“Why is that a curse?”
“Because.” She sighs. “He’s named after the main character in The Picture of Dorian Gray.”
“What’s wrong with that?” She’s going to have to spell this out for me.
“Wow. Okay. So, The Picture of Dorian Gray is about this young, wealthy man who has a painting of himself commissioned. The artist is so taken with Dorian’s good looks, he becomes obsessed with him. It ends up being this artist’s masterpiece. In the course of the sittings, Dorian’s introduced to another man, a lord. I can’t remember his name, but this lord shows Dorian the dark side of London.”
“Dark side?”
“You know, drugs, prostitutes, things of that nature. The London underbelly.”
“Ah, I see.”
“Anyway, Dorian gets so deep into this underbelly, it goes on for a long time, and he ends up murdering someone. But the part about this story that made it so strange was that no matter how old or debauched Dorian got, it never showed. Years pass and he never ages or changes. None of his excess affects him. Instead, all of his bad, terrible deeds appear in the painting.”
“Huh? How?”
She shrugs. “Something about the painting. It takes on all of Dorian Gray’s ugliness.”
“What happens?”
“Well, Dorian hides the painting, but he still visits it. In the end, he stabs the painting, and it kills him.”
“What? It kills him? How?”
“Well, by stabbing the painting, he’s stabbing himself.” She nods. “Blood even seeps from the painting.”
I raise a brow. “Wow. That sounds like a great story. That’d make a great movie.”
“They’ve made it into a movie. It’s old, though.”
“Fascinating. Maybe we could find it somewhere and watch it.”
“As long as we don’t have to watch The Great Gatsby, I’m all in.”
“Maybe I’ll just read the book.” I give her a smirk.
Daisy’s head hits the back of the sofa. “No. Please don’t. Trust me, Daisy Buchanan is the worst person in the world.”
“Worse than Dorian Gray?”
She purses her lips. “Well, no. But she’s pretty bad.”
“Fine. Let’s see where that Dorian Gray movie is. If I have to get one of those online movie subscriptions, I will.”
“Let’s check. Do you have a computer?”
“Yep. Let me get it.”
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Daisy
In the end, we found a movie called Dorian Gray that was filmed in 2010.
“Told you it was disturbing,” I say as the credits roll.
“It was, but what a creative story.”
I’ll give Oscar Wilde that. “Wilde was ahead of his time, really.”
“Why would your grandfather name his child after a character like that?”
I shrug. “I never met him, but I’m going to guess he did it for the same reason my dad named me after an F. Scott Fitzgerald character—he loved Oscar Wilde.”
“Hmm.” Gage looks off like he’s thinking. “If I had a child, I think I’d name it something average. You know, like John.”
I giggle, but I have to ask, “You want kids?”
Smiling down at me, he nods. “I do. You?”
“I wouldn’t mind. I’d want more than one, though. Being an only child sucks.”
He laughs. “Yeah, well, I’ve got a brother, and he’s a pain in the ass, so there’s that.”
“Why? What’s he do?” This is the first real personal information I’ve gotten from Gage. It’s nice.
“He’s always getting into trouble.”
My eyes grow round. “Like legal trouble or lady trouble?”
Chuckling, he takes my hand and holds it. “Both.”
“Wow. And you’re even a cop. Does he live around here?”
“Nah. I’m from Missouri originally. He still lives there, in the town where we grew up.”
“What about your parents?”
“My dad died a few years ago. My mom’s still in the same town. They live next door to each other, actually.”
“That’s nice for her. He can do things for her.”
Scoffing, Gage explains, “It’s the other way around. I’m pretty sure she still does his laundry.”
“No!” I slap Gage’s firm chest. “How old is he?”
“Twenty-four.” He pauses. “No, twenty-five now.”
“Close to my age. Old enough to do his own laundry.” I mean, seriously.
Chuckling, he leans down and kisses me quickly. “You’re right.” Moving a rogue piece of hair out of my face, he adds, “I think she likes to do it. It makes her feel needed or something.”
“She sounds nice.” I close in on him and give him a kiss. “I’m sorry about your dad.”
“Thanks.” Gage kisses me again, this time a little deeper. “He was a good man.”
“Like you?” We kiss again, a little longer this time.
“Better.” I feel Gage’s fingers slide around my neck and into my hair. His tongue sweeps against my lip, so I open for him. It’s getting heated fast. Moving closer, I crawl over him until I’m straddling his lap.
“You’re addictive, Mr. Golden.”
Kissing down my neck, he whispers. “So are you, Miss Buchanan.” Sliding his hand beneath my shirt, he skims over my lacy bra. “Let’s go to bed.”
“Yeah.” I nod. “Let’s.”
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Gage
“There.” I point to the monitor on Dan’s desk. We’re watching the footage from the elevator in Kara Becker’s building. “He’s the only one who entered via the elevator during the estimated time of death.”
“Yeah, but who is he? It’s impossible to tell thanks to the black trench coat and big hat. We can’t see shit,” grumbles Dan. “Was it raining that day?”
I shake my head. “It was chilly but no rain.” I watch the footage again.
Finch points. “Who wears that kind of coat these days? And that hat. It looks like something from an old black-and-white movie. What do they call those?”
“A fedora,” Dan replies .
“A fedora?” Finch sounds perplexed. “Seriously. Who wears a hat like that?” Snapping his fingers, he holds one up. “An old guy. That’s who.”
Looking down at the screen, I see it’s stopped. “Play it again.”
Dan starts the video again, and all three of us lean closer. “He’s got on dress shoes too.”
“It’s grainy, but you can tell they’re shiny.”
Finch mumbles something about old guys and shiny shoes, but I ignore it. The truth is, he’s right. Those are two things an older man would wear.
“Shit.” I push up to full height. “You can’t see his
