Maid of Murder

Chapter Forty

“Ms. Hayes, is it?” the burly man across the metal desk asked me. His arm was twice the circumference of my thigh. A blue plastic nameplate sat on his desk: Norman North, Bond Officer.

“Yes,” I said, wearing a gray summer suit reserved for job interviews and meetings with bond agents. My right foot tapped on the gray linoleum floor.

“You have no collateral. You don’t own any property. Your car is way past its expiration date, and you’re up to your ears in student loans.”

“I have excellent—”

“Frankly, North and South Bond Offices can’t afford such high-cost or high-profile cases. We specialize in juvenile violations, petty theft, auto theft, minor stuff. I wouldn’t touch your brother’s bail with a forty-foot pole.” He shrugged. “Sorry.”

The sweaty vinyl tugged the hem of my skirt as I leaned forward in my seat. “I understand your concerns. But I have a stable job and . . .”

“I’m sorry and wish you luck, but no.” He rose from the desk. He towered over me and the ugly chair. “I’ll show you out.”

We walked through the brief reception area and passed the clerk, who was sharpening her nails to a vicious point with a rainbow-colored emery board.

North opened the dingy glass door. “You ever have a friend arrested for carjacking, send him my way.”

“Uh, sure. Who’s South?”

“Huh?”

“North and South Bond Offices.” I pointed to the sign by the reception area.

He grunted. “It sounded good.”

I stepped out into the late-afternoon sunlight filtered by city haze. On the west side of Akron, North and South Bond nestled between an exotic dance studio and a suspect-looking video rental store with iron bars on the windows.

I marched to my car, left undisturbed on the street. Even in this neighborhood, my car was a clunker. Inside the car, I locked the doors and rooted in my shoulder bag for the list of names and numbers of bond officers that Lew had given me. I scratched off North and South Bond Offices, the last name on the list. I was out of bondsmen and out of luck. I couldn’t buy Mark any more time—not with my measly resources and lack of collateral.

I sat there for a few minutes collecting my thoughts. Both of the car windows were rolled all the way down, but no breeze cooled its interior. A local denizen spat tobacco juice in a beer can and crossed the street when we locked eyes. He looked away and ambled on. I wondered if his parents wouldn’t bail him out of jail, and that’s how he ended up where he was. There had to be a way I could help Mark. I thought about talking to my parents again, but knew it was a lost cause. When they were taking a stand, they wore blinders.

Suddenly, I had the heart-stopping fear that the engagement picture was no longer in my trunk. Sure, the trunk was locked, but the car was old and the lock could be jimmied with a screwdriver. I’d even used that method to get into the truck a few times when I couldn’t find my key.

I jumped out of the car and popped open the trunk. In this neighborhood, I wasn’t afraid of anyone recognizing me. I pushed back the carpet and exposed the tire well. There it was, wrapped safely in my T-shirt. I didn’t realize until I unwrapped the engagement picture to study it that I had used a Martin College T-shirt to protect the frame. I was sure there was some significance in that fact, but I was too drained to dwell on it. Carefully, almost lovingly, I rewrapped the framed photograph back in the T-shirt and pulled my cell phone from my jacket pocket. I hit the speed dial for Lew’s cell.

“How did it go with the bond officers?” Lew asked, clearly expecting my call.

“Three strikes, you’re out.” I said.

A man with a long, ratty ponytail walked out of the exotic dance studio.

“I’m not surprised,” Lew said.

“Not surprised. Well, that’s encouraging.” I kept an eye on the man so that I could kick him where it counted, if need be.

He lit a cigarette and leaned against the studio’s door.

In my ear, I heard Lew light a cigarette. “It never hurts to try.”

“It hurts me,” I muttered. “What’s our next step? Give me some more names.”

“That’s all I got. Those were the only names I thought would have even a remote interest in bailing out Mark.”

“But . . .”

“I’m sorry, India, but unless your parents take the initiative to post bond, he’s going to prison.”

I scratched my head angrily. “Will you speak to them?”

“I’ll do my best,” he promised.

I paused.

“What?” Lew rasped. Lew was a good attorney and knew when someone was holding something back.

“I found something,” I said, still unsure if I wanted to make a confession.

To my relief the pony-tailed man finished his cigarette. Throwing the stub back on the sidewalk, he reentered the studio.

“India,” Lew said impatiently. “What did you find?”

“A picture.”

“Am I going to have to guess of what?” He took a drag of his cigarette.

I took a breath and told him about my clandestine adventure and the engagement photograph.

Lew was not pleased. “Do you know how much trouble you could get into for this? Even if I can prove that your brother is innocent, you can still be charged with tampering with evidence.”

My chest constricted. I knew he was right. “It seemed like a good idea at the time.”

Lew snorted into the phone so loudly, I jumped.

“Don’t you see? This proves that Mark was framed.”

“It would have, if you hadn’t removed the evidence,” he complained.

“Listen, Lew, I’m giving you a heads-up. I’m turning the photo over to the police.”

“I don’t know if that’s . . .”

“My mind’s made up. I can’t keep driving around with it in my car. It’s making me crazy. Maybe, I can use it to show them that Mark really was framed. I found the picture before the scarf was found, didn’t I? This shows that whoever planted the scarf in his apartment, first tried the picture. I foiled the first plot when I found it before the police did.”

“That, my girl, is called conjecture.” Lew took another drag of his cigarette. “You can keep Mark company in county prison.”

On that note, I said good-bye and disconnected.

I reached through the open window for my shoulder bag. After sifting through it for a few seconds, I dumped its contents on the hood and over the ugly message that Kirk had keyed there the day before. Compact, wallet, spare change, a small army of pens and pencils, sketch pad, used tissues, and gum wrappers clattered onto the metal surface. I rummaged through the mess and located the card, crumpled and covered with charcoal pencil.

Standing outside North and South Bond Offices, I examined it. Medium-weight paper with simple black lettering and the department’s seal in the upper left-hand corner. I gathered my things back into the bag.

With shaky fingers, I punched the number into my cell. Mains’s line at the police station rang four times before his voicemail picked up. “This is Detective Richmond Mains of the Stripling Police Department. I’m sorry to have missed your call. If this is an emergency, press one. If you’d…” The recording stopped abruptly. “Mains speaking.”

I held the phone away from my ear, dumbstruck. I was hoping to just leave a message that said something like, “Oh hi, Detective Mains, I happen to pick up Olivia Blocken’s engagement picture, and I wanted to turn it over to you. Oh, and by-the-way, I found it in my brother’s office just a day or so after she was attacked. Thanks. Bye.”

“Hello?” Mains asked.

I found my voice. “Rick?”

“Yes.” He was impatient.

“This is India, uh, India Hayes.” I mentally slapped myself on the forehead; how many other Indias could he know?

“What’s up?” I heard a smile in his voice. I could’ve imagined it, or worse wished it. Focus, India, I told myself.

“I think we should meet about my brother’s case.” I couldn’t bring myself to tell him what I had done over the phone. It was better to get the confession over with and turn over the picture all at the same time. Or, so I thought.

Mains agreed to meet me in Ryan Memorial Library’s parking lot in thirty minutes.

I climbed into my car, made an illegal U-turn in the middle of the deserted street, and headed back to Stripling.