Karen Olson - The Missing Ink

She smiled shyly. “It’s nice,” she said, handing me back the mirror. “But I really did want Matthew’s name.”

I could remind her that she’d been engaged to Simon Chase once. That she’d been engaged to Chip. That love sometimes doesn’t last, but the devotion ink would.

I just nodded, wrapped the tat in Saran Wrap, and told her how to take care of it. She adjusted her bra and buttoned up the blouse as well as she could. The corner of the Saran Wrap peeked out from behind it.

Tim hadn’t waited for me. A paramedic was dressing Chip’s wound as Tim read him his rights. Matthew saw Elise and drew her to him, his big arms surrounding her. Simon Chase raised his eyebrows at me, and I nodded to indicate everything was all right.

But it wasn’t all right. Tim saw me, and looked up at Matthew.

“This was the guy who kidnapped you today, right?”

Description fit to a T. I thought about Jeff’s warning about Matthew, how he was “bad news.” So maybe he was trying to turn over a new leaf or something with Elise, but he still had a long way to go in the social skills area. He obviously hadn’t had a Sister Mary Eucharista to keep him in line.

“He also fits Ace’s description of the guy who broke in here,” Tim said, nodding at the uniformed cop, who now gripped Matthew’s arm, pulling it to his back, taking out his handcuffs.

For a nanosecond, I felt a little bad, thinking about Elise. But he did trash my place; he did kidnap me. He’d been following me around, scaring me for the last few days.

“You’re not arresting him, are you?” Elise’s eyes were wide as she confronted Tim. She swung around to me. “Tell him to stop. You know he didn’t mean it.”

“It’s okay.” Matthew’s voice resonated through the room as he smiled sadly at Elise. He looked a little too comfortable in those cuffs. Obviously, he’d been here before. I had about as much confidence that this relationship would work as I did in that devotion tat. Sure, he looked at her with some softness in his eyes, but I couldn’t forget that the diamond was what he was after all along. Two million dollars was nothing to sneeze at.

“Don’t worry. Simon’ll take care of you until I get out,” Matthew was saying.

Oh, yeah, Simon. “Why were you helping them?” I asked him.

“Because I still care about Elise and want her to be happy.” Simon cocked his head at Chip. “And because I couldn’t stand what he’d done to her. He was making dates with cocktail waitresses even while she was considered missing.”

I thought about Robbin, the woman in the restroom at Versailles who’d fixed my makeup. So her date was with Chip, not with Simon. I’d jumped to the wrong conclusion.

“And I found out that Chip was the one who lured you to my office with that text message. Your number was queued in. He’s also the one who locked you in. He wanted his father to find you there,” Simon said.

I mulled that over for a second. It made me less sorry I’d skewered Chip’s shoulder. But I had another question for Simon Chase.

“I overheard Manning asking you to take care of something, saying you could ‘let him come back’ after ‘it all died down.’ What was that all about?”

Simon shrugged. “One of our employees is facing a deportation issue, despite our sponsorship. We agreed to continue to help him get his visa, but he has to go home for a short while. That’s all.”

Made sense, now that he explained it.

“You might want to just ask for what you want the next time,” I told Matthew, then turned back to Simon. “And you, too. I mean, you just made that date with me so you’d get the diamond for them.”

A twinkle flashed in his eye. “That’s not the only reason.” And his gaze made me catch my breath.

“You could’ve called and told us what was going on,” Bitsy scolded.

“I thought you’d had enough excitement yesterday,” I said. I’d just gotten back from bringing Ace home from the hospital. Somehow he’d managed to bribe a nurse into giving him his own private oxygen tank. Never underestimate the power of a handsome face. Even after its nose gets crushed.

Joel handed me a doughnut and a cup of coffee. “Our lives are boring,” he teased. “We can always use a little more excitement.”

“Do you think Elise really loves him?” Bitsy asked. “I mean, that guy’s definitely not in her league.”

“I think she thinks she does,” I said. “She finds out her fiancé is having a baby with another woman, a guy who’s so totally not what her family would want for her pays attention, offers her a shoulder-and a lot more than that-and she thinks she’s in love. It’s happened before.”

“What about the blood you saw on Chip’s shirt?” Bitsy asked.

“It was red ink.”

“Tattoo ink?” Joel asked.

“No, from a pen.” The ink splatter made me think of something else. I showed them my leg, where Chip inadvertently had drawn the black line. “What should I do here?” I asked Joel. “I’ve got to cover it up somehow.”

Joel studied the short line, nodding. “How about a quote? Isn’t Macbeth about murder? ‘Out, out damned spot,’ or something like that?”

I shook my head, but couldn’t help smiling. “Oh, by the way, we need to talk about Charlotte Sampson. How she wants to train here. I almost forgot all about her.”

“She’s coming in day after tomorrow for an interview,” Bitsy said.

“Sounds a little formal,” I said, looking at Joel. “What do you think?”

He shrugged. “She’s a nice kid. Can she draw?”

Bitsy was one step ahead of him, pulling some sketches out of a file folder. “She dropped these off.”

They were good. Really good. Bold use of lines and color, geometric shapes, butterflies, flowers, even a portrait. She must have taken some art classes in between all that math. Seemed like a no-brainer to me, and from the way Joel was nodding, it could be unanimous.

I sipped my coffee and heard the front door open. I stepped out into the hall. Jeff Coleman stood awkwardly next to the front desk, staring at Ace’s paintings. He grinned when he saw me.

“So, Kavanaugh, this is your shop.”

He’d never been here before.

“That’s right,” I said.

He walked toward me, sticking his head into a couple of the rooms. “Swanky. Just like I expected. No self-respecting tattooist works like this.”

“Want some ink as a souvenir?” I teased.

He grinned. “I just wanted to thank you for talking to your brother, clearing everything up.”

“Well, it all sort of cleared itself up,” I said. “I’m sorry about Kelly.”

His face softened for a second. “Thanks, Kavanaugh.” He spotted the box of doughnuts and Bitsy and Joel in the staff room. “Doughnuts? Really? I don’t think I can deal with this. It’s way too clean-cut for me.” He started backing up. “Oh, by the way, my mother wants you to come by. Said something about a date with Napoleon.” He frowned. “Sometimes I just can’t figure out what she’s talking about anymore, but she swears you know what it means.”

I laughed. “Yeah, I do. And tell her I’ll call her next week. But she’s going to have to come here.”

“She won’t like that. And you won’t be able to change her mind.”

Maybe not. But maybe if I promised her a ride in a gondola she might.

Jeff gave me a little punch on the arm. “It’s been real. Later, Kavanaugh.”

I watched through the glass doors as he walked along the canal and across the footbridge and out of sight.

Napoleon. Now that would be a nice leg tat.