Copycat Killing

25

“Thanks for calling me,” Marcus said. He was wearing jeans and a short-sleeved blue T-shirt over a long-sleeved gray one.

I’d gotten to my feet and was waiting, holding the portfolio and the puzzle box when he got to the top of the stairs.

“You’re welcome,” I said. I handed him the leather case.

“Maggie said you found this in a box of her things?”

I pointed to the cardboard carton, still on its side on the floor. “It definitely belongs…belonged to Jaeger. Maggie recognized the top sketch.”

He flipped through some of the other papers without comment, then looked at the puzzle box. “And the box? What’s in that?”

“I don’t know,” I said.

He smiled. “You didn’t look?”

“We couldn’t.” I handed him the box. “It’s a puzzle box.”

He frowned. “Seriously?”

“Seriously.”

Maggie reached over and took the box out of his hands. “See? There’s a piece here that slides out. And another on the opposite side.”

I took a few steps away from them and pulled out my phone. I counted eleven rings before my father answered.

“Hello, my sweetheart,” he said. “I knew it was you.”

“No you didn’t,” I said, smiling at the sound of his voice.

“I did,” he insisted. “You’re the only person who wouldn’t hang up when I didn’t answer right away.”

That was true. “So what took you so long?”

“I was trying on my leather pants.”

It wasn’t quite as odd as it sounded, given that my dad had played a number of dashing, leather-clad swordsmen over the years. Still…“Do I want to know why?” I asked.

He laughed. “Probably not.” My dad had a great laugh, deep and rumbly. I could almost feel the vibration in my chest and for a moment the longing to be back in Boston with my family took my breath away.

I had to swallow a couple of times before I could speak. “Dad, um, I called because Maggie and I have a puzzle box we need to get into. Do you think you could help?”

“I can try sweetheart. I’m assuming you don’t know who made the box or anything about it.”

I glanced back at Maggie and Marcus. Marcus had his cop face on and Maggie looked very serious. “No, Dad,” I said, quietly. “I don’t. But this is important.”

There was silence on the other end for a moment. “Katie, there’s something you’re not telling me. Probably more than one thing, but interrogating you is your mother’s job so all I’m going to say is please be careful, whatever it is you’re doing.”

“I will, Dad,” I promised.

“Describe the box,” he said.

I walked over to Marcus and Maggie and silently held out my hand. Marcus gave me the box. I described what I was looking at to Dad.

“It’s not an antique, is it?” he asked.

“No, it’s not. I think it was made fairly recently.”

“How far out does the piece on the right side move?”

I worked at it and told him.

“Okay, let’s see what we can do,” he said.

We probably tried six or seven different combinations of moves, but the box didn’t open. I could see Marcus was getting impatient, shifting restlessly from one foot to the other. Finally I shook my head and handed it back to him, taking a few steps away.

“I’m sorry I can’t help you, Katie,” Dad said.

Marcus had turned the puzzle box over and was studying the underside.

“I’m guessing it would be a bad idea to try to pry it open.”

“You could damage what’s inside,” Dad said. “My advice would be to either keep trying—maybe there’s a part we missed—or”—he hesitated—“if you really need to get this box open, ask someone who knows a lot more about them than I do.”

Roma’s wonderful meal suddenly felt like a piece of stone from Wild Rose Bluff in my stomach. “I don’t really want to do that, Dad,” I said in a low voice.

“I know,” he said.

“Thanks for trying.” I wished that he were a lot closer so I could hug him.

“I’m sorry I couldn’t help. Call your mother when you have time. I love you.”

“I love you too,” I said.

I disconnected the call and looked over at Maggie. Owen adored her. Hercules liked her and I had no idea how I would have adjusted to life in Minnesota if we hadn’t become friends.

I walked back over to her just in time to see her shake her head angrily at Marcus.

“I don’t know how to open that box,” she said, enunciating each word slowly and carefully. “I don’t know what Jaeger was doing, but whatever it was, I wasn’t part of it.”

She reached over and grabbed the top carton from the pile by her door and thrust it at Marcus. “Here. You want to search my things for evidence? Go ahead!”

“Maggie, I’m just trying to do my job,” Marcus said. There were tight lines around his mouth.

I took a deep breath and let it out. I put one hand on Maggie’s shoulder and the other on Marcus’s arm. “Stop,” I said. My voice was louder than I intended and it bounced off the walls of the hallway.

“I might have another resource,” I said. I was surprised that my voice didn’t shake. It was the only part of me that wasn’t. “Just give me a minute.”

I opened my phone and dialed a number from memory and my heart pounded as it rang on the other end. He answered and for a moment I literally couldn’t breathe, I couldn’t speak. Then somehow I remembered how to do both.

“Hi Andrew,” I said. “It’s Kathleen.”