Little Secrets(89)
“Then I’m ninety-nine percent positive it’s still in the cab,” Marin says. “Is there any way you could put me in touch with the driver?”
“That’s not protocol,” the man says. “I can call him and ask about your missing item while I put you on hold. What’s your first name? And what does the wallet look like?”
“It’s um, Sadie.” Marin spits out the first name that comes to mind. “And the wallet is red with, um … a gold clasp.” It doesn’t matter—there’s no wallet, and even if there were, it isn’t Sadie’s.
“One sec.” The phone clicks, and soft rock plays over the line until the dispatcher is back. “Ma’am? The driver didn’t pick up. GPS shows him driving. Can I text him your number, tell him to call you when he’s finished his fare?”
“Yes, please.” Marin withholds a sigh of frustration. Why didn’t they do this in the first place? “Do you have a pen?”
She gives him her cell number and disconnects. She doesn’t know exactly what she’s looking for, but someone was in her house around nine p.m. Saturday night. She has a pretty good idea who it was, but if her theory is correct, Derek’s mistress would have gone missing sometime after she broke in. McKenzie wasn’t home when her roommate finished work at two a.m., which means the younger woman likely disappeared in that five-hour window.
The question was, why was she in their house? And what happened to her afterward?
The doorbell rings.
Frowning, Marin finishes her coffee and pads down the hallway to the front door. She peers through the peephole, letting out a gasp when she sees the distorted image of the person standing on the other side. She opens the door slowly, the blood draining from her face, and feels herself sway.
Vanessa Castro grabs her arm before she can fall.
“I haven’t found Sebastian,” the PI says. “You’re okay. Breathe.”
Marin straightens up, shaking, and takes a few seconds to gather herself. Phone calls are bad enough—Vanessa Castro’s name on her call display is always terrifying—but seeing the private investigator in person, she now knows, is a hundred times worse. Jesus Christ, she misses the days when Castro used to just email. “What are you doing here?”
“I’ve learned some new information. I thought we should talk in person. It couldn’t wait.” She looks past Marin. “You alone?”
“For now. Come in.”
Marin stands aside as Castro enters. She rubs her stomach, grimacing at the acidic taste at the back of her throat. It must be a strange superpower to have, causing people indigestion at the mere sight of you. Glancing around at the pristine perfection of the house and noting Marin’s bare feet, the other woman removes her shoes, leaving them neatly by the door.
Marin leads her into the kitchen. “Something to drink?” she asks.
Castro’s eyes flicker to the coffee machine. “Oh, wow. Is that a Breville Oracle? I’ve always wanted one of these for the office, but I’d have to sell a kidney.”
Marin manages a small smile. “Make whatever you like.”
A couple of minutes later, they take a seat at the banquette. Castro takes a sip of her mochaccino, nods her approval at the taste, and starts speaking.
“As soon as I saw that McKenzie Li was missing, something started niggling at me,” Castro says, “and I couldn’t put my finger on it. It felt like there was some missed connection I wasn’t seeing.”
“I know that feeling.”
“So I started digging deeper into her background. Are you aware that she and Sal Palermo had a sexual relationship when she was seventeen?”
Marin stares at the other woman, her mouth dropping open. The connection she couldn’t quite make earlier … here it is. She closes her mouth, swallows. “No, I was not. Are you sure?”
Castro pulls out her phone. She taps the screen a few times, then hands it to Marin. She’s pulled up a photo of a younger Sal with a much younger McKenzie. They’re sitting beside each other on a riverbank, the water rushing by behind them, their cheeks pressed together, the sun in both their eyes. A selfie. Not the greatest quality; it was probably taken with a BlackBerry Curve or whatever cheap smartphone was popular with high schoolers seven years ago. McKenzie’s hair was dark brown, hanging in a silky sheath almost down to her waist. Her eyebrows looked different—they were thinner then, overplucked—and she looked like a teenager, which she would have been when the photo was taken.
But there’s no mistaking it’s her.
“Holy shit.” Marin stares at the picture, stunned. “I don’t … I don’t understand.”
She works to wrap her mind around this new revelation. She knew that Sal was a serial dater, and had been since they broke up, and that he often hooked up with women much younger than he was. Ginny from the bar was a classic example.
But Marin had shown him McKenzie’s picture, at his bar that afternoon while she was getting drunk on amaretto sours. Sal had taken a good, long look at McKenzie’s naked body. And he’d laughed. Laughed. And then commiserated with her at the ridiculousness of McKenzie’s youth, her pink hair, her tattoos, all the things that made her the exact opposite of Marin. He never said a word about knowing her, or even recognizing her. And all along, he had known her. Intimately. Because they’d been lovers.