Chapter 15 #2
Ziya had given Amie’s See you soon! text a thumbs-up, with no other response.
Amie had to remind herself that this was normal behavior for Ziya.
But that was back when Amie was secure and confident in their relationship.
Now, after sleeping with her ex, telling her all about her experience in a time loop, and then waking up in an empty bed the following morning, Amie wasn’t sure she wanted “normal.”
Her wish was granted as she turned the corner and saw Ziya standing outside of Jonathan Oakland’s building.
“You’re early!” Amie called, surprised.
Ziya looked over and smiled. “I’m always keeping people on their toes,” she called back. “Never let them know your next move.”
Amie relaxed. Ziya was smiling at her, making jokes. Everything was fine.
As Amie closed the distance between them, Ziya gestured to the revolving door of the building. “Shall we?”
Amie thought she might say something else, like “Sorry I ran out yesterday,” or “It’s good to see you,” or “Let’s define the relationship right now, before we go in to talk to this potential murderer.
” She would have even settled for just a kiss.
Actually, she was moving that to her first choice.
If Ziya kissed her, she’d have zero complaints.
But as Ziya headed for the door, leaving Amie unkissed, Amie realized that was probably not in her near future. Which was fine. Ziya was focusing on the task at hand, and so was she. They could talk (and kiss? Hopefully??) later.
“I’m so bad at these,” Amie mumbled self-consciously as she emerged from the revolving door, having taken several long seconds before she managed to successfully hop in.
“I think they’re fun,” Ziya said as they approached the desk to their right. “Regular doors are way too easy to walk through. Why not make them unnecessarily complicated?”
“Hi,” Amie said to the man sitting behind the desk. “Amie T. for Jonathan Oakland?”
“IDs.”
Amie and Ziya pulled out their IDs, handing them to the man. He scanned the cards and returned them, giving Amie an additional card.
“Scan this in the elevator,” he said. “Make sure to return it when you leave.”
Amie looked at the card, which had the word GUEST printed on it in bold letters. “Sorry, what’s this?”
The man had already returned to his computer. “Penthouse access,” he said, not looking at her. “Scan it and press the button with a P.”
“Got it, thank you.”
Ziya’s eyes were comically wide as she mouthed, Penthouse?
As soon as the elevator doors shut, Ziya exclaimed, “Penthouse?” as if Amie might have had trouble reading her lips fifteen seconds prior. “So he’s rich rich.”
“I’m sure a penthouse in South Jersey runs less than a penthouse in an actual city,” Amie pointed out.
“Sure, but living in a penthouse is inherently rich rich-person shit,” Ziya countered. “Normal rich people buy, like, a house.”
“I think he has some of those, too,” Amie said, having done some more research on the man the night before.
“Whoa.”
The elevator fell silent. Then Ziya said, “I think I’d prefer a house. Penthouse is too high up. What if the elevator breaks?”
Amie hummed a laugh in response while suppressing a concerned frown. Ziya’s tone had shifted. It was too bright, almost forced. It was as if she was just trying to fill the silence. They’d never had a problem with silence before.
She didn’t have time to overthink any more than she likely already was. The screen above the elevator doors flashed the letter P, and the doors opened with a cheerful ding.
The two women stepped out into a foyer that, if it was an escape room, would be themed “sensory overload.” The wood floor was carpeted by two Persian rugs.
A chandelier that looked like an explosion of glass frozen in time hung from the ceiling.
The walls were covered with paintings and tapestries of varying size and styles, almost completely swallowing the patterned wallpaper underneath.
Among them were little shelves holding a variety of knickknacks, vases, masks, musical instruments—
“Hey!” Ziya exclaimed with recognition. She pointed at a hanging tapestry of a woman in a saree standing underneath a tree. “My aunt and uncle have that in their house.”
“Likely a copy,” came a voice from the doorway. “Either that, or my art dealer cheated me out of a significant sum of money.”
Jonathan Oakland looked to be in his late sixties or early seventies. His white hair was neatly trimmed, with thinning gray eyebrows that were raised with amusement over dark-blue eyes. His blue polo shirt was tucked neatly into an ironed pair of khaki pants.
“Mr. Oakland, hi, I’m Amie,” said Amie, crossing the foyer to shake the man’s hand. “This is my friend, Ziya.” She’d practiced the introduction in her head on the bus ride over, primarily to avoid any stammering over the second half.
“Amie, Ziya, pleasure to meet you.” He returned the handshake, shaking Ziya’s hand as well. “And just ‘Oakland’ is fine. I’d say Mr. Oakland is my father, but the son of a bitch died when I was four, so I can’t say for sure what people are calling him these days.”
Amie and Ziya both chuckled politely as Oakland let out a belly laugh.
“Come, join me in the sitting room.” The man led them down a short hall to a room that was somehow even more decorated than the foyer.
Amie sat down delicately on a dark red fainting couch, utilizing her experience from David’s apartment to avoid knocking over a small statue of a rabbit that sat on a wooden table to her left.
Ziya sat beside her, gazing around the room.
“Your place is …” Ziya began, then paused, starting again. “You have a lot of beautiful things.”
“Thank you!” Oakland sat down on a leather lounge chair, which had a name that escaped Amie but did, she knew, cost thousands of dollars.
The man gestured to a ceramic teapot that sat on a low table between them. “Can I offer you some tea or other refreshment?”
“We’re good, thanks,” Amie said. She didn’t think Ziya would have accepted the tea anyway, but she figured it was better to err on the side of caution while speaking to a murder suspect.
“So …” Oakland sat back in his chair. “You said you wanted to talk about Savannah Harlow?”
“Yes,” Amie said, giving him a tight smile. “I heard you talking about her on a podcast. Or, about Susannah.”
Oakland chuckled. “Wasn’t very subtle with that name change, was I? It was more to avoid legal trouble than a genuine attempt at obfuscation.”
“So Susannah was Savannah.”
“Of course! You seem like smart girls; I’m not going to insult your intelligence by pretending she wasn’t. If that was my intention, I could have just as easily ignored your email.”
“Why didn’t you?” Ziya asked. She’d crossed her legs, folding her hands on one knee. “A stranger emailed you about a woman you have no public connection to. Why the interest?”
“For exactly that reason,” Oakland said, looking at Amie. “Clearly you had some reason, some knowledge that connected me to Savannah Harlow. I was curious to know what you’d heard.”
Amie now knew what Madeline had meant when she described Oakland’s intense energy and excess of eye contact. She moved her gaze to the table in front of her to avoid his piercing stare.
“You’d been interested in buying Savannah’s bookstore,” Amie said to the ceramic teapot. “She turned you down. Then, according to your story, she tried to get free business advice from you.”
“And instead of turning her down,” Ziya jumped in, “you fed her bad business tips and shared the story to promote your entrepreneurship course.”
Amie winced. Ziya’s tone was neutral, but the criticism behind the words was clear to her. Thankfully, Oakland didn’t seem to notice—or care.
“You seem to have most of the story,” Oakland said, raising an eyebrow with amusement. “What brings you to me, then?”
“Did you hear about Savannah’s murder?” Amie knew, from Madeline, that he had, but wanted to see his reaction.
To his credit, Oakland sobered. “I did,” he said, carefully sitting up. “Terrible tragedy. She had a lot of life left in her.”
“How did you find out about it?”
“Heard it reported on the radio.”
“On Tuesday?”
“I believe so. She was found that morning, wasn’t she?” Oakland tilted his head, chuckling lightly. “This is starting to feel like an interrogation, Amie. Am I being interrogated?”
As Amie hesitated, he continued:
“Oh.” He nodded knowingly. “I see. Doing a bit of amateur sleuthing, are we? I wanted to buy the bookstore, but she refused, therefore I have a motive to have killed her.” He rubbed his chin thoughtfully.
“It’s a good deduction. A little weak, considering I didn’t want the bookstore that much, but I suppose I have no way of proving that. ”
“You did go out of your way to punish her for trying to use you for free advice,” Ziya pointed out. “Seems like you had a good amount of malice toward her.”
“Ah.” Oakland waved a hand dismissively. “That wasn’t malice; just me having some fun. She thought she was being so sneaky, speaking in hypotheticals and acting like we were good friends. It was amusing, and I got a good story out of it, that’s all. I certainly didn’t wish her any ill.”
He leaned forward in his chair. “Also,” he added, “it wouldn’t make much sense for me to have killed her, seeing as how she was planning on selling the store to me.”
Amie and Ziya glanced at each other, confused.
“That’s interesting,” Amie said slowly, turning back to the man. “Because I was told that the store was sold to Madeline, the owner of Eons Café.”
Oakland narrowed his eyes. “Who told you that?”
“Madeline. She said the final paperwork came in after you visited her on Tuesday.”
“Damn.” Oakland snapped his fingers, looking mildly disappointed. “I lied to the man for nothing. Strange he didn’t know …”
“Who did you lie to?” Amie asked, overlapping with Ziya saying, “Did you just lie to us?”