name had sounded familiar. He’d worked hard campaigning for civil rights, proving a standard-bearer for LGBT issues, though one article suggested he’d lost an election four years earlier by being openly gay. Thus he’d ended up as special assistant to the educational reforms minister instead.
Dan was about to close his laptop when a headline caught his eye. It was dated just before Christmas: Disgraced Queen’s Park MPP found dead in ravine. He clicked on the link. A cheerful-looking man in his mid-thirties met his gaze. Dan recalled the story: John Wilkens had been the opposition critic for a man named Alec Henderson. Peter Hansen’s boss. Despite his relative youth, Wilkens was once regarded as a contender for House Speaker, and possibly prime minister material, until he’d been dismissed for improper use of government funds. An investigation had been pending at the time of his death. The coroner’s ruling was suicide.
Dan scanned a follow-up piece. There were the usual official condolences from party leaders for their deceased colleague: John Wilkens was a good man who believed that public service was the most honourable way to serve others, etc. No mention of his indiscretions with public funds. Never speak ill of the dead. Wasn’t that what they taught?
The dead minister’s lineage was impressive. He’d come from one of the most established families in Ontario, scion of a proud race of industry leaders and charity funders. It was the usual muck, a political whitewash. The dead had no enemies. Dan smelled a story larger than what was written here, but the formal speak of politics had closed ranks around the dead minister, leaving the truth gagged once again.
He picked up his cell and dialed the number on the paper. Hansen answered.
“Dan Sharp here, Peter.”
“Yes, what? Anything wrong?”
“You left an awful lot of money on my desk.”
“It’s yours. Keep it.”
“It’s far more than a retainer.”
“Consider it a bonus if you find him.”
“I won’t keep it unless I earn it. I’ll put it in my safe for now.”
There was a pause. “You may need it to find Tony.”
“Meaning?”
“Spend it if you have to.” He hung up.
Dan sighed quietly. He hadn’t even begun to work on the case and Peter Hansen was already turning into a pain in the ass. It worried him. Something smelled wrong — he just wasn’t sure what. He glanced over the paper with the scant facts of Tony Moran’s life. Maybe the answer lay there, but it wasn’t much to go on.
He picked up his Day-Timer and wrote Hansen’s name along with the time of his visit. Beside it he wrote $10,000 CASH, underlining the entry.
In the space below he wrote: Find another caterer.
Two
Sweet Domesticity
Dan was comforted by the smell of roast chicken on arriving home. Apart from being a great companion, Nick was also an excellent chef. It was just one more thing that made him an outstanding partner.
There was no dog at the front door, but that wasn’t unusual these days. Ralph the Geriatric had given up his duties as official greeter to anyone he knew returning home. Only strangers still merited that calling.
Ralph had been many things in his long life, including a rabble-rouser and back-porch broadcaster of neighbourhood news, but he was now enjoying his retirement. Dan had named him after the unmarried uncle of one of his exes, whom he’d met one Thanksgiving. Uncle Ralph had had bloodshot eyes and been wracked with a terrible croup. It turned out he’d also briefly been the secret lover of actor Rock Hudson back in the 1950s when the term “confirmed bachelor” covered a multitude of sins. After dinner, Dan jokingly declared to his ex that he wanted a dog like the uncle. Stopping by the pound on a whim a month later, he found a ginger retriever pup with bloodshot eyes, just recovering from kennel cough. He brought the dog home for Kedrick. While the boyfriend soon deserted and the namesake uncle died not long afterward, taking Rock’s secret to the grave, Ralph was still around fifteen years later. Of late, however, he spent much of his time lounging on a cushion, thumping his tail when called, and surveying his kingdom from this private throne.
In the kitchen, Ralph looked up with an approving glance before settling back down again. Dan gave him a pat on the head, then reached for a mug in the cupboard. He turned on the tap and heard a yelp from upstairs. Nick was in the shower. The touchy thermostat had no doubt given him a sharp reminder of its finicky nature.
When they met, Dan had been single so long he wasn’t sure he could let another man into his life while retaining his emotional balance, the outer signs of self control so important to him. Still, Nick had given him reason to try. Surprisingly, gratefully, Dan had concluded that domestic life agreed with him so long as the man at his side brought more happiness than grief. In the meantime, to his pleasant surprise, a recurring stress disorder retreated to the far shores of consciousness till it was a mere echo of the turmoil and anxiety he’d once lived with daily.
So far, with Nick, there’d been little to regret. Dan had worried about dating a cop for all the usual reasons, but for the most part they turned out to be unfounded. True, Nick had a peppery temper, but it was as sudden as it was brief. Here and gone, like a summer squall. He had emotional depth and he was patient. He was also refreshingly direct.
Dan liked that Nick could be funny and serious in equal measure but never hid his true feelings. He was his own man. “You’ll never have to guess with me,” he’d told Dan at the relationship’s outset. Not entirely true, Dan discovered, as Nick’s emotions and moods changed like quicksilver. But he was reliable, loyal, and loving.
Dan was still not entirely sure how Kedrick felt about Nick, however. Ked had been happiest when Dan was with a man named Trevor. But Trevor had been unnerved by Dan’s choice of profession, living in constant fear for Dan’s safety. The split had been amicable, but since then Dan was never entirely certain of Ked’s approval of any man in his life. The problem had been temporarily resolved when Ked moved to B.C. to pursue a degree in oceanographic and environmental studies and could only vet his father’s boyfriends at a distance. Still, Dan would have preferred to know that Ked approved of his choice of mate.
Officially, Nick and Dan did not live together, though that was set to change with the marriage. Till then they were owners of two residences, one a spacious condo on Toronto’s coveted waterfront and the other a modest-size home in newly chic Leslieville. When Dan bought the house, it had been advertised as “two bedrooms plus den with basic backyard,” though in reality the latter turned out to be a veritable wilderness. At the time, Leslieville had been anything but fashionable, scorned by both hipsters and yuppies alike as an unremarkable lower-class pocket sandwiched between the Beach and genteel Riverdale. The yard reflected the city’s neglect. It consisted of a tottering wire fence enclosing a plot of weeds nearly four feet high. Dan cut the grass, built a deck, and erected a winding rock wall to shore up the flower beds before adding a pond in the far corner. High hopes. The pond’s goldfish supply was repeatedly plundered by marauding raccoons. An exploratory pair of turtles suffered the same fate, as did the half-dozen piranha Dan bought to nip some sense into the pesky thieves. While rats and cockroaches ruled the rest of the world, Toronto was lorded over by its well-fed Procyons.
A few indigenous plants made a strong showing the first season: rhubarb and wild roses, even garlic
