The Lady in Pink - Deadly Ever After 2 (18 page)

I
zzy stood next to me as we gazed up at the imposing building in front of us. The New Never City police headquarters was a structure built sometime around the turn of the century, a few centuries ago. It was a stone fortress, cold and foreboding, the perfect place to sweat a criminal or upstanding citizen like yours bluely. I’d spent more than a few nights locked in an interrogation room inside. And then a few more locked in a cell in the dungeon below. I wasn’t sure which was worse.

Today I had a very different reason for being here—solving a crime rather than lying about committing one. Oddly enough, they felt very much the same. Though, if I was honest, I preferred the former. Asking a cop for anything went against my thuggish code. But James’s burner cell phone could be the key to everything.

Or it could be a complete waste of time.

One more dead end in a long list of them.

Steeling myself, I started up the steps, what felt like a couple of thousand of them to a smoker like me. Izzy was already at the top when I finally wheezed my way up, gasping. I stopped to catch my breath. She glared at me. “Smoking will kill you.”

“I’ll risk it,” I wheezed to annoy her. Pressing my hand to my left side, I added, “Besides, I’m sure my liver will give up long before my lungs.”

“Your liver is on the right.” She shook her head sadly. “Remind me to up your life insurance.”

I snorted, switching my hand to the right side of my body. “Like I would make you my beneficiary.”

She gave a snort of her own. “Like I can’t forge your signature.”

“They teach that at the adult annex too?”

Rather than answer she shot me a wicked smile, turned on her heel, and disappeared inside the New Never City Police Plaza, leaving me wheezing on the steps, wondering just how much life insurance she had on me. I had a feeling I wouldn’t like the answer.

 

“What do you want, Reynolds?” Detective Peter Rabit asked with a weary sigh. His hundred-dollar suit was rumpled, as if he’d slept in it. But that didn’t stop him from leering at the fairy next to me when he finally looked up long enough to notice her. Hell, I half expected him to start drooling, and not from the box of bribery-coated doughnuts in my gloved hand.

I pushed the box at Rabit. “These are for you.” I lowered my voice to add, “She is not. Got it?”

He took the box, but his eyes stayed firmly on Izzy. “I’m busy, so make it quick.”

“I need to see James Wild’s personal effects.”

He snorted. “For what?”

“Closure?”

His next snort was louder.

“Fine,” I said, taking out my wallet and passing him a hundred bucks. “Let’s call it a professional courtesy.”

Rabit shook his head, but his nondescript, overly gelled hair didn’t move an inch. “Add another hundred and we’ll call it good.”

Annoyed but willing to do anything—I glanced at Rabit and his leering gaze—or almost anything to get the burner phone, I pulled out another hundred and slapped it on the desktop. Cops today. A few years ago a hundred bucks would’ve bought me a baggie of personal effects as well as a few baggies of fairy dust. When his hand went for the cash, I smashed my hand on top of it. “Effects first.”

He rolled his eyes but headed toward the evidence room just the same. I looked at Izzy, her wings brightly colored against the backdrop of the institutionally grey walls, and felt instantly better. It was nice to have her watching my back, though I would never admit it. Not for a second. I’d eat a blind mouse first.

As I was finishing my girlish musings Rabit returned, a thick padded envelope in his hand. He ripped the seal and emptied the contents onto the desk in front of us. Sure enough a cell phone dropped onto the desktop, as did a wallet and a driver’s license in the name of James W. Jones. No wonder James had used the name Wild. After all, the surname Jones didn’t inspire confidence when hiring a killer. Not that Wild was much better.

I reached for the cell phone but Rabit grabbed my gloved hand before I touched it. “You can look, but no touching,” he said. I raised an eyebrow but didn’t argue. Cops had a thing about chain of custody. Not like thugs. We just had a thing for chains. “Did you trace his last call?” I asked.

Rabit laughed without humor. “Are you telling me how to do my job, PI?”

“Of course not,” I said. “I was asking. That’s all.”

He rolled his eyes. “I suggest you ask somewhere else before my good mood vanishes and your ass ends up in the holding cells.” He paused, his eyes roaming over Izzy’s body, stopping on her wings. “You, I’ll keep right here.”

She smiled, stepping around me to flirt with the dickhead of a detective. “Is that so? What will you do with me?”

I turned away, the urge to fry Rabit nearly overwhelming. Taking gulping breaths, I tried to calm the desire. The leather of my shoe started to smolder. The cop seated at a desk a few feet away, jelly doughnut puffing out his cheeks like a hamster, glanced up. “We grilling burgers for lunch?”

I stomped the smoking shoe out, returning my attention to Izzy, who was now practically sitting in Rabit’s lap. What the hell was she thinking? He was an even worse choice than our VP Clark. Hell, the guy smelled of cheap aftershave and hookers. When I couldn’t stomach a minute more, I grabbed Izzy’s arm in my gloved hand. “Time to go.”

She didn’t argue, taking her time to scramble off Rabit. She shot him a large, toothy grin. He returned her smile. “Call me,” he said, winking as he tucked his card into the crease between her wings and shoulder blade. She winked back.

I pulled her toward the door, thankful when we reached the exit without my being arrested or electrocuting a certain detective. Once we were outside in the crisp afternoon air, Izzy gave a shudder. “I need a shower. Maybe two of them.”

“What?”

“You’re kidding, right?” Her tone conveyed just what she thought of me. “You really believed I was into that guy? Give me some credit, Blue.”

“Then . . .” I glanced down at her hand. “You stole the cell phone.”

“I’m getting pretty damn good at this petty-crime thing.”

I took the phone from her. “Sorry to be the one to break this to you, but stealing evidence from the cop shop is a little more than a petty crime.” I paused, my eyes burning with electricity.

Izzy swallowed, stepping back a small step. “Blue . . . we . . .”

I shook off the desire to kiss her until she moaned. “Right. The case.” I blew out a harsh breath. “We should go back to the office, give the phone to Alice, and see if she can prove my parents hired James to kill me.”

I spun on my heel and started down the stairs, nearly missing Izzy’s softly spoken words. “The case always comes first.” Her words were far from comforting.

F
ollowing our mini crime spree at the police plaza, we grabbed a taxi and set off for Reynolds & Davis. Right and Left followed behind in a second cab, leaving Izzy and me alone for a few minutes. My heart pulsed in my chest with unquenched lust and a renewed sense of purpose. James’s cell phone was just what I needed to crack this case. I could feel it.

I glanced over at my pink-winged obsession, smiling as she juggled her cell phone and her iPad. Izzy wasn’t one to let a minute go by without making the most of it. I, on the other hand, let too many minutes and opportunities go by. Most times it was easier that way. Less mess. No fuss. “Is Alice in?” she was asking whoever was on the other line. “Doreen, tell her to stay there. We’ll be right in.”

She hung up and smiled. “Alice is at her desk.”

“Excellent.” I fingered James’s cell phone. As soon as the taxi pulled to a stop in front of our offices, I tossed a few bucks at the cabbie and leapt from the cab. The doorman barely had time to reach for the handle of the door before I ripped it open and plowed my way inside. Izzy followed on my heels, or rather her heels, teetering with each step. Finally she apparently had enough, kicked off her offending footwear, and ran after me. I stabbed the elevator call button.

“Blue,” Izzy said, reaching for my gloved hand but pulling away before making contact. “Maybe we should just drop this, forget about James and your past . . .”

“What? Why?” I asked, surprised. When she didn’t answer I shook my head. “Izzy, you know me. You know what this means to me. What it could mean for me.” I nodded to my vibrating fingers. “Why would I stop before I learn the truth?”

Her eyes met mine, and I swore I saw tears well in them. “Because it won’t set you free, Blue.”

My forehead wrinkled. “What’s that mean?”

She blinked a few times, and the wetness disappeared. A trick of the light, I told myself, though I knew better. Izzy was keeping something from me, something that could very well destroy our tenuous partnership, let alone whatever sort of other relationship we had. Rather than continue our current conversation, I cowardly turned to the open elevator doors, motioning her inside.

I followed Izzy into the elevator with her warning rushing through my head. As we rose from floor to floor, my fear twisted to anger, and electrical current started to buzz through me, rising as we did. Growing hotter and hotter until I lost all control.

Izzy jumped back just in time, her wings only slightly singed. “Stop,” she ordered, but I couldn’t hear her over the snap, crackle, and buzzing in my brain. For a few brief moments, I was a god, an angry and vengeful one, sure, but godlike nonetheless.

And then Izzy’s hand touched my shoulder.

But rather than causing her to be knocked across the elevator by the sheer power I was emitting, her touch had the opposite effect. I winked out. I wasn’t sure what she’d done, or why it happened, but the current was gone. I staggered against the wall, using my hands to steady me. Before I could speak, to let forth the flurry of accusations inside my head, the elevator dinged, announcing our arrival.

I swallowed back every dark word, focusing on what was important, or at least what I could actually fix. The case. I could and would solve this case. My fingers tightened on the cell phone, the plastic smooth against the leather of my gloves.

“Blue,” Izzy said. “For what it’s worth ... I am sorry.”

I nodded, unable to look at her, and then exited the elevator, one goal in mind as I headed off to find my bespectacled employee Alice. Thankfully she was right where she always was, though she wasn’t quite the eager, annoyingly willing to please investigator she normally was, especially when I pulled to a stop in front of her desk. “Blue,” she said, pushing her glasses up her nose with her index finger, hiding the dark circles around her eyes. “Do you need something?”

“I need you to run a search on this phone,” I said, running my finger across the screen, surprised to see it flicker to life. Some investigator I was. I hadn’t even checked to see if it was locked. I blamed Izzy. She was too much of a distraction. I’d be better off on my own, I told myself, even though I knew it was a lie. Izzy had saved me from destitution, but also from myself. Left to my own devices, I would be dead by forty. With her around I had a few more years, as long as the life insurance policy didn’t become too tempting.

Izzy arrived behind me as I swiped my fingers over the touch screen, searching for the very last number dialed. I smiled when the New Never City area code appeared on-screen. Thankfully I didn’t recognize the phone number.

“Blue, wait—” Alice said as I pressed the send button for the last number dialed.

A resulting ringing burst forth.

But not from the phone in my hand.

T
he phone rang again. Izzy and I glanced down. Alice looked up, her eyes growing three times bigger under the lenses of her glasses. I shoved her back with a gloved hand, ripping open her desk drawer with the other. Inside sat an old-style flip phone, a burner phone like James’s that was lighting up like a Christmas tree as it rang unabated.

Alice made a move for the ringing phone, but I stopped her before her fingers reached it. My hand gripped her delicate skin, leaving red glove prints along her forearm. “I swear,” she said, her voice choked, “I’ve never seen that phone before.”

“Now, why don’t I believe that?” I said, keeping Alice back with one hand while I pulled out the burner phone with my other. I tossed the phone to Izzy, who much to my pleasure caught it with one hand. “Why don’t you and I have a little talk?” I said to Alice, helping her from her seat without ever breaking contact between us.

“Use my office,” Izzy said, waving us forward.

“Please,” Alice cried. “I don’t understand any of this.”

Ignoring her plea, I maneuvered her through our busy office, past Doreen, the bitchy receptionist, toward Izzy’s office. Doreen sneered with disgust as we moved by, and for once we were on the same page. I thought of the blond hair on the pillow at James’s loft. It was Alice’s. It had to be. She was probably the one behind the mechanical call to Bo Peep, as well as the fires, while all the while looking as pure and innocent as freshly fallen snow. I’d never suspected a thing. I’d trusted her and she’d betrayed me. I was a fool.

I couldn’t begin to understand the ramifications of her betrayal. Yet one question kept repeating inside my head: Why? Once I had her locked inside Izzy’s office, I asked her as much. “What’s this all about, Alice? What do you have against me?”

But Alice had stopped talking. She just sat in her chair, her eyes as clear as day behind her thick lenses. I decided on another tactic. With great effort, my tone lost its hard edge, and I sat down across from her. “It’s okay,” I began. “I get it.”

“Get what?” She blinked like an owl.

I smiled kindly. Or at least as kindly as I could. I knew my grin had missed its mark when she flinched. “You and James,” I said, thinking back to the photograph I’d stolen from James’s frat-house room. A picture of a younger version of Alice.

How could I have missed it?

In my defense, the image was grainy and most of the woman’s face was obscured by sun glare, but it was Alice. I was 80 percent sure of it. Ninety-five when I factored in the blond hair on the pillow. She was James’s lover.

But was she also a killer?