Chapter Thirty-Two
Chapter
Thirty-Two
Theo was waiting for me when I returned to the Mirage the next afternoon after picking Livy up from school.
“Hi, Theo!” Livy ran up to her and gave her a hug.
My heart swelled at the sight, especially when Theo gave her an affectionate squeeze in return.
I stepped aside as a muscular white man with longish, slicked-back brown hair emerged from the hallway to my right and strode toward the front door. I didn’t know his name, but I recognized him as Bitty’s godson. I smiled at him, but he didn’t so much as glance my way.
“Can we play hide-and-seek again?” Livy asked as the man disappeared out the door. She was bubbling with excitement at the prospect.
I didn’t get a chance to reply before the door to one of the old-fashioned phone booths opened, distracting me. Detective Callahan stepped out of the booth. When he spotted the three of us, his blue eyes zeroed in on me. My heart dropped through the floor, right down to the creepy basement.
“Detective,” I said with grave apprehension as he headed our way.
“Ladies,” he replied, his blue gaze passing over Theo and Livy before landing on me again.
It took effort, but I managed not to squirm.
“Did you search the speakeasy?” Theo asked.
Callahan stared at me for another second before turning his attention to her. “I had a team in there yesterday after Ms. Gray told me about its existence.”
“Then why were you in there just now?”
I loved that Theo wasn’t afraid to voice whatever question was on her mind. At least, I loved it at that moment, since it wasn’t directed at me.
“Just doing my job.”
Theo watched him with narrowed eyes. “Livy,” she said without looking away from the detective, “can you go press the button for the elevator?”
Livy looked to me, uncertainty clear on her face. She might not understand why the detective was there, but she most definitely sensed the tension that had filled the lobby.
I gave her an encouraging nod. “Go ahead. We’ll be there in a moment.”
She adjusted her backpack on her shoulders and headed for the elevator.
Theo lowered her voice so Livy wouldn’t overhear. “Is it your job to investigate Emersyn when you’ve already arrested a man for the murder?”
“Theo!” I admonished, worried she was pushing too hard.
She acted like she hadn’t heard me, which was par for the course, really.
“The case isn’t yet closed,” Callahan replied, apparently unfazed by Theo’s grilling. “Enjoy your afternoon.”
Theo and I watched him stride out the front door.
“Are you coming now?” Livy asked with dramatic impatience. She had sagged against the elevator doors to hold them open.
“He really thinks you did it,” Theo said quietly, wheeling toward the elevator.
I hurried along at her side. “What? No way.”
“Then why was he sniffing around here?”
“Because he thinks Hoffman might be guilty?” I voiced that possibility with more hope than conviction.
Theo sent me a sidelong, pitying glance before boarding the elevator.
I followed after her with heavy steps, each one seeming to pound out the word doom.
Mrs. Nagy opened her door when she heard us out in the hallway. She looked a little tired, but she smiled when she saw my niece.
“I thought it might be you, Livy,” she said. “Would you like to come over and help me bake some cookies?”
“Yes!” Livy bounced with excitement as she turned her pleading eyes on me. “Please, Auntie Em?”
“Are you sure it’s not too much?” I asked my neighbor. “You know, with everything that’s going on?”
“The distraction would do me good,” she assured me. “And spending time with Livy brings me such joy.”
“It makes me happy too,” Livy said, giving Mrs. Nagy a gap-toothed smile.
I could practically see the elderly woman’s heart melt at the sight.
My own heart did the same. I truly believed that her husband was innocent, that they were exactly what they seemed: a kind and generous elderly couple who adored Livy.
I’d never doubted for a second that my niece would be safe in their care.
“All right,” I said to Livy, sliding her backpack off her shoulders. “But don’t spoil your dinner by eating all the cookies.”
“I won’t eat all of them,” she said, following Mrs. Nagy into her apartment. “Only half.”
“Save the other half for me!” Theo called after her.
The sound of Livy’s giggle lifted my spirits and gave me a surge of energy and renewed determination. Mr. Nagy and I would have our names cleared in no time.
I checked my phone and wished I hadn’t.
Can we meet today? Wyatt had texted.
“Let’s get a move on,” Theo urged.
I tucked my phone away. I could always respond to Wyatt later, once I’d figured out what to say.
I let us into my apartment and dropped Livy’s backpack on a kitchen chair.
Then I fetched the murder board from my bedroom.
Even though it was still blank, I’d returned the board to its hiding place under my bed the day before.
I carried it out into the living room and set it on the desk, letting it lean against the wall.
Theo dug through her backpack and pulled out a manila folder.
“Is my file in there?” I asked, trying to get a peek inside when she opened the folder.
She made no attempt to hide the contents from me. “Personnel files are kept in a secure location. This is just murder board stuff.”
I frowned with disappointment—I really wanted to know what she’d written in my file and, more importantly, in Wyatt’s file—but I accepted the pictures she handed me.
One for each of our three murder suspects.
They were home-printed and consisted of a candid photograph of Minnie, one of Hoffman’s selfies from social media, and a generic silhouette of a man from the shoulders up.
“How did you get this one?” I asked as I studied the candid shot of Minnie checking her mailbox in the lobby.
“With my phone.”
“But not with Minnie’s consent.” I was pretty sure she had no idea she’d been photographed.
“You want me to announce to people that I’m taking their picture to put on our murder board?”
Well, when she put it that way…
“Never mind.” I stuck each photo up on the board with the help of a magnet.
Theo handed me a pen, and I wrote Hoffman’s and Minnie’s names below their photos. I added an x under the man’s silhouette. Then I stepped back to survey what we had.
“So, we’ve got Hoffman and Minnie and Wyatt’s unknown mystery man from the pub as our suspects.” My thoughts strayed away from the investigation. “Of course, Wyatt’s a bit of a mystery man himself.”
“Not really,” Theo said.
“He won’t even tell me his last name.”
“You let a little thing like that stop you?” Theo shook her head. “You need to get some investigative chops if you want to make it in this business.”
I was about to tell her that I didn’t have any intention of trying to make it in the private investigation business, but I had a more important thought to follow. “Are you saying you know his last name?”
“I know a lot of things.”
I planted my hands on my hips. “Did he tell you his surname?”
“I didn’t need him to.” Theo produced a package of Twizzlers from her bag. She pulled one out and took a bite. “Google told me all I need to know.”
“But if you just type ‘Wyatt’ into the search bar, you get eleventy billion results that have nothing to do with him.” I knew that for a fact, since I’d tried googling him the other day. Even adding the name of the country club hadn’t elicited any relevant results.
“Haven’t you heard of image searching?” She offered me the package of candy.
I took one of the Twizzlers. “Sure, but I don’t have a photo…” My gaze snapped to Minnie’s picture on the murder board. Then I whirled around to face Theo again. “You took a picture of Wyatt and used it to find him online.”
Theo raised her eyes to the ceiling. “Finally, she gets it.”
I pointed my floppy rope of candy at her. “Okay, dish. Who is he? What’s his secret? Why doesn’t he want us to know his last name?”
She lifted her chin. “I can only share details about the agency’s employees on a need-to-know basis.”
“But I really, really need to know.”
She sized me up, and her wicked smile made an appearance. “You’ve got it bad.”
“Just tell me. Please.” I wasn’t above begging, not when my curiosity was about to kill me.
Finally, Theo relented. “His name is Wyatt Quintal Alessi.”
I took a moment to absorb her words. “Quintal Alessi.” I rolled the names around in my mouth, testing them out. A light bulb went off in my head. I repeated Wyatt’s last words to me. “ ‘Who says I have one?’ ” I slapped a hand to my forehead and groaned. “He has two last names, not one.”
It was probably best that Wyatt wasn’t there with us, because in that moment I was sorely tempted to throttle him. Far more than I wanted to kiss him. Because I didn’t want to kiss him at all.
Liar, liar, pants on fire! the traitorous voice in my head yelled.
I practically dove at the coffee table, where I’d left my phone. I typed Wyatt’s full name into the search bar, my thumbs moving so fast they were little more than a blur.
“Oh. My. God.” My eyes nearly popped out of my head when I scanned what came up on the page.
I clicked on the image results, and my jaw dropped.
Numerous photos of Wyatt looking smoking hot filled my screen.
In some he was dressed casually; in others he wore a designer suit or a tux.
A few photos featured him alone, but in others he was pictured alongside a striking woman who had glowing brown skin, sharp cheekbones, and gleaming black hair.
She looked vaguely familiar, and it didn’t take more than a second or two to figure out why.
“Holy shit!”
“Right?” Theo said with a grin, coming over to join me by the coffee table. “He’s the son of Rosangela Quintal, former Brazilian supermodel and megarich businesswoman.”
“That explains the car and country club membership.” My voice sounded faint. “But she looks more like his older sister than his mother. What’s her secret?”
There was a knock on the door a split second later, and then it opened. Jemma breezed in before I could even make a move toward the entryway.
“Maybe you shouldn’t barge right in,” Theo said to her. “Emersyn and Wyatt could be doing some very private investigating.”
“As much as I wish that were true, Livy’s usually home at this time of day.” Jemma glanced around. “Where is the little Livysaurus?”
“Next door baking cookies with Mrs. Nagy,” I replied.
Jemma put her hands to her hips. “Then why aren’t you doing some very private investigating with Wyatt?”
“Because we’re supposed to be investigating Freddie’s murder,” I reminded her. “You know, to keep Mr. Nagy and me out of jail.”
I’d already told her via text messages about my status as a suspect.
Jemma dropped her purse on a kitchen chair and came closer to check out the whiteboard. “No reason why you can’t mix business with pleasure.”
“Can we focus, please?” I pleaded.
“We need to figure out if Minnie has an alibi for the time of the murder,” Theo said.
“Excellent idea.” One I could definitely get behind.
Theo started toward the door. “Let’s go talk to her now.”
“All of us?” I asked, no longer so sure of the merits of the plan. “We don’t want her realizing that we suspect her.”
“She won’t suspect anything if we act casual.” Theo zoomed out into the hallway.
Jemma practically pushed me out of the apartment.
I hurried to lock the door behind us. “What, exactly, are we supposed to say? If we ask where she was at the time of the murder, it’ll be obvious that we suspect her.”
“Don’t worry,” Theo said, boarding the elevator. “I’ve got an idea.”
Somehow that worried me more than ever.