I used my dog-training voice. “Grab your purse and anything else you need.”
“Things like this can’t happen to people like me. Craze. And the police. I have an MBA. I graduated cum laude.”
“Congratulations. Pack up. Right after you tell me how to find Erica. And the other women. Helen and Lupita.”
“You can’t bother them. They’re working.”
“That’s okay. I still need their numbers.”
Kaylee stared at me for a moment, then shook herself and turned to her screen. She scribbled three phone numbers on a sticky note.
“Just one more thing,” I said. “I need a list of addresses for all your clients.”
A sniffling sigh followed by more typing. “There. It’s printing now.”
I signaled Clyde to wait, then stepped into the hall and called for a squad car. When I returned, Kaylee was putting herself back together with a compact mirror and a tube of lipstick.
“Kaylee, I’m going to give you some advice. One woman to another.”
She placed the lipstick in a drawer. “Okay.”
“A police officer will be here soon to escort you to headquarters. Follow him in your own car. When you’re done, don’t come back to work.”
“But—”
“No. Go home. Lock your door. Call Candy and all your other employees and tell them to stay away. Because the man with the knife is a very bad man. You can’t simply will him away with positive thoughts.”
“What if Kurt comes back, and I’m not here? He’ll think I’m a terrible office manager.”
“Oh, Kaylee,” I said softly. I touched her hand. Her fingers were cold. “Better than being a dead one.”
CHAPTER 22
Someone once told me that murder cops are the foot soldiers in the battle between good and evil.
—Sydney Parnell. Personal journal.
I leaned against the Tahoe and watched as Kaylee drove away, her Volkswagen close behind the departing squad car. A tap of brakes, the brush of tires on loose gravel, and both vehicles turned the corner and disappeared.
Clyde stared up into one of the pine trees, ears swiveling, his gaze fixed on a crow as it clung to a branch and croaked its rage at our intrusion.
I crossed my ankles and fisted my hands in my pockets. I felt as though we definitely now had the who. Our killers were the Superior Gentlemen. Markey, Riley, Kurt, and Craze.
But we didn’t have the why. Why had they murdered their friend Noah? And had they done something with Ami? Most immediately important, who else did they intend to hurt?
And who the hell was Craze? If he was their leader, why had he come looking for Kurt?
The crow flew higher into the tree. Clyde pranced around the trunk.
What was Dashiell Donovan’s connection to the Superior Gentlemen? Why and how had he become their target?
I wondered, too, if I was missing something important in the men’s link to Top-A. Had Kurt simply talked his friends into using his cleaning company? Just a few pickup artists who wanted their homes to look as spiffy as their clothes?
Before they turned to murder, that was.
And what about Kurt? Was he my stalker?
It was like tuning in to a distant radio station. The occasional burst of words, then more static.
I pulled out my phone and started making a round of calls.
Lieutenant Lobowitz promised she’d rustle up the manpower to park an unmarked near Top-A Cleaning. Two cops in plainclothes on alternate shifts. I didn’t really expect Craze to show. But maybe we’d get lucky.
Next, I dialed Erica, who had cleaned the apartments of both Riley Lynch and Markey Byron. Straight to voice mail. I tried Lupita. Voice mail. Then Helen.
The voice-mail trifecta.
Silence, apparently, was trending. Maybe the women would return my calls when they went on break.
At least Bandoni answered. He grunted through my recitation of the conversations with Mac and Kaylee. When I was done, he said, “So we add Kurt Inger and Markey Byron to the list of the missing. If Evan’s right, we now got four pissed-off, sexually deprived, dickwad killers hiding out somewhere plotting mass murder.”
“But if these guys are in it together, why was Craze sniffing around the cleaning company looking for Kurt?”
“We ain’t exactly talking the A-Team here. Most of these asswipes probably ain’t interested in playing second fiddle. My guess is we got a little internal difference of opinion. We get lucky, these guys will blow each other to kingdom come without us having to lift a finger. Hold on.”
Over the connection came the sound of voices murmuring and Bandoni saying something about buying Rivero whatever he wanted for lunch in order to keep the kid close and talking.
Then he was back on the phone. “Rivero’s alibi checks out. He says Markey is a brilliant artiste and that was why he kept his trap shut about the Superior Gentlemen when you talked to the two of them. Didn’t want to upset genius, apparently.”
“Nothing else?”
“Nothing else. You heading to the address your feeb friend gave you for Aminta Valle?”
“That’s my plan. And I’ll keep trying to reach the other women. When are you having a sit-down with Damn Fox?”
“Right after I finish with Rivero and put on a hazmat suit. Stay in touch.”
I disconnected and slid my phone into my pocket.
Clyde had given up on the crow and stood facing into the gusts, his mouth open and tongue lolling. His tail swept back and forth like a sail in a high wind. He sniffed around my pocket for his hard rubber Kong, the pot of gold at the end of every working dog’s rainbow.
“You ready to catch some bad guys, partner?” I said in Clyde’s favorite high-pitched voice.
Clyde’s tail wagged harder. I opened the passenger door and gestured for him to get inside. He hopped into the passenger seat and waited while I used the K9 harness to buckle him in.
“Soon, buddy,” I said, ruffling his ears. “You might get to run down an entire platoon of baddies. And then we’ll buy you a case of Kongs.”
Clyde and I pulled up in front of a small tan brick bungalow
