Chapter 7
“Did you hear?” Aggie asked as I wiped down a booth that had a surprising amount of cracker crumbs left behind by a family who hadn’t ordered anything even slightly cracker-like.
“The blissful silence of half the diner being empty?” I said.
“No, that man,” she whispered. “The dead one. They released his name. Hugo Malloy. Said he was a criminal.”
I knew it was Hugo, but Aggie had left before the whole murder debacle and the hours of questioning that happened afterward, though she’d said the police did come by her place and question her this morning.
“Criminal?” I asked. “Who said he was a criminal?”
“I heard it from one of the diners. He stole things. Breaking and entering all up and down the coast.”
“Wow.” I moved to the next table. Aggie followed.
“He must have taken something from someone,” she said. “Probably double-crossing them for the money.”
I shook my head and smiled. “Isn’t that a bit of a leap?”
“Obviously you’ve never worked an antique store. Lots of shady characters have tried to pull a fast one on me.”
“You think he was like that? Shady?” I looked around for the napkin holder.
Aggie had already found it on the other table and handed it to me. “They’re all the same. I bet that police officer was on the take, too, and the deal got out of hand.”
“No. Jean wouldn’t do that.”
“How do you know? What do you know? What did you see out there?”
“I saw a dead man, and that’s it.”
Shelly was working swing, too, and must have noticed us talking in lowered voices. She hustled over.
“Are we talking about the dead guy?”
“We’re about to,” Aggie said. “Piper was there when the police came—or before they came since Buzz said you called them. So, spill. What happened? What did you see?”
“Was it gruesome?” Shelly asked breathlessly. “A lot of blood?”
“It was sad,” I said. “He was lying face down with a knife wound in his back. He was dead.”
Aggie was quiet, but Shelly nodded. “Knife wound means there was lots and lots of blood. Did you secure the scene?”
“What?”
“I love crime shows! Did you walk the perimeter, take pictures? Did you look for shoe tracks or fragments of cloth?”
“No!” I laughed. “I called the police.”
“Did he have anything on him?” Aggie asked. “A bag or, I don’t know, a briefcase or something in his pockets? He stole things. He could have been loaded.”
“Yeah,” Shelly said. “Did you pat him down?”
“What is up with you two today?” I waved my finger at them.
“I was sad and afraid. I called the police. I didn’t go through his pockets, I didn’t pull out a fingerprint dusting kit—that I don’t own—to look for prints.
I didn’t take any pictures. Sorry to disappoint, ladies. All I did was call in the experts.”
Shelly fiddled with the pencils in her apron and shook her head.
“That’s okay, Piper. Next time someone is murdered out back, you can take pictures or record the scene on your phone.
Wait! Even better! Next time, call me. I don’t live that far away.
I could be here so fast, and I’ll bring my fingerprint kit. ”
“No next times,” I warned with a smile. “One murder is more than enough, thank you.”
“A kitchen knife to the spine points to a personal connection with the killer, doesn’t it?” Aggie asked.
Apparently, they were not ready to let this go.
“Yes!” Shelly rocked up on her feet. “It does. The killer would have had to get in close. The victim—what was his name?”
“Hugo,” I said.
“Hugo might even have known the person who killed him and been comfortable turning his back on him.”
“A deal gone bad,” Aggie said smugly. “Are you sure the cop wasn’t on the take?”
“She was not.”
“Was the wound high or low in his back?” Shelly had a notepad in her hand now, a was making a bullet list. “We might be able to guess the height of the killer by where he stuck him.”
“Now you have to tell us all the details,” Aggie said. “Where was the wound, Piper?”
There was an edge to her words. She wasn’t just teasing, she was goading me, challenging me to tell her what I’d seen when I’d already said all I had to say.
And, yes. I knew people reacted in a variety of ways when faced with this kind of sudden death. I’d been sad and afraid.
Shelly was apparently delighted about the whole thing. But Aggie seemed to handle death like she didn’t care about the dead person. Like she just wanted all the information she could get. Like she blamed him for dying without giving up his secrets.
I put my hands on hips and raised my eyebrows. “Ghouls, the both of you. We’re talking about a dead man.”
“Dead thief.” Aggie shrugged. “He got what he deserved.”
“We don’t really know that.” I didn’t like her tone and wanted to end the conversation. I tipped my chin toward the door. “We do know there’s a rush headed our way. Let’s get to it, ladies!”
A group of six pushed through the door. I already had menus ready for them, and Shelly hustled to get them seated.
Behind that group was a steady stream of twos and fours that kept us busy for another couple hours.
I wasn’t watching the door, but I was the only one on the floor when the man walked in.
The man who had sat in the booth yesterday.
The man in the futures I’d seen.
Mr. Stalker.
“How many tonight?” I asked, even though I knew he was alone.
He was just as good looking as last time, though he’d brushed his hair, slicking it back. I missed the messier look.
“One. Booth, if you’ve got it.”
I could take him to the booth Shelly would look after, but I wanted to keep tabs on him this time, so I offered the one near the door. “This okay?”
“Works for me.”
He looked like a good guy, he felt like a good guy, but according to Aggie, there was that whole stalker thing he had going.
I was usually a good judge of people. Why did he mess up my intuition?
You want to like him, and you can’t, I thought. Total bummer.
“Coffee to start?”
“Do you have a minute, Piper?”
I was wearing my name tag, so it was no surprise he knew my name. Still, chills ran down my spine. Somehow it felt familiar. Like he’d noticed me before. Like he’d said my name before.
“It’s important,” he said. “About the crime.”
The diner was as quiet as it ever was. Buzz was in the kitchen and both Aggie and Shelly were outside on break. The five customers at tables were taking their time with their meals and no one needed a drink refill.
Two people at the counter were eating and scrolling on their phones.
There was no excuse for me to say no.
Plus, my curiosity was off the charts.
I sat across from him. “I’m listening. But if you know something about the crime, you should talk to the police.”
There. Jean would be happy I’d tried to stay out of it. Okay. Tried a little to stay out of it.
“I’ve been in touch,” he said. “This isn’t something the police can solve. Well, not Ordinary’s police.”
He reached into his coat pocket, and I wondered if he was going to pull a gun.
Futures flashed:
A badge
A badge
A badge
He opened a black leather wallet to show a badge with his name: Simon Vandre.
“Oh,” I said, studying it. It looked real. “Are you state police?”
“No. I’m a detective. And I’ve been watching Hugo Molloy for a couple years now.”
“For the thefts?”
“What do you know about the thefts?”
Shoot. I should know better than to give him things to question me about. How did Jules and Dusi handle interviewing suspects? One thing they did was try to get them to talk instead.
“I don’t know anything about the thefts.” (True.) “Someone mentioned he was a thief.” (Also true.) “Someone in the diner.”
“A customer?”
“That’s what I heard.”
He hummed like he was absently doing math in his head and spun the closed badge against the tabletop. “You saw the body?”
I nodded.
“Was there a knife in his back?”
Okay, time for me to do some questioning of my own. “Do killers just leave weapons behind like that?”
He seemed pleased with my question. “Sometimes. If they’re angry enough. If they’re interrupted. In a hurry.”
“There was no knife.”
He grunted. “Did you see anyone go out the door before you? See anyone come in?”
“Well, this is a diner and our back door is near the bathrooms. People move around. Hard to keep track of everyone. Plus, the back of the diner is accessible from the outside too. But you’d know that if you saw the crime scene.”
“I did. Look…” He flattened his palms against the table and pressed down hard enough it was like he was trying to hold onto ice.
Ooooo. Suddenly Mr. Detective-Stalker Guy was serious.
“This is going to be a strange question, but it could be important for building my case. Do you think magic is real?”
I waited to see if he was going to clarify what he meant by magic.
“Like hocus pocus, bunnies in hats?” I finally asked. My throat was dry. Was it hot in here? Why was it so hot in here? Whatever he was doing with his hands on the table was making me feel pinned down, itchy.
“Not like stage illusions,” he said. “More like witchcraft, ghosts, curses, seeing the future.”
Well, hadn’t this taken a turn?
I laughed to break the intensity of the moment. “Magic? I suppose it could be real. But I’d have to see proof before I believed. Why, detective?” I leaned my elbows on the table. “Do you think the killer was a ghost?”
He frowned and relaxed his fingers one by one.
I had the feeling I had just failed a test.
But I could hear the music in the diner again, could hear the scrape and clatter of cutlery on plates, Buzz crooning in the kitchen.
I hadn’t known those sounds had been missing. Either I’d just had a weird case of nerves, or he’d done something to change my awareness.
Magic?
“No,” he shook his head, the hint of a smile on his mouth. “Not a ghost. How about I ask this: Was there anything unusual at the scene?”
“Other than a dead body?”
He chuckled, and (dang it) I liked the sound of it. “Other than.”
“Nope. Nothing unusual.” I slid out of the booth and pulled my pad out of my apron. “Are you ready to order?”
He studied me, like he was expecting me to say something or do something else. Then he relaxed and picked up the menu. “You have any cherry pie?”