by Diane Kelly
It took everything in me not to rip the towel rack off the wall and throw it at her. “Flip-flops.”
“Okay.” The curtain swished closed.
I hesitated a moment, anticipating another question. When I heard the squeak of her turning the faucet off, I seized the moment, seizing Paige’s toothbrush, too. I pinched its bristles to avoid contaminating her prints with my own.
“What are you doing with my toothbrush?” Paige stood at the door that led into her room. I hadn’t heard her open it over the squeak of the faucets.
“Sorry!” I said. “I was looking to see if you had any sunscreen and I accidentally dropped it on the floor.”
“Ew.” She snatched it out of my hand and tossed it into the nearly full trash can. “I’ll have to get a new one now.” She bent down and rummaged around in her bin, standing with a brightly colored plastic bottle in each hand. “Do you want SPF 15 or SPF 50?”
“Fifty,” I said.
She handed me the bottle, returned the other to the bin, and reached down to pull the garbage bag out of the trash can, tying the top in a knot so nothing would fall out. She thrust the bag at Alexa, who’d stepped out of the shower, a towel wrapped around her torso. “Here, Alexa. Take this out when you get a chance.”
That same irritated look flicked across Alexa’s face, but she took the bag nonetheless.
I held out a hand. “I can do it. I’ve got some trash in my room that I need to take out, too.”
“Great.” Alexa handed me the bag.
I returned to my bedroom, where Emily was still sleeping, making up for all those lost hours. I rounded up what little trash we had, dumping it into a plastic grocery store bag, and carried the bags outside, bringing my backpack and Brigit with me. I circled around the back of the building, tossed the bag containing Emily’s and my trash into the Dumpster, and ducked behind the Dumpster out of view to shove the bag with Paige’s toothbrush in it into my backpack.
Walking as fast as I dared, I led Brigit to my car and returned to the W1 station. Unfortunately, no fingerprint tech was immediately available. A hand-lettered sign on the door said they were out working a scene.
I scurried down the hall to Jackson’s office. Luckily, she was still in. I held up the bag. “I’ve got the toothbrush!”
Her gaze roamed over the bag. “It looks like you’ve got a bunch of trash.”
“That, too,” I said, “but the toothbrush is in here.”
She waved a hand. “Go give it to the fingerprint gurus.”
“I can’t,” I said. “They’re out at a crime scene.”
“Oh, right,” she said. “There’s been an apparent murder-suicide.”
And on such a sunny summer day.
She held out her hand for the bag. “I’ll get the toothbrush to them as soon as they’re back. Keep your phone close. If we get a match we’ll arrest Paige right away. Any idea where she might be later?”
I knew exactly where Paige would be later. With me, at a pool party. I shared our plans with the detective.
“Perfect,” she said. “Try not to let her out of your sight.”
“I’ll do my best.”
FORTY-FIVE
PARTY ANIMAL
Brigit
Brigit felt like the belle of the ball. Everyone at the pool party was petting her and feeding her junk food and rubbing her belly. She even jumped into the pool and dog-paddled around. It felt good to cool off. She tried to climb onto a floating raft with Megan but something went wrong and all of the air went out of it. That was okay. She was having the time of her life!
FORTY-SIX
BACK TO THE TABLE
The Dealer
He breathed a sigh, though he wasn’t sure it was one of relief. After nearly giving in and giving up, he’d rallied. He’d had to use all manner of persuasion available to him, but he’d brought the prick back to the table. He had to. His numbers were down and if he didn’t do something it would all be over.
Of course it might all be over anyway. But he wouldn’t go down without a fight.
FORTY-SEVEN
MAKING A SPLASH
Megan
The party started out fairly low-key, a dozen people casually hanging out around an apartment pool, having a few beers. Paige and Alexa were among those indulging in a brew or two. I suspected some of the others who were drinking were underage, too, but nobody was getting out of control. I couldn’t risk missing a chance to bust a drug dealer by taking in a few children for minor-in-possession charges.
We’d stopped at a grocery store on the short drive over. I bought Paige a new toothbrush and myself a cheap inflatable pool lounge float in a fun lime-green color. It took me fifteen minutes to blow the darn thing up, and Brigit only fifteen seconds to pop it with her claws. Party pooper.
As expected, everyone in the group was checking everyone else out. The guys were checking out the girls in their bikinis. The girls were checking out the guys in their swim trunks. The guys were checking out the other guys to see how they ranked in comparison. The girls were doing the same with the other girls, performing mental computations of attractiveness. Five extra points for big boobs, six-pack abs, or a tight ass. Minus three points for poochy tummy, saggy butt, or back fat. Add two for nice hair or teeth … It was like some sort of sexual attraction calculus.
My nerves were on fire, my senses all abuzz. Why hasn’t Jackson contacted me yet? What’s taking the fingerprint techs so damn long? Argh!
“Morgan! Alexa!” Paige called from her seat on a lounge chair. “Time for a selfie!”
She’d attached her phone to a selfie stick and held it out in front of us, as Alexa slid in on one side of her, me on the other. “Wait. Let’s get Britney in the picture, too.” She scooted closer to Alexa to leave a space between me and her and patted the spot. “Up here, Britney!”
Brigit complied, hopping into the space. I turned her around to face the camera.
“One, two, three,” Paige said, and snapped the shot. Click.
We alternated between late-day sunbathing and cooling off in the pool over the next couple of hours. As the day transitioned into early evening, the sun sinking to the west and the lights coming on in the pool and around the complex, more people came out to hang, adding cases of beer and fresh ice to the coolers sitting about. The background music that had been playing became louder and faster, several people moving in place to the beat. Apparently nobody had called the police to complain, probably because the vast majority of the tenants were college kids who were down here by the pool. Any tenants who were not students must have realized they’d signed on for this when they’d signed a lease at a complex so close to the college.
Paige stood on a chair and cupped her hands around her mouth. “Who wants pizza? I’m taking up a collection. Ten bucks each.”
I had to give the girl credit. Drug dealer or not, she had leadership skills.
Knowing Brigit would insist on a slice or two, I chipped in twenty bucks for pizza. I sat next to Paige on a chaise lounge turned sideways as she placed the order. Alexa sat on the other side of Paige.
“Send a couple orders of breadsticks, too,” Paige said into her phone. “And dipping sauce.” When she was done, she looked out over the crowd, a wistful expression on her face. “I’m going to text Chaoxiang. See if he wants to come have some pizza.” Alexa started to say something but Paige silenced her with a raised hand. “I don’t want to hear it, Alexa! Chao’s a good guy. You just don’t understand our relationship. We’re … keeping it casual.”
Alexa leaned back, her gaze meeting mine behind Paige’s head. She shook her head as if to say, She’s pathetic, isn’t she?
Frankly, drug dealer or not, I felt sorry for Paige. Clearly she had more feelings for the guy than he had for her. It was one thing to have a casual relationship when neither party wanted more, but when one person hoped for something more meaningful it was a recipe for emotional disaster. She was setting herself up for a big heartbreak.
Paige’s fingers
worked her phone’s keypad. When she finished sending the text, she stared down at her screen as if willing Chaoxiang to respond right away, to show her he cared. As if she realized both Alexa and I were watching her, she slid her phone into the beach bag at her feet, attempting to act nonchalant. “Last one in’s a rotten egg!” She stood and ran to the pool, jumping off the side and performing an improvised jackknife. She immediately extended her bent leg upon hitting the water so that her head wouldn’t go under and ruin the makeup and hair she’d spent an hour getting just right, probably in the hopes of seeing Chao tonight.
I jumped into the pool, too, as did Alexa and Brigit. After bobbing around for a minute or two, we took places along the side, folding our arms over the edge, resting our heads on our arms, and letting our legs drift behind us. Brigit swam to the steps, climbed out, and lay on the concrete near us, softly panting in the warm evening.
“We should head over to Chisholm Trail Mall tomorrow,” Paige suggested. “Since it’s after the Fourth, all of their summer stuff will be on sale.”
“I can’t wait for the winter clothes to come out,” I said. “I love boots and sweaters and—”
Paige’s head popped up. “There’s Chao!”
He’d arrived at the same time as the pizza delivery guy, the two of them making their way up the walk in tandem, the pizza guy rolling a dozen stacked pizzas on a dolly.
Paige was up and out of the water faster than a breeching dolphin. She scurried over to the chair where we’d left our things and quickly wrapped her towel around her waist. Grabbing the roll of bills she’d collected, she returned to the pool and thrust them at me. “Here, Morgan. Pay the pizza guy.”
I took the bills from her and eased off the edge and backward into the chest-high water, holding my hands up by my head so the money wouldn’t get wet. I walked through the water to the steps, and climbed out of the pool, meeting the pizza guy by the gate. Chao slipped past us to come into the fenced pool area.
“How much do we owe you?” I asked.
“Hundred and sixty bucks,” he said.
I counted out the cash. Fortunately, there was enough to cover the pizzas and breadsticks and give the guy a decent tip, too. “Here you go,” I said, handing him the wad.
He tipped his hat. “Y’all have fun.”
“Thanks. We will.”
We had no plates or napkins, but that didn’t matter. People ate the pizza right out of the box, using their beach towels to wipe their hands.
Paige and Chaoxiang stood in a corner on the opposite side of the pool. Alexa and I assumed our seats on the lounge chairs. As I ate my pizza, I sent telepathic messages into the universe, willing the techs to finish up their work at the murder-suicide and run the prints on the toothbrush, and for Detective Jackson to send me a text that the prints on Paige’s toothbrush matched the ones on the phone. Come on, guys! Hurry up!
Finally, a buzz came from my phone.
It was the much-anticipated text from Aunt Jackie.
And it read Not a match.
Not a match? How can that be? How could the evidence confirm that Paige was not the person whose prints appeared on both the cell phone and her cup from Club Bassline? I closed my eyes and pressed my fingertips to the lids, trying to make sense of things. The only explanation was that the dealer had been at Club Bassline last night, had touched Paige’s cup, and I’d missed him. He’d been right under my nose and I’d been too busy dancing with a sexy poodle to even notice. Some undercover cop I was, some aspiring detective. Maybe I wasn’t cut out to be an investigator. Maybe I should just focus on writing parking tickets.
Defeated, I glanced over at Paige and Chao. While her face and gestures were animated, belying her excitement at seeing him, his face and posture were relaxed. He stood with one arm draped over the fence, the thumb of the other hand hooked casually through a belt loop.
Wait a second. Something about his stance seems familiar …
The thumb hooked through the belt loop. The guy from the dash cam footage taken at Tio’s Taco Stand, the one who’d seemed vaguely familiar, he’d walked with his thumb hooked through a belt loop, too.
“Oh, my God,” I said softly on a breath, talking to myself. Could Chao be the dealer?
“What?” Alexa asked, her cheek bulging with pizza.
“Oh, nothing,” I said. “Just talking to myself.”
My brain quickly took inventory of the evidence. The prints on the cell phone that we knew for certain belonged to the dealer matched prints lifted from Paige’s cup from Club Bassline. I’d assumed the prints were Paige’s, but could they be Chaoxiang’s instead?
They could!
He’d taken a drink from her cup last night at Club Bassline. I’d forgotten about it until now. Also, he was from China, where the chemicals needed to make MDMA were less regulated and thus easier to obtain. It was possible he had connections there.
Still, none of this evidence was a hundred percent sure, irrefutable. But you know what would be? An alert from Brigit.
I roused my partner from her spot at my feet and attached her leash. I led her over to Paige and Chaoxiang, walking slowly and even stopping a couple times along the way to let Brigit sniff the shoes and towels and clothing strewn about, as any dog, professional K-9 or otherwise, would do. As we approached our quarry, I bent down and whispered the order in Brigit’s ear to scent for drugs. Her intelligent eyes met mine, letting me know she understood. Gotcha, partner. I’m on the case.
I led my partner up to Paige and Chaoxiang, offering a welcoming smile, a “Hey!”, and a flirtatious head toss that I hoped would distract them both from Brigit sniffing Chao’s legs down below our line of vision.
Paige hadn’t introduced me to Chao at the rally or the nightclub. It was an implicit compliment, I supposed, as if she wanted to keep him away from other girls he might find attractive. Of course she had no choice now. She couldn’t very well ignore me when I was standing right in front of her. Or at least I’d thought so. Instead of introducing us, she stared at me with her laser-beam eyes again. I could almost feel them cutting through my skin, searing all the way to the bone, etching a message. Back off.
Given that Paige had forgotten her manners, I turned to Chaoxiang. “Hi. My name’s Morgan. I’m Paige’s new suitemate.”
Chao dipped his head. “I’m Chao.”
Down at my knees, Brigit issued her passive alert which, to anyone else would simply look like she’d decided to sit. But I knew better. Chao has drugs on him. It was clear he was the dealer. Paige’s incessant glare told me something, too. Her motive for helping him distribute his dirty wares, for writing the ads on the bathroom walls in the dorms, for picking up his cash drop at the gas station. She was a woman in love, desperately trying to please her man, willing to do whatever it took to keep him from walking away completely. Love made people do heroic, wonderful, selfless things. But love also made people do stupid, dangerous, even criminal things. Women’s prisons were full of lovelorn women who’d been led astray or even taken a rap for their man. The things we do for love.
Chao eyed me closely as he took a sip of his beer. I wondered if he had any inkling I was the “bluebonnet” who’d ordered Molly from him.
“That beer looks good,” I said. “Think I’ll get one myself.” I led Brigit over to a cooler nearby and fished a beer out of the ice and near-freezing water. Brrr!
I glanced around for somewhere private I could make a phone call. The clubhouse. I carried the beer into the small building on the patio, Brigit padding along beside me. Alexa was sitting at a table inside now, eating pizza and playing quarters with two boys and another girl and losing miserably judging from the way she tilted to one side. I set my beer on the table next to her. “I’ll be right back to get this.” I slipped into the bathroom, bringing Brigit with me and locking the door behind us.
Inside, I dialed Detective Jackson, speaking in a whisper. “There’s a guy at this party who drank out of Paige’s cup last night. I’d forgo
tten about it until I saw him here. Brigit just alerted on him. His first name is Chaoxiang. I don’t have a last name.”
“I’ll get officers over there right away. What’s the address?”
I gave her the number and street and ended the call. Before exiting the bathroom, I took a deep breath to calm myself. I didn’t want my behavior to somehow put anyone on notice that something big was about to go down.
I rounded up my beer from the table and headed back outside to the pool. Paige and Chao were sitting sideways on the lounge chair now, Paige’s beach bag under the chaise behind their feet. Paige had her arm draped over Chao’s back, a possessive hand curved over his shoulder. Poor, poor girl.
I took a seat on the edge of the pool, dangling my legs in the water as I sipped the beer. The faint smell of burning marijuana wafted over from a group huddled around a built-in grill outside the fenced pool area. A group of young men who’d been shotgunning Budweisers decided now was a good time for a cannonball contest.
“Boo-ya!” yelled the first as he took a running leap into the air. The bulky guy impacted the water’s surface with a huge KERSPLASH that sent a tsunami out in every direction, including mine and Brigit’s. The water lapped over the side of the pool, dousing me and my dog. Brigit jumped to her feet.
Not to be outdone, the next guy ran, hopped into the air, and performed a flip before cannonballing into the water. Splash! Water rained down on everyone around the pool, causing a few of the girls to shriek and the boys to laugh.
While the boys’ antics might be a bit annoying to someone just trying to relax poolside, the show provided a great distraction that would come in handy when my fellow officers arrived. Officers would have a much easier time sneaking up on the group if everyone was focused on the guys in the pool rather than the cruisers pulling up in the parking lot.
To that end, when the boys had completed their turns and things threatened to settle down, I raised my beer and hollered, “Girls’ turn!”
I set my beer on a nearby table and took a running leap at the deep end of the pool, jumping into the air and performing what cheerleaders and baton twirlers called a Texas T, both legs spread wide, hands reached for toes.
