It wasn’t the first time I hadn’t heard from Joe over the course of a day. He had a consulting job with airport security. He could be in a series of meetings or lost in the details of keeping outbound planes secure.
It was a great job and he loved it—but it was after three. He hadn’t texted me a single line since noon.
Of course, I was worried. Was Joe OK?
I checked on our little Sleeping Beauty and threw a sigh that relaxed my whole body. I watched her breathe. I rested my hand on her back. I made sure there was no draft, that she was dry and sleeping soundly. I pulled up her blanket, then softly closed her door.
I took an Advil and followed it with the shower I’d been longing for. After putting on PJs and checking on Julie again, I got into bed and fell asleep, instantly.
Maybe an hour later, my eyes flashed open.
Joe still wasn’t home.
I patted the bed and Martha jumped up, circled, and plopped down beside me. I hugged her and thought about the victims at the hotel. I reviewed each of the crime scenes in my mind’s eye and hoped that while I slept, answers would come to me.
When I woke up, it was morning.
I had not solved the crimes in my sleep, but Joe was in bed, snoring beside me.
CHAPTER 8
I KISSED MY husband.
He opened his blue eyes and asked, “What day is it?”
I told him and he fell back asleep.
I woke him up.
“What day is it?” he asked. Again.
“Hey. It’s Tuesday, six forty-five a.m. Did you get any phone calls from me, like about six of them?”
“Oh, geez. I’m sorry,” he said. “My phone was off.”
“You’re in the doghouse, buddy.”
I swung my legs over the bed. Joe’s arm snaked out and he grabbed me and pulled me down next to him.
“Some people on the watch list came up on our passenger manifest,” he said. “And that’s all I can tell you.”
“Fine.”
I made another break for the side of the bed, but he didn’t let me get up.
“I’m sorry.”
“OK. But I worry when I don’t hear from you, Joe.”
“I know. Same here.”
We nuzzled and wrestled around and I relented a little. Then I relented a lot. I shut down the hideous pictures in my mind of dead people, and I even tried to keep from listening for Julie. Martha hung her muzzle on the edge of the bed, and Joe pushed her away without losing a beat.
It was glorious lovemaking. Not fancy, but good wholesome friskiness when I hadn’t even thought kisses were in order.
I collapsed with my arm over Joe’s chest and my head under his chin.
“That was nice,” I said.
“Nice? At my age? With no sleep? I’m wondering how I pulled that off at all.”
He got me laughing. I said, “It was the best ever, Joe. God. You’re amazing.”
“Want to go another round?”
“Save something for tonight,” I said, laughing again.
I dressed, took Martha for a run along Lake Street, stretched my legs, and watched sunrise and early-morning traffic and other people out for a run with their dogs.
When doggy and I returned, Julie was in her high chair and I smelled pancakes. I went to my sweet girl and kissed and squeezed her a little bit.
“You’re sooo cute,” I told her. “Did you tell Daddy thank you for the pancakes?”
“Nooooo,” she said, slapping her hands on the tray.
“Oh, you like that word too much,” I said. So she said it again, laughing and burbling at the same time.
“OK, I’ll tell him,” I said.
I put my arms around my husband’s waist and hugged him tight. “I love you so much,” I said. “And thank you for making breakfast.”
“Uh-huh. Please, sit yourself down.”
I pulled up a seat at the table, which was positioned to get a nice bright beam of morning light. Joe dished up the pancakes and crispy bacon, and between bites, I fed cereal to Julie.
It was idyllic. Picture-perfect and framed in gold. We didn’t have breakfast table perfection when I was growing up, so I cherished every bit of this. Gloried in it.
Joe said, “I checked my phone and you were phoning me at three this morning.”
“I’d just gotten home after working some terrible business at the Four Seasons. The fourteenth floor was like an abattoir.”
I told Joe the details, availing myself of his excellent crime-solving mind.
“Among the many mysteries was this woman we saw going into the dead man’s room,” Lindsay said. I described her in full. “She may have been his lover, or lover-by-the-hour, or even his wife. Or I don’t know, Joe. All we know is that she’s the only living person who can answer our questions.”
“The bangs down to her glasses,” Joe said. “Not a bad disguise. Even talking on the phone distorts the shape of the mouth. All of that will outwit facial recognition. More coffee?”
“No thanks, honey. I’m going to hit the shower.”
I stood under the water and thought about the blond woman with the wraparound shades and how finding her could kick the doors down on all of it.
But in lieu of that, the dead man in 1420 was the beginning of the story.
CHAPTER 9
I FOUND CLAIRE hard at work in her autopsy suite, gowned and gloved up and halfway through the internal exam of the unknown male killed in room 1420. His face had been reflected down over his chin and a Y incision had opened his body down to the pubic bone.
“How’s it going?” I asked.
“You know how long I’ve been ME?” Claire asked me.
“Since I was this tall,” I said, putting my hand on top of my head. Actually, we’d been rookies together, back about a dozen years ago.
“And you know how many autopsies I do a year?”
“Why don’t you tell me?” I said.
She put a bloody liver on a scale. Bunny Ellis, one of Claire’s morgue techs, waggled her fingers hello at me and took Claire’s notes.
“One thousand, two hundred bodies more or less pass through these doors annually,” Claire said.
“I hear you.”
Claire was grumpy. Rare for her.
“What I hate the most—”
“Dead kids. I know.”
“And what I hate the second most? Healthy murder victims who could have had full and productive lives. Like Mr. Doe or Wang or whatever his real name is. He was perfect. All his organs are A-plus. He has bones and joints of steel. I don’t think this man even got heartburn,” she said.
“Tell me more,” I said, since this was why I had stopped by this morning.
Claire continued to cut and slice as she talked.
“He has a scar on his knee, probably from falling off a bike when he was six, and that’s it.”
“What about his stomach contents?”
“BLT on rye with mayo. Green tea.”
“You ran his blood?”
“It’s waiting to go out. With these.”
She showed me a stainless steel bowl with three slugs rattling inside.
“Medium-caliber, like nine-millimeter. Based on that squeaky-clean crime scene, keep your expectations in check,” said Claire. “I’ll bet you a burger and fries there won’t be a record of the murder weapon.”
I said, “Who’s up next?”
“I only have two hands, Lindsay. Two. I’m not finished with Mr. Wang.”
“I’ll get out of your way, Butterfly,” I said, calling her by her nickname.
As if she hadn’t barked at me, she said, “I’ll do young Ms. Doe next. That is a clean-looking girl, Lindsay. Skin like milk. She could just barely drive and vote. I’ll need backup to get this work done today. Meanwhile…”