Chapter 10
“Detectives?” Ursa stormed out of her office to greet the partners below the all-seeing eyes of the mermaid skeleton. “This is harassment, and I will be calling your supervisor. You cannot keep showing up unannounced at my place of business.”
“Here, call the FBI.” Bel handed the tattoo artist Agent Jameson Barry’s business card. “Make sure to tell him Isobel Emerson is the officer harassing you.”
Ursa gawked at the small rectangle, but Bel’s eagerness to offer it up clearly made her rethink her demands.
She refused to accept it, and suppressing a smirk, Bel shoved the card back into her pocket.
Most people folded when she called their bluffs, and she was in no mood for the shop owner’s defiance.
Over a dozen women were dead, and Ariella Triton was still missing.
There was a horrifying chance she was being held until her mermaid scale tattoos were complete, and Bel would do everything in her power to find the teenager before she lost her life.
“We can talk here,” Bel said, “or we can speak privately in your office. Up to you.”
“Fine, but make it quick. I have a packed schedule.” The tattoo artist spun on her heels and strode down the hallway without confirming that the detectives were in tow.
“Not only is our killer skilled in tattooing, but also embalming,” Bel said as she sealed the trio inside the office. “You’re clearly a very talented artist, but do you know what else you have experience in? Embalming.”
“What?” Ursa froze halfway to her seat. “I do n—do you mean my summer internship at the Bajka Funeral Home?”
“We do,” Olivia chimed in.
“Listen, I can explain that, okay?” The words tumbled from Ursa’s lips.
“I went to a birthday party when I was ten, where they gave the kids temporary tattoos, and I’ve been obsessed ever since.
I got this the second I turned eighteen, and I mean the second.
” She shoved her ankle toward them and lifted her skin-tight black pants to reveal a simple yet faded tattoo of ocean waves.
“I haven’t stopped… clearly.” She extended her arms to prove her point, as if she didn’t have delicate beadwork tattoos framing the sides of her face for everyone to see her commitment.
“I always knew this was my calling, but even if you’re talented, marketing is the hardest part of every creative job.
Before I finished my apprenticeship, I got a part-time internship at the funeral home to cultivate an interesting backstory.
Mortician turned artist. People eat that kind of drama up.
I had no interest in becoming a funeral home employee, nor did I particularly enjoy handling dead bodies.
It was all about creating a vibe. Just like the décor, dark paint, and eerie music in this shop create a vibe.
People equate skilled artists with cool shops.
I could be the best tattooist in the world, but if I worked out of an office with fluorescent lights and white walls tucked in a strip mall, people’s prejudices would affect business.
Tattoos are an art form, but they’re also an experience.
The adrenaline rush. The excitement and fear.
The hours and hours spent lying on the sterilized bed while the most unique person you’ve ever seen literally drills ink into your skin that you can’t remove.
This is more than a business. It’s a lifestyle, and anything I can do to supply the experience my clients crave is worth experimenting with.
You won’t believe how many times my mortician days—well, at least my internship days—sneak their way into conversations.
I work it into my social media marketing too.
People love it, but that’s all it is. An act.
A gimmick to help sell myself until my art spoke for itself.
I’m not a killer. I didn’t tattoo your dead girls.
I didn’t drown them in a lake, and I most certainly didn’t embalm anyone.
I prefer living clients who complement my designs… preferably with a huge tip.”
“Are your artists particularly interested in your funeral home days?” Olivia asked. “Or any of your clients? Do they ask a lot of specific questions that seem outside the normal spectrum?”
“My artists wouldn’t kill anyone.” Ursa was adamant. “And as for my clients. I don’t know. They step into my life for a few hours at a time. I couldn’t tell you if any of them took my mortician stories to heart or started tattooing dead girls in their spare time.”
“Well, if you think of anyone, can you call us?” Olivia offered her their cards.
“Detectives, I—”
“We realize this isn’t a comfortable conversation,” Bel interrupted.
“But as a woman, I’m sure you understand the horror of young girls being tattooed against their will before being drowned.
We aren’t here to make your life miserable, unless you’re the murderer we’re looking for.
We’re just trying to stop a monster before he drowns another victim.
A nineteen-year-old girl went missing two months ago, and we suspect she’s running out of time. ”
“I didn’t hurt those girls.” Ursa’s features softened.
“Then prove it,” Bel said. “Help us.”
“Fine.” Ursa accepted their business cards. “If I find something, I’ll call you.”
“Thank you,” Bel said.
“You’re welcome. Now, please leave.” Ursa stepped out from behind her desk’s protection and threw open her office door. “And don’t take this personally, but I hope never to see either of you in my shop again.”
“I hope we don’t have reason to return,” Bel said.
“Well, what do you think?” Olivia asked, throwing one last wary glance at the mermaid skeleton before they left. “Is Ursa guilty or just unfortunate in her coincidences? We theorized the killer is male because of the nudity, but Ursa is definitely not male.”
“She’s an artist, though.” Bel slid into the driver’s seat and waited for her partner to climb into the passenger side before continuing. “Maybe the desire to bare the mermaids’ bodies didn’t stem from humiliation or sexualization. Maybe it was—”
Crack!
An explosive bolt of lightning ripped through the sky so violently that both detectives flinched, the SUV swerving before Bel regained control.
“Oh my god.” Olivia leaned closer to the windshield to scan the heavens. “That was scary.”
“It looks like it’s going to pour,” Bel said.
“Glad you’re driving.”
“Gee, thanks.” Bel rolled her eyes as another bolt of lightning violated the air.
“Anyway, you were saying?”
“Right…” Bel rewound her thoughts. “The mermaids’ nudity.
Maybe it was meant to showcase the art. The early tattoos were lost to decay due to the chicken wire, but over time, the scales grew more detailed.
Ursa said it herself. Color and blackwork are different techniques.
Maybe she hated her first few attempts at color, so she wrapped them in wire and sank them to forget the shame.
But then she started getting better and wanted to frame her talent.
With every success, she increased her skill and her pride, so instead of letting the fish destroy her work, she preserved it.
No clothes. No barriers. Just art immortalized. ”
“When you put it—”
Crack!
“Good god!” Olivia shrieked as the sky flashed white before surrendering to the grey clouds.
“Anyway, when you put it like that, Ursa makes sense as the killer. The tattoo expertise, the mermaid obsessed, the embalming experience, the proximity to Bajka. Neptune’s Ink is just far enough not to be considered local, yet close enough to allow her familiarity with our lake. In theory, she fits.”
Crack!
“But without evidence, that’s all it is. A theory,” Bel said.
Crack!
And with that deafening explosion of thunder, the heavens opened up and wept, battering the SUV until Bel was driving blind. The windshield wipers were no match for the torrent beating down on them, and she eased off the gas. It was no use, though. She couldn’t see beyond the wall of water.
“Bel! Look out!” Olivia shouted, her arms flinging out before her as if she could stop the car by sheer force of will.
An ugly sound escaped Bel’s lips as she slammed on her brakes, and for a long, silent moment, the women stared at the telephone pole they’d been inches away from slamming into.
“I didn’t see that,” Bel whispered, the pounding rain the soundtrack to her panic.
“I barely saw it,” Olivia said. “It was just a shadow and my anxiety that made me yell.”
“I…” Bel’s voice wavered, and she rubbed her chest as if the soothing pressure could reach her erratic heart. “I don’t think I should drive in this.”
“No.” Olivia’s answer was instant. “I can’t see anything. It’s too dangerous. We should wait here until the rain slows.”
“Yeah… I’m sorry.”
“Why are you sorry?” Olivia asked. “You didn’t make this storm so violent.”
“No, but I…” Bel burst into tears, her reaction out of her control.
“Are you okay?” Her partner reached out and gripped her wrist. “We weren’t going that fast. You would’ve wrecked your brand-new SUV, but we would’ve been fine.”
“I’m just freaked out.” She swiped at her face with her free hand. “The news reported I died in a car accident, and then Taron Monroe’s kidnapper almost killed me after I forced an accident to help her escape. So it’s…”
“Scary?”
“Yeah.”
“Well, it’s okay. We don’t have to drive.” Olivia slid her palm down Bel’s wrist to grab her hand, and Bel stared at their intertwined fingers. Her friend. She’d so desperately missed her friend.
“I’ll call Eamon to come get us.” She pulled out her cell, and even though Olivia stiffened at his name, she didn’t let go.
“No service.” Bel cursed. “And this storm doesn’t look like it’ll let up anytime soon.” She glanced down at her necklace. “Sorry about this,” she mentally apologized to her boyfriend as she hit the panic button.
“Sorry about what?” Olivia asked.