Chapter 3
I gulped as I rose to my feet and continued to lock eyes with Coop, who stood over Hank’s crumpled body as though he were just another box she needed to unpack.
I glanced away only briefly and noted there were specks of blood on the front of her tan boot, but then I didn’t see much blood around Hank at all. Maybe it wasn’t blood? Maybe it was some sort of tattoo ink. There was a box labeled ink just behind her, after all. Could tattoo ink kill you if injected and how much did you need to do the job?
And why was I asking myself that question when I didn’t even know what the murder weapon was yet?
Slow your roll, Stevie.
Trying to focus, I quickly glanced at Hank’s immobile form. He was on his back, his expensive but casual tan suit jacket without so much as a wrinkle. Yet, his legs were positioned as though they’d crumpled beneath him, still bent at the knees. And the fake brown leather loafers he wore sported the white, chalky residue of the salt used to keep the sidewalks outside free of ice.
His sandy-blond hair had nary a strand out of place, still slicked back in that outdated pompadour he was so fond of, but that was all I was able to process before things got sticky.
Suddenly, Trixie was all sound and motion, reaching for her friend and taking her hand. “Coop! What happened?”
What happened? I couldn’t believe she was asking what happened. Here’s what happened: Glamazon went rogue and snuffed a guy out. That’s what happened, coo-coo pants.
Admittedly, Hank wasn’t the nicest guy and most of Eb Falls wasn’t too fond of him, myself included. But we’d all loved Abe, who’d only just died a couple of months back. So we tried to be pleasant toward his stepson in honor of him—sort of a goodwill gesture. Yet, no matter how disagreeable he had been, he certainly didn’t deserve to end up dead.
“We need to call 9-1-1,” I urged, digging in my purse for my phone.
“No!” Trixie cried out, pushing Coop behind her in a protective gesture I found odd as all get out. Coop didn’t need protecting. She’d cut your heart out and serve it on those snobby tasteless crackers Win was so fond of. I didn’t doubt that for a second.
But Trixie’s face, stricken with fear, spoke volumes. Which I suppose I could understand if your BFF is a cold-blooded killer and she was caught in the act. But why would she want to protect a murderer? Unless…
“Stephania!” Win’s harsh tone cut off my thoughts. “I see the wheels in your head turning. What’s the first rule of Spy Club?”
I wanted to answer him with my typical snarky reply, which was, “What happens in Spy Club stays in Spy Club, except when dead spies refuse to share their secrets with their earthly contacts and let new members join their stupid club.” But I refrained because I didn’t want Trixie to think I was crazy as a bedbug.
“You must not jump to conclusions,” he reminded with authority. “You must take in all the information around you before you simply assume this woman is guilty, and while she’s quite antagonistic, you have no facts to place Hank’s death at her doorstep. That’s what the first rule of Spy Club is.”
Blah-blah-blah. But he was right. So as I held my phone close to my chest, I eyed a terrified Trixie and an utterly unrepentant Coop. “We have to call the police, Trixie.”
But she held up her shaking hands in a frantic gesture. “Wait! Please. Just wait a minute and let me find out what happened before we involve the police. Please. I’m begging you.”
Okey-doke then. I know I openly gaped at her. Yet, there was something so raw about her plea. So desperate, and when she made the request sounding like the American version of Mary Poppins, I had trouble denying her. How could such a warm, sweet-spoken woman be knee-deep in this abrasive Coop? Talk about opposites attracting.
On a deep, steadying breath, I looked her right in the eye. “Okay. I’ll wait. But I want to know what happened, and I want to know right now. I knew Hank. I knew his stepfather, Abe. How did this happen, Coop?” I waved my hand in the direction of Hank’s body and took a step back out into the hall.
But Coop just shrugged her slim shoulders, as unaffected as ever, and said, “I dunno. I came back to empty the boxes just like Sister… Um, just like Trixie asked, and when I moved that pile over there,” she pointed to a stack to her left, next to a shelving unit, “I found him all crumpled up like a piece of paper. I almost tripped on him.”
Why did Coop keep calling Trixie sister? Maybe they were sisters? I hadn’t thought of that, though they looked nothing alike. But then maybe they were adopted?
That puzzle was for a much later conversation. For now, we needed to establish what had happened to Hank.
My eyes darted from Hank’s body to Coop and back again. “Does that explain the blood on your boot? You tripped on his body?” I asked, forcing my terror to the furthest recesses of my mind.
I realize it’s not like I haven’t encountered a killer, but there was something about Coop that truly frightened me on a deeper level than some murderer with a gun.
“Probably,” she said casually, daring me to say otherwise with those amazing eyes of hers.
“Probably?” I squawked, waving my phone around like a samurai sword. “Probably?”
Okay. The waiting game was over. I was going to call the police. Hopefully, Officer Foreign Object Stuffed Up His Butt was on duty and he’d handle this. I began to dial a very familiar number.
But Trixie took a leap toward me, grabbing my wrist, her face red, her eyes full of unshed tears. “Please wait, Stevie. Please. I need you to listen to me. If Coop says she found him like this, I know she’s telling the truth. It’s not in her to lie.”
Now that was rich. I fought barking a laugh as I yanked my arm away and took another step backward. “That’s insane. No one ever really knows anyone, and there’s no way you can possibly convince me it’s not in her to lie. I’m sure Jeffrey Dahmer’s parents thought he didn’t lie either, and look how that turned out.” Speaking of Dahmer… “And wait one minute,” I hissed. “How do I know the two of you weren’t in cahoots?”
Now, that was the dumbest question ever uttered by an amateur sleuth. Why would they murder Hank and wait until I showed up to announce his death? It was about as likely as the notion Vogue was going to call and ask me to be on their cover.
But what can I say? I was a little rattled. Not just by Hank’s death, but by Coop’s nonchalance about a dead man in their storage room.
Trixie took in a ragged breath, her chest heaving up and down, her neck a mottle red. “I’m begging you, Stevie. Please listen. Coop isn’t… She’s not like most people. She—”
“And that’s her alibi? She isn’t like most people? Most people aren’t like the Zodiac Killer either, but lookie there—a serial killer! A killer’s a killer. Period.” I backed away until I was almost pressed up against the orange and yellow wall of the hallway.
Out of nowhere, Coop suddenly straightened, her spine stiff, her face no longer aggressive but quite passive and, dare I say, confused.
She shook her head with a vehement motion, making her hair swing. “Kill Hank H. Morrison? Oh, no, Stevie Cartwright the medium. I would never kill someone who didn’t deserve to be killed.”
“Coop!” Trixie hissed, her eyes flashing all manner of signals to her friend who, hand to heart, looked about as confused as a mouse in a maze.
“Something is amok here, Dove. Something deep below the surface of this woman. I almost smell it. I know you’ll think me bananapants, as you so crassly point out when I make an observation you don’t like, but I find I believe her.”
Ooooo! I hated when Win had a point to make, and he made it at a time when I couldn’t defend my own point of view. Which was, this was nuts and I could be in danger.
“Coop,” Trixie pleaded, turning back to face her friend. “Stop talking. Please. Just let me handle this.”
Coop snapped her mouth shut, turning her lips into a thin line and crossing her arms over her chest.
My gaze narrowed in her direction and it took everything I had not to turn tail and run.
So what made me stay? Win and his stupid spy gut. Sure, I could chalk up his notion to the idea that maybe he was on Coop’s side because she was flat out a stone-cold fox. And yes, I’m going there because that’s always where I go these days. I can’t help but take the jealous route. It’s pathetic, but in the interest of honesty, I’m not playing games with myself.
However, Win wouldn’t put me in danger no matter how appealing Coop is.
So, taking into account Win’s gut, I decided to fish around a bit. I only knew a little about Hank, but one thing was for sure. He owned a lot of real estate via his stepfather Abe’s passing.
“Do you know Hank? Isn’t he your landlord? Didn’t he inherit this place after his stepfather passed?”
If that were true, it would explain why he’d been in the tattoo parlor. Hank wasn’t the kind of guy who had tattoos, or at least not any visible ones. But he was the kind of guy who liked money.
Just ask the Thursday night poker crowd of middle-aged men in Eb Falls. Hank liked to win, and he was a notorious sore loser, but tattoos? Not his thing.
Trixie inhaled a gulp of air and bounced her head. “Yes. He owns this building and several others on this block, I think.”
“He was mean,” Coop added for good measure, rocking from foot to foot, two bright spots of red on her cheeks.
“Coop!” Trixie fairly screamed before she appeared to gather herself and shake off her panic.
I cocked my head, eyeballing the front door and trying to remember if Trixie had locked it behind me in case I needed to make a quick escape.
Yet, I couldn’t resist asking, “Mean how, Coop?”
But Trixie intervened before Coop had the chance to open her mouth. “When we originally rented the store, the price was much more manageable. But we rented it from Abe, and by the time we got here, Abe had died and Hank was in charge. He upped our rent. It’s no big deal. We’ll make it work.”
“You’re not telling the truth, Sister Trixie,” Coop crowed like a child who catches their parent fibbing. “He lied and said he couldn’t find any paperwork on our lease and that must mean it didn’t really exist. Then he charged us more money.”
“Didn’t you have a copy of the lease Abe signed?” I asked, avoiding looking down at Hank’s body, though I knew I’d have to if I intended to figure out his murder.
Trixie’s shoulders slumped in defeat as she jammed her hands into the pockets of her jeans. “I looked everywhere and couldn’t find it when the time came to defend our position and prove he wasn’t being truthful. I’m usually so careful about things like this, but I have no idea where it went. I had a copy of it on my laptop, but then my laptop crashed and, well…it was just easier to let things be.”
Coop’s perfectly arched eyebrow rose. “You said we shouldn’t make a fuss because we didn’t need any more troub—”
“Coop! Honest to gracious, I’m going to put a dirty sock in your mouth if you don’t can it!”
I watched the silent warning conversation between Trixie and Coop play out via their eyes, and I was left feeling uneasy. If Hank was going to raise their rent, and it made Coop angry, she had motive to kill him. So did Trixie for that matter. But would they be so careless as to do it here in their own store while I’m here?
How long had Hank been dead, anyway?
But none of that made a difference. The police still had to be called. And I said as much.
“You do realize there’s no escaping calling the police, don’t you, Trixie?” I kept my voice as sympathetic as possible. Trixie’s panic was truly troubling me.
“Stevie Cartwright is correct,” Coop offered without so much as a pause. “The police must be called. It’s the rules. I saw it on the television. I think the show was called Snapped. And we can’t wait too long or they’ll become suspicious.”
Trixie let her head fall back on her shoulders in clear frustration. “Coop! No more!” she growled.
I didn’t know what to say to Coops assessment, but I was calling the police anyway. Looking to Trixie, I sighed in resignation. “I have to call the police, Trixie. I have to. But most of the Eb Falls Police Department is pretty decent. If Coop just explains—”
Trixie’s breath shuddered in and out, fear written all over her face, cutting off my words. “But they’ll have no choice but to question Coop ,and she’s, as you can see, very direct in nature. They’ll twist her words and—”
“It’s going to be all right,” Coop reassured her friend, grabbing her by the shoulders and forcing her to focus. “I’m going to tell the truth, and you always say the truth will set you free. They won’t have a choice but to set me free because I didn’t do anything wrong.”
I couldn’t get a clear read on the dynamic of their relationship, but I knew the ride home with Win and Arkady was going to be filled with speculative conversation. Sometimes it came off as though Trixie were the moral compass helping Coop understand the world around her, and at moments, Coop didn’t appear as though she needed anyone to guide her. Yet, she always deferred to Trixie.
And why was Trixie so worried about Coop being misinterpreted? She appeared pretty straightforward to me.
Trixie hugged Coop and patted her cheek. “You’re right, friend. I know you are, but…”
I looked to Trixie, my eyes sympathetic. I saw how torn she was, and I wanted to give her the benefit of the doubt, but I had to call the police. It was my duty to justice for all.
Plus, when I didn’t call the police, I ended up with the sour disapproval of Officer Stodgy and an angry, very vocal Detective Sean Moore who still wasn’t over the fact that his partner had been a cold-blooded murderer who’d almost killed me. Sometimes, I almost thought he blamed me for Detective Montgomery’s criminal shenanigans.
I put a hand on her arm. “Trixie?”
A tear slipped from her eye, but she nodded in resignation, using her thumb to swipe at the salty drop. “I know you mean well, Stevie. I just wish I could…” Then she paused and sighed. “Never mind. Go ahead, Stevie. Call them.”
I hated the defeated tone in her voice. I hated that I was the reason she was defeated.
“I think you guys should step out of the room. Just in case of contamination,” I advised.
As I dialed 9-1-1, Trixie drove her hand under Coop’s arm and pulled her away from Hank and out into the hallway, while I explained to the operator the scene that lie before me.
And as I spoke to the operator, my heart grew heavy and my stomach turned.