Harley Jean Davidson 03 - Evil Elvis (40 page)

“Yogi,” Eric said, shouldering his way through the crowd, “you’re the king, dude. You’re the king.” He and Yogi did that hand thing Harley never could quite figure out, not that she had the least desire to do so. Then Eric looked over at her. “Cool chick. Who’s been chewing on your hair?”

“I can’t believe you have the nerve to say anything to me about my hair. Especially when you look like you’ve been peed on by a rainbow.”

Eric stroked a hand across his hair, bright blue and yellow streaks vivid against his natural dark brown. “You don’t like it? It’s only temporary.”

“Keep dying your hair and it’ll be only temporary, too.” Harley looked over at her father. “I can’t stay long, only until they announce the winner. Sam’s gone and I have to find him.”

If anyone would understand the urgency about looking for a lost pet, it was Yogi. After all, it’d been the abduction of the larcenous King that had first sent her entire family into the world of jewelry thieves and murderers.

“Sam is fine,” Diva said. “He’s with the groundhog.”

“Groundhog? You mean, like the animal?”

“No, I don’t think so.” Diva frowned slightly. “It just popped into my head so I said it. I’m not sure why.”

“Good thing I don’t always say what just pops into my head,” Harley muttered, then said, “I’ll see what I can figure out. I’m glad he’s okay.”

A microphone crackled and popped, and the contest organizer announced it was time to count down to the winner of this year’s competition. All attention turned toward the stage.

It occurred to her as the tension in the room grew palpable that this was rather like the flip version of Miss America competitions, only without the bathing suit contests. Morgan could have won on looks alone, although he’d probably have been eliminated when it came to the congeniality portion. Yogi would have won that.

Thinking of Morgan, she wondered just where he’d gone. If he was really supposed to be her bodyguard for the evening, he’d lost track of her body and she was almost ready to go. Not that she was nervous about leaving alone.

Okay, she was nervous about leaving alone. Recent events suggested it was a bit risky to run around by herself. Whatever this killer’s identity, he had to be certifiably insane.

The fact that he’d waited for her in the dark privacy of her apartment wasn’t at all what he was supposed to do.

Either he was changing tactics or getting desperate. Neither of those options made her feel any better.

Thankfully, her attention was diverted from grim speculation by the excitement from Yogi as only he and Preston Hughes were left as contestants. Hughes had been pitch-perfect, but didn’t have the heart Yogi did. Maybe that was just her opinion—like the opinion she had that the man was probably a bold, vicious killer. He should still be in jail. She hadn’t a clue why he was here as if he had no problems at all, when he should be wearing an orange jumpsuit in a cell with a big guy named Bubba as his significant other.

Then the announcer named Yogi as the first runner-up, and he gleefully went up the stairs to the stage and took his bow as if he’d just been named Leader of the Free World. It never ceased to amaze Harley that Yogi let few disappointments bother him. The crowd roared its approval of his shimmy, shake, and curl of his upper lip, so that Hughes’s acceptance of the trophy and title of King was almost overshadowed.

“You were wonderful,” she told her father when she’d finally made her way through the crowd to his side, and gave him a kiss on the cheek. “If Hughes hadn’t made bail, you’d have won this one.”

Yogi’s broad grin acknowledged her faith in him. He looked jubilant. “Next year, the title. Tomorrow night, the candlelight vigil. Don’t forget.”

“I won’t.” As if she could. She’d already set herself out as bait once, but caught the wrong fish. Maybe this time she’d get it right.

Chapter Eighteen

Morgan
followed her home, driving an undercover car police used to escape notice. Until he showed up at her side as she got ready to leave, she hadn’t seen him since he’d blown her off. He’d had some lame excuse that he’d been watching over her the entire night, but he must have hidden really well.

He parked the battered gray Pontiac right in front of her building. Not exactly what she’d consider unobtrusive, but maybe that was the point. Harley parked in back next to Cami’s Saturn, and by the time she cut off her headlights and locked the car Morgan stood by the back door.

“Looking for anyone special, sailor?” she asked breezily, and he shook his head.

“Just doing my job, ma’am.” He opened the door for her. “I’ll be out here all night, in the heat with the mosquitoes.”

“Is that a hint to be invited inside?”

He just smiled.

So much for that. Not that she wanted him to come inside. Really. Okay, so she did, but it had nothing to do with lust, just security. Mostly, anyway.

“Better move your car if you don’t want to be seen,” she advised. “Or is that the idea?”

“It might be a deterrent. Run along inside like a good girl so I can skulk back to the car to watch over you.”

“I feel so safe.” Prompted by an inner devil that usually got her into trouble, she stepped closer to him and playfully ran her fingers down the front of his shirt. “And I’m much more fun when I’m a bad girl,” she added huskily, and saw heat flare in his eyes. A muscle leaped in his jaw and just when it seemed as if he was about to say something, she ran the tip of her tongue over her top lip and stepped back. “‘Night, copper.”

If he answered, she didn’t wait to hear it but scooted inside and up the stairs. One more second standing on the stoop with him, and she’d have said something she’d probably regret.

The door to her apartment was locked and she used her key. Cami stood in the middle of the living room, surrounded by wreckage that looked as if she’d attempted to tidy up. Her short blond hair had damp streaks in front of her ears and on the nape of her neck, and she looked completely frazzled. She turned to Harley.

“I’ve looked everywhere for him. It’s dark now, but I went out looking while it was still light. I guess I could again. I have this flashlight, and should be able to see him in the dark. It’s the eyes, you know, they shine like flat circles—if he’s gone across the street to the zoo, he might end up as a snack for the lions. Oh, I can’t stand this.”

Harley said quickly, “Diva assures me that Sam is just fine. He’s off somewhere with a groundhog.”

Cami blinked. “A groundhog? Like the animal?”

“She doesn’t think so. You know Diva. All her messages are so cryptic. I keep thinking I should know, but the only thing that comes to me right now is the mole that King’s been after in Mrs. Shipley’s yard. There’s something else I’m supposed to be remembering, but it’s not coming to me. God, what a mess. Sam could be hiding somewhere in here, for all we know.”

Broken glass, shards of a lamp, and something she didn’t want to look at too closely on one of the chair cushions, turned her usually-neat apartment into a rubbish dump. It was obvious Cami had done what she could, but it needed a complete overhaul.

“You know,” Harley reflected aloud, “if I’m going to keep getting involved in situations where people feel compelled to try to kill me, I really need to get indestructible furniture. Or a maid.”

“Or a security guard stationed at your door.”

“Even better. How very practical of you.”

“Where can we look next?” Cami ran a hand through her hair, and sweaty strands stuck out like Dagwood Bumstead’s hair. “I’ve searched every cabinet, drawer, under your bed—by the way, that’s not a good place to store Old Faithful.”

“Old Faithful? Ah. Yes. Well, I haven’t really needed it in a long time, and forgot about it being there. The batteries are probably run down by now. I should get some more in this time of need, I suppose.”

“Better clean it first. It’s pretty dusty. But much more discreet than that wooden penis you keep on your dresser.”

“That’s a souvenir, a reminder to duck when people are shooting at me.”

“You need a reminder for that? Jeez, Harley. But back to the problem at hand. Do you still think Sam went over your balcony?”

“I’m fairly sure. He was really spooked. We’ll look outside.”

Cami glanced doubtfully at the French doors, now closed and locked. “I don’t know...”

“It’s safe. Morgan’s hiding out there waiting to pounce on any evil Elvis that comes by. Pretend you don’t notice him. I think he’s sensitive about getting his cover blown.”

After searching inside, they went outside and searched in the bushes again, each armed with a flashlight. Privet hedges stretched on one side of the yard, and bushes next to the building were kept neatly trimmed at waist-high level. The front yard gas lamp put out enough feeble light to barely see the green and white caladiums thriving in scalloped flowerbeds, but it was too dark to see the vivid hues of red and pink begonias. Dark shadows made a huge pool beneath the low, spreading branches of the magnolia tree. Sam could be anywhere.

After crawling under the bushes next to the building, calling kitty, kitty, kitty as softly as she could so no one would call the cops on her at midnight, Harley sat down on the bricked front stoop. She cut off her flashlight and blew out a frustrated breath. Over at one side of the house, Cami still made her cat noises, strange sounds she interspersed with “Here Kitty”‘ calls.

“What was that?” Harley asked Cami when she gave up and came to sit on the front stoop beside her.

“Cat in heat noises. Sam doesn’t know he’s been neutered.”

“Sounded more like cat being strangled noises.” She shuddered and made a sign from her forehead to her chest, then crossed herself.

“Catholic school training sticks, doesn’t it,” Cami said with a sigh. “But don’t worry about that happening to Sam. He takes care of himself really well.”

“I know. So does Frank Burns. I should take lessons from the animal kingdom.”

“It’d help both of us. I’ll set the trap I brought and bait it with some tuna flakes, and you check it first thing in the morning.”

“It’s not one of those things that traps his paw, is it?”

“Lord no, Harley, you know better than that. It’s humane, a cage with a trap door. Once he gets in to eat the food, the door snaps shut and he’s trapped.”

“Try Chinese rather than tuna,” Harley suggested. “He particularly likes shrimp fried rice.”

Cami stood up. “No wonder Sam loves you. He’ll just have to take what I brought with me this time. You can use egg rolls or sushi or whatever if he’s not in it in the morning.”

“The only sushi he likes is salmon. My favorite is the California roll.”

“Somehow, I’m not surprised.”

After Cami set the trap, sliding a can of reddish tuna flakes just for cats to the back of the wire mesh cage, they situated it next to the house behind the bushes, and at the foot of the white trellis that held some kind of climbing greenery. They crawled out of the beds and brushed dirt and mulch from their hands and legs. The gray Pontiac still sat under a streetlight at the curb.

“I wonder if that’s how the killer got down so quickly,” Harley mused, staring at the trellis she’d never really paid attention to before. “It looks pretty sturdy, not like the cheap, flimsy ones.”

Cami turned to peer at the white trellis against the shadowed brick. “More than likely. The police were down here earlier pouring plaster into footprints.”

“Ever efficient.” Harley couldn’t resist one last call of kitty, kitty, kitty before they went in, but there was no answering miaoow or indignant yowl. “Strangely,” she said, “I don’t want to go to bed without Sam there to irritate me. He likes to bite my feet when I wiggle my toes.”