Chapter 12

My original thought was that I might catch Candy at work, but it turned out, the Neptune’s Depths Seafood Processing plant was closed on Sundays (who’d have thunk?). So instead, we drove into Astoria.

It was another beautiful summer day, and Astoria was beautiful too. If you’ve never visited—or you’ve never seen The Goonies (shame on you)—it’s not actually on the coast. It’s a waterfront city, yes, but it’s on the Columbia River. For over a hundred years, it’s been a major port in the Pacific Northwest: timber, fur, import and export, commercial fishing, all that stuff. As in many port cities, there’s a rift between the blue-collar workers who do the actual shipping and fishing and loading and unloading and processing, etc., and the business owners and managers and old-money families. So, for example, in addition to being a working port, Astoria also has a scenic river walk. It has tract homes, like the ones where Arlen, Candy, Neil, and Jane lived, but it also has big old Queen Annes up on the hill. (Side note: check out Airbnb. There’s this one house where you can rent a room, and the room used to be the nursery, and there’s this creepy old-timey bassinet in the room, and you have to sleep with that thing in there with you, and when Keme saw the pictures, he said it looked, quote, haunted as —well, a word that you can’t put in an Airbnb listing). The Columbia River Bar (that’s the spot where the river meets the ocean) is one of the most dangerous stretches of water in the world. Even huge commercial freighters occasionally capsize and go under there—no joke, not too long ago, it happened to a shipment of jeans, and people kept finding them washed up on the shore. In fact, it’s so dangerous that, for years, it kept all those intrepid sailor-explorers from discovering the mouth of the river, even though they were sailing right in front of it.

In other words, Astoria was not Hastings Rock. It was beautiful in its own way, as I said, but it was a working city, a grittier city. The bumper sticker from Neil’s truck came back to me: We ain’t quaint . Hastings Rock was quaint. I had the feeling that if Astoria ever had a chance, it would give Hastings Rock an atomic wedgie and shove it in a locker.

We found the Skin Art Collective (excuse me while I throw up a little) in a strip mall on the outskirts of town. I say we , but it was really Millie—remember, she was on research duty. And honestly, there was something simultaneously endearing and satisfying about watching Fox try to keep their cool while the Maps app on Millie’s phone announced, “At the next light, turn left,” and then, a nanosecond later, Millie repeated, “AT THE NEXT LIGHT, TURN LEFT.” It was hard to tell in the rearview mirror, but I thought Fox’s eye was twitching.

The strip mall itself was a two-story brick building with big display windows on the ground floor and smaller windows above that suggested space originally meant to be residential. The Skin Art Collective occupied one of the end units, with a disturbing sign that showed a needle, thread, and skull. There was, less disturbingly, a dispensary (Rad Roots), a pipe store (Smoke & Barrel), a real estate office (Aspire Property Group), and a Chinese restaurant (Imperial Taste). The asphalt was worn and potholed, and weeds grew behind the parking stops. I wasn’t sure what Aspire Property was aspiring to, but it probably included a sidewalk with fewer used needles and disposable contacts packages. Also, I know what you’re thinking, and both Keme and I looked at Imperial Taste at the same time—but as soon as I opened the van door, the smell of rancid oil rolled over us, and we silently agreed to pass (this time).

I was halfway to the tattoo parlor when the sound of footsteps alerted me.

“Oh no,” I said. “You’re all staying in the van.”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Indira said. “We can’t make sure you’re safe if we’re in the van.”

“ I’m being ridiculous? Indira, I’m going to confront this woman about, among other things, lying to me, and I’m going to try to get her to tell me where she was the night her brother disappeared, so I’m basically accusing her of murder. Also, I don’t even have Bobby to distract her with his muscles and oh-so-vanilla sexiness.”

I hadn’t meant for that last part to slip out.

Millie beamed at me like I’d just earned a gold star.

Keme looked like he was trying not to throw up.

Fox choked on their spit.

Indira, patting Fox on the back, said, “All right. We’ll wait outside.”

“No, you can’t just lurk on the sidewalk like a bunch of—” I managed to stop myself from saying weirdos , but maybe the message came through because Indira shot her eyebrows. “Uh,” I said, “okay. Perfect.”

“And Keme can go inside with you.”

I opened my mouth to protest, but I realized this was a losing battle. And, all things considered, Keme was probably the best choice—he wouldn’t talk much, unlike certain other people I could name, and if push came to shove, well, I mean, he was freakishly strong. (I still think Bobby lets him win at arm wrestling, but Bobby just gets that goofy smile when I ask.)

When we stepped inside, a bell jingled on the door, and music met us. I didn’t recognize the song or the band, but it was metal, and it was, um, angry? The store seemed to be lit only by natural light, which meant no headache from annoying fluorescents but which, I thought, might turn out to be an inconvenience when it came to, oh, putting indelible lines of ink on the human body. Beyond a small waiting area with a counter and register was the tattoo parlor’s studio space, with three different stations set up with tattoo chairs, rolling carts covered in supplies, and machines that looked like they’d been designed by someone whose true passion was torture. I mean, it’s a needle going into your skin. Like, millions of times. Tell me I’m wrong.

Maybe Keme saw it on my face because he snorted.

At the back of the shop, Candy sat sidesaddle in one of the tattoo chairs. She’d lost the kimono today, and she was wearing a pair of poisonously green snakeskin boots, Daisy Dukes, and (rather optimistically, in my opinion) an ombre tube top that had probably been described as “tequila sunrise.” She was talking to a man with stringy, graying hair. He wore a leather vest (no shirt underneath, of course), boot-cut jeans, and big, stompy-looking boots. The first smell I’d caught when I’d stepped into the tattoo parlor made me think of disinfectant, but now I caught a whiff of something else—a scent I occasionally noticed lingering around Fox.

“Can I help you?” the man asked, getting up from his seat. He was taller than I’d realized. Bigger too. I decided that, if necessary, today would be the day that I’d let Keme vent all that teenage aggression he’d been bottling up. Plus—bonus—Millie would get to watch.

“Uh, hi,” I said. “I was looking for Candy.”

“And who are you?”

“It’s okay,” I said, “I can see her right there. Hi, Candy.”

Keme gave a little, subvocal groan.

“I asked you your name,” the man said.

“It’s okay, Ricky,” Candy said and patted his arm. Then, her voice flat—almost hostile—she asked, “What?”

“I’m sorry to bother you, but I had a few more questions. I promise I’ll be quick.”

“Questions about what?” the man—Ricky—asked.

“Uh, tattoos?” I said.

Keme gave another of those little groans.

But it got worse a moment later when Candy’s gaze slid past me, toward the big display windows, and she said, “Did you bring your mom?”

“Okay, wow—”

“And who’s that? Your—”

Someone tapped on the glass in a way that could only be described as pugnacious, and then, their voice muffled as it passed through the window, Fox called, “I’m his titi.”

“Oh my God,” I said under my breath.

“AND I’M HIS SISTER!”

(No glass in the world could muffle that one.)

“Nope,” I tried.

“And what are you?” Candy asked Keme.

“His big brother,” Keme said without missing a beat. “I’m the one who wants the tattoo.”

“He’s not—” I began.

“Oh my God,” Candy said, “I can totally see the resemblance!”

For a single, spluttering moment, there was only, um, spluttering. And then I said, “You can?”

“Candy said you’re the best,” Keme said to Ricky. “I’m thinking something minimalist. Maybe a scene from John Wick .”

“Not one single thing about John Wick is minimalist,” I began, “and you are not getting a—” But then I caught Keme’s look (the translation was somewhere between How stupid are you? and one of those wordless noises of pure frustration), and I realized what he was doing. “Uh, okay. Maybe I could chat with Candy really quickly while you talk about it. And only talk about it.”

Keme ignored me, of course, and pulled out his phone as he moved over to Ricky, apparently to show him what a minimalist tattoo of a scene from a John Wick movie might conceivably look like.

Candy stayed where she was, looking up at Ricky, clearly hoping to be included in the conversation—or at least acknowledged. But Ricky was, apparently, a true professional, and now that there was work at hand, he seemed to have forgotten Candy entirely. After a few more seconds, she heaved herself to her feet with a sigh and came over to me.

“What?” she said.

“Sorry about—”

“Oh, it’s okay. I get it, trust me. Big brothers are the worst .”

I almost— almost— descended into sputtering again. But I managed to keep my cool (on the outside, anyway—I mean was it the hair? He was seventeen, for heaven’s sake. Was it because of all the testosterone?). “Right. Well, I was hoping I could ask you a few more questions about Richard.”

She lowered turquoise-shadowed eyelids and squinted out at me. Slowly, she said, “Okay.”

“One of the things that I’m still trying to figure out is where you were the night Richard disappeared.” (I didn’t add that the reason I was still trying to figure it out was because the first time I’d asked, she’d avoided the question.) “I was hoping you could tell me what you were doing that night.”

Her silence lasted a beat. And then she said, “Excuse me?”

“This is part of making sure the case is airtight—”

“The case is airtight,” she said, and the words were starting to get pitchy. “Vivienne killed him. I already told you that.”

“I know, but you understand that to prove that, the police are going to need more than your word for it.”

“I told you about all of it. How they were all fighting. And the money. She hated Richard, and she killed him, and she took the money and left.”

“Yes, I remember you telling me. But you know that defense attorneys do background checks on everyone involved in a case like this—including witnesses. So, I need to nail down exactly where you were that night.”

“I was at home.” She said it so fast that nobody would have believed her.

“Uh huh. So, the thing is, another name came up in the investigation, and I’m afraid it’s…complicating the timeline.” (How about that for some grade-A BS?) “What can you tell me about Zane Potthof?”

Underneath the inches of makeup, her face went white. It was like someone ripped the stuffing out of her—her shoulders slumped, and she sagged inside her tube top (try not to visualize it). Then she rallied. She struggled to pull herself upright, crossed her arms under her, uh, bosom, and said, “Who told you about Zane?” And before I could say anything, she said, “It was her , wasn’t it?”

“Who?”

“Of course she’d bring him up. Because that’s how she is! She’s always been such a dried-up old stick-in-the-mud. She’s never made any mistakes. She’s never done anything wrong. What did she say? What did she tell you?” Again, I didn’t have a chance to speak before she barreled forward: “I don’t care. I don’t want to know!”

“Why don’t we start with who you think—”

“Vivienne!” It was a shriek, and Keme and Ricky looked up from the book of tattoo designs they were examining.

A moment later, that combative tap came at the window, and Fox asked through the glass, “What did she say about Vivienne?”

That was when I decided that this would be the first—and last—episode of family-style sleuthing.

Fortunately, Candy was on a real tear by then, and she just kept going. “She’s always hated us. She hates that we’re her family, that she came from us, that she can’t get rid of us. And she hated Richard. You said you wanted to know why she’d hurt him— that’s why. She hated him so much she—she was insane. She would have done anything to hurt him.”

“That doesn’t make any sense,” I said. “Everyone told us how close they were. Vivienne told us she loved Richard. Jane said—”

A nasty laugh ripped its way out of Candy, but she was crying too, wiping her cheeks and spreading mascara everywhere. “I saw them,” she said, and the words had a child’s outrage. “I walked in on them.” And then, as though I might be even denser than she’d thought: “Doing it.”

Maybe I was denser than she’d thought because the words that came out of my mouth were: “Vivienne and Richard?”

“No, you idiot. Vivienne and Jane! That’s why Vivienne killed him. She was jealous of him! She hated him because she was obsessed with Jane. I told you Richard and Jane were arguing. I told you Jane was having an affair. Jeez, how dumb are you? She killed Richard to get him out of the way, made it look like a robbery, and—and threw Richard away like he was a piece of garbage.” Candy let out that ugly laugh again, but now her eyes were dry. “Jane didn’t want anything to do with her after that, though. Because she finally saw Vivienne for exactly who she was—who we all knew she was: someone who would do whatever it took to get what she wanted.”