The Mystery of the Curiosities Page 7

  “How can you be certain the clothes weren’t his own?” Calvin asked.

  Cop mode, activate!

  “They weren’t,” I insisted. “I swear, if I still had a home, I’d bet on it that this guy was made to look like Davis from these newspapers. His hair was right, he even had that ugly little beard. So… you can use his picture as a model for who the dead man was.”

  “Good grief, Sebastian,” Pop muttered, having stopped eating himself. He was staring at us both. “What have you gotten yourself into this time?”

  I LOOKED cool in aviator sunglasses.

  Pop had found an old pair of prescription sunglasses that were mine once upon a time in a drawer. Why had I not kept this style? Maybe only I thought I looked cool.

  I was sitting in the passenger seat of Calvin’s car as he drove to the precinct. The dreary morning crawled by during rush hour.

  Calvin turned the wipers on. “I’d rather have more of that epic snowstorm than this freezing rain,” he murmured.

  Agreed. This was the sort of cold, biting rain that made your soul shiver. At least the snow was pretty. It was mostly melted now, piles shoveled on street corners here and there, looking more like dirty blocks of ice than anything.

  Calvin’s hand touched mine.

  I glanced at him and wove our fingers together.

  I take what life gives me without much trouble. I think I’ve always been this way. Relaxed and composed to the point of it being suspicious. Hysterics get you nowhere. I see it as a waste of time and energy when you could instead take a deep breath and apply logic to your problem.

  Not that I don’t get upset now and then.

  And I definitely had cause for that now, but really—it wouldn’t have helped.

  I was homeless, but I had a loving boyfriend and father who would make sure I wasn’t actually without a roof over me. I had no possessions, but besides society possibly frowning over me running around naked, they were just things. Things that made me happy, of course, but my building had blown up and I had walked away with only a cut and a bump on the head.

  I was afraid to ask if all my neighbors had been so lucky.

  “You should get a dog,” I stated when Calvin put his hand back on the wheel.

  “What?”

  “A dog. I bet Pop would help pick out a good one.”

  “I’m too busy for a dog, Sebastian.”

  “Well… maybe you’d be inclined to take one less case or two if you had a pup.”

  “It doesn’t really work that way,” Calvin replied.

  “Quinn said you’ve just been doing cold case work lately.”

  “That doesn’t make them any less important. Maybe they’re even more so. Justice has yet to be served.”

  “Man, you’ve got a heart of gold.” I met Calvin’s expression, and he gave me a cute, sort of shy smile. “I can help take care of the dog too.”

  Calvin was quiet for a moment. He drove around a taxi and stopped at the next red light. “If we were living together?” he finally asked.

  Er… was that what I had suggested? The idea of waking up beside Calvin every morning definitely made me excited.

  “Snow and Winter—it’s destiny,” I joked instead, because I didn’t want to make Calvin uncomfortable and it was way too early in our relationship to consider this huge step. “Can’t you see our mailbox now?”

  He smiled a little.

  I waved my hand. “Not anytime soon.”

  “Yeah.”

  I dropped the dog and mailbox conversation.

  Calvin managed to snag an open parking spot on the side of the road when we reached the precinct, and parallel parked like a goddamn wizard.

  I whistled as he turned off the car and we got out. “Show off.”

  He laughed quietly. “Don’t be jealous. You get to be chauffeured everywhere.”

  “True. It’s great,” I agreed, following him onto the sidewalk and toward the door where a few uniformed officers mingled.

  They nodded at Calvin and shared a brief good morning. He opened the door and let me walk in first, then followed. Getting to bypass that same, less-than-chipper woman I had met in December was great. Although she did offer a glare that I suspected was as close as she got to saying hello.

  We got into the elevator alone and Calvin pressed the button for his floor. After the doors closed, he reached out, took my hand, and gave it a brief squeeze. The warm strength of Calvin’s touch was like silent love and assurance. “You look good in those shades,” he said as the doors opened and he dropped his hand.

  “Yeah? All I need is a dramatic line to say every time I put them on.”

  I followed Calvin down a short hall and turned to walk through the open space of desks and detectives who were either early risers or hadn’t yet gone home from the night before. Calvin made for another hall, unlocked his office, and ushered me inside. He left the light off, because he’s a sweetheart, and hung up his jacket.

  “So,” he began, opening the window blinds enough for gray light to come in. “Sit down. Let’s talk about Jefferson Davis.”

  “Don’t interrogate me,” I warned, unbuttoning my coat as I sat in the chair across from Calvin at his desk.

  “You’d be in a smaller and more uncomfortable room if I were doing that.”

  “Remember that time you offered to book me and strip me?”

  “Behave.”

  I grinned.

  He took a moment to shuffle some papers and folders around before picking up a pen and filling out a form. “What time did you get home?”

  I tugged my phone out of my pocket and checked the time I had called Calvin in a panic. “I called you at 7:18. So just a few minutes before.”

  “Tell me what happened after you walked in the front door of the building.”

  “Checked my mail—”

  “Anything?”

  “Preapproved credit cards?”

  “Go on.”

  “Went upstairs, talked to my neighbor for twenty seconds, and went inside.”

  “The door was locked?”

  I nodded. As a matter of fact, I had had the lock on my apartment changed after Christmas. So a whole lot of good that had done. “Yeah. Nothing seemed weird. But there he was, just lying on the floor.”

  “Where, exactly?”

  “Beside the couch. On his stomach.”

  Calvin was writing as I talked. “Then what?”

  “Umm… I shut the door. And… then I checked the guy.”

  “That was dangerous.”

  “I had a dictionary.”

  “What?”

  I shook my head. “Never mind.”

  “Did you touch anything?”

  “Can you lift fingerprints off soot and embers?”

  “Don’t be smart, Sebastian.”

  “I touched Davis. I mean, he didn’t appear to be breathing, so I pushed him onto his back.” I touched my chest as I spoke. “He had blood here. And on the floor.”

  Calvin glanced up. “Was it fresh?”

  “I—I don’t think so, not entirely. He wasn’t stiff, so if rigor had set in, it hadn’t gotten further than his face.”

  Calvin stared.

  “So that makes it as early as one or two, most likely, though, around four or five yesterday evening that he was killed.” I waved my hand while talking. “And you know, he couldn’t have been alone.”

  “Why do you say that?”

  “It’s not like someone shot him and then carried a dead guy into my building, up three flights, and deposited him in my place. So if at least one person was with him, he would have been killed while they were inside. I don’t think it was a knife wound, but if he were shot, the killer would have used a silencer, right? I have neighbors all on different schedules—someone would have heard and reported a gunshot.”

  Calvin set his pen down and stared at me.

  “And unless he was deranged, he definitely didn’t offer to be some sick sacrifice, so he trusted the person he w
as with. Nothing in my apartment was out of place, so no struggle.”

  Calvin grunted.

  “And I guess the killer brought those clothes with them. The petticoat, I mean. Killed the guy, dressed him….” I frowned and tapped my chin. “But if nothing was stolen or ransacked—this was definitely deliberate. Do you think someone was trying to frame me?”

  “I don’t know, Sherlock.”

  “What?”

  “You finished solving this case for me, yet?”

  “Now who’s being a smartass?”

  “Can you think of any reason he was dressed and staged to look like Jefferson Davis?”

  “Confederate sympathizers?” I asked with a shrug. “I really have no idea.”

  Calvin picked up his pen again. “You told the fire inspector last night that you didn’t smell smoke or gas before the explosion. Are you certain?”

  “Yeah.”

  Calvin nodded and wrote. “I got a call while you were in the shower. Gas company confirms it wasn’t a leak. The inspectors believe some sort of homemade device set off the explosion.”

  “A bomb?”

  “Yes. Three bodies were recovered,” Calvin said. “It’s a homicide case now.”

  “Jesus.” I put a hand over my mouth.

  “I have to confirm now if the bodies found were all tenants or if one was your intruder.”

  I nodded weakly. Sally and I had walked away. We were still breathing. We still had lives to live, people to love, jobs to work. “I think it came from around my floor or the fourth,” I whispered. “When I—I was in the hallway and I heard my neighbor, so I went to help, and I could feel cold air.”

  Calvin only nodded in agreement. “Do you need a glass of water?” he asked after a beat.

  I shook my head. “I’m okay.”

  “Is there anything else you can tell me that might help?”

  I started to say no but stopped.

  The note.

  “Shit. The note. There was another note,” I said quickly. “The same paper and handwriting as the two I got at the Emporium.”

  Without moving a muscle, Calvin’s entire demeanor changed. “What did it say?”

  “Umm…. ‘It started with a fire.’”

  “Did you keep the note?”

  “No. Sorry. I dropped it.”

  “But you have the other two?”

  “Yes.”

  “‘I know you like mysteries.’ That was the first, correct?” Calvin asked.

  “And the second said, ‘Curious?’”

  Calvin rubbed his jaw. “I need you to do something for me, Seb, and don’t argue.”

  “I can’t promise the second one.”

  “Keep the Emporium closed today.”

  “I have rent to pay. I can’t stay closed.”

  “No. You need to,” Calvin responded. “Because someone is singling you out. The first note was vandalism. The second was trespassing, the third was attempted murder. I don’t want you alone in places where this person knows to find you.”

  Fuck me, this wasn’t exactly easy to argue against.

  “What am I supposed to do, then?” I asked. “Hire a tough guy named Bubba to be my muscle?”

  “Lay low. Stay with your father,” Calvin said.

  “Calvin—”

  “I said not to argue.”

  “And I said I couldn’t promise that.”

  Calvin frowned. “If I could afford to stay with you instead, I would. But I’m on this case now, and I want to solve it fast. And I’ll be able to focus if I know you are somewhere safe. Please do this for me.”

  I huffed and slumped in the chair, staring at the ceiling. “God, you do such a good guilt trip. If you weren’t so cute, I’d ignore you.”

  “Glad to hear my freckles have such sway.”

  I snorted and looked back at Calvin. “You’ve been hanging around me too much.”

  “Probably.”

  I smiled. “Can I go, then, Detective? Or do I need someone to walk me home?”

  Calvin sat up and pulled his wallet from his back pocket. He took out a few bills and handed them over. “Take a cab back.”

  “I have money.”

  “Seb—”

  “Fine. Fine, fine.” I took the money and shoved it into my coat pocket. “I’m just going to use it to buy cupcakes and whiskey, though. You can find me at Pop’s between the hours of now and forever. I’ll be drunk under a blanket, watching television.”

  “Atta boy.”

  I DID hail a cab, but I had the guy drive to my street instead. Or as close as he could, considering the number of vehicles and people and roped off areas. I paid him and climbed out. I walked through the crowds that gathered to watch as the fire department finished dousing the remains of my building with water, while others combed through the debris.

  I stopped at the line of tape that kept civilians at a safe distance. There was no structure left. The entire building had collapsed into a pile of dark rubble. It was surreal as hell.

  “Did everyone make it out?” someone asked from behind me.

  “I don’t know,” a second said.

  “Oh, I heard on the news this morning that some bodies were found,” a third voice chimed in.

  “How awful,” the first answered.

  I felt my stomach roll. Whether I was friendly with my neighbors, or even knew their names, wasn’t the point. Someone had made a threat and attack against me, and others had suffered as a result.

  Others had died.

  Not me.

  I dug my fingers into my palms, nails biting the flesh. It made me angry. Really, really fucking angry. But like how I dealt with the rest of life’s curveballs, I took a breath. Because lashing out blindly wasn’t going to do shit. But finding out who did this? Sending them to jail where they belonged? Giving closure to the families, like Calvin did for his cold cases?

  That was how I was going to channel this rage.

  I had a knack for encouraging the unstable to latch on to me. Just as in December, this was personal, and I wasn’t going to let it rest. If I really was the cat curiosity tried to kill, I figured it had only gotten one or two of my lives so far. Plenty left.

  There was a mystery afoot.

  So much for my cupcakes and whiskey.

  CHAPTER SIX

  I STEPPED away from the crowd and my former home when my phone started ringing. I held it close to see Max’s name on the caller ID. “I didn’t call you,” I said upon answering. “I’m so sorry.”

  “You’re alive!” he shouted. “Oh my God! I saw on the news this morning! Seb, what happened?”

  “It’s a long story.”

  “But that was your apartment building, wasn’t it?”

  “Yes.”

  “Holy shit. Holy shit,” Max cried. “Was it a gas explosion?”

  I hesitated. I didn’t want to worry him more than necessary. “Maybe. They’re still investigating,” I lied.

  Max groaned. “Where are you staying? With Calvin?”

  “My dad’s right now.”

  “Do you need anything?”

  “No, I’m okay. But thank you.”

  “What about the Emporium? Do you—I can run it alone if you need.”

  “I’m going to stay closed for a day or two,” I answered. “Your pay won’t be affected.”

  “I don’t care about that.”

  Sweet kid.

  I had taken another step and was just about to tell Max once more that I was really okay, because the poor guy sounded more shaken than I did, when something hit my foot hard. “Ouch! Son of a bitch,” I muttered, looking down.

  “What? You okay?” Max’s voice echoed.

  “Yeah, fine—” I stared down at a brick beside my foot.

  I whipped my head up and looked around, but no one seemed to be paying me any notice. Uniformed personnel walked about, and civilians were all still watching the scene behind me.

  “Max, I have to go. I’ll call you later. Thank you again. I
mean it.”

  “Sure, Seb. Be safe, all right? Do you know how hard it’ll be to find another boss with your level of sarcasm and crotchety behavior? One doesn’t just stumble onto that every day.”

  “You’re too kind.” I said good-bye and hung up.

  I looked down at the brick again before crouching to examine it. Antique, similar to the ones in the Emporium, with a rubber band and slip of paper. I swallowed and pulled it free. Unfolding the note carefully at the corners, I squinted to read the message.

  He lost the whales but not the mermaid.

  Below that was an address on the Upper West Side.

  I frowned and read it again. He lost the whales? Who was he? What mermaid?

  I couldn’t make sense of the message, but I knew the address.

  “Museum of Natural History,” I murmured.

  I SHOULD have called Calvin.

  But going to the museum wasn’t dangerous. And really, I was only looking around. It’s not like they had mermaids on display, so what was I even doing there? What did the clue mean?

  No big deal.

  But as I raced up the steps, past the statue of Theodore Roosevelt, it struck me suddenly that the museum did have a whale display. A massive whale. It was a ninety-four-foot-long model of a blue whale that hung suspended from the huge Hall of Ocean Life. What did that mean, though?

  Was there going to be another clue waiting for me?

  This was like some sort of fucked-up treasure hunt. Would a dead body be my X that marks the spot?

  Damn it, I really should have called Calvin.

  But now I was too wrapped up in seeing where this led. I couldn’t walk away. Not yet. Calling him was logical, of course. He was a cop; he was working with the fire investigators and would undoubtedly solve the murder and find out who tried to off me. But he was also my boyfriend, and call it some stupid macho-man thing, but I felt like a damsel in distress with my default to chaos being to call Calvin.

  I could handle this.

  And I’d tell him what I learned.

  I stood at one of the kiosks in the main entrance, holding my magnifying glass to the screen as I fumbled through ticket options. One adult ticket, no special exhibits. I swiped my credit card and waited for the stub to be dispensed from the machine.