AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Why does Annisa have so much equipment in here?” Julia asked and peered closer into the closet.
I crouched down next to Julia and picked up a regulator to show her. “This costs over a thousand dollars.”
Julia’s eyes widened in disbelief. “Really?” She took it from my hand to inspect it.
I nodded and reached down again to pick up a dive computer. “And this is worth over three thousand dollars.” I set it down and looked at more gear. Taking my best guess at the total value, I said, “There’s about twenty thousand dollars’ worth of scuba diving equipment in this closet. Some of them are still shrink-wrapped in their boxes.”
“How do you know all that?” Julia was amazed by the information. She hadn’t been diving in a while, so she didn’t realize how expensive the equipment had become.
“Let’s call Aiden back and tell him about what we found,” I said to Julia, who remained silent while I was picking through Annisa’s guest closet. “Are you okay?” I took out my phone to FaceTime Aiden again, but I stopped when I saw Julia’s expression.
Julia let out a sigh and said, “It’s like I don’t even know my friend. First, we find a closet full of designer goods that I know Annisa can’t afford, and then we find a bunch of scuba diving equipment that she probably didn’t know what it was used for.”
I nodded, seeing Julia’s point, but I didn’t have an answer to explain it. “We need to talk to Annisa and get to the bottom of this.” Then I swiped on Aiden’s number and waited for the FaceTime call to go through.
“Hi, Claire.” Aiden seemed pleased that I called again, but his smile disappeared when he saw my expression. “What happened?”
“We’re still at Annisa’s apartment, and you won’t believe what we found in the spare room.” I turned the camera around so that he could see inside Annisa’s guest closet.
“That looks like scuba equipment.” Aiden’s voice rose in puzzlement.
“It is, and there are thousands of dollars’ worth of brand new and high-end equipment.”
I saw Aiden blink his eyes several times. “H-how come she has all this equipment when she just got certified?”
“I know, right? And do you think that this is what Trevor was referring to when he said that he left something at her house?”
“I don’t know.” He squinted into the camera. “Is that the same wetsuit that Annisa was wearing?”
“I don’t know if it’s the same one, but it looks like it.” I reached in the closet and flipped back the bright pink collar to see what brand it was. I did a double-take when I saw the brand name and said, “This is interesting. This wetsuit is made by Riplash. I’ve never heard of it. I wonder if it’s an international company.”
Julia raised an eyebrow, and I knew that she found it amusing that although I didn’t know much about the clothing brand names, I seemed to be an expert on the scuba diving brands.
Aiden wasn’t aware of the company either, but his perplexed expression indicated that he was more amazed that there were two neon pink 7mm dive suits in existence.
I turned the camera back to face me. “Were you able to find out if you can talk to Annisa again?”
“I was. I have an appointment to see her at three o’clock,” he said, looking down at his watch.
“When you see her, can you ask her about the equipment?”
Over my shoulder, Julia appeared on the screen. “Hi, Aiden,” she said.
“Hi, Julia,” Aiden raised one hand and waved at her.
Julia gave a small smile back and said, “Aiden, in addition to the scuba diving equipment and designer clothes and accessories in Annisa’s closet, we found a note written in Korean.” She licked her lips in hesitation. “I don’t know this for sure, and the note didn’t say who the person was addressed to, but I’m pretty sure that the message was for Annisa.”
“Oh? “What did the note say?”
“Well, neither one of us can read Hangul, so we had to call Claire’s mom to translate the note.”
Aiden grinned when he heard Julia’s explanation. “That must’ve been good.”
I rolled my eyes at him. “I guess what Julia’s trying to get at is that when you talk to Annisa, could you bring this up? We don’t want to be nosy, but with two closets full of expensive items and her scuba diving instructor dead, it might not be a coincidence.” At my words, Julia frowned, and Aiden nodded thoughtfully. Whatever Julia and I thought we would find at Annisa’s apartment, this was not it.
“That makes sense. I’ll call you after I speak with Annisa,” Aiden answered.
“Perfect!” Then, before I knew what I was doing, I added, “I miss you!” The words came out, and there was nothing I could do to take the words back. I gave him a weak grin, wishing a monster would come out of the closet and swallow me up.
