Passport to Murder Page 8

  I was puzzled by Lenny’s reaction. “That’s sort of the reason for the entire trip, if you remember. Which reminds me, I have to get back soon. The girls might need me.”

  “Well, I’m parked in a garage not far from here. I’ll take you back when we’re done.”

  For the rest of the hour, we munched on pizza and talked about Lenny’s performance and First Avenue and what it felt like to play in such a venue. When I joked with him about turning professional, he just laughed, but I wondered if he would have liked to live in the city again, playing shows more frequently. His music was as much a part of him as a hand or foot; anyone watching him perform could see as much. But I had a feeling he was as conflicted as I was about big cities. There was something about them that had driven us away, something we’d never spoken aloud. Maybe it had to do with money. For the wealthy, the city meant specialty stores and Starbucks; for others, it meant high rents, high prices, and little room to move. Or maybe it had to do with injustice. So many had so little yet suffered so much. Whatever it was, the feeling never left me, even after I left.

  I waited inside the restaurant while Lenny got the car. When I heard a beep outside, I pulled open the glass door, the cold wind stinging the corners of my eyes. Lenny was throwing food wrappers from the front to the backseat as I opened the passenger door to his Ford Taurus.

  “Sorry, this thing is a mess,” he said, brushing off the seat with his hand.

  “You didn’t exactly expect company.”

  “Did you say the place is on Eighth?” He twisted into traffic, which was heavy because of the downtown events letting out. A cab driver gave him a honk.

  I nodded, pulling out my envelope keycard. “Because of the last-minute reservation, we’re three to a room.”

  He grinned. “You can stay with me at my sister’s house if you’d like. I’m sure my nieces would be thrilled to wake up to another girl in the house.”

  The offer was tempting, though we both knew it was impractical given the circumstances. To snuggle into a warm bed in a nice home in the suburbs sounded heavenly. “Don’t you think your sister would be offended by your bringing home a strange woman?”

  He cocked an eyebrow. “Are you a strange woman?”

  I smiled mischievously. “I can be.”

  He laughed. “My sister’s cool. Really, she wouldn’t care.”

  “I wish I could,” I said, “but I’d better go back to the hotel. I’m helping to manage this unraveling affair, and I don’t know if we’re getting on another plane or heading home. We’ll find out more tomorrow. One of the police detectives said that he’d want to question us further.”

  “My advice to you, Em, is to keep it short and simple. Don’t go into all the possibilities for Molly’s death; keep those safely tucked away in your frontal lobes with all your other conspiracy theories.”

  “That’s not fair. You’re the conspiracy junkie.”

  “Elvis?” he said, a large question mark hanging over the word.

  I shook my head. “Well, everybody knows he’s living out his golden years in a Pyrenees tribe…. Hey, this is me.”

  He pulled up alongside the parking lot adjacent to the hotel, letting the car idle. “Call me tomorrow. I want to know what happens.”

  “I will,” I promised. “André still believes… who is that?” I shrank down in my seat.

  Lenny looked over at me and then at the parking lot. “What are you doing?”

  “Shh. That guy, over there. Isn’t that Nick Dramsdor?”

  “It depends,” whispered Lenny. “Who is Nick Dramsdor?”

  “Right. I forgot you don’t know him. He’s a paleontologist from Western State. He’s in our group.” I peeked out the window. “It is him.”

  As he walked around the corner of the hotel, his shadow came into focus. He looked left and right before entering the building.

  “Well, that’s interesting,” I said. “I wonder where he’s coming from.”

  Lenny sat up straighter in his seat. “What’s someone from Western State doing in the group anyway? He doesn’t look old enough to be a real prof.”

  “I know. I have to ask about his sunscreen. It’s really doing its job.” I squinted for a closer look. “I guess he was a good friend of Molly’s. Who’s that now?” As a form entered the light of the streetlamp, I knew in an instant it was Amanda. I would recognize her flat-ironed hair anywhere.

  “It looks like a student. Do you know her?” asked Lenny.

  I nodded. “It’s Amanda, one of the girls staying in my room. She must have left Kat behind. I had no idea Amanda was friendly with Nick Dramsdor.”

  “What are you saying? The young professor was mingling with a co-ed?” Lenny said.

  “Well, it can’t be a coincidence, can it? Look at her glancing over her shoulder.”

  Amanda was doing her best to appear nonchalant as she opened the front door of the hotel, tossing her hair as she entered.

  “Looks like she and the paleontologist were out on a moonlit dig to me,” said Lenny.

  “That is what it looks like,” I agreed. “I thought they knew each other through Molly, but I wasn’t certain. They both were on a trip with her in New Mexico, though. Maybe they were discussing her death. Maybe they know something.”

  “Maybe, but that sounds like a stretch. Maybe they just hooked up in the heat of the moment.”

  I frowned. “She doesn’t seem like the impetuous type.”

  Lenny grasped my hands, their warmth radiating up my wrist. “Don’t overthink this, Em. You’ll never sleep tonight. People hook up for all sorts of reasons, or no reason at all. The coldness of a night, even, can bring people together.”

  What he said was true. Being in a tight place with a warm body made even the impossible seem possible. “No, I won’t sleep,” I said as his look sent tingles up and down my spine. For the first time, it seemed, I realized how Lenny’s body affected my own.

  “Call me tomorrow?” he said but didn’t release my hand.

  I nodded, lingering a moment longer. Then I was out of the car, walking into the hotel, unsure of what floor I pushed on the elevator buttons.

  Chapter Eight

  I didn’t sleep well, not that I ever did, but my thoughts went beyond Amanda and Nick. Seeing a colleague die right in front of me had shaken me more than I realized. I had never been afraid of death; it wasn’t that. From an early age, catechism classes taught me death was natural and even welcome. Later, literature would become my instructor and add its bleaker lessons. But seeing a life expunged before my eyes, not just on a page, made me recognize life’s fragility, its brevity, and I valued the moment in the car with Lenny even more.

  I had always found him attractive. I doubted there was a woman on campus who didn’t. But I ignored my physical attraction to him because, in many ways, we were opposites. Yet our differences, and all the importance I had placed on them, had dissipated in the space between us in the car. What remained was the warmth of his hands in the coldness of the night, and I realized how extraordinary it could be to have someone after everyone has left. I wanted that in my life, to care for someone. Perhaps it could be him.

  When the sun began to drench the faded drapes Sunday morning, I shot out of the sofa bed like a bullet released from its chamber. I had been awake for over an hour and could lie still no longer. Amanda and Kat didn’t stir, and in fact, hadn’t stirred all night. They were both sleeping when I entered the room, or pretending to be asleep, and they stayed that way the entire night through.

  To be eighteen again, I thought as I flung open the shower curtain. Then I laughed out loud, the sleep deprivation kicking in. I would no more be eighteen again than return to Detroit. At that age, I had kept myself happily intoxicated with historical romances. Who was I kidding? I laughed again as I stepped into the lukewarm water. I was still doing that ten years later.

  By the time the group assembled in the lobby a couple of hours later, I had finished one book, thumbed through three
magazines, and drunk three cups of coffee, two of them brewed in the room and one of them from a coffee shop a mile and a half away. As I sat in the lobby’s leather chair, sipping the last drops from my paper cup, faculty members began to arrive, then students. Aaron and Jace scurried in at exactly nine o’clock, and Olivia and Meg had stumbled in a few minutes earlier. They all looked as exhausted as I felt, and I wondered if they’d gone out together, especially when Olivia greeted Aaron with a wink. Judith Spade appeared to be unaware that anything torrid might have happened under her watchful eye. She looked exactly the same as she had yesterday: clean, smart, and vaguely uninterested. Nick and Amanda said nothing to give away their late-night rendezvous, but they stood next to each other, exchanging secret smiles. Kat leaned against the far wall, silently observing the group. I had a feeling no one but me noticed her there; she really did blend in. The only one missing was André, which surprised me. I thought he would have been the first one down. Just as I was about to call him on my cellphone, he came rushing out of the elevator. I stood and walked over to the group. I knew right away something was wrong. Everyone else knew it, too, because the entire group stopped talking as he approached.

  “Good morning,” said André, winded.

  A few of us returned his greeting.

  André coughed. “I just finished talking to Mr. Wood at the police department. He wants us to meet him at his precinct downtown. I have the address.” He held up a little slip of hotel notepad paper. “There is new information about Molly Jaspers.”

  Bennett, who looked tired and pale, came to life all at once. “What? What is this about Molly? Why didn’t he have the decency to contact me? I’m her husband.”

  André shook his head. “I do not know. I am faculty coordinator, and so he contacts me. Maybe he wasn’t certain you were with us. He asked and I said, thankfully, yes. You decided to stay among friends.”

  “What is the new information?” Bennett said.

  “He did not say. Maybe they are ready to release her so that you can go home?”

  “What about our flight? What about spring break? What about Paris?” asked Olivia in a whiny voice.

  Her timing couldn’t have been worse. Bennett turned to her with hatred in his eyes. “Is that all you can think of? Your little trip to Paris? You selfish child! A woman is dead. My wife is dead.”

  “Mr. Jaspers, you have our sincerest condolences. Please know that,” said Judith Spade. “Molly was a dear friend to all of us. But she, more than anyone, believed in the importance of academic exploration. She would sympathize with the students’ desire to continue with their trip. They’re young. It’s only natural.”

  Judith sounded so intelligent, looked so intelligent, and was so intelligent that nobody responded. We simply nodded our heads. Even Bennett was chastened.

  “You’re right, of course, Judith. I am being selfish. You were all friends with Molly, and you are grieving, too.” He looked around at the group. “Forgive me.”

  André patted his shoulder. “Think nothing of it. Let us go and find out what this new information is, shall we, friend?”

  Bennett agreed.

  “It is not far from here, one mile to be exact. The detective gave me good directions for walking,” said André.

  A few of the students moaned, but André paid no attention. He led the group to the front door and I fell in beside him.

  “I was worried about you. I stopped by your room last night, and Amanda said you are gone. Poof!” He made a dramatic gesture with his hands that I assumed was supposed to be a puff of smoke.

  “I should have mentioned it, but I came up with a plan at the last minute, and I didn’t know if you felt up to going out. Lenny Jenkins, from English, happens to be in town, so I went to see him perform. He plays guitar, you know.”

  “Yes, yes, I know,” André replied. “He played rock and roll one Christmas party. He accompanied you, no? You are quite a singer.”

  I felt the heat in my face, knowing I was probably the same color as my bright pink scarf, an accessory that would have blended in perfectly with the Paris scenery. It felt like everyone in Copper Bluff had been there for my performance that snowy Christmas evening, an evening that included copious amounts of wine and a discussion between Lenny and me about nonconformity. “Yes, well, thank you. Lenny can be quite persuasive.”

  “I enjoyed myself very much—except for the wine. I distinctly remember it being tasteless and cheap,” he scoffed.

  I waved off the comment. “It’s always the case at those events.” I lowered my voice. “Last night, what time did you come to my room?”

  “Right after I unpacked. Maybe nine thirty? Why do you ask?”

  “No reason,” I shrugged. “I just wondered. Amanda left the room last night, but she was back by the time I returned.”

  “She was there at nine thirty, so it must have been late, but I did not hear the door open or close. She probably went to get snacks. I know the boys did. Aaron was digging into his Funyuns bag long after I went to bed. The noise, not to mention the smell, made sleep difficult, to say the least.”

  I nodded, but I doubted she’d been getting snacks. There was no evidence of food or candy wrappers in the room. If André was right about the time, though, she and Nick couldn’t have been out for long. What could they have talked about that needed to be said under the cloak of darkness? I hung back from André, pretending to take in the city streets. Really, I hoped to get in step with Amanda. I hadn’t had a chance to question her about last night. I wondered if she would admit to sneaking out with Nick Dramsdor.

  It being Sunday morning, the streets were deserted, and the sound of our collective footsteps echoed among silent bars and buildings. Our side of the street was white with bright spring sunlight, and the budding trees in the cross boulevards basked in its warmth. After a few more mornings like these, the leaves would burst open and green up the city and its sister city, Saint Paul. Together they formed one of the largest metropolises in the Midwest but also one of the friendliest. Despite its size and population, I felt at home.

  Amanda and Kat caught up with me, and I was enveloped by strong notes of perfume, the same fruity scent all girls their age wore. Had one of them carried a cut watermelon under her arm, I wouldn’t have been surprised. It was that pungent.

  “I hope I didn’t wake you when I came in last night. I was out a little later than I expected,” I said.

  “No. We had just shut off the light,” said Amanda.

  “Oh. I didn’t realize. I thought you both were sleeping. Did you go out, too?”

  Kat gazed off in the other direction. She was good at disappearing into her own world.

  “Not really,” said Amanda.

  Well, there was an evasive answer. Either you did go out or you didn’t, and I knew Amanda had been outside the hotel with Nick. “Were you—” I began, but Kat cut me off.

  “I’m hungry. Are we going to eat?”

  “I’m hungry, too,” said Jace, loping behind us.

  I turned around to acknowledge his comment but wasn’t sure how to respond. The boy looked as if he had grown another inch since the last time I saw him. I didn’t think we had time to stop to eat, yet these students—who suddenly seemed a lot like growing children—were hungry. I felt responsible for feeding them. “I’ll talk to André. I’ll inform him of the situation.”

  I had to run to catch up with André, who led the front of the group. He was walking briskly with no one beside him. “A few of the students say they’re hungry. Do we have time for breakfast?”

  “I don’t think so,” he said, pulling at his button-up collar. He wore a fitted long-sleeved shirt, black with a subtle, gray-paisley print. It paired perfectly with his jeans, and I had a feeling he knew more about fashion than I did—and probably half of South Dakota. “Jack Wood insisted that we come to the station right now before anyone disembarks.”

  “I understand,” I said, sympathetically. “They will just need to wait unti
l after we find out more information. Did Mr. Wood give you any clue as to what this was about?”

  “Not a one. I think he was afraid we were getting on the next plane to Paris, but I spoke to the airline last night and told him this was not the case. Even with our number down to eleven, taking into account Molly and Bennett, the airline couldn’t find seats. They have openings tomorrow on a multi-stop flight through Amsterdam, but this makes no sense. We wouldn’t get there until Tuesday.” He sighed and slumped a little, a picture of defeat.

  “Why didn’t you tell me you spoke to the airlines?” I was a little miffed he hadn’t relayed the information right away.

  “Because I had no verification and didn’t want to blow your bubble. The airline is supposed to confirm this morning. I was going to tell you then.” He gave me a small smile. “Based on my talk with them last night, though, I’m afraid we will be going back to Copper Bluff. I put in a call to the bus company.”

  He’d only verified what I already knew; still, I felt sad. I had dreamed of this trip so many times that it was not easy to see it fade away into that vague place called future. I tried to recall Giles’s smart words but couldn’t. Sure, I could make the trip to France on my own, and maybe someday I would, but with my hefty student loan payments and low yearly salary, the probability of that happening was on par with getting a full night’s sleep. Chances were, it just wasn’t going to happen.

  André stopped in front of a squat, two-story brick building. “This is it,” he said, checking the address against the numbers on the glass front doors, as if he doubted the upper-case letters on the building that read POLICE.

  Arnold Frasier, his hair slicked back in a fresh ponytail, held open the door while we filed inside. As the students crossed the threshold, their conversations ceased. The faculty stood quietly aside, allowing André to take the lead.

  In the busy lobby was an anteroom with a window like an old-fashioned movie theater’s. Above it read the words MINNEAPOLIS POLICE DEPARTMENT. Behind the desk sat a uniformed officer with a tightly knotted bun who motioned us closer. André stepped to the window.