* * *
It was sometime after noon when Cady woke. She lay in bed until nearly one, chasing after the remnants of the dream she couldn’t quite hold onto. There was a man… that much she knew. She only wished she could remember more about him.
Ian still snored like a buzz saw, and she knew from past experience she could blast the TV and not disturb him, but Cady was feeling reflective, not at all in the mood for loud music or television. Instead, she made herself a cup of coffee (mountain grown) with milk and a squirt of Hershey’s Special Dark syrup while she woke up her laptop.
The poor machine had seen better days, and it was slower than she liked. Still, it got her to the internet if she was patient, piggybacking onto someone stupid enough not to secure their wireless router. A quick glance over email, Facebook notifications, Twitter – none of it caught her interest. There was only one thing on her mind. Make that a lot of little somethings, but it amounted to one major topic. Trying to make sense of what Ethan was mixed up in.
It was obvious he didn’t plan on clueing her in on any of the big stuff, so Cady did what she’d always done, relying on her own resourcefulness to find the answers she wanted. Starting with the news sites, she found a story about the dead guy. He was identified as Claudio Rinaldo, a gallery owner from North Beach. His car had been found in the Mission district, completely stripped; police hinted that the two crimes were related, seeing as how he’d been found in a parking lot. There was an anonymous tip line where witnesses were encouraged to come forward with information.
Continuing to search, she found a couple of articles on the guy, pictures of his gallery. He hardly seemed like the type of man to drag a woman off the streets. Smart, attractive, well off, he could have easily gone home with a dozen girls in that bar. His handsome face smiled for the camera, but there was something… off. Cady wasn’t sure what it was, the smile maybe… but she didn’t feel like the same person was looking back at her. If she closed her eyes, she could remember the devastating effect of that dark gaze, the knowing tilt of his lips. A shiver rolled down the back of her arms, and she clicked out of the article.
Letting her fingers go slack over the keys, she tried to recall the words Ethan had used in the alley. Something spiritus… the words all jumbled together in her memory and she wasn’t able to recall any other specific words. Wikipedia came up with the definition right away. Spiritus: Latin for spirit or breathing. Spirit or breathing… and in Latin. What the hell was Ethan up to?
Curious about the tattoos, she searched under images for tattoo symbols, and could tell in an instant they weren’t Chinese or Japanese script. Nor were they reminiscent of any other written language. They didn’t match astrological symbols or tribal motifs, they were unlike anything she’d seen before. Without being able to articulate what they were called, Cady realized she could search the web for hours and not come across anything similar.
On a whim she searched under “sudden appearance of tattoos”, but all she got were ads for specific tattoo parlors and a reference to an episode of The Vampire Diaries. Figuring she could rule out anything from a TV show about vampires applying to real life, Cady gave up. What did she think she could find out there anyway? As much as she hated to admit it, she had to have just missed the tattoos in all the fuss over taking care of his stab wounds. It was the only logical explanation.
Sipping her now cold coffee, she considered what to do with the rest of her day. She could go up the roof and catch a few hours of sun with a pitcher of ice water, or she could call Kelli or Penny and see if they wanted to meet up anywhere.
Or, she could always pop next door to see if she could shake loose any more answers from her mysterious neighbor…