Karen Olson - Driven to Ink

“But he wasn’t killed in the car,” Tim said softly.

“How do you know that?”

Tim rolled his eyes. “Brett, do you really think that the guy crawled into the trunk on his own, and then someone decided, Hey, why don’t I strangle him with a clip cord while he’s in there? ”

“Maybe he did it himself.”

“Did what himself?”

“Strangled himself with the cord. You know, all that autoerotic-stimulation stuff. Aren’t some guys into that? You start to strangle yourself while you’re-um-well-servicing yourself so it feels even better? Maybe he did that, and he couldn’t stop. Maybe he strangled himself by mistake.” As I spoke, I began to wonder whether that wasn’t what had happened.

“With a dead rat?”

Okay, so I’d forgotten that tiny detail.

Tim started scratching his chin in that way he does when he’s deep in thought. “Although it’s an interesting theory.”

I left him with that as I went into the bedroom, plastic garbage bag in hand for my clothes. I filled the bag and stuck it in the hall, shutting my door before heading to the shower.

It felt really good standing under the stream of water, the heat soaking into the Celtic cross across my upper back, the dragon that curved around my torso from my breast to my hip, Monet’s garden on one arm and a Japanese koi on the other, and the tiger lily stretching along my side. Not to mention Napoleon on my calf.

I knew I wasn’t done yet, though. Getting tattooed, I mean. Every time a client came in, I wondered what my next one would be. The last was the koi, designed and inked by Jeff Coleman himself.

As I pulled my tank top on over my favorite denim skirt, I heard Bruce Springsteen singing “Born to Run.” My phone had fallen off the bed when I was getting changed. I picked it up and heard, “Kavanaugh?”

Speak of the devil. Jeff Coleman was the only person who ever called me by my last name and only my last name. I couldn’t remember him ever calling me Brett.

“Yeah?”

“The cops called.”

“I gave them your number. I didn’t know where Sylvia and Bernie were staying.”

“Why do you think they’re involved with this?”

“Jeff, they had my car at the wedding chapel. This guy is from the wedding chapel. I’m sorry if it seems clear to me that perhaps Sylvia and Bernie might know something. They may even have met this guy before he was killed.”

A loud knock resonated through the room.

“Hold on,” I said to Jeff as I tugged the door open.

Tim was holding the bag with my clothes. “Is this it?” he asked.

I nodded. “Everything.”

He strutted down the hall and out of sight.

“Kavanaugh?” I heard Jeff asking.

“Yeah, I’m here.” I wasn’t going to tell him that I had to strip down. There were things Jeff Coleman didn’t need to know. “There wasn’t only a dead body in the car.”

“What?”

I told him about the rat.

“How do you get yourself into situations like this, Kavanaugh?”

“I didn’t get myself into this situation, Jeff. It was your mother. By the way, did you reach her?”

He was quiet long enough so I thought maybe the call had been dropped.

“Hello? Hello?” I asked.

“I’m here.” But then it got quiet again.

“Hello?”

“Yeah, yeah, I hear you. There’s just a little problem.”

I didn’t like his tone.

“Problem? What kind of problem?”

“My mother and Bernie never checked into their hotel at the Grand Canyon. I have no idea where they are.”

Now this wasn’t exactly a surprise. Sylvia Coleman didn’t always do what anyone expected of her. Which was probably why she’d gotten her first ink when she was fourteen and didn’t stop until most of her body had been covered.

“I called Bernie’s daughter, Rosalie,” Jeff was saying. “She had the same information I did. Now she’s worried.”

Something about the way he said it made me ask, “But you’re not?”

Jeff chuckled. “You know my mother. She moves to a different drummer.”

As I said.

“If they stopped somewhere else that she might have liked better, then plans would change,” Jeff continued. “My mother is the queen of spontaneity. She told me the one thing that irritated her about Bernie was how he had to plan everything months in advance.” He paused. “She said she was going to change all that.”

Seemed as though she’d already started.

“So you don’t think something happened to them. Something bad,” I added.

“My mother can take care of herself.”

Well, I had to agree with that.

“Did you tell Flanigan they’re not at their hotel?” I asked.

“Who?”

“The cop who called.”

“I talked to someone named Willis.”

Right. “Did you tell him?”

“Not yet.”

“Why not?”

More silence. Uh-oh.

“You’re not going to, are you?”

“You’re not my mother, Kavanaugh. I’ll tell them when I’m ready. I figure I’ll do a little hunting around in the next couple hours and see if I can’t locate them first. I know if I tell the cops my mother isn’t where she said she’d be, then they might think she had something to do with what’s in your trunk.”

As if no one was already thinking that. But I let him have his little fantasy.

“So don’t tell anyone yet, okay?”

I bristled. “Why would you think I would?”

He laughed. “You’re one of the most law-abiding people I know, Kavanaugh.”

I almost told him I’d touched the guy’s collar, but he’d probably think I was lying, so I bit my tongue.

“I have to get to my shop,” I said. “I have to take Tim’s Jeep.”

“You could borrow my mother’s car.”

I’d driven the antique purple Gremlin a few months ago, and I totally didn’t want to get behind that wheel again.

“No, thanks. The Jeep’s fine.”

“I’ll let you know what I find out,” he said before the call ended.

As I combed my fingers through my short red hair and changed out a couple of the silver earrings that hung in rows outlining my ears, I wondered where Sylvia and Bernie could’ve gotten to.

I itched to tell Tim, but I’d promised Jeff. I hoped nothing had happened to them. Since Jeff wasn’t worried, I shouldn’t have been, but I couldn’t help it. They were an elderly couple who’d decided to drive an old Buick to the Grand Canyon instead of taking one of the bus tours that ran regularly. Granted, when Sylvia had hinted she wanted to take my car not only to the wedding chapel but also on their honeymoon, I did say no with no reservations.

Maybe I should’ve lent them the car.

I shrugged off the thought and went back outside. Nothing I could do about it now.

Flanigan let me go to work an hour later, after he had me run through each moment of the previous day, before and after Sylvia and Bernie had dropped off the car. I struggled to come up with exact times for everything, although I said if he called my shop later, I could double-check my appointments with Bitsy, who kept track of every minute. It seemed that he didn’t think I had anything to do with Mr. That’s Amore, although he did spend a bit of time questioning me about Sylvia and Bernie.

When he finally felt satisfied, or at least sated for the moment, I left the cops and the coroner in my driveway, the banana yuccas fanning the crime scene, and headed out through Henderson and onto Route 215 toward the Strip.

The good thing about leaving late was there was no traffic. When I turned off the highway, I went up Koval Lane, behind all the resorts and casinos, so I could miss all the lights on the Strip. I was convinced that some deranged traffic administrator got a lot of pleasure out of knowing that timing the lights the way they did would mean an extra fifteen minutes on my drive up to the Venetian.