He paused and held my gaze. “But I can make long distance work.”
We let those words hang between us—a visceral, ectoplasmic, shimmering sense of promise. I tucked the napkin into my purse.
He called for the check. I saw him sign the tab to his room. I got to my feet and wobbled slightly. He helped me into my coat and placed his hand gently at the small of my back as he escorted me from the bar into the lobby, the pressure of his palm both gentle and firm. Both sexual and benign. Both controlling and charmingly chivalrous.
He accompanied me outside and made sure I got safely into a cab. I nestled into the warm back seat of the taxi, and he waved goodbye from the hotel doors. As the cab pulled away I pressed my palm against the cold window and watched him through the softly falling snowflakes, feeling as though I were in a romantic movie.
“Where to?” asked the cab driver.
Home.
I gave him my address.
Except it doesn’t feel like home anymore.
As the taxi started down the snowy street, a traffic light turned red. We stopped, waiting in the softly swirling snow for the light to turn green. I turned to look back into the lighted windows of the hotel. Martin had gone inside and was standing in the lobby, talking to a woman and a man. A memory niggled through me. Martin said something to the couple and they all laughed. The man peeled away and the woman started to walk with Martin toward the bank of elevators. It hit me—the woman who’d been sitting at the Mallard bar counter earlier. Or was she?
A hesitation rippled through my fuzzy memory.
The light turned green and the cab started to move.
“Wait!” I called to my driver. “Stop!”
He hit the brakes. I flung open the door and tumbled myself out into the snowy street. I ran carefully on my heels toward the hotel entrance.
“Hey!” I heard the cabbie yell behind me. I ignored him and pushed through the revolving doors into the hotel, my heart hammering.
THEN
LOZZA
Over one year ago, November 18. Agnes Basin, New South Wales.
Warm rainwater leaked down the back of Lozza’s neck as she crouched in the darkness, taking photos, her camera flash throwing the floating body into macabre relief. White skin against black water, the empty eye sockets, the nose-less face, open, lipless mouth. She clicked. Flash. Her brain circled around the words she’d heard shortly before they got this call.
“Ellie is not what meets the eye . . . That kind of woman can be the most dangerous when betrayed or wronged, because you least expect it. They can be deadly. Did you know that she stabbed her ex-husband . . . ?”
The sheer number of puncture wounds in this floater’s chest—about fifteen, maybe more—whispered of rage, unhinged violence. Red-hot passion—because you didn’t need to stab someone this many times to kill him. But the ropes, the severed fingers—was that planned torture? Sadism? And why no pants? Where was the boat? How’d he get here, into this channel?
Nothing about this made sense.
Lozza came to her feet and waited for Gregg to quit throwing up. Mosquitoes buzzed in clouds about them. Rain beat down steadily, and water dripped off the bill of her police cap.
“You good?” she asked.
He nodded, his face ghostly in the light of her torch.
“Let’s get back to the launch.”
She’d phoned it in. Reception had been spotty but she’d gotten through. They made their way back to the police launch.
Barney sat beneath the targa cover. Rain pattered and ran off McGonigle’s jacket in silver rivulets.
“ETA for forensic services and a homicide squad detective is about two hours,” Lozza said as they reached the boat moored to the jetty. “We need to cordon this area off while we wait.” She turned to Barney. “There’s a path leading off the end of the dock. Where does it go?”
“Abandoned homestead,” Barney said. “The Agnes Marina developers erected some scaffolding near the old house. It’s for prospective buyers who want to climb up to a platform and survey the view they’ll get from the new lodge when it’s built.”
Lozza turned to Gregg. “Cordon off the immediate area with tape,” she said. “We can extend the cordon as we get a better idea of the scope of the scene. I’m going to take a look down that trail. The decedent lost his fingers somewhere. My bet is he didn’t drown here, either, but was killed elsewhere, and then someone tried