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They all stuck around for another hour or so, and I was touched, knowing they all stayed to make sure I was all right. Finally, Baker and Ortega left. Teague resumed his post in his car at the curb. Until they caught Gabe, I would still have the FBI to keep me safe. I poured another finger of Jameson and lay on my sofa to watch Humphrey Bogart and Katherine Hepburn in The African Queen. That helped a little, but when it ended, my heartache and confusion about Gabe returned. I wondered how Nick was doing and decided to call him after giving him some time to work it all out in his head.
Seeking solace in an unhealthy dinner, I went to Henry’s, a nearby bar, and ordered hot chicken wings and a cold pint. Teague followed me over and joined me. Wings and beer didn’t help. I ate a wing and a half before the thought of Gabe killing people so brutally twisted my gut. I couldn’t even bring myself to finish my beer and asked for water instead.
Teague noticed. “You all right, Lise?”
“Gabe is—was a good friend. Can’t wrap my mind around it.”
“I understand.”
“He and my boyfriend are the best of friends, so I know it’s tearing Nick up.”
“There are lots of victims when it comes to crimes, not just the obvious ones.”
He was right. My cousin’s murder was an example of that.
I smiled at Teague. “You’re a good guy. I hope we can stay in touch when this nightmare is over. I’d like for you to meet Nick.”
“I’d like that too.”
I checked my phone for the time. There would be a little time to visit Mom before they put her to bed. “Finish up, Special Agent Teague. I’m going to introduce you to my mother.”
Our two-car caravan made its way across town to San Marco Eldercare. Mom liked Teague and paid more attention to him than me, until he went to sit across the room to give us some privacy. I laid it all out for Mom, told her about Gabe and the horrors he’d perpetrated, though not in too much detail. She’d known Gabe, and had she been healthy, Mom would have been devastated. I confessed to suspecting Nick.
“God, I miss Nick,” I said.
Mom looked at me, a half grin in place, then her eyes took in something above me that she found much more interesting. In my mind, however, Mom said, “Honey, if you miss your man, maybe you should go to where you’re most reminded of him.”
Well, duh. “Thanks, Mom.” I kissed her cheek, signaled to Teague, and left.
He followed me home. I called Nick, and as I’d thought, he was having a rough time of it.
“As soon as I think I can accept the fact that Gabe was a killer, I get to thinking how he broke into your house. It makes no sense that Gabe would terrorize you of all people. I just can’t understand.” Nick sounded close to tears.
“I don’t think we’ll ever understand. And frankly, I don’t know if we should waste the time trying to.”
“I guess.”
“Focus on the fact that I’ll be there soon. A couple of days.”
“Yeah, that sounds good.”
“And speaking of being close to you, do you mind if I stay at your place tonight? If I can’t have you, I want to at least feel your presence.”
“Of course.”
After we ended the call, I got my bag, put my Ruger inside it, and headed out. I walked over to Teague, and he rolled down his window.
“I’m going to stay at my boyfriend’s place tonight,” I told him.
“I’ll follow you over.”
We did the two-car shuffle to Nick’s. I got out, opened the gate to Nick’s driveway, and drove through. Teague followed and shut the gate. Nick’s Florida Cracker house was surrounded by woods on all sides. The only illumination came from the stars and the sliver of moon above. It was creepy.
Teague stepped up next to me. “Want me to come in and look around?”
“You better believe it.”
We carefully made our way through the dark to the door. I picked up a planter that hid a spare key and passed it to Teague. He opened the door, and we stepped into the foyer.
Teague handed the key back and said, “Be right back.” He put his hand on the gun on his hip and went farther into the house.
He went through the rooms, switching on lights. I turned on the porch light and took a few moments to enjoy it as it shone through the stained-glass windows of random geometric shapes in a varied pastel palette on each side of the front door. Nick had made them himself after taking a course a few years ago. I switched on the hall light and smiled. It wasn’t creepy anymore. It was Nick’s home.
Teague returned to the foyer. “All clear down here. Let me check the second floor.”
“I’ll go with you.”
Nick’s room was the first at the top of the stairs. As Teague looked around, I put my bag on a chair and went to sit on Nick’s bed: a queen-size mahogany four-poster with a carved pineapple at the top of each post.
“I’ll check the other rooms,” Teague said and left.
Nick’s bedroom was furnished with a mishmash of antiques he’d picked up here and there, and though they were all of different styles, it fit Nick well. Though Nick was an art history professor, he only had one painting on his bedroom wall that was worth much. It was a Florida landscape by one of the founding members of the Florida Highwaymen, Alfred Hair. The Highwaymen were a group of African Americans who, from the 1950s through the 1970s, would paint colorful Florida landscapes and seascapes on Upson board. They made frames out of crown molding and sold them out of the trunks of their cars for an average price of twenty-five dollars. Years later, they valued into the thousands.
The framed picture on his bedside table was far from a masterpiece. It was the nude sketch I’d posed for the night we roleplayed as artist and model. I could feel my face flush as I realized Teague might have seen it. Hoping he hadn’t, I put the picture facedown.
“Hey, Lise?” Teague appeared in the doorway, wearing a serious expression. “Can you come here a minute?”
“Sure,” I said, curious as to what he wanted.
We went to the very last door in the hall. He pointed to the large padlock that hung under the doorknob. “What’s up with that?”
“That’s Nick’s home office,” I explained. “That’s the only way in, and there are no windows. He sometimes brings home valuable pieces to study, so he keeps them locked up in there.”
“Got a key? I’ll check it out.”
“No need. It’s not like anyone could lock the padlock from inside.”
“Then I’ll head on back to the car,” Teague said.
I almost invited him to stay inside then realized I wanted to be alone—well, I wanted to be with Nick. But since that wasn’t possible, I wanted to be in his home, where everything I could see, smell, and touch reminded me of him. “Make sure you tell Carter I’m staying here tonight.”
“I will,” Teague said and left.
I went down to the kitchen. As if being a first-rate lover and art expert weren’t enough, Nick loved to cook and had a wonderful kitchen filled with restored antique appliances. I opened the teal-blue 1950s Westinghouse refrigerator and found what I was looking for—a chilled bottle of Chardonnay. I filled my favorite wineglass, which was more of a goblet really, made of crackle glass with beads strung on a silver strand that ran up the stem. I took a sip.
“Yeah, that’s the stuff.”
I thought of calling Nick again, but a glance at his kitchen clock showed it was almost ten o’clock, so it was almost four in the morning in Vienna. If he’d somehow gotten to sleep, I didn’t want to wake him. I topped off the wine and went back upstairs. I stared down the hall at the padlocked door of his office. When Teague pointed it out, I didn’t think it was odd, but now I did. Nick only locked it when something valuable was inside. What would he leave in there for the whole semester?
I went into Nick’s bedroom and got the padlock key he kept in a dresser drawer. I keyed the lock, stepped in, and reached to the side to flick up the light switch. Illumination did not bring what I’d expected. In fact, what I saw made no sense. My wineglass fell from numb fingers and shattered on the floor. A moment later, I fell back against the wall and slid all the way down as I stared at the room.
Nick’s desk, computer, chair, and all the furnishings were shoved up against a wall and into corners, leaving an open area in the middle of the room. Wires and ropes in loose coils lay on the floor, which was stained with copious amounts of dried blood. Michelangelo—Gabe—had brought four stakes from Beverly Raine’s place, the same as the ones he’d used to mount her on her bedroom wall, and they’d been hammered into the hardwood floor. Lengths of rope were tied to each stake.
My attention was drawn to a photo that was finger-streaked with dried blood and tacked to the wall above the desk. It was the photo I’d given Nick of The Floating Ballerina. Gabe had stolen it from Nick’s office. This was where Gabe had made his most recent kill.