Chapter 23
Aqua shut down after that. He just kept singing the same thing over and over: “Watch out for people who belong in your past. Don’t let ’em back in your life.”
When she Googled the lyrics on her phone, it all came flooding back to her. The song was “Demon Lover” by Michael Smith. They had all seen him live in some dingy venue down in the Village twenty years ago. Jeff had scored the tickets, having seen him perform in Chicago two years earlier. Aqua had come with a fellow cross-dresser named Yellow. The two ended up working a drag-queen act out of a club in Jersey City. When they broke up, Aqua naturally claimed: “Aqua clashes with Yellow.”
The lyrics didn’t trigger any more information. She found the song online and listened to it. It was eerie and wonderful, more poetry than song, the story of a woman named Agnes Hines who loved a boy named Jimmy Harris, who died young in a car crash and then came back to her years later, after she was married, in that same car. The song’s message was clear: Keep past lovers in the past.
So was Aqua’s ranting just influenced by a favorite song? Had he simply listened to it and felt that if she kept searching for her demon lover Jeff, they’d both end up bursting into flames like Agnes and Jimmy? Or was there something more?
She thought about Aqua now, how Jeff’s dumping her and returning to Cincinnati had affected him. He had already gotten worse, but Jeff’s departure really set him off the rail. Was he already institutionalized when Jeff left? She tried to think back. No, she thought, it was after.
It didn’t matter. None of it mattered, really. Whatever mess Jeff had gotten himself into—she assumed there was a mess because you don’t change names for no reason—it was his concern, not hers. Despite his insanity, Aqua was the brightest man she had ever known. It was one of the reasons why she loved his yoga so much—the small truths he spoke during mediation, the little vignettes that rang deep, the offbeat way he had to teach a lesson.
For example, singing an obscure song she had last heard nearly two decades ago.
Aqua’s warning, coming from a diseased mind or not, made a lot of sense.
Brandon was awake when she got back from the precinct. He had two black eyes from his broken nose. “Where were you?” he asked.
“How are you feeling?”
“Sore.”
“Take some more painkillers or something. Here, I brought you a couple of cupcakes.” She had stopped at Magnolia Bakery on the way from the Central Park Precinct. She handed him the bag. “I have a favor to ask.”
“Shoot,” Brandon said.
“They caught the man who assaulted you. That’s where I was. At the precinct.”
“Who is he?”
“That’s the favor part. He’s a friend of mine. He thought he was protecting me. I need you to drop the charges.”
She explained, trying to be as vague as humanly possible.
“I’m still not sure I understand,” Brandon said.
“Then do it for me, okay? As a favor.”
He shrugged. “Okay.”
“I also think it’s time we let this go, Brandon. What do you think?”
Brandon pulled a cupcake apart and slowly ate half. “Can I ask you something?”
“Sure.”
“On TV, they always talk about cop intuition or playing a hunch.”
“Right.”
“Do you ever do that?”
“All cops do. Hell, all people do. But when the hunch flies in the face of the facts, it more often than not leads to mistakes.”
“And you think my hunch flies in the face of the facts?”
She thought about that. “No, not really. But it doesn’t match up with the facts, either.”
Brandon smiled and took another bite. “If it matched up with the facts, it wouldn’t be a hunch, would it?”
“Good point. But I still go with the Sherlock Holmes axiom.”
“What’s that?”
“I’m paraphrasing, but basically Sherlock warned that you should never theorize before you have the facts because then you twist the facts to suit the theory instead of twisting the theory to suit the facts.”
Brandon nodded. “I like that.”
“But?”
“But I’m still not buying it.”
“What about all that talk about not ruining it for your mom?”
“I won’t. If this is true love, I’ll let it be.”
“It’s not your place to say what kind of love it may be,” Kat said. “Your mom is allowed to make her own mistakes, you know. She’s allowed to get her heart broken by him.”
“Like you?”
“Yeah,” Kat said. “Like me. He was my demon lover. I need to leave him in my past.”
“Demon lover?”
She smiled and grabbed a carrot cupcake with cream cheese icing and walnuts. “Never mind.”
? ? ?
It felt good to let it go. For about twenty minutes. Then Kat got two calls.
The first was from Stacy. “I have a lead on Jeff Raynes aka Ron Kochman,” she said.
Too late. Kat didn’t want to know. It didn’t matter anymore. “What?”
“Jeff didn’t change his name legally.”
“You’re sure?”
“Definitely. I even called all fifty state offices. It’s a fake ID. Well done. Professional. A complete makeover. I even wonder if he was put into Witness Protection or something.”
“Could that be it? Witness Protection, I mean.”
“Doubtful. Guys in WP shouldn’t be advertising themselves on dating services, but it’s a possibility. I’m checking with a source. What I can tell you without question is that Jeff didn’t change his name legally nor does he really want to be found. No credit cards, no bank accounts, no residence.”
“He’s working as a journalist,” Kat said. “He has to be paying taxes.”
“That’s what I’m following up on now—my source with the IRS. I hope to get an address soon. Unless.”
“Unless what?”
“Unless you want to call me off,” Stacy said.
Kat rubbed her eyes. “You were the one who told me that Jeff and I might have the fairy-tale ending.”
“I know, but do you ever really read fairy tales? Little Red Riding Hood? Hansel and Gretel? There’s a lot of bloodshed and hurt.”
“You think I should leave it alone, don’t you?”
“Hell, no,” Stacy said.
“But you just said—”
“Who cares what I just said? You can’t leave this alone, Kat. You’re not good with loose ends. And right now? Your fiancé is a major loose end. So screw it. Let’s figure out what the hell happened to him, so once and for all, you can move past this dickwad who was dumb enough to dump your shapely ass.”
“Well, when you put it like that,” Kat said. Then: “You’re a good friend.”
“The best,” Stacy agreed.
“But you know what? Let it go.”
“Really?”
“Yeah.”
“You sure?”
No, Kat thought. God, no. “Positive.”
“Look at you, being all Miss Brave and whatnot,” Stacy said. “Drinks tonight?”
“They’re on me,” Kat said.
“Love you.”
“Love you too.”