by Beth Byers
Yet again, Zee caught me sleeping. My phone rang and rang and rang until Simon picked it up and then handed me the phone.
“It’s Zee,” he coughed. “She sounds pretty upset.”
She hadn’t come back to the diner after she’d left with Professor Pretty and hadn’t responded to the message I’d sent her. I simply warned her that Carver knew she had been with the pretty man and followed up my message with the picture Carver had sent me. Given the way she’d slapped Carver, stressed baked, and then been caught with Professor Pretty, I was desperate to find out what had happened
Simon, however, must be more exhausted than I’d thought if he really thought Zee was calling me because she was upset. Zee didn’t cry. She got vengeance. I kissed his forehead and left him in the bedroom.
“Ok,” I croaked into the phone. “We’re in the clear.”
“You alone?” Zee asked without a trace of distress. I could tell I was on speaker phone. She must have grabbed at least Maddie if not Jane.
“That’s what I mean by in the clear,” I told them. I grabbed an afghan and wrapped it around my shoulders. Did he really think that Zee called me crying? Was he really buying this? He’d been pretty asleep, so maybe?
“Get dressed in black and meet me at the end of Simon’s drive,” Zee ordered.
I sniffed and considered. Simon’s arms were very warm, and we’d turned off the heat the night before. It was chilly and snuggly with Simon. It was cold in the hallway despite my flannel pajamas.
“Don’t make me come in there,” Zee threatened. “I’ll come crying.”
That convinced me. I snuck into the bedroom, found Simon sleeping, and used the flashlight on my phone to grab a dark hoodie, my warmest boots, and black jeans. I left Simon and the dogs to dress in the hallway before I put my hair up in ponytail and darted down the drive.
I could see Zee by the light of her phone as she played games in the dark. Inside of the car was Maddie, Jane, and Zee. They were all dress in dark colors and I was pretty sure that Maddie, at least, had a glass or two of wine.
“My husband is going to kill us if he finds out,” Jane said. “Let’s avoid that. I’m trying to make things better before I confess.”
I glanced back at her. She wasn’t hiding her emotions, and I could see the stress on her. She’d been blackmailed for years about the father of her youngest son. Spoiler alert: it wasn’t her husband. She’d only recently decided to be straight with them, but she was terrified. Lately, she’d been making a lot of family dinners, going on weekend trips, and building up relationships. That way—when they got torn down—she hoped there was something left to resurrect.
I didn’t know if Jane was making the best choice, but it was her choice all the same, and I was her friend. I would be there for her, either way.
“Give it up,” Maddie suggested to Jane about whatever Zee was dragging us into. “You can’t say no to Zee. None of us can.”
“Where are we going?” I asked as Jane snorted. Maddie was right. We were definitely locked into Zee’s plan.
“See,” Maddie told Jane, “You don’t see Rose fighting fate.”
I didn’t bother to reply to any of that. Zee had us, she wasn’t going to let go until we’d done what she wanted. The time for fighting was when you didn’t answer Zee’s phone calls. “What’s Professor Pretty’s name?”
Zee snorted before she replied, “Peter Perkins.”
“Shut the front door,” I gasped choking on laughter. “So much alliteration with Peter Perkins the professor of pretty What do you know now?”
“Carver,” Zee told me, “arrested me. My chances to find things out was cut short.”
“Shut the front door,” I breathed, choking on my own spit and coughing until I cried. Maddie and Jane weren’t much better, but Jane was laughing and Maddie was crying with a combination of shock and humor. “Did Simon know you got arrested?”
She nodded once. “He fingerprinted me.”
“That rat,” I muttered. That must be why he thought Zee was crying. The fool. Carver should be concerned for his fate, I thought. As should Simon. Sleeping? I didn’t think so. I bet he had been faking to avoid my initial reaction to Zee’s arrest.
Maddie and Jane were laughing too hard to ask further questions, but I had already skipped past Zee getting fingerprinted and a mug shot in my mind. Though…just what would I have to do to get a copy of that mug shot?
“What did you find out before Carver took you in?”
“Professor Pretty doesn’t think Jayla stole the money. Get this,” she tossed me her phone and I opened the screen to an amazon author page of book after book about sex and psychology. “A lot of the money in that account was hers. She was thinking of buying the apartments outright and carrying the loan for the individual apartments. I guess a lot of the professors didn’t have the money to buy their apartment outright and didn’t want to empty their 401k.”
I glanced over the titles on Jayla’s author page. There was a book about the psychology of being a prostitute and the psychology of cheating partners. The covers were salacious and I bet Jayla made pretty good money on these books. I randomly clicked a title and read a few reviews. People seemed to like her stuff. At least the type of people who wanted to read about psychology and sex. I preferred my books to be fictional and the equivalent of brain candy.
“It’s a big deal,” I told the others, “to be published. Colleges and universities expect that of their staff. Even at Mount Hood Community College where my mom works. Someplace like Reed—this type of publishing would be a big deal. This is the difference between a job and no job.”
Zee glanced over and nodded as though she weren’t surprised by what I was saying, but of course she’d chatted up Professor Pretty today. She’d probably spent the afternoon getting the personal lessons on Reed College gossip and what it all meant.
“Those were bestsellers,” Zee told us. “I read a bunch of articles and watched some interviews with Jayla. She made good money off of those books. Really good money. It was how she was thinking of buying the Tidesman.”
“Money she wouldn’t have needed to steal,” I guessed. “Or that’s your theory.”
“It’s Professor Pretty’s theory too,” Zee told me.
It was mine too, to be honest.
“I can’t believe Carver arrested you,” Maddie said as though she’d spent the last few minutes imagining that and ignoring everything else we’d been saying.
“I don’t think he can believe he did it either,” Zee said smugly. “He looked…like he was stuck in a nightmare the whole time.”
Well now, I thought. That didn’t sound so much like she was on the warpath as it sounded like she was anticipating whatever was coming next. “You two deserve each other,” I told her.
She grinned with a smug expression.
“Did you get some enlightenment in jail?”
“He didn’t press charges in the end,” Zee said. “Just went through the process of arresting me and pulled it at the end.”
“Does he know where you are now? Was he trying to scare you straight?”
“Of course he doesn’t know where I am,” Zee said. There was a little something her voice that gave me an insight, I don’t think she wanted me to have. It said she wasn’t sure she wanted him to know where she was.
“Are you going to let him know? Because color me surprised, Zee, but I don’t think you want Carver Jones to know that you’re still up to your same old machinations.”
Zee pulled the car over and snarled, “Do you really think you want to go there with me?”
“I am both not afraid of you and on your side.”
Zee’s gaze fixated on me and I held her gaze steadily. Jane and Maddie seemed to be holding their breath in the back seat, neither of them even squeaked.
“Fine then,” Zee said after she stared me down.
As soon as she put the car into drive, I added, “Which means I want you to be happy with Carver. Something yo
u can’t do if you keep pushing him to his limits. He’s a man who enjoys your personality. The more he loves you…the more he’s going to want to keep you safe.”
She cleared her throat.
“You have to be on Carver’s team first, Zee. Not mine. Not on the side of figuring out murders. On Carver’s side.”
“Shut it.”
“Even I know that and I’m stupid when it comes to relationships.”
“Shut it.”
“He deserves it.”
“I said to shut it,” Zee snapped.
“You deserve it too.”
She said nothing else but she lifted her foot on the break and let the car roll slowly back onto the road.
“What about Simon?” Maddie asked, “Won’t he care that you’re out here?”
“Oh he’ll care,” I said. “He has to choose me back. You tell a girl when her buddy gets arrested.”
I sniffed and Zee smacked me.
“Besides,” I countered, “Simon knows I love him. And accepts that I’m helpless against Zee.”
“You didn’t even try to fight coming along,” Zee snorted. “Maddie put up more of an objection than you did.”
“He doesn’t know that,” I said. “For all he knows, I tried and tried to keep you from this madness and only came along to keep you safe. So we’re searching Jayla and Frank’s rooms? Right? Tell us the plan.”
* * * * *
Jayla and Frank’s rooms were on the top floor of the Tidesman. It was one of those rectangle things. The bottom and middle floor had four apartments. The top floor had two apartments that were twice the size.
Technically speaking, Stevie was Jayla’s boss, but Professor Pretty had said that Jayla was far more successful. They were in Silver Falls to see if she thought it was worth buying the Tidesman and for everyone to ensure having Jayla carry a loan for them was what they wanted. The deal had hinged on Jayla’s acceptance which she’d been threatening to pull since Stevie slept with Frank.
“What a mess,” Maddie said as we started looking through their things. The police had clearly been over it, but there wasn’t any crime scene tape. I stared at the doorway, certain they probably weren’t done with this apartment, but Zee hadn’t removed it when we came up. I stared at the doorway, at Zee, at the doorway. The next time I turned to Zee her lips twitched.
“Did you take the police tape down?” I asked.
“First time I’ve been here,” she said.
I didn’t believe that for a moment. But I did. She didn’t outright lie very often and her expression said that she was up to something but I hadn’t figured it out. My gaze narrowed on her, and she smiled innocently. Yep, she definitely had something to do with the police tape being down.
“You know,” Zee said nastily, “For a former…what do you call yourself? Call center slave? You are too clever.”
I sighed as I said, “Being a call center slave isn’t a sign of stupidity. They pay you just enough to make it hard to get the same starting pay somewhere else. Quit changing the subject, though, and tell me what happened to the crime scene tape.”
She shrugged and then confessed,“If you don’t know, you can’t tell on me.”
I tried staring her down, but I was unsuccessful. So, I decided the best idea was to finish up here and get out before we got caught. It wasn’t even worthwhile. There was just clothes, a few books, makeup, and bathroom stuff. I sighed and said, “Either the police already found everything worth finding, or there isn’t anything. Jayla and Frank didn’t come here to get murdered. They came here to visit this building and check the town out. We aren’t going to find bags of money with dollar signs on them.”
Zee frowned and then said, “What we need is to get everyone else out of their rooms.”
Maddie, Jane, and I flinched and instantly started shaking our heads. We were not pulling fire alarms or calling in bomb threats or whatever it was that Zee was considering.
Zee eyed us and muttered, “Cowards.”
“We aren’t cowards,” Jane cut in. “If there are any calls from this place to the police, they’re going to know you’re…”
Someone pounded on the door and I gasped. Zee’s gaze narrowed on the door and the pounding repeated with, “Open up. Police.”
I smacked Zee as she bypassed me to slam the door open. On the other side, I saw Carver, Simon, and two uniformed police officers whose names were escaping me. I frowned at Simon. He frowned back at me.
I jerked a thumb at Zee, but his gaze didn’t lighten. I guess he expected me to pick him even when he helped to arrest my friend. I scowled.
“Bring them all in,” Carver snarled.
“For what?” Zee demanded.
I closed my eyes. This is what happened when you spent time with Zee. I knew this. And yet here I was. I could hear Jane grumbling, but Maddie was only laughing. I looked at Maddie, she was staring at Carver and Zee.
“Contaminating a crime scene,” Carver said angrily.
“I feel like we’ve been drawn into their weird love games,” Maddie whispered. I held out my wrists to Simon. His jaw was ticking as he put handcuffs on me. I grinned at him, and he didn’t grin back. The punk. But I was determined to embrace the experience. My life had been so boring to this point, I’d never actually been in a police station outside of visiting Simon for lunch. It would be different, right? If I were brought in for a crime? I probably should be excited to see what happened next.
What better way to see what it was like than by being brought in by the man I loved? I grinned at him again. I was pretty sure his eye twitched in response. Oh yeah, I thought, this will be fun.
“What crime scene?” Zee asked. “Aren’t you supposed to mark that stuff or were we supposed to just psychically guess what this was?”
Carver growled and I laughed. I couldn’t help myself. He turned his gaze to me, and Simon slapped his hand over my mouth.
“You knew what this was!” Carver shouted.
Zee shrugged and blinked innocently.
“What did you do with the crime scene tape?” He was so loud, I could hear stirring in other apartments. The walls were really thin.
“There wasn’t any crime scene tape when we got here,” Jane said reasonably. As the town doctor, I guessed that she was a little more believable than me or Zee. “I wouldn’t have crossed that, Carver.”
“What are you doing here, doc?” Carver asked. He sounded frustrated. He should. Zee would torture him for the rest of his days.
“Spending the evening with friends,” she replied calmly. “There was no crime scene tape, Zee had a key, I don’t really see how this is a crime, sheriff. We’re just…checking out real estate.”
“Or something,” Maddie whispered and Jane kicked her.
Carver spun and faced off this the uniformed officers. “Go find the tape. Check her car and the trash.”
Jane cleared her throat and then said calmly, “I can assure you, sheriff. There was no crime scene tape when we got here. Zee arrived with us. She has never been out of my sight since she picked me up.”
“Then she came to take it down first,” Carver shouted. “She’s sneaky.”
That was true. Zee was sneaky. I waited. Simon had removed his hand from my mouth and settled it on my shoulder.
“What did you do with it, Zee?” He demanded, still yelling.
The door across from Jayla and Frank’s place opened and Professor Pretty and Stevie appear in the doorway. Carver’s gaze focused on Professor Pretty and his snarl reached new levels of terrifying. If I didn’t know him personally, I might have been actually scared.
“Everything all right out here?” Professor Pretty asked as Stevie laughed into his shoulder.
“Aren’t you the diner lady?” Stevie asked me. I was leaning against Simon’s chest with my hands cuffed in front of me. I shrugged and nodded and Stevie gasped dramatically. “They must be the killers.”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” Professor Pretty said, rubbing his cl
ose-cut beard, his gaze on Zee. “Of course they didn’t kill Jayla or Frank. They’re not sociopaths, and they couldn’t possibly have a motive. Let alone what are the chances that two coworkers decide together to murder random customers? Astronomically low.”
Stevie nuzzled Professor Pretty’s shoulder and she shrugged. “Why else are they here?”
“Enough of this,” Carver shouted. “You two go back to your apartment. The rest of you…out!”
Zee walked nonchalantly towards the door of the apartment and Carver grabbed her arm, refusing to let her get past him. Simon tugged me past where Carver and Zee were hissing into each other’s faces. It took Professor Pretty a few minutes to shut the door though he stepped back into his apartment. I wasn’t sure that Zee or Carver even noticed. I did though. I watched Professor Pretty. He watched me. Simon finally shut the door for the professors and brought me downstairs, still cuffed.
When we reached the lobby of the apartment building I turned to Simon and asked, “Are you really going to arrest me?”
He glanced back to make sure Carver hadn’t followed him down and dropped a kiss on my forehead.
“What happened to the police tape?” He whispered into my ear.
I pulled back and shrugged and then said, “It really wasn’t here when I got here.”
Simon examined my face and then nodded. Both of us knew that Zee was responsible for whatever had happened to it, but it wasn’t something I knew. She’d lie about it to her dying day.
Carver hauled Zee out of the apartment building a few minutes later and put her on the front seat of his car. We all watched as Carver slammed the passenger door shut, stride around his car, and turn on his car. The engine roared and Carver sped away, taking Zee with him.
“That’s not towards the police station,” Maddie laughed.