Mint Chip & Murder

by Erin Huss

  "Child?" I squeaked out. "Where was the child?"

  "I don't know. It struck me as odd, because she was looking for Sherman then was in a fight with Patrick, talking about a kid. And she was wearing the same outfit."

  "Where did she say her clothes came from?"

  Reena had to think. "Charlotte Russe."

  I gulped. "Did you catch her name?"

  "I don't remember. Maybe Lara? That sounds slightly familiar."

  Lara was close to Larissa. It was possible that I was trying to fit a square peg into a round hole and Larissa had nothing to do with this. But still, even if there were so many similarities, the timing didn't work.

  "Was her name Larissa?"

  "Can't remember."

  "What about the woman's teeth?"

  Reena crinkled her nose. "Her teeth?"

  "Where her teeth nice?"

  "Not sure. Who looks at people's teeth?"

  Me. "Was the woman petite with dark hair and Hispanic?"

  "Yes. She was all three. As soon as Neo told me about the woman in the barrel, I immediately remembered this story. It has to be her. What are the chances? I mean, she was in a fight with Patrick the day Neo and I left for good. So I can't say what happened afterward. But I know for a fact there were five barrels in that attic. The resident in Apartment 4B would complain all the time about them. She thought they'd come crashing down on her head if there was an earthquake. Then she'd complain if Neo had to go in her apartment to use the attic access. We stored all the odds and ends for the property in those barrels."

  On a whim, I grabbed my phone and pulled up the missing person website to the picture of Larissa. "Was this the woman?"

  Reena grabbed my phone and zoomed in on the picture. "The woman I saw was older. Late thirties, maybe early forties. This could have been her when she was young. I can't say for sure." Not exactly helpful, but even if the woman wasn't Larissa, it sounded like whoever was arguing with Patrick could have been who ended up in the barrel.

  I thanked Reena for her time. She apologized again for attacking me, and I left. My head felt heavy with all the new information. The woman in the Charlotte Russe outfit arguing with Patrick over a child. Not a baby, but a child. Could it have been Patrick's ex-wife? Did Patrick even have an ex-wife? I knew Patrick had a current wife. I'd never met her, but Patrick and I were Facebook friends, and I'd seen her picture. She was tall and blonde with blue eyes and freckles. But how did this woman know Sherman and Patrick? There had to be some connection between the two men.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Designated driver

  I met up with Kevin and Amy at the party. They were talking to a man with dark, shiny hair and a red scarf. The crowd had tripled since I'd stepped out, and a DJ had arrived. The music thumped in time with my heartbeat, and the room was about fifteen degrees hotter than when I left. Hazy chatter could be heard over the loud bass, and I caught a few bits of conversation as I snaked my way towards Kevin and Amy. People were wondering where Reena had gone.

  Amy waved as I approached. "Wheres haves you been?!"

  Wheres? Haves? How many of those pink drinks has she had?

  "Five," Kevin said, as if reading my thoughts.

  A waiter came by and took Amy's empty glass and gave her a new pink drink. I swiped it from his hand and took a sip. Wowza. There was enough alcohol packed in that tiny pink cocktail to get a small army drunk.

  "Heys, that's my…drink." Amy pouted.

  "I think we're done."

  "No. I don't want to be done. You have to meet…what's your name?" she asked the scarf guy.

  Scarf guy stood a little taller. "Nathan."

  "Yes, that's right. This is Zack. He is a producer and wants to get me a parts in the movies."

  "Errr…um, I'm a book blogger." Nathan handed me a business card. "I blog about books."

  Kevin laughed.

  "This isn't funny," I hissed. "Let's get you out of here." I snaked an arm around Amy's tiny waist and escorted her through the crowd.

  "Where did you go?" Kevin asked as we zigzagged around waiters and tables and people with purple faces on our way to the flashing EXIT sign.

  "I had a run-in with Reena. She had a lot to say."

  "Like what?"

  "I'll tell you later. We need to get Amy home."

  "Why? I'm finnntthh!" she slurred. "I want to sstay—" She stopped to puke all over my shoes.

  Gross.

  * * *

  We made it back to my apartment, only having to pull over twice so Amy could disgorge the contents of her stomach. What a night. I'd been puked on, spit on, and attacked by a woman in pleather. I was tired and ready for bed, but first I had a few pressing issues to deal with. One of which was my boyfriend, who was exiting his car just as we pulled up.

  I'd completely forgotten Chase was coming over tonight.

  "What happened to Amy?" Chase asked.

  "Too many Tarian cocktails," Kevin said.

  Chase looked to me for clarification.

  "We were at Reena Hike's launch party." I managed to coax Amy out of the car. "She's been so busy reading today that she forgot to eat. Then she had too many drinks."

  Amy started to protest, then paused to burp into her fist. "Yeah, maybe I did."

  Chase took over escorting duties and grabbed Amy by the arm and slung it over his shoulders. I rolled my neck, from side to side working out a kink. I'd hauled a drunk Amy around many times over the course of our friendship—you'd think my body would be used to it by now.

  "I'm going home," Kevin announced. "I want to finish this." He held up the latest Zankla book.

  "I thought you were only on the first one?"

  "I'm skipping ahead. I need to read about Enest McMall." He unleashed a devious grin, and I could see the muscles tense up a little in his jaw. I imagined these past few days had to have brought up a lot of painful memories. I wanted to ask him how he was feeling. But I knew if I brought up the subject, he'd make some sort of snarky remark and walk away.

  But I couldn't help myself.

  "Kevin, how are you doing?" I touched his arm.

  "I'm feeling nauseated because you stink. Take a shower and call me in the morning."

  At least he was predictable.

  Back in my apartment, I found Amy passed out on the couch with a pillow under her head and a blanket pulled up to her chin. Chase was in the kitchen pouring a glass of water. He had on a gray suit. His tie was pulled loose and his hair disheveled. His five o'clock shadow was more a beard by this point, and his eyes were tired.

  He was thrashed, and my heart swelled. It felt good having him in my home, and I couldn't help myself. I grabbed his stubbly cheeks and kissed him softly on the lips.

  "What was that for?" he asked, running his fingers down the length of my spine.

  "I missed you. That's all."

  "Oh, yeah?" He gave me a mischievous smile. "How much?"

  I playfully held my finger and thumb about an inch apart, and Chase hoisted me up onto the counter. I wrapped my legs around him, and his mouth traveled down my neck, leaving a trail of passionate kisses. I threw my head back and allowed all my worries to float away…for a moment.

  Like a freaking boomerang, they all came shooting back at me with a vengeance.

  A flashback to four months ago played out in my mind. I was perched on the bathroom counter, my legs wrapped around Tom, who was kissing my neck. It had been the first time Tom and I had kissed since the night we made Lilly. His lips were warm and wanting, and I was swept up in a moment of passion. If we hadn't been interrupted by a grumpy three-year-old who wanted breakfast, then who knows what would have happened.

  I was so lost in thought that I hadn't noticed that Chase was still kissing me along my jawline.

  Right. Be in the moment, Cambria.

  I sucked in a deep breath and lowered my mouth to meet his. We kissed with more fervor and passion, but my mind continued to wander off.

  What if I accepted Tom's propo
sal?

  We'd get married. Move in together. Tom had mentioned leaving the state. Of course, I'd have to bring Mr. and Mrs. Nguyen along. Sure, they had family in New Mexico, but I called dibs. Tom would go work for a law firm, and I'd find a job in property management there. We'd have more kids.

  It was a happy thought. Until I realized if I went with Tom, I'd no longer have Chase. I had serious doubts Tom would be cool with me bringing along my ex-boyfriend. There was also Kevin. I couldn't leave him either. Nor could I ditch Amy.

  Really, everyone would have to come along.

  On the other hand, what if I married Chase?

  We'd stay here in Los Angeles. He'd move in. I'd keep my job—assuming I had one. He'd go off to train for the FBI then come back and work. We could do this until his new job relocated us someplace new. I couldn't up and leave without Tom's consent. He'd have to agree to come along—which he wouldn't. Not easily, at least. I could still bring the Nguyens, and Kevin, and Amy.

  Really, the only way I could have both men in my life was to accept Chase.

  Or I could accept no one.

  That was also a real option. Especially since Lilly had decided she no longer liked having Chase around. I had no idea what that was about. What I knew for certain was that I could never be with a man my child didn't like.

  "What's wrong?" Chase asked, his voice husky. He cupped my face in his hands, studying me with his gorgeous green eyes.

  Right, making out. Focus, Cambria.

  I forced my mouth to make words. "We should talk."

  "I know."

  "Can you either talk louder so I can hear or go to your room?!" Amy shouted from the couch. "I haven't fully passed out yet."

  I rolled my eyes and leapt off the counter. Chase grabbed my hand and pulled me down the hall. With each step, my feet started to protest. They wanted to go back to the kitchen and make out, not deal with the gigantic elephant in the room. Both figuratively and literally, as Lilly's stuffed elephant Amy had bought her was on the floor next to my bed.

  "Where did that come from?" Chase asked.

  "A present from Aunt Amy."

  "Why is it cross-eyed?"

  "Not sure."

  "How much did that thing cost?"

  "Fifty dollars."

  "It's creepy." Chase moved the gigantic stuff animal back to the closet and loosened his tie with a yawn.

  "Rough day?" I asked.

  "You have no idea."

  "How'd it go at the prison with Sherman?"

  Chase crossed the room and fell onto the bed face first. "Sherman doesn't know where Larissa is," he muffled into the pillow then turned his head. "I pulled the case file. Larissa was originally from El Salvador, except she had dual citizenship. Her mother was a US citizen, and Larissa was born here. Then they moved to Central America where her father was from. When she was eighteen, she came back and lived with her aunt in Los Angeles. Her aunt is the one who reported her missing. I spoke to her today, and I'm just not so sure this is our girl."

  Shoot. It was a long shot anyway. "What did the aunt say?"

  Chase rolled to his side and propped up on his elbow. "This is between you and me. Got it?"

  I gave him a captain salute.

  "Larissa did date Sherman," he said.

  "Aha!"

  "Hold the celebrating. There's more. Larissa dated Sherman for six months. They'd originally met at the apartment complex. Larissa was friends with a few of the women who did live there in Apartment 11A. She never lived there."

  Still, I mentally patted myself on the back.

  "Everything lines up but the timing," he says. "Larissa has the right body type. She was Hispanic. She had connections to the Burbank building. Her aunt even said she was self-conscious about her smile and had been saving up to have dental work done. Larissa had been going out a lot with a mystery man. When her aunt questioned who it was, Larissa refused to answer. It wasn't Sherman. He was interviewed back in '78, and the detective wrote that he was cleared as a suspect. They even searched his apartment, and nothing turned up. The detective who interviewed him today said Sherman was adamant that he did not hurt Larissa. According to him, the two were friends after they broke up, and she'd been acting aloof right before she vanished. I checked with the medical examiner, and he's confident that the body has not been dead over forty years. It can't be her unless she vanished, reappeared twenty years later, and was then killed."

  "Well, now that you mention it. I had an interesting conversation with Reena Hike tonight." I rubbed my neck at the memory, then launched into what Reena had told me about the woman who showed up at Sherman's apartment. I left out the bit about Reena basing the story line of her hit books on her time at Burbank—not that it wasn't already obvious. I mean, come on, Borbank. But she said manager to manager, and I wasn't about to break code. Nor did I tell Chase about her attacking me. I didn't want to get her in trouble.

  "She said her name was Lara?" Chase asked.

  "Reena was shaky on some of the details, being that it was so long ago. She did say that the woman was first looking for Sherman then was fighting with Patrick over a kid."

  "It would sure be nice if your boss wasn't hiding from us. His lawyer called us and said his client would only talk if he were present."

  Oh, geez. Patrick was getting harder and harder to defend.

  "Hampton also tried to get Reena to come down to the station today, but she refused. Said she'd only talk with her lawyer present, and her lawyer was out of town. Sounded to me like she had something to hide."

  "Perhaps, but it's not a dead body." I don't think.

  My phone rang, and I slid it out from my back pocket. A 704 number flashed across my screen. Probably a solicitor. "Where is 704 area code?"

  "North Carolina," Chase said, because he knows pretty much everything.

  North Carolina! This was Maria's cousin, Angela, the one who knew about everyone who lived in Apartment 11A.

  I slapped the phone to my ear. "Hello?"

  "Hola. Es esta Cambria?"

  "This is Cambria."

  "Recibí tu mensaje."

  "Sorry, I don't speak Spanish."

  "Recibí tu mensaje," she repeated.

  Crud. Why can't I speak Spanish?

  "Give it to me," Chase said.

  Oh, that's right. I handed over the phone, and he spoke in Spanish with such fluidity you'd think it was his first language.

  Note to self: Learn a second language.

  With Lilly able to speak in Vietnamese and Chase able to speak in like ten different languages, I felt a wee bit inadequate.

  Chase looked at me, his brows squished together. "She says you left her a message about her cousin who is dead in a barrel?"

  "That's not what I said." More or less. "She's related to all the women who lived in Apartment 11A, and her cousin Maria said she keeps tabs on everyone."

  Chase first looked heavenward then put the phone back to his ear. He spoke for several minutes. My Spanish was limited, but I heard him mention a few of the women from my list.

  "Everyone is alive," he said. "The women I didn't have information on have all moved back to El Salvador." Chase returned to the phone and asked about Larissa. "She said Larissa was her cousin Maria's cousin's friend on her other side."

  That wasn't confusing. "Does she know anyone by the name of Lara?"

  Chase asked. "Larissa sometimes went by Lara."

  I threw my arms up in a silent victory, and Chase gave me a high five. This was too much of a coincidence to be a coincidence. The only thing that didn't work was the timing. There had to be an explanation as to why Larissa went missing for…I did the math on my calculator…exactly eighteen years.

  Chase finally hung up and heaved a telling sigh.

  Except I wasn't quite sure what it was telling me.

  "What? What? What? What?" I asked. "What?"

  "Again, it sounds like Larissa could be our girl. It's just the timing."

  "Did Angela say anythi
ng about a child?"

  "She suspected Larissa got involved with a married man and took off. She confirmed Larissa had been sneaking around with a guy she refused to identify, but again, the timing does not work."

  I felt like yelling, I know the timing—Does. Not. Work! But I didn't. The walls were thin, and Mickey, my upstairs neighbor, was already asleep. He kept to a strict schedule. He'd be up in two hours to go to the bathroom. Anyway. "What if Larissa did take off and returned eighteen years later and was killed?"

  Chase shrugged, as if to say maybe. "According to her aunt, Larissa wouldn't have taken off without contacting her parents."

  "Have you talked to her parents? Maybe she did contact them."

  Again with the shrug. "Her parents are dead. Mother died in '87 from cancer. Dad died in '85 from a heart attack."

  "It's too much a coincidence that Reena said a woman by the name of Lara came by Sherman's empty apartment right before Reena was fired. The woman left and returned a few days later and got into a fight with Patrick about a child. If she had the child in '78, the kid would be eighteen in 1996." I checked the math on my phone. Yep. "The woman was wearing black pants and a white shirt that she'd bought at Charlotte Russe."

  Chase froze. "Did the pants have white feathers?"

  "Yes, near the bottom…what are you doing? Who are you calling?"

  "Hampton. Our woman in the barrel had black pants with white feathers around the bottom." He slapped his phone to his ear.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  Excellent at solving murders

  Hampton was at my front door roughly five minutes later since he'd been at Silvia's. He'd left his hair at home, which was nice. He looked better bald. We were sitting around my kitchen table. Amy had shuffled to my bedroom to continue to sober up, dragging her blanket behind her.

  Hampton's extended forehead glistened under the light from the fan above my kitchen table—being as it was hot in my apartment. So hot. Now that I knew Mr. McMills was so cheap, it made sense that most of my ideas for improvement had been immediately shut down. Updated air conditioners for the Los Angeles property being one of them.