“Sure, Jake. You know I will.”
“Hey, Dad?”
“Yeah?”
“Um, how did you know, well, that Mom was ‘the one’?”
“Ah-ha!”
“What?”
“I knew things were getting serious!”
“What?! What are you talking about?”
“You and that cop of yours!”
“I don’t –”
“You never talk about him. You’re just like your mom with her sketching. Don’t want to talk about something you care about until you’re sure about it. I’m right, aren’t I?”
“I’m going to call Mom and tell her to get you checked for dementia.”
“Hee hee!” My dad was enjoying this way too much.
“You think I’m kidding.”
“Jake, just relax and enjoy life. If it’s right, you’ll know. Try imagining your life without him, and see how that feels.”
“I’m hanging up now.”
“Yes, Son, you do that. I love you, too.”
I turned off the ringer on my phone. I knew it wouldn’t be long before my mom started calling, wanting to interrogate me about Petreski. I should have kept my big mouth shut. When would I learn?
They’ve Got Apps for Everything These Days
“What are you doing?” Don asked, looking over my shoulder from behind the sofa.
“Geez, personal space dude. What if I’d been doing something super private?”
“Are you?”
“I’m updating my food diary.”
“Your what?”
“Your girlfriend told me to keep track of everything I eat and enter it in this app.”
“She’s not my girlfriend. What app?”
“It’s one she gave me. I don’t think it has a name, as such. I enter what I eat, and it tracks all kinds of stuff like carbs and proteins and vitamins and stuff. Dani can access it to review it and give me advice about what I’m eating. I enter my exercise, too. It’s pretty comprehensive.”
“Hold on. Can I see it?” Don asked, holding out his hand.
“Um, I guess so. Just don’t mess it up.”
Don rolled his eyes as he took my phone. “I’ll try.”
I cracked open a textbook while Don tapped away at my phone.
“Hold on. Does Dani have a background in nutrition?” Don asked after a few minutes.
“I don’t think so. I know she’s a personal trainer and studied exercise, um, physiology? Something like that. Why?”
“Because nutrition is a big part of this. They say abs are made in the kitchen, you know?”
“They do?”
“Yeah. Like, everything comes back around to what you eat, right? So exercise is important for health and fitness, but diet is key for losing weight. So where does Dani get her nutrition expertise?”
“Um...”
“Who do we know of, who knows Dani, and knows something about nutrition?”
“Um...?”
“Starts with a ‘G’?”
“Ohhh... but she’s still a student, right?”
“Maybe she’s a grad student? Or close to finishing? Whatever, I’ll bet that’s the connection between Dani and Gloria – this app. I mean, other than them both knowing Lana.”
“Maybe Lana is how they met?”
“Makes total sense.”
“And, it’s perfectly innocent. So why act cagey about it?”
“I don’t know.”
“But wait,” I said, putting the textbook back on the coffee table. “Don’t you need a lot of programming know-how to create an app?”
Don shrugged. “Not so much anymore. There’s programs that just about anybody can use. I think now it’s mostly a matter of subject matter knowledge, and in this case the ability to analyze data. Maybe they have someone else working with them who has tech skills. Don’t see that it matters, though.”
“No. Probably not.”
“But like you said, why be cagey about the whole thing?”
“Maybe there’s lots of money-making potential.”
“Yeah. These days people are making money by creating things and selling them to bigger companies. Is there anything ground-breaking or innovative about their program?”
“How on earth would I know? I’ve never used anything like this before. It’s easy to use, though. But it’s not automated. Dani actually looks at what I enter. It’s more like a way for us to interface. But I guess it could be – whaddayacallit? – commercialized. Maybe as a resource for personal trainers or nutritionists working one-on-one with clients.”
“Hmm.” Don scrolled around on the app a bit more before handing my phone back. “Still don’t see how it relates to Lana, though.”
“It probably doesn’t.”
“You want coffee?” Don called from my kitchen. I grunted and could hear him pouring water into the coffee maker. I knew we were friends for a reason.
“Oh! I just thought of something terrible!”
“What? What?!” Don stepped out of the kitchen.
“What if Gloria remembers where she saw us and tells Dani that you’ve got a thing for mermaids?”
Don sighed and went back into the kitchen. “So what if she does?”
“What if Dani shows up at your door in a mermaid outfit?”
“What if you give it a rest?”
I shrugged, even though he couldn’t see me. “Could get awkward, I’m just sayin’.” I muttered to myself.
Coffee with Gloria
“What about Miletti?” I asked Petreski that evening as we sat at the bar while Don was working happy hour.
“What about him?”
“Could he have –” I looked around to make sure no one was too close before lowering my voice, “could he have killed Lana?”
“Could he? Sure. But what would his motive be? By all accounts she was making him good money and no one we’ve questioned has indicated any tension between him and Lana.”
“What about jealousy? Or, you know, mob ties?”
“What, because his name is Italian? That’s a stereotype, isn’t it?”
“Uh...”
“Besides, it’s not his real name.”
“Say what?”
“Nope. Michael Trumbull from Kansas City. Sorry to disappoint you.”
I sighed. “Lame.”
“If it makes you feel any better, he does have a record.”
“Oh, swell. But nothing that backs up him being the killer?”
Petreski shrugged. “Not directly, no. He was a small time pimp, cut a deal, testified against some bigger fish, changed his name and started over here.”
“Do you think he was doing that here? That the club is a front?”
“There’s nothing to indicate that that’s the case.”
“There’s nothing to indicate that that’s the case.” I repeated. “That’s some fancy phrasing there. They teach you that in cop school?”
Petreski snorted. “Do I really sound that stuffy?”
“Not all the time. Only when you’re trying not to say something.”
“Hmm. I think you may know me too well.”
“No such thing, Boo,” I said, clinking my beer bottle against his.
“Am I interrupting anything?” Don asked from the other side of the bar.
“Nope,” I answered.
“Too bad. Another beer?”
“I’d better not.”
“Yeah, me neither,” Petreski said. “Busy day tomorrow.”
“So what is it?” I asked Petreski as we walked back to my apartment building.
“What’s what?”
“What were you not saying back there? About Miletti?”
He didn’t answer right away, but after a minute he said, “It’s kind of a gut feeling. I don’t like him for Lana, but I don’t like ruling him out for Standing.”
“Well, Lana was, according to Dani, sleeping with both of them. Miletti might not have liked that. Maybe he’s the jealous type.”
“Maybe. But he has an alibi. Says he was at the club, and there were plenty of people who saw him there. So he couldn’t have done it, not really, but there’s just something there that’s eating at me.
“Well, don’t give yourself wrinkles over it, Boo. You’ll figure it out.”
❧
Later that night, after Petreski had gone home, I sat in front of my murder board, filling in what I had learned about Miletti/Trumbull and wondering how they were all connected.
What had Dani said the other day at Jennifer’s? Something about thinking Standing wasn’t interested in her for herself. Was Standing really interested in Miletti? Was he trying to get information about Miletti?
It seemed Standing rubbed everyone the wrong way. I was irritated just thinking about him. He must have really turned on the charm to get Lana to give him the time of day, let alone keep him around for a while. Or he was great in bed. He must have something going for him – Perez kept him around for a while. Or maybe he’d changed since then.
But back to now – why go to all that trouble if there wasn’t something in it for him?
Petreski had said something about Standing being dirty, hadn’t he? So... dirty cop seduces entertainer who works for a business owner who used to be a pimp. Was Standing trying to exploit that somehow? Maybe he knew, or figured, that Miletti was up to his old tricks and was trying to get a piece of the action.
Of everyone on the board, three people would really know, and two of them were dead. The next closest would be Gloria, and I couldn’t figure out a way to talk to her that wasn’t totally weird.
❧
“Do you mind?”
I looked up from my book to see, of all people, Gloria Quintanilla herself pointing to the chair across the table from me. I tried not to do a double take.
“Oh, of course not. Please.” I gestured toward the chair and she sat, lowering her bag to the floor and setting her coffee on the table. The campus coffee shop wasn’t crowded, since it was summer semester, so she could have sat somewhere else. She was here on purpose.
“I’ve seen you before,” she said, taking the lid off her coffee and emptying a packet of sweetener into it.
“Yeah. I, uh, get around.”
“You were at Ground Up the other day. Dani says you’re one of her clients.”
“Yeah. That’s right.”
“Dani was really interested in your friend, I think his name was Don?”
“Is that why you’re here? To find out about him? Did Dani put you up to this?”
She shook her head. “That’s not Dani’s style. But she’s a friend, so I’m asking. Because, see, I kind of got the impression that your friend is into mermaids.”
“Ugh.” I leaned forward, elbows on the table, and buried my face in my hands. “No. That’s not it.”
“No? So what’s going on then?”
“I just said that. Don didn’t even want to go. He was just there to keep me out of trouble.”
“But instead you got him into it.”
“It’s kind of my superpower.”
She cocked her head to one side and studied me for a minute before picking up her coffee. “Hmm. Dani likes you, and you seem like a nice guy. Funny, too.”
“I try.”
“And your friend? Is he a nice guy?”
“The best. He’s been my best friend since we were fifteen.”
“So why were you there, then?”
She was smart, and she wasn’t letting this go. “I don’t suppose you’d buy that I was there for the shrimp?”
“You did get your money’s worth. But no, I wouldn’t.”
I sighed. “I am – and Don will back me up on this – a hopeless snoop.”
“But what were you there to snoop about?”
“Lana.”
“Lana? But why? Did you know her?”
“No. I hadn’t even met Dani yet at that point. But I... it’s complicated. But you remember those detectives that came while we were there? One of them – the younger one – he’s my boyfriend.”
“Oh. Well done, you. But you didn’t say anything. Oh – he didn’t know you were there, did he?”
“Not until he saw me.”
“And you were in big trouble after that, yeah?”
“Eh. Not so much. He’s used to me being a snoop.”
Gloria leaned back in her chair, crossing her legs and kicking her top leg back and forth.
“So what’s your deal, then?” she asked me.
“My deal?”
“Yeah. Why were you snooping? What was your interest? How did you know about Lana?”
“Do you believe in the paranormal?” Either she’d buy into it, or she’d think I was a (hopefully harmless) weirdo and leave it alone.
“What, like werewolves and demons and stuff?”
“No. More like, oh, spiritual connections, ESP, that kind of thing.”
“I don’t know. My Tia Zoila does. She says she sees ghosts and communicates with spirits.”
“Do you believe her?”
She shrugged. “I don’t know. Other than that, though, she’s a very practical, no nonsense person. She’s not a kook or delusional or anything. So I guess maybe I give her the benefit of the doubt. Why? Are you saying you saw Lana’s ghost?”
“No. I’ve never seen a ghost. Let’s call it intuition. I had a feeling, or something, about someone. And that someone turned out to be Lana, and shortly afterwards she was dead, and I can’t let that go.”
“A feeling? What kind of feeling? And how did you know it was Lana if you didn’t know her?”
Oh. My. God. This girl was not giving up. “I didn’t exactly know it was Lana so much as I realized it was Lana after the fact.” It was close enough to the truth for me.
“Too bad you didn’t realize it earlier.”
Ouch. “Yeah. That’s what I thought, too.”
We sat in silence for a minute before I said, “You told me that you and Lana weren’t really friends, but that’s not exactly – precisely – true, is it?”
She sighed, her leg swinging faster before she stopped it. “Oh, fine,” she said, almost under her breath. “Maybe not exactly. In hindsight I think we probably would have gotten there eventually, and she introduced me to Dani, who’s become a really good friend. But Lana... she was, well...”
“Was it about a man?” I asked when she seemed to be having trouble finding her words.
“Stupid cliché, right?” She huffed out a humorless laugh. “And then when she met that Bobby guy. Well, I thought she’d start going out with him and leave Mike alone, but no. She wanted both of them. It just made me so angry and frustrated. It feels petty now, though.”
“You can’t always control your feelings.”
“No. That’s true. But it was stupid. And he’s my boss, which is even more stupid. I mean, seriously, what was I thinking?”
“Was? You don’t feel that way about him now?”
“That’s what makes it so stupid! It’s like, now that she’s gone my eyes are opened. What she had with him wasn’t all that great. Sure, I still find him attractive, but I don’t want him like I did. I mean, what’s to say anything I would have with him would be any better?”
“Different people? You’re not Lana.”
“No,” she shook her head. “It’s more about him. He’s very closed off. There’s something, oh, hard and cold about him. And the world he lives and works in? It’s something I want to leave behind. It’s a job I took to help pay for school, and that’s it.”
“That makes sense.”
“I thought Lana wanted out, too, but after she met Bobby she seemed even more interested in Mike. Maybe she was trying to play them off against each other or something? I don’t know. I’m not good at those games. It was confusing and frustrating for me.”
I nodded. “Sure. I totally get that. For them, too, maybe.”
“That’s the weird thing. Bobby seemed totally on board. I think he knew
she was still fooling around with Miletti. One night I – oh, I never even thought about this until now. Weird.”
“What?”
“Well, one night I was leaving work and saw them – Mike and Bobby – talking in the parking lot off to the side, away from the back entrance. I didn’t hear what they were saying, but I did catch Lana’s name. Bobby had his back to me, but I could see Mike’s face and he looked pissed. Bobby was laughing, but it was a mean kind of laugh, if you know what I mean?”
I nodded. This was big stuff.
“I wondered if they were arguing over Lana, like maybe Bobby was baiting Mike, but I didn’t want to stick around and I didn’t want them to see me. And now Bobby’s dead and I’m wondering... oh geez. What if... what if Mike, you know?” She sat up, her hands shaking and eyes wide.
“I know, but – oh, shoot. No, I didn’t mean to freak you out. It’s okay, yeah? It’s okay. Miletti had an alibi, right? He didn’t do it.”
She took a deep breath and nodded. “Yeah. I’m okay. Sorry. And it’s ridiculous, right? Mike was at work when Standing was killed. I saw him. He was there all night, just like I told the police. I’m being silly.”
“No, you’re not. I think it’s perfectly normal to be worried and afraid when murder happens close to home.”
“Hah. Speaking from vast personal experience, are you?” she scoffed. She was trying to play it cool, but her hand shook when she picked up her coffee cup.
“Not vast, no. But personal, yes.” Personal enough for me, anyway.
“Oh. Sorry.”
“No worries. But I guess I do have a unique perspective.”
“Look, I know Dani’s been talking to you. She barely knows you, but she seems to trust you and I guess I can see why. But I’m gonna worry about her, and I’m not going to let that go.”
“Dani’s lucky to have a friend like you. But, and no offense, but how do we know you didn’t kill Lana? Or Standing? You’ve got motive.”
“You don’t. But I didn’t. I know you’re going to tell your boyfriend what I told you. Fine. But if they want to question me again, ask them not to do it when I’m at work, okay? I don’t want to get in trouble.”
Movie Night with Cats
Not a Mermaid Page 13