Arsen’s heart thumped in his throat, pounding against his Adam’s apple. He stabbed at his food, eating as quickly as possible, willing his heart to calm the fuck down. But he’d been close to Maya, really close to her—physically and emotionally—for the first time in over a year. How else was he supposed to react?
Underneath the table, Arsen’s free hand sat in his lap, his fingers crossed. It was an old habit, an unfortunate holdover from his childhood that stuck around. Whenever he lied or wasn’t sure that he was telling the truth, he’d cross his fingers, as if that made it better. His fingers were crossed now for the sake of his “promise” not to push things with Maya. He just couldn’t help it. It was like his fingers had their own agenda, and what they wanted was to touch her again. Even now, mere minutes after he’d comforted her, his fingertips itched like they physically needed to brush up against her skin.
Even still, he knew that he had to keep up appearances, despite what his body wanted to do. If Maya knew that he still had feelings for her, she’d flee. He knew she would. She was a survivor, through and through, and sometimes, that meant that when things got dangerous, she ran away. It wasn’t like he could blame her, not really. She was in a relationship now, after all. Arsen hadn’t expected that. When he’d first e-mailed her, he assumed that she was living somewhere alone, just like him. It stung, knowing that she was able to “move on” so quickly. No matter how many women Arsen bedded over the past several months, he couldn’t get Maya out of his mind, not even for a second. It really hurt to know that the opposite wasn’t true for her.
For now, at least, he smiled at her, giving her the big megawatt grin that always made her melt. He still knew how she operated, even after all this time. She was still the same Maya, despite everything. She smiled back for a second before it fell from her face. Arsen figured she hadn’t meant to smile at him, but it just came naturally. That’s the way things always worked with them. They never had to force their feelings for each other. I wonder if it’s the same for her and this new guy, he couldn’t help but think.
He was tempted to ask her about her fiancé, but instead, he found another way to keep the conversation going, even though the silence that fell between them as they ate was far from uncomfortable. It was almost nice, sitting with her in the quiet the way they used to. But it was a little too familiar; it might scare Maya off again if he wasn’t careful. Better to focus on the case for now. “So, um, the girl whose parents hired me, Roxie Greenwood… She’s only been gone for a week now, but The Blade left his symbol in her room for her parents to find. It’s him.”
“He wants the attention,” Maya said, flipping her fork between her fingers like it was a coin. It was hard for her to sit still, Arsen knew, when her brain was working overtime the way it had been tonight. But it wasn’t done yet. He still needed to get more information out of her if they were going to solve this case in time to save Roxie and the other girl. “But instead of leaving a sign for the cops…he does it for the parents? He wants to hurt people. The pain is important to him.”
“Go on,” Arsen prompted her, pulling out a pen and a notepad from his pocket to keep track of her thoughts.
“It’s personal. He…he must have chosen her specifically, targeted all of them for some reason,” Maya said, a little line appearing between her eyebrows as she concentrated. Arsen loved that line. In the past, whenever she was too focused on a case, obsessing over the details, he’d lean in and kiss her right in between her eyes to smooth the tension away. Most of the time, it didn’t work. Maya’s anxious energy defeated any and all foes, but he liked doing it anyway, trying anything to help her relax.
“I’ve got her diary,” Arsen said, getting up from his seat to go dig through his evidence cabinet. “Roxie’s, I mean. I waited to read through it until you were here. I figured you’d have a better sense of what was normal and what wasn’t, having been a teenage girl yourself.”
Maya nodded and accepted the small, thin book from Arsen’s hands. This time, their fingers did not brush up against each other at all, and Arsen felt a pang of disappointment as a result. As Maya flipped the book open and began to read, Arsen walked over to her side of the table, keeping safe distance but still staying close enough so that he could read over her shoulder, even though she spoke the words aloud. “Dear Diary,” Maya began, moving her finger across the page as if she could feel Roxie’s energy through the marks of her bright red pen. “Today, school was so interesting! I learned about sine, cosine, and tangents. I’m really good at math. Mom always said that I would be, but Dad thought that my brother Ron is smarter than me. That just shows what he knows. Nothing. One day Mom will dump his ass and then it’ll just be the two of us, forever.” Maya stopped reading to clear her throat before flipping over to the next page. “Dear Diary, I want to apologize for how I talked about Dad last time. He was the one who bought you for me anyway. He just makes me so mad sometimes because he thinks I am stupid just because I get bad grades in science and history. They’re boring! It’s not my fault! I always do my homework and study, but sometimes it’s just not good enough. Oh, well. I’m sorry, Dad, that I talked badly about you even though you can’t see it. I love you.” Maya paused, putting the book down on the table next to her now-empty plate. “Jesus Christ,” she murmured, leaning her head onto the palm of her hand. “Fuck.”
“What is it, what’s the matter?” Arsen asked, even though he was pretty sure he knew the answer to that question. He had a feeling he and Maya had the same reaction.
“Nothing, nothing, it’s just…she’s so normal. Healthy,” Maya muttered, her voice low, like she couldn’t bring herself to talk any louder in the presence of the diary. “Such a sweet kid.”
“I found Lizzie’s diary once,” Arsen blurted out, the words leaving his mouth before he even knew that he was going to say them. “I still have it, actually. But I’ve never read it.”
Maya turned to look at him then, her eyes wide and sad and full of emotion that had the potential to shake Arsen to his core. “Why not?” she asked in a small voice.
Arsen shrugged, even though he already knew the answer. It felt stupid, saying it out loud. “I know she wouldn’t want me to read it, you know, if she was still here.”
Maya frowned, her eyebrows scrunched up together. “What’s the difference between Lizzie’s diary and Roxie’s? Do you think we’re…do you think we’re violating her by doing this?” Maya was clearly trying to keep her voice as casual and light as possible, but Arsen could detect the fear hidden between her words. She doesn’t want to do anything to hurt anybody, Arsen thought. Same old Maya, same old beautiful kind loving Maya.
“It’s different,” Arsen began, “because Roxie is still alive. She can still forgive us for doing it. But Lizzie…Lizzie will never be able to do that.”
Maya was quiet a moment, tapping her fingers on the top of the table as she thought. “I think she’d forgive you,” Maya said softly. “I really think she would. It would just be…it’d be you trying to speak to her one last time. That’s not so bad.”
Arsen didn’t know what to say to that. Sometimes, especially now that Maya was gone, he’d take out the diary from its hiding place, late at night, and run his hands over the brightly decorated covers, dragging his fingers over his sister’s writing, where she’d scrawled, “PROPERTY OF ELIZABETH. STAY. OUT” on the front. What could he do, except respect his sister’s last message to him? Wasn’t that the best thing to do, after all?
But he didn’t want to argue with Maya, not now, not when she just got here. “Maybe,” he said instead of the flood of thoughts that had invaded his brain.
“It’s just a thought,” Maya said, returning her attention to Roxie’s diary and flipping to the back page. There were tons of empty pages, lots of room where she hadn’t written anything yet. Maya flipped back until she found writing again, landing on Roxie’s last entry.
“Maybe we should head to bed, get an early start tomorrow,” Arsen suggested, tearing Maya’s gaze away from the diary. He honestly felt exhausted, like he’d run a bunch of miles and swam across an entire lake or something like that, even if he knew it was only because he’d thought of Lizzie.
But Maya frowned and shook her head. “You can go ahead. I’m going to stay up a little while longer and read the last few entries here. Maybe she mentioned something that could come in handy. You never know…” She ducked her head, flipping a few pages back to some earlier entries, and resumed reading.
Arsen stared down at her for a long moment, conflicted. This was the ultimate contradiction with Maya: on one hand, she could be quite fragile, falling apart at the slightest reminder of what had happened to her as a teenager. But at the same time, she was so much stronger than him. A mere mention of Lizzie could cause him to crumble into pieces, which he’d have to reassemble by himself, piece by piece by piece. If Maya weren’t here, he’d probably go to his room and simmer in his feelings or otherwise, head out to the clubhouse of his MC, where he spent most of his time now that Maya was gone. But even after having a panic attack, here Maya was, struggling away at the work like she needed to solve the case to survive. Hell, maybe she did. Maybe that’s why she was such a fighter, because she knew how weak she was underneath it all.
Arsen finally sat down, next to her rather than across from her this time, so he could read along while Maya’s finger scanned its way down the pages of Roxie’s diary. After a few minutes of reading basic banal details like her schoolwork, her soccer games, and her friends’ teenager drama, Maya suddenly cleared her throat and began reading aloud again: “Today I met a boy! Well, he’s not really a boy. He’s more of a man. But he’s in college and works at the sunglasses store in the mall, right next to my favorite shop. He asked me and Celeste if we wanted to buy something and when we said we were broke, he gave me a free pair! Celeste was FUMING. She was so jealous, it made me laugh really hard. But not really. I kept it in because I don’t want to piss her off because we’re best friends.” Maya paused to take another sip of her scotch, sighing loudly as she downed the thick liquid. “But anyway, I gave him my number, but I forgot to get his name! How stupid am I? I have to go back and try to look and see if he has a nametag because it’s going to be so awkward and embarrassing if I have to ask now. He hasn’t texted me yet, though, so maybe nothing will happen. I’ll let you know!”
Maya paused again, putting the book down on the table as she drained off the rest of her glass and got up to pour more without asking Arsen’s permission this time. Arsen smiled a little at that, loving how quickly Maya seemed to get used to this new place, but in the back of his mind, worry nagged at him like a pestering child. Why is she drinking so much? Is she okay? Arsen wondered. But he didn’t push the issue, at least not for the moment.
“The Inked Hunters’ clubhouse is near the mall, right?” Maya asked as she settled back in her chair, gripping her glass in her hand. “At least, that’s the way I remember it.”
“It really depends on which mall,” Arsen said, rolling his eyes in the back of his head as he thought of the different shopping malls in this part of the city. “But yeah, the one closest to her house and school…is that one.”
“So let’s go,” Maya said, getting to her feet and quickly draining her full glass, cringing a little as it slid down her throat into her stomach.
“Wait, why? Just because she met a guy there?” Arsen asked, confused.
“Most victims know their murderers,” Maya reminded him. “Even if it’s just an acquaintance situation, this is the best clue we’ve got right now. We need to go see if that guy still works at the sunglasses shop. He might be our guy.”
“The mall closed, like, ten minutes ago,” Arsen said as he checked his watch. “We’ll have to go by tomorrow to see if we can find him.”
“Shit,” Maya groaned, sighing deeply before standing up to pour herself another glass of scotch.
“You know you’re supposed to drink that slowly, right, savor the taste?” Arsen couldn’t stop himself from saying.
“Fuck off,” Maya said as she continued to sip at the dark brown liquid. Arsen had to smile a little at that. He missed being told off by Maya, hearing her cuss at him at the drop of a hat. Somehow, she was all things, all the time: fragile, weak, strong, and a badass, all at once.
They were both quiet for a minute. Arsen watched Maya’s face became scrunched-up as she concentrated, staring down at Roxie’s diary, looking at a page next to her last entry where she’d drawn hearts, large and small, from the top of the page to the very bottom. She’s so young, Arsen thought wistfully, thinking about Lizzie, how she used to talk about the boys she had crushes on in middle school.
Suddenly, he felt energized, his blood pumping harder in his veins as he thought about his sister, about Roxie, and about the other nameless, faceless girls that The Blade had taken away. All those women—whose lives had been absolutely erased, whose identities were traded in for the all-encompassing label of “murder victim”—all of those stories, lost forever.
Not this time, Arsen thought to himself, balling up his hands into fists and digging his nails sharply into the sensitive skin of his palms. Not this time. Not these girls. They will get to live. They will get to be people, just like Maya.
Except Maya wasn’t exactly doing okay either. He could tell just from looking at her, the way she pulled at her hair, that she was coming out of her skin. It was like she had too much energy inside of her and nowhere to put it. She couldn’t move forward with her discovery given that the mall was closed and there was no way they could figure out who the man was that flirted with Roxie.
“Her cell records,” Maya finally said a minute later. “Call her parents; get the cell records. We can see if she texted or called a number the day she was taken.”
“Oh, that’s good. That’s a great idea!” Arsen said, but then a minute later, he saw another path. “There’s another way, you know—to get the cell records faster.”
“What is it?” Maya asked, her eyes alight with a fire that Arsen hadn’t seen in years. It made him scared and excited all at once, seeing that flame within Maya, that old spark that she had, the desire to save someone burning inside of her like a bright hot sun.
“Chris, from the Inked Hunters. He works at a phone company, has connects with others. I could talk to him to ask if he can trace the calls. She has her phone number written down on the front of her diary, on the first page. Look,” he said, leaning over Maya to flip the diary back to the first page, brushing their shoulders together in the process. Roxie’s number was written there, in bright pink ink.
“The Inked Hunters…” Maya murmured, pulling at her bottom lip with her teeth.
“What is it? What’s wrong?” Arsen asked, confused as to why she suddenly seemed so much more anxious than she had mere seconds before.
“It’s nothing, nothing,” Maya said, shaking her head, but then a second later, she opened her mouth to speak again. “It’s just…I haven’t seen them in so long. The guys there, in your club.”
Ah, she’s nervous about seeing my friends again, Arsen concluded to himself. He’d been a member of the Inked Hunters since he was a teenager, since before Lizzie was killed, even. They were his second family, the only people he could trust in the world. And they’d been upset when Maya dumped him over a year before. Honestly, Maya had some good reasons to be nervous. They were protective over Arsen, judging all the women he dated in the past year as harshly as possible, but in all honesty, they had loved Maya, too, accepted her as one of their own, even though she didn’t participate in the MC’s activities.
“It’ll be okay,” Arsen said. “I won’t leave your side.”
Maya smiled a little at that, but it was without humor or lightness. “I think that might cause more problems than it solves. They’ll think…they’ll think we’re…”
“Together?” Arsen supplied, and Maya grimaced but nodded. Arsen felt something fall apart in his chest—breaking into pieces like a fragile fruit—at the way her face fell at the idea of someone thinking they were together. Goddammit, that hurt like a bitch.
Suck it up, he told himself. She’s not your girlfriend anymore. She doesn’t want to be your girlfriend. He repeated the words to himself, like if he said them enough times, even internally, they’d sink in and feel more like the truth. But despite everything, there was another little voice in his head, small and weak but persistent, that kept whispering, She doesn’t want you yet. But that doesn’t mean you can’t try. A man’s got to fight for what he wants. You should know that better than almost anybody.
“It’ll be alright. I’ll make sure they don’t bother you,” he said, walking over to the other side of the room to slip his jacket on. “Come on, let’s go. We can bring the diary with us and read up on the subway ride over.”
Maya sighed deeply but nodded and followed him across the room, buttoning her sweater up to protect herself against the winter chill outside. “Just don’t want to get into any bar fights,” she said with a small, forced laugh. Arsen could always tell when she was really laughing and when she was faking it. This was definitely the latter.
The subway stop was a few blocks from Arsen’s house, and they walked side by side on the sidewalk, both of them with their arms crossed to avoid touching hands, even though Arsen wouldn’t mind touching her right about now, considering they were out in the cold, freezing their noses off. Years ago, when it got this cold in the city, he would grab Maya’s hand and put it in his pocket, keeping it safe and warm and protected. He wished he could do that now.
“I’m not sure my metro card still works,” Maya murmured, digging around in her purse as they approached the subway station. “Might have to get a temporary one.”
“I still have one of your old ones,” Arsen said without thinking, not considering how creepy that might come across until he’d already said it. Well, it was too late to take it back, even though Maya was looking at him strangely, like he’d just started speaking another language. “I keep it in my wallet. Here,” he said, reaching into his pocket to give her a card that he knew worked. Sometimes, he’d use it to get on the train, sitting down in a corner spot where nobody would sit next to him, so that he could pretend he was with Maya. Such a fucking pathetic, sad, little bitch, he thought to himself. So weak. Move on already, he thought. But it wasn’t that easy.
A minute later, Arsen and Maya stepped onto the train that would take them deeper into downtown, near the docks, where the mall was as well as the Inked Hunters’ clubhouse. There was only one seat left on the car they’d stepped into, so Arsen gestured for Maya to sit and grabbed one of the poles that hung down from the ceiling for passengers to grab onto when the train was overcrowded. But Maya, ever the stubborn fighter, just shook her head and grabbed onto the pole as well. An inch of empty space separated their hands, both gripped around the pole.
“Um, so all the gang is still there?” Maya asked, swaying a little back and forth as the train lurched into motion.
“Pretty much,” Arsen responded. “Still doing all the same business.”
Maya nodded but didn’t say anything, staring off into space, over Arsen’s shoulder. “So there’s two missing,” she whispered.
“Yeah, one other girl is presumed dead by the police. We don’t know her name. Her parents wanted to keep it out of the papers.”
Maya flinched a little, her eyebrows furrowing together. “That’s a little suspicious, don’t you think?”
“What do you mean?” Arsen asked.
“Well, if you were a parent, wouldn’t you stop at nothing to find your daughter? Maybe if they released her name, somebody who knew her, who knew that a creepy guy was hanging around her, would help them lead us to the killer. It’s just fishy, that’s all,” Maya said in a rush, pausing to breathe for a second before speaking again. “I think we need to start coming up with a suspect list. People to check out, people to keep watch on. We need to figure out who the missing girl is and look into her father. And Mr. Greenwood, too.”
“Mr. Greenwood?” Arsen asked, wanting to spur her thoughts to keep her analysis going. This was the side of Maya that he needed for work, the side that looked at a situation from an entirely different angle than Arsen. She was able to see things that he couldn’t, feel things that were beyond him. She was smarter than him, really. That’s what it came down to. He needed her mind.
“Roxie mentioned having fights with him in a few entries,” she explained, having apparently skimmed several diary entries that she hadn’t read thoroughly. “It’s probably nothing, but we’ve got to look into it. I see stuff like this all the time nowadays. There’s a lot of domestic violence out there.”
Arsen nodded, even though, personally, he didn’t feel like there was anything suspicious about Mr. Greenwood. Why would he come to a P.I. about his daughter if he was responsible for her death? She’s not dead yet, he corrected himself internally. There’s still hope. We can still find her.
Arsen and Maya got off at the stop nearest the clubhouse, and he began leading the way, even though Maya probably remembered the path from the train stop. “We’ll get my guy, Chris, on this right away,” he said reassuringly. “We’ll be able to see if Roxie was complaining a lot to her friends about her dad, too. We should be able to tell if there was any violence in the house.”
“You can read people’s text messages?” Maya asked.
“Uh, well, Chris can,” Arsen said, keeping his voice low so that bystanders couldn’t hear him.
But Maya’s voice only got louder as her disbelief grew. “Is he in the fucking FBI or something?”
Damn, she’s smart, Arsen thought, and he didn’t know why he felt surprised. She was never slow to pick up on things he tried to hide. “I can’t answer that,” he said with a laugh, looking over his shoulder to smile at Maya, who returned his grin for the briefest second before it faded away. Arsen savored that smile, locked it up in his brain so he could look back on it later.
“Here we are,” Maya said under her breath as they approached the clubhouse. Arsen walked up to the back entrance, knocking on the door three times in quick succession.
“Yo, it’s Arsen, open up!” he shouted, knocking a few more times until the door finally swung open.
“Hold your damn horses, Arsen, damn,” a woman said, scowling down at him until her eyes flicked over to Maya, confusion playing over the woman’s face for a second before it was replaced by recognition. “Maya, hey, girl, what are you doing here?” She shouted, quickly jumping out of the clubhouse and colliding into Maya, smashing her into a hug. Arsen saw Maya’s expression change from fear to resignation as she slowly returned the hug, patting the woman on her back slowly.
“Hey, Cassandra,” Maya said, apparently remembering the woman’s name, even though, as far as Arsen could remember, they’d only spoken a few times in the past, well over a year ago.
“Where have you been, girl? We’ve been missing you so much,” Cassandra said, still clasping Maya to her body as if they were best friends. “Come on, let’s get a drink, huh?”
Arsen was tempted to make a comment about Maya having already had enough to drink tonight, but he bit his tongue. He didn’t want to embarrass Maya in front of the MC crew. Throughout their relationship, Maya mostly avoided coming to the clubhouse. They never really discussed it, but Arsen got the sense that she was uncomfortable hanging around the MC. Maybe she didn’t trust them or thought they were criminals. But to be fair, Maya didn’t like most people. She kept a very small social circle, only trusting a handful of people at a time.
Cassandra ushered them inside the clubhouse, and only a few seconds passed before several members noticed them, slamming their drinks down and yelling at Maya to come over. Arsen had to suppress a grin; no matter how standoffish Maya was, the club always accepted her, always wanted her to be a part of the family.
Maya waved him over a second before a crowd of MC members could drag her into a drinking game. “Get the information from Chris, okay?” she instructed him before plastering on an inauthentic smile, performing for the club members. Arsen made a mental note for apologize to her later for dragging her along. Really, he knew he shouldn’t have done this. Too many people overwhelmed Maya, and sometimes, when she was in large crowds, she would have anxiety attacks, needing to run outside to get fresh air before she could breathe normally. Maybe that’s why she likes being out there in the country, Arsen thought. All those open spaces must be good for her.
He tried to dislodge that thought from his brain. It was no good wasting time feeling jealous of her new life. Maya was here now, in his grasp. He had to make good use of this time while he still had the chance. “I’ll be right back, okay?” he said to Maya before walking off to find Chris. He felt a little guilty for leaving Maya alone. He knew she was tough, that she could handle anything, but at the same time, she was often very nervous, very easily overwhelmed. As he turned his head to give Maya one last, reassuring look as he walked away, he thought to himself, I’ll take care of you, baby. I promise.