Hide and Snoop (The Odelia Grey Mysteries) (18 page)

twenty-one

It felt odd to
get up on Monday morning and not have to get ready for the office. Greg rolled over and told me to stay in bed. He wrapped an arm around me and nuzzled my neck. Normally that would be enough for me to toss any and all exercise plans aside, but this morning I was antsy and not inclined towards romance. After heartfelt apologies and a promise of a rain check to Greg, I got up, put on my sneakers, and left on my usual walk with Wainwright.

By the time we’d gone the few blocks to the beach, I began to regret my decision to leave my warm bed and hot hubby. It wasn’t raining, but it was damp and chilly. I contemplated turning around but instead zipped my windbreaker high up under my chin and kept moving, glad that under it I’d layered an old sweater over my usual tee shirt. I hadn’t slept well, even after a glass or two of wine with dinner. My brain was a kaleidoscope of people, events, and possibilities. Who killed Connie and Hank? Where was Erica? What was going to happen to Lily? These questions and others twisted and turned in dizzying patterns of bright colors and shapes, mingling with secondary shades representing my job situation and the relationship between Mark and Erica. I was hoping the brisk morning walk would clear my head and calm me down.

Wainwright didn’t seem to mind the chill. He trotted ahead of me, his tail high, his step perky, setting our pace until we reached the beach. Once there, we traveled up and down the water’s edge, getting our exercise, until I was tuckered out. We trudged back up to the sidewalk and plunked down on a bench facing the ocean. I wanted to sort a few things out before going home. Wainwright stretched out on the concrete next to the bench and kept a sharp eye on the gulls.

We hadn’t been settled long when my cell phone rang. By the ring tone, I knew it wasn’t Greg. He insisted I take my phone with me on my morning walks in case of emergencies, but so far, the only emergencies seemed to be him calling me to pick up a few pastries from the bakery on my way back.

I dug my phone out of the pocket of my windbreaker and looked at it. The display said the number was blocked, meaning the caller didn’t want to be identified. Usually I don’t answer those calls. The numbers of my friends, family, and coworkers were always displayed. A new caller with an unblocked number would at least show the number, but this number was specifically blocked. I was about to decline the call when I realized it might be Willie calling. We didn’t have a direct number for Willie. He was still a fugitive from the law. But we did have a number to call if we needed him. Neither Greg nor I knew who or what the number reached, only that it had a Wyoming prefix and a mechanical voice telling us to leave a message. Although these days, should we need to reach Willie, we’d probably just call Clark. Considering Willie was running those samples for me, I moved my finger to the answer button.

It was not Willie.

“Odelia?” Although a question, the woman’s voice was not hesitant. Nor was it a young-sounding voice.

I pressed the phone closer to my ear to hear better and asked, “Who is this?”

“A ghost from your past.”

Humph
. The last time someone said that to me, it had been Clarice Hollowell and had spelled trouble. But this wasn’t Clarice. I knew her voice and, besides, she was currently a long-term guest of the California Department of Corrections.

“I’m not into playing games,” I said, keeping my own tone firm. “Tell me or I hang up.”

“It’s Mother.”

I doubted my mother, Grace Littlejohn, would ever call herself Mother. She was
Mom
. But even if she did, would she call herself a ghost from my past, no matter how appropriate? Then again, Mom was an eccentric and cranky old broad who lived in a time zone three hours ahead of mine. And if Clark was unreachable, she might call me to amuse herself. She’d done it before. But the voice didn’t sound like hers either.

I ventured another comment. “Not my mother, you’re not.”

“It’s
Mother
, Odelia,” the woman stressed. “My, how quickly you’ve forgotten. I’m truly disappointed. I thought I was more memorable than that.”

When I didn’t answer, she added, “Need your house cleaned?”

When my brain clicked, matching the name with the reference, I almost threw the phone into the sea and ran all the way home. Let Mother Do It was a house-cleaning business that moonlighted as contract killers. I’d encountered them while on the trail of a missing Mike Steele. Mother, an older woman, was the leader of the organization.

“No.” I moved the phone to my other ear and stared at the waves lapping the sand below me. “My house is just fine, thank you.” I fought to keep my voice even.

“Are you sure?” she taunted.

I started to ask Mother how she got my cell phone number but stopped. If there was one thing I’d learned, both in my years working in the legal field and especially during my stint as a corpse magnet, it was how easy it was to find people and their contact information. All you needed was a shred of starter information and knowing where to look.

“I see you’re married now.”

Again, it was almost the same words used by Clarice when she’d shown up on my doorstep unannounced. It made me wonder if there was a script undesirables could buy and memorize when reconnecting to people in their past.

“My life is of no concern to you,” I answered with my chin aloft in defiance, as if she could see it.

“But Odelia, you’re wrong about that. Very wrong.”

My chin dropped, and I swallowed hard. “Is this about settling old scores? About what happened back in that house?”

“Partially, but not in the way you might imagine. I need you to meet me today.”

I snorted. “And what—walk into a trap?”

“
Tch, tch, tch.
If I had my cap set on killing you, do you really think you would still be alive? My crew and I are very good at what we do.” Her voice vibrated with amusement. “If you want to live, you need to meet with me. Today. It’s that simple. And you will not be ambushed. At least not by me and my people.” Her voice had slipped from mirth into dead serious in the blink of an eye. “And you cannot tell anyone where you’re going or bring anyone, not even that cutie husband of yours, or the deal about your safety is off.”

I steeled my shoulders as I readied to ask the next question. “When and where?”

I hated driving into
Los Angeles, especially during the week. I’d made good time on the 405 Freeway, but once I merged onto the 110 heading north, things bogged down. My portable GPS said I would arrive a few minutes after ten. I hoped it was right, because ten thirty was the time I’d set with Mother, and I didn’t want to be late. I would have left earlier, but I had to get Greg out the door first and with as few questions as possible.

“What are you going to do today, sweetheart?” he’d asked over coffee and the cinnamon rolls I’d picked up from the bakery on my way home.

I’d picked up an entire box of rolls, muffins, and donuts, thinking I might be able to get Greg out the door faster if he was taking breakfast goodies to his staff. No such luck. Instead, he plucked out a fat bun for himself and settled at the table with his coffee as if he had no place to go and no special time to be there. I wanted to scream but knew if I behaved squirrelly, he wouldn’t let up until he’d picked my brain for the reason.

“I was thinking of having a spa day. Might be nice after everything.” I sipped my own coffee and tried to still the nervous tapping of my foot under the table.

“That’s an outstanding idea,” announced my hubs. He took a big bite of his cinnamon roll and beamed at me. “Why don’t you see if Zee wants to go with you? I’m sure you can find a sitter for Lily for just a couple of hours.”

“I thought about that,” I lied. “But I think I’d rather go alone and just detox in silence.”

With a full mouth, he nodded in agreement. He swallowed and washed it down with coffee. “After what you’ve been through these past few days, I understand. And you deserve it.”

I hadn’t actually lied to Greg—I
was
going to a spa. That’s where Mother had said to meet her. She’d given me the name and address. Curious, I’d looked the place up. According to its website, the Olympic Spa was in the Korean section of Los Angeles, not far from downtown. Although I’d heard about them, I’d never been to a Korean-style spa before. The services looked inviting, but I doubted I would be partaking of any. Mother probably planned on having a small, intimate meeting with me in a van in the parking lot.

I must be out of my freaking mind.
All the way there, that phrase played over and over in my head like an annoying ditty from a sitcom.

As directed, I pulled into the parking lot behind the spa. An attendant took my keys. The lot was nearly empty, and there was no sign of Mother anywhere. The area around the spa was seedy, and so was the outside of the building, which was covered in graffiti. It was a far cry from the frou-frou spas Zee and I frequented in Orange County. But all that changed once I entered the building.

After walking down a narrow and nicely decorated corridor with bamboo wall coverings and Asian pottery and prints, I came to a reception counter. Behind it were two cute Korean girls in their late teens or early twenties. Both wore black leggings and black tee shirts with
spa diva
spelled out across their chests in rhinestones.

“Are you Miss Odelia?” one asked in heavily accented English with a lyrical undertone.

“Yes.”

She flashed me a 100-watt smile. “Your friend is inside waiting. Have you been here before?”

“No, I’m afraid not.”

“First, no cell phones, please.”

I pulled mine out and turned it off.

She showed me through double doors to a small area of stacked cubes with doors. “Your shoes, please.” She pointed at my flats. I kicked them off, and she stashed them in one of the cubbies, shut the little door, turned a key, and pulled it out. “You are locker fifty-two.” She handed me a hot-pink, curly plastic key ring with two oddly shaped keys—one that went to the shoe cubby and another. She pointed down the hallway towards two closed doors. “The one on the left is the restroom.”

Finished with that chore, she showed me into a large room. In the middle were two sofas and some chairs in a grouping. Two middle-aged Asian ladies clad in thin cotton robes the color of wet sand were sitting on one of the sofas. They chatted quietly while sipping from paper cups. On the left-hand wall were several vanity areas with hair dryers, tissues, and lotions. To the right was a slightly raised stage with green tiles. My guide pointed to it. “That is our jade floor,” she explained. “The floor is heated. After treatments ladies like to nap on it.”

I nodded, wondering how in the world people could nap out in the open like that, warm tiles or not.

Next she pointed to the left, to a steamy glass door that divided the vanity area. “That is bathing area. You must take shower before using pools. Understand?”

Again, I nodded. Showering before using pools was spa etiquette no matter where you were.

“Some lockers are behind there.” She pointed to an area partially hidden by a wall behind the sofas. “Yours is over here.” With a sweep of her arm, she pointed to an area in an alcove to the right of the jade floor. “If you have any questions, please ask.”

“Do I need to pay you?” Most spas allowed people to use their facilities without booking massages and other services, but there was always a small fee involved.

“Your friend pay for you. If you want to book something else, please see me at front desk.” She gave me a slight bow and left.

I stood there in my stockinged feet, my tote bag in one hand, the jellied squiggly key ring in the other, and wondered what I was supposed to do next. The door to the bathing section opened, and two women walked out into the lounge area—one Asian, the other Caucasian. Both were naked as jaybirds, although the Caucasian woman was half wearing a thin cotton robe like the ladies on the sofa. The other had only a towel thrown casually over her shoulder. She strode over to the vanity, totally unfazed by being naked in front of strangers, before finally wrapping the towel around her body.

“Odelia, over here.”

The voice came from the locker area. I took a few steps in that direction and peeked. Seated on a bench was a pudgy woman wearing one of the cotton robes. She was in her late sixties, possibly even seventy, with short hair the color of a dead field mouse. She smiled at me, showing small, stained teeth. It was Mother.

She looked the same as when I’d last seen her, except then her hair had been permed into tight, tiny curls and was gray. I didn’t know how much money she made being a contract killer, but she really needed to spend some of her dough on a better dye job and a dentist. Then again, I probably needed to spend my money on some brains.

She waved me forward and pointed to one of the tall, narrow wooden lockers. “Your locker is right here.”

When I hesitated, she added with a soft giggle, “Don’t worry, I’m not gonna bite.” She leaned towards me. “This is an informational meeting, Odelia, and you’re going to thank me for it in the end.”

Mother stood up. “Now get out of those clothes.” She opened the locker with number 52 on the front and pulled out a cotton robe. “And put this on.” She shoved the robe at me, hitting me in the chest. “There are towels in here, too. Bring those and the locker key, that’s it.”

I clutched the robe in front of me as if I were already naked. “Do I have to get undressed? Can’t we just go somewhere for a nice cup of coffee?”

She laughed softly. “Not only will the hot tubs do you a lot of good, Odelia, but if you’re naked, I’ll know you’re not wearing a wire. And in a place like this, I’ll be able to spot anyone who might be coming along for the ride.”

“I didn’t tell anyone I was coming here,” I assured her. “Not even Greg, my husband.”

“Maybe not, but you never know who might be following you. You have quite a bevy of men protecting you, and this is a women-only spa. It’s dead here on Monday mornings, so our conversation will be private enough.” She started past me. “Now hurry up,” she snapped. “I don’t have all day.”