Now Casey understood why the case wasn’t a high priority. Everyone except Walker believed it should be closed. “What do you think has happened to her?” she asked. Walker must have formed a theory.
“I honestly don’t know. Why would someone kidnap a woman in a coma, and what would he do with her? She wasn’t on a ventilator, but she has to be fed, turned, checked. And where could she be? We’ve checked every medical facility in the country.” Walker coughed into her napkin. “What have you discovered?”
Casey hesitated. “Uh…”
Walker rolled her eyes. “Do you mind if I give you a little advice?”
“No. Anything you can share with me would be great.” Casey clasped her hands on the table and stared in anticipation at Walker, who grinned.
“Listen, I like your attitude. I have a good feeling about you. If you’re going to get anywhere, you’ll need cops on your side, okay? You share with me, I share with you. And sometimes you’ll want someone with a gun and handcuffs around. Trust me on that. So I’ll ask you again. What have you discovered?”
“Not much,” Casey admitted. “I’ve only just started working on the case.” She recounted the important parts of her meeting with Ellen and her search of Mrs. Rose’s house.
“Good catch about the nightstand,” Walker said. Casey squirmed when blood rushed to her cheeks, then her shoulders slumped when Walker added, “Useless without knowing what was in the envelope, though.”
“Do you think you’ll—we’ll find her?”
Walker pushed her plate away. “I don’t know. We have her information out there. I suppose we could put up posters, but what would we say? If you see a woman being wheeled down the street on a gurney, call us? Wherever she is, she’s inside, where nobody except her supposed son will ever see her.”
But what would anyone want with a comatose woman? “Do you think she’s still alive?”
“I don’t know.” The possibility that she wasn’t hung between them. “Listen, if you want to bounce something off me about the case, call me, okay? You might tell me something that connects a couple of dots.”
“I’ll do that.” Knowing she could consult with Walker instantly made her first case less intimidating.
“I’ll call you if I need to ask you something.” Walker wagged her finger. “Or if we receive complaints about a nosy PI.”
“You won’t!”
“Can I have your card?”
Her card? Shit. She hadn’t thought about business cards, but gamely patted her pockets. “Uh…”
Walker shook her head and pulled a business card and pen from her blazer pocket. “Here, write your number on the back. Give me your email address, too.”
Feeling like an ass, Casey did so.
Walker took the card and stared at it. “Casey Cook. That’s it? No snappy company name?” Casey opened her mouth to reply, then clamped it shut when Walker winked. “I bet this is your first case.”
“Uh, yeah.” It wouldn’t take a crack detective to figure that out. If her absolutely stunning display of confidence hadn’t tipped Walker off, the date on her licence would have.
Walker snorted. “And it’s to find a missing comatose woman. Jesus. The guys back at the station won’t believe this.”
“Do you think you can keep it between us?”
“I suppose I can.” Walker bit her lip. “For now. Anyway, I have to run.” She waggled her eyebrows. “Thanks for lunch.”
Casey bit back a surprised retort. “Yeah. Sure.”
Walker slid from the booth and patted Casey’s shoulder as she passed her. “We’re going to get along just fine.”
There went more of Ellen’s retainer than Casey had expected. She looked over her shoulder and watched Walker stroll from the diner. The waitress slapped the bill onto the table. “Here you go. Pay at the cash,” she muttered.
Casey read the amount and sighed. After leaving the tip—fifteen percent, despite the waitress’s attitude—she settled the bill at the cash.
Outside, she sat on her bike with her helmet resting on her knee, mentally reviewing her to do list. “Make sure you wear your helmet,” a familiar voice yelled. Walker, stopped at the traffic light, rolled up her window. If Walker hadn’t already made Casey feel like a five-year-old, she would have succeeded now. Casey waved, but Walker pulled away without a backward glance. Well, it wasn’t as if Casey had expected any respect as a PI…
She refocused on her mental list. She’d called Ellen and arranged to kill two birds with one stone: rummage through Mrs. Rose’s purse and meet with Sissy, but not until tomorrow night. Her date with Leah came first. Butterflies took flight in Casey’s stomach. Focus, focus! She’d go home and, uh, brainstorm, while she counted down the hours to her date. Uh-huh, she thought, admitting that she’d be useless for the rest of the afternoon. She’d put in extra hours tomorrow. She’d promised Ellen eighteen hours, and Ellen would get them.
Chapter Three
Casey stepped off the bus and darted into the bus shelter to avoid getting wet. Did it have to rain? Her fantasy of breezing into the restaurant and sweeping Leah off her feet hadn’t included wet hair and the damp bedraggled look. She glanced at her watch. Since she didn’t want to be late, she’d arrived twenty minutes early and could afford to wait out the shower, while appealing to every god and goddess she’d heard of to give the sun a turn. One of them must have taken pity on her. With five minutes to go, the rain eased up. Casey seized the opportunity to jog into the restaurant.
The greeter smiled at her. “Table for…?”
“I’m meeting someone. Maybe she’s here? Leah…”
The greeter glanced at the table plan in front of her. “Leah who?”
Leah…she didn’t know. Leah had always been “Leah, the popular and self-assured woman who would never look at Casey twice.”
The greeter tapped her pencil against the table plan.
“Do you mind if I pop into the restaurant and see if she’s here?”
“No, go right ahead.”
Casey wandered past the reception podium and scanned the dining room. Shit, Leah wasn’t here. She checked her watch again. Three minutes to go. “I’ll just wait here,” she said, trying not to look as if she was worried about being stood up. She wasn’t worried. Nope. Not worried.
Ten minutes later, it was becoming more difficult to smile at the greeter every time their eyes met. “What time were you supposed to be meeting your friend?” the woman asked.
“Six.”
The greeter glanced at her watch and frowned.
“She’s always late,” Casey said with an exaggerated sigh.
“Why don’t I seat you? I’m sure she’ll be here soon.”
“Sure.” It would be better than being stared at, but what if Leah didn’t show up?
The greeter led her to a window table. “Here you go.” She set two menus on the table.
Casey sat down and stared out the window. If it was anyone else, she wouldn’t think twice about pulling out her phone to call and ask where the hell she was. But in this case, Casey had to play it cool, not sound desperate. She clenched her hands on her lap and resisted the urge to look at her watch again. What if Leah didn’t show? Should she slink out and hope the greeter had gone to the bathroom, or order dinner and pretend that she hadn’t just experienced a humiliating rejection every time someone looked over at the poor woman sitting by herself?
A waiter stopped at the table to fill the water glasses. Was that sympathy in his eyes? The evening hadn’t even started and it was already a nightmare. Casey struggled to suppress her rising panic. Leah wouldn’t set up a date and then blow her off, right? Maybe anxiety made Leah lose track of time. She was probably as nervous as Casey.
A gleaming red sports car pulled into a parking spot outside Casey’s window. The driver’s door opened and Leah stepped out, looking as if she’d spent the afternoon being pampered at a spa. Okay, so maybe she wasn’t anxious. At least she was here! Casey’s throat tightened
. She grabbed her water glass and gulped half its contents, then set it on the table and smiled when Leah approached.
“Hey.” Leah pulled out the chair across from Casey and smiled.
“Hi.”
They stared at each other.
“Have you been here before?” Leah asked.
“No,” Casey said while her mind screamed, Where the hell were you? It’s almost 6:15! Her fingernails dug into her palms.
“Have you ordered?”
“No.”
They both reached for their menus. Casey scanned the offerings. Typical Italian fare. Normally she’d go for lasagna or tortellini, but Leah had mentioned pizza on the phone. “What do you like on your pizza?” she asked, her nose still buried in the menu.
“Meat. Pepperoni, ham, beef, bacon.”
Hmm, it sounded like the meat-lovers pizza was right up Leah’s alley.
“With cheese. Lots and lots of cheese.”
Casey preferred a pizza lighter on meat and cheese, but the meat-lovers pizza wouldn’t kill her. She closed her menu and swallowed. “You look nice.”
Leah flicked back her hair. “Thanks.”
The waiter arrived and turned to Leah. “What can I get you to drink?”
“White wine.”
“Certainly. And for you?”
“Coke,” Casey said.
He made a note and eyed the closed menus. “Are you ready to order?”
“Sure,” Casey said, since the waiter was still focused on her. “Do you think a medium pizza will be big enough?” she asked Leah.
“Um, yeah.”
“Okay. One medium meat-lovers pizza, with extra cheese.”
The waiter nodded. “Is that all?”
“No,” Leah said, at the same time Casey nodded. “I’ll have the fettuccine.”
What? She’d thought…she couldn’t eat a medium pizza by herself.
The waiter turned back to Casey. “Are you sure you want a medium?”
No! “Yes.” And if he could run along before embarrassing her any further, that would be great.
“All right. One medium meat-lovers pizza with Coke, and one fettuccine with a white wine.” He gathered up the menus and left.
Casey and Leah stared at each other. “How have you been? How’s your day been?” Casey asked.
Leah launched into a detailed account of her day from the moment she’d risen: the TV shows she’d watched, the stores she’d visited, the food she’d eaten—and that only took them to mid-afternoon. Apart from “uh-huh” and “cool,” Casey couldn’t get a word in edgewise. Leah paused when the waiter returned with their drinks, then picked up mid-sentence and talked until their meals were on the table. Her brows shot up. “You have quite the appetite.”
“I thought maybe you’d have some,” Casey said hopefully. “You did say on the phone that this place has great pizza.” She couldn’t keep the irritation out of her voice, but Leah didn’t notice.
“It does, but I wasn’t in the mood for pizza tonight.”
Something Casey would have appreciated knowing before she’d ordered a pizza three times larger than she could eat. Okay, she hadn’t asked Leah if she wanted pizza; she’d assumed. But did Leah honestly think she was ordering a medium for herself? She could have spoken up, if she was aware of Casey’s existence. So far, Casey felt invisible. Maybe Leah was nervous. Some people clammed up, others couldn’t shut up. Normally Casey’s nerves would make her stumble over her words, but her ruffled feathers were overruling the butterflies—when she had the chance to open her mouth. Well, it was still early. Maybe Leah would calm down and notice that she wasn’t eating alone.
Casey lifted a slice of pizza onto her plate and flashed back to Ellen knocking back her wine. Pizza for dinner twice in a row. Good thing she loved it. Leah popped a forkful of fettuccine into her mouth…and stopped talking. Casey quickly finished chewing her mouthful of pizza. “I’m working a case,” she blurted.
“A case? Oh, right, Diane mentioned that you’re trying the PI thing.”
Trying the PI thing? She hadn’t sweated over getting her licence on a whim.
“What’s the case about?”
Casey wanted to kick herself. She didn’t want a reputation for blabbing her clients’ private business to anyone who’d listen. “A missing person case. I can’t talk about the details, though. Confidential.” Why had she even brought it up? “What do you do?” she asked, realizing that she didn’t know.
“I’m working on my thesis for my PhD in psychology.”
“What’s your thesis about?”
“The details would bore you. Let’s just say it concerns relationships.” Leah’s eyes lit up. “Guess what I did last weekend? Went to that new club on Beach Street. Have you been?”
Casey shook her head.
“You pretty much have to know someone to get in.”
Maybe they could go after supper, not that Casey was big on clubbing. She’d prefer a movie followed by a coffee, and then home to bed. She wasn’t the “arrive at eleven and stay up until four” type.
“Let’s see, who was there.” Leah pursed her lips, then reeled off a list of names and proceeded to gossip about people Casey didn’t know or care about. She could feel her eyes glazing over, and only Leah’s every third or fourth word got through. This date was a disaster. Mismatched didn’t begin to describe it. And maybe she was being sensitive, but she’d bet Leah told everyone else the details of her thesis. Why had Leah wanted to get together with a dumb PI? How could Casey politely wiggle her way out of the movie so she could cut her losses, go home, and marvel at how some people were best admired from afar?
When Casey had finished her third—and final—piece of pizza, Leah finally lapsed into silence. The waiter came over to see how they were doing. He lifted Leah’s empty plate from the table, then frowned at the half of the pizza still waiting to be eaten. “Was it all right?”
“It was fine,” Casey said, aghast.
“You sure?”
“Yes.” Jesus, she hated waiters who called attention to how much she had or hadn’t eaten. They were supposed to make the dining experience a pleasurable one, not embarrass people.
“I can put this into a takeout container for you.”
“Sure, do that.” Anything to get rid of the guy.
He whisked the pizza off the table and strode away. Casey and Leah stared at each other. The seconds dragged by. Leah swallowed the last of her wine and narrowed her eyes at Casey. “Maybe we should skip the movie.”
Casey instantly relaxed. “Good idea. I’m glad we met for dinner, but—”
“Let’s go back to your place.”
“What?”
“We can’t go to mine. My roommate’s home.”
“What are you talking about?”
Leah snorted. “Do I have to draw you a diagram? Come on! So we’re not exactly hitting it off. I’m not looking for anything serious, anyway.” She leaned forward. “Sometimes it’s better with someone you don’t click with on a conversational level. No talking. Just raw action.”
Wait, wait, wait! Leah wasn’t suggesting… “Look—I mean—we just met.”
“We’ve been passing each other at parties for years.”
“I pass a lot of people at parties. That doesn’t mean…I like to know someone a little better before I take that step, okay?”
“You’re so cute,” Leah said with a giggle. “I’m liking this idea more and more. What do you need to know?”
Her last name, for a start—hopefully very early on in their relationship, you know, the one they’d have before they slept together. “Leah…it’s not you, okay. I don’t sleep with people I hardly know.”
Leah drew back. She arched a skeptical brow. “Is it that we can’t go back to your place for some reason? You’re not one of those sad cases who still lives with her parents, are you?”
“Well, I live with my grandmother, but—”
“Is she senile?”
“No!” Sh
e needed Gran more than Gran needed her.
“Okay, so your place is out.” Leah blew a stray hair out of her face. “There’s my car.”
“Leah, the answer is no.”
Leah shrugged. “Fine. I already have plenty of people on my list for when I’m feeling raunchy. I’m always looking to add more, though.” She reached across the table and ran her finger down Casey’s forearm. “Last chance.”
Casey jerked her arm away. So this was what their “date” was about? She was auditioning for a spot on Leah’s booty call list? God, what a waste of time! Did Diane know about this?
Leah scowled and pushed back her chair. “Thanks for dinner.”
“But…” As she watched Leah sashay away, she wanted to shout, “Come back and pay your half of the bill,” but pride wouldn’t let her.
The waiter returned with her takeout container. His eyes flicked to Leah’s empty place. “Coffee?”
“Just the bill, please,” she muttered. Mercifully, it only took him a minute to present the bill on a tray—with one candy. Casey frowned at the total. At this rate, she’d have nothing left. She fished several bills from her wallet—enough to cover the total plus a fifteen percent tip—and skulked from the restaurant carrying her leftover pizza. She glimpsed Leah sitting in the front seat of her car, gabbing on her phone. Probably going down her list.
Casey was almost at the bus shelter when a tidal wave instantly drenched her. The red sports car continued on past the deep puddle near the curb, zooming into the distance. Casey stared after it, then pulled out her phone and dialed Diane’s number. “Call me, okay?” she said through gritted teeth when she got voice mail. Maybe it was for the best that Diane hadn’t answered.
When the bus arrived, she climbed aboard and ignored the curious looks from those who wondered why only half of her was soaked. As soon as she sat down, she realized that she’d left the pizza in the bus shelter. No great loss. Let someone eat it who needed it more than she did. Of course, a minute before her stop, the skies opened up again—and just when she was starting to feel pleasantly damp. Apparently her fervent pleas to the rain gods earlier that evening had expired.
The Missing Comatose Woman Page 3
