I slept fitfully, waking up from nightmares I couldn’t remember. I ended up out of bed and showered before my alarm was even set to go off. That gave me the vague sensation that I was doing vacationing wrong. Then again, there’d been nothing else normal about this trip.
Mark and I planned to stay with Ahanti until her consult client left and Eddie arrived, and then we’d made an appointment with a realtor to find out about house prices within an easy commute of where Mark might end up working. He’d been right when he said one of my major concerns was apartment living with two big dogs. If we couldn’t afford a house with even a modest yard within a close enough distance that Mark wouldn’t give himself high blood pressure thanks to the traffic, that would be a major black mark against moving back to DC. Most people likely would have waited until they’d decided to move before pricing homes, but I wasn’t most people. I liked having a plan, and I hated surprises.
Ahanti opened late on Wednesdays, so I waited until Mark and I had breakfast together before calling Detective DeGoey. By the time I woke up this morning, I’d realized that the grumpier he was, the less likely I was to get any information from him. Waking him up accidentally seemed like a great way to increase the grumpy factor.
DeGoey answered on the second ring.
“This is Nicole Fitzhenry-Dawes, Ahanti Tenali’s lawyer.”
“I remember you.” His voice had a dry edge to it, but I couldn’t tell if amusement or annoyance put it there. Police officers had enough training in controlling their tells that they were harder to read even in person, let alone on the phone.
Which left me with no direction as to how to forge ahead. “We learned about Terrance Moore and—”
“I can’t talk to you about an ongoing investigation.”
That was vague enough to make me want to shake him. Was he referring to the investigation into who had attacked Terrance? Or was he trying to tell me without telling me that they were reopening the investigation into Cary’s murder?
I’d assume it was a hint if I was back in Fair Haven where even I-never-jaywalk Erik fudged things a little to give me information. But we weren’t in Fair Haven anymore, Toto.
Unfortunately, that also meant I couldn’t be Fair Haven Nicole. Here I had to be Big City Nicole. I hadn’t had much success at that before. If you asked my parents, succeeding here required a drive and hardness that I didn’t have. And didn’t want to have.
But now was as good a time as any to see if I could get what I wanted and needed here without sacrificing who I was.
“I appreciate that, Detective. I don’t want to impede your investigation in any way or jeopardize a conviction when you find the right suspect. All I’ve ever wanted was to make sure whoever is behind this is caught so my client can be safe.”
I made sure to keep any snark or snootiness out of my voice. I didn’t want to imply that he didn’t care about justice or about Ahanti’s safety. It seemed to me like he did care.
The silence on his end of the line stretched like I’d caught him off guard. He’d probably expected some moral blackmail like I hope you can appreciate that we can’t trust you to keep people safe and to find the right perpetrator. In the background, I heard the low drone of a room full of people talking, but none of them close enough to hear distinct words.
I forged ahead. “I’m calling because we’d like to know if the attack on Terrance yielded any more evidence that might point you to who’s really behind this. We need to know how extreme we need to get in making sure my client stays safe. I figured that if I tried to work with you instead of against you, there’d be a better chance of achieving that.”
The noise in the background faded as if DeGoey were moving away from a group of people. “Take whatever precautions you can. I’m doing what I’m able to on my end, but my opinion of what’s going on isn’t the popular one anymore. Recent events might end up being treated as an unrelated crime.”
He’d kept it vague enough that he couldn’t be accused of giving me anything he shouldn’t. I understood anyway. He believed Terrance wasn’t the guy, but it was possible he’d be outvoted and Terrance, if he survived, might still be tried for Cary’s murder and for stalking Ahanti. That likely meant the attack on Terrance hadn’t turned up any knew evidence, at least not yet. It could take weeks before they had the DNA results from the lab.
Worse, unless something changed, we were on our own for figuring out who was really behind it all.
“I don’t know what to do next,” I said to Mark as we drove to Skin Canvas. “Since Terrance sent the picture of Geoff, the list Ahanti made earlier isn’t even a starting point. Her stalker might have been there that day, but he might not.”
The only thing we knew for sure anymore was that her stalker was a man. My private investigator was sure the attacker was a man.
With only a couple of days left before Mark and I headed back to Fair Haven, it didn’t look like we were going to solve this before we had to leave. Detective DeGoey hadn’t sounded confident that the police would pursue other suspects. And Ahanti would remain at risk, the focus of a man who’d killed already.
“When we eliminate what Terrance sent, what do we still know?” Mark asked.
The words not much came to mind, but that wasn’t entirely true. “Many of the messages still showed up at Skin Canvas, and the stalker wrote to her about her touch, so it’s likely one of her clients.”
Mark gave an affirmative grunt and hit the brakes to avoid a car that jammed itself into a space that barely fit it. “What I do sometimes is look at anything strange that doesn’t seem to fit, and I focus on that.”
The fact that he could still come up with that while navigating the traffic was impressive.
The thing that had troubled me since we first catalogued this creep’s messages were the strange gaps. “He doesn’t maintain consistent communication with her.”
“It could be someone who travels for work,” Mark said.
I pulled my phone from my purse and opened the note feature. I typed in Mark’s suggestion. “It probably isn’t multiple incarcerations. She’d know if one of her clients kept ending up in jail.” I tapped the edge of my phone against my chin. There wasn’t much in the way of specifics in the messages, but the comments about her touch still made my skin crawl. “Maybe he sends her messages either when she’s working on one of his tattoos or when she isn’t.”
“Isn’t would make more sense.” Mark parked the rental car. “If she’s as much a pack rat about her calendars as she was about her fan mail, you should be able to see if any names come up regularly shortly before she received a message. Did you want me to stay and help you sort through?”
It would make the work go faster since Ahanti wouldn’t be able to help. Unfortunately, it would also mean he wouldn’t be able to scope out the real estate situation for us. That would make the decision about whether or not to move even harder than it would already be. And if he stayed, Ahanti would ask questions. “I don’t want to get her hopes up if this turns out to lead nowhere. She must already feel like a yoyo with all the ups and downs.”
Finding a parking space almost made us late. I waved at Lucas sitting in his car out front as we passed. He raised his bandaged hand in return. I couldn’t keep a private investigator sitting out front of Ahanti’s shop forever—at least not on my dad’s dime—but, thankfully, Lucas agreed to come back today, despite the short notice.
Inside, Mark and I sat in the cushy chairs Ahanti kept in her waiting area and looked through her portfolio as if we were a couple intending to design matching tattoos. Ahanti did her consult with the new client.
The new client at least didn’t strike me as a viable suspect. He wanted Ahanti to ink a picture of his wife and two kids on his back.
Mark left to meet the realtor as soon as the new client was safely out the doors. Ahanti locked the door behind him and went back to her chair to finish her notes and see when she could fit another client into her schedule.
I peeked sidelong at the calendar. Because she liked to keep everything, Ahanti still used a paper and pen planner to schedule all of her appointments. I’d be out of luck if she kept them at her apartment.
I meandered back into the office area as if I were simply killing time until Eddie arrived.
Ahanti labeled everything, so she should have it clearly marked if the calendars were here. I knelt down by the filing cabinet and opened the bottom drawer.
“What are you doing?” Ahanti said from behind me.
I lost my balance and grabbed for the filing cabinet drawer. It pulled all the way out, metal screeching against metal. I stayed upright. Barely.
Ahanti stood over me. Her arms were crossed, but another expression flickered across her face. Like for a second she was afraid she couldn’t trust even me.
The part of me that always felt not quite good enough ached in protest. The more rational part of me knew I might feel exactly the same way if our roles were reversed. Maybe more so since I was naturally paranoid and suspicious.
I clambered to my feet and brushed off my knees. Mark should have stayed because I was going to have to tell Ahanti, after all. “I was looking for your old calendars. I thought that I could use them to figure out whose appointments matched the pattern of the stalker’s messages.”
Her bottom lip jutted the tiniest bit. “Why were you doing it behind my back?”
This was quickly turning into one of those situations where in trying not to harm, I’d ended up doing more harm than if I’d been honest in the first place. Note to self—don’t try to keep secrets from your best friend or you might not have one once it’s over. “I didn’t want to get your hopes up. It might be another dead end.”
Ahanti cringed slightly. Dead end might not have been my best choice of words.
A knock sounded on the front door.
“That’ll be Eddie.” Ahanti pointed at the second drawer up. “The calendars are in there.”
She turned on her heel. Based on the lingering sharpness to her tone, I’d need to apologize again later, once Eddie was gone.
I opened the second drawer. Laying in a neat row inside were nine planners.
I wriggled them out and took them to Ahanti’s desk. I opened my phone to the notes I’d taken.
The first message from the stalker had come right after Ahanti had left Cary’s studio, but that wouldn’t point to anyone since it was linked to a move she’d made in her life.
I checked the month that the second note came, opened the planner for that year to the month before, and wrote down all the names. I did the same for the following month. He might have sent the message a few weeks after his appointment or a few days. By cataloguing the names in both months, I’d spread the net wide enough to capture his name either way.
The list was long, despite the fact that she was technically a new business. Many of her clients would have followed her from Cary’s, though.
Terrance’s name was on the list. I touched the tip of my pen to the paper beside it. My hand itched with the desire to cross it out. It’d be much easier to convince the police that Terrance wasn’t their only possible suspect if he didn’t correlate with the missives at all.
But if I omitted it and they found out, everything else I’d done would be called into question. Besides, this was only the first month. Eddie’s name was on the list, too, along with a couple of other regulars I remembered from when I used to hang around the studio. Obviously, they weren’t all guilty.
This wasn’t about one month. It was about the larger pattern.
After the fifth note, the list had dwindled to half. I crossed off any names that didn’t appear in a month when a note was delivered. Sadly, that still amounted to a lot of names. Including Terrance’s.
What I’d failed to take into account was that many people would be on the same schedule if they liked the complex tattoos Ahanti was known for. They needed design work ahead of time. Plus, many had to be done in stages, allowing the skin to heal in between. It seemed like a lot of Ahanti’s projects stretched out over months.
I rubbed at my eyes. When I dropped my hands, Ahanti stood in the doorway. “Eddie and I were wondering how it’s going.”
Her voice was the kind of soft people got when they wanted to put a tiff behind them without actually talking about it. Even though we hadn’t had a real argument, I was just as happy to move forward.
Might as well put the best possible spin on it. “I’ve already eliminated half the names on my initial list. I should have it down to one or two solid possibilities to give to the police by the end of the day.”
Her smile said thank you for everything even though she never actually said the words.
She ducked back out of the room, but returned a minute later. “I’m going to run across the street and grab us some subs for a late lunch. You want me to get you one? I think we could all use some food before we get back to it.”
My mouth watered before I could form a conscious response. A glance at my watch told me I’d already been at it two hours. No wonder Ahanti had cooled off.
I pushed back the chair and joined her in the main room. Eddie’d been face down on the table. He maneuvered to a sitting position with the cautiousness of someone with a bad sunburn. His back probably didn’t feel much better than if that was what he had. The brief glance at his skin showed a huge red patch where Ahanti’d been working.
I shuddered and averted my eyes.
Ahanti handed Eddie a slip of paper to write his order, and he passed it along to me.
My eyes struggled to focus. Something niggled at my mind, and the tightness in my throat that often preceded an anxiety attacked clawed at me.
I drew a stabilizing breath and scribbled down my order. It was probably just the fear that I might soon need glasses. It wasn’t ego that made me hate the thought. It was that it’d get expensive fast if I misplaced my glasses as often as everything else.
The tightness moved down my throat, into my chest, as I finished writing down what I wanted. Maybe it wasn’t the prospect of glasses. Maybe what was bothering me was that Ahanti sounded like she planned to go for the subs herself rather than letting me or Eddie or Lucas go.
I kept hold on the paper. “Wouldn’t it be better if I picked up the order?” I held out the paper and pen to her. “You could write down what you want.”
Ahanti grabbed the paper, leaving the pen behind. “I told you last night. I’m not going to be a prisoner in my life. It was turning me into a wreck. You can watch me go and come back from the front window. It’s perfectly safe.”
I couldn’t stop her if she’d made up her mind. Blocking the door physically would only make her angry, and she could still go out the back door.
Perhaps if it was two against one. I gave Eddie a help-me-out-here eyebrow raise.
Ahanti was already halfway to the door. “Don’t think he’ll back you up. He thinks it’s a good idea to live my life as normally as possible.”
What the heck, Eddie! He should know better considering Ahanti had told him about Cary. Since she’d told him what I was working on, presumably he knew about Terrance as well.
“Take Lucas,” I yelled after her just before the front door swished shut.
Whether she signaled Lucas or he heard me, he climbed out of his car and trailed after her. I watched them cross the street, then spun back around with a scowl.
Eddie stood right behind me, looking out the front door as well. A little too close behind me.
“She’s safe,” he said. “I won’t let anyone hurt her.”
My skin felt like it was trying to shiver off my arms. That assertion sounded a lot more like it was directed at me than at Ahanti’s stalker.
I stepped back, but there was only so far I could go. The door stopped my progress, and I couldn’t open it without either moving forward or to the side. Why hadn’t I gone with Ahanti?
Eddie didn’t come any closer.
Maybe I was overreacting. This situation hadn’t been as stressful on me as on Ahanti, but according to my counselor, I had a mild case of PTSD from everything I’d been through. It wasn’t impossible that I was reading too much into Eddie’s voice and body language.
I shifted to face him, abandoning my search for an escape route, and offered a truce smile. My gaze landed on the tattoo on his chest, and the smile died.
I’d seen some of Eddie’s tattoos in design form, but I’d never seen this one before. It wasn’t one Ahanti had designed since I’d known her, and this was the first time I’d seen Eddie’s naked chest close up. The actual inking process made me squeamish, so I always chatted with Terrance in the back or faced my chair away while Ahanti worked. In the past, when Eddie’s shirt came off, it signaled that I should turn away.
Now I couldn’t turn away. Right over his heart, the pattern formed what looked like a gift box. It was subtle. The design was made in such a way that it reminded me of those Magic Eye puzzles that used to give me a headache from crossing my eyes to see the hidden image.
But I saw it. It couldn’t be anything else.
Dear God protect me. Eddie was Ahanti’s stalker.