Vanishing Girls (Detective Josie Quinn #1)(8)
Another smile. Up close, the woman’s face was lined with wrinkles and she had the kind of look that people get when they can’t really hear what someone is saying but are too embarrassed to admit it, so they simply smile and nod along.
“You colored your hair,” the woman said.
Josie returned her smile but said nothing. Later, if her unsanctioned visit to Dirk Spencer’s house became an issue, she could say truthfully that she had not encouraged the woman.
“The darker color looks good on you,” the woman added. When Josie didn’t respond, the woman said, “It’s a shame it didn’t work out with you two. He really loves you.”
The corners of Josie’s mouth tightened. “Oh well, that’s nice of you to say.”
“You still work at that restaurant in town?”
“Uh, no,” Josie replied.
The woman stared at her for a long moment, eyes narrowing, like she was trying to puzzle something out. Josie waited, a cold sweat gathering on her top lip; the woman had realized her mistake, surely. But then she smiled again, her eyes going blank once more. She turned and began shuffling back down the driveway to the street. “I’ll leave you to it,” she said over her shoulder.
She wanted to stop her and ask if she knew where she might find someone named Ramona, but she stopped herself. What if Spencer’s ex was Ramona? Josie waved and watched the old lady move slowly down the block before she turned and tried the key in the lock.
The living room had two mismatched couches with blankets thrown over their backs. Bookcases dominated one wall, and the tomes that didn’t fit there were stacked on end tables. A blue sweatshirt was thrown carelessly over one of the couch arms. The local newspaper—an edition from three days earlier—lay spread out across the coffee table, open at one of the first features they had done on the disappearance of Isabelle Coleman. Beside that was a coffee mug, its dregs congealing in the bottom in a thick brown goo.
In the kitchen was a sink filled with unwashed dishes. Crumbs dotted the countertops. A butter knife lay next to the chrome-colored toaster, sheathed in a coating of dried-up butter. A cell phone charger was plugged into the wall next to the toaster, its cord dangling over the side of the countertop. Josie made a mental note to try to find out what, if anything, was found on Spencer’s cell phone. On the fridge were photographs affixed with magnets from various places Spencer had obviously been: New York City, Baltimore’s Inner Harbor, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland, Hershey Park, and San Francisco. In most of the photos Spencer smiled happily into the camera, alongside a woman with long brown hair and blue eyes. Other than having long hair, she didn’t really resemble Josie. She was probably a few years older, early thirties maybe. This, Josie assumed, was the ex-girlfriend. In one photo she wore a green apron and stood in front of a bar in a restaurant that Josie vaguely recognized.
Mixed in with the photos of the ex-girlfriend were photos of Dirk with a different woman and a teenage girl. This woman was older, maybe mid-forties, thicker around the middle with brittle, sandy-colored hair and dark eyes. The teenager looked like a combination of the two of them, only her skin was more olive-colored. Her hair was dark, like Dirk’s.
She assumed this was Spencer’s family. Perhaps he was divorced. She wondered where this woman and teenage girl were now. Someone would have to notify his next of kin if he didn’t make it; someone had probably already been in touch as it seemed likely he wouldn’t make it another day. She used her cell phone to snap a few pictures of the photos on Spencer’s fridge and checked the upstairs. The queen-size bed in the master bedroom was unmade. Down the hall from that, the other bedroom had a neatly made twin bed in it with a dust-covered nightstand and dresser, but the room had no adornments. It didn’t look lived in at all. Nothing of interest. Josie made her way back toward the front door, careful not to disturb anything. On the porch, she closed the door and turned the key to lock it.
“What the hell are you doing here?”
Josie froze at the sound of Trinity’s voice. Her right hand was still turning the key, her stomach somewhere around her ankles. This was not good. She sucked in a deep breath, shored herself up and turned, trying to look put out and annoyed. “What are you doing here?” she countered.
Trinity still wore the same puffy blue coat she’d had on that morning; a black, knee-length A-line skirt peeked from beneath it, followed by long, toned legs in thin stockings and finished with four-inch heels. At least Josie didn’t have to worry about Trinity chasing her down, not in those shoes.
Josie’s gaze drifted back to Trinity’s face. As always, she was struck by the similarities. The two women weren’t related—Trinity had grown up a few towns away in relative wealth, raised in a two-parent home, while Josie had been raised by a single mother who never quite found her way out of abject poverty—but they both had long, jet-black hair, porcelain skin, and striking blue eyes with long lashes. Josie’s fingers reached up and pulled her hair forward, making sure it covered the long, jagged scar that ran down the side of her right cheek. It was the most striking difference between them. Josie had always been grateful the scar was close to her ear so that if she wore her hair down with some concealer, it was barely noticeable.
Trinity pointed to her own chest. “Me? I’m working a story. A story that just got a whole lot more interesting now that I’ve found a suspended cop breaking into a shooting victim’s house.”