Beyond the Blue, page 4
“Early, as always,” Shanvi declared, smiling as she sat down across from Mei. “Though it does get us the best seat.” She nodded at the floor-to-ceiling windows facing the street next to them. The corner table also provided Mei with a view of the entire café, as well as the patrons. As averse as she was to socializing, she did enjoy people-watching. “You know, some people think compulsive punctuality is an intimidation tactic.”
Mei raised an eyebrow. “Some people? And what scientific study did ‘some people’ say this in?”
Shanvi shrugged, sipping her coffee. “Google it. Anyway, how’s work?”
“Oh, you know. Same as always,” came Mei’s automatic response. Not satisfactory enough, judging by the look on Shanvi’s face, so Mei prepared to elaborate. “Well, not exactly. I did have a rather odd conversation with two detectives.”
“A conversation? And honest-to-god conversation?” Shanvi opened her eyes wide, smiling devilishly. “Do tell.”
“I’m performing the autopsy on a murder victim. Apparently, Captain Williams has little to go on and sent them down to push me along. Normally, the cops don’t like to hang around the morgue.”
“Unsurprising.”
“Exactly. But Sergeant Ruiz—I think I’ve told you about her, haven’t I?”
Shanvi paused in thought. “Yeah, I think so. Former military, right? No bullshit?”
“Precisely. She brought with her a woman I’d never seen before. Or at least, I thought I hadn’t seen her before.”
“Oh, intriguing. But you had seen her before?”
“Yes,” Mei replied. “Remember when I got that flat on Valentine’s Day?”
“Yes, and your romantic roadside rescue,” Shanvi recalled with a wistful sigh.
“That is not how I described it, but yes. So, um, as it turns out, the stranger who helped me is a new officer at the county.”
If Mei had any other friend to tell, she would have. Shanvi’s obsession with mysticism and fate ran directly counter to Mei’s strict adherence to an orderly world. Two chance meetings with the same person struck her as slightly odd. Meanwhile, Shanvi’s eyes practically burst from her head. “Oh, my goodness! Mei-be!”
“You know perfectly well that is not my name.”
“Mei, that is kismet if I ever heard it. What did she say?”
Mei ventured a look outside at the sun pouring its golden light into the street. “Nothing, she didn’t recognize me. Instead, thinking I’m a perfect stranger she just met, she made me re-enact the murder with her.”
Shanvi snorted into her drink. “Wow. How did she manage to get the woman who won’t even participate in charades to do such a thing?”
Reclining her chair, Mei considered that question for long moments. She hadn’t given any thought to why she’d gone along with Lieutenant Kelly’s request. “I—I don’t know. She asked. She did change my tire in a blizzard.”
“And I was the maid of honor at your wedding and you won’t even play Pictionary with Paul and me.”
Glaring at her friend, Mei continued. “Anyway, I finished the autopsy earlier than usual and sent a prelim report to the captain and the lieutenant. I’ve received no response from either.” Mei nursed a bit of disappointment having not heard back from the lieutenant, considering she was the one who’d extended contact to Mei. She cupped her mug in both hands. “What about you?”
Shanvi launched into a humorous story of a woman who did not “believe in floss,” and Mei listened with her full attention. Until, over Shanvi’s shoulder, the lieutenant strolled through the door, side-swept and tousled blond hair glinting in the early morning sunlight. In place of a plaid shirt she wore an untucked crisp white button-down with a slim navy blue tie, her badge dangling around her neck from a beaded metal necklace. Eyes glued to her phone, Mei went unnoticed by Morgan as she kept her gaze on the officer and her ears tuned in to Shanvi.
“I tell her floss is not a scam invented by dentists. If she would just do it, she could see me less. Trust me, I want to see her less.”
Once at her turn, Morgan flashed a brilliant smile and ordered something Mei couldn’t hear. Sharing a genial laugh with the cashier, she paid her bill and moved along to the pickup counter. Leaning on the counter with one elbow, she continued to swipe through whatever kept her engrossed in her phone.
“Hey, Morgan,” the barista greeted. She slid a wax bag toward the officer, who snatched it and excitedly peeked inside. “How are you?”
“Oh, you know me, Amira,” Morgan replied, taking a bite of her pastry with a halfhearted shrug. “Self-soothing with sugar. How are you? Any new developments in the field of microbiology I need to be aware of?”
Amira giggled, bashfully chewing on the inside of her cheek. Mei could not stop the eyebrow on her face from rising straight off her forehead. Was this young woman flirting with the lieutenant? At her place of employment? Mei must’ve made a noise out loud because Shanvi stopped talking and followed the direction of Mei’s intent stare. “Do you know her?”
Mei shook her head. “No. I mean, yes. That’s the woman who came down with Sergeant Ruiz yesterday.” Morgan, oblivious to the two women now staring at her, allowed the barista to fondle the badge around her neck.
“That’s your blizzard heroine?” Shanvi raised her eyebrows. “You neglected to mention her being built like an Ancient Greek Olympian.”
“That’s because I would never describe someone in those terms,” Mei replied flatly. “Plus, it was winter and we were in our coats. What is she doing here?”
“Probably for coffee, like we are.” Mei shot her a look. “Looks like she’s definitely been here before. We’ve been coming for months and we don’t know that barista’s name.” She paused. “Are we assholes?”
“No, that woman is egregiously friendly,” Mei complained, tuning in to Morgan’s conversation with her rapt barista.
“Oh, well, it depends on the day.”
“So,” the barista purred, batting her eyelashes, “if you made dinner plans, say, tonight? Would your schedule allow for that?” Mouth full of pastry, Morgan bobbed her head in agreement. Again, the barista let out a giggle that niggled its way beneath Mei’s skin. How unprofessional, to proposition a customer. Amira released the officer’s badge and slid the coffee toward her. “My number’s on the cup. Don’t throw it out.”
“Okay.” Morgan raised the cup and bag. “Thanks!” As the officer spun toward the door, Mei returned her attention to Shanvi. Apparently a moment too late, because Morgan stopped in her tracks. “Dr. Sharpe?”
“Hello, Lieutenant,” Mei greeted, smiling softly.
“Hey, fancy meeting you here,” Morgan said, smiling back with her megawatt grin. Mei thought she might need sunglasses just to look at her. “Not that I’m a regular. Do you—do you come here often?”
“When I can convince her to leave her house, yes,” Shanvi interjected with a devious grin. “Hi, I’m Shanvi.”
Tucking her pastry under her arm, she extended her hand to Shanvi. “Nice to meet you. I’m Morgan. Wow, Shanvi is a beautiful name. Is that Hindi?”
With mischief painted all over Shanvi’s face, Mei knew she could not prevent her friend from engaging her coworker. “It is. So, Morgan, we come here almost every day. How come we only saw you today for the first time?”
Morgan anxiously hovered her items over the table. “May I? Only for a minute, I don’t want to intrude.”
“No intrusion,” Shanvi answered. Mei knew, deep in her heart, Shanvi’s insistence was punishment. Morgan silently asked Mei for additional approval and she reluctantly consented.
“Great!” Morgan grabbed a chair from behind them and slid it across, straddling it backward. “I only started coming here two weeks ago, and usually not this early. Ruiz insists we start our day before everyone else. So, while I appreciate her work ethic, I do need a coffee and a pastry to handle it.”
Gleefully engaging in conversation in the wake of Mei’s obvious discomfort, Shanvi inquired further. “And what division do you work in?”
Morgan took a big bite of her pastry, holding up a finger as she chewed. Swallowing, she offered an apologetic smile. “Sorry, Ruiz doesn’t let me eat in the squad car so I have to inhale this or I won’t see sustenance again until lunch. I’m in investigations. I was transferred to lead the cold case unit.”
“Cold case unit?” Mei asked, finally catching up to the conversation after shooting death glares at her friend. “I wasn’t aware we had one.”
“It’s new,” Morgan replied, a shadow crossing her otherwise permanently smiling face. “It got worked into my promotion.”
“I see.” Mei sipped her tea, eyeing the phone number and winking face scrawled on Morgan’s cup. “Why are you working the Solomon case with Ruiz? Isn’t that a bit below your title, Lieutenant?”
“I do as I’m told. Cap asked that I step in before diving into the cold case files.”
“Why you?” Shanvi pressed. A homicidal urge thrummed through Mei, encouraging her to strangle her only friend. Lieutenant Kelly engendered disquiet in her, like removing a bone fragment whilst needing to sneeze. Mei did not like that feeling. “Surely there are other officers with less to do?”
“Probably, but I am a very good detective, Shanvi,” Morgan drawled. Suddenly, she shot back in her seat. “Oh! Speaking of.” Whipping out her phone from her pocket, she tapped a few buttons and handed the phone to Mei. “Look what I found at the Solomon residence.”
Mei took the phone and stared down at the blurry image of a forensic photo of a bloodied pillow. “A pillow.”
Morgan stared at Shanvi, narrowing her gaze. “Gosh, your eyes are lovely. They should have you, like, model glasses or contacts or something.” She turned to Mei, just in time for Shanvi to bashfully glance away. “Yes, we found it. Stuffed behind the refrigerator in the kitchen. Forensics is matching the blood to the vic, but the fibers are already a match for the ones you found. That’s why I never got back to you about the email, things got pretty crazy after that. But your finds totally blew the case open, Dr. Sharpe.” Like ping-pong, she looked to Shanvi. “Your friend is a stellar medical examiner.”
“She works hard at it,” Shanvi concurred.
“She sure does. I’ve read several of her reports,” Morgan said, tearing off another piece of her pastry.
Mei pushed the phone back across the table. “You have?”
Morgan nodded, as if reading old autopsy reports was commonplace and not an extremely odd extracurricular activity. “Yeah. I dug into the cold cases while I help Ruiz, some of which you were the medical examiner on. Your reports are obsessively thorough. They’re some of the most well-written and incredibly intelligent autopsy results I’ve ever read.” She canted her head. “You know that, right? That you’re, like, brilliant?”
Mei blushed, silently cursing herself for the inability to school her features. She must look like a fool, like the blue-haired barista staring longingly from behind the counter at the back of Morgan’s head, but nobody had ever fawned over her boring autopsy reports before. “Well, I am always happy to be of use.”
Swallowing the last bite of whatever blood-sugar-spiking confection she purchased, Morgan took a swig of her beverage and returned her chair to the proper table. “Thanks for letting me crash your party. I’m glad to have run into you, Dr. Sharpe. I hope we see each other again soon. You’re always welcome to visit my dungeon.”
Again, Morgan’s eye contact pulled her into a trance. “Your dungeon?”
“Yeah, the cold case unit is in the basement. Well, I say ‘unit’ but it’s a couple storage rooms full of boxes and binders. Anyway, I should get going. Ruiz will have my head if I’m late to the briefing again.” She extended her hand to Shanvi. “It was nice to meet you, Shanvi.”
“Likewise, Morgan,” Shanvi replied, shaking her hand. “You can crash our party anytime.”
Morgan laughed gently and shook her head. “Ah, be careful. I am not known for being able to turn down a wonderful time with not one, but two fascinating women. Enjoy the rest of your day.”
Shanvi’s eyes followed Morgan out, only to see her nearly bump into a woman walking her dog. Morgan knelt down, matching the dog’s excitement with effusive, two-handed petting. The dog licked her face and she laughed, chatting with the woman above her. Morgan took out her phone and snapped a picture of the dog, then shook the dog’s paw politely. They parted with short waves, and the woman turned around with a grin to check Morgan out as she walked away.
“Wow. How is anyone that pleasant? Especially a cop.” Shanvi sighed. “You were right, though. She is a lot.”
Mei grumbled into her tea. “I know. I appreciate you bringing her show to our table and inviting her back for an encore.”
“Please, you like her.”
Coughing in surprise, Mei dabbed her mouth with a napkin. “Excuse me?”
“You like her, I can tell.”
“A: I barely know her,” Mei countered. “B: She’s a cop. You’ve been around enough of them by now to know they’re all muscle, no meat.”
“She looked like plenty of meat to me,” Shanvi said with a waggle of her eyebrows. “And muscle.”
“Please do not objectify my colleagues.”
Shanvi grinned. “Oh, she’s a colleague.” Off Mei’s exasperated look, Shanvi raised her hands in surrender. “I’m just saying you were not your usual icy self. More of a gentle frost.”
“I sometimes genuinely wonder how we remain friends.”
“Because I am one of the few people in the world who knows you this well and still likes you.” Mei glared at her, but Shanvi did nothing but smile in return. “Besides, I think it would be good for you to make a friend. I will continue to be your best and closest friend, but still.”
Mei relaxed, releasing the breath she held in her chest. Pressing her finger against the window, she dragged it down the dewy condensation on the pane and scoffed. “Gentle frost.”
After an uneventful rest of her morning, Mei arrived (predictably, but not intentionally) early to lunch with her daughters. Sitting outside in a comfortable wooden chair, she closed her eyes and allowed the spring sun to warm her up. Mild for early March; weather Allan used to love. He would set up the patio furniture in the backyard, insisting on taking all his meals in the fresh air, disregarding their perfectly acceptable dining room. When the girls were little he dug them a firepit and took them “camping” in the yard, complete with a tent and s’mores. Mei rarely joined them—the thought of sleeping amongst the bugs was particularly off-putting—but they always had a good time.
“Earth to Mom.” Mei opened her eyes to see her youngest staring down at her, concerned, with her black hair tossed haphazardly in a bun atop her head and makeup dark. She wore a T-shirt with a band Mei had never heard of scrawled across the chest, and a pair of low-slung, ripped black jeans. Punk rock couture. “Aren’t you a little young for the midday naps?”
“Hello, Lara.”
“Hello, Mother.” Lara sat down, waving over the attention of an anxious waitress. After ordering a tame cocktail, she folded her jacket over her chair and clasped her hands. “Well, this is a nice place.”
“Fairly adequate American Italian. They recently opened the alfresco dining. I thought the three of us could do with a little sunshine.”
Lara snorted. “You sound like Daddy.”
“Thirty years of marriage will do that, no matter how hard I resisted his influence,” Mei replied with a fond smile. “Do you know why your sister arranged this date?”
“No,” Lara said, the lie written plainly across her face. Her youngest was brilliant, but also an awful liar. Domineering since birth, Grace always took the lead in their sisterly scheming. This submissiveness was painted all over Lara—her string of failed relationships, her aimless job-hunting, and the constant existential crises. Lara rubbed the blood-red ink tattoo on her forearm. One of her many tells. “I found out when you did.”
“Is that right?” Mei didn’t push it. Grace would be here soon enough and they could lay their cards out on the table. “How is school going?”
Lara shrugged, tugging at one of her short shirtsleeves. “Same as always. Misogynist professors. Patriarchal textbooks. I’m this close to switching to Women’s Studies so I don’t have to hear another old white guy mansplain Jane Austen to me.”
Between British Literature and Women’s Studies, Mei could see no practical application for her daughter’s future, but she knew better than to try going down that road. These children would be the ones picking her senior home, and she’d like a nice room facing the sunset. “Fair enough. Ah, there she is.”
Grace, in her business-suited glory, came powering through the restaurant. Where Lara got Allan’s softness, his sensitivity, and the artist in him, Grace seemed to have sucked up all Mei’s straightforwardness. Designer sunglasses on, she put her purse on the ground and sat in the chair next to her sister. “Am I late?”
“No, Mom insists on being early enough to make us feel late.”
“Why does everyone think I do that on purpose?” Mei asked, baffled.
“Because you do.” Grace ordered a drink from the waitress and let out a long sigh. “How are you, Mom?”
Mei eyed her suspiciously. “As I told you over the phone, I am fine. Keeping busy, as always. I tried a spin class.”
“Did Shanvi drag you?” Lara asked, teasing. “She loves yanking you out of your comfort zone.”
“Yes, when she can. It does bring her a strange glee.” Unable to bear an awkward silence, Mei placed her folded hands on the table. “You may tell me why we are here now. Not that I don’t love a chance to see my wonderful daughters, but you are less than subtle.”
