The Prettiest One: A Thriller

by James Hankins

  She followed his gaze down to where the towel she had wrapped around herself had opened an inch or two. She turned away from Bix and parted the towel a little more. Josh, who could still see what he had been looking at a moment ago, asked, “Is that a tattoo?”

  “Sure looks like one,” Caitlin said, recognizing the image at once. “It’s a Wild Thing.”

  “A Wild Thing?”

  “From Where the Wild Things Are.”

  “Exactly,” Bix said, though he wouldn’t have been able to see the tattoo from where he was standing. “You said it was your favorite book as a little girl.”

  And it was. Written decades ago by Maurice Sendak, it both frightened and delighted her in equal measures as a child. In it, a boy named Max wreaks havoc in his home and talks back to his mother and so is sent to his bedroom, which mysteriously transforms into a forest, and which somehow contains an ocean on which Max sails to an island inhabited by strange beasts he calls “Wild Things.” He becomes their king but grows bored and misses his home, so he leaves the island, to the dismay of the Wild Things. When he sails home again to his own room, he finds a warm supper waiting for him.

  As much as Caitlin loved the story, it was the creatures that kept her entranced. There were several Wild Things, and they all looked like monsters of one kind or another. The one adorning Caitlin’s hip had a broad, semi-smiling mouth with a row of short fangs running from one side to the other, yellow eyes, light-colored fur, and claw-toed bird feet. Caitlin’s eyes were particularly drawn to the creature’s wavy hair, which looked to be the same shade of red as her own. She had to admit that she kind of liked the tattoo.

  “Seriously?” Josh said. “You got a tattoo?”

  “Sure she did,” Bix said. “We both did.”

  He pulled up his shirt and turned so they could see the tattoo on the back of his shoulder. Bix’s Wild Thing looked a lot like a Minotaur from Greek mythology, which was depicted with the head of a bull and the body of a man. Sendak’s Wild Thing version was a bit different, though. It had a bull’s head and stood erect like a man, but its entire body was covered in blue-gray fur—except for its big, naked human feet.

  “Nice work, huh?” Bix said as he tugged down his shirt. “My little Wild Thing,” he added, smiling at Caitlin.

  “Not anymore, Bix,” Josh said. “So what’s going on in here?”

  Caitlin took a last look at her own tattoo, then turned back to the men. She’d forgotten for a moment the reason she’d barged in on Bix.

  “You said that before we sold the car I came here in, you dumped everything from it in a box.”

  “Yeah, it’s in the closet,” Bix said as he stepped over to the closet and slid open one of the doors. He reached up and took a cardboard box down from the shelf. It was a little bigger than a shoebox. He put it on the bed.

  “There could be answers inside,” she said as she sat down next to it.

  “Whoa, there,” Josh said.

  Caitlin glanced up, then followed Josh’s gaze to her thighs, where her towel had ridden up, exposing most of her legs and, she feared, a little too much beyond that. She quickly adjusted the towel before Bix could see anything private, though she realized a moment later that it hardly mattered. Still . . .

  “Could you guys give me a minute or two here?” she asked.

  “Sure,” Bix said.

  They closed the door behind them as they left. Caitlin removed the lid of the box and peered inside.

  Bix sat in the armchair in his living room with his head tipped back, his legs sticking out in front of him, crossed at the ankles. He had his eyes closed so he wouldn’t have to make eye contact with Josh, who was sitting on the couch doing something on his tablet. Even though Bix had been sleeping with the guy’s wife, he resented the hell out of Josh. It didn’t matter to him that Josh had been with Katie for years before Bix ever met her. Bix loved her. And even though she didn’t remember being in love with Bix, the fact was, she had loved him. There was no doubt about it. And deep inside, he believed she’d remember that one day—maybe not in time for her to decide to stay with him, but she’d remember.

  Bix’s thoughts wandered to the film Cast Away, in which Tom Hanks gets stuck on a deserted island for four years. The only thing that sustains him during that time, that gives him the strength and will to survive and ultimately risk his life to be saved, is a photograph of his girlfriend and the thought of reuniting with her one day. And miraculously, years later he makes it back to her, only to find that he’s been presumed dead by everyone and his girl is married to another man. For four years he thought of nothing but her, but she had moved on, started a whole new life. She’s happy again. So Tom has to let her go.

  Bix and Katie had rented the movie a few months ago, and he remembered being pissed off for Tom. She was with him first. He was the goddamn star of the movie. When he came home, she should have left the second guy. It occurred to Bix now that Josh was a little like good old Tom in the movie, having lost his wife for a long time before getting her back. It was Bix who was the second man. Josh reuniting with Katie was like the happy Hollywood ending Bix had wanted for Tom Hanks. It didn’t seem so happy, though, when Bix was on the losing end.

  He heard his bedroom door open and Katie came down the hall, the cardboard box in her hands.

  “What are you wearing?” Josh asked.

  “Oh,” she said, looking down at herself. “I was in Bix’s room in nothing but my towel, so I threw on some of my old clothes. I mean . . . the clothes I wore when I was . . .” She trailed off.

  “You look good, honey,” Josh said.

  It was probably the first thing Josh had said with which Bix agreed. Katie looked amazing. Gone were the shapeless sweatshirt and department-store blue jeans. As she stood in the middle of the room, the morning sunlight seemed drawn to her as if according to some previously unknown law of nature. She absolutely glowed. Her hair was still sexy damp. She wore a pair of stylish jeans that fit her in a way that would make store mannequins jealous, topped off by a thin belt with cool, feminine little silver studs. Above that, a tiny sliver of her belly showed below a tight blouse that was short in the waist and the sleeves, coming down only just below her elbows, and was cut so that it was open enough in the neck to show a perfect amount of cleavage—not enough to make her look like a hooker, but enough to draw your eyes and hold them for longer than was polite.

  “There’s the Katie I know,” Bix said, grinning. For the first time since she had appeared on his porch and announced that she was actually married to another man, Caitlin looked like Katie again. She looked fantastic. But as much as Bix enjoyed seeing her like this, it felt bittersweet. He was reminded yet again about all he was losing.

  “Seriously, Caitlin,” Josh said, “you look great.”

  “That always was my favorite shirt on you,” Bix said.

  “Of course it was,” Josh said.

  “Okay, guys, thanks,” she said, suddenly seeming uncomfortable under their scrutiny. “But let’s forget about my clothes for a second.”

  She crossed to the couch and sat beside Josh with the box in her lap. She removed the lid and pulled out a wrinkled piece of light-blue paper.

  “What’s that?” Josh asked.

  “I think,” Caitlin said, “that this is the reason I came to Smithfield.”

  “It looks like a takeout menu,” Josh said.

  “It is. For the Fish Place.”

  “I know you said the steak tips were good there,” Josh said, “but you think you started a new life just to try them?”

  “Do you remember where in the car you found this, Bix?” Caitlin asked.

  He thought for a moment. “I think it was right on the seat, along with some garbage. To be honest, I thought you were a bit of a pig, Katie. That menu was there, along with some empty water bottles and old food wrappers.”

  “You mean these?” Caitlin asked as she removed three plastic water bottles, empty and hand-crushed, and a crumpled ball of
fast-food wrapper.

  “Yeah, that’s it.”

  “You didn’t throw the garbage away?” Josh asked.

  “Like I said, before we traded in her car, I dumped everything I could find into a box and set it aside. When we got home, I just stuck it in the closet and forgot about it.”

  “Why do you think that menu is the reason you came to Smithfield?” Josh asked.

  “I figured it might have been right there on the seat when I got in the car,” Caitlin said, “and Bix just confirmed that. I probably saw it, saw the address, and drove straight there . . . which makes sense, because Bix says it’s where we met.”

  “Okay,” Josh said, “but how did you find the place? If you had just entered a fugue state, I doubt you were thinking very clearly.”

  “The car had a plug-in GPS mounted on the dash,” Bix offered.

  “But is it possible I could have programmed in the address in whatever frame of mind I was in?” Caitlin asked.

  Josh considered that. “My first thought was that it might have been tough for you, but they say you can be fully functioning in a fugue state, so I guess you could. Anything else in there?”

  Caitlin took items out of the box one by one as she listed them. “A couple of CDs—Iron Maiden and Anthrax—a roll of duct tape, a small pouch of tools . . . looks like a pair of pliers and a couple of screwdrivers . . . a cigarette lighter and half a pack of cigarettes.”

  “I forgot about the cigarettes,” Bix said. “You don’t smoke, Katie.”

  “I think we’ve established that this wasn’t Katie’s car, Bix,” Josh said. “These are obviously the real owner’s things.”

  Bix looked at the collection of items on the couch beside Caitlin. He hadn’t given much thought to them when he’d boxed them up, but now that he knew the car hadn’t been Caitlin’s, that the vehicle and the items inside had belonged to someone else, they started to look a little different to him, taking on new meaning. Duct tape, food wrappers, empty water bottles, cigarettes . . . They looked like things someone might bring on a stakeout. And the presence of the duct tape gave that stakeout a sinister feel.

  Caitlin took another item from the box. It was a small notepad, the kind that could fit in the palm of a hand.

  “Was that in the box?” he asked.

  Caitlin nodded. “Sure.”

  Bix frowned. “I know it’s been a while since I put that stuff in there, and I know I forgot about the cigarettes, but I definitely don’t remember that notepad.”

  Caitlin flipped open the cover. From where he sat, Bix could see handwriting on the top page.

  “What’s it say?” he asked.

  “It’s a list,” Caitlin said.

  “That looks like your handwriting,” Josh pointed out.

  “It is.”

  “What’s on the list?” Bix asked.

  “Names,” Caitlin said. “Well, sort of, I guess.” She stared down at the notepad in silence for a moment, then said, “The first one is Bogeyman.”

  “Bogeyman?” Josh said. “Seriously? Is that the Bogeyman from your nightmares, do you think?”

  “No, Josh,” Bix said. “It’s the real Bogeyman.”

  Josh ignored that. “Caitlin?”

  Caitlin shook her head. “I have no idea. I still have nightmares about him all the time, but I have no idea why I would write a list with him on it.”

  “What are the other names?” Bix asked.

  Caitlin read, “One-Eyed Jack and Bob.”

  “Bob?” Bix said. “Doesn’t really seem to fit with Bogeyman and One-Eyed Jack, does it?”

  “There’s also something that looks like an address,” Caitlin said. “1108 Greendale Boulevard. Next to it, in parentheses, it says, ‘Ten to four.’ ”

  “Sounds like a business address, maybe,” Josh said. “And those are the hours it’s open. You know where that is, Bix?”

  Bix thought for a moment. “I know the general area. It’s near the brewery on the other side of the city. Not a great part of town. No idea what business might be at that address, though.”

  “It’s something we need to check out,” Caitlin said. “And last but not least, there’s this,” she said as she took a stack of paper money from the box.

  “Whoa,” Bix said. “That definitely wasn’t there when I put that box in the closet. How much is it?”

  “Twelve hundred dollars.”

  Bix frowned. “Why were you hiding that from me?”

  “Guess you don’t know her as well as you think,” Josh said, taking evident pleasure from that fact.

  Without taking his eyes off Caitlin and the money, Bix gave Josh the finger.

  “This is weird,” Caitlin said, looking down at the things she had removed from the box. “Bix says he put this box in the closet seven months ago and this notepad and the money weren’t in it. That means that sometime since then, I wrote this list and hid it in the box, along with twelve hundred bucks. Why would I do that?”

  Bix couldn’t help but feel that she had hidden the list specifically from him. And the money, too.

  “Well, we have a few clues now,” Josh said, “for whatever they’re worth. Make sure you bring that notepad with us today.”

  “And the money,” Bix said. “We may need it for . . . whatever.” As Caitlin stuffed the bills into a front pocket, he added, “Let’s get going.”

  The restaurant where Caitlin worked was still their first stop. Hopefully, someone there would tell them something helpful. Bix wasn’t optimistic. In his experience, nobody really helped anybody with anything if they could avoid it, especially when doing so required the sharing of information. And sadly, it looked like the three of them were going to need a lot of help.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  HUNNSAKER WAS HUNCHED OVER HER desk with the Boston Globe and the Smithfield Beacon in front of her, both newspapers open to stories about the warehouse shooting. Apparently, the murder was already old news to the editors of both papers, having occurred as long ago as yesterday morning, because neither of the articles was featured prominently, meriting only a few inches of column space toward the back of the local news sections. But they did print the sketches of both the victim and the redheaded “person of interest,” as Hunnsaker had requested she be labeled, along with more detailed physical descriptions. Now it was time to see how many calls from nutjobs and cranks they would have to sift through to find out if anyone out there actually had useful information. Someone must have seen the victim. Someone must know the redhead. The question was, would they see the sketches? And even if they did, would they call the cops?

  Martin Donnello sat at the counter and picked at his omelet. It was a little late for breakfast but still a bit early for lunch, and he wasn’t all that hungry anyway. But he knew he should eat something. He hadn’t slept much since everything went wrong at the warehouse the night before last. Guns came out, Donnello’s partner seemed to have gotten himself shot, and then that damn redhead led them on a chase before somehow getting away. Donnello had spent most of his time since then looking for her. He wished he’d gotten a better look at her. He wasn’t even sure he’d know her if he saw her again.

  His eggs had grown cold, so he dropped his fork and picked up a piece of sausage and took a bite. He was so lost in thought about the shit that went down the other night that he almost didn’t hear the old guys talking behind him. He wasn’t sure what it was that had snagged his attention, but when he tuned in to the old guys’ conversation, he grew interested.

  “‘Person of interest,’ they call her,” one of the old men said.

  “I could get interested in her person,” the other said, causing them both to chuckle.

  “What the hell was she doing in an abandoned warehouse in the middle of the night?”

  “Probably a hooker.”

  “I’d pay for some of that.”

  “You’d have to pay. Nobody’s gonna give a dried-up old sonofabitch like you anything for free.”

  Donnello
turned to his left to look behind him. He always turned to his left. No point turning to his right, seeing as he’d lost that eye in a fight a few years ago. Who was he kidding? It’s hard to call anything a fight that consists of four guys holding you down while a fifth pops your eye out with a spoon like a chef with a melon baller. He’d grown accustomed to turning to the left all the time, just like he’d gotten used to his eye patch. When he turned, he saw two old men sitting across from each other in a booth, both of them looking over Donnello’s shoulder. He turned back around and saw the bulky sixteen-inch television on a corner shelf above the cash register. The news was on and coverage of a story was under way. On the screen was what appeared to be a police sketch of a young woman. Evidently, it had been there for a little while already, because Donnello saw it for only three or four seconds before the sketch disappeared and the program cut to a reporter standing in front of a warehouse.

  Donnello knew the warehouse, of course.

  And he’d seen the young woman before . . . at the warehouse two nights ago. He hadn’t gotten a good look at her then. Things got confusing when the bullets were flying. Plus, the warehouse was dark. When she started running, it was hard to keep up. They had searched for a while but they’d ultimately lost her. Donnello had been searching ever since. And now maybe he’d finally find her. Because he recognized her, and not just from the warehouse. No, he’d seen her before. He wasn’t yet sure where, but he definitely had.

  He would remember eventually, he was certain of it. And then he’d track her down. And when he did, he’d do what he had to do.

  Caitlin sat in the front seat, her eyes scanning the sights as they drove through the city. They had passed through the West End, where they’d had dinner last night, and were heading through the heart of Smithfield on Barstow Boulevard, one of the city’s main drags. From the driver’s seat, Bix pointed out various landmarks and gave points of reference for them while Caitlin struggled to call forth a single memory.

  “That corner is where you gave that homeless guy with the dog half your bagel, then went back and bought another one for him to split with his mutt.”