“Whoa there. You’ve got to give me a day or two, okay? Hell, give yourself a day or two.” It wouldn’t take him more than twenty minutes to pull the names together, and maybe another half hour to track down current contact information for all of them. But he had a feeling that he’d pushed too hard, too far, and that Leda needed some breathing room—whether she’d admit it or not.
“A day or two? Time is of the essence! This guy is really getting around.”
“Yes, a day or two, and that’s all, I swear. Things take as long as they take, okay? So let’s say Thursday. That’ll give me a couple of days to round up the suspects and arrange at least one meeting.”
“It feels like starting over at square one,” she complained.
“Nuh-uh,” he said. “We’ve found a promising connection between your case and mine, and now we just have to massage it until a good suspect falls out. This is police work, Leda. Sometimes it’s tedious and time-consuming. But if you do it right, and you do it long enough, you can usually find your way to an answer.”
“You’ve got a lot of faith in the process, don’t you?”
“I do.” He nodded. “Furthermore, I have a lot of faith in you. But we can only go so fast here. We don’t want to screw up the case for prosecutors down the road.” He didn’t want to screw up Leda, either. She wouldn’t want to hear that part, and if he said it out loud, she’d argue with him.
She took a deep breath that was half coffee steam, sneezed, and wiped her nose again. “All right, I trust you.” She glanced down at the Fitbit she seemed to use as a watch. “Shouldn’t you be heading into the office yourself, right about now?”
“Sooner rather than later, yeah.” He gathered up the napkins, empty sweetener packets, and plastic stirrers they’d used between them and stood up to bus the table. “And tomorrow afternoon, I’ll give you a call and let you know what’s up. I’ll try to arrange something for Thursday.”
Leda lifted her half-empty cup and toasted him with it. “Right on. I’d better…” She looked around, like she was seeking some direction to escape. Any direction. “I’d better throw on some makeup and get to work myself.”
23.
Leda did not swing by the office on the way home. She didn’t have the energy, despite the sixteen ounces of coffee she’d dumped down her throat. She felt exactly like she ought to, considering she’d been dragged out of bed far too early, then hauled to a crime scene—where she’d subsequently fondled a corpse in hopes of a psychic episode. If you asked her, the episode in question had been one of her worst and least helpful. Contrary to Grady’s insistence, she didn’t feel like any of it had meant a damn thing. It was all stuff he could’ve guessed, and stuff that would come out in a careful police investigation anyway.
That was the worst part.
It’d hit her hard, once they’d made it back to the car and she’d given him the short version of what she’d seen. It’d been brutal and weird, and largely meaningless. What did they know, before she came along? They knew that someone had murdered Janette after a struggle. What did they know, after she’d done her thing? That someone had manslaughtered Janette after a struggle.
All she’d done was narrow the gender down to “a dude, definitely,” and they were already leaning that way in the first place. It was the weakest of all possible clues.
Truly, she was the most inconsequential of psychics. A Cassandra doomed to know gnarly details about the truth—but only if they’re no good to anybody, anywhere, at all. Ever.
Except for the one time she kept a cop off a plane.
She felt sorry for herself while she hunted for the eyeliner she wanted, and she marinated in self-pity as she smoothed her hair into a ponytail. She wallowed in woe as she hunted for a better shirt and some different boots, since the first pair she’d worn that day were wet from the early-morning outing in the damp Seattle dawn. Upon noticing that her socks didn’t match, she removed her boots and found a set that went together. No one would see them, but she would know, and it would drive her crazy if she didn’t fix it.
All in all, she’d rather go back to bed than do anything else.
But now it was after 8:00 a.m., and the rest of the world was up and running. She should at least show up at her office and check her emails. After all, technically she had a job. Technically, she was a small-business owner.
Dragging her feet all the way, she walked into the office. It still wasn’t raining, and she’d thought the fresh air might perk her up.
She’d thought wrong. She kind of wanted to die.
Instead, she unlocked her office and sat down at her desk. She powered up the computer and, lo and behold, she had emails! From people who wanted to go places! Encouraged by happy adrenaline, she sat up straighter and began typing professional-sounding words that might persuade folks to hire her. Within an hour, she definitely had one new client—and probably a second client, too.
Well, after a morning like the one she’d had, there was nowhere to go but up.
Right?
A third email landed. Her Google and Facebook ads must be working! It wasn’t enough to float the business, but it was a good sign. She needed a good sign. As she sent off the requested information and double-checked her email signature, she honestly felt like maybe the day would brighten up after all. If she could hit some perfect threshold of happy customers, word of mouth would pick up, and that would help grow the business. Things were coming up roses all over.
By lunchtime, Leda was thinking about taking a break. Maybe she’d knock off, head home, and take that nap after all. Honestly, she deserved that break.
Also, maybe she deserved sushi.
She hadn’t heard from Niki since the night before, so she shot her a text asking if she was free for lunch. It’d been like, eighteen hours. There was so much to catch up on! Niki was probably just lounging around her apartment anyway; and if she agreed to drive all the way out to the south end for sushi at their favorite place… then she could probably be persuaded to goof off until the evening, when they could head over to Castaways together.
Niki didn’t bother to text back. She called instead. “Hey, I was just thinking about you.”
“Of course you were. I’m awesome.”
“You sound… tired,” she observed carefully.
Leda sighed. “Only because you know me so well. It’s been a hell of a morning already—I’ll tell you all about it when I see you. Will I see you for lunch? Can you come down here and keep me company? I’ll buy you sushi. You like sushi.”
“Not as much as you do, and you know I love you—but I’ve got to skip it.”
“What?”
Niki said, “Another doctor’s appointment. I’m sitting in the waiting room right now.”
“Oh God, get off the phone. Don’t be the guy who talks in a quiet room full of sick people who just want to be left in peace. Everyone hates that guy.”
“Yeah, but I’m the only guy here, so I don’t care. I might be getting my boot off. At the very least, I’m getting a lighter one.”
“Already?” Leda asked.