Pretty In Ink

Pretty In Ink Page 6

by Karen Olson

  “So?” Bitsy asked, following me into the staff room, bringing her small stool with her. She needed the stool to compensate for her height, but her habit of dragging it along the floor caused it to squeak in that fingernails-on-the-blackboard kind of way that made me cringe.

  “I had to go to the bank,” I said, trying not to meet her eyes as I pulled the bag of bagels out of my messenger bag and set it on the small table we used for eating. We also had a light table, but that was for work.

  “What happened to that?” Bitsy asked, staring at the bag, which had ripped and now bled portions of onion, poppy seed, and sesame seed bagels on the table.

  Ripping the bag even further, I saw that the container of cream cheese was also a victim of my fall: It had exploded all over the bagels and the bag, leaving a white, creamy mess.

  “I fell.” I lifted my knee to show her my wound.

  “You better start at the beginning,” she said, shoving the stool to the side and plopping herself down on one of the chairs as I tried to clean up the bagel mess.

  “Well, I stopped for bagels—you know that—and then I got a little distracted by the roulette table.” Her eyebrows went up, but before she could say anything, I continued. “There was a guy there, a guy with a queen-of-hearts playing card on his arm, and I stopped, and he gave me a fifty-dollar chip, and I put it on a square, and it won, and then I played again and again and again, and I won over sixty thousand dollars.” I sank into the chair opposite Bitsy as I took a deep breath.

  “No, really, Brett, what happened?”

  She thought I was kidding.

  So I told her about the guy knowing my name and about running and falling because of the stroller and the woman who looked at me like I was from Mars.

  “Sixty thousand?”

  I nodded, unable to believe it, either.

  “Remind me to go with you the next time you’re playing the tables.”

  She wasn’t kidding.

  “So how did he know your name?”

  “I have no idea. He ran before I could ask him.”

  “So he knows that he shouldn’t have known your name.”

  “He might be the guy with the cork last night.”

  “The guy in the picture you drew?”

  “No, a different one.”

  She snorted. “So there are two?”

  “Maybe.”

  It all sounded so far-fetched.

  Bitsy got up. “Joel’s finishing up with a client, Ace has gone who knows where, probably that oxygen bar to get his fix, Charlotte called in, said she was going to spend the day with Trevor. Guess she brought him home from the hospital this morning; everything’s fine.”

  But everything wasn’t fine. At least not in my world. I was sixty thousand dollars richer because of a stranger who knew my name.

  And then I thought of something.

  He said he’d gotten his tattoo at Murder Ink. I could call Jeff Coleman and see whether he knew the guy.

  Could it be that easy?

  Bitsy was picking at one of the bagels, sweeping it across some of the loose cream cheese. She stuck it in her mouth and nodded. “Good,” she said through the poppy seeds.

  Nice to know they still tasted okay, even though they looked like a cement roller had run over them.

  We heard the front door buzzer, and Bitsy went out to see who’d come in. I took the wad of cream cheese-covered paper towels and threw it in the trash.

  “Brett?” Bitsy had returned, sticking her head in the staff room door. “Someone’s here to see you.”

  I didn’t have a client scheduled for another hour, but Bitsy didn’t hang around for me to ask who it was. I followed her out.

  Detective Frank DeBurra was standing by the door.

  Chapter 10

  He was becoming my new best friend.

  I didn’t like it.

  But I admittedly was curious as to why he would show up both at my house and now here, at The Painted Lady.

  “Yes?” I asked. “I thought I answered all your questions.”

  His ears were more pronounced now, since his hair was slicked back, like he’d just taken a shower, making him look even more elfin. But a tall elf.

  “Is there somewhere we can talk privately?” he asked, shooting a look at Bitsy that I didn’t much like.

  Bitsy noticed it, too, and she rolled her eyes at me behind his back. Being a little person, she’s got to deal with that sort of thing a lot more than I do and she’s pretty comfortable in her own skin.

  I led Frank DeBurra to the back of the shop, to the office rather than the staff room, as if he’d suck all the creativity out of it and leave us with nothing.

  When I settled myself in the leather chair behind the desk, indicating that he should sit on the folding chair across from me, I said, “Okay. What do you want?”

  He gave a little snort accompanied by something he probably thought passed for a smile. “I’d like that sketch back.”

  Uh-oh. Tim had it. I had a feeling that DeBurra might not like that.

  “It’s home,” I said.

  “Then can you go home later and get it for me?”

  It was the way he asked that made me begin to wonder whether he didn’t already know that Tim had it. That he was testing me, in some sick way.

  “I can’t get away today. I’ve got clients coming in.”

  “Where’s your brother?”

  “Not my turn to watch him.” Okay, so it was a little flip, but this guy brought out the worst in me.

  He really did smile this time, but it wasn’t a warm smile; it didn’t spread to his eyes. “Funny.”

  “I thought you said you didn’t need the sketch.” I couldn’t help myself. Really.

  “Maybe I want to frame it and put it on my wall.”

  So we were both baiting each other. This wouldn’t get us anywhere. I got up. “Detective, unless you’re here for some practical purpose, I have work to do.”

  He stood up. He was wearing the same frayed sport jacket from last night. I wondered about Shawna. She’d been into material things. This guy didn’t look like he could buy a loaf of bread. Maybe he was good in bed.

  Yuck. Definitely did not want to go there.

  I went over to the door and opened it. “Thank you for stopping by.”

  “I need to ask a couple of questions about your employee, Charlotte Sampson.” Frank DeBurra leaned over past me and shut the door again, indicating that I should sit down.

  I did because I was too surprised not to.

  “What about her?” I asked.

  “What do you know of her background?”

  I thought about Charlotte, the first time she’d come in for ink. She’d asked me to fix a heart she’d tattooed herself on her wrist, sort of like the one I’d done on my own. She was studying to be an accountant at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. She graduated but admitted she didn’t want to work with numbers; she wanted to work here. I hired her as a trainee.

  I didn’t know what this detective wanted with Charlotte, so all I said was, “She was going to be an accountant but decided to become a tattooist.” I had another thought. “Why don’t you talk to her yourself?”

  “Is she here?”

  His tone was so casual, my antennae went up. Something wasn’t right. I hesitated for a second before saying, “She’s spending the day with her friend Trevor McKay, you know, the guy who got hit with the cork last night.”

  “He got released from the hospital this morning,” DeBurra said.

  I nodded, not sure where this was going.

  “He left alone.”

  “Maybe she’s meeting him at his place.” Although that’s not what she told Bitsy on the phone.

  Frank DeBurra leaned forward in his chair, his elbows on his knees, his hands clasped together in front of him. His eyes met mine.

  I had a bad feeling.

  “Charlotte Sampson is wanted for questioning in an incident at a pawnshop this morning.”

  Chapter 11

  I couldn’t catch my breath. Finally, I sputtered, “Excuse me?”

  “You heard me,” he
said flatly.

  “An incident? What type of incident?”

  “She hasn’t been here at all this morning?” He was being dodgy.

  “No.”

  “You haven’t seen her?”

  “Not since last night. What’s this all about?” I was going to keep asking until he answered me.

  “I’m not at liberty to say.”

  “Are you sure it’s Charlotte you’re looking for?” I couldn’t wrap my head around this.

  “Those derringer tattoos on her arms are very distinct.”

  I’d inked those derringers myself.

  My brain was skipping so fast over a million thoughts, like a stone in a rocky riverbed. I was thinking about pawnshops and how Wesley Lambert had been poking around the club yesterday, saying something about a mistake with something Trevor had pawned. Charlotte had spent quite a bit of time with Trevor in the last twenty-four hours.

  “Wesley Lambert,” I said.

  “Hmm?” He acted like he didn’t know what I was insinuating, but a flicker of his eye told me we were on the same page.

  “Do you think this has something to do with Wesley Lambert? He was at Chez Tango talking about pawnshops.”

  “Does she have a locker or anything here? Any personal items?”

  His change of subject threw me for a second. I thought about her room, which was just next to this office. But I couldn’t have him poking around in there. “No,” I lied, hoping he wouldn’t see through me. “She’s just a trainee. She works wherever we have room at the moment.”

  He pursed his mouth, like he knew. But instead of calling me on it, he stood. “Okay, well, if she contacts you or comes in here, I expect you to call me.” Then he handed me a business card, the one I’d wanted last night but he hadn’t given me. Guess I was more important to him today. “You’re close enough to the law to know what the punishment is for obstruction.”

  A direct reference to Tim.

  But obstruction? How serious was this?

  I didn’t get a chance to ask, however, because Frank DeBurra strode across my blond laminate flooring and went out the front glass door so quickly, he didn’t even say good-bye. Bitsy watched after him, her mouth forming a perfect “O.”

  “What was that all about?” she asked.

  I frowned. “I wish I knew. You were eavesdropping.”

  “And wouldn’t you? He comes in here like gangbusters and I’m not supposed to make sure he’s not beating the crap out of you back there?”

  “Isn’t that a little extreme?”

  “Seems like it’s serious, whatever it is,” Bitsy said.

  “I guess. He wanted to see her stuff. I don’t get that. What’s he fishing for? It doesn’t make any sense. But if she calls or comes in, we’re supposed to call him. I don’t think so.” I waved his card. “He wouldn’t give it to me last night.”

  Bitsy took it and stuck it under the phone. “We’ll leave it here,” she said matter-of-factly. “So we all know where it is and we can call when we hear from Charlotte.”

  I knew that was her out. The card could get lost, easily.

  Even though I didn’t trust DeBurra, he had planted some doubts about Charlotte. Why had she lied about picking up Trevor and bringing him home this morning?

  It was exactly those doubts that made me push open the door to her room and stand on the threshold as I took everything in.

  She’d taken a fancy to a couple of Ace’s smaller works. They weren’t his comic-book versions of classic paintings; instead, they were his own cartoon creations: a superhero rat and a rooster playing baseball. I’m not one to judge someone’s artwork, but I was glad they were in here and not out where the public could see them.

  Charlotte’s own artwork hung on the walls, too. She created geometric and tribal designs in acrylics and then recreated them as tattoos.

  The chair almost glistened, it was so clean; Charlotte’s inkpots and tattoo machine were lined up along the waist-high counter. On a shelf below that, she had a supply of disposable needles, some stencils were scattered, and a cup held some fine-point markers.

  It was clean, thanks most likely to Bitsy’s efforts, and organized, again Bitsy’s doing. Other than the paintings, there were no personal items.

  I had a client in half an hour, so I went into the staff room and sat at the light table to finish up a stencil of palm trees, dice, and Hello Kitty. About twenty minutes later, Joel wandered in with a box of doughnuts, unaware that I’d brought in smashed bagels. He took one of each.

  Joel had started Weight Watchers, but we hadn’t seen any difference.

  I raised my eyebrows when he took a bite of bagel.

  “Oh, don’t get on my case,” he chided. “I count my points.”

  “And you probably round down, too,” I said.

  He made a face at me.

  I didn’t want to get into it any further, so I told him about Frank DeBurra and Charlotte.

  Joel actually stopped eating as I told him.

  Bitsy stuck her head in the door and nodded at me. “She’s here.” She meant my client.

  I glanced at the clock. Hello Kitty was just about done. “Tell her I’ll be a few. She can hang in the waiting area.”

  Bitsy disappeared.

  “Looking good,” Joel said, leaning over my shoulder, getting a little doughnut dust on the light table.

  I brushed it off. “I don’t want the stencil messed up. Stay over there if you’re eating.”

  “So this is the gambling Hello Kitty? I’ve never seen that one before.” Joel spoke as he moved over to the staff table and sat down.

  “Hello Kitty likes Vegas,” I said. “She’s one hot cat.” As I said it, I thought about Rebecca Sinclair, my client. Nice girl, first tattoo. As I surveyed my work, I didn’t think this would have to be one she’d regret. Hello Kitty was always in style.

  I finished up the stencil and carefully cut around it before bringing it out to Rebecca, whom I beckoned into my room.

  “Here it is,” I said, showing her. “And you want it just below your shoulder on your back on the left side?”

  Rebecca nodded. She was smiling, but her mouth was tight. First time was always a little nerve-wracking.

  With a baby wipe, I washed down the area where I’d do the ink and shaved it with a disposable razor so it would be completely hair free. I then rolled a little glycerin-based deodorant over the same area before placing the stencil down, rubbing it so it would transfer onto her skin. I pulled it off carefully, then surveyed it. Perfect.

  I handed Rebecca a hand mirror and told her to go out and look at it in the full-length mirror in the waiting area. While she was gone, I organized my inks, took a new needle out of a package, and slid it into my tattoo machine.

  “It looks good,” she said softly when she returned.

  “It’ll be fine,” I said as soothingly as I could as I put the chair flat so she could lie down on her stomach. “You’ll feel it sting at first—I won’t lie about that—but then your endorphins will kick in and it won’t hurt as much.” I couldn’t tell her it wouldn’t hurt at all. In fact, tattoos over bone hurt more than when they were inked on more fleshy areas. But she’d been insistent about placement.

  When she was as comfortable as she would be, I pulled on my latex gloves, dipped the needle in black ink, pressed the foot pedal, and the machine whirred to life. I pressed the needle to her skin and felt her jump slightly.

  “Try to stay as still as possible,” I advised as I began outlining Hello Kitty.

  By the time I started filling in the palm trees, Rebecca was chatting up a storm, telling me about the classes she was taking at the university.

  It didn’t take too long before I was taping plastic wrap over the tattoo and handing Rebecca a typewritten sheet of paper that explained how to take care of it for the next few days. She shouldn’t keep the plastic wrap on long, just until she got home. Washing it with unscented antibacterial soap and an antibacterial gel would be the next step, but it would still peel like a sunburn.

  “It’ll look a little faded for a while, but don’t worry. The color will come bac
k once it’s healed.”

  I followed her out to the front desk, where Bitsy would take her credit card.

  But Bitsy wasn’t there.

  Trevor McKay was.

  Chapter 12

  “Where’s Bitsy?” I asked as I took the credit card machine out of the drawer in the mahogany desk.

  “Joel needed her for something. I said I’d wait,” Trevor, aka Britney Brassieres, said. Without his Britney costume, he looked like any normal guy: close-cropped bleached blond hair, brown eyes, long nose, short chin. He was slightly shorter than me, and I stand about five-nine. He wore his clothes—a pair of faded jeans and loose T-shirt—with casual style.

  I’d asked him why he decided to do drag, and he said it was a lark at first, a Halloween costume. But something had clicked; MissTique saw him and convinced him to try performing. He loved it, the acting, the dancing, the lip-synching.

  “Not that I want to be a woman,” he’d said. “Believe me, I like being a boy.”

  He looked all boy today. I gave him a look that I hoped would convey that he was to stay put while I took care of Rebecca. It was just a few minutes; Rebecca signed her receipt and left with a smile.

  I took a breath when the door closed, turned to Trevor, and asked, “Are you okay?” His shirt didn’t conceal the outline of a bandage in the center of his chest.

  He saw me looking at it, and he touched it gently. “Broke skin. Can you believe it? Got blood on my dress. I’m not sure I’ll be able to get it out.”

  I murmured my sympathy, then asked, “Where’s Charlotte?”

  “That’s what I was going to ask you,” he said. “I’m worried about her. She said she’d stay at the hospital with me, but they wouldn’t let her. She called early this morning, said she’d come get me, but she never did. I’ve tried her cell, but there’s no answer, just voice mail. That’s not like her.”

 

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