Sherlock Holmes and the Case of the Disappearing Diva Read online

  "Officer Steele's out on leave," he told us.

  "When is he due back?" I asked.

  His shoulders lifted and fell.

  "When did he go on leave?" I asked.

  His shoulders lifted and fell again.

  "How long has he been gone?" I asked.

  His shoulders stayed still while he glared at me.

  "Excuse me." Irene flashed her phone screen at me out of Sergeant Coif's view, beneath the window. The note keep him talking was scrolled across it. Easier said than done. First I had to get him talking.

  I slid her a sideways glance. "What…?"

  She shook her head very slightly. "I'm waiting for an important email," she said in a loud, clear voice. "I'll just step aside to check it."

  I resisted the urge to follow her. Great. Now what?

  Two uniformed officers entered the lobby, chatting about the upcoming football season. They did a double take when they noticed Irene—obviously auburn-haired bombshells carrying Birkin bags weren't par for the course at the station. They glanced briefly at me—blondes in not-so-chic shabby jeans clearly didn't seem so out of place. Then they nodded to Sergeant Coif, who wordlessly buzzed them into the inner sanctum.

  So all I needed was a uniform, a badge, and a gun to get his attention.

  "Is Officer Steele picking up his messages?" I asked him.

  "Sure. His secretary comes in for them every morning," he said, without a trace of humor.

  Hilarious. I glanced over my shoulder to see Irene sitting with her back to us, typing furiously on her phone. Whatever she was doing, she wasn't done yet. And I had a feeling email had nothing to do with it

  I turned back to the window. "Did I mention that we're friends of Rebecca Lowery?"

  Nothing.

  "Officer Steele's girlfriend?" I prompted.

  Less than nothing. He actually looked bored.

  I suppressed a sigh. "How are the Niners looking this year?"

  His eyes lit up. "Garoppalo's the best move they've made in a long time. Long as the injury bug doesn't bite, they should be able to go twelve and—"

  "Time to go," Irene cut in from behind me.

  Naturally, just when I'd solved the Rubik's Cube.

  She smiled at the sergeant. "Thanks for all your help."

  He actually had the nerve to say "You're welcome" before she dragged me by the arm out of the station.

  "What's wrong with you?" I asked when we'd reached the sidewalk.

  "While you were busy charming the desk sergeant—nice job, by the way—I was taking a tiny peek at Bryan Steele's file."

  I gasped. "You hacked into a police file?"

  "I just peeked."

  "What were you thinking?"

  "The same thing you were," she said, grinning proudly. "That it would be easier to turn water into wine than to get anything out of Sergeant Tight Lips back there."

  I shook my head. "Great. So when is Steele coming back from leave?"

  The grin grew. "That's the thing. The file I hacked—I mean, peeked at? It was an IA file."

  I resisted the urge to shake her. "You hacked into an Internal Affairs file?" I glanced over both shoulders as if expecting a swarm of officers to follow after us shouting Miranda rights. "Do you know how illegal that is?" I hissed.

  She nodded. "Very." If anything, she looked even more proud of herself as she practically propelled me down the block. "Listen, Bryan Steele's not out on leave. He's been suspended for use of excessive force against an arrestee."

  I stared at her. "Are you sure?"

  "Marty." Her tone was withering. "If I know one thing in this life, it's computer hacking. And finding a killer shoe sale. But mostly computer hacking."

  I noticed she'd dropped the peeking ruse altogether.

  "Also," she added, "I know how to read. Bryan Steele's not only a hothead. He's a violent hothead. He's also totally our number one suspect."

  "Has it occurred to you," I said, "that the last person you talk to always seems to become your number one suspect?"

  "That's because I'm flexible," she said. "I'm telling you, Mar, this Steele guy has what it takes."

  Great. A violent hothead who just happened to also be a police officer. What could go wrong there? Suddenly, I was rethinking our theory on nice, safe Tara.

  "So what are we going to do about it?" I asked her. "You saw the kind of cooperation we got from that desk sergeant. Cops look out for one another. I highly doubt any of them would be interested in helping us."

  Irene checked her Piaget watch. "I can't do anything about it right now. I'm due at a meeting."

  "New baby entrepreneurs?" I asked.

  She nodded. "Yep. I've got a couple of Cal kids who have an AI property they're trying to sell."

  "Artificial intelligence?"

  She nodded. "Yeah, this one's really cool. It's a hairless, poopless cat robot."

  The wonders of technology.

  "I'll track down Steele's home address after," she promised, "and we can pay him a visit tomorrow."

  "Looking forward to it."

  If Irene detected my sarcasm, she didn't mention it. "Can I drop you off at 221?" she asked as we got into her car.

  I thought about my options. Rent was due this week at my apartment. Then again, at the Victorian I had a hole in the roof, broken hot water heater, peeling and possibly lead-contaminated paint…

  "Actually, mind swinging by my apartment instead?"

  Irene gave me a small nod of pity before pulling away from the curb. "Not quite livable yet, huh?"

  "Depends on how much you enjoy fresh air."

  "Cheer up. A few more cases and you'll be able to get enough of the repairs done at the house to move in. There's some good news for you, right?"

  A few more cases? I didn't know if that was good news or bad.

  * * *

  My neighbor across the hall, 2B, was sitting in the hallway, back against his door, legs outstretched, when I climbed the stairs with the day's assortment of circulars and bills in my hand. Legally speaking, 2B was named Ed Something-with-twenty-letters-and-no-vowels, and he was a throwback to the Woodstock era that he was about twenty years too young to have actually experienced, with torn jeans and an endless wardrobe of rock band and old album cover art T-shirts. His long, thin face was accented with devilish arched eyebrows and scrubby whiskers. He'd lived across the hall from me for about a year, and for eleven months and three weeks, he'd been trying to get me to go out with him. I had nothing against 2B, but I'd rather have dinner with Mr. Bitterman.

  "Hey, Marty." He scrambled to his feet and stood with his hands stuffed into his pockets, shifting back and forth. "Have you got a spare key to my place?"

  I shook my head. "You've never gave me a spare key, Ed." Thank God for small favors.

  "I didn't?" He pulled one hand from his pocket to scratch his head. "I'm gonna get one made for you. Soon as I get back inside. See, I kind of locked myself out."

  I stuck my key in the lock and heard the frantic scrabble of paws followed by a thud on the other side of the door.

  "I'd rather you didn't." I unlocked the door. "I don't want that kind of responsibility."

  Suddenly 2B was right over my shoulder, following me inside. I left the door cracked so he could find his way back out. Quickly.

  Toby danced around me with a happy smile, his tail wagging furiously. When I knelt to pet his wriggling little body, he paused to sniff my hands, punctuating his inspection with a sloppy kiss to my palm. Having fulfilled his canine obligations, he trotted back to his doggy bed, where he lay muzzle on paws, watching us intently so he didn't miss anything.

  2B followed me into the kitchen. "If you don't have a key, who'll feed the bird when I'm on vacation?"

  "You don't have a bird," I said wearily.

  "Not yet," he said. "But I'm working on it. I leave the window open all the time in case one flies in. Thing is, it's supposed to rain, and I got my Bose on the floor right below the window. Speakers don't
like water. Can I borrow a lock pick so I can get inside?"

  I dropped the mail on the table. It was nothing that couldn't wait—for months if necessary. "I don't have a lockpick either, Ed."

  "You don't?" His mouth twisted. "Wow, Marty, I thought you were some kind of PI or something."

  "Or something," I mumbled.

  Someone knocked on the door. I knew from the smell that roiled into the apartment that my day had just gone from meh to ugh.

  Sure enough, Isaac Bitterman shuffled into the room wearing green plaid pants under a yellow striped polo shirt with pristine white Adidas. Gray hair poked from his collar. And his sleeves. And his ears. His black-framed glasses magnified his eyes into golf balls.

  He carried a plate loaded with what looked like crisp, skinny asparagus stalks slathered with some noxious-smelling green sauce. "I've been waiting for you to get home, Martha Hudson. I developed a new dip." He thrust the plate under my nose.

  Immediately the carbon monoxide detector on the ceiling beeped once in protest at the rising fumes. Toby let out a sharp bark and fled to the safety of my bedroom.

  "Whoa!" 2B took a step back, pinching his nostrils shut. "What is that, dude?"

  "It's a secret recipe," Mr. Bitterman said with obvious, if misplaced, pride.

  "It should've stayed a secret," 2B told him.

  "Mrs. Frist was looking for you yesterday," I told him. "She said you had a dinner date."

  He snorted. "In her dreams. She's too old for me. I'm a cougar."

  "Pretty sure you can't be a cougar, dude," 2B said. "You've got the wrong equipment."

  "What equipment?" Mr. Bitterman asked. "I've got equipment for any project, thanks to my friends Black & Decker."

  2B laughed. "Can I have some of what you're smoking?"

  Mr. Bitterman scowled at him. "Is that how you dress for dinner, young man?"

  "He's not here for dinner," I said immediately. "He's locked himself out of his apartment and thought I had a spare key." I eyed the plate of asparagus spears, hoping I wasn't here for dinner either.

  "What's wrong with how I dress?" 2B asked. "Lynyrd Skynyrd rocks."

  Mr. Bitterman took his time looking 2B up and down before shoving the plate at him. "People should eat more vegetables. Try one."

  2B backed up with an expression of horror, and if there had been a window behind him, he might have dived through it to escape. "I don't eat vegetables, dude. I'm a carnivore."

  "Come on, they're good for you," I said, egging Mr. Bitterman to take step closer to 2B. Which caused 2B to take a step closer to my door.

  "N-n-no thank you!" 2B said, backing up just a bit further. "I'm on a strictly cheeseburger diet."

  "Those things will clog your arteries, son. Trust me. I've had three bypass surgeries." Bitterman shoved the plate toward him again.

  2B stumbled over the threshold of my front door.

  "Good luck with the birds," I told him as I swiftly closed it shut.

  Bitterman shook his head at me. "You could do better than him."

  God, I hoped so.

  Mr. Bitterman set the plate on the table. "Now that I've got you to myself, Martha Hudson, what say we order a pizza?"

  I crossed my arms, amused and relieved, since I'd been afraid he'd expect me to sample that green sauce, which on closer inspection, appeared to be bubbling, although it was cold. "What about 'people should eat more vegetables'?"

  He shrugged his thin shoulders. "Win some, lose some."

  Story of my life.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  I'd checked my phone a total of fifteen times by mid-shift the next morning, anxious for word from Irene about Bryan Steele. The silence on her end was making me jumpy. That and the four cups of coffee I'd downed trying to pump some life into my veins as I took the early shift—which started at 5 a.m. to prep pastries and lattes for the students who'd pulled midterm all-nighters. As early as it sometimes started, I actually kinda liked my job. The coffee bar sat on the mezzanine floor of the Stanford Bookstore, filling my days with the heavenly scents of dark roast and freshly printed paperbacks. The tips paid the bills (mostly), free caffeine was an employee perk (no pun intended), and being on the university campus gave me unfettered access to dozens of classes, of which I'd audited (or crashed) enough to qualify as a PhD candidate. Unfortunately, since college tuition had never been in the budget for the single mother who'd raised me, and auditing classes didn't earn actual credits, a degree eluded me. Which was fine. It saved me the trouble of picking just one subject to focus all my time on. My brain was a virtual Jill-of-all-trades, full of the random facts I'd picked up over time. All very useful in my career of filling paper cups for cramming college students.

  My fellow barista, Pam Lockwood, slipped behind the counter with an armful of empty cups, which she dumped in the recycling bin. Pam was one of those rare always-happy people, pink-cheeked with a general air of softness about her, in appearance and in personality. She'd only worked at the coffee bar for a few quarters, but she was convinced she'd find her Mr. Right someday behind a macchiato or a cappuccino, if only she kept flossing. Pam was a big believer in good oral hygiene and the appeal of a winning smile.

  "Do you see that blond guy sitting by the stairs?" She blew a wisp of brown hair from her eyes. "Maybe I should ask him out. What do you think?"

  Blond guy? My mind went instantly to Watson. I glanced over, relieved and irritated to see it wasn't him. Of course it wasn't. Watson was buried in his cinderblock Batcave solving the eternal mysteries of unexplained death. "You mean the guy in head-to-toe leather? With the motorcycle helmet on the chair beside him?"

  "I don't think he's a student," she said. "He doesn't have any books or a laptop or anything. Just his helmet. And his…leather."

  The way she breathed that last word, whispered of hidden fetishes. One I wanted to know nothing about.

  "Motorcycles are so sexy," Pam said with a little shiver. "I mean, sure, there's the chance you could get flattened into ribbon by a tractor trailer on the freeway, but it's the fear of death that makes you live, right?"

  Except Pam's idea of living was hitting up Bed Bath & Beyond on payday to browse for the latest kitchen gadget and stock up on fluffy bath towels.

  "You can just tell he's born to be wild," she added in a rapturous whisper.

  "I think he might be just passing through," I told her. "You might want to wait for someone more…rooted."

  "That's good advice, Marty." She bent to retrieve a spray bottle of cleanser from the storage cabinet. "Do you know where I can rent a motorcycle helmet?"

  So much for good advice.

  "Why don't you start with buying him another coffee?" I suggested.

  Pam considered it. "You're probably right. I can work a coffee into my budget. I'm trying to be frugal, since I've got my eye on a new juicer." She found the folded newspaper. "Thanks, Marty. Let me know if I can give you advice sometime."

  I hoped she didn't mean that.

  After checking my phone for time number sixteen, I decided to take advantage of the lull in the customers by wiping down the tables. Ten minutes later, I gathered two abandoned cups from the last one, turned, and nearly bumped into a tall blond man. And not one dressed in leather and carrying a motorcycle helmet this time.

  Watson. Apparently he'd escaped from the Batcave after all.

  I blinked up at him, trying to cover my surprise. "I'm so sorry," I said on a gasp. "Did I spill anything on you?"

  "I don't think so." Smiling, he patted down his chest and stomach just to be sure, while I thought, I could do that for you. A thought followed immediately by an intense flush of heat in my face.

  "Not a drop," he said. "Have you got a minute?"

  For that smile, I have a lifetime.

  Good Lord. I really needed to get a grip. I glanced at the emptiness around us. "Sure."

  I suddenly felt nervous. Watson and I weren't exactly on drop-by-your-work-to-hang terms. Granted, what terms we were on was still a bit
ambiguous. Sure, we'd had dinner together before, but that had been purely work related. Sure, he'd been to the Victorian, even in the bedroom—which hadn't been as exciting as it might sound since he'd been chasing after an intruder at the time—and he'd even been to my apartment. But in all that time he'd been a perfect gentleman.

  That just had to end.

  "Do you want something to drink?" I asked him.

  He shook his head. "No, thanks. I just came to talk to you."

  The nerves kicked up a notch. We certainly weren't on drove-all-the-way-to-Palo-Alto-just-to-talk-to-you terms.

  "Is there a problem?" I asked, gesturing to a table we could sit at.

  "There might be." He held a chair for me. "I wanted to chat about Mr. Holmes."

  I froze. This was it then. The end of the Sherlock Holmes ruse. I'd known it would come someday, but I hadn't expected it so soon. Well, that wasn't entirely true. I'd kind of expected it as soon as Irene had first showed Watson that fake PI license. It seemed strange that he'd question its validity now, but the gears of bureaucracy ground slowly.

  I stifled a sigh, thinking the least I could do was offer an explanation. I owed him that much.

  "Listen," I said, "let me—"

  "Detective Lestrade paid me a visit this morning," he said.

  The words stuck in my throat. It was worse than I thought. Lestrade had made the discovery and had issued a warrant for our arrest on fraud charges. Watson probably thought he'd warn me in case I wanted to turn myself in. I arranged my features into an expression of complete neutrality while I raised my eyebrows in question, pretending my heart wasn't trying to crash through my ribs.

  He sat back, crossing his legs. He wore gray slacks and a black shirt with a burgundy tie and looked like a recent med school graduate. I wondered if he'd visit me in jail.

  "Someone hacked into the police database yesterday," he said. "Specifically, the Internal Affairs database."

  "Did they?" An image of Irene bent over her phone at the police station sprang to mind. "You read about things like this all the time," I said. "No one is safe from hacking these days, are they?"