City of Saints & Thieves(32)

“Any connection to your mom?” Michael asks.

“Not that I can find.”

“Maybe she overheard something about one of them,” Michael says. “And that person found out. We should do more digging.” He writes their names on his list and taps his pen on his chin. “Who were the staff working that day?”

“You think another maid or a gardener or someone did it?”

Michael considers this. “Probably not. Dad definitely wouldn’t cover for one of them. He would have turned them over to the police.”

“Maybe he killed whoever it was and got rid of the body.”

Michael drops his pen onto the paper. “Ngai, you really do think my dad’s a monster, don’t you?”

I don’t answer. “I don’t know who on staff it would have been, anyway. She didn’t really have much to do with the other staff, that I remember.”

“You never saw her talking to anyone? A gardener? One of the security guys?”

I shake my head. “Maybe one or two of the other maids, but not any of the men.”

“You were young; maybe you just didn’t notice.”

I scowl at him. “Ngai, you really do think my mom was a slut, don’t you?”

“I didn’t mean—”

“Whatever.”

I stand up to stalk back to the window and nudge the shades aside again. Still looks like a garden out there. Michael continues to pore through the file, but I don’t bother. I’ve got it memorized.

On the next page he’ll see the full list of all the people who were at the Greyhills that day: Mr. Greyhill; Mwika; the cook, who was about a hundred then. Two other maids, a gardener, a driver, and four security guards. Everyone else had the night off. Kiki and I are not included, even though we were there. I guess maids’ illegitimate children don’t count. The officer noted on the list that Mrs. Greyhill and the kids had left the day before to spend the night at their beach house up the coast. The cook confirmed it.

Then come the officer’s notes. In the scantiest detail possible, he relays Mr. G’s version of what happened: Mr. G heard a shot, but it took him a few minutes to make his way through the house to check on it. The officer asks why Mr. G didn’t notify security first, to which Mr. G replied that he doesn’t know. Even the doofus police officer must have thought that was weird, because there’s a little question mark beside Mr. G’s answer.

Mr. G finds my mother already dead. No mention of the tunnel. No mention of what may have happened to the killer. The murder weapon is the gun that was already in Greyhill’s desk. He thinks a robber did it, but nothing was stolen and there’s no footage of an intruder. Does the officer question this? Of course not.

Mwika basically says the same thing, but adds a detail. I wait for Michael to get to it.

Sure enough, his head soon pops up. “According to Mwika, the power went out a few minutes before the murder,” he tells me.

I nod. “And the surveillance cameras were interrupted. But they come back on just in time to place Mwika in the guardhouse at the time your dad says he hears the gunshot.”

“Very convenient for Mwika, don’t you think?” Michael asks.

“You’re the one keeping me from him,” I say. “I’d love to ask him a couple hundred questions.”

Michael scowls. “I’m working on it.”

“Well, work harder.”

My phone buzzes with a text. Donatien has written me back.

Meet me at Samaki Joint in an hour.

Perfect. We’ll go see him, and then I can make a break and find Boyboy.

“Come on,” I say, wiggling into my shoes. “We’re never going to figure anything out just sitting here in the dark.”

“I told you, I’m grounded,” Michael says, not moving. “My parents are going to be back any minute.” He glances at his watch. I wonder idly how much I could get for it at the Go-Downs.

“Do you want my help or not?” I ask. “The guy who knew my mom can meet, but we’ve got to go now.”

Michael looks around at the papers on the floor and his laptop. There’s nothing else to look at. He knows that until we get more information we’re at a dead end.

“I am going to be in so much trouble,” he mutters, but by then he’s already following me out the door.





SIXTEEN


Where are we going?” Michael asks as we step outside the mansion. “Who are we going to see?”

“We need to get a taxi to town,” I say, walking across the driveway toward the gate.

“I’ve got a driver.”

“But do you trust him? Is he going to tell your dad where we went?”

Michael frowns, answering my question. He looks around and seems to make some sort of decision. “Okay, then. Wait here.”

I check the time on my phone as he walks away. I’m not sure how I’m going to manage to shake Michael to meet Boyboy. There’s no way I’m taking him with me. Maybe I can send him on an errand? Tell him I’ll meet him back here? Somehow I doubt he’ll go for any of that . . .

My thoughts are interrupted by a roar. I look up and my jaw drops. “You’re joking, right?”

Michael rolls forward astride a motorcycle, his face hidden under a helmet. The bike is bright red, a European brand, and huge. Nothing like the little Chinese-made piki-piki that shuttle people and goods throughout the city.