“This will help you brace yourself, dear,” Grace said, placing a cup of tea beside me.
“The only thing that would help me now is a potion to ward off evil spirits.”
“I’m afraid it’s only chamomile, love.” Grace headed for the curtain. “I’ll see what I can do about the potion.”
Did she think I was serious? “Wait, Grace,” I called after her. Sometimes she was so efficient she scared me.
The curtain parted and Jillian swept in. She wore a rich, colorful paisley scarf over the shoulders of her white wool coat, with brown leather boots and a matching beret that brought out the highlights in her coppery red hair.
“Look at this picture,” she said, thrusting her tiny camera at me. “Tell me what you see.”
“I see people standing around the bar at Down the Hatch.”
“Now tell me who’s not in the picture.”
“How am I supposed to know who’s not in it?”
She huffed in exasperation. “Remember when I stopped at the bar to take Vlad’s photo? Well, do you see him in the photo?”
“Here’s an idea, Jillian. Say, ‘Look, Abby! Vlad’s not in the picture.’ ”
Frowning, she said in a monotone, “Look, Abby. Vlad is not in the picture. Now tell me
why
he’s not in the picture.”
I examined the screen. “Here’s your problem. Your thumb was on the lens.”
Jillian clicked a button on the camera to forward it to the next shot. “He’s not in this one either.” She clicked again. “Or this one.”
I had to admit it was odd that she hadn’t managed to capture even one shot of Vlad, but I wasn’t about to give her the satisfaction of agreeing with her. “Maybe you should have asked Vlad to pose instead of trying to take his picture through the crowd.”
Jillian put her hands on the sides of my face and bent her knees so we were eye to eye. “Abby, hello! Don’t you get it? He isn’t in the photos because vampires can’t be photographed.”
“Let go of my face.”
She tucked a lock of hair behind my ear. “Have you ever thought of flipping your hair? Remember when you were fourteen and I did a makeover on you? We were at your house over spring break—it was March twenty-sixth, at one seventeen p.m.—and you—”
I pulled away from her. “Vampires aren’t real, Jillian.”
“You don’t believe me?” She narrowed her eyes. “Then I’ll just have to get more proof.” She slipped the camera into her purse and started toward the curtain. She’d forgotten all about dinner at the country club.
Then she paused, turned toward me, and tapped her chin. “There was something else . . .”
I held my breath.
Lottie peeked through the curtain. “I’m gonna take my lunch break now, sweetie. The shop is quiet and I need to get home to start my dinner for tonight.”
“Dinner!” Jillian said, brightening. “That’s it! Thank you, Lottie.”
“You’re welcome,” Lottie said, giving her a puzzled glance before she left.
Looking smug, Jillian returned to the worktable and leaned on both elbows to smile at me. “You were hoping I’d forget, weren’t you?”
“Listen, Jillian, about the dinner.”
She pointed at me. “I agreed to keep quiet about your you-know-what for one more week, and that week is up tonight. So if you don’t show up, I get to tell.”
Where was Grace with that potion?
“I don’t understand why you’re making a big deal out of our news,” I said.
“And I don’t understand your need for secrecy,” Jillian countered. “This
is
a big deal, Abs! After waffling for months, you’re finally going to tie the knot. You should be delighted to share that with family. Imagine the fun you, your mom, Marco’s mom, and me and my mom will have planning your bridal events and shopping for your wedding accoutrements. Seriously, who could possibly be better qualified to help you shop for a wedding gown than
moi
?”
“That’s because you bought five of them.”
“I
meant
because I shop for finicky Chicago women all the time. And, FYI, I returned four of those gowns. But just think, Abs. We can make an entire day of it in Chicago. No, a week! Fire up your charge card, cuz. Magnificent Mile, here we come!”
Which was exactly why I’d been keeping our engagement a secret. In fact, an elopement was starting to look pretty darn attractive. “Grace?” I called. “The potion? Hurry!”
“There’s a new rumor spreading about Vlad,” Lottie reported upon her return from lunch. “The gossip is that he set up a secret rendezvous with the Willis woman so he could drink her blood, and in his bloodlust craze, he left her car and belongings behind.”
“That’s absurd,” I said.
“Maybe so, but people are eating this stuff up, sweetie, and that doesn’t bode well for Vlad. You might want to call Marco and alert him.”
“I’ll tell him in person. I’m heading down there for lunch now anyway.”
I exchanged the wheelchair for my crutches and waited while Lottie opened the door for me. Outside, people were once again huddled on the courthouse lawn, but many more than before, with cops in patrol cars watching from both ends of the block.
I felt hundreds of eyes on me as I laboriously made my way up the sidewalk—
step-hop-step-hop
. I managed to wave to a group of women from the clerk’s office, regulars at our coffee-and-tea parlor, but they pretended not to see me. At Down the Hatch, I tapped on the big window and waited until Gert let me in. Marco was working with Rafe behind the bar, and as soon as he saw me, he came around to help. There were a few customers sitting in booths and two at the counter; otherwise the place was empty.
“Hey, Buttercup,” Marco said with a smile. “You’re just the tonic we need.”
“I need to talk to you privately,” I said in a whisper.
“Sure. Let me finish up with Rafe. Then I’ll meet you in my office.”
“Hey, Rafe,” I said, passing by the bar. “How’s it going?”
“Ask my brother,” he answered with a grimace.
“Rafe’s doing well,” Marco said.
“That’s not what you said earlier,” Rafe countered. “You said I couldn’t even—”
“That was an hour ago,” Marco cut in. “You’re improving.”
“Improving?” Rafe asked. “How can I improve when you’re always criticizing me?”
“It’s not criticism,” Marco said. “It’s instruction.”
I left them arguing and crutched down the hallway to Marco’s office, sinking gratefully into one of the sling-back chairs that faced his desk.
Minutes later, Marco came in and closed the door. “What’s up?”
“Two things. First, you need to know there’s a nasty new rumor going around.”
“About why Vlad abducted the Willis woman?” Marco sat down in the chair next to mine. “I’ve already heard it.”
“Lottie says everyone is talking about it, and after seeing all the people across the street, I believe her. It was unnerving walking down here, like I was on the set of
The Birds
.”
“Sorry, babe,” he said, taking my hand. “Until the cops clear Vlad, we’re stuck with it.”
“It’s not us I’m worried about. If people work themselves into a frenzy, they’ll turn against Vlad. I’ll be very surprised if he wants to stay in New Chapel after he hears the latest.”
“Vlad is free to go whenever he chooses. I’d be disappointed, though. I think he’ll do a great job running the place—if I have to leave.”
“
If
you have to leave. Let’s not jump the gun. And that brings me to the second thing. Today is Friday.”
Marco gave me a blank look.
“
Friday
, Marco. Dinner with the family. The night we make our announcements.”
“Ah,” he said.
I threaded my fingers through his. “I want us to announce our engagement together, and then have you explain about your letter, because I know there will be lots of questions. But I know you’re not going to feel comfortable leaving the bar this evening, so I’m not sure what to do. If we don’t attend the dinner, I’m not sure I can get Jillian to keep quiet for another week.”
There was a rap on the office door.
“Hold that thought,” Marco said, and got up and opened the door. I turned to see Reilly standing in the doorway in his police uniform. He looked unusually somber.
“Hey, Sean, what’s up?” Marco said.
“I just wanted to stop by and check on a few things.”
“Come in and have a seat,” Marco said, indicating the chair he’d just vacated.
Reilly sat down, his thick leather belt and gun holster creaking. He pulled a five-by-seven glossy color photo out of a manila envelope and showed it to Marco, who was leaning one hip on the corner of his desk. “Do you recognize this woman?”
Marco studied it. “Is this the missing woman?”
“Her name is Lori Willis,” Reilly said. “Ever seen her in the bar?”
“She looks familiar,” Marco said, then passed the photo tome.
At first glance Lori Willis appeared to be in her late forties. She had long ash blond hair, bright red lips, and brown eyes rimmed with heavy black liner and glittering purple eye shadow. She wore dangling crystal earrings, a matching choker necklace, and a low-cut silver evening gown. A more careful look revealed heavy bags beneath her eyes and more than a few crow’s-feet in the corners. It also showed over-processed hair, a nose obviously shortened and pinched in just above the tip, and lips fattened by injections. I revised her age upward about ten years.
“It looks like one of those glamour photos,” I said, handing it back.
“Parkview Hospital supplied it,” Reilly said.
That was her personnel file photo?
“Have you heard from Vlad yet?” Reilly asked Marco.
“No. I don’t expect to. He doesn’t start until five o’clock.”
Reilly took off his hat, smoothed his hair, and put the hat back on, a sign that he wasn’t pleased with what he was hearing. “Vlad still isn’t answering his door or his phone, and he hasn’t responded to any of the messages we’ve left. From what we can tell, he doesn’t own a car—no registration listed at the BMV—so we can’t even use that to indicate whether he’s home.”
Marco folded his arms over his chest, which was the equivalent of Reilly’s hat signal. “Is there a reason the detectives can’t wait until five to talk to him?”
Reilly scratched his nose. Another signal. It translated to:
Yes, there’s a reason, and now I’m going to lie as to why
. “We want to make sure he’s safe.”
“Ha,” I said.
“We received a tip that there might be trouble,” Reilly added, giving me a frown.
“What kind of trouble?” Marco asked. No signal for me to interpret.
“Rumors of vigilantes out to catch a vampire. We’re taking that to mean Vlad.”
Marco studied his friend for a moment. “Are you working the abduction case?”
Reilly leaned back in his chair, clearly trying to play it cool. “Yeah, why?”
“Because maybe I wouldn’t have told you some of the things I did. Why didn’t you say something at the start?”
Reilly shrugged. “You know how it is, Marco. We’re friends, but I’ve still got a job to do. And besides, if the guy really is in trouble, I’m doing you a favor.”
Marco let it pass, but his body language showed that he was now on his guard. “Any validity to the rumors about the vigilante group?”
“We believe they’re just a bunch of hotheaded males who don’t like the female attention Vlad’s been getting. Might even be some of your regular customers. We’re taking the threat seriously in any case. No one wants a posse in town.”
“Why did you want to know if the Willis woman had been here?” Marco asked.
“We think Vlad made contact with her before she disappeared.”
“Do you have a reason for thinking that?” Marco asked.
Reilly studied Marco for a moment, then sat forward, hands on his knees. “Okay, what I say here doesn’t leave this room.” He glanced at me. “Got that?”
I nodded. Women’s signals were much more straightforward.
“In going through Willis’s PDA,” Reilly explained, “we found a dinner engagement at the Calumet Casino boat’s Tumbling Dice Restaurant at nine o’clock on Tuesday evening. We contacted the restaurant, but they couldn’t tell us anything because the reservation hadn’t been made under her name. We got a list of patrons who’d dined there that evening and contacted them, but they’re all clean.
“However, there was a party of two that didn’t show up Tuesday—a Mr. Vlad Serban and guest. And the phone number listed for that reservation was not in service. So you can see why it’s imperative that we talk to Vlad ASAP.”
Marco was scowling as he walked around his desk and sat in his chair. “In the first place, Sean, whether Vlad knew the Willis woman or not, he wouldn’t have made a reservation for an evening he was on duty at the bar. And I can vouch for him being here Tuesday evening.”
“Did he take a break?” Reilly asked, pulling out his notebook and pencil.
“Of course he took a break,” Marco said. “For thirty minutes. He ate a sandwich and went back to work. Secondly, if Vlad had made a dinner reservation, how can you assume his guest was Lori Willis? It could’ve been anyone. And last, the woman is a little long in the tooth for a healthy thirty-year-old male.”
“When was his night off?” Reilly asked.
Marco typed something into his computer, watching the monitor. “Wednesday.”
Reilly took off his hat, smoothed his hair, then put the hat back on. “Wednesday was the day Willis was reported missing.”
Marco’s jaw muscles tensed. “Do you have anything that positively implicates Vlad? Fingerprints? DNA? A witness?”
“We’ve lifted several sets of prints but haven’t identified all of them,” Reilly said tersely.
“So the answer is no,” Marco said.
“What do you want me to do, Marco? Ignore the connections to Vlad? Is that what you’d do if you were in my shoes?”
I’d kept quiet until this point, but as both men seemed to be taking their argument to a higher level, I decided to jump in with my two cents.