Fatal Reaction

around then. You know, come to think of it, Danny moved not too long after that. I wonder if there was some connection.”
    “Did Stephen and Danny travel together often?” asked Elliott, seemingly from out of the blue.
    “Of course they did.”
    “So this trip to Japan was not the first time?”
    “Not by a long shot and I know where you’re going with this, Abelman, and that dog won’t hunt.” Law enforcement types were all the same; they always assumed the worst. “Danny was gay; Stephen was straight. They worked together, but they didn’t sleep together.”
    “For now I guess I’ll have to take your word for it,” shrugged Elliott, his tone of voice suggesting that nothing would make him happier than discovering that Stephen was secretly gay. “I’ve got a gay operative assigned to work on Danny’s other life.”
    “What do you mean, his ‘other’ life?” I demanded, resenting the sleaziness his tone implied.
    “Don’t be so naive, Kate. I guarantee you, there are things you don’t know about Danny, things that may lead us to finding out who killed him.”
    “That’s true of everyone,” I protested.
    “Yes, but it’s more true because he was gay. But for now, why don’t you just tell me what he was like to work with?”
    “He was a good guy.”
    “In what way?”
    “He was very smart, good at his job, easy to deal with the way that competent people always are. You knew that if he said he’d do it, it would get done.”
    “How long had he worked for Azor?”
    “From the very beginning. He and Stephen used to joke that in the old days he actually worked for food.”
    “How’s that?”
    “Like all start-up companies Azor didn’t have much money and what they had they certainly couldn’t waste on legal advice. I think the first six months Danny worked for Azor he actually slept on Stephen’s couch.”
    “Why would he do that?” asked Elliott with a look that said he didn’t believe for a minute that Danny had confined his slumbers to the couch. “He was a Georgetown-educated lawyer. Stephen told me that before Danny came to work for Azor he was an associate at McKenzie Valentine in New York. Why would he give up such a prestigious job in order to work for Stephen Azorini for free?”
    “For the same reason they still come to work for Stephen,” I replied, thinking about the scientists on the ZK-501 project. “Because he gives them a chance to do work they wouldn’t otherwise get a chance to do. Besides, Danny was no fool. He knew Stephen well enough to realize the odds were pretty good that Stephen would hit 0lle out of the park with his new company. He had a chance to be in on the ground floor.”
    “Did he own stock in Azor?”
    “Quite a bit. I can look up the exact number of shares for you.”
    “What would you guess the dollar value to be?”
    “I don’t know. Somewhere in the million-dollar range at the price the shares are trading today.”
    “Do you have any idea how he left his money?”
    “As far as I know he left it all to AIDS-related charities. From what he told me, I gathered his family were all dead.”
    “I still don’t quite buy his leaving McKenzie just because he thought Stephen might strike pay dirt. There had to be something more, something personal, that would make him take that risk.”
    “Sure, but it’s not what you’re thinking. You’re the one who was talking about the straight world and the gay world a minute ago. Well, if he’d stayed at McKenzie it would have meant staying in the closet for the rest of his life.”
    “From what I’ve heard about him, Danny was not exactly open about his homosexuality. Just from the few people I’ve talked to out here I didn’t get the sense that people realized he was gay.”
    “He was a lawyer. At Azor that means he didn’t even really exist. Besides, not telling the world about what’s going on in your bedroom is a lot different from being terrified that if someone finds out, it will destroy your career.”
    “So do you have any idea what his life was like out of the office?”
    “He collected modern art,” I replied dryly.
    “You know that’s not what I mean. Did he have a steady boyfriend, do you know? Did he do a lot of one-night stands? Did he cruise leather bars? Was he a drag queen?”
    “I have absolutely no idea.”
    “That’s okay, we’ll find out all his secrets soon enough,” declared Elliott matter-of-factly.
    “Not everybody has secrets,” I shot