by Gina LaManna
“That was cool,” Meg said. “But don’t worry, Clay. I like you more. I think your technology is magic.”
Usually I would’ve agreed, but I was too distracted by the strangeness of this whole situation. Who was this Beckett, and how had he found us? More importantly, what did he want? And how/why/when had he stolen my ring?
Somewhat appeased by Meg’s cheek kiss, Clay grunted. Tossing the baby over his shoulder, he stomped toward the apartment. I followed close behind.
When we reached the stairs, I slid out of my sweater. Climbing these stairs was like hiking Mount Everest. It wasn’t pretty.
However, this time, as I climbed and huffed my way past the fourth floor, a piece of paper floated out of my sweater. I picked it up, reading the words printed in neat handwriting.
Luckily for both of us, I don’t give up easily. Talk to you soon.
Mr. Magic
Below his signature was the small image of a key. One of those big skeleton keys that looked like a piece of Hogwarts, except with four prongs instead of the typical two. A symbol, probably, but a symbol of what? What game was he playing?
My blood ran cold as I looked around the staircase, but except for the heavy breathing of Meg and Clay, it was empty.
Chapter 12
“I’ll find her,” Clay assured me for the third time. “Stop asking or I won’t help.”
“I trust you, I’m just getting nervous. The show is tomorrow night, and I’d hate to see Lizabeth’s debut flop because I couldn’t do my job. And you’re the best in the business.” I leaned against Door B. I’d given Clay all of the information on Alessandra and requested her name and address.
“You’re just saying that,” he grumbled, unlocking the door to Apartment A. “I’m not upset by that Magic Man’s tricks. You don’t have to stroke my ego.”
“A little bit?” Meg held her fingers apart. “I already told you, Clay, I don’t like you any less because you couldn’t figure out his tricks. After all, it’s magic! Maybe you’ve just gotta believe. Like in Santa Claus.”
Clay’s lips tightened. He’d joined me in a mutual pact to make sure Meg never found out that Santa didn’t exist. I’d been successful for nearly three decades, and I had no intention of stopping now.
“Yes,” he said finally. “Just like Santa.”
Meg smiled up at him, and not for the first time, I recognized a softer side of her emerging like a cute little butterfly. A camouflage butterfly. Every now and again Meg found nice words instead of retorts, or a hug instead of a pinch. Granted, sometimes a pat on the back from her felt more like a smack, but it was progress.
“Well, you two have a good afternoon,” I said. “I’ll be in my room. Knock or call or… something, if you find out any information on Alessandra. I’d like to pay her a visit tonight if possible.”
“Do you want to come in?” Meg’s eyes flicked toward Clay. He wasn’t feeling so generous. He rolled his eyes to the ceiling and groaned.
“No, it’s okay,” I said quickly. “Call if you need anything.”
“If you don’t wanna hang out alone, you can sit in our kitchen while I take a nap. Clay’s going to fiddle around with his computer, anyway.”
“I don’t fiddle,” Clay told Meg. “I tinker.”
I said goodbye to them both. Since I had no real plans, I figured I might try to squeeze in a quick nap. Closing the door, I headed straight for the kitchen. Unfortunately, my fridge was not magic, and it hadn’t stocked itself while I’d been out. The only items inside were a few water bottles, a hunk of cheese, and enough ketchup to stock McDonald’s.
Grabbing the slab of Parmesan—whole cheese, not grated—I determined via sniff test that it probably wasn’t stale. I added a plate underneath and a fork on top and voila—snack time.
I clicked on the TV in the bedroom and bit into the cheese, the freshest cheese I’d ever eaten. Then I wondered why I had never eaten cheese with a fork before. Then I realized I shouldn’t be giving so much of my time and energy to thinking about cheese, and I turned my attention back to the television.
I’d been hoping for a news story about the thefts, but the announcer seemed far more concerned with talking about soccer and shouting the word GOL one hundred times. By the time I’d gotten a stomachache from cheese, the soccer match had finally ended, and the newscaster switched to coverage of the thefts.
I couldn’t understand a word they said, so I focused on the pictures. There was a shot of Marquita’s store, the images fresh from this morning. An image of a watch probably belonging to The Chad popped up next, followed by a brief video of the interior of The Chad’s showroom.
When they flicked to an image of an older woman, maybe in her early seventies, with perfectly coiffed white hair, a perfectly starched white dress, and perfectly shimmering pink lips, I realized I’d found Leslie. Then her name popped up under her photo and confirmed it.
I choked on a shred of Parmesan as they zeroed in on a close-up. There, in the background, was the assistant—Alessandra. Dressed in black jeans, black tank, and army green jacket, she looked as fashionable as ever, lifted an extra few inches by the exact same stilettos as earlier.
Reaching for my phone, I called Meg. “Hey,” I said as soon as she answered. “It’s about Leslie.”
“What about her?” As she spoke, I heard the slight echo of her voice through the walls.
“I’m watching the news, and they showed a picture of Leslie in her store on the day of the break-in. She was being interviewed by cops, and in the background Alessandra was standing around—again! Besides the color of her jacket, everything was exactly the same as today, including her high heels.”
“Well, you were right about something.”
“I know! I knew she was up to no good!”
“I meant this coffee flavored gelato. The one you got last night? Clay ran down and got some, put it in the fridge. It’s delicious. Want some?”
She knocked against the wall. I set my plate on the table and collapsed onto my bed. “No thanks,” I said into the phone. “I was talking about Alessandra.”
“Oh yeah, your intuition was right on her, too.”
“Has Clay found anything on her?”
“Uh—”
“Uh, what?” I looked to the corner where Arnold was sleeping peacefully. “Does she have a real name?”
“Meg, are you coming?” Clay’s voice echoed through the walls and through the phone, all at once.
Exactly one second later, the shower turned on next door. The contents of my stomach almost evacuated at full force.
“Gotta go,” I said. “Let me know when you find something.”
“Oh relax, I told him I’d teach him how to tweeze his eyebrows,” Meg said. “It’s not what you think.”
“Goodbye.”
Flipping my phone back and forth in my hands, I tried to ignore the sounds of Clay’s girlish screams as Meg, hopefully, plucked his brows. I thought his forehead had been looking a little shinier lately.
One thought led to another until suddenly, I was thinking about Anthony. He still hadn’t responded to my voicemail about eloping. Only ten percent of me was terrified that I’d scared him off. The other ninety percent of me suspected he was busy. Either way, it wouldn’t hurt to call again.
I dialed, smiling as he clicked onto the line and said hello in a way that warmed my stomach.
“How are things going?” I asked.
“Good,” he said, sounding a little out of breath. “Efficient. How are you?”
I filled him in on the day, not bothering to ask if he had time to talk now. Maybe it was selfish, but I missed him, and I didn’t want to give him an easy way out of the phone call. I glossed over most of the details, leaving out names and specifics, and mostly babbling about whatever popped into my head.
“Sorry, that was a lot of words,” I said fifteen minutes later. “Are you still there?”
“I heard every word. You’re doing a great job on the case, Lacey. L
izabeth should be very happy with your work. I’m proud of you.”
“When are you coming back?” He hadn’t brought up the whole eloping thing yet, but then again I had barely given him time to breathe, let alone talk about getting married. “I miss you.”
“I miss you, too.” He hesitated for too long. “I might need to stay overnight.”
“Overnight? But…” The list of reasons he shouldn’t stay was too long to list, so I started with a whimpered “no!”
“I’ll fly back before the show—there’s a plane landing at six p.m. tomorrow, so I’ll have time to shower and get to the runway. I’m really sorry.”
“Business?”
He sighed. “No. Yes. Sort of.”
“If it’s not business, what else could it be?”
Anthony’s silence fell heavily across the line. We’d agreed not to keep secrets, and I could hear him struggling with the truth. “Family,” he said eventually.
The breath escaped from my lips like a punctured balloon. “Why didn’t you tell me? I would have come with you!”
“I didn’t want you to come.” Anthony cleared his throat. “I didn’t mean it like that. I was…I was afraid.”
“Afraid of your family?”
He paused. “Of what you’d think of me.”
“Anthony!” My heart rose in my throat, the sadness swallowing my ability to speak. “You know I love you more than anything. Nothing can change that.”
“It’s difficult to explain. When I was a kid…” he sighed. “I don’t want to talk about it over the phone. Can you please trust me? I need to take care of something tonight. I thought it would be quick, but things have changed.”
“Of course,” I said, remembering the lengths I’d gone to in order to find my dad not so very long ago. “Whatever you need to do. I’m here for you, too, don’t forget that.”
Even when things had looked hopeless around Christmas time, Anthony had been there for me. Every step of the way, even the strange ones. He’d held van doors open as I sprinted through yards, and taken a bullet from my father’s gun.
“I just wish there was something more I could do. If you want me to come down, I’m sure Lizabeth would understand.”
“I’ll be back in Milan within the day. Afterward, I’ll bring you back down here and explain everything.” Anthony had the already decided tone going in his voice. “Lizabeth’s counting on you.”
I blew out a sigh. “If you need rescuing, call me. I’ll come save you. I’ll swim if I have to.”
Anthony smiled through the phone line. “I would suggest flying. It’s faster, and less cold.”
I laughed too, something about Anthony’s voice, his presence, even through the phone line, making my heart whole. “I love you.”
“I love you, sugar. When I return tomorrow night, you better have a sitter for Arnold because I don’t think it’d be appropriate for him to stay with us.”
My cheeks warmed. “I’m sure I can figure something out.”
“Please.”
“Bye, Anthony.”
He hesitated one more second. “Oh, and about the eloping message. You just say the word, and I’ll be there.”
Chapter 13
I tried my best to nap, but it didn’t work. Curled into a ball on the bed, my mind wouldn’t stop flicking through the information I’d learned today. Beckett, Alessandra, The Chad, Lizabeth, Angelica, Arnold, and finally, Anthony.
The espresso didn’t help. Maybe I was wrong. Maybe Anthony was right, and there was a lot more caffeine in those little cups than I had anticipated. At least three times in the last five minutes I wondered whether I was having a heart attack. I pulled up Web MD and Googled my symptoms, but that only made me think I was having a heart attack, a stroke, and a bunch of rare diseases all in one go.
Eventually, listening to my racing heart freaked me out, so I gave up on napping and migrated to the kitchen. The fridge was still empty, save for the ketchup.
I returned to the bedroom and stared at Arnold for a while, but now the baby chose to sleep peacefully. I almost wanted him to wake up and give me something to do, but no luck there.
Sighing, I picked up the sleeping Arnold and decided to visit my neighbors. Since Meg and Clay were busy, I knocked on Door C.
“Oh, hello, dear, what are you doing here?” Nora stood in the doorway, peering out at the bundle in my arms. “And who do we have here?”
“It’s Arnold,” I said by way of explanation. “You’ve met. May I come in?”
“Oh, yes, please!” She waved me inside. “I was just doing my spa day. Would you like to join?”
“Are you alone?” I sniffed as I stepped inside, the place smelling like rotten eggs.
“No, Carlos is here with me. I forced him to put on a robe and pretend he was at the spa too. It’s not a girls’ day if a girl has nobody to talk to.”
I walked into the kitchen where Nora had spread out all sorts of cucumbers, gels, polishes, and waxes. An overstuffed armchair in the corner held a very disgruntled Carlos. Nora had wrapped him in a plush bathrobe and spun a towel around his head.
“Come here, Arnold,” Nora cooed. “Come here my precious, Auntie Nora will hold you.”
I handed the baby over, hoping that the thing had run out of batteries. He’d never been quiet for this long.
A timer dinged in the kitchen. “Oh, my, that’s my homemade face mask,” Nora said. “Gotta get it out of the oven. It’s supposed to make my pores vanish.”
“Is that what smells like eggs?”
“They say it’s very good for my skin, and worth the smell,” she said. “Here, Carlos, take your grandbaby.”
A horrified expression replaced Carlos’s former look of dismay as Nora dumped the plastic child onto his lap. “What is this?” He shrunk against the back of the chair. “Take it away.”
“It’s Arnold,” I said, since Nora had disappeared. “We’re taking care of him for Marissa and Clarissa.”
“You’ve got to help,” Carlos hissed, leaning forward and forgetting about the plastic doll. “She’s going to manicure my fingers. I can’t have a manicure on my fingers. I don’t even want to know what she’s going to do with my face. I like my pores right where they’re at. You’ve got to get me out of here.”
“Carlos,” I said, catching on quickly, as Nora walked into the room. “Would you like to go for a walk?”
“Oh, what a wonderful idea!” Nora snatched the baby from his arms and cradled him to her chest. “Spa day for Auntie Nora and Baby Arnold. Skedaddle, you two. Get out of here. Go change, Carlos. You can’t wear that robe outside, or everyone is going to see your junk.”
Carlos’s face went blank. Completely empty. I thought he might explode for a minute, and I held my breath in anticipation. Then he just stood up, gave me a nod, and disappeared from the room.
“Now, show me how to feed this thing,” Nora said. “I’m trying to give him juice, but it’s just giving him the runs.”
I explained to Nora how to feed the doll with the gel. Then I tried to explain that the doll was fake, but she preferred to ignore that part of things.
“He’s not eating solids yet?” Nora chirped. “Can I get his ear pierced? Might be cute. I love earrings on babies. When does he start teething?”
“Nora, it’s a robot.”
“Don’t talk about him like that,” she said shielding Arnold’s ears. “You’re going to make him fussy.”
“He’s plastic. Not real.”
“Well, I would prefer a real baby from you, but since that has not happened, I’m taking what I can get.” Nora sniffed at me. “Don’t rob me of my fun.”
Thankfully Carlos was back, fully dressed in his usual suit. He kissed his wife on the cheek. “We’ll be back…later.”
“Take your time.” Nora bounced the baby. “We’re gonna have a fun afternoon, aren’t we, Arnold?”
Chapter 14
We left the apartment complex and didn’t talk until we reached the s
treet.
“Well, you’re free now.” I turned toward Carlos and smiled, making it clear that I didn’t expect him to spend the afternoon with me. “Should we plan to meet up in front of the apartment in a few hours?”
Carlos shook his head. “Not necessary. We can just tell your grandmother that we had business to attend to.”
I nodded. “Works for me.” I took a few steps away, though I had no particular direction I needed to go. “Have a good afternoon.”
My grandfather nodded and turned the other way.
I wracked my brain for places to go, pausing at the edge of the street. Maybe I could do some souvenir shopping, pick up a few things for friends back home. Definitely no gifts for Marissa and Clarissa—they deserved a kick in the pants for sending Arnold along on our vacation. Pulling out my phone, I Googled directions back to the D’uomo.
“Lacey,” Carlos said, breaking up my search as he called across the sidewalk. “What are your plans for this afternoon?”
I shrugged, playing it cool. “Go for a walk, pick up some souvenirs. Run some errands.”
“Would you like to come with me?”
“Where are you going?”
“A walk.”
The silence hung between us. I couldn’t tell if he wanted me to come or if he was offering me the option from a place of pity.
“Oh, I don’t want to intrude on your plans. I’ll just wander around.”
“Will you walk with me?” he asked, sounding somewhat unsure.
Nobody ever said no to Carlos, and I didn’t want to start now. “That sounds nice.”
“Come on.” He waved a hand. “I’ll show you the Brera district.”
“Where’s Brera?”
“If you come with me, I’ll show you.”
We walked off together, strolling the streets of Milan side by side, and I thought that maybe this moment should be documented for posterity. So I pulled out my phone and snapped a selfie of the two of us.
“What are you doing?” Carlos shielded his eyes. “Put that away, you tourist.”
I put the phone in my pocket.