorite piece of furniture.”

  “Oh,” Tom said, sounding nearly as blank as he felt. He didn’t understand why he was here. He knew, of course, what had motivated him to come, but the detective’s mind never stopped looking for mysteries, or clues to their solution.

  Notwithstanding his hot nuts, he felt oddly unsure of why she had invited him. Lust, yes, he recognized that, had always been finely attuned to it in women. She wanted him. He’d known 78 Victor J. Banis

  that from the moment she first laid eyes on him. He wanted her too. And yet…

  Something was wrong, a false note that he couldn’t put his finger on, but which his detective’s instinct could feel thrumming between them. It wasn’t him she’d set out to pick up when she’d approached them downstairs. It was Stanley.

  Now, he personally thought Stanley was as cute as could be, in his tutti frutti way, but it would be a pretty unsophisticated woman who couldn’t tell at a glance that Stanley wasn’t turned on to women.

  Daniella Bentham was not that unsophisticated. She must have known before she even spoke to them, yet she had made a play for Stanley, even knowing from the start that it was doomed to failure.

  Even before that, though, she had invited them here, to her gallery, for reasons not explained, had come to seek them out only minutes after they had arrived, as if she had been waiting for them to walk in the door. Why, he wondered? Something planned in advance, it would seem. And if so, what exactly was planned, that involved Stanley? Because, whatever it was, he was certain of that—it was about Stanley. His involvement, the fact that she was hot for him, was mere chance. The rest of it wasn’t.

  He wasn’t even aware that he had spoken Stanley’s name aloud but he might have, because she asked, “Will he be very angry?”

  He didn’t like the question, and he especially didn’t like the smile that accompanied it, that looked too much like a self-satisfied smirk.

  Because, aroused as he was, as badly as he wanted to fuck the woman standing in front of him, taking a step now closer to him, her invitation blatant, intentions unmistakable, he couldn’t forget Stanley. His to protect. And none of her business, fucking notwithstanding.

  He was torn in two, wanting her, knowing she was his for the taking—and thinking of Stanley, going away from them, walking away without a word or a backward glance; knowing DEADLY DREAMS 79

  absolutely what was afoot, and hurting with the knowledge, and yet giving Tom his freedom to do what he wanted.

  Was that what love was? To sacrifice your own happiness for your partner’s? He’d never had anyone do that before.

  Before Stanley.

  “Daniella,” he said.

  “Danna.” Then she was in his arms, kissing her, and there was no question of his kissing her back.

  § § § § §

  He couldn’t, though, couldn’t go through with it. Much as he wanted to take advantage of her desire to appease his, to use this time with her, the time wasn’t his. It had been a gift—no, more a loan—that Stanley had given him. The truth was, Stanley hadn’t left him at all, was still very much here with him.

  Between him and the woman, as it turned out.

  “Sorry,” he mumbled, feeling stupid and embarrassed, a total asshole. “I’ve got to go.”

  She was too astonished to say anything, for which he was grateful. She stood and watched as he left, moving like a man in a big hurry, the door closing after him with a decisive snap.

  Danna stared after him briefly, not sure whether to be disappointed or insulted. Finally, she shrugged and went to the liquor shelf against the one wall, pouring herself a large cognac.

  “Make that two,” a male voice said from behind her.

  She looked over her shoulder. The huge mirror at the far wall had been pushed aside and Andrew Korski stood in the opening that was now revealed. She looked at him, worried about what his expression might say, but it said nothing. His face was blank. It often was, and she found that perversely appealing, exciting, even, but it could be unsettling, too.

  She had found him both unsettling and exciting since their first meeting, a chance one at a watering hole she liked to frequent. A gay bar, as it happened. She liked to go there when she got tired of men hitting on her.

  80 Victor J. Banis

  Not that she disliked sex or men. On the contrary, she liked both very much. But more often than not, it was only the sex men wanted from her, and after a while, that got repetitious, boring. How many ways could a man move his hips, after all?

  Surely there were men who had more to offer—more importantly, who wanted more from her.

  When she got to this stage in her thinking, then she went to the Castro, to her gay bar. She could still meet men there, talk to them, but these men were interested in her mind, or her personality at least, in something more than jumping her bones.

  The other men, the horny ones, affirmed her sexual desirability.

  These men, the ones she met at the gay bar, affirmed her special woman-ness. Sometimes, she needed that even more than the other.

  She thought, when she discovered him standing next to her at the bar, that he was gay. Not that he looked it, he emphatically did not, but she had spent enough time in gay bars to know that there were men who looked not at all the part, were every bit as macho as the studly ones you met in a straight bar.