“What’s this I hear about hairnets?” I hadn’t heard Andre come up behind me. “It’s nights like this I wonder why we’re even open past six, amiright?”
Sunday evenings were usually quiet, but tonight was painfully so. “Would you cover the kitchen Thursday night if Silvia wanted to leave early to see a band?”
“Sure thing. No one orders much of anything other than beer after eight.” He leaned against the countertop. “This have anything to do with that adorable, lonely-looking patron out there with an empty beer glass?”
“Oh, right,” I said. “I’ll go check on him.”
“You do that, Odessa,” Andre said with a chuckle.
Raleigh had finished his sandwich and gazpacho and didn’t need another beer. He told me he needed to get to practice, and settled his bill. “Are you sure I can’t talk you into coming to the show on Thursday?” he asked.
I shrugged. “Maybe,” I told him.
“Hope to see you at the show.” He winked at me and left.
“What do you say we close up early?” Andre asked. Silvia and I both agreed, so we hurried through the cleaning and closing chores. By the time we finished, it was almost normal closing time anyway, so I didn’t feel too bad about leaving a little early.
“Huckleberry going home with you tonight?” I asked Andre. The shop dog didn’t actually belong to anyone as far as I could tell. Legend had it that he just showed up one day and never left. Since he’d been around longer than anyone else, I figured he had as much right to be here as anyone. Sometimes he followed employees or customers home at night, and then showed up again the next morning. Other times he slept in the shop.
There might have been a few health code violations in there somewhere, but considering the health inspector only dropped by to flirt with Andre, barely giving the kitchen a passing glance, no one made a fuss about it.
“He’s been staying here at night lately,” Andre said. “Plus, my sister’s friend moved in with us, and things have gotten even more crowded than normal.” Last I heard, Andre lived with his boyfriend at his mom’s house, along with a few grown siblings and a cousin or two. I got the impression that his mother’s house wasn’t nearly big enough to accommodate everyone, but she wasn’t the kind to turn anyone away, not even a big, floofy dog.
“Alrighty then. Night.” I pushed open the front door and almost walked smack into Izzy. “Hey,” I said, once I got over my initial surprise. “What are you doing here so late?”
“Just swung by to return your keys. Your aunt’s laundry is all washed and folded and put away. She was still in a lot of pain, so she took a pill and turned in early. Thought I’d let you know so you don’t go home and make a ton of noise.”
“Shoot, I was gonna practice my Riverdancing tonight,” I said.
“Maybe you should try it barefoot?” she offered with a grin. Izzy always got my sense of humor, even when no one else did.
“You’ll never guess who came in tonight. Raleigh, um, somebody. He’s in that band Cosmic Possum.”
Her eyes got wide. “Really? What’s he like?”
“Nice guy.”
“So, you like him?” Izzy asked.
That was a weird question. “He’s funny and a good tipper.”
She nodded, looking pleased with herself. “That’s a start.”
Something wasn’t adding up. Izzy mostly worked in the bookstore half of Untapped. While she was friendly and helpful to her customers, she had little interaction with the café regulars and had never shown much interest in them before. “What’s going on?”
“Going on? Nothing. Nada. Why do you ask?”
Before she could answer, Silvia appeared behind me. “Walk me to my car, and I’ll give you a lift. You, too, Izzy.”
Izzy gave her a dismissive gesture with her hand. “Thanks, but I’m good. Besides, I think I left something earlier and I’m gonna grab it before Andre locks up. You working tomorrow?”
“Morning shift,” I confirmed.
“Call in sick,” she told me.
“I can’t do that. I need the money,” I said.
“Sure, don’t we all? But I got to thinking, how come Vickie booked an escape room for six but only four people showed up? I doubt the police have questioned the two that flaked out. We should talk to them.”
“Why?” I asked. “They weren’t in the room with us, so they couldn’t have possibly killed Vickie. Besides, how would we even find them?”
“Easy. Amanda said there was a Facebook invite, right? I’ll ask Gennifer who else was on the invite. Then we’ll know who RSVP’d but didn’t show.”
Silvia lifted a finger. “I hate to interrupt, but do you guys want that ride home or not?”
“Go ahead,” Izzy said. “I’ll call you in the morning.”
I nodded. I hated the idea of calling in sick and leaving the café shorthanded, but if there was any chance I was leaving Williamsburg in a few days, time was running out to figure out who killed Vickie and clear Izzy’s name. “Alrighty.”
As much as I’d grown to love walking, it was nice to have a free ride home. After a long shift, my feet hurt whether I wore cowboy boots or orthopedic shoes, so it felt good to sit down and be chauffeured. As Silvia cut up Metropolitan Avenue, I asked, “You’re not gonna dime me out to Todd, are you?”
“Are you kidding? I wouldn’t pass Todd a cold.” I took that to mean no.
She pulled up in front of my building. “Thanks for the ride. Oh, and before I forget, I shared those tamales with my aunt yesterday and she wanted to tell your mom those were the best tamales she’s ever had in her life.”
Silvia grinned. “She’ll be happy to hear that.”
I got out of the car, and she took off, heading toward the highway. After a recent breakup, Silvia had moved back in with her parents in Queens and commuted to Untapped Books & Café while she figured out her next step. Maybe I should ask her if she was looking for a roomie, in case Izzy and I needed a third.
Not wanting to wake my aunt, I was as quiet as possible coming home. Rufus meowed persistently as soon as I put my key in the lock, and I tried to shush him before realizing he was closed up in the bedroom with my aunt. I opened the door a crack, and the cat slipped outside, weaving between my legs and purring loudly. “Happy to see you, too, Rufie,” I said, bending down to offer my hand for him to rub against.
When he was satisfied, he retreated to one of his favorite spots, an empty shelf near the top of the bookshelf. Apparently there used to be books and knickknacks there like every other surface in my aunt’s apartment, but he kept knocking them over until she relented and gave him the whole shelf all to himself. Once he was settled, I went out on the balcony.
Aunt Melanie’s apartment was on the top floor of the building, but because hers was an interior unit, there was no view to speak of except for the other balconies in the courtyard. I could see a twinkle of lights over the roof of the building, but Manhattan was too far away to be more than just a glow on the horizon from this angle. It was quiet tonight, or at least as quiet as it ever got in Brooklyn. I tuned out the distant buzz of traffic and ever-present wail of sirens, opened my phone, and navigated to the pictures that Amanda had uploaded earlier.
Most of the pictures were exactly what I’d expected to see—well-composed selfies of Amanda with glimpses of the escape room in the background. I reached the end of the set and found nothing useful, so I went back through them, slower the second time. That’s when I noticed it.
There were pictures missing.
A lot of them.
The file names were numbered, and there were huge gaps. One picture was 712_357, and the next started at 712_374. I identified several jumps like that, where at least a dozen pictures were missing in between.
Not knowing that someone would come by and ask for her deleted pictures, Amanda had deliberately,
permanently erased a whole bunch of photos that might have contained evidence.
Now, why would anyone go and do a thing like that?
17
Odessa Dean @OdessaWaiting ∙ July 15
Am I laughing because I’m happy? Yes. Am I laughing because I have ZERO CLUE what I’m doing and don’t really have a fallback plan? Also yes! #zerochill
There are few things more glorious than waking naturally instead of being yanked out of dreamland by a blaring alarm, even if it was barely nine in the morning. I might have felt a tiny smidgeon of guilt about skipping out on work, but I’d already sent a text to Todd—on a delay so he wouldn’t receive it until seven a.m.—and it was too late to back out now. Besides, it wasn’t like I was up for a promotion.
Plus, I had a murder to solve.
I sat up and stretched. My aunt’s couch wasn’t exactly a room at the Ritz, but if I was being completely honest, it was at least as comfortable as the well-worn mattress back at my parents’ house that I’d had ever since I’d graduated from a toddler’s bed.
Huh. That was new. When had I started thinking of it as my parents’ house and not “home”? Probably around the time that I’d stopped seeing Williamsburg as an alien planet and started feeling like I belonged here. Like this wasn’t just a summer visit.
I picked up my phone and texted Izzy. My first instinct was to ask her if she’d found us a permanent place to stay, but if she had, she would have called, texted, or kicked down my aunt’s front door to tell me the good news. So instead, I simply asked, Where we meeting? When?
Her answer was instantaneous, which was a surprise. Unless she was working, Izzy rarely rose and shone before noon. Meet me @ 53 & Lex 1 hour.
I hurried through my morning routine, pulling my hair back into a ponytail in lieu of washing it. It was lazy, but considering that my weather app predicted soaring temperatures I was being practical. Equally practical was my long cotton skirt which barely brushed the tops of my cowboy boots, and a blousy top I’d scored at a local secondhand resale store.
Before leaving, I downloaded a few podcasts to listen to on the long subway ride into Manhattan. Feeling like a legit New Yorker, I walked to the nearest subway station and jumped on a train without even consulting my app. However, I sat across from one of the electronic screens in the car and stole surreptitious glances at the map display to make sure I was heading in the right direction.
I might be more comfortable getting around the city, but I wasn’t sure anyone had the full map memorized. Anyone who said they did had to be lying.
The New York City subway system was a confusing tangle of numbered and lettered colored lines that spiderwebbed between boroughs. Lines merged and split with transfer spots whenever they crossed other tracks. I took the subway into Manhattan and then made a rookie mistake at the transfer station. Rather than waiting for the right train, I got on the first train that pulled up, which took me several blocks out of my way. Instead of trying to backtrack and get on the correct train, I walked the extra blocks aboveground, where it was only slightly less confusing.
I was in the business district, commonly known as Midtown, surrounded by medium- and high-rise geometric steel-and-glass office buildings. Traffic—delivery vans, yellow taxis, and sedans ranging from beat-up 1990s-era Hondas to sleek, silent electric cars—crept past. I was glad that I’d opted for the subway instead of taking an Uber, not that I could afford morning-rush-hour prices. I heard a sharp whistle, the kind I had been trying with no success to learn, and looked up to see Izzy waving with both hands over her head from the corner diagonal to me.
I waved back to let her know I saw her and hurried across the crosswalk at the tail end of the flashing walk signal, quickly sidestepping out of the way of a bicyclist who couldn’t care less that I was in his path. I had to wait a few seconds for the next light, and then gave it a few more seconds as an impatient driver blew through the red. When I finally made it to Izzy’s corner, my heart was racing. I might have fallen in love with New York, but I doubt I’d ever be comfortable playing Frogger through the intersections.
“You made it,” Izzy said, beaming at me. She checked her phone. “And with minutes to spare.” She handed me an insulated thermos I knew would be filled with hot coffee. Izzy was always prepared, but the most impressive thing wasn’t that she’d brought not only her own reusable coffee container but she’d brought one for me, too. Talk about thoughtful and eco-conscious!
“Thanks! Was there any doubt?” I craned my neck to study the high-rises surrounding the intersection. In the distance, I caught a glimpse of the familiar spire of the Chrysler Building. I knew it was several blocks away still, and was impressed with the sheer size of any building that could stand out in this teeming steel metropolis.
“You know, it’s gonna be high nineties today. You might want to consider making yourself a pair of shorts,” she said, checking out my long skirt.
“Believe it or not, with the right pattern and material, this is as cool if not cooler than your shorts. Besides, subway seats, right?” I was no germaphobe, but New York City mass transit was every bit as dirty as the worst bayou back home. It was bad enough knowing that the folds of my skirt were the only thing between my skin and the seats, but it would be worse if my legs were bare. “So, who are we here to see?”
I had to admit that after watching a gazillion TV shows and movies set in swanky New York office buildings, I was curious to see one up close in person. Would there be some geeky kid pushing a squeaky mail cart among a sea of cubicles? Would everyone be dressed in pin-striped suits, with women in their Louboutin shoes and ruffled blouses? I bet someone was screaming at their poor assistants from a corner office right now, ordering them to bring them that memo, stat!
“Nadia works here,” she said, gesturing at the drugstore on the corner.
My face fell. My hopes of finally touring a real Manhattan office were dashed. I’d been in a hundred drugstores, and they looked exactly the same in New York City as they looked in Piney Island, except bigger.
“Whatya waiting for?” Izzy asked, already in motion. The automatic doors whooshed open and she disappeared inside.
I followed her. An air-conditioned chill washed over me. The store smelled like industrial cleaners with a hint of flowers, which grew stronger as we wove between aisles of hair products to arrive at the pharmacy desk in the back. The white-coated pharmacist behind the counter was serving a customer. Her name tag read “Nadia.” The dark-skinned woman was tall and built like a runner—long and lean. Her curls brushed the top of her shoulders and she wore pink-framed glasses.
“Can I help you?” she asked in a pleasant, if slightly bored voice when it was our turn to approach the desk.
Izzy flashed a smile at her and stepped forward. “Izzy Wilson,” she announced. “And this is Odessa Dean.”
“Do you have a prescription?” Nadia asked in the tone of someone who repeated the same questions ad nauseam all day long. I know exactly how she felt. Can I get you some water to start? Do you need a minute to decide? Would you like some ketchup with that?
“Actually, we need to speak to you on a personal matter. Do you have a minute?”
She pushed her glasses up higher on the bridge of her nose with one finger and studied Izzy. “Do I know you?”
“Not yet. We’re friends of Vickie Marsh.”
Personally, I thought friends was stretching the truth.
Nadia rolled her eyes. “This is about that stupid escape room, isn’t it? I already PayPal’d her my share. I’m sorry I couldn’t go, but my fiancée wasn’t feeling well.” She shook her head. “I can’t believe Vickie’s still sore about that.”
Izzy elbowed me, hard. “Tell her,” she whispered.
“Why do I have to be the one to break the news?” I whispered back.
“News? What news?” Nadia asked.
I was impre
ssed. Between my accent and lowering my voice, she would have had to have some kind of superpower to catch that. “Um, I hate to break it to you, but Vickie, um, passed.”
“Passed?” Nadia stared at me incredulously, her dark eyes boring into me. “Passed what?”
“She was murdered,” Izzy clarified. She was just trying to help, but seeing the shock on Nadia’s face, I think she was making things worse.
“I’m gonna need a second,” Nadia said, leaning her weight on her palms, which were braced against the counter.
“Maybe you should sit down?” I suggested.
“You think?” she snapped. Then she took a deep breath. “Sorry.” I don’t think I’d heard a New Yorker apologize before now. That, more than any physical reaction Nadia had shown, was evidence of her shock.
Izzy vaulted over the counter and took Nadia’s elbow. “Let’s get you a seat.”
Unlike my athletic and adventurous friend, I wasn’t a vaulter. Or even a jumper, really. I was more of an ambler. Besides, I didn’t relish the idea of trying to clear a counter in a skirt. Practicality being the better part of valor and all that, I hurried around to a hinged section of counter and tugged on it. It didn’t move. I had to hop up a little, resting my stomach against the edge, and reached over to unlatch the door before swinging it open.
A buzzer sounded and one of the technicians in the back noticed me for the first time. He looked up, put down the enormous pill bottle he’d been holding, and approached menacingly. “Customers aren’t allowed back here,” he said in a stern voice.
“Oh, I’m not a customer,” I explained, then realized that probably sounded worse. “I’m here with Nadia.” I waved at the back of her white lab coat as she retreated with Izzy toward an unmarked door.
“Employees only,” he said, blocking my way.
A man in a security guard uniform appeared at my side. He towered over me, arms straining the sleeves of his polo shirt. When he clapped a hand on my shoulder, it felt like a sandbag. “You ain’t goin’ nowhere,” he told me, his voice a rumbling bass.
No Memes of Escape Page 16