Scarlett Undercover (6 page)

He stood up so fast the chair skidded into the wall behind it. “You’ll regret this,” he growled.

“Seriously?” I said. “That’s the line you’re going with? ‘You’ll regret this’?”

He gave me a look meant to freeze my heart. “You won’t be so smug for long,” he spat. “Consider yourself warned.”

“Consider it considered.”

He stomped across the room, shot me one last withering look, and slammed the door so hard I thought the glass would shatter.

It held.

I drank some more cocoa. Got up. And went around to my own chair, where I belonged.

A
n hour later I was still at my desk, watching the morning unfold down on Carroll Street. Families dressed in their Sunday best strolled home from church. Sleepy-eyed heathens straggled out of the bodega across the street with newspapers and coffee. On the computer behind me, the Library of Alexandria’s website was open to a picture of
Abbi
’s bottle.

Only it wasn’t actually one of his; it was an exact replica owned by the Egyptian government.

BOTTLE, CIRCA
950
BC
, the caption read.
HELD IN STORAGE
. Below that were links to three academic papers. The first argued that the bottle was nothing
more than a souvenir made for early spice traders to take home to their wives.

Not so interesting.

The second was better.

Its authors had used carbon dating and some kind of metallurgical analysis to figure out that the bottle was made in Jerusalem during the reign of King Suleyman, a.k.a. Solomon, a.k.a. the guy with the knot. They’d tried to open it, since every archaeologist and engineer who’d seen the thing swore its lid was designed to come off. But that hadn’t worked out so well, and in the end, all they could say was that the bottle was old.

And the third paper? Well, that’s where things got interesting. According to Ebe Sawalha, PhD, the bottle on display in Egypt hadn’t just been cast during Solomon’s reign; it was made
for
the guy. She said the design on the lid was an impression made by Solomon’s own ring, which, according to some legends, was what gave him the power to control humans and jinn, animals and weather. Devout Muslims believed Solomon’s power came from Allah, but Dr. Sawalha’s research had turned up ancient texts describing a magical ring that, when used in conjunction with a bottle called the
Shubaak
, allowed Solomon to imprison rebellious jinn.
According to those same texts, the
Shubaak
’s lid could only be removed by someone who both possessed the ring and knew the proper incantation to say over it. The ring, Dr. Sawalha wrote, had disappeared after Solomon’s death. And the incantation had been lost to time.

I rotated the Alexandria bottle’s picture through its 360-degree view and saw that the bottom was smooth. If
Abbi
had been right about only the hash marked bottle being the real deal, then the museum copy was a fake. Which meant my dad’s family of quiet, bookish Egyptians had somehow ended up with an antiquity so precious that a
copy
of it was on display in a museum. Which meant that some ancient king’s super-special-magic-and-unicorns
Shubaak
was, at that very moment, sitting in a steel box on Fourth Street at the central branch of the Las Almas Teachers Credit Union.

How the hell had that happened?

While my brain tangled with this brand-new mystery, my eyes watched the conspicuously inconspicuous woman down on Carroll Street. She’d been there since Oliver left, leaning against the bricks of a doorway four buildings over, using a newspaper to hide her face. As I watched, the paper dropped low enough for me to see her.

Blondie.

My tail from yesterday.

A few seconds later, I spotted her dark-haired buddy huddling under a ratty coat, holding out a hand to collect change from passersby. The General hadn’t put in an appearance yet that morning, but any panhandler worth her salt would know better than to set up shop on his turf. That, along with the fact that she kept looking up at my window every few minutes, gave Shorty away.

The day before, my shadows hadn’t made a secret of their tail job. They’d wanted me to see them, wanted me scared. Staying hidden meant the game had changed. I wasn’t just a nuisance anymore. I was a threat.

I took out my phone and hit Gemma’s number. I hadn’t heard from her in a while, and with Oliver out making unwanted social calls, and me pissing him off even more than he’d been before, I wanted to know she was safe. More importantly, I wanted to make sure she stayed that way. The kid was turning me soft.

One ring did the trick.

“Hi, Scarlett.”

“Hey,” I said. “Everything good with you?”

“Good enough. Did you figure out what’s going on?”

I kept my eye on Blondie. “Sort of, but I’ve got a long way to go.”

“That’s okay,” she said. “Aunt Lucy likes it when I help out with my cousin, Knox. He can’t talk yet. He’s fun.”

I smiled in spite of myself. I’d only known Gemma for a day, but she was smart enough to know what was what.

“I’m glad, kid,” I said. “Listen, you sit tight, be careful, and shoot me a text every once in a while to let me know you’re hanging in there. And don’t leave your aunt’s place except for school. Honestly, I wish you didn’t have to go out at all, but if you start skipping or faking sick, your parents might figure out there’s something going on.”

“Sure,” she said. “And, Scarlett?”

“Yeah?”

“You be careful, too.”

I closed my computer. “Don’t worry about me, kid. I’ll be fine.”

She said good-bye. I did the same and called Emmet Morales.

He took three rings.

“Scarlett?”

“Morning, Emmet. How’s my favorite cop?”

“You know me—I’m always good. Haven’t heard from you in a while, though. Keeping your nose clean?”

“Clean
ish
.”

Trouble wasn’t a topic to joke about with Emmet. I did it anyway.

“What’s up?” he said.

“I was hoping we could meet sometime today.”

“New client?”

“Nah. I just miss your pretty face.”

“Yeah. Right. Tell me about the case.”

I laughed. Tried to sound casual.

“It’s nothing special. Just a little girl with a brother who’s been acting weird lately. Staying out too much, getting into fights, that kind of thing. Oh, and one of his friends took a little tumble Friday.”

“Keep going,” Emmet said

“The friend was Quinlan Johnson.”

I could picture him in the silence that followed, folding his lower lip in with his index finger and thumb, thinking.

“A lot of bad stuff goes down on the streets,” he said after a while. “Sounds like this kid needs a shrink more
than a detective. I know some good ones. How about I give you a name?”

He sounded guarded. Careful.

“You know,” I said, “I might just take you up on that once I sort out some other stuff. Like why my client’s brother broke into my office this morning and tried to scare me off the case.”

“Tried to scare you how?”

“Tough talk. Nothing big.”

“Families get messed up, Scarlett. You don’t know what this kid might have tangled with or what’s going on in his sister’s head. Maybe she’s just trying to get him in trouble. Did you talk to the parents?”

“She says they’re out to lunch, and so far everything else she’s told me has checked out.”

“Maybe she’s just looking for attention. How’d she get your name?”

“Business card in the school bathroom.”

He laughed. “Quite the entrepreneur, aren’t you?”

“Don’t change the subject. Can we meet or not?”

“Being police is a real job, you know. I don’t have time to play sidekick to some ghetto Nancy Drew.”

His words sounded cruel, but I knew better.

“I’ll remember that the next time you need my help tracking down a serial killer,
Detective
Morales.”

“I suppose you do come in handy once in a while,” he said, laughing again.

“So how about Rita Mae’s?” I asked. “Say, in an hour?”

“Sure. Rita Mae’s.”

“Great. Oh, and Emmet, what can you tell me about Quinlan Johnson?”

The line went quiet.

“Emmet?”

“It’s not my case,” he said.

“That’s not what I asked.”

“I know.”

“So you’ll tell me what you can?”

“Rita Mae’s,” Emmet said. He wasn’t laughing anymore. “See you there.”

Blondie and Shorty hadn’t budged, and since I wasn’t in the mood for company, there was no choice but to ditch them the hard way. I tucked my blackjack under my jacket sleeve, strapped my bag across my chest, and hit the street.

Blondie stayed behind her paper as I passed by. I didn’t look up, didn’t let on that I knew she was there. I stopped at the curb, snuck a peek at Shorty, and crossed to the newsstand on the other side of the street.

A curved security mirror was mounted up high on the stand’s wall. I grabbed a magazine, snuck a peek at the mirror, caught Blondie pretending to read a flyer on a lamppost. Farther back, Shorty was still holding out her cup to passersby. I put down the magazine, bought a pack of gum, and strolled two blocks east to Zelinski’s Bagel Shop. Sundays were always busy there, and since my tails were doing their best to stay invisible, with any luck they wouldn’t follow me in.

It worked. Inside the shop, counter workers jitterbugged back and forth along a row of overflowing metal baskets, tossing bagels and bialys into paper bags, slapping spackling knives full of cream cheese into tubs. Cashiers shouted orders and rang up sales so fast the registers smoked. Any other morning, I would have taken time to be impressed.

I made my way to the front of the line, using a tall man in a Windbreaker for cover. After a few minutes, I turned and pretended to look at the clock over the door. Blondie was peering in the window. She seemed
anxious, like her puppy had wandered too far away in the park. I pulled a handful of pennies out of my pocket, let them fall to the floor in a patter of
clink
s. Then I crouched low, crawling through the crowd as I pretended to gather them, muttering “excuse me” and working my way toward the narrow passage that staff used to get behind the counter. No one noticed when I crawled under and snuck back to the kitchen. And even if the counter workers had, they’d have been too busy to care.

In the hot, calm back room, a mountain of a man dumping salt bagels off a peel saw me making tracks along the wall.

“Morning, Scarlett. Who’d you piss off today?”

“Nobody good, Edgar.”

I kept moving.

“One of these days somebody’s gonna wise up to your little escape route. Till then I might have to start charging a toll each time you cut through here.”

“Yeah, well, if I make it to next time, you can name your price,” I said.

Edgar laughed.

“Heads up!” He chucked a hot bagel toward my noggin. I caught it on the fly and told him I owed him one.

“One?” he called after me.

“Maybe two,” I hollered back, and started down the basement stairs.

At the bottom, I cut right and ran to the heavy double doors that led up to the street. I lifted the righthand side, scanned the alley, saw it was empty except for a crook-tailed cat licking his paw on a Dumpster. I climbed out, closed the door behind me, and hightailed it to the nearest metro station, stopping at the turnstiles to make sure my tails hadn’t caught on to my trick. I checked again at the top of the platform stairs and once more from behind a stained tile column near the tracks. The coast stayed clear, but after what had happened the day before, I knew better than to be smug or lazy. In my business, smug and lazy got you in trouble.

And sometimes they even got you dead.

E
mmet wasn’t at the restaurant when I arrived, so I got a table and took out
Abbi
’s copy of
One Thousand and One Nights
. It smelled of leather and dust and things I couldn’t have, and made me miss my parents so bad it hurt.

I opened it to the first page. Traced the outline of a water stain. Ran my finger over an indigo inscription I hadn’t remembered was there:
Abd al-Malik
.

Servant of the King.

“You ready to order yet?”

My waitress stood a few feet away, and judging by the look on her face, she wasn’t any too pleased about
it. She was only a year or two older than me, but her kitchen-sink bleach job, pockmarked skin, and bloodshot eyes all told me life had dealt her a rough hand.

“My friend will be here soon,” I said. “Can I get a soda while I wait?”

She sniffed and meandered away. I doubted I’d see her anytime soon.

Then Emmet walked in.

Emmet was tall and broad shouldered, with blue-black skin, black-brown eyes, and neat little dreads all over his head. His ironed white shirt looked crisp under a camel-hair jacket, and other than the barely legal spring-assisted knife he carried in a strap around his right calf, his jeans weren’t keeping any secrets.

“You’re early,” he said.

“You’re not.”

I smiled. Seeing Emmet always reminded me that I wished I could see him more.

He hung his jacket on the hook at the end of the booth and sat down.

“Been waiting long?”

“Long enough to cheese off Miss Sunshine over there.”

“That sweet thing?” Emmet grinned at the hard-faced girl as she hustled toward us.

“Afternoon, Detective. What can I get for you?” She was suddenly all smiles.

“Apart from your lovely self?” he said. “How about a cup of coffee?” The waitress giggled, then hustled off to get the coffee.

Emmet had first introduced Reem and me to Rita Mae’s two years earlier. That had been a good meal. A great meal, really, since he’d just managed to convince an old bulldog of a judge not to send me to Hammett House. “The food here tastes like my granny cooked it,” he’d said. To me, a fourteen-year-old kid who’d just dodged a stretch in the worst juvy lockup in the state, Rita Mae’s food tasted like freedom.

But our friendship with Emmet hadn’t started off so happy. He’d still been a beat cop the day he and a washed-out homicide detective showed up on our doorstep to tell us
Abbi
was dead. And he’d made a lousy show of looking tough, sitting stiff as starch on our couch while the detective droned on and on and on. After that, he’d driven
Ummi
and Reem and me to the morgue in his squad car. He went into the observation room with
Ummi
, too, and all but carried her out when she was done.

From then on, Emmet kept in touch with a call here, a ring on the doorbell there. He cared, so we cared
back.
Ummi
cooked for him and fussed over his weight and loved him like a son. When she died, he’d helped carry her shrouded body to its grave. He hadn’t looked tough then, either. He hadn’t even bothered trying.

So when I got busted hot-wiring a Lexus in ninth grade, Reem had called him straightaway. He stayed with me through booking, called in favors to get my paperwork moving, and promised the judge he’d keep me on the straight and narrow.

And he had, mainly by putting me to work. At first I only helped with little things: seeing if liquor stores would sell to me with a fake ID, digging up records at City Hall, scouting for pickpockets in tourist areas. Turned out I had a knack for talking to people and the natural stubbornness it took to be a gumshoe. So Emmet taught me how to tail suspects, run surveillance, and work a case. He even got the owner of his muay Thai gym to train me for free, and pretended not to know I’d forged Reem’s signature on the gym’s release forms. “I can’t send you out there like a lamb to the slaughter,” he’d muttered under his breath. “It wouldn’t be right.”

From then on, he’d brought me in on juvy cases where an inside angle might help move things along. I was young. I wasn’t a cop. That meant I could go places
cops couldn’t and get teenagers to talk to me. The arrangement wasn’t official. Hell, it wasn’t even kosher. But Emmet had a soft spot for kids, and I had a soft spot for Emmet. We made it work.

While Emmet sipped his coffee, I filled him in as best I could on my life. Yes, I was still working cases. No, I wasn’t doing anything too dangerous. No, I hadn’t gotten any taller.

He listened close, asking questions when it suited him.

“How’s Reem?” he said, nodding a thank-you to the waitress for refilling his cup. I’d given up on my soda.

“Busy.”

“She taking care of herself?”

“Not really.”

Emmet took the wrapper off a straw and rolled it into a ball.

“You helping out?”

“As much as I can. I keep the apartment clean and make sure she eats.”

He poured a plastic container of cream into his coffee and stirred.

“Tell her I said hello. And if she ever has a night off…”

He let the words hover.

“You know Muslim women can’t date, Emmet,” I said. “And Reem’s hard-core. Unless that changes, it just won’t work.”

He smiled and shrugged like he didn’t care. Only I knew he did.

“How about some pie, handsome?” The waitress was back, and she wasn’t talking to me.

“What kind you got?” He draped his arm over the back of the seat. Emmet was not unaware of his charms.

“The usuals, plus boysenberry and mango.”

“I think I’ll take chocolate cream with a slice of peach on the side. If I’ve got room after that, I’ll try the mango.”

“Anything else?” Her lashes looked ready to flutter off her face.

Emmet looked to me. The waitress did not.

“I’d like a slice of sweet potato,” I said. “And my soda, if you don’t mind.” Her pen moved across the pad in her hand, but her eyes stayed on Emmet. She batted her lashes one last time and walked away, rear end swinging.

I pretended to throw up in my mouth. Emmet grinned.

“I can’t help it, Scarlett.”

“Yes. You can.”

He laughed, eyeing the waitress like a well-fed wolf. “Maybe a little. But there’s no point behaving till I’ve got someone worth doing it for.”

I rolled my eyes. Asked him if we could talk about something more important.

“Nothing’s more important than you and your sister.”

I rolled them some more.

“Tell me about Quinlan Johnson.”

His smile disappeared like a raindrop in the ocean. “Like I said on the phone, it sounds like your client’s brother needs counseling, not a detective.”

“Maybe,” I said. “But my
client
needs me.”

We watched the waitress set three fat wedges of pie in front of Emmet and slap my soda down. “The mango’s on the house,” she said, giving Emmet a wink. “I made it myself. Tell me if I put in enough sugar.”

“Darlin’, if it’s half as sweet as you, it’s twice as sweet as I can handle.”

She let out a quackish giggle and waggled back to her station like a duck in heat. I didn’t bother wondering if my pie would ever show.

“Emmet,” I asked quietly. “Were there any marks on Quinlan Johnson’s body?”

His fork froze halfway to his mouth.

“Yes.”

“Well?”

“What kind of marks do you mean?”

“Tattoos. Scars. Stuff like that.”

He put the forkful of chocolate in his mouth and chewed a long time before he swallowed.

“Maybe.”

“Was there a kind of design, like interlocking rings?”

“Maybe.”

“I’ll take that as a yes.”

Emmet put down his fork. “What makes you ask?”

“Well, I’m pretty sure my client’s brother has the same thing carved into his wrist. It’s red and infected and ugly, and he’s not doing anything to keep it clean. Like he wants it to scar.”

Emmet pushed the chocolate pie away.

“There
was
a mark on the Johnson boy’s body, exactly like the one you’re describing. The medical examiner said it was at least three weeks old.”

“On his wrist?”

“Chest. We think it’s a ritual mark from some kind of gang or cult that hasn’t crossed our radar until now.”

“A rich white boy gang?”

“Or cult,” Emmet repeated. “That’s what I’m thinking. The department psychologist, too.”

“Why?”

Emmet mulled over his response. He wasn’t going to spill everything, but he wasn’t going to leave me hanging.

“From what the boy’s parents told us, he’d been very involved with a new group of friends in the past few months. Apparently they were playing some kind of elaborate, real-life fantasy game together.”

“Had the parents been worried?”

“They said yes, but I’m not so sure. You know how it goes.” He pressed his lips together and pulled the slice of mango closer.

“Emmet?”

“Mmmm?”

“Quinn Johnson’s father is second-in-command at Archer Construction. My client’s name is Archer. Gemma Archer.”

His eyes narrowed.

“You know anything about all the problems with The Parker?” I asked.

He took a mouthful of mango and grimaced. “Too much sugar.”

“Let’s stick to The Parker,” I said. “The
Globe
mentioned four break-ins at Archer Construction’s on-site trailer.”

Emmet sighed. “Five. The last was an inside job. Whoever did it had a key, but they weren’t authorized to go in after hours. The company wanted that one kept quiet.”

“Did the thieves take anything?”

“The first four times? No. They just tore the place up. Spray-painted walls and such.”

“With interlocking rings?”

Emmet nodded and scowled at his pie like it was trying to get away.

“What about the fifth?”

He took another bite and grimaced again. “Still too sweet.”

“Emmet?”

“Robbery’s not my department, Scarlett. I’m in homicide, remember?”

“Look,” I said. “I think there’s more to Quinn Johnson’s death than suicide, and I need your help proving it.”

He folded in his lower lip.

“You’re stalling,” I said.

“You’re right.” He dropped his hand and nodded, more for himself than me. “The thieves took a stack of papers from the secretary’s out-box.”

“Any idea why?”

Emmet’s lips curled into a lopsided smile. “You’re the detective. You tell me.”

“Funny.”

“It kind of was,” he said. “But the truth is, we’re not sure why. All they got was opened mail that the secretary hadn’t had a chance to sort. Invoices. Receipts. Stuff like that. The only thing she hadn’t laid eyeballs on directly was an unopened envelope that needed forwarding to The Parker’s architect in Chicago.”

I pushed my glass around, spreading the little puddle of condensation underneath it.

“She didn’t have any idea what was in it?” I asked.

“Nope.”

“Are you telling me everything?”

Emmet sat back and crossed his arms over his chest. “In case you haven’t noticed, Scarlett, I don’t like it when kids get lost in the system. I’m trying to help you here.”

I gave him a smile for that. A real one.

“I know. You’re a good guy, Emmet.”

“Don’t believe it for a minute.” He noticed the empty space in front of me and started to wave the waitress over. “You didn’t get your pie.”

“Stop,” I said. Emmet took one look at my face and waved her off. She wilted like week-old flowers.

“I don’t want pie,” I said. “I want to figure out what happened to Quinn Johnson. The
Globe
said he threw something that looked like paper into the water before he jumped. Do you know what it was?”

“Here.” Emmet pushed the wedge of peach toward me. “I can’t eat three.”

“Emmet?” I shoved the plate back.

He took in a long breath and let it out through pursed lips.

“No. We don’t know what it was.”

“Then what did he say to the woman on the bridge before he jumped?”

Emmet’s body coiled up tight as an overwound music box.

“Emmet?”

He jiggled his coffee cup back and forth by the handle.

“You’re not as tough as you think, Scarlett,” he said.

“Probably not.”

“And you’ve got a lot to learn.”

“I know.”

“No. You don’t.” He shook his head slowly back and forth. “You really don’t.”

I took a bite of pie to try to flush the taste of condescension out of my mouth. It didn’t work.

“Emmet, what did Quinn say before he jumped?”

His brown eyes filled with pain, like they had after
Abbi
died.

“Promise you’ll come to me for help if you get in over your head with this one?” he said.

“I promise.”

His voice went rough.

“Quinn said, ‘Sam’s safe now.’ And then he jumped.”

“That’s all?”

The pain in Emmet’s eyes darkened down to something more like anger. “That’s all. But you know, Scarlett, I think something—someone—
made
that boy kill himself. The coroner ruled it a suicide, though, so I can’t do a damned thing about it. At least not officially.”

I reached for his hand, wondering what the hell was up with me and all the hand-holding lately.

It was more than our waitress could stand. She sashayed over to ask if we wanted anything else. Emmet ignored her and looked up at the ceiling. I told her we were set. She tossed the bill on the table and left in a huff.

“Don’t worry, Emmet,” I said, giving his hand a squeeze before I picked up the check. “This one’s on me.”