Geoff’s skin was the color of dark chocolate, making it impossible to tell if his face went red or not. “Like you kept things from me, you mean.”
I might not be able to see a change in his skin color, but I could hear it in his voice. Mark and I had our own disagreements, and Geoff’s voice had taken on that spoiling-for-a-fight tone people got when grievances had piled up over time. Ahanti said he hated causing a public scene, but she’d forced his hand.
Ahanti shrugged away from him. “This situation isn’t easy.”
“I didn’t say it was, but catering to this man hasn’t gotten us anywhere. We should elope the way I wanted. Once he sees you’re married, he’ll stop trying to win you over, and we’ll be done with this.”
A cold shot, like spilling ice water down my arms, ran over me. Mark glanced up from his examination of the image on my phone’s screen and met my gaze.
He caught it, too. If Geoff were Ahanti’s stalker, we’d found the reason why he might have sent the burned picture of himself.
He didn’t want to wait to get married. He didn’t want to share their wedding with anyone else. It made me think about the stalker Taylor Swift had a few years back who believed he was married to her and who threatened to shoot anyone who he saw as a danger to her or their relationship. I wasn’t up on celebrity news, but I vaguely remembered Rhianna having a similar situation.
The chill on my skin seeped into my blood, down deep to my bones. If Geoff turned out to be her stalker and she married him, she’d never be safe. Things would be okay at first, but then if he ever felt she wasn’t paying enough attention to him, if he ever imagined she might be interested in another man, he could snap again and hurt Ahanti or someone else. I didn’t even want to think what would happen if they had children and he felt Ahanti was paying them more attention than she paid him.
My mom passed my phone back into my numb hand. Up until this point, she’d been pretending to ignore the conversation. In my family, arguments weren’t something you ever did in front of non-family. It didn’t matter the impetus.
But Ahanti and Geoff weren’t her family, so up until now, she’d been treating it the way she did when clients argued with their relatives in front of us. By the look on her face, her patience had run out.
She extended an arm between them like a blocker. “That’s enough,” she said in the tone that always made me cower as a child, even if I hadn’t done anything wrong. “Whoever is behind this killed a man because that man seemed to be harassing Ahanti.” She speared Geoff with the gaze that made prosecuting attorneys sit back down and forget the objection they were about to make. “Getting married could get you killed as well. In her stalker’s version of reality, she wants to be with him, and you’d have coerced her into a situation the stalker would feel compelled to free her from.”
Ahanti sank to the edge of the bed. Her eyes glassed over like she no longer saw anything around her.
Geoff crossed his arms over his chest. “Then we should leave DC. I can start a new practice anywhere.”
My mom said something about how they’d have to change more than their location to lose a stalker determined enough to kill for her. The buzzing in my head made it hard to focus on what she was saying.
They couldn’t be allowed to move away. Not until we were sure he wasn’t the stalker. She’d have no one to protect her, and she wouldn’t know to protect herself until it was too late.
Mark slid a hand down my arm and shook his head. He leaned in close, his lips almost touching my ear. “I know what you’re thinking.”
He pulled me back to the other side of the room.
“Geoff was in police custody most of today,” he whispered. “He wouldn’t have had time to leave the knife and photo after Ahanti left for work and before the police called him in. It wasn’t him. We’re still looking for someone else.”
14
When Mark and I came out of the church service we’d picked to attend the next morning, Mandy had texted me. Again.
If you let me throw the nylon leashes out, I’ll buy you these pretty leather leashes with the matching collars to replace them.
She sent me a link. The woman was obsessed. I only ever used the nylon leashes to tie the dogs to the stoop railing when I bathed them outside, so maybe I should let them go. The old leather leashes could be the bath leashes, and the ones Mandy had picked out were much nicer. But I’d let her stew a little longer first.
Ahanti had texted me as well.
Police done with my apartment. I called Eddie, and he’s free this afternoon to check my place. Can you come?
In the second it took Mark to unlock the car with the clicker, I considered telling her no. Eddie should know more about what to check than I would. Besides, this trip was supposed to be about Mark, and so far, I hadn’t even spent much time with him.
Thankfully, it didn’t seem like I’d been expected to. Most of the events they’d had planned were for Mark to get a better idea of the scope of their research, the work environment, and what they were offering him. Other than the first day, and a dinner we were supposed to attend together with his potential future boss and his wife, my presence hadn’t been necessary.
But still. It felt like I was spending most of my time hunting down another criminal and not nearly enough time with Mark seeing the sights. I hadn’t even had time to confront my dad about blackmailing—or bribing, depending on how you looked at it—Mark into staying here.
The passenger-side window lowered. “Are you getting in?” Mark asked.
Enough heat to rival the Virginia sun arched up my neck and into my cheeks. Ahanti always teased me about my tendency to space out when I was thinking. I climbed in.
The leather seats scorched my legs even. “Ahanti’s having a security check of her apartment done today. She wants me to come by.”
“Should I drop you off?”
He didn’t sound angry. He didn’t even sound annoyed. I couldn’t lean over far enough to kiss his cheek, so I snagged a hold of his nearest hand and planted a kiss on the back of that.
He flipped his hand over so ours rested palm to palm and squeezed. “We’ll have to talk eventually about whether I take his job or not.”
At first it felt like a topic jump. But it wasn’t really. He was still thinking I wouldn’t be happy long-term in Fair Haven because of how cases drew me in like they were the bright light and I was the mosquito.
“Do they want your decision before we leave?”
Mark shook his head. “They said they’re slowly expanding the department, so we can take a few weeks to decide after we go home.”
Mark pulled into a parking space in front of Ahanti’s building. “Did you want me to stay? If not, your mom asked if I wanted to get coffee just the two of us this afternoon.”
The panic sensors in my brain flashed all sorts of warning colors at the thought of Mark and my mom having coffee. For all I knew, she was in on whatever my dad’s plan was. I was much more afraid of her ability to sway Mark than of my dad’s.
But telling him no and making him stand around while Eddie checked Ahanti’s alarm system would be selfish. “Go ahead. I’ll text you when we’re done.”
Eddie had arrived a few minutes before me. By the time Ahanti buzzed me in and I climbed the stairs, he already had her keypad panel pulled apart.
