Mister X

27

New York, the present

"I suppose you're mad at me," Chrissie said, standing before Quinn's desk.

Her attitude seemed that of a teenage girl caught breaking curfew, rather than that of an avenging huntress talking to hired help.

They were in the office alone. Quinn had looked up, surprised, when she'd entered. She was slightly bedraggled from the heat, and at first he hadn't recognized her. Her sleeveless white blouse clung to her narrow upper body, and a strand of her dishwater-blond hair dangled over one eye. She was wearing jeans that looked genuinely well worn, and brown leather sandals that looked brand new.

In the vacuum of his surprise, she managed a half smile and said, "I could never do that."

He didn't know what she'd meant at first, and then realized she was referring to what he'd been doing at his desk-trying to balance a checkbook. "Seems I never could, either."

She went from smiling to looking guilty. "I know you've been trying to get in touch with me."

"You have blue eyes now," Quinn said. "And short blond hair."

"Before, I was wearing brown contact lenses and a brown wig. There was a certain facial resemblance to begin with, don't you think?"

"Not really," Quinn said.

He sat calmly, trying to figure out her game. He couldn't.

"Usually it's the other way around," he said. "The client is too available and badgers the detective agency for reports on any kind of progress."

She nervously shifted her weight from one foot to the other, like a tennis player anticipating a serve. Seeking a point of balance.

"I'm sorry for making myself scarce," she said. "Really."

"Maybe you had a good reason for disappearing."

"I'm not sure it was good enough. I knew after a while that you'd probably looked up photos of all the Carver victims and figured out that I'd sort of misled you into thinking Tiffany and I are-were-identical twins. What scared me was that it might not have occurred to you that we were fraternal twins. That you might simply think I was an imposter. That I'd lied to you."

"That's what you did," Quinn said. "You lied."

"More like misled you." She gnawed on her lower lip for a moment with her overbite. "Misled?" She tried the word again.

"We won't quibble over it," Quinn said.

"But then I ran. I'm not very brave lately."

"But you came back."

"When I saw in the news that the Carver had killed that woman down in Chelsea, Maureen Sanders, and then attacked that other woman, I couldn't stay away. I had to find out what you'd learned."

"It's pretty much all in the news."

She stared at him. "You're playing it closed-mouthed. Now you don't trust me." Her contriteness had disappeared to be replaced by anger.

He had to grin. "Should I trust you?"

"Maybe not. But I am your client. Don't you have some kind of legal obligation to tell me everything you know?"

"Legal and ethical. Unless there are special circumstances."

"Such as?"

"The client disappearing."

She tucked her fingertips into her jeans pockets and looked glum as well as bedraggled. The blond hairdo he couldn't get used to looked damp and stuck to her head.

"You know the police are actively involved now," he said.

"Yeah. I didn't want that to happen. They'll screw things up, don't you think?"

"Possibly they will." He toyed with the ballpoint pen he'd been holding during his assault on the checkbook and bank statement. "But we didn't have a choice. When Maureen Sanders was killed and sliced up using the Carver's M.O., the police naturally made the connection and reopened the investigation. And that includes all the Carver murders, including your sister's."

"They couldn't catch the Carver the first time around, so I don't have much hope they'll do any better this time. They should have stayed out of it."

"Politics are involved," Quinn said. "As well as that pesky thing called the law."

"Well, I don't see much point to it. Maybe you can explain to me all that's happened, tell me what my money's bought."

Quinn studied her, not wanting to be taken in again. Her sudden mood changes and apparent ignorance of the law didn't fool him. He knew she wasn't nearly as naive as she appeared.

He put down the pen and pointed to the nearest desk chair, Pearl's. "Roll that chair over here and sit down."

She did, and he brought her up to date on the investigation.

"So who's this mystery woman who's been shadowing the investigation?" Chrissie asked, when he was finished. "Any ideas?"

Quinn had deliberately mentioned Pearl's shadow woman. "One theory is that she's you."

Chrissie seemed surprised, but she might be good at that. She appeared to think about what he'd said, absently rubbing her chin. It might have been a feigned gesture, but he'd seen her do it before, unconsciously. Quinn noticed that she wore no rings on either hand-no jewelry at all, at least that he could see.

"Well, I can understand why you might have thought it was me," she said, "since you couldn't get in touch with me for a while. But I can tell you honestly it wasn't me."

"It also occurred to us that something bad might have happened to you and you couldn't contact us."

Now she seemed embarrassed, and not a little bit pleased. "I hadn't thought of that, truly. It didn't occur to me that my disappearance might alarm you. But I am touched by your concern."

She wasn't being sarcastic. She'd meant it, he was sure.

Don't be sure. Don't take for granted that anything this woman says is true.

"So where were you?" Quinn asked.

"Oh, nowhere or not doing anything that has anything to do with any of this," Chrissie said.

While Quinn was mentally diagramming her sentence, Chrissie stood up from Pearl's chair and tapped the side of the small brown leather purse she was carrying.

"I've got my cell phone turned on again," she said. "You have my number."

"Where are you staying?"

"I'm looking for a new place now. I'll let you know." She exhaled loudly and smiled. "I'm glad we're on the same page again. Do you need any more money?"

He shook his head no. "We're fine for now." He tapped a knuckle on the checkbook and statement spread out before him on the desk. "I think we are, anyway."

She took a step closer to the desk. "I do want, more than anything, for my sister's killer to be brought to hard justice."

"We all do."

She nodded, shifted her weight awkwardly, and made for the door.

"By the way," Quinn said, "you needn't have worried. We had it figured that you were a fraternal twin."

"I should have known," she said. "You do have a reputation."

"Pearl suggested it."

"Cherchez la femme."

She was smiling as she went out.