"Misty, please cooperate," he said. "If you come down to the police station, we're just going to ask you a few questions about the murder of Anthony Jenkins. If you didn't do anything, then you have no need to worry—"
"No! Please, Jax, you have to believe me." My knees gave out, and I felt myself sinking to the floor again as I registered the victim's name. "I have no idea what you're talking about."
Jax's professional, clinical manner was unnerving. He'd changed from a reckless, wild boy into a law-upholding policeman. His eyes softened a bit as he reached forward and helped me to my feet. "Everything will be smoother if you cooperate."
"But Anthony was just my landlord. I've barely spoken to him at all since I came back to town. I don't understand why—how—I'm being taken in for questioning," I said, my hands trembling.
Jax ran a hand through his hair and exhaled loudly. "Please come with me. It won't take long."
"Can I at least put pants on?" I asked. I glanced down at my fishnet stockings, tiny leotard, and bare feet. The black feather boa, complete with sparkles, swung haphazardly from my neck.
He gestured for me to go ahead.
I wriggled quickly into a pair of sweats, my fingers shaking as I tied the waistband.
"Shall we?" he asked once I finished.
"I don't think I have a choice," I said, trying to put on a brave face on the outside. Because on the inside, I was full of fear.
He marched next to me in a long, uneasy silence down the hallway of my studio. I glanced toward the small office I'd worked so hard to make cozy, despite its less-than-ideal location at the far end of the hallway. The space was the size of a shoebox and would have better functioned as a broom closet, but I'd had to make do for the price. Plus, I didn't spend a lot of time in there. In fact, once I'd set it up two weeks ago, I hadn't gone back.
As we emerged into the sunlight outside, I did my best to ignore stares from shoppers as Jax led me past the parking lot the studio shared with the other stores in the small town center. Jax tried once or twice to make conversation, but I didn't take the bait.
"I'm sorry," he apologized.
"It's fine," I said shortly. I wasn't exactly sure how to feel at the moment, my words coming out clipped. I supposed there was a little bit of confusion, a little bit of anger, a little bit of terror—at the end of the day, this was all a giant misunderstanding. I just hoped the cops would see it that way too.
He turned to me as we reached his cruiser. "On the plus side, you look very nice," he said, breaking the tense silence once more. "I like what you've done to your hair."
I didn't respond, thinking instead that my hair might look nice for a mug shot at the rate things were going today.
Jax opened the door to the cop car.
I held my stance and looked him in the eye. "I'm going to talk to your sister about this."
"She'll hear about it one way or another," Jax said with a sigh. "Careful now, duck your head." Jax gently but firmly shoved me into the backseat.
Sitting in the back of the cop car, I felt as if I'd taken a soccer ball straight to the gut. Half of me wanted to puke. The other half wanted to cry until I was all sobbed out. There was also the frustrated half of me that wanted to call Jax some not-very-nice names.
But there was also a small part of me asking scary questions. What's this all about? Sure, I hadn't seen Jax in ten years, but it was obvious by the hard line of his jaw and the firm contours of his face that this was serious business.
"Do you think I did it?" I asked, my voice soft.
Jax surveyed me in the mirror, but his look wasn't one that might be exchanged between a man and a woman who'd once been intimate. Instead, his eyes scanned me like a cop, analyzing my actions, features, movements. The sterility of his gaze hurt the most, a realization that shocked me.
"I don't know, Misty," Jax said, shaking his head. "But it's my job to find out."
CHAPTER TWO
"Ms. Newman, may I ask you a question about your personal life before we start?"
"What sort of question?" I asked hesitantly.
Alfred Shnocklepops, an unfortunate name tagged to an unfortunate body, sat before me. The plump cop had a row of pimples across his forehead that vaguely resembled the Rockies, and his hairline had been receding since sixth grade.
"How many lovers have you taken since me?" His round eyes stared at me with alarming clarity.
I started. "What?"
"Relationships, Ms. Newman. How many relationships have you had since ours?" he asked with a sweeping gesture.
I glanced around the room where I'd been taken to answer a few questions. I'd been provided with coffee and water, and it seemed like the cops were trying their best to make me comfortable. Except for Alfie's probing questions, that is. "Alfie, we never had a relationship."
I was ashamed to admit that Alfred Shnocklepops had been my first kiss—not because of his looks but because of the reason behind the smooch. Looking back, it would've been nice if my first kiss would be a romantic moment, something sweet and memorable, with someone I loved.
Instead, Alfie and I had been two six-year-olds playing dodgeball on an old, rickety playground during recess. At the time, I had whipped the ball as hard as my scrawny arms could at none other than Jax—the elementary school heartthrob—but Alfred's big noggin got right smack dab in the way. It wasn't my fault his head was the size of a watermelon.
Little Alfred had proceeded to cry and scream and generally make a fuss for the rest of recess. Since I desperately didn't want him to tattle on me in front of Jax, I pleaded with him to reconsider his formal complaint to our teacher.
I've never been proud of it, but eventually Alfie agreed to a deal. His one condition, however, was that I give him a kiss. Which was the story of my first smooch.
"I see," Alfred said, after a mini stare-down. He tapped his pencil, tsking sadly, as if I were in denial of a special relationship we'd once had.
I made a sound in my throat, but I was trying to follow that old rule: if you can't say anything nice, don't say anything at all. A grunt didn't really count as saying anything.
"Let's move on." Alfred looked at his paper. "Where were you on the night of Anthony Jenkins's murder?"
I paused a moment to collect my thoughts. "You're going to have to be more specific. I have no idea when you're talking about. Today? Yesterday? Two weeks ago?"
"Last night. Anthony Jenkins's body was found in the alleyway outside of your studio this morning, and he was believed to have been killed late last night. Where were you?"
"I was at home." I crossed my arms. "Reading."
Alfred gazed me over. "Reading what?"
"Books." I sealed my lips shut.
"Can anyone vouch for you?" he asked.
"Yeah, a bottle of wine and a bowl of Froot Loops," I said.
"Now's not the time to be funny, Ms. Newman." Alfred's ears tinged a bit red. "Please tell me about your relationship with Anthony Jenkins."
"Anthony?" I still didn't see the connection. I didn't have a ton of feelings one way or another toward the guy. "He was my landlord. I barely knew him."
"That's not what we've heard," Alfie said with a hesitation.
"I don't know where you're getting your information. It's terrible that he was murdered, of course, but it wasn't like I was friends with the guy. We were business acquaintances." I was lying only a little bit to Alfie.
I'd interacted with Anthony once or twice outside of our business transactions, but only because he'd asked me out on a few dates. I'd always declined—he was married!—but I didn't want the guy dead. In fact, we'd struck a pretty sweet deal on my studio only a month before when I'd moved back to town from shiny Los Angeles. It was one of the reasons I'd made my way back to the Midwest in the first place. He'd given me a price on real estate that I couldn't refuse.
"So you're denying any relationship with the man?" Alfred looked a bit miffed, as if my relationship with the landlord was any of his business. Even though I wouldn
't dream of even holding hands with Anthony Jenkins.
"I'm confused at this relationship you speak of," I said. "I moved back from LA a few weeks ago. I needed space for a studio, and he was the landlord of the Crossroads strip mall. It's in town, a prime location for a dance studio between Sweets Candy Store and the Beauteous Babe salon. We negotiated a good deal. Bam. Done. That's it. I paid him first and last month's rent early. I didn't owe him a dime."
Which was good, because I didn't have a dime. I'd funneled all my savings into ripping down the dusty old market previously occupying the space and turning it into a bright and sparkling dance studio. If I didn't succeed at teaching burlesque classes, I was in deep doo-doo. Right now I was able to afford Froot Loops and oatmeal, a relatively well-balanced meal in my book. It would be gourmet compared to the cardboard boxes I'd be eating if my classes didn't take off.
"What would you say if I knew that there was more between the two of you?" Alfred stared eerily into my eyes, as if waiting for the dirty truth to come out. A dirty truth that didn't exist.
"I don't know what you're talking about," I said, my body suddenly feeling weary. "Can I go? I have classes to teach."
Alfred's gaze didn't waver. "I'll need a list of the students in your class."
"Why?" The main reason I was hesitant to hand over that info was because of the fact that current enrollment numbers were a little on the low end—a.k.a Zero.
"Because the body was found just outside your studio, in the alley. Strangled with a pair of fishnet stockings. We'll know for sure in a few days if they're yours or not, but I do know that you're the only burlesque dancer in this entire town at the moment."
"Other people might have stockings," I said.
"We'll wait to see what the tests show," Alfie said, neither confirming nor denying my point. "I'll need a list of everyone who was inside your studio between last night and now. And, Ms. Newman, someone saw something, I guarantee it. We'll get to the bottom of this."
"Good." I raised my chin. "I hope you discover the killer, because it wasn't me. For the record, I have no students currently, and nobody was in the building until Jax asked me to come in for questioning."
He sniffed, as if my acknowledging Jax was a low blow to his ego. Alfie's gaze was cold and stern, as if he believed my reappearance in town had caused someone's death. The thought churned my stomach, and I regretted the second bowl of Froot Loops I'd consumed for breakfast.
"Do you have a reason to keep me here any longer?" I forced myself to keep my gaze strong.
Grudgingly, Alfred stood up. "Don't leave town, Ms. Newman."
"I won't. I didn't do anything wrong," I said, meeting his gaze. Though in my heart I knew I was innocent, Alfred's unconvinced look twisted my stomach in knots as he led me from the room.
CHAPTER THREE
I couldn't bring myself to go past the studio on my way home. Not only could I not bear the thought of seeing crime scene crews tear the place apart—not after my heart and soul and money had been poured into the place just as firmly as the cement in the floors—but I also physically couldn't bring myself to the studio. I didn't have a car.
I'd sold everything after moving back from Los Angeles. I preferred not to think of it as a failure. Instead of a walk of shame, I viewed it as a stride of pride. After all, who wants to waltz into the cemetery on their deathbed all intact and beautiful? I was more of the belief that skidding in all torn up, a little bit worse for the wear, was worth the stories behind the scars. That was a quote somewhere, for sure.
But those scars came at a cost, and this time, it was a car. As I walked down the lonely street, I forced myself to focus on the one piece of worth I had left in my life. The car, the costumes, the furniture, the computers had all been sold. But my grandmother's old farmhouse remained in my name. She'd died six months before and left it to me, and I was just coming back now.
On the market, it was worth next to nothing. Location, location, location, they said. Well, its location was crap. It was next to a small pond, just outside of Little Lake proper, not quite far enough to be a "private" farm but not close enough to be "in town." The place was old and borderline kept up enough to be livable, but nothing to brag about.
However, I loved it. The pale yellow house was built of character and smelled lightly of peppermint and honey. The floors creaked in all the familiar places, and the ceilings were tall and lofty. Every afternoon sunlight streamed into the huge, cobwebby windows, painting the floor in a golden glow, perfect for reading a book on the couch. More importantly, it reminded me of my grandma. And, it was mine.
A car honk pulled me out of my reverie. I had about two miles left of a hike to get home, a walk I didn't mind. It'd give me something to keep my mind off the murder, get me some exercise, and take up some time. All for the price of zero dollars.
But as I continued down the side of the road, visions of Anthony Jenkins kept coming into my mind. I'd seen him on a few occasions, and even talked to him on the phone before I'd moved from California. But there had been nothing between us. Nothing at all.
I'd paid him my rent. We'd had a bargain—I had no incentive to kill him. And despite him being a little bit creepy, I couldn't see a reason anyone else would want to kill him either. He was a staple in town—a strange man with greasy hair who was harmless. Every town had one of them.
A rush of sadness coursed through my veins. Death was always a sad event, and it irked me beyond belief that people who knew me—had known me since high school—thought I was capable of being involved in something so dark. That's what really bothered me.
"Misty May?" A shrill voice pierced my eardrums.
I looked up. "I'd recognize that voice anywhere!"
The car stopped in the middle of Main Street, a minivan that stretched just under a block in length. The woman leaping out of the car was all cute and bubbly, short blonde hair kept in a perfectly coiffed soccer-mom bob.
"Misty May, how have you not stopped over yet?" Donna Bartman, née Adams, gathered me in a squeeze. She was a little cushier than during our high-school-days hugs, but I guess that was expected five kids later.
She was just as pretty and full of life as she'd always been. And as it always had been, we lived polar opposite lifestyles—perfect complements to one another. Her days revolved around family and kids, and activities and schedules. Mine varied erratically, leaving me feeling as if I was on top of the world one day and down in the dumps the next. A lot of people would call it unstable. I would agree.
"I've been back only a short time, and with the studio being built…plus, I heard you've been out of town?" I held my lifelong best friend at an arm's length, faux scanning her up and down. "Don, you look great."
"Thanks! I've lost thirteen pounds since baby numero cinco. We've been visiting Nathan's family up in the Cities for the past couple weeks before the kids start school again, and we just got back last night." She paused, her breath coming in short gulps. "How are you?"
Her question struck a chord deep inside. It suddenly seemed like it'd been a long time since anyone had asked me that question and meant it. I'd moved across the country, poured my heart into a new business that was on the verge of failing, and been accused of killing a man, but it was this simple question that caused my eyes to well up with tears.
"I'm okay," I said, my voice cracking. I sat down on the curb, right there on Main Street, and let the tears peppering my eyes skid down my cheeks.
Donna didn't miss a beat. She just plopped right next to me and threw her arm around me, rubbing my back lightly as she'd done numerous times before: after the first night we'd discovered wine and decided to drink all of it, when we'd gotten in trouble for breaking curfew, when we'd cried over unreturned phone calls from boys in fifth grade. I felt home for the first time since I'd been back.
"What's wrong?"
My lip quivered, and I prayed silently that neither Jax nor Alfred would drive by and see me weeping on the side of the road. Then again, Donn
a was Jax's sister, and she'd ream him a new one if she knew he was the reason for my tears.
The day's events poured out in uneven glops. My retelling of the story was all over the place, sprinkled with tidbits of my reasons for moving back from the City of Angels, the struggles of building a studio and adjusting to small-town life, and the reality of failing with my roster of zero students. How she managed to piece together my phrases into a coherent story was pure and utter magic.
"Wowzers, life is never boring around you, is it?" Donna put her arm around my shoulder. "The most exciting part of my day was when Nathan Jr. pooped on the potty."
"You don't want this kind of exciting," I sniffled.
"Look at the bright side," she said. "You didn't do it, right?"
"Right."
"Exactly. So find out who did, and you're golden."
"Find out who…you mean, like a detective?" I raised my eyebrows. "Isn't that what the police are for?"
Donna smirked. "Yeah, yeah, but they got a lot on their plates. Like enforcing the lawn-watering rules and making sure Bonnie Mayweather's dog doesn't crap on the fire hydrants."
She leaned forward. "Misty, let's make it happen. I'll help you. I could use a little excitement in my life."
I looked up. "I don't want to get you involved. You have a family, and I'm sure Nathan wouldn't approve."
"We won't do anything dangerous," she said. "Just poke our noses around a bit."
I shifted. "How do you mean?"
A slow smile spread across Donna's face. "I do have one piece of news to tell you, and I think it'll be perfect to help you figure out who knew Anthony Jenkins."
"Tell me!" I said, leaning forward. My eyes were now dry, an effect Donna always had on me.
"I'm taking over Sweets Candy Store! We'll be business neighbors!"
"That is amazing!" I said, squeezing my bestie into a bear hug. "Congratulations."
"Thank you," she said grinning. "And it will be perfect. People come to gossip in Sweets all the time. I have to kick Bonnie Mayweather out at store close three nights a week. She goes through a bag of jelly beans a day just to hear the latest news. I am sure Anthony will be the talk of the store over the next few weeks. I'll be able to poke my nose around a bit."
The Killing Green Page 18