by Lis Wiehl
Puerto Marquez was a wild riot of colors, from the purple carpet to the bright seascape murals decorating the walls. Each of the restaurant’s chairs was a different color of the rainbow—green, purple, orange, yellow—and the backs were covered with paintings of flowers and birds.
The sounds were nearly as overwhelming as the colors: Mexican folk music drifting from the kitchen fought with Spanish-language infomercials playing on two of the dining room’s big-screen televisions. The other two TVs were broadcasting Spanish telenovelas with the sound turned down. Overlaying the music and advertisements was the rattle of three aging air conditioners turned on full blast.
Nicole Hedges nodded, looking a little shell-shocked. Whenever it was Nicole’s turn to choose a restaurant for the three of them, she tended to pick places where the loudest sound was the clink of ice cubes.
Puerto Marquez was located in a strip mall in a less-than-glamorous part of outer Southeast Portland. Without Cassidy’s recommendation, Allison wouldn’t have given the place a second look, but their friend had sworn that the restaurant had the best Mexican food in Portland. It didn’t hurt that free chips, salsa, and refried beans had appeared on their table as soon as they sat down.
Allison thumbed through the huge menu, pages and pages encased in clear plastic. Despite the aggressive air-conditioning, her fingers slid on the pages. It was nearly eight o’clock, and she bet the temperature outside still hadn’t dropped below eighty-five. Because of the heat, she had left most of what she thought of as her “court uniform” in the car—the suit jacket, white blouse, and pumps—and was now wearing just a white camisole, a dark blue skirt, and flip-flops. Her hair was still pinned up from this morning, but tendrils kept falling in front of her eyes or, more annoyingly, finding their way between her lips.
She hooked a strand out of the corner of her mouth and took another sip of her margarita, wondering just how late Cassidy would be. Maybe she’d sent a second text? But when Allison checked her phone again, there was nothing new.
Nicole put her hand on Allison’s wrist. At the touch of her cool fingers, Allison set her phone back on the table.
“Stop checking,” Nicole said. “You know that in ten or twenty minutes Cassidy will come running in, knocking some poor customer in the head with that big old black tote of hers. That girl is always late.” As she spoke, Nic managed to dip a tortilla chip into the bean dip and the salsa without snapping it in half.
Nicole’s description of Cassidy was on the money. Cassidy was always multitasking, always looking for a shortcut, always in a hurry, and always, as Nicole had said, late.
“Maybe I should start telling her we’re meeting half an hour earlier than we really are,” Allison suggested. “That way she might actually be on time for a change.”
Nicole shook her head. “The leopard doesn’t change its spots. Cassidy is Cassidy, and that means she’s always late. It means a lot of other things too, but right now it means we shouldn’t wait for her before we place our order.”
The three of them had been friends for six years, though they had been acquainted with each other for much longer. Sixteen years earlier they had graduated from Catlin Gabel, one of Portland’s elite private schools. In high school they had barely known each other. Cassidy had been a cheerleader. Nicole had stood out by virtue of being one of the fewer than a half-dozen African American students. And Allison had captained the debate team.
At their ten-year high school reunion, the three women realized they now had something more than an alma mater in common: crime. Cassidy covered it for Channel Four, Nicole investigated it for the FBI, and Allison prosecuted it for the federal government. At the time, Nicole had been working out of the Denver FBI field office, but a few months later she was transferred back to Portland and started working cases with Allison.
Soon after, the three women met for dinner, and a friendship began over a shared dessert called Triple Threat Chocolate Cake. In its honor, they had half jokingly christened themselves the Triple Threat Club. Now whenever they got together they always ordered the most decadent dessert on the menu—but just one serving, and three forks.
Allison wasn’t sure, since most of Puerto Marquez’s menu was in Spanish with no translation, but she thought the only dessert available here might be a flan.
Their waiter came up, and the two women ordered. After he left, Nicole said, “Some idiot almost ran me over today.”
“What?” Allison straightened up.
“Yeah, I was out for a run at lunch, and some guy in an old beater came out of nowhere.” Raising her hands, Nicole made a shoving motion. “I managed to push myself off his hood. Somehow I stayed on my feet and made it to the other side of the car. I’m lucky he didn’t break my legs, or worse. As it is, I know I’m going to be really stiff tomorrow.”
Despite the air-conditioning, Allison shivered. “Did you get his license plate number?”
Nicole grimaced. “The car was filthy. There was mud all over the plate.”
Allison replayed her friend’s words. “Wait—did you say you were running? It must have been ninety degrees by lunchtime.”
The city was on the second day of over one-hundred-degree temperatures, and coping poorly. While most businesses had air-conditioning, a lot of older homes didn’t. It was also an oddly muggy heat for Portland, which usually didn’t have much humidity. The weathermen had promised a thunderstorm the night before, but it never came.
Nicole shrugged. “Lunch is the only free time I have. It’s not that bad if you wear sunglasses and drink lots of water.”
“I’ll take your word for it. I can’t stand this heat much longer.” Allison made a face. “When I got in my car to come here it was like getting into a blazing oven. A blazing oven that was on fire. Inside a volcano.”
Nicole smiled. “Don’t you guys have air-conditioning at home?”
“Only in our bedroom. It’s either turn the air-conditioning on and listen to it rattle, or turn it off and baste in your own sweat.”
Nicole took another sip of her margarita. “Which one are you—the one who prefers silence or the one who would rather be cool?”
“We alternate.” Allison pushed a piece of hair out of her eyes. She was starting to sweat again just thinking about it. “One hour I just want to cool off and who cares about the noise, only Marshall can’t take it. The next hour I’m the one who can’t stand listening to the fan bang around in that metal box, and Marshall’s the one begging to turn it back on.”
Nicole sighed. “I’ve been sleeping in the basement on a cot. I’m just thankful that Makayla’s at that sleepaway camp. It’s always cool at the coast.”
“You must miss her a lot,” Allison said. “Is it hard to have an empty house?”
“I do miss her.” Nicole took another sip of ice water. “At the same time, it’s a nice break not to be juggling child care or asking my parents to keep her for the night when something breaks. And if I come home too tired to do anything but eat a bowl of cereal, I don’t feel guilty for not serving a meal made from however many food groups there are now.”
Talking about food made Allison think about Cassidy. She checked her watch again. Cassidy was now forty-five minutes late—a record, even for her.
Their food came. Allison had ordered spicy shrimp with a side of rice and beans. The shrimp made her sweat too, but with the air-conditioning and the ice water and the margarita, she didn’t mind. Every bite or two, she glanced at the front door.
“I’m going to call her again,” she said when her plate was half empty, already pressing buttons on her phone. After four rings, Cassidy’s voice mail kicked in. Disconnecting the call, Allison said slowly, “She doesn’t have a new boyfriend, does she?” It was the only reason she could think of why their friend wouldn’t even pick up.
“Not that I know of.” Nicole shrugged. “But you know Cassidy—that can change in a minute.”
“One thing that will never change is how much she likes her phone. You know she’ll always a
nswer. It doesn’t matter whether she’s sleeping or sick or super busy.” They sometimes joked that Cassidy should just cut out the middleman and have her phone surgically implanted. “So why isn’t she answering now? It’s not like she’s on the line and it’s going straight to voice mail. It’s like it’s ringing and no one is answering.” The shrimp Allison had eaten felt like they were alive and squirming in her gut. “Nic—I think something’s wrong.”
“Let’s give it five more minutes,” Nicole said. “If she doesn’t show by then, we’ll see if we can track her down.”
CHAPTER 3
Without discussing it, they took Nic’s Crown Victoria. As she slid behind the steering wheel, Nic’s fingers hovered over the switches that activated the siren, the alternately flashing lights in the grill, the red-and-blue light bar in the rear window. Then she lifted her hand and put it back on the wheel. A friend not showing up for dinner didn’t qualify as an emergency.
At a red light she cut a sideways glance at Allison. Her friend’s eyes were closed, her lips moving silently. Nic knew what she was doing. Offering up a prayer for Cassidy’s safety. The old Nic would have rolled her eyes at Allison’s gullibility. But that was before breast cancer had shown her just how impossible it sometimes was to stand only on your own two feet.
Traffic was light. A second before the signal turned green, Nic was halfway across the intersection. She knew she was driving too fast. Tailgating. Switching lanes every few seconds. She cut off a young guy driving a white cube-shaped car, ignoring his rude gesture. Two blocks later they hit a speed bump so hard they were momentarily airborne, their teeth clacking together when they landed. Finally they were flying down the freeway toward downtown Portland. Five minutes later Nic took the off-ramp for Cassidy’s neighborhood.
Located in the shadow of one of Portland’s eleven bridges, Riverside Condominiums had been envisioned as the first stage in the redevelopment of an old industrial area. When Cassidy bought her condo a few years back, artist renderings had pictured the area filled with shops, restaurants, and bars. Most of those businesses had never materialized. Instead the area was filled with boarded-up former warehouses and light manufacturing plants that had been bought and gutted but never rehabbed.
With few cars parked on it, the street that led to the condominiums seemed unnaturally wide. Adding to Nic’s sense of unease, there wasn’t a soul in sight. In the fading light, the whole area looked deserted. Of course there was no one around, she scolded herself. That’s what this part of town always looked like.
When they reached Cassidy’s condo building, Nic drove down the ramp into the underground parking garage. As soon as she got out of the car, the hot air immediately wrapped her in a smothering blanket.
“Look.” Allison pointed. “There’s her car.”
“So she’s here.” Nic should have felt relief, but she didn’t. She was aware of her Glock in its shoulder holster. She wore the gun everyplace except at home, and sometimes even there. She undid the button on her jacket.
They walked over to Cassidy’s car, heels clacking on concrete already veined with cracks, and bent down to peer inside. It was the same mess it always was—brightly colored suits still wrapped in dry cleaner’s plastic, red Netflix envelopes, a mascara tube or two or three, celebrity gossip magazines, and enough empty silver Diet Coke cans to fill a couple of cases.
“Maybe she forgot something and had to stop by her place to get it before dinner,” Allison suggested. “Or she spilled something on her clothes and had to change.”
Nic didn’t answer. There was no point in speculating. They would find out soon enough. Something inside her was building a wall between her thoughts and her emotions.
While they waited for the elevator, Allison pressed the redial button on her phone. She held it to her ear for a long moment, then ended the call without speaking. Her lips thinned to a white line.
The doors opened on the fourth floor. The hall must have had some sort of air-conditioning, because it was slightly cooler than the elevator. A plant in a dark brown ceramic pot sat next to the silver doors. Even though it was fake, it looked like it was dying. Dust furred its sagging fabric leaves.
Nic knocked on Cassidy’s door. She and Allison were both silent, listening for music, for footsteps, for their friend’s voice.
Nothing.
Allison pressed the redial button again. Through the door they heard the faint first few notes of a song turned ringtone.
Cassidy never went anywhere without her phone.
“She has to be in there.” Allison bit her lip.
“You don’t have a key, do you?” Nic asked, but Allison shook her head.
With luck, the manager lived on-site. Nic would flash her badge. She would talk fast. She would say whatever she needed to say to get him to open this door. As she was thinking this, she put her hand to the doorknob. In her fingers, the handle turned.
Her mind split in two. One part was yammering that it was a bad sign, a bad sign indeed, that Cassidy’s door was unlocked. The other, more rational part, the part that made her a good FBI agent, was thinking about fingerprints. If there were any, she had probably just obliterated them. Not that it was easy to lift prints from a doorknob. The twisting motion turned prints into long smears.
Allison’s eyebrows rose. “It’s unlocked?”
Nic nodded. Cassidy could be absentminded. It was possible she’d been in a hurry to get home for whatever reason and had forgotten to lock the door. She was probably sick, Nic told herself. They’d find her huddled miserably in the bathroom or curled up on the bed. It would explain everything. The unlocked door, the unanswered phone, the missed meal.
With her toe she nudged the door open. Her mouth was suddenly dry. She moistened her lips with a tongue that felt like leather.
“Cassidy?” She waited. “Cassidy?”
Nothing. Nothing but silence.
Nic elbowed the door wider and they both stepped inside. The room was shadowed, the light from the windows melting into dusk. Allison made a move toward the light switch, but Nic laid a hand on her arm.
“Fingerprints.”
Allison’s eyes went wide, as if reality was just sinking in. Nic took a pen from her purse and flicked up the switch.
“Cassidy?” Allison called out again. “Cassidy?”
No answer. The word fell flat, absorbed by the willow green walls, the flat cream-colored Berber carpeting.
It was staggeringly hot. So hot and stale and close. Why hadn’t Cassidy turned on the air-conditioning? Why hadn’t she at least opened a window?
Without moving from the entryway, Nic turned her head, taking it all in. Cassidy’s mail had been tossed on the entryway table. Next to it were her keys and her black tote. A tall vase held a thick bouquet of tiny white flowers that smelled sickeningly sweet. A few of the blossoms had drifted down.
Nic thought of weddings, of flower girls in beribboned dresses, sprinkling pale petals before them. Of how Cassidy had had boyfriend after boyfriend but never married.
The white leather couch and matching armless chair in the living room were a sleek Danish design, with deep-seated cushions and steel legs. Nic couldn’t imagine sitting on leather in this heat. Let alone owning white furniture. It was the kind of furniture that only a woman without kids would buy. Between the couch and chair lay a curved smoked-glass table shaped like half a heart. The pedestal was made of twisted wood that looked tortured.
Nic sniffed. Nothing. No smells, no sounds, nothing unusual to see.
Her nerves thrummed. Something working below the level of consciousness was screaming at her to run.
“It’s a little messy.” Allison swept out one arm to indicate the room, the pair of pumps kicked off in front of the couch, the book left facedown on the chair. Her voice shook a little bit. “But no messier than any of the other times I’ve seen it.”
“If anything, I’d say it’s cleaner,” Nic said. She’d been here plenty of times when discarded outfits
had draped the furniture, when newspapers, magazines, and pizza boxes littered every flat service.
The kitchen-dining area was partly visible from where they stood. Nic walked into the kitchen. Empty. There were dirty dishes on the counter and in the sink. On the floor was a small garbage can full of coffee grounds, takeout boxes, and a blackened banana peel. When Nic accidentally nudged it with her toe, a swarm of fruit flies rose up.
She turned and walked down the short hall. In five steps she was at the end, Allison trailing silently behind her. No one was in the bedroom. Or the bathroom. The counter was covered with makeup, hair products, and jewelry. A scent lingered in the air, a light, grassy smell that Nic had always presumed was Cassidy’s natural smell, but what must be, she now realized, perfume.
“She’s not here,” Allison said. “That’s good, right? She’s not here.”
Nic tried to feel relief. There must be a reason Cassidy wasn’t home, a reason her door was unlocked, a reason she hadn’t answered her phone. Maybe she had gone down the hall to visit a neighbor. Although Cassidy always complained about how quiet the building was, how empty. How she could scream her head off and no one would hear.
A shiver danced across Nic’s skin. She walked back into the living room, remembering the other times the three of them had been here. Laughing. Talking. Sharing gossip and information and treats. The time they had polished off three boxes of Girl Scout cookies and two bottles of wine.
There had been other times, too, like the time she and Allison had confronted Cassidy about Rick, about what he was doing to her.
“Nicole?” Allison’s voice shook. “Nic?”
Nic followed Allison’s pointing finger. Underneath the dining room table, half hidden in shadow, lay Cassidy’s phone—the latest, sleekest, thinnest model, all matte black and shiny silver.
Nic crouched down to look closer, not touching it. It was face up. A spiderweb of cracks spread out from one bottom corner of the screen.
Behind her, Allison said, “Maybe that’s why Cassidy’s not here. She’s probably at the phone store. That doesn’t even look usable. She dropped it, it broke, and she couldn’t call us.”