Six #2
I felt terror clawing my throat, and I swallowed it back down. Panicking wouldn’t help. But all I wanted to do was panic.
I itched to check my socials and my texts, but every time I did, I found nothing new. It shouldn’t surprise me. The Canceled Killer loved to let people sweat. It was part of the sick control game he lived to play.
When my phone vibrated, I whipped it out of my pocket and saw an incoming message on Spark from Spider-Man Mateo.
I hid the message without reading it. I was too far from Chicago for a hookup and I had other things on my mind.
That’s when I saw Jude at the bamboo gate.
He’d exchanged his navy half-zip sweater for a gray one, and wore dark jeans and his trademark Adidas.
“Mind if I come in?” he asked, even though he never needed to ask. Mom and Dad treated him like a son. They were always ushering him inside, trying to feed him something.
“Oscar’s not here,” I told him, expecting Jude to shrug and skulk away, as he usually did when the other half of his soulmate bromance wasn’t around.
“I’m not looking for Oscar,” he said, taking a few steps closer to the one end of the wooden bridge near the koi pond. “I’m looking for you.”
“Why?” I asked as I met him on the edge of the water. Diamond Dave slapped the pond surface with his massive golden tail, splashing a decorative rock, one of dozens along the edge. My phone vibrated in my back pocket. Mateo sent me something else, no doubt. I ignored it.
“I need your expertise.”
“You think I have expertise in something?” Now I was really shocked.
“This is a first,” I said. I couldn’t help but revel in the compliment.
Jude rarely asked for help with anything, because he almost always had the answers.
I might tease him about being Dr. Cheese, but the man held two Ivy League degrees and had always been the smartest man in the room.
“Brie serious,” he said, without even missing a beat.
“Dr. Cheese, do not start—”
“Are you feta up with the puns?”
“Stop, I mean. I swear—”
“Okay, I’ll just let the curds fall where they whey.” He adjusted his squarish, black-framed glasses on his nose.
“I’m leaving.” I turned to go.
“Ella, wait,” Jude called, chuckling to himself. “I’m done. I promise. I do really need to talk to you. Seriously. It’s about the Canceled Killer.”
Those two words stopped me in my tracks. I turned, crossing my arms across my chest. “What about him?”
“Kenzie told me she’s worried about her dad. He has gotten skull emojis. Because of the listeria outbreak.” Jude offered me his phone, open to the social media accounts.
“What?” I grabbed his phone and sure enough, three skull emojis. From CanceledKill. And they were posted earlier than mine. Huh.
I clicked on Allen Gordon’s personal account, which only had reposts of the corporate account, plus a couple of pictures of his new yacht. And, there, in his last post, sat three ominous skull emojis.
“You know the Canceled Killer better than anyone. Do you think it’s a warning? Has Gordon been targeted?”
“Maybe,” I said as I handed Jude back his phone. My gut screamed that Allen Gordon was in serious trouble. And so was I. If CanceledKill was the Canceled Killer, Gordon would be his next victim, followed by me.
My phone vibrated again. Mateo, read the room—I am ignoring you for a reason.
“But I told Kenzie that the Canceled Killer had only ever struck in Chicago. Once in Evanston,” Jude continued. “And he always is so meticulous about his routine.”
“So you really did listen to Crime Hive?”
Jude looked taken aback. “Of course, er, I… listen to a lot of podcasts, and…” Jude seemed uncharacteristically flustered. A spot of red appeared on his cheekbone. “It was good to have something on in the background at work.”
I imagined Jude, tucked away in his cheese laboratory in his white coat, me in his ear whispering about the new serial killer stalking Chicagoland.
“I’m sure it was just a pity listen.”
“No. You were good. It was a smart show.” The compliment seemed authentic, and I was surprised by how much that meant to me. If he thought it was smart, that meant something.
“I was good until I wasn’t. My picker is broken. I got the wrong guy.”
Jude studied me a beat. “Actually, I think you were better than you think. I think the Canceled Killer was feeding you Jared as a possible suspect.”
I blinked fast. “How?”
“Either the Canceled Killer started mimicking what Jared did online, or he actually hacked Jared’s accounts. I’m not sure which, but if you want my theory, the Canceled Killer wanted Jared to take the fall. He was just using you as a means to get there.”
It had never occurred to me that I was a tool to an end. I’d always just assumed I was the one in the wrong, that I’d made the mistake all on my own.
“You said it yourself: The Canceled Killer is playing some kind of long game.” I did say that. I was also flattered Jude remembered it. “There’s one more thing I wanted to talk to you about…” Jude said and then hesitated.
I waited.
“Oscar wanted me to…”
“Is this about the mayor?”
Jude looked extremely guilty. “It is about the mayor.” He sighed. “It’s an election year, and, well, Oscar wanted to know if maybe… you’d think about… talking to the mayor.”
At the mention of Stokes, blood rushed in my ears.
“About what? About how I’d like to kick his spleen into next week? I’d love to talk to him about that.”
“No. About… maybe… not attacking him.”
“Tell him not to touch me, and I’ll happily never touch him again.”
Jude sighed. “I know. Oscar says the mayor is threatening to get his friend the judge involved.”
“To do what?” I challenged. “There are no charges to press.”
“Maybe he’ll want to bring in the state police.”
“On a misdemeanor? Good luck. Besides, I did nothing wrong. I defended myself.”
“I know. I know that. I was there.” Jude sent me a pained look. “I told Oscar that, too. So, you know what? I’m with you. To hell with Stokes. Oscar shouldn’t have asked me to intervene.”
“Yeah, he should have been brave enough to ask me himself. Why didn’t he?”
“He said that I’m the only one you never punch,” he said. “That’s a direct quote.”
“You don’t have a very punchable face,” I said.
“If that’s a compliment, I’ll take it.”
I had to laugh at that.
Suddenly, the bamboo gate rattled open, flung so hard it hit the fence with a popping sound. Russo strode through the gate like he owned the place, his face twisted into a scowl, as if he was looking for the perfect perp to wrestle to the ground.
Russo glanced at Jude and me with surprise. Then his frown grew even deeper.
“You okay, kid?” Russo asked me.
“Uh. Yeah. Fine.”
“You didn’t answer my texts.”
I grabbed my phone out of my pocket. Mateo hadn’t been texting. It had been Russo. And one missed call as well. I felt a rush of guilt. I’d been ignoring the vibrating phone all the time I’d been talking to Jude.
“I was…” I said, feeling a little embarrassed to be caught talking to Jude, though I had no idea why. Russo and I weren’t dating. He had no hold over me. But he gave Jude a cold sweep of his gaze.
“Busy,” Russo finished my sentence for me as he narrowed his eyes. “I see.”
Jude flashed Russo a disarming smile, but Russo was in no mood to be disarmed.
“Brother’s best friend,” he said.
“That’s right.” Jude nodded.
“Right. Except the brother is never around.” Russo glared at Jude, but Jude, to his credit, stared right back. Cool, calm, unruffled. Jude had a steadiness to him, a solidness. He was always the coolest head on the playground.
The back door of the Koi Inn opened then, and Olivia walked out on the wraparound porch, pink hair up in a high pony.
My heart lifted a bit, because if anyone could defuse the awkward tension between the two men in the Zen garden, it would be her, the sweetest Takeda with the most piercings.
But as she clocked both Jude and Russo standing near the koi pond, she frowned.
A quizzical expression passed across her face as she looked at me.
“Ella? You’ve got a visitor?” she said and her pink ponytail practically quivered with uncertainty.
That’s when both Russo and Jude swiveled to take a look at the porch and my worst nightmare emerged from the screen door.
No, not the Canceled Killer.
It was even worse.
It was Spider-Man Mateo.