by Jennie Marts
Her shoulders bristled. “He didn’t seem so bad. Besides the fact we didn’t really have anything to talk about.”
“That’s because he wasn’t interested in talking.”
“What do you mean?”
“I think he was interested in something else. I can’t be a hundred percent sure, but I’m almost positive I saw him slip something into your drink when you were in the bathroom.”
Piper’s knees threatened to buckle. In all the confusion and talk about Brittany, she’d almost forgotten the real reason they were all standing in the alley together. “That’s why you came over to our table, why you pretended to be my boyfriend? To rescue me?”
“Yeah, of course. I know it was lame, but it was all I could think of to get you out of there.”
It hadn’t seemed lame to her at all. “Thank you.”
“Somebody needs to go back in there and teach that guy a lesson,” Edna said, digging in her bag again for the Taser gun.
“I would have done just that if I would have known for sure,” Fitz said. “I would have knocked the guy out, but like I said, I wasn’t positive, and I thought the easiest thing was to get you out of there.”
Piper held up her hands. “Can everyone just stop for a minute? My head is spinning, and I really just want to go home. I don’t even like going out on random dates in the first place, I don’t know why I agreed to go out with these guys. Maybe I thought guys wearing Star Wars shirts would be safe because they are nerdier, but going out with three guys in two days was too much for me.”
“Three guys?” Claire asked. “There were only supposed to be two.”
Piper glared at her mother. “What do you mean, there were only supposed to be two?”
“Well, um,” Claire stammered. “I just meant that surely there couldn’t be more than two guys wearing Star Wars paraphernalia who would ask you out in one day.”
She narrowed her eyes. “Mother, did you have something to do with those guys asking me out?” How could her mom possibly have anything to do with these three random guys? “Were you standing outside of the coffee shop offering them money or something to ask me on a date?”
“No, of course not.” Claire stared at a puddle of greasy water on the ground of the alley.
Piper didn’t believe this innocent act for a second. “Mom? What did you do?”
“Nothing. Really. I just might have built you an online dating profile and pretended to be you and talked to two guys who looked cute and nice and arranged for them to come into the coffee shop and compliment you on your hair and then ask you out.” Her words came out in a rush. “But I was just trying to help. And I only talked to two guys, not three.”
Her mouth opened and closed, but no words came out. She was stunned and could think of absolutely nothing to say.
“Then how did three different guys know to follow the same pattern?” Fitz asked. He looked down at Piper. “I know they were all wearing something that had to do with Star Wars, but that could be a weird coincidence. Did they all say something nice about your hair?”
She nodded.
“So, who’s the third guy, and how did he know those specific details and where she worked?” Cassie asked.
“More important than how someone did it,” Edna said, “is why they did it. Why would someone pretend to be one of Piper’s profile matches?”
A chill ran down Piper’s back. She couldn’t think of any reason that wasn’t strange, creepy, or downright terrifying.
“There’s one way to find out,” Claire said. “Let’s go check out the online site. Piper should be able to look at the profile pictures and easily figure out which one is the imposter.”
Thirty minutes later, the whole group was back at Piper’s apartment and clustered around Claire’s laptop.
Piper couldn’t help but notice the computer looked brand new, but she had more things to worry about right now than her mom’s peculiar financial affairs.
Like why someone would want to go out with her and keep their identity a secret. Or why someone would want to go with her at all. But that was a different therapy session.
“What are the names of the three guys you went out with?” Claire tapped the keys to get to the dating site.
“Brandon, Clay, and Aaron,” Piper said. The dog was snuggled around her socked feet, and she was surprised by the comfort she took in the weight of its small body against her legs.
“What about their last names?” Cassie asked.
“And are you sure those are their real names?” Edna asked.
Piper shrugged. “I don’t know. I never asked any of them what their last names were, but I assume those are their real first names. I didn’t ask for their ID’s.”
“Maybe next time you should,” Edna stated.
“Yeah, right. Next time I’ll be like, ‘Oh sure, I’d love to grab coffee with you, but first, I’ll need to see some ID.’”
Not like there was going to be a next time.
Piper was done with dating. She snuck a glance at Fitz who was staring intently at the laptop screen. Well, maybe not done with dating entirely. But done with dating random guys who she didn’t know.
“Sounds like a good idea to me,” Fitz muttered, not taking his eyes off the computer.
Claire shook her head in frustration. “I don’t get it. They’re all gone.”
“What do you mean they’re all gone?”
“I mean they are all gone. All the profiles which had shown interest in you were on the side of the screen, and now they aren’t. They’ve been deleted. And when I go back in to search for matches, none of them come up.”
“How can that be?” Piper asked, groaning at the picture her mom had chosen to use on her profile page. She’d never seen it before, but it was recent enough that it had her new pink-colored hair in it. The background showed the kitchen cabinets of the apartment, and she recognized the side of Cassie’s arm and the purple sweater she’d been wearing the last time the Page Turners had been over for book club. Her mom must have taken it that night and uploaded it from her phone.
It wasn’t a terrible picture of her. In fact, it captured a rare moment of her laughing. But if anyone saw that picture they’d assume that was her natural state—that she spent her life in joyous laughter—that, heaven forbid, she was actually fun.
The profile pic was just setting her up for failure. It wouldn’t take but ten minutes of actually spending time with her to realize she wasn’t fun at all. She was plain and boring and generally preferred spending time in the company of a good book over spending time with actual company.
“Why would they all be gone? And how are they all gone? No one has access to this profile except for me.” Claire repeatedly clicked the cursor on the side of the screen as if the profiles would magically reappear if she just clicked it enough times.
“Someone had access to it,” Fitz said. “Whoever hacked into it in the first place obviously went in again and deleted all the profiles so Piper wouldn’t be able to figure out which guy was the fake.”
“But you saw them, Mom,” Piper said. “Can’t you just try to describe them and we can figure out which one doesn’t fit the description.”
“I can try,” Claire said. “They both had kind of brownish hair.”
“That doesn’t help. All three of the guys I went out with had brownish hair. But one wore glasses. Did any of them wear glasses?”
“I don’t think so.”
“That doesn’t prove anything,” Cassie said. “Lots of people take their glasses off for pictures or he could have been wearing contacts.”
“True.”
“Have you ever seen any of the boys before?” Edna asked.
“No, but one of them, Brandon, is in my English class. And I saw him there today.”
“That doesn’t mean anything either,” Fitz said. “Not if you had English in one of the huge lecture halls. Anyone could go in there and pretend to be in the class. It’s not like they take roll.”
“Did you see the notes? Or just see him typing? He could have been updating his Facebook status.”
“Or his serial-killer files,” Edna added.
Piper raised an eyebrow at the older woman. “Not helping.”
Edna shrugged.
“Think about your conversations with him,” Fitz continued. “Did he actually tell you about the assignments, or did he just ask you general questions which could be about any assignment.”
She shook her head. “I can’t remember. He mainly asked me questions about Brittany’s murder.”
Edna smacked her hand on the kitchen table. “Well that seems suspicious, right there.”
“Why? You ask me about the murder all the time? Does that mean you did it?”
“Touché,” she grumbled.
“We need to start from the beginning.” Cassie headed toward the kitchen. “I’ll make us all something to eat while you tell us everything. Start with the first second when you met each one and tell us what they said and what happened on each date. Claire, you grab some paper and make a note of anything that seems suspicious.”
While Cassie put together sandwiches and set out chips, Piper relayed every detail she could think of about each of the three guys. They had seemed so ordinary, but after scrutinizing each one, it seemed like they each had at least one thing which could be deemed as questionable behavior.
Clay had seemed way too handsy for a first date, Brandon had asked too many questions about the murder, and Aaron had possibly tried to slip something into her drink.
Piper ran a hand through her hair and let out a frustrated sigh. “This isn’t doing any good. All of these things can be explained. Plenty of people treat those online dating sites as places to find hook-ups and plenty of people ask me questions about Brittany and what happened. It’s not that unusual for people to be curious.”
“But what about Aaron? Drugging someone is not ordinary behavior.” Cassie pressed the last of her potato chip crumbs onto her finger then sucked them into her mouth.
“It is for some people,” Claire muttered.
Wait…what? What was that supposed to mean?
Before Piper could press her mom on what she meant by that, Edna barged ahead with the conversation.
“As deplorable as the idea is, we don’t know for sure that Date #3 did, in fact, try to slip something into her drink. We only know what Fitz thought he saw, and that’s all circumstantial.”
“Circumstantial? We’re not in court.”
“Not yet.”
Claire had written each boy’s name at the top of a sheet of paper and had jotted down pertinent details as Piper had talked. She taped the three sheets to the wall above the dining room table. “This seems like a measly list of suspects.”
“We don’t even know if they are suspects,” Piper said. “This whole dating thing is weird, but we don’t really have anything which connects this situation to what happened to Brittany.”
They studied the pages, each of them looking for any kind of clues or connections.
A hard knock sounded at the door, causing them all to jump at once.
“Holy hiccups,” Edna said, pressing her hand to her chest, as the group stood up from the table. “I think I might have just had a heart attack.”
Cassie crossed to the door, shouting, “Who is it?” as she walked.
“It’s Mac,” a deep voice answered.
She opened the door, and the tall police officer strode in.
He scanned the room, seemingly taking in all the details. He pointed to Fitz, who was standing next to Piper. “Who’s this?”
She put her hand on Fitz’s arm. “This is Fitz. We work together at The Perk. And he’s also my friend. Fitz, this is Officer McCarthy. He’s a friend of the family.”
“Nice to meet you.” Fitz stuck a hand out to shake Mac’s.
“Well, I’m family, and you’re not a friend of mine,” Claire said, giving him a cool once-over with her eyes and offering him a flirty smile. “Not yet.”
Gag.
Piper had seen her mother do this routine a hundred times.
“Down girl,” Edna said firmly. “Mac’s taken. By my granddaughter, Zoey.”
Zoey was the newest member of the book club, but she’d been spending a few weeks at her parents’ farm helping them with the fall harvest so Claire hadn’t had a chance to meet her.
Piper nodded her head toward her mother. “This is my mom, Claire Denton. She’s my new roommate.”
Mac raised an eyebrow, glancing between her and her mother as he shook Claire’s hand. “Nice to meet you. I’m glad to see you spending time with your daughter.” He knew their history and how Claire had abandoned her at Cassie’s.
His eyes narrowed as his gaze swept over the table and landed on the sheets of paper taped to the wall. “I see the Page Turners have been doing my job for me again.”
“Now don’t get your knickers in a twist,” Edna said. “We’re just doing a little investigative digging. We’re not stepping on anyone’s toes, and we haven’t found out much of anything yet.”
He sighed, a grim frown tightening his mouth. “I wish you had. We’re racing against the clock right now, and I’d take any ideas you had.”
“Why? What’s happened?”
“I’m afraid there’s been another murder.”
Piper’s stomach clenched, and she doubled over as if she’d been punched in the gut. “Oh no.”
Fitz wrapped an arm around her and settled her back into her chair. “It’s okay. Put your head between your knees if you feel like you’re gonna hurl.”
She did feel like she might hurl. A hot sweat broke out across her back, and her chest felt tight. She was nauseous. And shocked. And terrified to her very toes. “Who was it?”
“I can’t release the victim’s name yet, but I can tell you it was another student at the college and around the same age as Brittany.”
“How was she killed?” Piper asked, although she felt like she already knew the answer. Otherwise, Mac wouldn’t be here.
A crease wrinkled his forehead. “Strangulation and asphyxiation. Same as before.”
“Then the two are definitely related.”
“Again, I can’t confirm or deny any details, but I can warn you to be careful and tell you not to go out alone or off with someone you don’t know or trust. The campus has added extra security measures as well. I don’t think they’re putting out any kind of official statement just yet, but they are aware of the situation and doing what they can.”
Edna narrowed her eyes at Mac. “Other than the obvious means by which they were killed, are the girls connected in any other way? Same color hair? Same neighborhood? Same classes?”
Mac shrugged. “I wish I could tell you more, but I can’t.”
“We appreciate you letting us know,” Cassie said, laying a hand on his arm.
He looked down at her, his expression softening. “Keep an eye on Piper. All of you need to keep a close eye on her.”
“We will.” She lowered her voice to a whisper, but they all heard her. “Do you really think she’s in danger?”
“I wouldn’t be here if I weren’t worried about her. She could be in danger in a lot of ways. The more people who find out about this, the more amateur sleuths come out of the woodwork. People could see Piper as the next victim. Or as a suspect.”
Claire gasped. “A suspect?”
“The first murder did happen in this apartment.”
The apartment that was supposed to be her doorway to freedom, to living on her own and finally being able to control her own life.
The apartment which now felt more like a prison, a heavy weight dragging her down instead of lifting her up.
Edna had moved to Mac’s other side, and she pointed to the sheets of paper on the wall. “Are any of these guys on your list of suspects?”
Mac took a step closer and studied the
pages. “Why, do you think they should be?”
Piper gave him a quick rundown on the events of the last few days and the strange extra date.
“Hmm. That does seem weird,” he said, pulling his notebook from his pocket and jotting down the three names. “I’ll add them to my list of things to check out.”
Edna stood glued to his elbow, craning her neck as she tried to read the notes on the pad.
He frowned down at her and snapped the notebook shut. “You all have my number if you need me.”
“Thanks, Mac,” Piper said, walking him to the door.
He bent forward and drew her into a hug. “Watch yourself, kid.”
She held on for just a second, savoring the feel of Mac’s protective arms around her. His shirt was crisply pressed, and he smelled like aftershave and starch. She gave herself one moment to remember the feeling of being safe and sheltered in her dad’s embrace, one tiny beat of time to let down her wall and miss her father.
Then she let go and swallowed back the emotion burning her throat. “I’ll be careful,” she whispered.
She pushed the door shut and took a second to compose herself before sucking in a deep breath and turning back to the group. “What do we do now?”
Cassie put an arm around Piper’s shoulder. “I think we all go home and let you get some rest. You’ve had a heck of a day.”
She nodded, her body feeling the exhaustion, as if it had been suddenly overwhelmed with the stress and trauma of the day.
“We’re not done investigating,” Edna said.
“We’re done for tonight,” Cassie said, overruling her. “We can get back together tomorrow and talk some more. Why don’t I bring over some lunch, and we can invite Maggie and Sunny too?” She tenderly brushed the hair from Piper’s forehead. “Why don’t you stay home tomorrow? You can take one day off.”
Piper knew her aunt well enough to know when she was just being nice. She was using the offer of staying home and bringing over lunch as a way to follow Mac’s direction and keep an eye on her. “I can’t. I have class at eleven, and I can’t miss it.”
