Still Life and Death

by Tracy Gardner

  Seeing her mother wasn’t satisfied, Savanna spelled out her idea. She was a little relieved Aidan was outside with her dad. Charlotte wasn’t exactly on board, but it couldn’t be helped. Savanna had a feeling Uncle Max’s promise to “think about” taking time off was also simply an empty appeasement.

  The family was treated to a preview of Mollie’s and Nolan’s recital numbers on the patio before they separated for the evening. Mollie performed a tapless tap dance while Aidan played the music through an app on his phone, and then Nolan recited his lines—the ones he remembered—from the drama skit he’d been rehearsing. Their enthusiasm for the upcoming show was infectious.

  Savanna mentally ran through her role one last time Tuesday morning. She was nestled in the big aqua chair in front of the window at Fancy Tails a few minutes before eight a.m., when she was set to meet Detective Jordan.

  Sydney spoke from the gourmet treat counter where she was restocking pupcakes. “Okay, so you and Nick are going to grab a table at the coffee shop—”

  “Near the register. We need to be close enough to where they take the orders.”

  “Right,” Syd said. “You’ll be at a table near checkout, having coffee, when Dylan Blake makes his eight fifteen morning coffee run. Which I still find a little creepy that you’ve kept track of, just so you know. I mean, we were all kind of kidding last week about watching everyone from my window.”

  “I wasn’t kidding,” Savanna said.

  “Again. Creepy. So you and Nick will be talking about the case? About Libby or the broken window or something like that?”

  “Yes, but more importantly, I’m going to have these folders here,” Savanna said, tapping the set of dummy file folders she’d created, “on our table.” She’d made sure to use large, dark block lettering on the front of each to write a word or two summarizing each folder’s “contents.”

  Sydney came over to the nook by the window, reading them aloud. “Lawsuit, Purchase Offer, Financials, Life Insurance.”

  “Nice! What’s in them?” Sydney flipped open the PURCHASE OFFER folder. “Oh! How did you get these?”

  Savanna grinned. “They’re fake! But you looked right at them and thought they were real. I typed a made-up address and printed them from a real estate website. I even thought about trying to whip out my mirrored compact at some point, to keep an eye on him at the counter, but that might be too obvious.”

  Sydney laughed. “Nice! Like you’re a spy on a covert mission.”

  “Well, I kind of am, right?”

  “Do you have a backup plan in case Miss Priscilla doesn’t send her husband for coffee this morning? Skylar said dress rehearsals start this afternoon. What if their schedule’s different today?”

  “Don’t jinx me!”

  Sydney looked over her shoulder at the wall clock. “Eight o’clock. Don’t you have to go?”

  Savanna stood and gathered her things from the table. “Wish me luck!” She walked the half block to the coffeehouse and was pleased to find Detective Jordan already seated near the register. She took the chair opposite him and fanned out the folders on the small table. Then, scrutinizing them, she messed them up a little, moving them around. Then changed her mind and stacked them neatly. They had to look authentic. Maybe messy was better? Was this too obvious a setup? Savanna’s mouth was suddenly too dry.

  “Savanna,” Jordan said. He put a hand on the folders. “Sit back, take a breath. Here’s your coffee.” He pushed a cup over to her.

  “Sorry.” She took a sip and grimaced. It might as well be black. He’d added the tiniest amount of cream and no sugar.

  “I’ve no idea how you take your coffee. Apparently not like that,” he said, smiling.

  “It’s fine, thank you. What time is it?”

  “We’ve still got about ten minutes.” He jerked his head in the direction of the cream-and-sugar station at the end of the counter. “Go fix your coffee. Don’t rush. We’re fine.”

  Jordan’s calm did nothing to settle Savanna’s nerves. She went quickly to the counter and added three sugars, her hands trembling enough to scatter sugar granules all over the granite. She didn’t trust herself to pour the cream. She was back in her chair in a flash. She leaned across the table, keeping her voice low. “Have you thought about what we should talk about while he’s in here? We can’t rely only on him looking at the folders.”

  The detective sat back in his chair and crossed his legs. “Listen, this was a great idea. Really. But you have got to relax. If you telegraph the body language of someone who’s being sneaky or furtive, with nervous movements and speech, this won’t work. It’ll have been a waste of time, and worse, we’ll have trashed our one shot at using what we know to learn more. This negates any chance of me using the same type of information to interrogate him in a conventional setting.”

  Oh, for the love of Pete! Savanna swallowed hard and bugged her eyes out at him. She began to speak and then stopped, mirroring his actions. She sat back in her chair and picked up her coffee. She narrowed her eyes at Nick Jordan and spoke severely. “Everything you’ve just told me makes me a thousand times more nervous. So thanks for that.”

  Jordan raised his eyebrows in surprise, saying nothing.

  Oof. She’d have to apologize for her tone later; she never spoke to anyone that way. “I’ll be fine. It’s fine. I want this to go well, the same as you,” she said, mindful of her voice.

  “I’m going to ask you some questions. All you need to do is answer them. That’s it. Okay?”

  “That’ll work? But he’ll be unable to hear us at least part of the time he’s in here.” She hoped the detective knew what he was doing. She’d imagined they’d talk about complaints being filed, lawsuits, life insurance—subjects with key words Dylan Blake would hear.

  “It’ll work.” He moved the folders about on the tabletop, making it appear as if they’d been going through them. He pulled the edge of a page out the bottom of one and turned another to face himself instead of Savanna. She reached to nudge some pages from another one, and he put a hand out, palm down in the air over their table. “All good.” He pulled a pen and small notebook from inside his jacket and flipped the notebook open to a page that already had something written on it.

  She focused on the chalkboard on the wall behind Jordan, reading the price list for the specialty drinks.

  Jordan cleared his throat. “Showtime.” He sat forward, elbows on the table, and Savanna did the same. He waited, timing his first question. As Dylan Blake crossed her peripheral vision, approaching the register, Jordan asked, “Can you prove what you’re telling me?”

  She frowned at first, and then understood what he was doing. “Yes, I can. Let me show you.” She opened the first file folder and turned it around to face Detective Jordan, pointing at the middle of the first piece of paper. “This part goes over the property details for Libby’s Blooms.”

  “I see,” Jordan said. He clicked his pen and jotted something illegible down in his notepad. “What about this?” He pulled a page from behind the first one.

  Now Blake was directly behind Jordan and in Savanna’s line of sight, a few feet from their table.

  With the ambient noise in the coffee shop, Savanna could only hear words and snippets of conversation from those around her, even from the two women at the next table over. Jordan must be figuring an occasional meaningful word or phrase would float to Blake’s ears.

  Savanna spoke up. “That’s the purchase agreement Mike told me about.”

  “Interesting.” He flipped the folder closed and reached for another one. “And these are the files on the Kents’ finances?”

  “That’s right. I know they used a financial advisor to invest their money.”

  Jordan flipped through the papers in the open folder, stopping to write down a few things. “Now as far as the investment losses, do you have something that cov
ers that?”

  “Yes,” she said, pointing at nothing on the lines of text in front of him. “There’s some information right here. And you know about the complaint they filed, right?”

  “What complaint do you mean? There have been dozens through the years.”

  Blake paid using a card, and should’ve stepped to the end of the counter to wait for his order, but instead he only moved a few feet down. He stooped and looked into the biscotti-and-scone case. His normally handsome profile was skewed by the grimace on his lips, his jaw set forward. Blake’s brow was furrowed, and his body appeared rigid as he stood quite still. He had to be listening.

  “The one to the IRS—there’s paperwork in here going over the details.” Savanna passed the detective another folder.

  He made a good show of perusing the dummy documents in the folder. “Do you know if there was any legal action taken?”

  “There was, actually. It’s toward the back,” she said, reaching across and pointing. “It’s on letterhead from Black, Jones, and Sydowski, the law firm down the street.”

  “And all of this happened in the last several months, you said?” Jordan pulled a page from the back of the folder and set it down, picking up his pen again and jotting several lines of scrawled cursive in his notebook. “Good, very good,” he said as he wrote.

  Now the next customer had paid, and Dylan Blake was forced to move to the end of the counter, where Savanna couldn’t see him well without making it obvious.

  Jordan sorted the folders into a neat stack on the table between them. “This was very helpful. And I can keep these? Your information should lead us in the right direction. I appreciate you coming to me.”

  A splash of yellow and blue registered in Savanna’s peripheral vision as Dylan Blake’s name was called for his coffee, and he took it and left.

  “He’s gone,” Jordan confirmed. “I hope he caught enough of that. You did great!”

  She finally relaxed; she’d been sitting with all her muscles tensed and not even realizing it. “Really? Thank you. I couldn’t see him most of the time. How did he look when he left?”

  “Hard to say. But if he’s got anything to hide, I’m sure we’ll know.”

  She nodded. “Good. All right, I’ve got to get to school before I’m late.”

  Jordan checked his watch. “It’s eight twenty-two.”

  “What? Oh, wow. That was stressful. Seven minutes from when he arrived? It felt like an hour,” she said, laughing at herself.

  She and Jordan walked together as far as Savanna’s car, parked in front of Fancy Tails. As she watched the detective cross the street and head toward the precinct, she had a stroke of genius. Or at least a decent idea; she wouldn’t know until she tried it. She knocked on Fancy Tails until her sister let her in. The salon was still closed.

  “Did it go okay?”

  “It went great. Give me your glasses.”

  “What? Why?”

  “I’ll bring them back. You don’t need them right now, anyway—you aren’t driving anywhere.”

  Syd moved to her purse and handed her glasses over. Savanna piled her hair into a messy topknot and grabbed the rust-colored chiffon scarf off her sister’s desk, tying it around her hair like a headband. “How do I look?”

  “Um. Like Savanna in a scarf and glasses.”

  She groaned. “I’m working on an idea and I only have a few minutes before I have to run to school. I need something...do you have any obnoxious lipstick in your purse? Or eyeliner, maybe?”

  Syd darted to her desk and turned her purse upside down. “Yes! Ooh, this color looks awful on me. You can keep it. Here.”

  Savanna used the dark magenta lipstick and then stood in front of Sydney while she drew dark brown eyeliner in wide rims around her eyes.

  Syd stepped back, appraising her. “Not bad. Not so much Savanna anymore.”

  “I’m hoping Marcus Valentine doesn’t pay much attention to the parents in the lobby. I don’t think he’ll have a clue who I am.”

  “Okay, I have no idea what you’re up to, but none of this works if he watches you walk back across the street afterward and get into your car that you park in front of my shop almost every single day. Give me your keys, and I’ll put it out back.”

  Breathless now, Savanna stood in front of the Owners / Occupants Only door between Libby’s Blooms and Priscilla’s Dance Academy. The stairway through the window was empty. Before she could lose her nerve, she pushed the buzzer for apartment 202. She waited. A minute. Two whole minutes. She pushed it again. This was Marcus Valentine’s apartment, she was positive. When she’d run into his neighbor Brianna that day up on the second floor, she’d been in the hallway with apartments 201 and 202, and 201 had a cute bunny and duckling Easter wreath on the door. She didn’t know Marcus Valentine at all, but she was betting her entire plan that he was in 202.

  The speaker on the intercom crackled with a man’s voice. “Hello?”

  Savanna tried her hardest to sound like she was breaking up, leaving gaps between a few words. “I—dropping—there?” It had happened all the time in her Chicago apartment; the intercom had constantly been in need of repair. She stared at the speaker expectantly.

  “I can’t hear you. Who is this?”

  “Sorry—documents—promised—morning.” She clutched the folders in one hand and rocked back on her heels, looking up and down Main Street. It was still pretty quiet this early in the morning. She wasn’t attracting any unwanted attention.

  “Hold on, I’m coming down.” He sounded irritated.

  She’d woken him up. Marcus descended the stairs in bare feet and pajama pants, pulling a T-shirt over his head on the way down, and pushed the door open. “Hi. The intercom must be broken.” He tapped it.

  “I’m so sorry. Now I’m not sure I have the right address? Is this not 3705?” She took two steps backward to look up at the building and purposely stumbled, opening her fingers and letting the folders fly out of her hand.

  She and Valentine watched the papers drift to the sidewalk. He bent to help Savanna gather them up as she did her best to flip the folders face up with the block lettering visible. “I can’t believe I did that,” she said.

  “This building is 3695,” he said. “You probably want the law office next door.” He stood up and pointed east.

  “Yes! That’s exactly what I was trying to find. And I’ve mixed up all the Kents’ important files now,” she said, smacking her own forehead. She stacked the file folders in the crook of her arm and looked at the young man. She so wished Nick Jordan had told her what he’d found out about him, why he was living in Carson. She’d hoped to push him, if he was responsible for Libby’s death. Maybe he’d see her files and start worrying he’d been found out. What safer place to prod a potential killer than in public in broad daylight?

  But Valentine didn’t appear bothered. “Good luck.” He went back inside and upstairs. The only drawback to both of her plans this morning was the lack of instant gratification. It wouldn’t be apparent until sometime later today or maybe tomorrow whether she’d struck a sensitive nerve with a murderer. Now they’d have to wait and watch.

  Savanna hurried around the block to the back of Fancy Tails, where Sydney had left her keys on the front seat of her car. She took the glasses and scarf off and headed to school with a few minutes to spare. She’d completely forgotten about her dramatic new eyeliner look until Elaina Jenson gave her the strangest stare when she delivered her students to Savanna.

  Savanna sat beside Aidan in the darkened auditorium of Carson High School, waiting for Mollie’s ballet number. There were still several ahead of her, and then her tap dance was nine songs after that, plenty of time to change costumes. Dress rehearsal ran for two days, with a one-day break before the recital this Friday. When Aidan had asked if she had any interest in coming with him tonight, she’d immediately said
yes. She fondly remembered her dancing days, and all the magical excitement surrounding rehearsal and the spring recital. Plus she needed an excuse to keep an eye on the Blakes and Marcus Valentine.

  In the large holding area backstage, she’d carefully styled Mollie’s fine blond hair into a bun, using dabs of hair gel when the silky strands wouldn’t stop slipping through her fingertips. She’d finally gotten it perfectly centered, with most of the fly-aways tucked into bobby pins, then told Mollie to hold her breath while she’d spritzed it with hairspray before sending her over to her group—a dozen or so children around her age, wearing sparkly, poufy pink ballet costumes with springy tutus.

  Aidan had arrived before her and snagged them seats dead center in front of the stage, in the sixth row, which, he told Savanna, was the perfect distance from the stage for pictures and video—far enough away to be able to see the full dance, including the feet, but close enough to see detail. In full dad-mode tonight, his camcorder was on a tripod in front of him and his camera was ready for still shots. Photos and video weren’t allowed in the auditorium during the recital, only in rehearsal. She could see he’d done this before.

  She hadn’t shared with him her ulterior motive for wanting to come to dress rehearsal tonight, but she needed to know if her and Jordan’s ploy this morning had had any effect at all. Now, as the jazz instructor helped her students find their marks onstage, Miss Priscilla was visible in the wings at stage left, talking with her husband. With the dim lighting, it was impossible to get a feel for their interaction.

  Five or six songs later, Mollie’s group came onstage. Aidan went to work filming and snapping photos, while Savanna had the pleasure of sitting back and enjoying the dance. Miss Priscilla returned to the stage to give them notes, reminding them the most important thing to do was to smile. Savanna leaned over and offered again to operate the camcorder or camera, but Aidan declined. He turned to her. “Look how great she did on just the first run-through!”