Another One Found

Chapter 12

"Is it safe to open my eyes yet, Lee?" Amanda wanted to know, refusing to look as they entered May Wong's bedroom, "because it smells awful in here. Please tell me it's the smell of fear."

"You may feel that way if you see what I see," warned Lee, as she heard him put away the gun, "You may not want to look, Amanda."

"Oh, Lee, that is absolutely the wrong thing to say to anyone," bemoaned Amanda, as she dropped her hand from her eyes, "everyone knows that once someone says that, then the other person has to look..."

Curiosity got the best of her and she stepped away from Lee. Now letting go of the tail of Lee's jacket, she attempted to look around him. And instantly regretted it.

There draped across the sofa was apparently the petite body of May Wong. Her mouth had been duct taped shut, with a rope tightly pulled around her neck, with her eyes staring past them into the dark abyss. Lee blocked the morbid scene with his body, a concern look on his face.

"Amanda, stop looking. It's over. There's nothing we can do to help her. You going to be okay?"

Amanda morosely looked away from the dead victim, and took a quick glance around the apartment, "You know what I think, Lee?"

"What's that?"

"This room would be rather small for a three-piece furniture set, wouldn't it?"

Furniture set? Lee was surprised that Amanda brought up such a random comment. Perhaps the shock of the killing was affecting her more than he thought it would.

"Amanda, we should go..."

"Not until you've notice the furniture, Lee!" Amanda insisted, as Lee looked at her in puzzlement, "Look around you!"

He looked. One long sofa and a short love seat that matched was all he saw.

"Yeah, and?"

"...and," Amanda commented, "there are two sofas here, only."

Amanda waited, knowing Lee would make some type of remark about her not making sense, like he usually did.

"You know, Amanda, you're like Goldilocks."

Now Lee was being the cryptic one.

"What?" Amanda questioned.

"Sometimes you explain too little and most times you explain too much. But this time, you've explained just right. I actually understood you this time."

Amanda looked wide-eyed and pleased, "Really? I made perfect sense to you?"

Lee nodded, "Yes, and that's what really scares me. I figure what you're saying is that we have two sofas but no coffee table, right? "

"Exactly!" Amanda looked pleased, "It verifies that May Wong was the original owner of that coffee table -the table that got people killed," she whispered emphatically the last part as she silently pointed to the latest victim.

Lee stared down at the dead body, too. To be murdered because of a coffee table, he shook his head. Such a waste.

"My gosh," Amanda suddenly realized, "I've dealt with more deaths these last few days than a mortician."

Lee looked over with concern at Amanda and saw she was as white as a sheet. It was true what she had stated. A suburban housewife with two small boys should not be exposed to all these murders. The protective side of him came out again. It was his fault for bringing her into the cold, hard, bad side of the world. He needed to get her out of here, and fast.

"Let's go, Amanda." he held onto her arm to give her a slight nudge away from the body.

"But, Lee, wait..." began Amanda, "are we...are we going to leave her ...like this?"

"Don't worry, I'll make a call to the detectives from my car phone. It's a police matter now, and they're be able to take care of this body... properly. Right now, I just want to get you out of here."

He held on to the side of her arms and led her away. They left the morbid scene exactly as they had found it. It felt good to be out in the fresh air. Lee had parked a block away on Fairfax Street. From the security of his car, he made the call. Ten minutes later they watched three police cars rush past them, sirens on full blast.

From the driver's side, Lee turned and watched Amanda's profile. She stared straight out, not saying a word. It seemed like forever before she turned to face him.

"You're taking me home now, aren't you?" her eyes seemed filled with sadness.

Lee did not want to leave her like this.

"I have an idea," he said, as he turned on the engine of his car and made a U-turn.

The streets were pretty empty, although there were cars parked up and down the street.

Unfortunately, one of those parked vehicles was an ominous black car.

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From the front windshield of his car, the killer watched the Porsche drive past him, his gaze on them the entire time. He had been so thorough with the killings; the police were stumped. With no other clues, the police would have eventually considered these murders unsolvable and filed them away.

But those two kept making the connections to his deeds.

It didn't take long for him to find out the names Lee Stetson and Amanda King. Those two could spell trouble. At first he didn't think they would be very much a threat, but every place he had made a killing, they would eventually appear there, too. They were getting too close. He reached down and put on his black leather gloves before turning on his car.

His information about Stetson was sketchy, but it seemed that the guy was involved in some kind of covert operation. Not that it mattered, the murderer smiled evilly to himself; he could handle Stetson. But first he would make sure Stetson suffered And what better way to do that than to let him watch the King woman being killed?

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Lee had decided to drive them to the local coffee shop, hoping the respite from the violence would settle Amanda's nerves.

They sat in a booth and had planned on ordering two cups of coffee. Funny, Lee thought, he had wined and dined in the most luxurious places, but never spent any quality time in the intimacy of a round booth with Amanda.

And he felt nervous about that.

But that was ridiculous. This was not a social date. It was agent and trainee discussing a case. Still, it was nice, just being away from the chaos of real life. They actually looked like two regular people enjoying coffee at a everyday diner.

The waitress came over, took their order and left.

"Do you think the police found the body yet?" Amanda asked him, watching him solemnly.

"Being that we heard sirens, I guess in all likelihood, yes," Lee stated, "Not that it matters for us anyway. It's over, as far as we'll concerned."

"What do you mean?" Amanda questioned him.

"Earlier I had done some checking up on this latest victim, May Wong. She was an insurance agent-had the same job her entire career. She was definitely not part of The Agency."

For the first time, Amanda looked confused, "Lee, what are you saying? That her murder and therefore all three murders had nothing to do with Agency business?"

"That is exactly what I'm saying, Amanda," Lee stated solemnly, "Whatever this coffee table had to do with this murders, the victims were not all related to being ex-employees. Therefore, this matter no longer concerns us. It's no longer Agency business."

"So, that's it?" Amanda asked, "we're not investigating any further?"

Her eyes were large and beautifully shaped. Sometimes Lee felt mesmerized by them, especially when they sparkled. But right now, they were looking at him with uncertainty.

"Yes. This really is now a police matter, "Lee stated, "I plan to call Cassie later to give her what information we have and let the two detectives solve these murders At least the true identities of Tony Montella and Carolyn McMurray being in the spy business will be buried along with their bodies."

He sounded grim.

Amanda looked evenly at Lee, "I don't think that will happen."

Lee looked confused, "What won't happen?"

"I don't think you can let this go. Hand off these murders. That's not you."

Lee looked away and smiled to himself. Oh, Amanda knew him so well.

"You're probably right that, Amanda; I don't like the idea of quitting," Lee said, "I've learned very early in life that if I quit even once, it will become a habit, so I've convinced myself never to quit!"

"You've learned that early in life?" Amanda's eyes turned very soft, "That's quite a number someone did on you as a young boy. Whoever taught you that, Lee?"

Lee suddenly realized he had revealed too much of himself.

"Oh, just some dumb lesson I learned as a youth; forget I said anything." He looked away, unable to meet her eyes.

There he goes, revealing something personal to Amanda again. She didn't need to know about how hard it was being raised by his tough, military uncle. And he shouldn't have mentioned it. Seems he was always telling her more than he had ever told to anyone else. It had to stop.

Maybe having coffee with her wasn't a good idea.

The waitress came over to refill, the brew smelled divine, and as she filled each cup, Lee and Amanda exchanged glances. But what passed between them was something more. For the first time Lee felt a closeness to someone. And it absolutely scared him.

Amanda had become entranced with the greenness of his eyes. Common sense told her Lee Stetson was not the man for her, but nevertheless she felt herself thinking about him more and more. She sat up straighter and concentrated on their conversation instead.

"Lee, you never did ask me how I felt about quitting this investigation," Amanda commented. once the waitress left.

A small grunt came from Lee, "I think I already know what you'll say, Amanda. You're not ready to give up this; you're not a quitter, either, are you?"

"Well," Amanda reasoned, "I think we should keep talking about it until something clicks. Like my mother said, 'it's often the last key in the bunch that opens the lock'."

"Your mother said that?" questioned Lee, "I never thought your mother was so analytically deep."

Amanda's did her familiar head jerk to one side, "Well, not quite. She was often frustrated when she couldn't find the right key to get inside the lock of our front door."

Lee laughed, which lightened the situation. Maybe they could solve these murders instead of the police.

"I suppose it wouldn't hurt to discuss it," he decided " So let's see if we can put the facts in chronological order...In the beginning, May Wong donated a coffee table to a consignment store..."

"...and she wanted to do that because she had moved from a larger place to a smaller place, " Amanda added.

Lee looked confused, "What? Where did you get that information from?"

"I'm just using logic, Lee," Amanda explained, "-because now she lives in an apartment, so...I assume she thought it was a good idea to downsize and that's why she needed to get rid of the table..."

"Amanda, is all this backstory necessary?" Lee asked.

"Details, Lee, " Amanda said, "We need to use all the keys, remember?"

"Yes but let's not complicate matters..."

"Haven't you've ever seen any detective shows on TV, Lee?" questioned Amanda, "You can learn from them. Like for instance, Columbo. He always finds and follows the clues that will lead him to the solution. He goes step by step. No clue was too unimportant."

Lee could only shake his head.

"Okay, okay, in the future I'll watch more TV to learn how real murder investigations work. Anyway...Tony Montella, the store owner, was killed for the record of that transaction. The killer then finds buyer, Carolyn McMurray..."

"...who was eventually murdered for information about the coffee table." Amanda finished, "but the killer evidently didn't get the information from her because her place had been ransacked in anger."

"You're right, but we are back to where we started," said Lee, frustrated that nothing new came out of the discussion, " why all these vicious murders for a coffee table?" Lee asked to himself, just as the waitress brought over the check. After she left, he added as an afterthought, "Damn! If only we knew what was hidden in that coffee table!"

He could feel the start of a headache as he rubbed his forehead.

"I know how we can find out," Amanda stated quietly.

He stopped to look up to face her again. His stunned expressed seemed to be mixed with a bit of trepidation, "Oh, you think you know how, do you?"

"Yes,, " Amanda's eyes danced with excitement, "You see, my common sense tells me that the killer is obviously connected to May Wong, the original owner of the coffee table. Whatever was in that drawer was put in there when May Wong possessed the table. It had nothing to do with the other victims."

Lee gave a 'not bad' expression, "Makes sense...and?"

"And..." Amanda paused for dramatic effect, "I have a feeling her boyfriend knows the secret contents of that table."

Lee looked unsure, "Isn't that a leap, Amanda? To assume May Wong had a boyfriend?"

"Not really, because, before we left her apartment," Amanda began in her usual low-toned this is a secret voice, "I had looked over at the coat rack and I noticed a beanie cap and a jacket hanging there that looked like a man's. And I said to myself, "One manly item might belong to her, but two masculine items? " It had to belong to a male. Now it couldn't be a husband, because there were no other masculine items around the apartment. Only a boyfriend would leave a scant amount of items at his girlfriend's place."

"Why didn't you say that earlier, Amanda?" Lee asked, "We could have searched her apartment for more clues regarding a boyfriend!"

"I tried to, but YOU were so insistent on leaving, practically pushing me out the door!" Amanda stated..

Lee sighed. Why does he always seem on the losing side of their discussions?

"Yeah, okay, so I was a bit impatient," he admitted.

"A bit?" Amanda questioned.

"I get your point. I'm impatient," Lee defended himself, "but it's because I don't have all day to deal with something!"

"How can you not have all day?" Amanda inquired, "Everyone has all day!"

Lee gave Amanda a double take and saw she was stifling a smile and it made him smile. She really knew how to put him in a good mood. And though at times she tried his patience with her ramblings, he couldn't help admiring her thought process.

"You may be right about that, Amanda," Lee conceded, his tone light, "and you know what else? Come to think of it, I do believe that in one way, you are like that TV character Columbo."

Amanda tilted her head, " I hope it's not that you think I wear rumpled clothing."

"Not quite, " he stated, enjoying their talk, "it's that the killer always underestimated him, too."

Amanda looked quite pleased.

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