The Lady is a Thief

by Aimee Nicole Walker

  “Oh good, Adrian’s back,” Wen said. “The rest of us can go on home. He’ll take it from here.”

  “Was there really a severed head dumped in the alley behind the coffee shop?”

  “It was a bloody marble bust,” I told my new partner. Even though I hadn’t worked in the field with him yet, we had clicked right away when I met him the day I interviewed with the captain.

  “Bust? Like a breast?” Adrian asked

  “Bust, as in a marble statue of someone’s head and shoulders,” our captain answered. “Of course, your mind went there.”

  “Who was the bust of and what the hell was it doing in Maegan’s alley?”

  “I have a pretty good idea of who the bust was created to honor, but I need to confirm it. I’m hoping the newspaper will provide a clue, but if not, the guy from the historical society should be able to help us.”

  “Who do you think it is?” the captain asked me.

  “I think it’s Blissville’s founder, Anthony Bliss.”

  “Who’s he?” the captain asked.

  I told him everything that Maegan had shared with me that morning. I had called Homer Stillwater to make an appointment with him, but he was out of town for the day. “I’d much rather help you solve a homicide than go antiquing with my wife, but I’m already in the doghouse,” he had told me. “Can this wait until tomorrow? I can meet you at the historical society after church.”

  I had agreed to meet him, but I would have to revise our meeting location since I couldn’t take a key piece of evidence out of the station. In the meantime, I planned to use everyone’s favorite research tool: Google.

  “Let’s suit up and see what we have before we send it off to the state lab,” the captain said. “I hope they can get the results back to us fairly quickly so we can for sure say the bust was used to kill Renzo.”

  “I have a contact in the state lab. I don’t mind making a phone call or two,” I offered.

  “Is she pretty?” Adrian teased, implying that I knew her outside the job. I did, but not in the way he thought.

  “Kelsey is very pretty, but better yet, she’s a brilliant scientist. Her wife wouldn’t approve of me trying to charm her to get my evidence moved up the priority list though. I’ve seen Valeria swing a bat for our co-ed softball team, so I won’t be crossing any lines.”

  “Fair enough,” Adrian replied.

  In our small lab, Officer Jayna Murkowsky was a step ahead of us. She was scanning the bust with a handheld device that looked like something they used at a store for items too big to put on the conveyor belt. Instead of reading a barcode, it recorded the angles of the face and compiled the data into her computer to form a photo. On another computer, she had a split screen showing Anthony Bliss’s image from two different angles.

  “Left was definitely his strongest side,” Adrian said.

  “That’s the side most people choose for selfies,” Wen added.

  “It’s true that most people photograph best from the left side,” Murkowsky agreed.

  “How do you know that about selfies, Wen?” Adrian asked incredulously.“Do you take a lot?”

  “Teen sister.”

  “Ahhh,” we all said.

  “Does that same logic apply to dick pics?” Adrian pondered out loud.

  “Only if your dick smiles, Detective,” Murkowsky replied good-naturedly.

  “Can we get back to the evidence please?” the captain asked. “I don’t even want to know why Adrian wants to know the best side to photograph his dick.”

  “Sorry, sir,” Adrian said. “I apologize, Officer Murkowsky.”

  “I’m not offended, Adrian.”

  “Let’s take a look at the newspaper,” I told Adrian. “It was getting dark in the alleyway so I couldn’t be sure, but the parts of the newspaper not covered in blood looked brownish from age.”

  I carefully straightened out the wrinkled paper with gloved hands while Adrian had the camera ready to photograph any clues. The paper was stiff to work with since it had been saturated with blood. There was also a lot of hair and flesh stuck to the paper from where it transferred off the bust. I finally spread the paper on the sterile surface and saw that it was even older than I thought. It was an article dated May 1, 1850.

  “Anthony Bliss, railroad magnate and Blissville founder disappeared on the morning of April 30, 1850,” I read out loud. “Was it premeditated or was Mr. Bliss a victim of foul play or his family curse?”

  “Can you imagine the headings today?” Adrian asked. “Alien abduction would certainly be included.”

  “I can’t help but wonder what the hell happened to him,” I replied. “I wonder if the man kept journals or anything. As creepy as that cellar is, I’m pretty sure I have to go back and do some digging. Now that you’re back…”

  “I’m suddenly not feeling that good. Must’ve been something I ate. Wen, will help you out.”

  “Thanks a lot,” Wen replied dryly.

  “Adrian loves dark, dank cellars,” the captain teased. “That last murder we had in Blissville required us to dig around through one.”

  “The captain’s house,” Adrian said.

  “Someone was murdered in your cellar?” I asked the captain. “Internal Affairs must love you.”

  His lips tipped up into a quirky, half-smile. “It wasn’t my house at the time.”

  “You bought a house where a homicide was committed though?” I asked. I wasn’t sure how I felt about that.

  “Married the prime suspect too,” Adrian added.

  “Josh?” I asked in shock.

  “It’s a long story,” the captain said to me before turning to his former partner. “No one believed Josh killed Georgia Beaumont.”

  “I’ll tell you all about it over dinner, partner,” Adrian said cheerfully.

  As much as I wanted to hear the story, I had someplace I wanted to be more that night. “I have plans tonight, but perhaps you can tell me all about it while we dig through boxes looking for journals or some other type of evidence.”

  “Fine,” Adrian reluctantly agreed.

  Officer Murkowsky’s computer program beeped, interrupting me before I could answer. “Aha! It’s a one hundred percent match to Anthony Bliss.” We looked over her shoulder at the side-by-side comparisons. “See these circles on the bridge of his nose, his eyebrows, and his chin?”

  “Yeah,” we all answered.

  “It’s a tool that points out the different angles in the profiles. Green circles mean that the angles match and red means they’re different.” In every instance, the bust was a positive match to the documented photos of Anthony Bliss.

  “That’s great work, Murkowsky,” the captain said.

  “Thank you, sir. There’s not much else we can do with the evidence, so I’ll bag it and send it to Columbus. I didn’t see any obvious fingerprints in the blood on the bust, but that doesn’t mean they’re not there. Hopefully we can get a DNA match for Thom from either the blood, hair, or tissue transferred to the statue or paper. I don’t know how long it was exposed to the elements though.”

  “Approximately thirty minutes,” I told her. “That’s the time lapse between the employees leaving Books and Brew and Maegan leaving Curious Things.”

  “Are there any clues, confessions, or anything that will help us solve this case in the newspaper? Any circled letters that spell our next clue out?” Adrian asked hopefully.

  “Nothing that I can tell, but the blood has smeared most of the ink. I can’t read much beyond the headline. I have a feeling the bust was deliberately placed that way.”

  “You think the choice of murder weapon and newspaper used to wrap it are clues?” Wen asked.

  “It seems so, but why? What the hell does Thom Renzo have to do with a man that disappeared one hundred and sixty-seven years ago?” I asked.

  “Thom was about to let strangers comb through Anthony’s things and sell the home he loved,” Adrian tossed out there.

  “You think the ghos
t of Anthony Bliss killed Thom Renzo using a statue of himself, wrapped it up in a newspaper article about his disappearance, and left it behind Maegan’s business?” the captain disbelievingly asked. “That’s a stretch.”

  “No, but it sounds like you do, Cap.” Adrian raised a brow so high it nearly disappeared. “I meant who would be angry that Thom was about to do that? Do we know what happened to the Bliss kids once they moved away? Is it possible that a great-great-grandkid is pissed about Thom capitalizing on their family’s misfortune?”

  “That sounds slightly more plausible than the captain’s theory,” I told Adrian.

  “I didn’t say that I believed that,” Captain Roman-Wyatt interjected. “Is there anyone in town with a vested interest in that property who took exception to Thom making a buck on Bliss’s belongings?”

  “I guess we’ll find out when we talk to Homer Stillwater from the historical society. I’m meeting him after church tomorrow. I’m thinking we can dig through the cellar in the morning before we meet with him in case we find anything else of importance.”

  “Okay, fine,” Adrian grumbled. “Can I at least sleep in until eight on my last vacation day?”

  “How can you sleep until eight with a newborn in the house?” the captain asked, sounding a little jealous. “Dylan and Destiny still aren’t sleeping that late.”

  “Lucky, I guess,” Adrian said with a shrug. “How does nine tomorrow morning work? I’ll meet you at that haunted mansion.”

  “Sounds good to me. See you tomorrow, partner.”

  Adrian discarded his protective gear and patted me on the shoulder before he left the small lab. “I’m going to stop by the diner and pick up dinner for Maegan,” I said, discarding my gloves, goggles, face mask, surgical cap, and sterile gown in the biohazard bin.

  “How’s she holding up?” Officer Murkowsky asked.

  “She was pretty shook up when she called me, but she seemed calm by the time I arrived.”

  “She’s a tough lady,” Murkowsky replied.

  I knew that was true, but my protective instincts were tripped big time. “I hate that it appears our killer is trying to involve Maegan. It feels like a threat to me, and I don’t fucking like it.”

  “Maegan beat cancer, so she’ll survive this bastard too.”

  I wasn’t sure how to respond to the news. Did it surprise me that Maegan kicked cancer’s ass? No, but I still hated that she went through it. A million questions went through my mind, but Murkowsky wasn’t the one I should ask, and I sure as hell wouldn’t pose them to Maegan after the night she had. The right time would come when I could ask Freckles.

  “Thanks for your help tonight, Wen,” I said, steering the conversation back to a less personal one for me. “If you’re not busy tomorrow…”

  “I’ll be there.”

  “Goodnight, everyone,” I said with a small wave. My mind had already moved on from the evidence we found to the fierce woman who was waiting for me.

  “NO, MARILYN, IT WASN’T A severed head,” my mom said into the phone. “Maegan is fine, by the way. Thank you for asking.” She jabbed the button on the cordless phone to disconnect the call. “It’s times like these you miss slamming the old-fashioned phones down to hang up on someone. Stabbing that button isn’t nearly as satisfying.”

  “That makes how many calls since Maegan got here?” my dad asked.

  “I lost count,” my mom replied.

  “At least fifteen,” Milo said from beside me on the couch. “We’ve only been here for twenty minutes too. This must be a record for nosy calls.”

  “Not a single one of them asked about her well-being?” Dennis Miracle wasn’t pleased that no one asked about his baby girl. “You remember that when these same people expect you to work ridiculous hours procuring some nineteen fifties vase or a British teapot that is rumored to have traveled over on the Mayflower. You need to start charging more for your time.”

  “I will, Daddy,” I said, nodding my head. “I’m going to need a list of names, Mama.”

  My mom, thinking I was serious, pulled a pad of paper and pen out of the drawer in the side table and began writing names down. It was best to give her something else to focus on before she started knocking on doors and giving them a piece of her mind.

  “You and Lulu should stay here with us tonight,” Mom said.

  “She has a date with the cop,” Milo told her before I could respond.

  “Really?” my mom asked, looking up from her Nosy List.

  “It’s not a date,” I told her. “Elijah is just picking up dinner for me at the diner and making sure that I’m okay after tonight.”

  “You didn’t tell me you had a boyfriend. When are we going to meet this fella?” Dad asked.

  “He’s not my boyfriend, Daddy, so there’s no reason for you to meet him.”

  “If there’s food involved then it’s a date,” Mom said, looking at me over the rim of her glasses. “Is that what you’re going to wear?” I looked down at my outfit and didn’t think there was anything wrong with my casual jeans and sweater. Saturdays were about comfort for me since they were my longest work day.

  “Don’t forget about sex,” Milo tossed out there. “I saw the sparks flying between the two of you this morning, so don’t tell me you’re not planning to shimmy on up that sexy-as-fuck tree.”

  “I don’t want to hear this,” my dad said, plugging his ears and most likely praying he could unhear what Milo had just said.

  “Milo, stop it,” I hissed.

  “What?” he asked innocently.

  “Elijah and I aren’t dating. We’re just…”

  “Fu—”

  I covered his mouth before he could finish. Technically, Elijah and I were fuck buddies, or neighbors who fucked, but that wasn’t something I wanted my parents to know. Not only that, I didn’t like reducing what I shared with Elijah to something that sounded so crude. I didn’t have expectations of a happily ever after with the man, but a girl could hope. Right?

  “Enough,” I said firmly. One hand still covered Milo’s mouth, and I used my index finger on my free hand to point at him as a warning. “Are you going to behave?”

  “Mmm hmmm,” Milo mumbled against my palm. He dramatically gasped for air when I lifted my hand. “You don’t let me have any fun, Maegan. It’s like you go out of your way to steal the spotlight.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “I was born first and our parents were overjoyed with their dark-haired angel, but then you had to come kicking and screaming into the world with your gleaming blonde hair.”

  “Oh, whatever,” I replied. “I had zero control of our birth order or the color of my hair.”

  “Let’s talk about my coming out confession over pot roast, carrots, and potatoes,” Milo countered.

  “You remember what we had for dinner?” my dad asked.

  “It was a momentous occasion in a young lad’s life,” Milo replied huffily.

  “My pot roast is pretty spectacular,” my mom teased.

  “There I sat,” Milo said theatrically, “my heart pounding in my chest just knowing that it could be my last meal in the house.”

  “Did he think we were moving out of Blissville because he was gay?” my dad asked my mom.

  “Dennis, I think he’s trying to imply that he worried we would toss him out on the street because he liked to kiss boys.”

  “Oh,” my father replied then looked at Milo. “Dude, there was glitter in your afterbirth. We knew from day one that you would be fabulous. There was never a chance that we would toss you out.”

  “Good to know, Father, but that doesn’t detract from how Maegan stole the show.”

  “I did not,” I said between loud guffaws of laughter. “You’re insane.”

  “Shall we recap what happened? Mom and Dad were sitting at the dinner table staring at me with their mouths hanging open after I poured my heart and soul into my big announcement. You—”

  “Wait a minute! They
couldn’t understand a word you were saying because you were sobbing the whole time. I just clarified things for you.”

  “I had no idea what you said,” Dad agreed. “I could only make out every fourth word you said and those weren’t real clear.”

  “It was an emotional night for me,” Milo declared defensively.

  “I was too busy staring at the herbs stuck in your braces,” Mom confessed. “Like your father said, we already knew that you were into boys. I knew it was no coincidence that your GI Joes and Maegan’s Ken dolls shared a bed in Barbie’s playhouse.”

  “Do you think Barbie knew?” my father asked.

  “How could she not? The evidence was right in front of her.”

  “I always thought that Barbie was too self-absorbed,” Dad replied. “How much time could she spend paying attention to her man if she was always putting on lipstick? No one looks that plastic all the time.”

  “She is plastic, love. Looking pretty and being aware of the people around you aren’t mutually exclusive. There’s nothing wrong with putting your best foot forward.”

  “Says the former beauty queen,” Milo muttered under his breath.

  My mom narrowed her eyes at my brother, letting him know that she caught his little remark. “A woman can put on lipstick and pay attention to her family. I wear lipstick and… wait! Are you saying that I’m self-absorbed or don’t have my priorities straight?” she asked my father.

  He stared at her through wide eyes, his mouth opening and shutting as he tried to find the right words to say. “I would never—”

  “Can we please get back to how Maegan ruined my coming out?” Milo asked with a pout.

  “Sure,” Dad said, sounding relieved to shift the spotlight on someone else.

  “We’re very sorry to have interrupted your hallucinations,” Mom added.

  “As I was saying,” Milo continued, “I was sitting there with my heart in my throat and Maegan just blurts out that she has an announcement too. She paused for dramatic effect to ensure she had your full attention, which I taught her, then said ‘I like boys too.’ You guys were like ‘oh, okay’ then started talking about how you hope Maegan and I don’t get crushes on the same boy.”