Snuff

by Simonson, Melissa

  Sort of. I shrug. “I hear you can drink wine sparingly when you’re pregnant.”

  “I’m not getting you wine.” He lifts me by the waist, and plunks me down on a barstool. “I’ll get grape juice, and you can pour it in a wine glass.” He scratches more on the list with the pen I left on the island. “You forgot milk, granny smith apples, and peanut butter.” His eyebrows pull together. “What about that cinnamon swirly bread? You like that stuff.”

  “It has too many calories.”

  He rolls his eyes and writes cinnamon bread. Carrots and ranch dip are added as afterthoughts. “I’ll call you when I’m there.” He tucks his wallet into his back pocket. “I might see something you didn’t think of.”

  Jack turns to leave, but I tug him back by the hem of his shirt and wrap my arms around his waist. When I bury my face in his stomach, he peels me off, both hands on my shoulders, and just looks at me.

  He doesn’t need words. He can say entire paragraphs with his glances.

  He tilts my chin up and presses his lips to mine. “I’ll be back soon, baby,” he says when we break apart. “Remember to take your vitamins.”

  I sit there on the barstool for a long time after listening for his footsteps on the stairs and his car engine turning over, until Stripes slinks from the bedroom and hops onto the island demanding breakfast. I ignore him as long as I’m able, pecking mindlessly at the keys on the laptop that always sits on the island, but he’s pretty persistent.

  Someone knocks on the front door as I’m busting open a can of Fancy Feast in the sink. Since I haven’t been expecting anyone, I walk to the living room window overlooking the parking lot. The blinds splay when I shove my fingers between them.

  It’s Elena’s Altima wedged between the neighbor’s rusting SUV and the wall, behind Aaron and Brett, Defenders of the Parking Lot. They see me peek down and wave, so I wave back before heading to the door. Stripes is hot on my heels. He likes visitors more than other cats seem to—he doesn’t have a standoffish bone in his body.

  I pull the door open. Stripes tries to shoot out, but I kick him back. It’s not that I’m afraid he’ll run away, it’s that he’ll mosey around on other people’s patios, and cats aren’t exactly welcome in this complex.

  “Sorry,” I say, half-turning to shove my furry illegal stowaway back into the living room. “Can’t let Stripes out or I’ll have to hunt him down and explain to the manager why he’s here.”

  “Stripes? That’s original.”

  I look up through the hair falling in my face as the woman pushes a pair of oversized sunglasses on the top of her auburn head.

  “Oh.” I straighten, still clenching the doorknob, and give her what feels like a confused smile. “I thought you were someone else.”

  Her lips squish into a nameless expression. It’s not a smile, but it isn’t a frown, either. “Who did you think I was?”

  I’m about to answer, but who does she think she is, coming to my door, asking questions? If anyone gets to ask them, it’s me. “I’m sorry, do I know you?”

  “Do you want to?”

  She’s worse than door-to-door preachers.

  “I think you should go.” I try to shut the door in her face, but her foot is in the way. So is a knife. A long, thin one. Shiny silver—the same color as the clasps on the Dolce purse swaying from her wrist—like it’s never been used.

  You’d think a blade would be scary. I’ve read crime reports saying people are more likely to scream for help if they see a gun, but not a knife. I’m not so much scared as I am completely taken aback.

  She must have been watching for a long time if she’s gone out of her way to copy my friend’s looks and car. Aaron and Brett know Elena’s allowed up.

  But I still have no idea who she is.

  “I know this isn’t enough inspiration,” she says, wagging the knife. “Which is why I ought to let you know my friend’s already got Jack.”

  Like hell. “Who are you?” I’ve never seen her in my life, and I’d remember a face like hers. It’s rounded, making her look younger than she probably is. Too pale for a California native. The only color she has is a light rose flush on the apples of her plump cheeks.

  She rolls her blue eyes, and it almost looks friendly when her face splits into a smile. She ignores my question. “I know, you probably don’t believe that, either. I wouldn’t. We’re cynical, living in LA. I get it. Let’s just say he’s not going to live to buy you bananas and grape juice and cinnamon bread, unless you come with me.”

  My stomach squirms. She had to have gotten close enough to read the grocery list. Jack never leaves them behind or drops them like I do.

  But Jack’s six-two and a hundred and seventy-five pounds; not exactly someone who can be kidnapped with minimal effort. “Who the hell are you?”

  “We’ll have time for pleasantries later.” The hand not holding the knife goes palm-up. “In the meantime, let’s just call this a leap of faith.”

  I don’t move, but my eyes dart to the window. How long would it take to reach it and scream?

  She shakes her head. “Bad idea. If I don’t text my friend every ten minutes, he’ll slit your boyfriend’s throat. But wait—isn’t he your fiancé now?”

  No, not technically. But I want him to be, just as soon as I feel marginally better.

  Stripes the Traitor winds around the ankles of her skinny jeans, and she stoops to pick him up. “We need to get going,” she says, looking up at me through a thick fringe of lashes. “Sooner we do, sooner I can tell my friend to let Jack go.”

  I’m rooted to the carpet, watching in frozen silence as she strokes Stripes’s head with a fingertip. “Put my fucking cat down.”

  He hits the carpet on all fours and darts away.

  “You’re really protective of things, aren’t you?” She keeps the knife trained with her right hand and links her left through the crook of my elbow. “Grab that cardigan.”

  “Those cops aren’t going to let me go anywhere.” At least I hope not.

  She adjusts the cardigan so it covers the knife. “That’s why we’re going down the fire escape.”

  “I’m not moving until you tell me who the hell you are.”

  “Good point.” She drags me toward the bedroom. “I’m nobody important. A fellow traveler. Boring in the extreme, but I overcompensate with night-vision and flash photography. ”

  SIXTY-ONE

  John made his way down the stairs and parted the sea of CSU and men in SWAT clothes on his way out the open French front doors. He started toward the sloping driveway and dialed Stacy.

  “I was just going to call you,” she said, her usual tapping filling her end of the line.

  He plugged the ear he wasn’t using. “I need you to run full background on Bianca Cartwright, DOB—”

  “No, let me go first.”

  He stopped beside Lisette’s unmarked cruiser. “Okay. Go.”

  Her typing broke off. “I got through the three layers of encryption on the media files posted to that blog. I’m emailing all four, but fair warning, watching them will be painful. I only watched long enough to make sure I had the right files.”

  He leaned against the still-hot car hood. “Thanks. Anything else?”

  “Yeah. There’s a contact form on the blog. I have no idea why, but I’m going to hack the email the messages are routed to. It’ll be a long shot, but it can’t hurt.”

  John slid a pair of aviators on his face to stave off the sun looming low in the sky. “I need you to get full background on Bianca Cartwright before you get into that. Date of birth October second, 1985.”

  “I’ll call when I’ve got something.”

  He disconnected. Lisette galloped down the steep driveway with the cardboard box on her hip, Kevlar flapping in the salty sea breeze. “Nothing at Aunt Melinda’s. The units I dispatched checked in.” She puffed to a stop beside the open car door. “I’d say we can hit that next, but getting all the way there will take too long, and I told Br
ooke I’d stop by at lunchtime. I want to check on her. She sounded okay last time I spoke with her, but you know.” She shrugged and dropped the box. “She’s an actress.”

  You really should check on her, the voice wheedled, clanging against his ears like a tiny, annoying gong.

  “You’ve still got units watching her apartment?”

  She jostled her holstered gun as she tucked her cell phone in her back pocket. “Around the clock. I just got off the phone with Aaron, and everything’s been quiet. They’re not allowed to leave their post, even if Brooke and Jack aren’t there. Told them to piss in a bottle if they have to. This crazy bitch might try breaking in when they’re gone, or some shit.”

  In retrospect, this may be a good life lesson. Never underestimate the ability of other people letting you down.

  Monday at 10:10 a.m.

  IP Address: 75.84.67.69

  Sent via contact form by an anonymous viewer on your website

  SIXTY-TWO

  “Tell your friend to let Jack go,” I say, once we hit the sidewalk. “You’ve got me. I won’t fight.”

  She wipes off a smudge of fuchsia lip gloss, and all but drags me through an alley that leads to a neighboring street. A thick worm of scar tissue curls around her wrist, and a grudging sort of sympathy stabs my gut. Was she his first victim? Victim turned accomplice? Was it her I heard up there with that man, being raped, instead of the willing participant I’d imagined? Has he kidnapped her fiancé too, forced her into this? If so, I can reason with her. Appeal to her better judgment. Something.

  “So you can try to be a hero or start screaming bloody murder the second I do? I don’t think so.”

  SIXTY-THREE

  “She works part-time at a strip club,” Stacy said. “I’ll text you the address. Only real estate holdings are the ones you already know about. The house where she grew up in Laguna, and Melinda’s house. Minimal activity on credit cards; grocery deliveries and whatnot. For as much money as she’s supposed to have, she doesn’t act like it, having a job she doesn’t need and a boring Honda. No work history before the club. Seems like she was a recluse up till the past year.”

  “What does she do at the strip club? Wait tables?” John held his iPhone out so Lisette could hear on speakerphone.

  “Uh, no, sweetheart. She’s a dancer. I need to take you out more if you don’t know what goes down in strip clubs.”

  “But that makes no sense,” Lisette said from behind the wheel. “Why would she strip for a living when Aunt Melinda hammered it into her head how awful whores are?”

  When one is told something over and over, the voice said, eventually they’ll start to believe it.

  “Maybe as a stiff middle finger?” Stacy offered. “I dressed like a goth in highschool to piss my mother off.”

  Or there’s that.

  “Any other records?” John asked.

  Stacy’s typing cut off. “She doesn’t have a criminal record, but there are some from the psych ward. She spent two months there. Can’t say I blame her much, looking over the old police reports from what happened.”

  “Email the hospital records.”

  “Already done. Don’t get your hopes up, though. They’re not much. I see she had a psychiatrist, but she hasn’t gone in a few years, and I can’t get those records unless you have a warrant, or I get creative with the insurance’s firewalls.”

  “Can you tell if she’s running?” Lisette hunched over the wheel as she squinted into the wing mirror. “Does she know you’ve been poking around on her site?”

  Stacy made a noise between a snort of derision and grunt of affronted disgust. “I know how to cover my tracks. She hasn’t emptied her accounts. Latest cash withdrawal was quite a lot, but that was two months ago, and only ten thousand—wouldn’t keep her afloat for long, if she wanted to get out of Dodge. No plane ticket purchases. No hotel room check-ins. No large-scale contract job order. I’ll flag her name and let you know if anything changes.”

  “Call Chief Foster at LAPD and tell him I need to see Stanley Heckles, Stacy.”

  “Got it. I’ll call him now.”

  “Hey,” Lisette half-yelled. “Before you go—what’s the name of this strip club she’s supposed to work for?”

  “Garden of Eve. Tacky, huh?”

  John agreed it was tacky, hung up, and stuffed the phone into his pocket.

  Lisette slapped the steering wheel. “Garden of Motherfucking Eve. I know that place. Narcotics say the owner uses it to run drugs—mostly blow, but stuff like E and ketamine, too. We’ve never had anything more than circumstantial evidence. We need to go there before we talk to Heckles.”

  John suppressed a groan. A strip club raid was absolutely last on his list of things he’d like to do.

  Lisette gave him a dark look, and the slow driver blocking the road ahead of her the finger. “Suddenly this shit makes a lot more sense if the Ivashkovs are involved. Have you heard of the Ivashkov brotherhood? I’ve heard horror stories about their brothels and sex clubs back in the homeland—Czech Republic. Clients can do whatever they want to the girls, as long as they have the money. Videotaped torture’s not a long way from what I’ve heard.”

  SIXTY-FOUR

  The lacy hem of her blouse flounces as she walks to the mouth of the alley. She whirls around to look at me, crooking a finger. “Come on.”

  She takes my hand when I catch up and swings it back and forth like we’re little girls BFF’s.

  “Where’s Jack?”

  She forces the sunglasses back on the bridge of her nose with her middle finger, and tosses a sideways glance. “We’ll discuss that later.”

  I stop, smack in the middle of the road. “No. If you want me to go with you, I have to know he’s okay.”

  “He’s okay. Would I lie to you?”

  I assume that’s rhetorical. She thinks I’ll believe she’s a killer, but not a liar? “I want to talk to him.”

  That cute little button nose wrinkles into a peach accordion. She wags a finger. “Not until we’re there.”

  I’m tugged forward again when she continues across the street, winding through another alley, and inside an outdoor mall’s parking garage.

  “That’s us.” She points with the hand still grasping mine. It’s a pearl-white Escalade. She presses the car clicker, and the locks pop down.

  “I’m not getting in until you let Jack go. I need to talk to him first.”

  “I hate to break it to you sweetheart, but you don’t have a card to play.”

  I cross my arms over my chest.

  She unclasps her purse and digs through the contents. “So stubborn,” she chides, pulling a black case from her bag. “I don’t want to fight with you.”

  “Is the man holding Jack the one who took me?”

  “No, silly.” She unzips the case. Something glitters, snug in a black pocket. A needle. I try to slap it from her hand, but she’s quicker. “That was me.”

  SIXTY-FIVE

  Lisette walked ahead of John to the middle of the strip club’s main lounge, before a stage on which a pair of topless, dark-haired women with melon-shaped breasts gyrated around slick silver poles, their bronzed, thick areolas glistening with glittered oil.

  He looked away before the glitter made his eyeballs detonate.

  “Good afternoon, everyone,” Lisette yelled over the music. When it pulsed to a stop, she kept her voice raised. “My name is Sergeant Jennings from LAPD Homicide, and I’ll be your official pain in the ass for the day.” She lifted the chain from her neck and held up her badge. “I need employees on that wall by the door, and sad perverts on the wall closest to me.”

  The room exploded into clicking stiletto heels, grumbles, and muted are you fucking kidding me’s.

  “Afraid I’m not fucking kidding,” she called, as the room’s occupants were corralled into their respective walls by uniformed officers.

  A man with a groomed goatee and close-cropped hair wound a path through the sad perverts and police
officers. He came to a stop before John and Lisette, a smile of polite confusion plastered on his face. “Is there a problem?”

  Lisette turned, slipping her chained badge back over her head. Her stoic expression morphed into one of amusement when she saw the newest arrival. “Well, shit, look who it is. You’re an employee and a sad pervert. I don’t know where to put you.” She elbowed John in the ribcage. “This is Jacob Ivashkov. He used to be a low-level loser, but now it seems like he’s a mid-level loser. Are you the manager, Jacob?”

  He crossed his arms over his purple satin button-down, rocking on the balls of his loafers. “I am.”

  “That’s wonderful. You’re come a long way from being a greasy dumbfuck who beats on escorts.”

  He smiled. The crinkles around his dark eyes told John it was sincere, and the pupils dilating within them made it obvious he liked what he saw. “And you as well. Sergeant, now. Last time we met, you were a detective. I guess congratulations are in order. I should have known it was you by the scent. Like Vegas. Sort of smoky and sweet at the same time.”

  She took a step toward him and stabbed him with her index finger. “If you smell me again I’ll make you gargle your balls.”

  He showed off every one of his pricey porcelain veneers as he laughed. “How do you make that sound so hot?”

  Lisette rolled back on the heels of her Timberlands. “Jacob, you’ve got an employee named Bianca Cartwright working for you, yes?”

  “That’s correct.”

  “Did you know she’s suspected of multiple murders?”

  “I did not,” Jacob said, gaze traipsing over the swell of cleavage peeking from the ribbed neckline of her LAPD tank top. “You could knock me over with a feather. She’s such a quiet girl.”

  “It’s in my experience,” John interjected, massaging the space between his brows to ward off the beginnings of a migraine, “that quiet girls don’t usually turn to stripping.”

  Jacob’s hands slid into the pockets of his pinstriped pants as he considered John with professional curiosity. “And it’s been in my experience that girls who like money turn to stripping, Mr.…?”