“Are you sure? Where’s your purse and stuff?” Joe asked.
“It…it’s in my car. And my car’s at…Tabitha’s.” Her throat tightened. “The police said I could get my car after they checked it out. They also said I should be careful…and not to stay alone.”
“You won’t be alone,” Les said.
“It’s going to be okay,” Joe said.
Katie turned to Joe. “I…” She stared at the scratches down Joe’s cheek. Was she imagining things?
She blinked. “What happened?”
“I happened,” Les said.
Katie glanced back at Les. “Huh?”
“It was a misunderstanding,” Joe said.
Katie looked from Joe to Les. “What kind of…?”
“We saw each other at the bar,” Les said. “But I didn’t know who he was. I went back to your place. Joe was looking for you too, he let himself in, and I thought he’d followed me. Then a limb in your backyard snapped and broke the window and…”
Katie tried to soak in what Les was saying; it was hard because Les talked fast. She always talked fast when nervous. Then again, maybe Katie was just thinking ultraslowly.
“I’m so sorry,” she said. “I didn’t tell you that you were both joining me at the bar because I didn’t want you to have a hundred and one questions prepared to ask Joe.” She looked at her fiancé. And why hadn’t she told him?
“I didn’t tell you because…we’ve hardly talked these past few weeks.” And why was that? The questions she needed to ask formed in her head. Lots of questions.
“I’m sorry,” both Les and Joe said at the same time.
Shaking off questions that would be better asked and answered later, she took a deep breath. “I should have told you.” Then she focused on Joe’s face again.
“Does it look that bad?” he asked.
“No, it’s just…weird.”
“Weird, how?” Les asked, her voice sounding tense.
“Remember the PI I told you was with me?”
“Yeah,” Les answered.
“Well, I…I scratched him, too.”
“But you said he was the good guy,” Les said.
“He was really nice. I…scratched him before I knew who he was.”
All of a sudden, talking to them about Carl felt awkward. And leaving without saying good-bye to Carl felt even more awkward. “Should I check and see if we can go get my car now?”
Joe ran a hand over her shoulder. “I’ll call and have someone drive me there to pick it up tomorrow.”
“Thanks,” she said, and couldn’t think of another reason for her to turn around and look for Carl.
“Here, why don’t you take this.” Joe took off his jacket. “You should wear it—it’s cold out there.” He helped her slip on his jacket and then said, “I think I ran into him.”
“Ran into who?” Katie asked.
“The man you scratched.”
Katie’s heart picked up speed. “You saw Carl?” She turned around, hungry for the sight of him. “Where?”
“He was in the bathroom. We saw each other and noticed each other’s faces.” Joe put his hand on her back, then pulled away, and started moving them toward the door.
Katie pulled his jacket close and tried to understand how she felt about Carl seeing Joe. She snuggled into Joe’s jacket, hoping to find the warmth in it that she’d found from a certain brown leather coat. Not there. No warmth. No safe feeling. She stopped walking, wanting a minute to think. To think about leaving Carl. To think about what she needed to tell Joe.
Katie looked up at her fiancé. Kind eyes. Caring eyes. Why didn’t he make her feel those same things Carl did?
He gave her arm a squeeze. “I’m glad you’re okay.”
She nodded but couldn’t speak. She loved Joe. Didn’t she?
Her heart pounded and she knew. Yes, she loved Joe. She just wasn’t sure if it was the right kind of love.
“You okay?” Les asked, standing to her left.
“I am.” I think. And she realized she needed to think before she spoke to Joe. Needed to know the right way to express her doubts without being too brash. Joe deserved that.
As she stepped out the door, she looked back one more time. The air carried a chill so intense it hurt to breathe. Darkness clung to the sky, but to her right, dawn fought for its own space, and some gold fingers of light spread across the horizon. As they got to Joe’s car, he opened the doors for her and Les. Les slid into the back and Katie crawled into the front.
Joe settled behind the wheel and then reached over and took her hand in his. Her left hand. The hand devoid of the ring he gave her.
She met his gaze and forgot about not being brash. “I flushed my engagement ring down the toilet.”
“You did what?” he spat out.
“And it may not have been an accident.”
The music clicked off and woke him up. Tabitha’s killer continued the humming in his head, though. Here comes the bride. All dressed in white. He rolled over and stared up at the ceiling. The smell of gas still clung to his skin. His breath caught when he remembered how badly he’d screwed up.
He sat upright, bounced back and forth against the headboard, and pulled his photo album from the bedside table. On the first page, he saw Maria’s picture in the paper. Her wedding announcement to another man, less than six months after their own announcement had been printed. In the photograph, she had worn a big smile. And he knew she’d been laughing at him. Laughing as she’d laughed at the church. The way everyone at the church had laughed.
Still bouncing back and forth, he flipped the page and stared at the images of his brides without their smiles. Beside them was the picture he’d clipped from the newspaper last week. KATIE RAY AND JOE LYON ANNOUNCE THEIR ENGAGEMENT…
She was smiling in the picture. Just as Maria had smiled. But not for long, he promised himself. Katie Ray wouldn’t be smiling for long.
He set the album down and pulled a rose from a vase of flowers. Soon he’d bring Katie Ray flowers just as he’d brought the others their flowers.
“No fucking way!” Carl scowled at his dad. “Just take the bitch with you.” Carl stood up from his computer, where for the last hour he’d been going through Tabitha’s e-mailed files.
After leaving the precinct, his dad had dropped Carl off at his car. Carl came straight home and left his dad to visit with his old cronies at the crime scene. But now his dad was here, with company in tow.
“I’m serious,” Carl said again. “Get her out of here.”
His dad frowned. “She likes you.”
“Well, I don’t like her.” Carl pointed to the door. “Keep her for yourself.”
“I can’t have pets at my place.” His dad put Ms. Jones’s dog on the floor. The prissy mongrel, tail spinning, ran up to Carl.
“They were going to take her to a shelter,” his dad said.
Carl stared away from the dog. “Then let them.”
“It’s just for a few days.” He moved into the living room. “I’m sure some relative of Ms. Jones will come claim her.”
The dog ran circles around Carl’s leg, then rose up on her back legs, placing her front paws with pink-painted nails on Carl’s knee as if pleading with him to change his mind.
“Damn!” Carl grumbled.
Precious hauled ass into the room, his bark box turned on. The two dogs stood a foot apart from each other, growling and sniffing the air.
“See? They won’t get along. You have to take her.”
“Bullshit, give them some time. They’ll be the best of buds.”
Carl shook his head. “No! It’s bad enough I get stuck with one sissy dog, but I’ll be damned if I’ll get stuck with two.”
His dad shrugged. “I don’t know. You looked comfortable in that pink scarf this morning.”
“Real funny.” Carl walked around the dogs as they made circles around the coffee table, each trying to sniff the other’s ass.
“Is that co
ffee I smell?” his old man asked.
“Yeah. I just made a pot. But you’re taking that dog with you when you go.” Carl went to the kitchen. His dad followed and grabbed his cup from the dishwasher.
“I figured you’d be sawing logs by now.”
Steam rose from Carl’s coffee. “Ahh, so you were going to just sneak the dog in and leave, weren’t you?”
His dad didn’t try to pretend. “Seemed like a good plan.”
“Well, it didn’t work.” Carl brought the cup up to his lips. He should have been sleeping, but he’d spent every second in bed remembering how soft Red had felt, how she’d fit against him, and how bitter it had felt seeing her fit all that softness up against Mr. Metro. Finally, Carl gave up trying to sleep and started reading through Tabitha’s files.
His dad focused on Carl’s desk. “CSI is checking the computer. They’ll know you snagged those files.”
Cup held to his lips, Carl looked at his dad through a trail of steam. “They have their job, and I have mine.”
“I hope she cut you a check before she checked out.”
“It’s not about money. It’s personal. I take personal offense when someone tries to use me as kindling.”
Glancing back at the painting resting on his mantel, Carl frowned. He remembered Katie’s look when he’d told her he’d bought a painting done by an elephant. And now the painting had taunted him since he’d come home. He couldn’t forget how Red had looked when she’d talked about painting. No disrespect for the dead, but her parents had been assholes to rob her of her dreams.
His dad grabbed the coffeepot and filled his cup. “Did you find anything in her files?”
“Just some names to look at.”
“You do know Ms. Jones made a police report last week about her missing brides.” Steam rose from his dad’s cup.
“Yeah, I got that much when I talked to her on the phone.”
His dad blew on the coffee. “They blew her off.”
Carl leaned against the counter. “Yeah, she said they did.”
“They’re going to be talking out their asses trying to make up for it, too.”
Carl studied his dad. “What do you mean?”
“A body was found about an hour ago. A woman. Rumor has it she was one of the missing brides.”
Carl set his cup down. “I was hoping Ms. Jones was wrong about the brides.”
“Doesn’t look that way,” Buck said. “What all did she tell you on the phone?”
“Just that she thought someone was killing her brides-to-be. She said she thought it was one of four people, but she never got around to saying who. I got the impression it was someone connected to the weddings. Ah, shit.”
“What?” his dad asked, noticing Carl’s mood shift.
“The freak could be after Red next.” He let out a pound of oxygen.
His dad’s eyebrow shot up. “Red’s getting married? Whoa. I thought…I mean the way you two—”
“Yeah, she’s getting married.”
“But…she wasn’t wearing a ring.”
Carl grabbed his coffee. “She flushed it down the john.”
His dad’s lips twitched into a smile. “They had a fight.”
“Supposedly, it was an accident.”
“Doesn’t sound like an accident.”
“I know.” Carl burned his tongue on the coffee. His dad continued to study him.
“What are you going to do?”
“I’m going to make sure Ben talks to her,” Carl said. “Then I’m going to catch the bastard.”
“Why don’t you talk to her?” His dad’s tone spoke volumes.
“That’s Ben’s job,” Carl snarled.
“They won’t offer her around-the-clock protection.”
“Neither will I.” He’d had one night of around-the-clock with her and wasn’t sure he could handle another. “Besides, she doesn’t need me. She has her fiancé to take care of her.” The image of Mr. Metro and her together stabbed at his mind.
His dad’s left brow arched. “I thought you two bonded.”
“We were locked in a room together. We had to bond.”
A grin widened his dad’s mouth. “How close of a bond?”
“Not that close. She’s not like that.” Carl made sure the look he shot his dad had a warning stamped all over it.
Buck Hades seldom paid heed to warnings. “You should go see her. Perhaps she’ll realize the real reason she flushed the ring and maybe you two can hook up.”
“Stop it.” Carl held up his hand.
His old man wrinkled his forehead. “I just think—”
“Stop thinking. It gets your ass in a crack every time.”
His dad shrugged as if letting it drop. They stood across from each other, each leaning against the counter, sipping coffee.
Carl’s thoughts zipped back to Red. Had Ben warned her about being in danger? He needed to talk to Ben.
Eyeing his dad he asked, “Have they released the name of the bride?”
“Not yet,” his dad said.
Would Ben give Carl the name? Like his dad, Carl’s brother played by the rules and believed in the system. Of course, the system hadn’t ever let them down, not the way it had him.
“Carl?” His dad’s brow creased. From the look on Buck’s face, Carl surmised they were back on the subject of Red.
“She’s getting married, Dad. So drop it.”
“It’s not about Red.” His dad grimaced.
“Then what?” he asked, not liking his dad’s expression.
“You were wrong.” His dad pulled his cup to his lips.
“Wrong about what?”
“The dogs are getting along…just fine.” Buck motioned to the living room.
Carl turned around. “Ah, fuck!” And yes. This was definitely f-word worthy. It was also what was going on.
“Yup,” his father said. “I think that’s what you call it.”
“This is your fault.” He pointed at his dad.
“Yup. I’ll take the hit on this one.” His old man eyed Carl over his coffee cup. “But you’re going to forgive me.”
“And what makes you so damn certain of that?” Carl snarled.
“Because I saved your ass this morning.”
Carl gritted his teeth. “There is that.”
Both of them stood and watched the dogs go at it. Carl finally laughed. “At least now I know he’s not queer.”
Les walked into Katie’s study, where Joe had just finished nailing a board over the broken window. “Katie’s asleep. I talked her into taking a sleeping pill.”
Joe placed the hammer on the side of the desk. It teetered on the edge, then fell and clattered against the floor. Joe’s frown, along with the way he raked his hand through his hair, told her he was on his last nerve. They all were. But Katie won the Worst Night award.
“Hell of a night.” Joe picked up the hammer.
“I was just thinking that myself.”
Tired lines were etched around his still-bloodshot eyes, and exhaustion echoed in his tone. Leaning against the desk, Les watched his Adam’s apple go up and down.
The crease between his eyebrows deepened. “We need to tell Katie about the shower and the 911 call. It’s not as if—”
“Anything happened,” Les finished for him. “I know.” She picked up a heart-shaped marble paperweight from Katie’s desk. The rock felt cold and heavy in her hands, sort of how her own heart felt lately. She held the stone tight.
He studied her. “Knowing Katie, she’ll laugh,” he said.
Les forced a smile on her lips. “It is kind of funny when you step back from it.” Her smile became genuine. “You looked pretty stunned when you stepped into the shower.” She palmed the cold paperweight tighter. It felt a little warmer.
They shared a grin. He stuck his hands into his jeans, then pulled them out. “I’ve got to run by work for a bit. My plan is to grab a few hours of sleep. Then I’ll go get some glass to replace the window. I’l
l be back sometime this afternoon, and I’ll see what I can do about getting Katie’s car back.”
“That’s fine. I’m sure she’ll sleep most of the day.” Les smoothed her fingers over the heart-shaped rock.
His gaze moved over her. “You look exhausted. You should try to get some rest also.”
“I will.” Their gazes met and held, and the humor she’d seen in his eyes seconds earlier faded into something different.
He shifted. The heater moaned as it tried to kick on. “Is the ring what you weren’t telling me about earlier?”
Les hesitated, then decided she had nothing to hide. “Yeah.”
“Was she really going to buy another one?”
“Yeah,” Les answered.
Katie had told Joe the truth. Les had sat in the backseat feeling like a third wheel and secretly admiring Katie for being honest. And admiring Joe. You had to respect a man who could hear that his fiancée had flushed his eight-thousand-dollar ring down the toilet and not get angry.
But then Katie had continued: “And the bad part, Joe, is that I’m not sure if it was an accident.”
Les had seen Joe’s shoulders tighten, and the only thing he said was, “I’m sure you’re tired right now.”
Then the car had gone silent.
In the silence, Les had remembered she’d been the one to earlier accuse Katie of having motives for flushing the ring. Nothing like feeling responsible for creating your best friend’s problems.
Katie’s heater groaned again, bringing Les back to the moment. She clutched the heart-shaped paperweight.
Joe stared at the ceiling. “Do you think she meant to flush the ring?”
Les swallowed. “Don’t blame Katie. I was the one who said maybe she’d done it on purpose. She said she loved you and I…I planted the doubt there.”
“Why?” he asked.
She gave his question a quick thought. “I was concerned that maybe she was getting married just to replace her family. But now I’m not sure if maybe I wasn’t just…” The word jealous didn’t seem appropriate.
Weddings Can Be Murder Page 14