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I rolled my eyes. “We need backup.”
“Look toward the entrance.”
I did, and there was Mason standing with Jeremy. They made their way to my hidden table, which I guess hadn’t been so hidden. Then again, they were both cops, and they both knew me pretty well.
I hugged Mason’s neck. He kissed mine. I clasped Jeremy’s shoulder. “You didn’t find Misty, I take it.”
He shook his head, lowered his eyes. “Not yet."
Mason said, “We hadn’t finished looking. Jeremy was going back out tonight, but we got a text from Detective Scott. Eva Quaid’s body was found.”
I felt my eyes widen and looked at the guys in turn. And then I frowned. “Now? After ten years?”
“I know,” Jeremy said. “And on the weekend of her disappearance, just when the mermaid podcast has everyone in town talking about her again.” He looked at Mason, then me again. “It has to be connected. All of it.”
“Jen Scott says that Eva looks like she died yesterday. And uh— she was wearing her tail. There’ll be an autopsy early tomorrow morning. She’s trying to push the ME to do it overnight instead. But she says we can come in now if we want.”
“Oh,” I said.
“Jeremy can stay here to watch out for Christy. We’ll resume looking for Misty right after we see the body. Okay?”
“But there are three perfectly good suspects in that private room in the back.”
“Don’t worry,” Jeremy said. “I’ll keep an eye on things.”
* * *
CHRISTY
Christy managed to execute the corkscrew move directly in front of the tank’s right side, beyond which blurry forms watched from the private dining room. She had decided to do it for Misty after Toby had given her a stern lecture. Maybe she was offended by those assholes, he’d said. Who wasn’t? But their bonus checks were real money that Misty was counting on. He said she never would have left if she’d known the owners were coming tonight and that Christy could make or break her sister’s budding career.
So she’d decided that, if she wanted to take a stand against the patriarchy, she should not do it while pretending to be her sister. She would just be mild-mannered and shake her tail at them so Misty could collect a big fat check.
She couldn’t see the trio very well from inside the tank, especially when in constant motion. She was supposed to be gathering softball sized fake pearls from strategically placed fake oyster shells. Which meant they had a view of her ass inside the tail, or her boobs behind the clam shells. It irked her.
This wasn’t their only mermaid club, Jasmine had told her when she’d probed for a little background info. A performer who caught their eye might get to move up to one of their bigger venues in New York or L.A.
So she did the damn descending spiral, and gathered pearls, and as she swam away, she glanced over her shoulder and added a sassy tail flip. Then she froze, squinting because she was pretty sure Barron White had his fucking hand in his fucking pants while he watched her.
Enraged, she flipped him off and swam to the surface. She loved the power her tail fin gave her. It propelled her upward like a missile. And then she smashed her head into a solid ceiling that shouldn’t have been there. Her yelp was swallowed up in its own bubble of air, as she held her head and sank, but then someone had her by the arm and was pulling her up and out of the water, and he was shouting, “Who the hell closed this? Here, here—” It was Raphael Jones. He must’ve raced up the stairs when she’d crashed into the cover. He was kneeling over her on the floor beside the pool.
“Get off her,” Jeremy said.
Jeremy was here?
She opened her eyes, still holding both hands to the top of her head, and looked between her bent elbows at two faces. One was Jeremy’s and he looked pissed and worried. The other was the dark, handsome, older guy with a pair of expensive sunglasses on his bald, brown head. Behind them Coach Hannah and the other performers were crowding in.
“I think I’m okay.” She sat up. Jones tried to help. Jeremy glared, and he backed off with his hands up, letting Jere do the honors. The pool cover was only partly closed, she noticed. “I’m pretty sure that was wide open when I went in.”
“We’ll check the security footage,” said Jones. “I’ll get to the bottom of this.”
“You one of the owners?” Jeremy asked.
“Yeah,” he replied in a kind of shitty tone, but then pressed his lips tight as if to check himself and extended a hand. “Raphael Jones.”
“Jeremy Brown.”
“I’d offer to help you stand, Misty, but, um—” Jones looked down at her tail with a grin.
