Vanessa Gray Bartal - Lacy Steele 07 - Icy Grip of Murder (14 page)

“I think I prefer the stupid ones
from among your friends,” Jason said.

“You have a lot to choose from,”
Michael said. “Let’s go talk to the next.”

“Do you believe he’s innocent?”
Lacy asked the men after they left Louse’s shop.

“Innocent? No.
Guilty
of murder?
Possibly not,” Michael said. “If what he said was true and
their partnership had fizzled years ago, then he had no motive.”

“Love gone wrong?” Lacy said.

“Louse doesn’t love anything but
the almighty dollar,” Michael said.

“And if they weren’t fencing
anymore, then he would have lost interest in Jenny and dismissed her. There was
nothing else she could do for him. Michael’s right—we’re missing a motive
there. Bug, on the other hand…” he trailed off and Michael picked up.

“May have had the double motive of
money and love.”

“But didn’t Flea have those same
motives?” Lacy asked.

“Flea loved her, but he wasn’t
making money off of her. In fact she was using him pretty heavily, both as her
errand boy and as a hideout,” Michael said.

“Maybe he got tired of it,” Lacy
said.

“Did you see him? He would have
licked her toes if she asked him,” Jason said.

“That could have been an act,” Lacy
said.

“True, but Flea’s never been that
smart. The truth is that until we find out exactly what was going on with Jenny
and who was on her payroll, we can’t rule anyone out as a suspect,” Michael
said.

“You sound like a cop,” Jason said.

“You take that back,” Michael said.

They pulled up outside of the auto
shop where Bug worked and observed for a while. As with Louse’s store, there
were customers inside. “What’s our angle here?” Jason asked. “Is this whole
shop dirty? Should we go in with guns blazing, figuratively speaking?”

“No, I know this place.
It’s run by some mechanic who is as honest as he is old
. If
anything illegal is going on here, it’s going on behind his back, most likely
at night. Flea is a compulsive liar. He’s never going to
cop
 
to
fencing unless we catch him at
it.”

“So that’s what we need to do. We
need to do some surveillance and catch him in the act,” Lacy said.

Jason and Michael exchanged
glances.

“What?” Lacy said.

“You should sit this one out,”
Michael said.

“What? Why?” Lacy said.

“Because we’re knowingly going to
interrupt a crime ring. I know these guys, and things could get nasty,” Michael
said.

“I could help,” Lacy said.

“How?” Michael asked. Jason stayed
wisely silent.

“At the very least, I could call
911.”

“We don’t want the cops,” Michael
said. “We want answers. Things might get a little rough.”

“I can handle it,” Lacy said.

“Look, Lacy, you’ve put yourself
out there, and I appreciate it. Don’t turn gratitude into grief by getting
yourself injured. Leave this one for us. Please.”

She sat back with a huff. She
didn’t like it, but she was outnumbered. Why did women so often have to miss
all the action? It wasn’t as if Lacy was a thrill seeker bent on
self-destruction. All she wanted was to be a part of the interrogation and help
her friends if necessary. Why did they think she couldn’t do that? True, she
was smaller than they were and had never been much good in a fight. She wasn’t
even a good screamer. But people wouldn’t actually attack her, would they? They
were going to have a conversation about things, and there was safety in
numbers. Although it might be true that she could be a distraction for Jason
and Michael. They trusted each other to watch their own backs, but if she were
there, part of their attention would be on her. If she went, there was the
possibility that she would get them hurt.

“Awfully quiet back there,” Jason
said. He sounded relieved to have dodged the bullet. For once he wasn’t the one
who had to have the conversation with her to tell her she couldn’t do a thing.

“I’m seething. Leave me be,” Lacy
said.

He turned around to squeeze her
knee. She smacked his hand. He chuckled and turned back around. She looked for
something to chuck at his head and, finding nothing, contented herself with
pouting in silence.

“We have some time to kill. Let’s
grab coffee,” Michael said. They had just pulled into the parking lot of the
coffee house when Lacy’s phone rang. She answered it without thinking. It was
Pearl.

“Lacy, how’s my play coming?”

Lacy pinched the bridge of her
nose. And then inspiration struck. “It’s great, Pearl. In fact, I hope you
don’t mind, but I’ve been reading it aloud with Jason and Michael.”

“No, that’s fine. I would love
their feedback,” Pearl said.

“Great. They would love to talk to
you about it. Here they are.” She pushed the speakerphone button and shoved the
phone to the front of the car, despite Jason’s desperate attempts to wave her
off.

“Hey, Pearl,” he said reluctantly,
and Pearl was off, chattering like a chipmunk. Lacy didn’t stick around to hear
what she said. She let herself out of the car and went to enjoy a solitary
coffee.

Ninety minutes later, the men
joined her. “Finished?” she asked.

“No, the battery on your phone
died,”
Jason
said.

“That was abominably cruel. She
made us act out scenes. With voices,” Michael said.

“I thought you enjoyed that,” Lacy
said.

“I enjoy it when I’m with fellow
sane people. Reenacting Pearl’s play to Pearl is like reading the Unabomber his
manifestos,” Michael said.

Because she felt a little guilty,
she treated them to coffee and pastries, which went a long way to smooth things
over, especially with Jason. By the time they were finished with their coffee,
it was time for supper. Lacy wasn’t hungry, but they decided to pick up
something and take it home to Len and Linda.

When they arrived at the house,
however, Len and Linda were nowhere in sight.

“Maybe Len had a doctor’s
appointment,” Lacy suggested. It wasn’t as if their hosts answered to them for
their whereabouts, rather it was strange that they were missing when Len had
such a difficult time getting around. Moving from room to room seemed to wear
him out and require more than a few drags on his oxygen tank.

They ate supper, being careful to
leave leftovers should the older couple arrive hungry. Jason and Michael helped
Lacy clean the kitchen, and then they left. Lacy tried not to be forlorn at
their absence. She didn’t want to mope, but being left behind was never fun.
With nothing else to do and the house to herself, she decided to take a bath.

As she soaked in the too-small tub,
she felt herself relax for the first time since the ordeal with Michael began.
Her thoughts began to wander, and they strayed to Jenny’s murder. Though she
hated to think it, any of Michael’s friends could be culpable. They were all
too familiar with the criminal underworld, and Jenny had seemed to be the type
of woman who pushed people to their breaking points. She wondered what
information Michael and Jason would learn from Bug and once again had to tamp
down her resentment.

It wasn’t just that she wasn’t
allowed to go on the stakeout. In many ways she had felt like a third wheel the
entire trip. Michael and Jason had become good friends over the past weeks, and
that was a good thing. The fact that she felt any resentment over their
friendship shamed her. After all, hadn’t she wanted them to become friends?
Yes. And wasn’t it a positive development that Jason, who had intentionally
pushed almost everyone in his life away since his brother’s death, was now
reaching out and making a connection? Yes. Her smidgen of jealousy at being
excluded was proof positive that she was a horrible, selfish person. The fact
that she was unwilling to share Jason with anyone was a testament to her
immaturity. And she
liked
Michael. It
shouldn’t matter that she had been
friends
with him
first until Jason came in and swooped him away.

She rolled her eyes at her idiocy
and ducked under the water, blowing bubbles. Okay, so she was a tiny bit
jealous. She was human. It wasn’t as if she was going to throw a tantrum and
demand that the two stop being friends. She was happy they were buddies, truly
she was. And she was secure in her relationship with both of them. Sometimes
negative emotions couldn’t be helped, but that didn’t mean they couldn’t be
managed. She was no doubt feeling it more keenly tonight because she had been
left behind like a hapless female. And how was she spending her time?
By whining and feeling sorry for herself.
Grow up,
she demanded.

She sat up in the now tepid water
and debated adding more. Common courtesy stopped her. Len and Linda could be
home any minute and one of them might need the bathroom. Plus she didn’t want
to hog all the hot water. She had yet to figure out what to do for their
generous hosts. Maybe she would pay their electricity bill. Maybe she would pay
all their bills.

It was while she was rinsing her
hair that she heard it, a thump and a tap, the unmistakable sound of someone in
the house. Her heart began to beat wildly, and she didn’t know why. Len and
Linda were home, that was all. Still, why were her instincts shouting at her
that something was amiss?

Listen
to your instincts; they’ll keep you alive,
Jason had said on more than one
occasion. Sometimes people were victims of crime because they ignored their
instincts, convincing themselves they were being silly or unreasonable. Lacy
was alone in a strange house in a strange town and a woman had just been
murdered. She had no intention of ignoring her instincts.

Slowly, she stepped out of the bath
and wrapped a towel around herself. She had brought her phone into the bathroom
with her. She picked it up now, searching for a signal, but the battery was
dead. She forgot to charge it after Michael and Jason’s marathon conversation
with Pearl. She set it aside and looked for a weapon, but she was in the
bathroom of a sickly middle-aged couple. What was she supposed to do? Numb the
intruder with Preparation-H?

She turned off the light and opened
the door, both hoping and not hoping that it was Len or Linda who had made the
noise. Of course she would be relieved, but how would she explain sneaking out
of a darkened bathroom dripping wet and wrapped in a towel? If she could make
it to her bedroom, she wouldn’t have to explain. She could lock herself inside
and put on some clothes. She could also charge her phone, she realized
belatedly after she stepped into the hallway. She stepped back in to retrieve
her phone.

From the corner of her eye, she saw
movement. The quickness and agility of the motion told her whoever was in the
house wasn’t Len or Linda. And he or she was dressed in black. She couldn’t be
sure, but she thought she had caught sight of a mask. No good ever came from
people who wore masks.

Giving up on the phone, she fled.
Unfortunately, her towel didn’t. It became caught on something and slid off,
leaving her to sprint naked down the hallway. To make matters worse, her
bladder was suddenly on high alert and threatening to revolt.
Please don’t let me die naked with full bladder
loss,
she silently pled as she darted to the nearest open door and sprinted
inside. It was Len and Linda’s room. She scooted under the bed, bumping what
sounded like a box of pills in her haste. They rattled and rolled. To Lacy, the
sound seemed supernaturally loud. To her right, a cowhide covered the floor.
She edged her fingers from beneath the bed and began inching it closer,
preparing to wrap herself in it. It was almost completely under the bed when
the sounds from outside the room became more distinct.

Footsteps fell gently in the
hallway, growing louder as they grew nearer. She watched from under the bed as
they stopped outside Len and Linda’s bedroom door.

“I know you’re in here,” a voice
whispered.

Any moment she would be discovered,
defenseless and naked except for a cowhide. Her bladder quivered tauntingly,
threatening to betray her. She squeezed her eyes closed and pressed her hand to
her mouth, willing herself not to make a whimper of fear. The shoes left the
doorway and took a step toward the bed.

“I’m getting sick of restaurant
food,” Michael said and he and Jason drove toward Bug’s auto shop.

“I’m not, which is strange because
I don’t usually eat out that much,” Jason said.

“Yeah, well, you’re not quite
normal now, are you?”

“What do you mean?”

“You really don’t get it? The food,
the hat, the falling,” Michael said.

“I’m cold, I’m hungry, and it’s
icy,” Jason said. “I don’t get where you’re going with this.”

“You don’t see it, and that makes
it even weirder. Lacy sees it.”

“Sees what?”

“Never mind,” Michael said. “She
was quiet tonight. How mad is she?”

“She wasn’t mad after the Pearl
thing. Believe me, if Lacy was mad, we would know.”

“Then why was she quiet?” Michael
asked.

“I don’t know. She looked a little
bereft.”

“Do you think she’s sad? Like we
actually hurt her feelings?”

“I don’t know,” Jason answered
slowly.

They drove in silence a while
longer until Michael swore and did a U-turn in the middle of the road.

“What are you doing?” Jason asked.

“I’m going back to get her. She can
stay in the car and call for help like she suggested,” Michael said.

“She’s not so good at the stay in
the car thing,” Jason said.

“Do you really want to leave her
behind?” Michael asked.

“No,” Jason said. He leaned forward
and put his hand on the dashboard. Now that they had decided to go get her, he
felt an unsettling urgency to get there. Maybe something was wrong with him; he
wasn’t usually so jittery.