The Missing Ink

Chapter 18

I didn’t want to put my fingerprints anywhere, so I hit the elevator button with my elbow. I had a minute or two before the doors opened, and I took a couple of deep breaths to try to calm down. I immediately thought of Jeff Coleman and how he’d sent me over here. Did he know about this? Had he set me up?

I wanted to give him the benefit of the doubt, but I was having a hard time with that.

The elevator finally arrived, and I again hit the lobby button with my elbow and felt the drop in my gut. When I stepped out, a footman-a different one this time-was waiting. He was frowning.

“Is there a problem, miss?”

“You might say that. There’s a body up there, in the bathroom, in the bathtub.” As I said it, I started to feel a little woozy.

I sank down on the floor, dropping my case at my side, and put my head between my knees.

“What’s the problem?”

It was a baritone, with an English accent.

“She says there’s a body in the Marie Antoinette Suite,” I heard the footman whisper.

“Who are you?” I felt his breath on my cheek, and I looked up into deep brown eyes that twinkled at me.

“Brett Kavanaugh. The Painted Lady.”

His mouth quivered slightly, as if he wanted to smile but stopped himself in time. I felt myself get warm all over as his eyes now moved to my arm and then across my chest to the dragon’s head, but it wasn’t an unpleasant feeling. In fact, just the opposite.

“Yes, Miss Kavanaugh, I see that. What were you doing in the Marie Antoinette Suite, and what did you see up there?”

I glanced behind him to see a crowd starting to form. I cocked my head and said, “Maybe we should just go up there and I can show you.”

His hand was under my elbow-sending a small electric shock through me that I told myself was just from the carpeting, but from the way he was looking at me, I wasn’t totally able to convince myself of that-and he gently helped me up, leaning down slightly to pick up my case with his other hand. “Let’s,” he said simply and nodded at the footman, who fetched the elevator for us.

Once inside and going up, my stomach doing more flip-flops, I noticed the stranger was slightly taller than I was and had a sort of rakish, Hugh Jackman look about him. His hair was blonder, streaked with natural highlights, brushed back to emphasize the angles of his face. I figured he was mid-thirties or so. He wore a navy suit with a red tie but carried it off better than the Young Republican I’d seen earlier.

“Who are you?” I asked.

He did smile then.

“Simon Chase. I’m the manager.”

“I thought everyone here had to be French.”

His eyebrows arched slightly. “It is a bit of a sacrilege to have an Englishman here, but Bruce Manning likes my résumé.”

“And I guess what Bruce Manning likes, Bruce Manning gets,” I said, happy to have a small distraction from what we were about to walk in on.

“Perhaps now that you know who I am, you can tell me why you’re here, Miss Kavanaugh.”

“I was here to give a guy a tattoo, but when I showed up, I didn’t see the guy I was supposed to see. Instead, I saw some other guy dead in the bathtub.”

“Are you sure he’s dead?”

“He didn’t look alive.” As I remembered, I took a deep breath and hoped I wouldn’t get woozy again.

The amusement disappeared off his face, and his mouth set in a grim line. “Well, we’ll see about that.”

I got the sense he didn’t believe me-like I would make something like that up-but before I could say anything further, the doors slid open and we were stepping back into the suite.

I smelled it then, the faint pungent scent that I hadn’t noticed the first time because I’d been too hopped up about my celebrity encounter. Simon Chase smelled it, too, and his nose wrinkled, leading him toward the bathroom. I followed, not only to make sure the body was there, like I’d said, but to keep an eye on my case, which he was still carrying.

Simon Chase turned at the door, his hand again taking my elbow and steering me back out into the living area. “I see what you mean.” He looked over at the footman, who was standing sentry at the elevator. “Please call nine-one-one. But we need to be discreet. Have them meet you at the loading dock entrance, and bring them up that way, please.”

The footman nodded and stepped backward into the elevator, the doors closing.

Simon Chase let go of me then, put my case on the floor, and sank down on the back of a plush sofa, facing me.

“So, Miss Kavanaugh, you were here for a job. To tattoo a gentleman. But not that gentleman in the loo?”

“No. Not him.” And I told him who was supposed to be the recipient of the Stones logo, without going into the intimate details of my assignment.

Simon Chase didn’t stop the smile this time, which spread from his lips up to his eyes. I was feeling slightly unnerved. It had been a long time since I’d felt an attraction like this, and if my radar was working properly-I wasn’t one hundred percent sure it was-it seemed he was reciprocating.

“That particular guest left yesterday, Miss Kavanaugh. I find it difficult to believe he would arrange this, since he knew he would be leaving.”

My mind was racing. Again I wondered if Jeff had set me up. Then again, maybe he’d been set up. He was the one who was supposed to be here, not me. He had told me that he thought someone was framing him in Kelly’s death.

“I’m actually covering for someone else, another tattooist,” I admitted.

“So he’s the one who arranged this?” I could tell that he, too, wondered if I’d been set up.

“I really think he thought it was his client who called and made the appointment,” I said, surprising myself by defending Jeff. But my gut told me Jeff wouldn’t set me up like this, despite our tenuous relationship. Would he? Seemed my gut was a little ambivalent.

“Who’s in there?” I asked.

“So you really don’t know?”

“No. Is it a big secret?”

“I suppose not.” Simon Chase got up and walked around to the window, his back to me for a second before he turned to face me.

“His name is Matt Powell. He’s Chip Manning’s driver.”