Ink Flamingos (29 page)

“Doesn’t scare me,” Jeff said, going over to the wall, reaching up, and pulling the stencil down. It tore a little where it had been taped up, but otherwise it was intact. He brought it over to me, and I took it, studying it.

“Someone could’ve done this from the picture on that blog,” I said. “It’s not that hard to do a stencil. You can get instructions on the Internet.” You could get mostly everything having to do with tattooing on the Internet, except experience and talent and common sense.

A flash of red hit the wall, illuminating the flash designs. We all turned at the same time to see the police car pulling up out front, an SUV behind it. Showtime.

The uniformed cop knocked on the door, and Jeff motioned that he could come in. To my dismay, it turned out to be Willis, a cop I’d come across a couple of times before and who didn’t like me much. From the scowl on his face, I could tell that hadn’t changed.

“We got a report,” he said, eyeing me as though I was the culprit.

A couple of crime scene investigators followed him in, and Jeff led them to the back of the shop to see the flamingo. Joel and I lingered where we were. I was tired of making statements to the police and knew I wasn’t out of the woods on this one yet, either, but the longer I could delay the inevitable, the better. Especially since it was Willis.

“We have to find Ann Wainwright,” I said.

Joel shifted from one foot to the other, his fingers still toying with the chain at his waist. “How?”

I had no clue.

“Maybe we could go back to her sister’s apartment. Talk to that neighbor again. Terri.” And then a light bulb went off over my head. “Her sister worked for a dentist.” I struggled to remember what it had said on that paycheck stub. “Carruthers? Columbia? Something with a ‘C.’ ”

“Corinthian.” The word slipped off Joel’s tongue easily.

“What, are you psychic or something?” Joel hadn’t been inside with Bitsy and me; he’d been out in the hall with Terri the whole time.

“Bitsy made me make an appointment for a cleaning. I’m supposed to go tomorrow. See what I can find out.” He made a face. “I don’t like the dentist.”

“No one likes the dentist,” I said. “So why don’t we go now? Pretend that you thought the appointment was today. We could ask questions.” Sounded like a plan, except for one thing: Jeff and Willis were still in the back of the shop. My eyes strayed in that direction.

“It’s too late,” Joel said. “It’s after seven.”

“Sometimes dentists stay open late. It’s a Thursday. Maybe they’re like banks and they’re open late on Thursdays.” I was grabbing at straws, but I didn’t want to stick around here, and I had no other ideas.

I took a few steps toward the door.

“We’re parked in back,” Joel reminded me.

We could be stuck here all night. But I underestimated how much Willis disliked me, because he came storming through the sixties beads that hung between the back of the shop and the front, his face all scrunched up, a little notebook in his hand.

“You didn’t touch anything?” he barked.

I shook my head, then quickly told him how the door had been ajar, the flamingo wedged behind it. “That’s when I called Tim.”

Jeff was standing behind Willis. I could tell he wanted him out of here, too. The crime scene guys were shuffling out now, past us and toward the door. One of them had put the flamingo in a plastic bag and he carried it with the tips of his fingers. They didn’t exactly stand on ceremony, since they didn’t bother to say good-bye, just left. I glanced up at where the flamingo stencil had hung, but then Jeff caught my eye and gave a quick shake of his head. For some reason he didn’t want to tell them about it. Hmm.

Willis jotted a few notes down, then turned to Jeff. “You can pick up the report tomorrow afternoon.” He handed him a card. “The case report number’s on that. Just go to records and ask for it. Maybe you can get your insurance to pay for the damage.” And with that, he took off out the door and into the street without even a nod in my direction.

We watched as the police cruiser slid away from the curb and down the street. When it was out of sight, Jeff stuck the card in his front breast pocket and said, “What a jerk.”

I could think of more colorful words than that, but “jerk” would do, too.

We didn’t have much time.

“We’ll get out of your hair now,” I said quickly, tugging on Joel’s sleeve.

Jeff frowned and held up his hand. “What’s your hurry?” He looked from me to Joel. He knew we were up to something.

I wasn’t going to tell him. I didn’t need him tagging along everywhere I went. I had Joel; he was enough. But Jeff didn’t seem to agree. He stared Joel down, until Joel broke down.

“We’re going to check out that dentist office where Ainsley Wainwright worked. See if they knew anything about her sister.”

“Your car or mine?” he asked, adding, “Oh, we’d better take mine. More room.” And without waiting for a response, he went toward the back of the shop.

Joel gave a short shrug. It was a lost cause. I wouldn’t be able to talk Jeff out of coming with us. I’d just have to resign myself to the fact that he was.

The back of the shop was covered in fingerprint dust. I didn’t much blame Jeff for wanting to take off right now; it would take a little work to clean up. I felt as though there should be a white chalk outline where the flamingo had been.

Jeff slammed the door shut after us and went over to the back door of the Chinese place. A Hispanic man wearing an apron came out, and they talked for a couple of minutes before Jeff came back over.

“They’re going to watch the back. Make sure no one else shows up and tries to get in,” he said.

“Did they see anyone here before?” I asked, kicking myself for not thinking about asking them in the first place.

Jeff shook his head. “No.”

“Did the cops talk to them?” Joel asked.

“You kidding? That Willis guy wanted out of here right away.” He chuckled. “You are not his favorite person, Kavanaugh.”

Tell me something I didn’t already know.

“What about your shop?” I asked. “Can you afford to shut down?”

Jeff snickered. “Don’t worry your pretty little head about me, Kavanaugh.” And he opened his car door and climbed in.

We followed suit. I let Joel sit in the front because of his size, and I squeezed my long legs in the back, angling them so I wouldn’t feel too squished. Joel told Jeff where we were headed.

“Dentist, huh?”

Joel just grunted, clearly put out that Bitsy had put it on him to handle this unpleasant undercover operation.

We drove in silence. My head was spinning with everything that was going on: flamingos, pictures of me and Harry, Sherman Potter dead, Colin Bixby. Hey, how did he end up there? Oh, right. He broke up with me. And that led right into thinking about that kiss again. The one Jeff and I shared.

I felt the car slow, and I forced everything out of my head. I needed to be at the top of my game, because I was sure that there would have to be some fancy footwork to find out anything about Ainsley Wainwright at her former place of employment.

But as the car turned into the parking lot, it became obvious that this was not going to be our final destination after all, even though my suspicions about the office staying open late were on target.

Ann Wainwright was scurrying out of the building and through the parking lot, the lights of a nondescript white Toyota flashing as she hit the key fob.

Jeff slowed to a stop. I held my breath as we watched her get into the car and pull out. If she’d seen us sitting in this bright orange car, there was no outward sign. The Toyota moved out of the exit on the other side of the lot.

I told myself the metallic orange wasn’t obvious because it was dark now, and we wouldn’t stand out unless we were under a streetlight. Jeff really needed to get a car that was more incognito, although I couldn’t talk, since I owned a bright red Mustang Bullitt convertible.

Blame it on living in the desert. We needed those splashes of color amongst all the desert browns.

Slowly, the Pontiac moved forward until we were on the street, a couple of cars back.

“You won’t lose her?” Joel asked.

“Jeff was in the Marines,” I said.

Joel nodded, the answer satisfying him.

Jeff said nothing as his hands tightened around the steering wheel. I saw his biceps flex, the skull tattoo looking as though it was clenching its jaw. I absently touched my chest, where my Chinese dragon poked out of my shirt.

Ann turned down a couple of side roads and then came back up to the main drag, and I started to wonder if she didn’t know we were behind her, but then she maneuvered around again, and I realized she’d pulled into the parking lot at her sister’s apartment house. Jeff eased the Pontiac against the curb on the street, and we watched as Ann got out of the Toyota and went toward the building, disappearing inside.

I thought about the picture I’d found. Something was gnawing at me. What if this really was Ainsley, and it was her sister who was murdered instead? I mean, she had been at the dentist office where she worked and then gone to her apartment. What if the murder had been a case of mistaken identity? What if whoever killed her sister had meant to kill her instead?

But that would mean that the Ainsley I met was leading some sort of double life. Dental hygienist by day, sex kitten for Sherman Potter by night. But maybe she’d had a dream. A dream to sing with the Flamingos. A dream she couldn’t pass up.

I was grabbing at straws. Or was I?

We sat and watched the building for any kind of movement, until another car swung into the lot. A woman got out, staring at the Toyota, which was bathed in light from the streetlamp. She moved toward it, her head down as she tried the driver’s side door. It was locked. She lifted her face toward the light, and I recognized Terri.

Jeff sat up a little straighter in his seat.

“That’s her neighbor,” I explained. “The one we talked to this morning. Her name’s Terri. She’s having Joel do a tattoo for her.”

Jeff didn’t seem to hear me.

“That’s the girl I saw at Cleopatra’s Barge,” Jeff said. “The one who was pretending to be you.”

A
ll my senses were on overload. “How do you know?” I asked. “She was in disguise, right?”

Jeff nodded, his eyes still glued to Terri, who was now holding a cell phone to her ear and watching the building, her face totally illuminated.

“She’s the one. I saw her come out of that ladies’ room without the disguise,” he said. “I noticed her. It was her.”

My brain was somehow stuck on the words “I noticed her.”

Terri stuck the cell phone back in her pocket and went toward her car. She climbed in, and the brake lights came on before she started to pull out.

“Okay, guys, here’s the problem. She’s still in there,” Jeff indicated the apartment house. “But
she
”—he indicated the neighbor—“is leaving. What do we want to do?”

“Follow Terri,” Joel said without thinking.

Jeff sensed my hesitation. I wanted to see what both of them were up to.

“You want to stay here and confront that chick yourself, Kavanaugh? Because I agree with Joel. Let’s follow that girl who pretended to be you.”

They both needed to be watched. But we only had one car, even though there were three of us. I said as much.

“I can stay here if you want to drive,” Jeff offered.

“I can’t follow anyone like you can,” I admitted.

“I can stay,” Joel said. “I’ve got a phone; I can call if anything happens. If she goes anywhere.”

“But you don’t have a car.”

“Don’t worry about me. I’ll think of something.” Joel scrambled out of the car. “You better get going.” He indicated Terri’s car stopped at the light at the next block before stepping onto the sidewalk.

I barely got out a “thanks” when Jeff peeled away from the curb. I fell back against the backseat, the passenger door shutting on its own with the force of the car.

“Hey!” I said.

We took a couple of turns, and I peered out the front window to see that we were only three cars away from Terri. How did he do that? I looked out the back window to see Joel lumbering along the sidewalk toward the apartment house. I hoped he was going to be okay. But there are definite positives to being his size and looking the way he did. He also knew a lot of people in this city, and I knew he’d have people to call on if he got into a jam.

I didn’t want to sit in the backseat like a kid.

I folded myself up and squeezed my way into the front seat, shifting a little so at one point I felt Jeff Coleman’s hand on my butt, steering me in the right direction. I wasn’t sure how I felt about that.

As I settled into my seat, though, I didn’t have time to ruminate about where his hand had been. Because Terri was slowing down. In front of Murder Ink.

“Do you think she’s the one who left the flamingo?” I asked.

Jeff shrugged, said nothing. When Terri started to move again, he made sure we were well behind her but close enough so he wouldn’t lose her.

I didn’t want to boost his ego by telling him how good he was at this. He knew it, anyway, didn’t need me to tell him, and if I did, he’d take that as more proof of our alleged
thing
.

“What if she’s the one who’s behind all this?” I asked, unable to shut up. I couldn’t explain my sudden need to voice my thoughts. But the silence was killing me. Not to mention the intense way Jeff was watching that car. I’d never seen that expression before, and it scared me a little. Made me wonder if I shouldn’t have been the one staying behind with Ann rather than Joel.

“She’s pretty, isn’t she?” I now said, disgusted with myself.

Jeff’s head snapped around and he barked, “Kavanaugh, I get it. You’re jealous. Okay. But if this is the chick who’s been impersonating you and leaving flamingos all over the place, then maybe you need to refocus.”