Unwed and Dead (The Dead Ex Files Book 1)

by Claire Kane

  Perplexed, Lacey narrowed her eyes at it. “Uh…” She almost stopped her, knowing she had already found the engagement ring.

  The woman opened the box to reveal a simple round diamond on a white gold band.

  Dumbfounded, Lacey said, “You’re sure this is for me?” She shifted her eyes all around, looking for Victor in vain.

  Karen vigorously nodded, her hat shaking atop her thin hair. “You were the girl who captured his heart. He had called me the morning of his… passing… and told me of his plan to present you with an engagement ring.”

  Hesitantly, Lacey accepted the gift in the palm of her hand. “I’m sorry, I’m just speechless,” she said for reasons other than Karen could know.

  “It’s okay. It can be hard to take it all in. I understand.” She rubbed Lacey’s arm.

  Without thinking, Lacey said aloud, “I need to talk to him.”

  Victor’s mother sputtered back a sob. “Yes, I wish I could talk to him too.”

  Lacey gave another warm embrace. “Thank you so much for this. I will cherish it forever.”

  Victor! Lacey yelled in her mind. We need to talk!

  *

  The luncheon afterward at Victor’s parents’ was hard to deal with. Lacey wanted to find out who owned the ring she had found in the ash. It would be a major clue as to who was Victor’s murderer. Victor had answered Lacey’s summons after only a brief delay, excusing himself with a remark about his dead pet cat. Lacey had ignored it, and told him they’d speak at the luncheon. And now, here they were, Lacey seated at the kitchen island in the St. John home amid the murmur of the other guests, while Victor floated in front of her in a meditative stance.

  When Lacey carefully opened the ring box for Victor to see, he gave a low whistle. “I can’t believe you thought I could afford a gigantic marquis diamond, anyway, and on a platinum band, no less.” Victor shook his head, eyeing the hors d’oeuvres with a gleam of craving in his blue eyes. “Mom made her best chicken salad and I can’t even smell it. Sometimes I really hate being dead.”

  Lacey bit into a carrot dipped in ranch and mentally retorted, Marquis are my favorite!

  “Does that mean I could afford one any easier?” He chuckled.

  You’re right. You were a student intern. I should have known, except logic kinda flies out the window when your ex-boyfriend is suddenly dead.

  He sobered quickly. “I would have found a way to do it for you, Lacey. You were worth it.”

  Lacey felt herself flush.

  Victor shifted out of his stance and drifted to the floor, quirking his back to look like he was actually leaning against the kitchen’s island. “I should tell you now, before you get more disappointed down the road—the diamond isn’t real. It was a placeholder for the real thing that I could afford later.”

  A cubic zirconium? She lifted her brows.

  A gentle hand on Lacey’s shoulder took her out of her discussion with Victor. It was Deborah McMahon of all people. Even at a funeral, the woman managed to look absolutely perky, smiling brightly with pink lipstick.

  “Hi!” she said, giving Lacey a stiff, tight hug. “How’re you holding up?” She pulled back. Her coiffed brunette hair stayed in perfect position, curled at the shoulders.

  “Deborah… I didn’t expect you to be here,” Lacey said, and added apologetically, “I mean, hello! I’m holding up. I’m sorry, did you know Victor?”

  “Goodness, no.” She shook her head. “I can’t imagine how you must be feeling right now. No, I heard the news from Greg last night that you quit. He told me the shock over what transpired with your ex was too much to bear. Since we’ve been coworkers over the last almost five years, I thought it would only be the right thing for me to swing by and give my condolences, you know?”

  “Oh, well, thank you very much.”

  Deborah asked, her face more serious, “What are your plans now? Where will you go? What will you do?”

  “I’m going to stay in the area, and take some time figuring that out.”

  “So you’re staying at the same apartment?”

  Lacey nodded.

  “Good to know, in case I want to bring over a tub of ice cream for comfort.” She smiled so big, her green eyes looked tight. “Hey, I won’t take any more of your time up. I just wanted to stop by.”

  Upon the woman exiting the kitchen, Victor said, “Who was that, and how many uppers is she on? I tried reading her mind and it was like a nuclear blast of chipper.”

  Lacey hurried out the kitchen’s back door and went directly to her car, Victor trailing behind.

  “What are you doing?” he asked.

  “I need to visit Jenning’s Jewelers,” she said out loud, nobody in earshot.

  “If you want to return the ring I got you, that’s fine, but I didn’t get it from Jenning’s. I got it from Walmart.”

  Lacey whipped open her car door and halted. “Walmart?” she sneered.

  Victor shrugged a shoulder. “What?”

  “It’s getting worse by the second. The next thing you’ll tell me is you stole it off a homeless woman standing outside the automotive department.”

  “No, it was ordered online. Walmart shipped it from the States.” That earned him a glare. He got the picture. “I should just… zip my lips.”

  Lacey cracked a smile. “Anyway, I’m going to Jenning’s because their logo was on the ring’s box I found at your place. Maybe they can help. It’s a good clue.”

  “I’ll go with you,” he said, promptly.

  SIXTEEN

  Jenning’s Jewelers was a quaint store, sharing a parking lot with a dry cleaners. Its locale was easy enough for Lacey to remember, however, as KZTB’s towering headquarters gleamed in the gray sky just two blocks down. She had once accidentally entered the jewelry store, intending to pick up her white, silk blouse. If it weren’t for the need to track down clues to Victor’s murder, Lacey never would have, even accidentally, stepped foot in there again. The owner apparently liked antiques and owls, or rather antique owls, as they sat at various heights, perched in the darndest places. All the eyes were a bit unsettling.

  Showing the jeweler the box, and its accompanying dazzler, Lacey said, “This was lost and found. I’m trying to return it to its rightful owner.”

  The older woman peered through tiny glasses, hooked to a chain necklace, and tottering atop a beakish nose. “Mm-hm, I remember this ring. It was sold to a very handsome gentleman.”

  “Go on.”

  “He said the special woman in mind wouldn’t expect it in the least bit. Best part was, for me, he paid in cash. Twenty-two thousand dollars.”

  “That’s a great memory you have there.” Lacey tucked some hair behind an ear. “Do you have a name, a description of the man?”

  “Oh, I don’t need a great memory for that,” she said. “All of our jewelry sales are on file with the buyer’s name, address, everything, not only for insurance purposes, but because of our best warranty in Seattle. All our customers have a warranty that promises to replace any lost or damaged gemstones as long as they bring their jewelry to the store for a quarterly cleaning.”

  Lacey leaned in. “Great, so you’ll tell me?”

  “Heavens no. That information is all strictly confidential. It’s our policy.” She shook a long finger in chastisement.

  Great! Lacey thought. The ol’ bat isn’t going to budge.

  “Play hardball with her,” Victor said. “Tell her you’ll just have to keep the ring and sell it on Ebay or something for a pretty penny.”

  Lacey placed a hand over the jewelry box, saying, “And what’s the policy for ‘Finders Keepers’?”

  The woman said, stepping back, “I’m sorry, I don’t follow…”

  Lacey swiped up the ring and stuffed it into her purse. “That’s because there is no such thing as a Finders Keepers policy. I could sell it on Ebay and get another, matching tennis bracelet.” She longingly eyed the glittering jewelry around her dainty wrist.

  Ob
viously annoyed, the jeweler said, “Why don’t you leave it up to me? I’ll contact the buyer myself, and tell them to come down here to pick it up.”

  Lacey retorted, “I’m not leaving a ring here without any assurances that it will in fact get back to the rightful owner. For all I know, the ring could have just been placed in this box, and come from Walmart.”

  The woman sneered, a hand over her heart. “Walmart?”

  Victor groaned. “I’m never going to live this one down, am I?”

  “I need proof somehow,” Lacey said.

  “Our store has an A rating with The Better Business Bureau.”

  “Look, you’re not understanding.” Lacey’s eyes widened. “I need to see with my own two eyes that this gets returned to the right person. I’m certain the owner won’t care one iota that you broke some sort of confidentiality policy, as long as their precious engagement ring is back in their hands.”

  The woman huffed, her spectacles shaking in frustration. “Fine. I think there’s something that may satisfy you.”

  She trundled to a back room, and was heard opening a drawer of files, and flipping through them. Victor teleported, hovering over her hunched shoulder. The woman pulled out a green file and licked a thick thumb, before resuming.

  This lady does things Old School, Victor thought, eyeing the folder. He’d have put all that information in a spreadsheet. Still this close to finding what might be a good lead… if he had a beating heart, it would’ve been racing in anticipation. Who else’s engagement ring was found in his apartment the night he was killed?

  “Aha,” she muttered under her breath, pulling out one contract/receipt in particular. She quickly made a copy of it from a dinosaur machine in the corner, occupying about half the room.

  Victor followed her, trying to catch the customer name, and finally got a good view of it as the copy came off the machine: John Smith. Who the heck was John Smith? The jeweler used a black Sharpie to black out the name on the copy.

  Coming with the copy smugly in hand, the woman returned to Lacey at the counter. She placed it on the glass top, and said, “Here is the proof.” On the sheet was a black and white picture of the ring, with its exact cut, color, and quality listed beside it. No wonder it was a huge diamond—it said it was two whole carats. At the top of the form, the customer’s name was blacked out.

  Victor appeared next to Lacey. “The name was John Smith.”

  Good job! Lacey, happy he caught that, pulled the ring back out of her purse. She said to the jeweler, “Do you mind calling Jo—? Him?” She caught herself.

  “No problem at all,” she said with a fake smile. She pulled a rotary phone with a curly cord out from under a nearby cash register. She dialed. Victor flashed beside her to listen in, cheek-to-cheek, like he’d done with Jessica. The response was easily heard: an operator’s voice robotically announced that the number had been disconnected or was no longer in service.

  Instead of hanging up, the lady oddly said, “Good afternoon, this is Jenning’s Jewelry calling… Yes, hello… Well, I’m calling because someone turned in the engagement ring you purchased, saying they found it… Wonderful! We’ll look forward to you coming by to claim your lost ring today, then. Thank you again for choosing us.” She put down the receiver with a smile.

  Victor blurted, “Don’t give her the ring!”

  “Why not?” Lacey blurted back.

  “Pardon me?” the jeweler responded, as Victor watched a black being start to seep out of the old telephone. He backed quickly away; he’d never seen Legion during daylight. But the thing was sluggish, and didn’t seem to take notice of him, thankfully.

  “Sorry, I was speaking to… never mind.” Lacey’s voice drooped.

  “The number was disconnected,” Victor said, urging, “Just get out of here. Now!”

  Lacey’s heart suddenly squeezed by fear, she rushed out the front door.

  “Hey! Wait!” the woman barked, nearly leaping over the counter.

  Quickly behind her Lincoln’s wheel, Lacey peeled out of the small parking lot. Victor beside her, she trembled. “That lady suddenly gave me the creeps.”

  “That’s because she had evil intents,” he said matter-of-factly.

  Lacey kind of glanced at him, her grip on the steering wheel still tight. “Thank you for listening in on her call. Now that you’re kind of on the ‘other side,’ do you read people’s auras… or whatever they’re called?”

  “No. It’s not like that. But I do see things.” He didn’t feel like divulging the horrifying details of Legion to her. It’s already bad enough that mortals know evil exists, he thought to himself. She doesn’t need to know its face, or lack thereof.

  That gave Lacey a chill. “At least we got the name of the murderer. Who’s John Smith?”

  “Heck if I know.” He put his arms up.

  Lacey’s brow wrinkled. “You don’t know?”

  “Nope.”

  “You don’t think, do you, that the ring could have belonged to one of the emergency personnel—a firefighter? EMT?” She put her sunglasses on, and eased her grip, heading downtown, toward her apartment. She suddenly felt the need to check on Nainai.

  “Trust me, none of them would have a white bread name like John Smith. And why would a Japanese cop or firefighter purchase a ring from Seattle?”

  Lacey nodded. “Of course. I’m just still a bit shaken up. He’s an American, white.”

  Victor joked, “…Has wavy blond hair, a square jawline and can sing a duet to Colors of the Wind.”

  “Ha ha.” Lacey laughed sarcastically. “We can check the phone book, when we get to my place.”

  “You have a phone book? Do those still exist?”

  “Of course, it’s where I get all my handy plumber and dentist magnets for my refrigerator.”

  Victor paused.

  “I’m kidding.”

  Victor rolled his eyes. “Hey, so I wanted to talk to you about some stuff I found out last night. Remember my boss from this summer’s internship?”

  Lacey nodded. “You practically worshipped the guy. It was really nice of him to come to your funeral. I wouldn’t expect that of someone as powerful as he is.”

  “He’s committing corporate fraud, Lacey.”

  She frowned. “Wait, how did you get from ‘Mister Taniguchi is my hero’ to ‘Mister Taniguchi is a criminal’?”

  Victor leaned forward and rested his head in a hand, a gesture that looked as natural in death as it had in life. “I spent last night at St. Ignatius.”

  “The Catholic church not far from here?”

  “That’s the one. It seems churches and other holy sites are my best bet for a stress-free night.”

  Lacey quirked an eyebrow.

  “Let’s just say there are really bad… things… that come out at night.” Even the memory made him shudder. “Anyway, Taniguchi showed up there last night.”

  “I thought he was Zen Buddhist.” Lacey stopped at a red light, and turned to look at Victor. For just a moment, she forgot he was dead, and was stunned at just how handsome he was, and about how nice a guy he was. Had things only been just a little bit different…

  Victor smiled. “I heard that. And Lacey—I do love you.”

  Lacey blushed and cleared her throat, facing forward again and begging the light to change.

  “Anyway, Taniguchi met up with some half-price crook of an accountant, there. The guy was using a church as his hideout while he cooked Taniguchi’s books.”

  Lacey frowned. “So what does that have to do with your death? Are you saying your old boss arranged to have you killed?”

  Victor shook his head. “I don’t think so; I never found anything that struck me as incriminating. I was just really shocked and figured I’d tell you. But wow—seeing those ledgers? That man has his finger in everything. I mean, he even exports parakeets, of all things.”

  Lacey hit the brakes reflexively, and a car behind her screeched to a stop, horn blaring. She hid her blush, an
d pulled to the curb as she waved the other driver by. She ignored the choice words and flashing finger. “Did you say ‘parakeets’?”

  Victor nodded. “Yeah. Why?”

  “Remember what I told you at the Space Needle about parakeets? You never asked me about my night with Greg.”

  Victor felt a simmering rage, then deflated, realizing that he’d been so caught up in himself that he hadn’t stopped to see how Lacey had fared; at least he’d had the good sense to pray for her. “Okay. So how was your night with… him?”

  Lacey rolled her eyes and swatted at Victor out of habit. “Don’t be such a baby. I’ve never had any feelings for Greg Mendoza, aside from professional interest. Even if he weren’t married, he’s not my type.”

  “I get the picture,” Victor said stiffly. He hated the thought of his girl alone with another man. “Just get on with it.”

  “Such a gentleman,” Lacey cooed mockingly. “As I was saying, Greg showed me his warehouse. Tried to buy me back by offering me a raise, a promotion, and a cut of his export business.”

  Victor perked up. “Did you say—?”

  “Yes. Export. Just like I said back at the Space Needle. I knew he wasn’t being upfront with me.”

  Victor’s brow furrowed. “So were you right about the exporting?”

  Lacey grimaced. “Somewhat. Mostly aphrodisiacs and cosmetics,” and she blanked her mind against the memory of what had almost happened with Greg, “and the warehouse had a huge room full of caged parakeets; those were imports, not exports. And there were crates with children’s pictures on them.”

  Victor gestured for her to continue. “Meaning?”

  Lacey narrowed her eyes. “Meaning I don’t know. I think Greg might be into child trafficking, but I have no proof at all.”

  “And you’re saying that my old boss does business with your old boss. So what does that mean? That they’re both crooked?”

  Lacey shrugged, checked traffic for an opening, and pulled back on to the street to continue home. “I don’t know what it means, my dear Victor. I only know that Greg works with some… Watanabe guy and—”

  “Wait—Orochi Watanabe?”