Which one will stop me first? she wondered.
A heavyset man in a dark blue suit was on the stage speaking into a microphone. “The mayor has cleaned up the parks.” He raised his voice to broadcast over the din of the crowd. “She has boosted volunteerism at homeless shelters and has reinvigorated tourism.”
Someone bellowed, “Hey you. Stop!”
Without flinching, Kayla kept walking. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw one of the uniformed cops bracing Muscles by the biceps. G.I. Joe was wrestling with another guard.
Seeing they were detained, Kayla hurried back to the waiters’ dressing room. She couldn’t believe her eyes when she spotted a prepaid cell phone sitting unattended on a shelf. Wanting to know Dennis Wald’s whereabouts, she snared it and her backpack. On her way down the escalator, while removing the waiter’s jacket, she dialed the Mission District precinct. A female receptionist came on the line. Kayla said, “Captain Wald, please.”
“He’s unavailable.”
“Is he at the Policemen’s Ball?”
“No, ma’am,” the receptionist said. “But he’s . . . ”
Kayla heard muffled words in the background. It was a man speaking.
The receptionist came back on the line. “Ma’am, I was mistaken. He is available after all. May I tell him who’s calling?”
Kayla stabbed End. If Dennis was at the precinct, then he wasn’t the passenger in the Town Car. She dared to make one more call . . . to Eve.
When Eve didn’t answer, Kayla saw the cell phone was on its last bit of juice, which explained why its owner had abandoned it. She left a terse message, “I’ll be in touch,” then ditched the phone, tossed the waiter’s jacket aside, and fled the hotel.
Outside, she hailed a taxi.
While shivering in the rear seat, it dawned on her she couldn’t cab her way through the investigation. She’d blow through Ashley’s wad of cash. To keep mobile, she needed wheels.
CHAPTER FORTY-NINE
Megan was seatedin the banquet room, but she hadn’t touched her salad. Her appetite had vanished the moment she’d snagged a spot at Tom’s table. He was four chairs away chatting amiably to a friend. Darned if he didn’t look handsome in a tuxedo. She hoped she looked half as good in her black gown. Three weeks ago, she’d spent an entire day searching for the right dress and the perfect spiked heels. How she wished the officers at the entry to the ballroom would hush up so the mayor, who had recently taken the microphone, could finish her celebratory speech. She was itching to dance to big band music.
As if sensing her musings, Tom raised a glass. “You’re killing it tonight, Hanrahan.”
Contentment washed over Megan until she caught sight of Rodrigo tramping toward her. Tapping his watch. Signaling they had someplace to be.
Now? No, no, no.Not the one time Tom has the guts to pay attention to me.
Rodrigo arrived at the table. “We can’t locate Norton.”
Megan gawked. “What do you mean you can’t locate him?”
“He’s MIA. He abandoned his Mercedes. Neighbors haven’t seen him all day.”
Everyone at the precinct knew Rodrigo had an internal GPS system in his brain. If he couldn’t locate Norton, nobody could. If the guy was in the wind, Ashley Macintyre could be at risk.
Megan thundered out of the ballroom, opened her phone app, and tapped in Ashley’s home number. No answer. She tried Ashley’s cell phone with the same result.
Fifteen minutes later, she and Rodrigo were standing on Ashley Macintyre’s balcony, the silk shawl Megan had thrown over her shoulders powerless at thwarting the cold. Fortunately, the rain had stopped.
Where had Ashley gone? In the last twenty-four hours, two of her sister’s clients had turned up dead. Add what Megan had dubbed Ventano’s staged suicide, and her anxiety amped up three-fold. Was Ashley on the run?
Megan gazed at the bedroom. Who was Ashley Macintyre really? She had filled the townhouse with designer furniture. She liked pillar candles, bowls of sachet, and froufrou bedcovers. In spite of the designer duds, none of the rest matched the woman Megan had met.
She concentrated on the other clues in the room. Clothes were strewn on the floor. A computer and a cell phone had been cast aside on the bed. Ashley had left the place in a hurry. Was she running scared? Had Norton shown up, or was Ashley, as Rodrigo suggested, the killer and putting on a terrific bereavement act? Maybe the whirlwind mess had been staged. What if Ashley had counted on the police showing up? Megan hated being a cynic, but she didn’t know what to believe anymore.
“My guess?” Rodrigo aimed a finger. “Miss Macintyre beat a retreat out the alley. We found a pair of panties on the terrace.” He held the item up using a capped pen. “No evidence of rape or foul play. I think they fell out of a hastily packed bag.”
A black cat darted from under the bed and disappeared down the hall.
