“I think she loved her family, and to dance, and New York. I don’t think she would leave all of that by choice. I think she’s dead, and now so is Gizi. Now Gizi will find her, so they will, at least, have each other.”
“Your nephew was interested in Beata—personally.”
“He likes pretty girls,” Sasha said cautiously. “What young man doesn’t?”
“But she wasn’t interested in him?”
“She was more interested in dance than in men. Pure of heart, and with music in her blood.”
“Can you tell me where you were this afternoon?”
“I went to market after morning classes—I like to go most days. I came home to have my lunch and to play. I opened the windows so the music could go out. I came down to talk to my sister, and play for the two o’clock class. When that’s done, we have tea, Natalya and me.”
“Okay, thank you. Would you send Allie Madison out?”
“Will they send her body home?”
“I don’t have that information.”
“I hope she goes home,” Sasha murmured, then wandered back inside.
“He immigrated here from Russia with his sister and her kid—Alexi was a couple months old—twenty-six years ago,” Peabody added. “Sister’s husband’s listed as dead, right before the kid was born. Korchov was thirty-five and had been a big-deal ballet guy until he got messed up in a car wreck. They fixed him, but his career was shot. The sister was thirty, and had a pretty decent career herself. They opened the school. He has his own apartment on six. No criminal record. No marriages on record, two cohabs, both in Russia. The second one died in the same wreck that messed him up.”
“Okay.” Eve watched the willowy blonde glide out.
“You wanted to see me?” She had a breathy, baby doll voice that made Eve think it was Allie’s good luck ballet didn’t require vocals.
“Just verifying some information. Would you mind telling me where you were this afternoon?”
“Sure. Alex and I had brunch with some friends at Quazar’s. Caviar and champagne—it was CeeCee’s birthday—which probably wasn’t a good idea right before practice. I’m still carrying those blinis.” She smiled easily. “Doesn’t bother Alex, I guess, because he jumped right in when we got here. Pushed me through that damn pas de deux until I thought about just sticking my fingers down my throat. But Barinova will skin you for purging, and she always knows. Anyway, I got through it. My Angel to his Devil.”
“His what?”
“Devil.” She lifted the water bottle she carried, took a long sip. “We’re performing the final pas de deux from Diabolique. I’m dancing Angel. Alex is Devil. Let me tell you, it
’s a killer.”
Eve looked past her to the studio doorway. “I just bet.”
Six
“That’s what I’d call a devil of a coincidence,” Peabody commented when they stepped out on the street.
“Are you buying it?”
“Not even for the couple of loose credits in my pocket.”
“I want you to check with the other people the blonde gave us, and the restaurant. We’ll see if Alexi could’ve managed to slip away. See what the timing is from the restaurant to the alley, from the school to the alley.”
“Beata turned him down, pissed him off. He kills her, buries the body.” Peabody scanned the area. “God knows where, but that would fit in with the west of the alley, underground deal.”
“She’s not dead. She’s trapped.” Eve snapped it out furiously, shocking herself as much as Peabody.
“Okay . . . So you think—”
“It’s what she thought. Szabo.” Eve rubbed a hand between her breasts where her heart beat, hard and dull, a hammer against cloth. “I’m saying Szabo thought Beata was alive.”
“Right. Behind a red door. Why do people have to be so cryptic?”