Private Dick Casefile 01 - Lily White Rose Red

daughter. He said that Mr. X asked him to.”
    “You tricked me!” Lily seemed delighted rather than upset. “ Very clever! I certainly fell for your subterfuge.”

“Lily, you don’t have to entertain me.”
    Her smile faded, and she stared at me. “I forgot. It’s been… rather wearing.”
    It struck me how awful it must have been for her not to be able to claim her daughter publicly, but I didn’t want to make it worse by mentioning it. “I need to see Max Hamilton.”
    “All right. I can set it up, I have an in. Today?” Lily White, Rose Red: Grey Randall, Private Dick Casefile #1
    103

    “You said time was of the essence,” I reminded her.
    “So I did. And?”
    “The keys to Marguerite’s apartment and the address.” Funny how much more real she’d become to me as I learned more about her.
    She wasn’t just the Saint-Ville dame who died in an alley any more.
    “So you can search it. And?”
    I took out the florist’s card I’d found stuck in Marguerite’s dressing table at the Jungle Room. “Do you have any idea what that means?”
    “‘Red roses for my Rose Red,’” Lily murmured. “Did you notice my roses when you came in?”
    It would have been hard not to; the scent was intoxicating in the hot sun. “They’re very pretty.”
    “Marguerite loved red roses. They were her favorite flower and remind me of her. Flaming and deep and velvety. She was softer than I am, you know. She didn’t have that hard edge she needed to—” Lily’s voice broke. “When she was a little girl and we played pretend, her name was Rose Red and mine was Lily White.”
    “So she wouldn’t have told just anybody her secret name?” Lily shook her head. “I don’t know. I wouldn’t have thought so.”
    “Did Mr. Hamilton know that was her nickname?”
    “He would never have killed her. He’d always wanted a daughter—he was so proud of her when he knew—” Lily raised a hand as if pushing away some horror. “He couldn’t have!”
    “Maybe he knows who did it?”
    “Why would he protect them, when he knows—” Lily jumped up and started to pace. “No, I can’t believe it.”
    “Get me in to see him.”
    “Why do you think he wouldn’t see you if you called him yourself?”
    “I’m just a small fish in a big pond, and he’s the shark that owns it,” I said.

    104

    CATT FORD

    LILY was good for it, and when I left, it was with an appointment to go see Mr. Hamilton. Of course I’d had to talk her out of coming along, because she was so keen to prove to me that he couldn’t have done it.
    Well, I didn’t think he would have done it himself; he was too big for that. If he wanted it, he was a man who had these types of things done for him. I just couldn’t think of a reason why, other than blackmail, but the relationship was complicated enough that I would have thought it was a two-way street. Besides, it didn’t sound like the Marguerite I was coming to know.
    I’d heard whispers and hints about Mr. X around town, but I hadn’t paid too much attention because I didn’t move in those lofty circles. And I never connected Mr. X with Mr. Hamilton until things started coming together on this case, but since he was a casino owner, it stood to reason that he had ties to organized crime. You didn’t step off the train in Las Vegas and work your way up from bus boy to casino owner without a little backing.
    As to that, I didn’t want to rock the boat. The system had been going on a long time before I got there, and I had no interest in stopping it. But if he had been involved in Marguerite Saint-Ville’s death, I was going to nail him for it.
    Mr. Hamilton was in his office at his first hotel, the Rising Star.
    The girl at the front desk in the lobby recognized my name when I said I was there to see him and pointed me at the elevator to the penthouse.
    The elevator jockey took me up without comment, but I could tell he was heeled. When I stepped out at the end of the ride, I found myself in a circular room with no windows. A cute dame with light brown hair and girlish freckles sat behind a desk with a phone, a blank pad, and a vase of flowers. Not roses.
    “I’m Grey Randall, private dick. I have an appointment to see Mr.
    Hamilton,” I told her.
    She smiled brightly at me. “Please sit down, Mr. Randall. He’s with someone right now, but he’ll be right with you.” Lily White, Rose Red: Grey Randall, Private Dick Casefile #1
    105

    I sat. The furniture was modern and