Destroying Angel, page 6
She was rambling and it was totally something Emery would have done. It instantly charmed her, and she decided to let Julia keep rambling simply because she wanted to know how long it would go on for. She wanted to keep hearing that soft, sweet voice in her ear.
“You know what?” Julia cut herself off abruptly, her tone shifting. “The truth is that my boss just left me on my own for lunch and I can’t stop thinking about you – you’re really cute and interesting, and I’d love to learn more about what a mycologist does. Do you want to grab something to eat?”
Emery opened her mouth to say yes, but Julia proved not quite finished.
“Oh man, you probably have a wife,” she second-guessed herself. “I bet you don’t wear a ring because you work in a lab and it’s dangerous, and I shouldn’t even be thinking about women like that right now, and–”
“I don’t have a wife,” Emery cut her off, finally saving her from herself. “And I’d love to get lunch with you. Where?”
She heard Julia sigh as if her tension valve had been released. Emery could picture the big smile on her face. “I have to stay close to the station in case there are any developments. There’s a diner not far from here that’s good.”
“Sounds great, what’s it called?”
Julia gave her directions, and Emery hung up the phone feeling pleased with herself – even if it did mean Monica was right about everything she’d said in the lab. Julia liked her, and it was time to put herself out there a little more.
Well, Emery just wouldn’t tell Monica about her win – not right away, anyhow.
12
JULIA
It was pretty much noon on the dot, and despite having a breakfast-oriented menu, the diner was busy. Julia walked there and grabbed the last available booth, marveling at the fact that she was about to have lunch with a gorgeous scientist.
Just a couple weeks ago, she would have sat at her desk with a take-out sandwich. She definitely wouldn’t have had the guts to call Emery out of the blue. She was opening a can of worms with someone she didn’t know very well, but once she got on the phone with her, she had to take her shot.
Maybe things would be different here. Better.
When she saw Emery step into the diner, Julia waved her over. She was out of her hiking gear today, looking professorial in a pair of slim-fitting black slacks and a plaid button-down shirt, sleeves rolled to the elbows and a messenger bag draped across her chest. Her dimples were just as adorable here as they’d been in the early morning sun, and Julia felt a tingle in her core just sitting across from her.
“Thanks for meeting me,” she said. “I hate eating alone.”
“I don’t mind it – I do it a lot,” Emery said. “Although having company is better, as long as it’s the right kind.”
“I’ll try my hardest to be that,” Julia said. Something about Emery made Julia want to impress her – easier yesterday when she was in her element, even when she was tripping and making a fool of herself.
“You don’t have to try at all,” Emery said. Then she lifted her menu.
Julia ordered an omelet, something that wouldn’t sit heavily in her belly all afternoon. Emery had a salad, and they worked together to drain two carafes of coffee over the course of the meal.
“I brought my report on my findings,” Emery said as soon as the server took their orders. She pulled a manilla folder out of her bag and handed it to Julia. “It’s not the final-final version, I had to rush to finish after you called, but I figured you’d want to take a look.”
Julia flipped the folder open, frowning at all the technical language, the microscope images depicting scientists-only-knew what. “Mind giving me the Cliff’s Notes version for the scientifically disinclined?”
Emery explained it all to her in great detail, and it was clear she was enjoying the process. Julia enjoyed it too, the way Emery leaned over the table, the fresh lemongrass scent of her clothes wafting over, her eyes meeting Julia’s in furtive glances. Their fingers brushed each other a couple of times – accidentally at first, but Julia started finding reasons to point at the report.
“And this? What does this chart mean?”
The conversation drew out, probably longer than it needed to for something that really boiled down to nothing pertinent to the case was found in the woods. But it got them to when their food arrived without any awkward silences, and then Emery tucked the report back into the manilla envelope and handed it to Julia.
She took it, then popped a piece of bacon in her mouth. With her cheek full, she said, “Oh, I wanted to tell you about my restaurant lead – thanks for that tip.”
“What did you find?”
“There was only one restaurant I could track down in the area that’s recently purchased mushrooms from a guy named…” She plucked the name from the long list of new ones floating around in her head. “Rick Beasley. Left him a voicemail just before I came here, hopefully he calls me back today so we can chat.”
Emery’s eyes lit up. “I know Rick, pretty well, actually.”
“Really?”
“Yep. The mycology community is pretty tight-knit.”
“That so?” Julia was smiling cheekily at her, enjoying the view from across the booth.
“The mycology community in the entire United States isn’t that big, truth be told, and Fox County is an even smaller world,” Emery explained. “I met Rick years ago at a talk given by my predecessor at the university, and he sends the department questions every once in a while.”
“So you think he knows what he’s doing?”
“Definitely,” Emery went on. “He may be kind of an old hippie who does things on his own schedule, but he’s been foraging for decades now. There’s no way he’d accidentally sell someone a destroying angel.”
“Well, damn.” Julia put down her next slice of bacon. “I guess that brings me back to square one.”
“Sorry.”
“It’s okay, I’m used to working hard,” Julia said.
“So, you mentioned while we were hiking that you’re new to the area,” Emery said as she drizzled vinaigrette over her salad. “What made you move to Fox City?”
“The foxy ladies, of course,” Julia said, emboldened by the way Emery was looking at her.
“There are a lot of them in the police department,” Emery said. “I’ve only consulted on one other case – I just became the community liaison at the beginning of the school year – but I’ve met a few.”
Jealousy surged hot, sour and quick in Julia’s belly, and she pushed it aside as ridiculous.
“Oh yeah? Seeing any of them?”
Real smooth… but there was no point letting this crush get any bigger if the sexy mycologist sitting across from her was taken.
Emery smiled, coy as hell. “No.”
She was going to make Julia drag it out of her.
“Someone at the university, then?”
“No.”
Her eyes were dancing with mischief, and Julia was pretty sure she was going to die if the answer ended up being yes, Emery’s taken, when she finally asked the right question.
“Wife?” she cut to the chase. “Girlfriend?”
“No and no,” Emery said. “You?”
Julia’s heart did a quick double-time in her chest before returning to normal. Her pulse, on the other hand, stayed elevated. She shook her head and took a big bite of her omelet.
“Did you leave a broken heart somewhere back in Michigan?” Emery asked.
Julia had to stifle a snort. “Yes, but not how you think.”
“Oh?”
How much did she want to tell her? How much did she dare share before it would – rightly – scare Emery off?
“The broken heart was my own,” she said. Shattered to pieces with so little left of it that it wasn’t worth schlepping across state lines. “The relationship was… not a good one.”
“Toxic?”
“To put it mildly,” Julia answered. “But that’s not great lunch conversation… why don’t you tell me about yourself instead? I’ve gotta confess, I’m dying to know what a fascinating woman like you does in her free time – you must have some interesting hobbies.”
“Fascinating?” Emery’s eyebrow arched in disagreement.
“You study mushrooms, you’re not the least bit squeamish when you stumble across a skeleton in the woods, and you confidently rock a fanny pack better than anyone I’ve ever seen – nineteen-eighties inclusive.”
Emery laughed. “What do you know of the eighties? Were you even born then?”
“Ninety-five,” Julia admitted. She’d never commit the cardinal sin of asking a woman her age, but if she had to guess, she’d say Emery had about ten years on her.
It didn’t bother Julia in the least, but that sentiment didn’t always go the other way.
“Eighty-three here,” Emery volunteered. “I was seven when the eighties ended so I guess I wasn’t a fashion expert at the time. I just appreciate the utility of a fanny pack when I’m out collecting specimens, without the bulk of a backpack. Oh, and they’re called belt bags now.”
“I always thought they were extremely nerdy,” Julia teased, “until I saw you in one.”
“Then you knew they were extremely nerdy,” Emery answered with a wide grin. “And I no longer want to share my hobby with you because I’m afraid that, coupled with the belt bag, it’ll make me simply too geeky. One of two things will happen.”
She let it hang, and Julia found herself leaning forward in her seat. “And those are?”
“One, you will find me entirely irresistible and climb across this table to beg me to ravish you, thus getting us kicked out of this fine establishment,” Emery said, her delivery deadpan and yet incredibly sexy. “Or two, you will make a beeline for the nearest exit, we’ll never speak again, and you’ll always think of me as ‘that weird scientist.’”
“I’m intrigued by option one,” Julia said, her pulse still racing through her veins. She never would have guessed she’d be ready for this kind of banter so soon after Samantha. Should be running from it, really. But part of her did want to crawl across the table and into Emery’s lap. “What’s your hobby?”
Emery laughed. “I can see it in your eyes – you’re chanting don’t let it be taxidermy in your head, aren’t you?”
“Come on,” Julia begged. “Just tell me!”
“Spider web preservation,” Emery said, and Julia sat back.
“Wow, I don’t even know what that is but I never in a million years would have guessed it.” She sipped her coffee, omelet all but forgotten. “Tell me more.”
Apparently, spider web preservation was part hunting, part scrapbooking. It involved hiking through the woods until Emery found a good specimen – preferably one that was a little dusty, indicating that the spider had moved on. Then she’d spray it with adhesive and press it against a black piece of heavy-duty cardstock to collect it.
“What do you do with them?” Julia asked. “I told you that you were fascinating, by the way, and this just proves it. I’ve never even heard of this before.”
“My dad taught me how to do it when I was a kid,” Emery explained. “He was an entomologist, retired now, and while bugs aren’t really my thing, he got me interested in nature. Now I mostly just do it as an excuse to go exploring, but if I get a really good one, I frame it up and give it as a gift.”
“Well, if you’re ever my Secret Santa, I’d love one,” Julia said. “My apartment walls are completely bare right now – crying out for some weird art. Oh – not that it’s weird–“
Emery laughed. “It’s totally weird. And beautiful too, they make great conversation pieces. When I go home tonight, I’ll pick one out from my collection that I think you’ll like.”
Julia’s cheeks colored, and the fact that they now had another reason to meet did not escape her.
“What about you?” Emery asked. “What’s your most remarkable hobby?”
“I feel like a potato next to you,” Julia admitted. “Anything I say will be boring in comparison.”
Emery shook her head. “You think I’m fascinating? Well, you’re an enigma to me, and I find that just as compelling.” Her foot nudged Julia’s under the table – on purpose? “I’m a scientist, after all – it’s in my nature to be intrigued by new and interesting things, and you are interesting.”
Julia’s heart was in her throat again. This time, it was at the idea of Emery studying her like she studied her mushrooms – looking at her under a microscope, figuring out all her secrets. Things no one in Fox County knew, things she didn’t want them to find out.
Maybe this was a bad idea after all.
“I wanted to be an Olympic figure skater when I was a kid,” she said. “I was good, too. But it didn’t go anywhere. My parents couldn’t afford coaching, and even if they could, they didn’t have time to drive me to practice for hours every day, which is what you have to do if you want to compete on that level. Now I just skate for fun when I can.”
Emery’s eyes glimmered. “See? That’s very interesting and I have follow-up questions.”
Julia’s phone started to vibrate against her hip. “Oh, hold that thought.”
As she extracted the phone from her pocket, it suddenly occurred to her that they’d been sitting here talking for an awfully long time – long enough for the server to come back for several coffee refills, long enough for her untouched omelet to go cold.
Long enough for her to be late getting back to the station.
When she saw Tom Logan on her screen, she cursed.
“What’s wrong?” Emery asked.
Julia answered and before she could even finish her hello, he was asking, “Taking a long lunch?”
“I’m so sorry–”
“Amanda Drake showed up. I’ve got her waiting right now but I’ll do the job myself if you’re not here in five minutes.”
He hung up, and Julia stood, nearly knocking her coffee over in the process. “Shit, shit, shit, I gotta go. I lost track of time.”
Emery stood with her. “Go – I’ll take care of the bill.”
“Are you sure?”
“I got this,” she said, though a smile flickered across her lips. “Although that does qualify this as a date.”
If she could have stuck around long enough to acknowledge it, Julia would have gotten flustered, maybe blushed, probably started worrying again and wondering whether any of this was a smart idea.
Another part of her would have wanted to kiss Emery, and she was pretty sure Emery wanted that too.
13
JULIA
When Julia arrived back at the station, out of breath and her dark hair frizzy around her temples from running, Tom wasn’t at his desk. Arlen looked unimpressed but told Julia he was already in the room with Amanda and that Tom said she could go in.
He’d taken Amanda to one of the interrogation rooms rather than the pink room. That meant he was looking at her as a potential suspect, and Julia had to agree. The phrase they used on crime shows all the time, “It’s always the spouse,” was generally true, especially ones as hard to track down as Amanda Drake.
Julia paused outside the door for a moment, catching her breath, smoothing her hair and shifting her brain from the lovey mush it had been sitting across from Emery and back into professional mode.
Then she stepped inside.
Tom was sitting across from Amanda, who was young and blonde and cradled a to-go cup of coffee in her hands. Her eyes were red-rimmed, and if she wasn’t genuinely distraught at the death of her boyfriend, she was doing a really good job of pretending.
“This is Detective Taylor,” Tom said, successfully disguising his own annoyance at how late Julia was. “She’s been assisting on this case.”
Damn it. Demoted to assistant again.
“Hi,” Amanda said blankly, holding out a hand.
Julia shook it, then took a seat in a chair pushed up against the wall, away from the stainless-steel table. Silent observer seemed to be the best role for her to play right now, so she flipped open her notebook and clicked her pen, ready to take notes.
Tom turned back to Amanda. “You were telling me about the last time you saw Brandon.”
“It was about two weeks before he died… well, if you don’t count when he was in the hospital,” she said. “I visited him there, but they’d induced a coma so I couldn’t really talk to him.”
“Was that typical?” Tom asked gently. “To go a week or two between seeing him?”
“No,” Amanda said. “Normally I see… saw… him every day, or as often as we could with our schedules. He thought he had a stomach bug – he didn’t want me to catch it.”
“So he told you not to visit?”
“Yeah, he said he’d call me when he was feeling better,” she said. “We texted and Facetimed while he was sick, and at one point he thought he was better, so we made plans to go to dinner at our favorite restaurant the next night.”
“Where?” Tom pounced on the detail, and Julia figured he was hoping for another lead on the source of the toxic mushrooms.
But Amanda shook her head. “This little diner down the street from his apartment, but we never made it there. He got sick again and cancelled. I shoulda gone over there, checked on him. But he asked me to give him space and I was trying to honor his wishes. His mom found him,” she said. “It could have been me, and it coulda been days earlier. Maybe that would have made the difference.”
Julia couldn’t dispute that – Emery told that early intervention was a person’s best chance against amatoxin. But there was no reason to let this girl sit here and beat herself up over something she couldn’t change. Julia grabbed a box of tissues – ubiquitous all over the police station – and passed them to her.
“Thank you,” Amanda murmured into one.
“And where have you been the past few days?” Julia asked. Tom may have already asked the question before she got here, but Amanda could answer it again.
