by Mary Maxwell
“No time like the present,” I said to myself, closing the Sky High checkbook.
I plucked my phone from the desk and quickly navigated to the photograph of the deposit slip. It revealed three intriguing clues: the logo for a large national bank; the account holder’s name—E. A. Hoffmann; and, a mailing address on Pine Grove Lane in Steamboat Springs.
Since it was highly unlikely that the bank would divulge anything over the phone, I decided to hit the road for a quick drive. It was early enough in the day that I could head north, do some snooping around and get back to Sky High before seven.
“You leaving now?” Julia asked when I appeared in the kitchen a few minutes later.
“How’d you know?” I asked.
She put one hand on her hip. “Uh, well…” She gave me the once over and smiled. “The purse, car keys, travel mug and jacket are pretty obvious, Katie. Not to mention that look on your face.”
“What look?”
She giggled. “The I’m-in-a-rush-don’t-get-in-my-way look.”
I dashed over, held up my hand for a high five and then thanked her for the incredible job during the frantic lunch rush earlier in the day.
“You’re welcome,” she said. “I couldn’t have done it without you.”
After we exchanged a few words about the prep list for the next morning, I went out the backdoor, climbed into the car and set off for Steamboat Springs.
Luckily, traffic was light, I didn’t need to make any pit stops and the cup of coffee that I’d fixed before leaving gave me just enough of a caffeine buzz that I was focused and vigilant as I followed the GPS directions to my destination on Pine Grove Lane.
“Okay, this isn’t what I expected,” I said, parking in front of a business service center called Make It, Mail It & More. “I was hoping to discover that Mr. Hoffmann lived in maybe a normal house, not a strip mall.”
After checking to make sure that I had the right address, I headed inside to see if someone might be willing to answer a few questions. A middle-aged man and younger woman were behind the counter staring at an issue of People magazine. When they glanced up, I introduced myself, explained the reason for my visit and showed them the copy of the deposit slip on my phone. I noticed a name tag pinned to the man’s shirt: ARLO FRANKS, ASSISTANT MANAGER.
“I’m not telling you a thing about him!” he barked. “We have very strict policies to protect our clients and their privacy.”
The young woman offered a sympathetic smile as I expanded on the reason for my visit.
“The thing is,” I said, grinning at the grouchy authoritarian figure in his Make It, Mail It & More uniform shirt, “I’m trying to help the police in Crescent Creek locate a couple of people who are missing.”
Arlo wrinkled his nose. “If you’re a cop,” he demanded harshly, “let me see your badge.”
“That’s the other thing,” I said, increasing the wattage on my smile from Really Friendly and Nice to Absolutely the Least Threatening and Most Honest Person You’ll Ever Meet. “I’m not with the Crescent Creek PD. I used to be a private investigator in Chicago, and I—”
“Used to be?” His voice squeaked slightly. “That doesn’t make you anything.”
I felt a faint whir of anger stirring deep inside. My credibility and character had just been challenged by a pudgy middle-aged guy wearing suspenders and a baggy pair of khakis along with his bright yellow shirt.
As I kept my eyes on Arlo, the young woman scooped up a notebook, mumbled something about taking a break and headed outside.
“Normally,” Arlo said, “that kind of thing wouldn’t be allowed here. But she’s my cousin, right?” He rubbed his chin between one chubby thumb and forefinger. “Plus, you know, she’s studying art history, so this is probably the best place she’ll ever work. My district supervisor would have a total meltdown, but I cut her some slack on account of we’re related and stuff.”
“I get that,” I said. “How about cutting me some—”
“Not possible!” he yelped. “Our corporate office just sent out a new employee guidebook last month, and one of the biggest infractions they talked about was people who disclose sensitive information about customers to unauthorized individuals.”
He smiled. There was something between two of his bottom teeth, but I wasn’t about to let him know. It would be my luck that doing a good deed might violate one of the guidebook’s other gazillion rules.
“How about this?” I suggested. “If I say a name and it rings any bells, you can just touch your nose with one finger. That way, you’re not violating the rule about telling someone about a customer.”
He shook his head. “No can do. That’s a nonverbal. There’s a big chunk of Appendix A devoted to nonverbal communication and how you can breach customer confidentiality just as easily by doing something like that.”
“By touching your finger to your nose?”
He lifted one arm and touched his nose. “Yeah, exactly like that.”
I could tell that I wasn’t going to get anywhere with Mr. Weisenheimer, so I thanked him for his time, swiveled back toward the door and prepared to exit the Land of No Can Do.
“Sure you don’t need to make or mail anything?” Arlo called.
“I’m good,” I said over my shoulder. “But I appreciate the offer.”
As I reached for the door, it suddenly swung open and the young woman who’d gone outside was standing on the sidewalk with a faint grin on her face.
“Have a nice day,” she murmured.
“Thank you,” I said.
As I crossed the threshold and walked past her, I heard her whisper an odd remark.
“Windshield,” she said. “Check your windshield.”
CHAPTER 17
The note was scribbled on a sheet of lined paper: Google this guy—Elmyr de Hory. Below the name and cryptic suggestion, I saw two more things written in the same flowery script: Sissy—970-555-9835.
I sat in the car, staring at the message as my mind sifted through the reasons a stranger had gone out of her way to leave the enigmatic communiqué on my car.
“There’s only one way to find out,” I said, pulling out my phone.
I dialed the number and waited. When she answered, I told her my name and asked if she was the young woman from Make It, Mail It & More.
“Who else would I be?” she said. “Or do people leave stuff on your windshield all the time?”
I ignored the mumbled retort and went right for the most obvious question.
“Who is Elmyr de Hory?” I asked.
She scoffed. “Google him.”
“Can’t you give me a clue?”
“No, I’m at work,” she said, lowering her voice. “Just Google the guy. I think it might help you with whatever you’re looking for.”
“Why?” I asked. “Do you know Mr. Hoffmann?”
“Yeah.”
“Do you know him well?”
She didn’t answer, but I heard Mr. Bureaucracy in the background.
“Sissy?”
“What?” she whispered.
“I appreciate the information,” I said. “But if you can just give me a hint as to why this name relates to—”
“The guy you’re asking about is a painter, right?”
“Yes, but his name isn’t Hoffmann.”
“Well, duh,” she rasped. “That’s the whole point.”
“The whole point of what?”
“Look,” she said sharply. “I saw that bank slip that you asked my cousin about. And I recognized the name because that painter guy was always nice to me when he came in to get his mail. He told me one time all about Hoffmann and why he picked that for his phony name.”
“Phony name?”
“Google it,” she said.
“And he had a box here in Steamboat?”
“Yeah. He picked up most Fridays,” she answered. “But there were some weeks when he didn’t come in at all.”
“Do you know anything about him?” I
asked.
“I know he’s a painter,” she said. “And he was nice to me. One day when I was doing my homework at the counter, he noticed the art history book I was reading. He told me that he was an artist and asked if I’d heard of a movie called F for Fake or some dude named Elmyr de Hory.”
“The man you want me to Google?”
“Uh-huh. Because I can’t really talk much more. My cousin is kind of a nit-picker. He’s all about rules and stuff.”
“Then I should probably let you go,” I said.
“Probably,” she agreed. “But you seemed like a nice person. And I like Mr. Hoffmann.” She paused and I heard a feathery laugh. “Or whatever his name is.”
“Right,” I said. “Whatever it is.”
We both chuckled at the possibility that we were talking about someone without knowing his true identity. I wanted to follow up with another question, but Sissy beat me to it with one of her own.
“Is he okay?” she asked.
Since his whereabouts were still unknown, I told her that I hoped he was fine.
“Me, too,” Sissy said. “The last time he picked up his mail, he had a black eye.”
“Did he tell you how it happened?”
She laughed. “Yeah, but he was pretty embarrassed. He said it was from getting sucker punched by a woman he was dating.”
“Did he tell you her name?”
“Maybe,” she said. “But it was a while ago.”
“It would be helpful if you could remember,” I said.
I waited while she searched her memory, hoping that she would recall the name and it might dovetail with another that I’d already heard in the past couple of days.
“I’m sorry,” the young woman said finally. “I can’t remember. I know it was a short name. But it wasn’t, like, Susan or Betsy or anything like that.”
“What about Liza?” I said. “Or maybe Pia?”
“Possibly,” she mumbled. “It could’ve been one of those or something else. I’m sorry that I can’t be more helpful. Like I already said, it was a while ago.”
“When did you last see Mr. Hoffmann?”
“Um…” She hummed, trying to call up the recollection. “I’m not really sure.”
“Was it within the last two or three weeks?”
“Oh, definitely! Because I was still going out with Robbie. Me and Mr. Hoffman traded dating horror stories fairly often.”
“Did he have a lot of them?”
She giggled. “Are you serious? The guy was either a prolific liar or a Don Juan. It seemed like he was dating a different woman every time he picked up his mail.”
“And one of the more recent girlfriends clocked him?”
“You mean hit him?”
“Same thing, yeah. You mentioned that he had a black eye.”
Sissy laughed again. “A nasty one. It was black and purple and red. There was even a gash from the ring she was wearing when she…what was that you said? Clocked him?”
“Right,” I answered. “Do you know what they were fighting about?”
“I’m not exactly sure,” Sissy said. “But I think it was about another woman. I guess that whoever hit him had recently caught Mr. Hoffman in a compromising position with an ex-girlfriend. Even though he promised to be faithful, she double-crossed him anyway. And that’s why he was so upset.”
“She double-crossed him?” I said. “By doing what?”
“She took some things from his house that belong to someone he works for,” Sissy told me. “He was pretty freaked out because he said that if they weren’t returned in the next couple of weeks then he’d have to leave town.”
“Do you have any idea what was taken from his house?”
“Nope. But whatever it was, Mr. Hoffmann was pretty sure it was the worst trouble he’d ever been in before.”
I thought about all of the moving pieces that Sissy had just described. Vito. A current paramour. An ex-girlfriend. Stolen goods. And a very angry boss.
“It sounds like he really trusted you,” I said.
“I guess. He’s a cool guy. We just sort of clicked the first time we met.”
I was getting ready to thank her again when I heard Arlo snarl in the background.
“Oh, shoot,” Sissy whispered. “He’s coming to see if I’m doing what I’m supposed to be—”
And she was gone with a hefty sigh, a muttered curse word and a crisp clack.
CHAPTER 18
I had my eyes on the chicken pasta primavera as it rotated slowly beneath the harsh glare of the bright bulb inside the microwave. After I arrived back in Crescent Creek, Blanche Speltzer had called with a last-minute invitation to dinner, but I felt like spending the evening at home with three of my favorite guilty pleasures: Lean Cuisine, a small bowl of Chubby Hubby and my beloved copy of Mamma Mia! It wasn’t the best movie in the world, but it always made me happy to sing along with the old ABBA hits and fantasize about being on a Greek island. Before the movie, I also planned to see what I could find online about the tip I’d received from Sissy in Steamboat Springs.
As I waited for the microwave to finish, I heard the muffled sound of my phone ringing inside my purse in the living room. I’d plopped it down when I got home from my field trip, intending to clean it out at some point during the movie.
Hoping it might be Zack calling from Santa Fe, I darted into the next room and grabbed my phone just in time to hear the most welcome sound on the planet.
“Katie?”
“Hi, handsome,” I said as the familiar surge of tenderness and calm pulsed through my body from head to toe. “How are you?”
“Feeling really saintly,” he said with a hint of mischief in his voice.
“And why do you feel saintly, Saint Zachary?”
He laughed. “We knocked off early today and did a little sightseeing. We went to the Loretto Chapel and the Saint Francis Cathedral.”
“Wow! That’s a great way to spend part of the day.”
“No kidding,” he said. “Have you ever been?”
“My parents took us when Nana Reed was running Sky High,” I answered. “It was one of the last family vacations we all went on together.”
“Maybe you and I can come here sometime,” he suggested.
“That would be nice.”
We both listened to the silence for a few moments. I didn’t know what Zack was thinking about, but my mind was fluttering from one image of him to the next: laughing as he washed the dishes at his place the night before he left; falling asleep on the sofa one time with a box of M&Ms balanced on his stomach; kissing my neck as we spooned together in bed on a recent Sunday morning.
“So?” His voice pulled me back from the series of hazy snapshots. “What are you up to tonight?”
“Oh, you know me,” I said. “A little dusting, a bit of vacuuming and a few loads of laundry.”
He laughed. “You’re funny, Katie.”
“What?”
“I’m guessing you’re going to eat some fast food, like maybe a burger or slice of pizza. Then you’ll get into your PJs. And then you’ll watch The Notebook or Sixteen Candles again for the fifty gazillionth time.”
I smiled at his joke. Then I told him the truth.
“Well, two out of three isn’t bad,” he said. “I’ve never seen that ABBA movie.”
“Are you serious?”
“Why would I lie about something like that?”
“Hmmm…” I tried to think of a witty reply, but the microwave timer chimed in the kitchen. “Ah, there’s my dinner, sweetie.”
“Leftover pizza?”
“Heck, no! I’m having a healthy, gourmet meal.”
“Carrot sticks dipped in that stuff you make out of yogurt and Grey Poupon?”
“Oh, much more gourmet than that! I’m having a Lean Cuisine.”
“Yum!” he said. “And I thought my plans were dodgy.”
“What are you doing for dinner?”
“I got a couple of beef sliders from Del
Charro,” he said. “It was on the way back to the hotel from our sightseeing trip.”
“And then what?” I asked.
“Top Gun is on,” he answered. “It’s one of my favorites, and I haven’t seen it for a while.”
“Maverick and Goose!” I cheered. “Man, I love that one, too.”
He laughed. “Well, there’s a cool idea for one night after I get back,” he said. “We can get a bottle of good wine, a pizza from Pepper & Roni’s and watch Top Gun and Mia Mommy or whatever it’s called.”
“Mamma Mia!” I teased. “But you knew that already, didn’t you?”
He didn’t say anything.
“Babe?”
There was still no reply, so I held the phone away from my ear to make sure the call hadn’t dropped.
“Zack?” I heard a little wrinkle of worry in my voice. “Are you still there?”
“Yeah,” he answered finally.
“Where’d you go?”
“It’s just…” He stopped and I heard him inhale deeply. “Oh, shoot, Katie. It’s just that I kind of miss you a lot whenever I’m away.”
“Ditto,” I said.
“But I’ll be back in a couple of days, okay?”
“Okay,” I whispered. “And, in the meantime?”
“Yeah, babe?”
“‘I still don’t know what you’ve done with me,’” I sang, quoting one of my favorite ABBA hits. “‘A grownup woman should never fall so easily.’”
“What do you mean?” Zack asked. “Did you slip or something?”
I laughed at his innocent question before explaining that my remark was from one of the songs on the Mamma Mia! soundtrack.
“Oh, I get it,” he said. “Two can play that game, Katie.”
“Yeah?”
He laughed and started to sing, “‘Highway to the danger zone. Ride into the danger zone.’”
I pressed the phone to my ear and listened as my handsome boyfriend delivered one of the most off-key renditions of the old song from Top Gun. When he finished, Zack asked what I thought.
“You want me to be honest?”
“Yeah, babe,” he said. “Tell me what you think.”
I felt another rush of happiness. Then I said, “You take my breath away, Zachary Hutton. And I’m so glad that you’re mine.”