by Anne R. Tan
Raina jumped and stifled a scream. With her heart still racing, she stepped closer.
Blue reached to flipped the cutout over.
She held out a hand. “Wait.”
He glanced at her. “Why?”
She pulled out a tissue from her purse and gave it to him. “Use this.”
“Again, why?” His tone had an exasperated edge to it.
“Does Jung-yee have a cardboard cutout of a celebrity?”
“Not that I know of.”
“I didn’t think she owned one either. So who put this in her home?” Raina gestured at the cutout on the floor. “Use the tissue. You don’t want to contaminate the evidence.”
He was smart enough not to argue even though he didn’t look convinced. He flipped the cardboard over. It was a life-size image of Jung-yee in casual wear with splotches of red ink over it.
Raina gasped. Why would someone threaten her cousin with death?
Blue touched the red ink. “What the he—”
“What did I say about not touching anything?” Raina snapped. She cringed at her tone. “Sorry. It has been a long day, and it looks like it’ll be an even longer night. Please tell me you’ve already called the police?”
“Is this a sick joke?”
Raina’s jaw dropped, and she had to snap it shut. “Someone is threatening to kill your fiancée. Look at the red ink. That is supposed to represent blood. Do you know how unlucky this is for your marriage?”
Blue still looked confused. “She is the sweetest girl. Who would want to threaten her?”
Raina thought about the wedding planner’s animosity toward her cousin. Also, while she went Bridezilla on the hired help at the winery yesterday, she could have offended a dozen or more people. “What about the people at the photo shoot yesterday? She threatened to fire everybody before she broke down into tears.”
“All brides go through this phase. I’m sure the wedding professionals are used to this kind of excitable behavior. I don’t think anyone is threatening her. This is just a sick joke. We better clean this up before Jung-yee gets a look at it. She’s already mumbling about bad omens. I don’t want her to see this.”
“No! We should call the police. If this turns out to be a joke, all we have wasted is the police’s time. If this turns out to be a real threat, at least we notified the authorities.”
Blue straightened and looked Raina straight in the eyes. “No. We’ll clean this up and pretend we didn’t find anything in her apartment. Then she’s coming back to my place for the rest of the week.”
“But that’s even worse luck,” Raina said.
“I don’t care about your Chinese superstition. I want this wedding to be a happy memory for my bride. This wedding has nothing to do with you, Matthew, or your family. All of you can disappear for all I care. I’m taking Jung-yee back to my home, and that’s the end of it. She’ll feel safe there.”
Raina took a deep breath. Her intuition told her someone was threatening Jung-yee, but Blue was also correct that her cousin couldn’t take any more bad news. “Why don’t we do this? Go pack a bag for Jung-yee. I’ll call the police and wait for them to come and check this out. This way we will get it on record without her knowing about it until after the wedding.”
“And you’ll promise not to say anything to her until after the wedding?”
“If she doesn’t ask, I won’t say anything. But I will not lie to her.”
Blue nodded. “Good enough. She’ll be too busy with last-minute plans to ask you.”
While Blue went about the bedroom and packed a bag for her cousin, Raina called the police. She explained the situation to them, and the dispatcher said they would send someone out to take a statement the next morning. She left her phone number with the dispatcher and locked up the condo.
Raina and Blue went downstairs to check on her cousin. She stood silent while Blue told his little lie. She gave her cousin a hug and said she would come by the condo to check on things in the morning, and left to catch what little sleep remained for the evening.
As she drove back to the Victorian, she wondered who would threaten her cousin. Bridget, the wedding planner? Did she pay the field hand to do this? It would be easy enough for her to blow up a photo of her client and put it on a cardboard.
And did Blue have her cousin’s best interest at heart? If he did, wouldn’t he tell her the truth? But then again, who was Raina to point the finger? She knew a secret about Matthew’s family that could potentially change how he viewed his parents, and she’d kept silent. If this was what protecting those you love meant, then she and Blue got the same incorrect memo.
9
An Old Familiar Friend
When Raina came downstairs the next morning, Po Po was preparing peanut butter and jelly sandwiches in the kitchen. Her grandma was in her little old lady outfit again—Chinese silk pajamas, half-moon glasses halfway down her nose, and a shawl with fringes looped around her shoulders. It looked so normal that it was disturbing. Though traffic noise from the street drifted in through the dual pane windows, the rest of the house was silent.
“Are we ready to go?” Po Po asked.
Raina bit into the sandwich and grabbed her purse. “Let’s roll, Watson.” She glanced at the plastic lucky cat clock on the wall. Its tail swung lazily back and forth. Eleven already? “The dispatcher said someone would come by Jung-yee’s apartment to take the report between noon and four.”
Po Po harrumphed. “Just like a service call with the power company. It’s like we have all the time in the world to wait for them.”
“You don’t have to come. I can take care of it myself.”
“And leave you unprotected? I don’t think so. Does Jung-yee have to be there?”
Raina shrugged. “I don’t know. She opened her front door, noticed one of her shoes was crooked on the shoe rack, and hightailed out. She didn’t even step inside.”
Po Po locked up the Victorian and waited for Raina to pull up the manual garage door. “I probably should put in an electric door opener the next time I’m in town.”
Raina backed out her faded red Honda Accord onto the short driveway, and Po Po closed the garage door and got inside the car.
As Raina pulled onto the street, she said, “Since I searched the apartment with Blue, I have more information to give the police.”
Po Po frowned. “I still can’t believe she was able to detect that someone had been inside her home because of a crooked shoe. That girl must be more anal-retentive than she lets on.”
Raina bit her lower lip to keep from laughing. When they were kids, Jung-yee had made them line up the Barbie shoes in the playhouse after a fashion show. Her cousin’s personality quirks were not news to her.
She circled her cousin’s condo block for several minutes, looking for a parking spot. Finally, Po Po called Jung-yee and got the passcode for the underground garage. Each condo unit got two parking spots. Jung-yee’s spare spot was probably worth five hundred dollars a month if she rented it out.
Raina breathed a sigh of relief when they got into the elevator. If she had to look for parking on a daily basis like this, she might give herself an early heart attack or become a hermit, so she never had to leave her home.
“Just a few more days, girl. Hold it together until after the wedding,” Po Po said.
“Was it always like this? Or did more people move into the city?” Raina asked.
“San Francisco has always been crowded. Now it has gotten ridiculous. After your brother is done with college, I might sell the Victorian.”
Raina gave her grandma a sideways glance. Her mom had lived in the Victorian rent-free for years. With the aid of a small trust, Mom had enjoyed the life of a socialite after her husband’s death, though much of it was heavily subsidized by her parents and older brothers. “What will happen to Mom?”
“Melody is fifty years old. She’ll have to figure it out. It was your grandfather’s decision to support her. I had always opposed the ide
a. Hard work builds character. And it’s about time your mom learns to hustle. She could always move to someplace more affordable.”
“What if she ends up moving in with you?”
“At the senior complex? I don’t think so. Maybe she’ll move in with your sister.”
Raina chuckled at the idea. “Mom wouldn’t want to be the granny babysitter.”
They got out of the elevator. The door of Jung-yee’s unit was wide open again like last night. The hair on the back of Raina’s neck stiffened. Did the intruder come back after they had left? How did he get in without a key?
Po Po stopped short. “Why is the door open?”
“I’m wondering the same thing. Maybe we should get back into the elevator and call the cops.” Raina turned around and pressed the call button.
Po Po pulled out her pepper spray and a knitting needle. “Let’s rock ’n’ roll.”
Raina spun around. Before she could call out, her grandma dashed toward the open doorway like a ninja on a mission. “Po Po!” she whispered. Her heart thumped painfully against her chest. She wanted nothing more in the world than to jump back into the elevator. She swallowed her fear and ran after her grandma.
She didn’t want to call out again and alert the intruder in the condo unit. They were on the eighth floor, so it was unlikely that the intruder would jump out the window. If he came barreling out, he would run toward the front door and her grandma.
Raina was about three paces behind her grandma when Po Po rushed into the unit with a banshee shriek. She almost jumped out of her skin at the noise, dropping her purse and tripping on the carpeted hallway. She grabbed the doorframe to keep from hurling onto the floor.
A peep-squeak of a man jerked and knocked over the framed photograph on the side table next to the sofa. He spun around, reaching for the gun in his shoulder harness. He pointed the weapon at the door.
Po Po screamed and dropped to the floor, leaving Raina exposed to the barrel of a gun.
“Smith, don’t shoot!” Raina yelled to be heard above the noise.
The police detective lowered his gun. “Raina Sun, so we meet again.”
Raina had met Smith a few years ago during another murder investigation. If she were generous, she would say he was about five feet five inches. His clothes were tight and showed off his muscles. Though he was in his early thirties, his skin tone was luminous, and his eyes were smoldering, giving his hatchet face a hint of sensitivity that women probably found charming.
His gray eyes studied Raina and her grandma like they were in a lineup. It looked like the years hadn’t changed him all that much. The homicide detective had trust issues.
Po Po picked herself up off the floor and collapsed onto the sofa, fanning herself with her hand. “You almost gave me a heart attack, young man.”
Smith raised an eyebrow. “Likewise.” He had dealt with Po Po before, so he was immune to her senile old lady trick.
“How did you get in?” Raina asked, coming inside. She stood behind her grandma, trying to appear at ease. Smith always made her nervous because she couldn't tell if he had crossed over to the dark side after his fiancée's death.
“The doorman let me in,” Smith said.
Po Po glanced at her Fitbit. “You’re early. I thought the dispatcher said someone would show up between noon and four. There still ten minutes before noon.”
“Your tax dollars at work, ladies.” Smith smiled, but it didn’t reach his eyes. He pulled out a notebook. “Would you like to tell me what happened?”
Raina told him. “The cardboard cutout is still in the bedroom. Do you want me to show you where it is?”
Smith had listened to her intently but hadn't written down anything. He probably had a good memory. “We’ll get to that later. Why do you think someone wants to break into your cousin’s home? Do you have any suspects in mind?”
Po Po snorted. “Isn’t that your job to find out?”
Raina squeezed her grandma’s shoulder in warning. There was no need to antagonize Smith. He already had a Napoleon complex bigger than Mount Everest. She was surprised he took her seriously. After all, break-ins in a city like San Francisco happened all the time.
“You’ll have to talk to my cousin about her enemies. The red paint looks like blood. So obviously someone is threatening her,” she said.
“This might be a prank. Is there anyone who might want to scare her?” Smith asked.
An image of Bridget Harker swam into focus in Raina’s mind. She shifted from foot to foot. The poor woman already had enough on her hands without adding the police to the mix. And if this turned out to be a prank from the wedding planner, there was no real harm done. The single mom deserved a break.
“The wedding planner, Bridget Harker, is mighty upset over getting fired,” Po Po said. “And she thinks Jung-yee smeared her good name on social media. Personally, I don’t think there’s any truth in that. Jung-yee might be persnickety, but she knows better than to do something like this. It could ruin a small business.”
Raina squeezed her grandma's shoulder in warning again. This was one of those moments where she wanted her grandma to be a mute. “I’m sure it’s all a misunderstanding.”
Smith scribbled in his notebook and tucked it back into his back pocket. “I’m ready to see this cardboard with the blood on it.”
Raina led the way into the master bedroom. She stepped aside and gestured at the cutout on the floor. She waited at the doorway while Smith stepped into the room and pulled out his cell phone. He snapped several photos from various angles, flipping the cardboard over with the tip of his pen.
As Raina watched him work, it occurred to her that he was using a cell phone for snapping the photos. Were these images even permissible in court? Matthew had to use the department-issued camera for his crime scene photos even though his cell phone was faster and produced better quality photos. Apparently, he was more likely to tamper with the photographs on his cell phone than on the old digital camera. It made no sense to Raina, but that was government red tape for you.
She was still frowning when Smith put his cell phone away. And now that she thought about it, why would a homicide detective respond to a break-in? Why didn’t the dispatcher send a beat cop? “What are the chances for catching the culprit?”
“The official answer is that the police will do its best. Unofficially, not likely. He would have to get arrested for another crime, and we would have somehow link the two crimes together...” Smith shrugged.
“Can I ask you another question?”
“Even if I said no, I’m sure you’ll ask anyway. What is it?”
“Why are you here? You’re too high up in the ranks to take a police report.”
His expression didn’t change, but his eyes seemed to dim slightly. What was he hiding? “I live in the neighborhood. It’s more efficient for me to fill out the report than for another cop to spend thirty minutes in traffic to get here.”
Raina waited, hoping he would say more. Usually guilty people kept talking to fill in the silence when they were uncomfortable. He remained silent. His story sounded plausible, but most city cops wouldn’t be able to afford this part of town.
Maybe Smith was assigned to the Arianna Cobb's disappearance case. And this case was linked to Jung-yee through Blue's angel loan. Smith could have picked up this information during his investigation on Arianna’s disappearance. And now that her body had surfaced, any link, no matter how fragile, might be relevant.
The air seemed to thicken around them.
“Do you know anything about Arianna Cobb’s murder?” Raina finally blurted out.
Smith blinked, but the reaction was enough. She hit the bullseye. “No comment. I don't discuss ongoing investigations with civilians."
After he left, Raina and Po Po cleaned up the master bedroom. They packed another bag and locked up the condo and texted Jung-yee to let her know it was all taken care of. She replied with her thanks.
The dynamic duo then went d
ownstairs. Raina dropped her grandma off at the home of one of her friends for an afternoon of mahjong. Then she fought the traffic to Blue Diamond Construction. Raina's mind whirled in the one hour it took for her to make the two stops.
With Smith on the case, things could get complicated. Not only did he have a Napoleon complex, but he could be like a dog with a bone. And to top it all off, he was probably still sore that Raina didn't want to help him the last time they'd met. As a matter of fact, she might have inadvertently helped the bad guy—or at least in Smith's eyes—get away. If he was out for revenge, he might just be petty enough to take it out on her cousin and Blue.
10
The Jelly Between Boulders
When Raina pulled into the parking spot in front of Blue Diamond Construction, she saw Blue talking to Mrs. Santos in the reception area through the storefront windows. He gave Raina a nod of acknowledgment and finished his conversation with his receptionist.
Blue came out and hopped into the car. He greeted her and said, “When you pull out of the parking lot, make a left, go straight, and turn right at the first light.”
Raina pulled out onto the street. “There’s another bag for Jung-yee in the trunk. I’m assuming she’ll stay with you until after the wedding?”
Blue nodded. “What did the cop say about the break-in?”
Raina hesitated. It was no coincidence for Smith to show up at Jung-yee’s condo. He wasn’t the type of person to take a lowly police report because he happened to be in the area. So this probably meant he wanted to link Blue to Arianna. Was this something a groom needed to hear on the eve of his wedding? And as the Chinese proverb went, if you “walked straight, stood straight,” then Blue probably had nothing to fear, right?
But then again, Blue would be family soon, doubly so with his relationship to Matthew. She would want to know in his plac—