by Claire Kane
Lacey nodded.
Victor pursed his lips. “I think that seals it. Mister Watanabe is half-partner, half-rival with Mister Taniguchi. They did business together in Tokyo. It makes sense they’d work together on other things. But aside from them being shady, is this even worth our time? Ms. Tibbitts—Rao, whatever—might find some way to drag me back to Heaven at any minute. I can’t waste my time playing crime fighter. I stayed to find out who killed me.” He paused, then added, softly, “But I mostly stayed for you.”
Lacey wasn’t sure she managed to completely hide her blush, but she kept it from her voice when she answered. “That’s very sweet, Victor.” An idea struck her at random. “Wait—you said you saw Taniguchi meet with an accountant at the church?”
Victor nodded. “Yeah. Why?”
“Wasn’t that what you were doing for him? Accounting?”
Victor nodded again, slowly. “Are you saying…?”
Lacey glanced at him. “Maybe you came a little too close to finding something out after all.”
He shuddered, then sat back in his seat to think. “Maybe I did. Before last night, I would have said you were crazy to think that Mister Taniguchi would do something like that. But the way that other guy acted even when he was just on the phone with my boss? I’m not so sure I’d put it past the guy now. I wonder how close I was to finding out about his fraud.” A chilling thought brushed Victor’s mind. “Wait—you said you thought your ex-boss might have been involved in child trafficking, right?”
Lacey’s beautiful face soured. “I hope I’m not right.”
Victor ground his teeth. “Maybe I was about to find about that too. I need to visit that warehouse. Can we turn around?”
She shook her head. “I’ve been away from Nainai too long. She has trouble even feeding herself, let alone taking care of personal hygiene. Maybe tomorrow. I get really nervous whenever I leave her alone.”
Victor nodded. “It’ll wait. Let’s get back and help Grandma. We can sleep on everything else.”
*
Lacey soon entered her dark apartment, Victor in tow. “Nainai? I’m home?” There was no response. Only the murmur of a television soap opera, complete with dramatic music, broke the eerie silence.
“Nainai?” Lacey stepped out of the foyer and around the corner into her living room, and was greeted by the sight of an empty hideaway bed; Nainai never left her plush couch-bed without Lacey’s help. An unwelcome chill ran down her spine.
SEVENTEEN
“Nainai! Nainai, where are you?”
A crash and the clatter of broken glass came from the master bedroom. Lacey dropped her purse and sprinted toward the sound, visions of someone kicking in her window swirling in her mind. “Nainai!”
Lacey skidded to a halt just inside the bedroom door. Rather than an intruder, she saw her grandmother sitting in her wheelchair, her head in her hands. Down on the wood floor, close by, were white shards.
Lacey exhaled in relief.
“I’m sorry,” Nainai said. “I’m so sorry.”
“What are you doing in here?” Lacey asked, kneeling beside her sympathetically. She spotted what remained of a ceramic paw.
“I was bored… and scared,” she said. Her wrinkled fingers now spread over her cheeks. “I felt a… presence. There was some creaking near the kitchen. So I was trying to get my good luck cat. I wanted it in the living room with me.”
Lacey wiped her grandmother’s hair as she drew her against her chest for a soothing hug. “It’s okay. Everything is okay.”
“No.” Nainai pulled back, looking Lacey in the eyes, her eyelids puffy. “I broke my feng shui cat, and so now we won’t have good luck. A curse will fall upon your place, and it’s my doing.”
“I don’t believe in curses.” At least Lacey didn’t think she did. Why hadn’t that eerie feeling totally left? “Everything will be fine, especially now that I’ve resigned from my job—”
“You quit your job?” Nainai protested. “How will you afford this place? Ancestors, help us!” She cupped her hands together. “The curse has already started.”
“No, no curse has started!” She placed both hands on Nainai’s shoulders. “I don’t want to hear any more of this. Look, I will get you a new cat. It will be even luckier than the old one.”
Nainai actually looked a bit relieved. “It has to be bigger. Big!”
“In the words of Donald Trump, it will be huge.”
“I’m so sorry…”
“I’m the one who’s sorry, Nainai. You told me you wanted your cat in the living room with you, and I got distracted. But everything will be okay. I promise. We can have the rest of the day together. Tonight, I’ll look online and buy rush order shipping on a cat.”
Did somebody say cat? Rao popped beside Victor, who was watching quietly from the doorway.
“Only about a million times,” Victor said. “Where have you been? I have a ton of questions for you.”
Will you look at the time? Rao said. I guess I should be going.
*
Later that evening, Victor had gone to New Life Church to spend an uneventful night there. He’d apologized that he couldn’t keep watch over Lacey’s place, but he still hadn’t figured out how to fight whatever evil spirits he claimed to see, and added a remark about how his pet cat wasn’t forthcoming on teaching him self-defense against the dark arts. Lacey had retorted with a Harry Potter comment, but she could tell Victor was sincere in his desires to not abandon her. Still, shortly before sunset, he slipped through her front wall, disappearing with a promise of being back at first light, leaving Lacey to follow up the lead on the jewelry.
Unfortunately, she had no success in reaching any John Smith who knew anything to do with an engagement ring. Lacey started to wonder if it were perhaps a John or Jane Doe purchase, to remain anonymous. The jeweler had mentioned the buyer paid in cash. After another fruitless phone call, the doorbell rang. Annoyed by the interruption, but grateful for the short break, she wrapped her sweater tighter around her waist, and approached the door in white slippers. Passing Nainai in the living room bed, she was stopped with a, “Don’t answer that. Who comes this late?”
Lacey answered, glancing at her Apple watch. “It’s only 8:32.” She peeked in the peephole. The shadowed figure on the doorstep was female, Lacey determined, having a smaller frame and hair with plenty of body. She unhooked her chain lock, and opened the door.
It was Deborah. “Hi! Hope it’s not too late!” She presented a white bakery box. “This is a cake from us at KZTB, since we never had a proper goodbye ceremony for you, under the circumstances. I called up a few friends, like Cathy and Greg, to chip in on this for STAT delivery tonight. It was a group effort, but they weren’t able to make it. I’m simply the delivery girl. No tip necessary!” She awkwardly laughed through a stretched smile.
“Oh, wow, that was very thoughtful.” Lacey touched her chin, wondering why Cathy hadn’t been the one to bring it by. She turned toward the foyer. “Would you like to come in, have a bite with me?”
Deborah said, “Oh, goodness, no. I don’t want to take up your evening. But do you think I could use your restroom? I waited thirty minutes in Bliss Bakery, and have to tinkle.”
“Sure, no problem. Please, come in.” Lacey took the cake gratefully, and pointed her to a restroom down the hall.
While Deborah was doing her business, Lacey set the cake on the kitchen table. She sat there a moment, still wondering about the ring and its owner. She finally peeled the tape on the edge of the box and was about to lift the lid, but was interrupted by Deborah’s chipper voice. “All done!”
She had approached from behind, startling Lacey.
Lacey breathed. “Oh, okay. Thank you again for this.”
“My pleasure.”
The woman was out the door, the next moment, leaving Lacey alone with the tune of Nainai turning over in bed, readjusting pillows.
Rain started to patter against the apartment, which wasn’t
unusual, considering their locale. But tonight it came with a foreboding chill. Lacey again wrapped her sweater tighter, and sat back at her kitchen table. Something wasn’t right.
“Don’t eat the cake,” Nainai said nonchalantly.
That was definitely unexpected. “Why not?” Lacey asked.
“Confucious say, ‘Never accept treats from druggies.’”
Lacey cocked a brow with disbelief. “What makes you think Deborah’s a druggie?”
“She used your bathroom but didn’t flush the toilet.”
Lacey put her elbows on the table. “What does that have to do with anything?”
“You’re the investigative journalist. Do you want to check for a floater? Or see if pills are missing from the medicine cabinet?”
“Hm, that’s quite the analysis.” Lacey perked up. “Did you happen to see KZTB’s nightly special on opioid abuse, warning realtors to lock up medicine during open houses?”
“No, stupid is across the globe, baby girl.”
Before heading to the bathroom, Lacey deadbolted and chain-locked the front door. KZTB actually aired a nightly special on opioid abuse, wherein they warned realtors of addicts stealing drugs from medicine cabinets.
There was no hint in the toilet bowl of any unflushed business. Lacey knew better, anyway. Deborah was as pristine as she was perky. As far as medicine cabinets go, thankfully Lacey’s stash was limited to a trio of pill bottles for Nainai. One called Aricept, to combat early signs of Dementia. Another was a blood thinner, Warfarin. And lastly, a Chinese herbal supplement that Lacey didn’t know much about, as it seemed too much of mystical mumbo-jumbo to care for; she couldn’t read the Mandarin words anyway. She unscrewed each lid and counted. Of course everything was fine, because there weren’t any mood/pain changers in the lot.
Shaking the bottles beside Nainai, moments later, Lacey said, “If she took anything, it was from the green herbal bottle.”
“Figures,” her grandmother huffed. “That was my pot.”
Lacey arched a brow.
“I’m teasing.” She laughed loudly, clapping her hands like a child. “You should have seen your face. That’s just vitamins.”
“I’m about to buy you a new lucky cat, and that’s how you treat me?” she teased back.
Lacey retreated to the kitchen. The rain’s pattering became more aggressive, sounding more like buckets of water being thrown against the windows. She filled a teapot with water and put it on the stove in thought. Who killed Victor? Watanabe or Taniguchi, or the two of them in cahoots? But then who was John Smith? Either one of them, she supposed. She suddenly remembered Greg’s comment when they’d visited his warehouse on River Street. That had been the place she’d covered a money laundering scheme. If she had to guess, she suspected Taniguchi and Watanabe would be laundering their money to cover their tracks; which meant they’d have exorbitant amounts of spare cash to burn, and would be looking for things to buy that weren’t easily traceable.
Which one would have purchased the ring? And why would they have had it if they’d gone to Victor’s apartment? She wished she could recall Watanabe’s death-grip on her upper arm. She tried willing an image of his ring finger. Was it bare? She paused, pulling an herbal mint tea bag out of a box. Perhaps her thoughts were leading her down the wrong path, a rabbit trail. What if it didn’t matter whether the murderer was married or single, because maybe the ring wasn’t intended for anybody? Maybe it was just one of the ways the murderer laundered money.
Lacey lifted the teapot’s lid and dipped the minty bag into it, letting its string hang out the edge. While she waited for steam to cause a whistle, she again returned to the table, to her cake. She lifted the box lid, and inside was a small round cake wrapped in hot pink fondant icing. Written in loopy letters, red frosting said, “Farewell, Lacey.”
Lacey Ling thought nothing of the message, until the next morning, when she became violently ill.
EIGHTEEN
Clinging to the toilet bowl, Lacey heaved what little bile was left in her pained stomach, before crumpling to the ground in a jerky shiver. She moaned, cold sweat running down her forehead and chest.
She had only had a tiny slice of the cake, but that had to be it. If she had a regular slice, would she be dead right now? Thankfully Nainai had refused a piece. Lacey didn’t want to think of what could’ve happened if her grandmother accepted. Farewell, Lacey, it read. Farewell.
Victor hadn’t come over yet. She figured it was eight-something in the morning. Out of being a gentleman, he wouldn’t show until at least nine, knowing there was “getting ready” time. Lacey thought of her phone. Should she call an ambulance?
Nainai’s voice drifted to her from the living room. “You’ve been sounding like a barking seal for the last half hour. I told you not to eat the cake!”
Lacey clenched her teeth, feeling her stomach roil more. She moaned again, this time longer. Why would Deborah do this? she wondered. What did I do to deserve this? It had been out of character for the woman to be so thoughtful of another, but Lacey decided that under the circumstance, Victor’s death, maybe things were different. She gave her the benefit of the doubt. She wouldn’t be so trusting of someone so selfish ever again, if she lived through this.
A sudden sharp pain, like scissors, knifed through Lacey’s back. Shoulder blades reactively rammed together as she howled. The sickness was getting worse by the moment. Where was her phone? By her bed? With every ounce of energy, Lacey pushed herself on to her knees, on all fours, and slogged, like moving through a pool of molasses, into the hall.
“I’m going to get out of bed and help you!” Nainai called again. “You’re not even responding in any way coherently! I’m getting really worried!”
No, Lacey thought, but it came out in a lower grunt, a drop of saliva stringing from her loose lips. The wood floor started to wave beneath her, and a halo of blackness was closing in on her vision, until she couldn’t see anymore, or feel anymore.
*
Lacey awoke to the feeling of her right arm’s blood going cold. She blinked a few times, hearing a beeping in the background. Oh yeah, she was at the hospital, an IV in her arm. She vaguely remembered being put on a stretcher and rolled out into an ambulance, cold rain drizzling down on her and the EMTs.
Victor hovered beside her. “Hey there,” he said softly, unmistakably worried.
Lacey said, “I hope you’re not here to tell me you’re taking me to your God’s kingdom. Am I still alive?”
“Yes, you are plenty alive,” someone else said before Victor. Lacey flopped her head to her right where a middle-aged man in scrubs had just entered her room. He approached her bedside. “I’m Dr. Spellman.” He pulled a light-pen out of his pocket, and looked at her pupils. “How are you feeling?”
She was suddenly brought back to the awareness of her muscles aching, and the pit of her stomach feeling raw. “I’ve been better.” She thought of Nainai. “Where’s my grandma?”
“She’s here. She came over with you in the ambulance. She’s pretty adamant that you were poisoned. What do you think about that?”
Lacey thought of the cake again, and Deborah’s smile that, in remembrance, now seemed fake. “That’s what I thought, too.”
His eyebrows went up a touch. “That’s a pretty serious thing to say, unless you’re talking about typical food poisoning. We’ll take a blood test to see precisely what’s going on here, okay? It may just be a flu.”
“That would be a pretty bad flu,” Lacey said, repositioning her pillow behind tangled hair. Her chills came back, feeling like her sheet and thin blanket were suddenly yanked off her. She moaned. Victor put a hand over hers, and Lacey felt a moment of warmth.
A nurse stepped up beside the doctor and pulled out the implements for a blood draw. Spellman flicked his gaze at Lacey as the nurse dabbed her arm with iodine and began searching for a vein. The look in his eyes made Lacey wonder if things might be worse than she’d thought.
*
Lacey nodded weakly. Victor, at the other side of the bed, listened with anticipation.
“It’s actually one of my standard questions, anyway, along with ‘Do you smoke?’ and ‘Are you pregnant?’ So, do you take any illegal drugs?”
“No,” she said fast.
“Does anyone you associate with do drugs?”
She thought of Deborah, what Nainai said about her being a druggie. “Well, I have my suspicions but no proof.”
“Your test showed positive for opium.”
Victor interjected, “Greg. It has to be him!”
“I was thinking Deborah, not Greg,” Lacey said out loud.
The doctor, obviously thinking she was talking to him, said, “Who’s Deborah?”
“Deborah works with me, or rather did work with me. I recently resigned. She came to my place last night offering a ‘Farewell’ cake. I ate some of it this morning, and became ill.”
“You mentioned a Greg. Who’s he?”
“Greg… is my former boss. The last time I was with him was two nights ago, though.” Should she tell him what went down, that night in the warehouse? She decided to be subtle about the details, not really wanting cops to come to the hospital… if that’s how it worked.
“Did you eat anything he gave you?”
“No…” She thought of the cosmetics. “He did give me two perfume bottles, though. I sprayed some on me that night. Actually, I sprayed quite a bit. The smell was… divine.”
Dr. Spellman crossed his arms, a thoughtful look of concern in his eyes. “How did you feel after spraying it?”
Lacey nearly blushed through her sickness. She hated admitting to it, especially with Victor right there. “I remember feeling a soft, happy feeling, kind of warm inside. Everything I touched was perfect.”
