“How long would you say, Ms. Brown?”
“Last four months steady.”
“Any other men before that?”
“Before and during,” Ms. Brown said with a look of high moral disgust. “I don’t mean to speak ill of the dead, but since that one got here, there’s been a steady stream of men coming and going from there.”
“How many men are we talking about?”
“Counting this one, there’s four of them, but one of them slacked off here lately. And there was two others stopped coming around ’bout a year ago. You mind if I ask you a question, Olivia?”
“No, not at all.”
“What did—what’s her name?”
“Abril Arrington.”
“What did she do for a living?”
“I’m not quite sure, but she had a business call Venture Capital. Why do you ask?”
“I thought she was one of them call girls or something.”
“What makes you say that?”
“Because she didn’t keep no regular hours like working folk do. And when she left that condo, she was always all gussied up, dressed up to beat the band.” Ms. brown laughed, and Olivia did too.
“On the night it happened, did you see anybody come or leave her condo?”
“Yes.”
“Was it a man or a woman?”
“I couldn’t tell. It was starting to get dark.”
“What time was that? Do you remember?”
“They got there at eight-fifteen. They come out ’bout a half hour later and left in a hurry.”
“You sure about the time?” Olivia asked.
Miss Brown pointed to the clock sitting on a stand by the window. “I sit here and look out that window and look at that clock all day.”
It was after six when Olivia finally said goodbye to Ms. Brown. But not before Olivia asked if she could come by some time, just to sit and talk. Ms. Brown said she would like that too.
As soon as she got in the car, Olivia tried to call Marcus and got no answer. She tried to call Garrett, but got his voicemail. “As usual,” she blurted out of frustration. And maybe that was a good thing.
She was anxious to share what she’d learned with somebody. Abril Arrington was seeing more than one man and there was definitely something not right about her business. Maybe if she spent the weekend digging a little more she just might find out what.
10
Marcus was at home late that same evening when he heard the phone ring. He was irritated by the interruption; Marcus tried to pull himself away from the file he was reading. He looked at the clock; it was almost ten. Who the hell could that be at this hour? he wondered as he glanced around the room searching for the damn phone. Once he spotted it, he rose from his desk and moved toward the cordless phone, which wasn’t on its base.
“Shit,” he grumbled as he grabbed the phone and put it to his ear without looking at the caller ID. “Talk to me,” he said hastily as he pressed the talk button.
“Marcus? Is that you?” the sultry voice asked, uncertain if she had the right number.
Marcus flinched when he finally recognized the voice. “Panthea?” he asked just to be sure.