His mouth pulled into a thin line, Milo dropped his hands and backed away.
“What, no butler to answer the door?” I asked.
“His night off,” Milo answered, and since he’d already turned and walked out into the hallway, I couldn’t tell if he was kidding or not.
Quickly, I glanced around, wondering what else I could see or learn before he returned. But hey, curiosity is a weird thing. When I heard the irritated rumble of Milo’s voice at the front door and the reply of not one, but two other voices, I scooted to the doorway of the museum room to try to hear what was going on.
The foyer of the house was directly to my left. About a million feet away, but directly to my left. From there, I had a perfect view when Milo’s visitors stepped into view.
One of them was a heavyset man a whole head shorter than Milo.
The other was younger, taller, skinnier. He had a head of wild, dark curls.
The instinct for self-preservation is a funny thing.
Except mine wasn’t laughing.
The men were the ones who were in the comic book store when Quinn and I went there, and the kid?
The last time I saw him, he was hightailing it through the rhododendrons at Garden View after he jumped off that backhoe.
He was the one who tried to kill me.
I darted back into the museum room, and I hoped I did it fast enough that neither of the visitors saw me. While I was at it, I looked for a way out of the room, and the house.
It wasn’t the windows. The glass was thick and there was no way to open them.
The blood pounding in my head, I raced back the other way. I wasn’t imagining it, the men’s voices were getting closer. Trying to think, I put my hand on the corner of the marble fireplace.
That was when the wall opened and spun and I spun with it.
The next thing I knew, I wasn’t in the museum room anymore.
No wonder the museum room seemed so misshapen! The room I suddenly found myself in was parallel to it, just as long and nearly as wide.
No windows. No doors. Just the weird spinning wall like something out of a sci-fi movie.
Or a superhero comic.
My heart beating fast and my breaths coming just as quickly, I stepped away from the wall and looked around. The secret room had an chilly feel, but then, that was no surprise. The walls were made from brushed stainless steel. So were the tables, a desk that held a computer, and the chair in front of it.
The silvery color of the steel and the lights recessed into the ceiling made the whole room look as if it had been carved from ice.
Suddenly shivering, I wrapped my arms around myself and went over to examine a larger-than-life statue near the far wall. No, not Superman. Not this time. The statue was of a man and a woman and whatever it was made out of, it was just as cold and silvery as the rest of the room. They were standing side by side, his right hand and her left on a globe.
“Weird,” I told myself. “Way weird.”
So was the contraption at the center of the room.
Squinting, I closed in on it at the same time I tried to figure out what it was. It looked like a Plexiglas box, big enough to hold a person and suspended between two stainless steel chains that hung from the ceiling.
It was empty.
As empty as Milo would find his little museum room if he got back there and I was nowhere to be found.
Jolted by the thought, I took out my cell phone and snapped a few quick pictures of the strange room, then hurried back over to the wall and pressed my hands to it until I found the spot that made the secret door swing open.
Luckily, when Milo Blackburne returned to the museum room just a minute later, he was alone. He found me admiring his display of Superman comics in French. Hopefully, he didn’t notice that I was breathing just a little hard.
But then, I had a pretty good excuse, didn’t it?
Not only had I just taken a walk on the really weird side, but I had more questions now than I had when I arrived at Blackburne’s.
Like, who were those two guys who’d come to the door?
Why did they want to kill me?
And what connection did they—and the attempt on my life—have with Milo Blackburne?
New bar?
I hit the reply button on my phone to return a text message to Quinn and started typing furiously.
No. Not a bar, I told you—
Before I could finish, another text from him arrived.
Didn’t tell me u were going out.
New partners with you?
Like anyone could blame me for grumbling? Not only was he assuming I was actually going to go into business with my mom and dad, he obviously hadn’t paid enough attention to the first text I sent along with the pictures of Milo Blackburne’s secret room.
Not a bar. Told u. Blackburne’s house.
My phone rang instantly.
“What the hell—”
“If you read your texts, you’d know this already. And besides, I was going to tell you as soon as I got back. I knew he was a Superman collector, see, and—”
“And we’ve got one, maybe two murders that have something to do with Superman collectors so you just thought you could run out on your own and—”
“It’s not like anything happened. Well, except for the fact that two guys showed up at Blackburne’s and one of them was the one who tried to kill me.”
To this, Quinn didn’t bother to reply. In fact, he hung up. I wasn’t surprised when within fifteen minutes, he was pounding on my door. Even with the traffic gods smiling on him, he shouldn’t have been able to make it to the other side of town that quickly. Something told me the portable flashing police light and siren he stored under the front seat of his unmarked car had been put to good use.
“I told you, I’m fine,” I said, opening the door and stepping back to let him in because really, he would have just run me down to get past me, anyway.
“The two guys. Give me descriptions.”
“I don’t need to. They were the ones—”
“At the comic book shop.” He pulled out his phone, and I think he would have called right over to Dick’s and demanded a list of customers, a complete log of every sale made over the last year and footage from Dick’s security cameras if there were such things. That is, before he realized how late it was and how there was no way Dick was still hanging around the comic book shop. He covered by shoving his phone back in its holder and reminding me, “That was stupid.”
“Not completely.” I pulled out the check Blackburne had written to the cemetery and waved it under Quinn’s nose. “I can be very persuasive.”
“And very stupid.”
“I’m alive, aren’t I?” Frustrated and tired of standing at my door and arguing, I spun around and headed for the couch. “The two guys who came to see Blackburne never saw me.”
“But Blackburne and those creeps, they’re connected.”
I shrugged.
Quinn wasn’t about to take that as the final say on the subject. “Which means Blackburne—”
“It means he might be somehow connected with the attempt on my life, not that he definitely is. Besides…” I thought about the way Blackburne had looked into my eyes, and his offer to make his casa, mi casa. I thought about his obsession with Lana Lang, too, and a shiver skipped up my spine. “He’d never hurt me. He likes me.”
Quinn’s eyebrows slid up.
I protested instantly. “It’s not like that.”
“What is it like?”
“Well, it is like that.” My shoulders slumped. “I think…that is, he sort of…” There was no use trying to sugarcoat the truth so I just blurted it out, “I think he sort of asked me to marry him.”
Up until then, Quinn was still near the open door. He slammed it shut so he could march over and plunk down beside me. “What did you tell him?”
“Are you kidding me?” It was my turn to jump to my feet. Fists on hips, I glared down at Quinn. “You can’
t possibly think I’m that shallow.”
“I didn’t say you were.”
“But you did think it. You thought there was the remote possibility that I’d say yes to a marriage proposal from a guy I barely know just because he’s rich. And nice-looking. And he’s got this house that’s so incredibly gorgeous and—”
I didn’t need Quinn to interrupt me, I stopped myself. Before I could say anything else that would make him actually believe his half-assed theory.
“That’s not why I sent you the pictures,” I said.
“The pictures of the bar.”
Screeching is so unladylike.
Good thing Mom wasn’t there to remind me.
I threw my hands in the air. “It’s not a bar. It’s a secret room. In Milo’s house. I got to the secret room through a secret door.”
“And Blackburne showed it to you. Even though it’s secret.”
“Not exactly. I sort of stumbled into it by myself. Because I didn’t want those two guys from the comic book shop to see me. But that’s not the point. The point is, it’s weird enough to have a secret room in your house. It’s weirder when the weird secret room is…” It was hard to explain so I grabbed my phone and scrolled through until I found the pictures I’d sent to Quinn earlier. “Weird.”
It says something about technology and our dependence on it that rather than looking at the pictures on the screen of my phone, he pulled out his own phone and looked through the pictures I’d sent him. He paused on the one I took that showed a wide view of the room, stainless steel walls and all. “The Fortress of Solitude,” was all he said.
I slumped back onto the couch. “The Fortress of—”
“Solitude. Yeah.” Quickly, Quinn rolled through rest of the pictures. “In the comic books, and in the movies, and even in the Superman shows that have been on TV, the Fortress was the place Superman went to be alone. The way I remember it, it was made out of ice, or crystals or something.”
I sat up. “That’s exactly what Blackburne’s room looks like.” I shot through my pictures until I found the one of the statue of the man and woman. “And this?” I tipped my phone so that Quinn could see the photo.
He scrolled through and found the same picture on his phone. “Jor-El and Lara.” Quinn glanced over at me. “They were Superman’s parents. At least his parents on Krypton, his home planet. When he came to Earth, that’s when he was adopted by the Kents. According to the Superman stories, he kept a statue of his parents in the Fortress. See?” He pointed. “They’re holding a globe of Krypton.”
Okay, call me slow. It wasn’t the first time I’d heard him spout super-facts, but it was the first time it struck me as odd. I leaned forward to pin Quinn with a look. “And you know all this…how?”
He set down his phone on the cushion next to him. “Come on, I read Superman comics when I was a kid. Most boys do. And I’ve seen the movies. I guess we can say that Blackburne has, too. That room is an amazing reproduction of the Fortress of Solitude.”
“Yeah. Amazing. And it’s in the guy’s house. Don’t you think that’s a little weird?”
I’m sure he didn’t need to look, but Quinn scrolled through the photos again. “It’s kind of cool,” he admitted.
“But it’s in his house. And it’s not like it’s a bar or anything and he takes his friend in there and they have a couple beers and laugh about the Superman stuff. It’s secret. I only found it because I leaned on this spot on the fireplace and the whole darned thing spun around, and spit me out into this Fortress thingy.”
He glanced at me out of the corner of his eye. “He doesn’t know you were in there?”
“When he got back to the museum room where he keeps all his Superman stuff and where he left me when he went to talk to those two guys we saw at Dicks’s, I was right back where he left me, looking around like nothing had happened.”
“And those two guys?”
“No sign of them. Believe me, I checked and double-checked when I left the house.”
“Which was…?”
Another not-so-subtle comment that did—or didn’t—call my integrity into question.
“What, you think I stuck around after I found out Milo was friends with some guy who dropped me in a hole and did his best to cover me with six feet of dirt?”
Maybe Quinn’s first clue that I was telling the truth was that my hands started shaking when I thought about my close call back at Garden View. Then again, he might not have noticed if he didn’t grab them and haul me back down to sit on the couch next to him. He slipped an arm around my shoulders. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to make you think about it.”
“I’m fine.” I took back a hand long enough to brush the tears off my cheeks. “It’s just…well, it was pretty scary.”
“And you were pretty brave. Not to mention resourceful.”
“Yeah, thanks to Jack.” I glanced around the apartment, but there was no sign of my newest client. “Maybe now that he saved me, he’s crossed over.”
“Maybe.” Quinn drew me closer into the circle of his arm. “And that would pretty much prove he didn’t have anything to do with Dingo’s murder, wouldn’t it? I mean, if he was guilty, he wouldn’t go to the light or wherever it is that spirits go.”
“Is that where you were headed?”
I asked the question and held my breath.
Seemed to me, Quinn did, too. He went very still. At least until he said, “There was a light. I know that sounds goofy, but…well, I really did see it. Like a pinpoint. Really far away. And I didn’t see anyone, so I don’t know who I was talking to, but whoever it was, I told that person I wasn’t heading for the light.” He turned to look at me. “Not until I stopped to see you first.”
This time, the tears that slipped down my cheeks had nothing to do with reliving getting tossed in that grave.
“You saved a lot of lives by telling me where the cops could find the guy who shot you,” I told Quinn. “He was one bad dude. He would have killed again.”
“Hey, I was just doing my job.” He twitched away the compliment before he crooked a finger under my chin and tipped my face up to his. “But that’s not why I insisted on coming here to see you. I know it all happened fast. Faster than it takes to tell it. But in that instant when I realized I’d been shot…well, damn, Pepper, I also realized that I didn’t want to die. Because I’d really messed things up with you, and I wanted—no, I didn’t just want it, or need it, I knew I had to—I had to get another chance. I was about to melt into that bright light for all eternity, and the only thing that mattered to me was that I wanted to make things right with you.”
He leaned closer, his lips a hairsbreadth away from mine. “I’m going to try, Pepper. I swear I will. If you’ll give me a chance.”
It was a sweet and noble declaration, and a step in the right direction.
I never had a chance to reply to tell Quinn that, because his cell rang.
“Doesn’t it figure.” Quinn sat back, took one look at the caller ID and rolled his eyes. “Vincent,” he grumbled.
I sat back, too, and listened while he tried to be the voice of patience. Someday when he was in a really good mood, I would break the news that when it came to that particular virtue, Quinn needed lots more practice.
“It’s late, Vincent,” Quinn said. “And—”
He listened to whatever Vincent had to say, and although I couldn’t understand the words, I could hear the staccato tempo of Vincent’s voice.
“Yes, sure. Yes, Vincent, I understand about the morgue and the people who are going to break in. We’re going to talk about it some more. How about tomorrow? I’ll stop by the hotel and— Now?” Quinn held the phone far enough away to check the time display. “Like I said, it’s late and—” Another roll of those emerald eyes. “All right. Give me your address. Yes, yes, Vincent. I’m on my way.”
He puffed out a breath of annoyance before he turned back to me. “Where were we?” he asked.
“You were headin
g over to Vincent’s, and as long as you are…” I popped off the couch. “You’re going to take me along, right?”
Quinn dragged himself to his feet. “Because…”
“Because Vincent’s as crazy as a loon, but he’s talking about something happening at the comic convention and we know things are getting stolen from comic book conventions all over the country, and we know that someone’s sending postcards from those same cities and signing them with Jack’s name even though we know Jack’s dead, which means—”
“I know all that.” He already had his car keys out. “What I’m asking is why I should—”
“Take me along?” I opened the door and stepped into the hallway after him. “Thanks, I’d love to come.”
As it turned out, Vincent the hotel security guard lived in a three-room rental at the back of a beverage store in a part of town that had been down on its luck practically since there was a Cleveland. Steel mills, highways, boarded-up buildings. In the name of an investigation, I would have made the trip on my own if I had to. But I was glad I had Quinn and his big gun with me.
Quinn knocked and got no answer. He called out to Vincent, and there was no reply. I, sensible person that I am, was just a tad annoyed. Yes, I’d been anxious to tag along, but that was when I thought there was actually something to be gained from it. Now that I knew Vincent was just being Vincent and as flighty and strange and as all over the place as ever, our little visit to the hood wasn’t looking like the best way to spend the night. It was late, remember, and as I recall, just as Vincent’s call came in, Mr. Tall, Dark, and Grumpy was about to kiss me. Call me crazy, but that seemed a better option than standing out on a sidewalk littered with broken glass, a couple beers cans, and—
Something moved in the weeds near the street and I scooted closer to Quinn.
That was the first I realized he had his gun out.
With his free hand, he reached for the doorknob. It turned easily. “Stay here,” he told me.
Yeah, right.
When he slipped into the house as quiet as a shadow, I slipped in after him. Of course, he noticed, but honestly, he didn’t try to stop me. We’d stepped into the kitchen, and there was a light on over the sink. Quickly, Quinn scanned the countertop where dirty glasses and dishes were piled high and the two-seater table where a few days’ worth of newspapers were piled. Through a doorway directly in front of us was the living room, and he leaned in, took a quick peek, and seeing that it was empty, he pointed to a closed door over on my left.
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