Part 8 (2/2)

If Tabitha or Father or even Ash's killer had hired someone to spy on me, I had to figure out what they were after before they found it-or before they killed me to keep it hidden. Moreover, I wanted to give them a little show for their money. I would respond to the surveillance the same way Ash did. I started with my little black book, courtesy of sis.

”Bethany, hi, this is Megan Caulfield.”

The voice on the other end of the line sounded sleepy. I pictured sweet Bethany Hanks in her pj's and was even more interested in ticking her off my list. ”Yes, Ash's little sister. I was wondering if you'd like to have coffee sometime?”

”Sure, yeah, okay.”

We made a date for Tuesday and I was free to dial up another of my sister's old pals. Thus would begin my month of f.u.c.king my way through all of Ash's old conquests. Whoever wanted me followed would be getting detailed reports of my liaisons. If the killer was one of Ash's lovers, I'd be getting to her soon enough.

Chapter Fifteen.

The private d.i.c.k that was hired to follow me was worse than a wise guy in an old Columbo episode. Old flatfoot was easy to spot and even easier to lose. If he was supposed to curtail my activities in any way, he most certainly failed. I was so bored with the surveillance that I tried for a while to find creative ways to give flatfoot the slip. I climbed out the bathroom window at Saucebox, took the fire escape at Powell's, hid in a Porta-Potty at the Jazz Fest for an hour. After a while I grew bored with my own shenanigans and decided to turn the tables on him. After a week of following the gumshoe hired to follow me, he just seemed to disappear.

Good riddance. I a.s.sumed by now that his reports back to the home office-whoever that client was-had given them enough salaciousness to work with. Subject had s.e.x in parking lot of the Egyptian Club. Subject took a shot of ecstasy and danced at the Crystal Ballroom with twelve different women. Subject flashed me her t.i.ts in the men's section of Fred Meyer. I had worked my way through Ash's Rolodex. Tina, Julie, Evy, Beatrice, Leisha, Susan, Ariel-I bedded them all and made sure the private d.i.c.k was around to see it. Or at least hear about it through the walls of my otherwise soundproof apartment.

The thing that happened, though, was that with all this baseless eroticism, I started to wonder about this woman that Ash pined after for years. How could one secret ten-month love affair affect the next several years of her life? It had always seemed like Ash could have anyone she wanted, her pick of the litter, so to speak, so it made me wonder, what was so d.a.m.n special about Tabitha, the stepmother I barely knew?

All the signs pointed to Tabitha being the one Ash was in love with, and now, thinking back on the things that Ash had said and done, it seemed obvious, like a giant dumbbell hitting me over the head. Of course it was her all along. But how, why, when? Had they been lovers only that year and never again, or had their affair resumed years later? How could this one woman-a high school educated gold digger Father had married for her youth and beauty-have so enthralled a savvy girl like Ash?

I started to realize that the only way to understand Ash was to understand the woman she was in love with. Had her forbidden attraction to our stepmother gotten Ash killed? Did one of her other lovers fly into a jealous rage when they learned Ash would never love them the way she loved Tabitha?

My quest needed to change. I had to give up my erotic explorations in search of something deeper: the story behind this mystery. Just thinking about it was nerve-wracking, as I realized that I didn't know where to start. And if I hired someone, I was almost positive it would get back to Father. Did he even know about his wife's illicit Sapphic indiscretion?

I needed to find out who Tabitha really was. My Junior League charity-driven stepmother? My sister's true love? Or some sick Sapphic version of Mary Kay Letourneau who preyed on my vulnerable sister? I decided not to trust a PI. I was capable of doing the job myself. So I followed Tabitha from the estate to the bank to the florist, where almost all of her stops were pedantic and typical. She volunteered once a week at some charity, though she was rarely there long enough to get her hands dirty, so I a.s.sume she was gabbing and dropping off a check. Poor Father-cuckolded by a young wife who just spent his money and screwed his daughter. Still, there was something captivating about Tabitha and her secrets. She had the ability to surprise me sometimes. Last night, she was at the Q Center at a lesbian literary salon, in a red dress and a black wig. The other day, I watched her walk into Union Jacks, a rather notorious strip club in town. Even when she was incognito she was cautious, constantly looking around furtively, ducking in and out of aisles so she was harder to track than one would imagine a suburban housewife would be.

By now, I realized she was no ordinary housewife. Tuesday's journey was most intriguing. She parked her car at Lloyd Center Mall, got on the railway to downtown, then got off two blocks from the river and walked to a giant gla.s.s building called The Pinnacle. I followed her inside at a safe distance, but by then had lost her to the crowds around the elevators. I'd never been to this part of the Pearl District and couldn't imagine whom Tabitha could be seeing there. Again today, she did the exact same thing. Only this time I managed to watch which floor her elevator stopped at-fourteen-and so I followed her up on a different elevator. She was in loft 1411, a corner unit at the end of the hallway, loudly playing that Eric Clapton song ”Tears in Heaven” over and over again. I waited in the utility room down the hall, peaking out through the door's tiny hatched window every time I heard a new shuffling, mumbling, or electronic noise, but it was over an hour before I saw anything. Tabitha reappeared in the hall, distracted but red faced and empty-handed, and to my surprise, the door shut on her coat and she broke down crying in the hallway, trapped in the door. Instead of opening the door, she tugged at the camel colored trench, eventually tearing a swatch from it. She turned the k.n.o.b to make sure the door was locked as she looked nervously up and down the hallway. She looked like a trapped woman, and not just because of the coat.

As soon as she'd rescued her now tattered coat from the door she ran to the elevator as if she couldn't wait to get out of there. Funnily enough, I couldn't wait to get in that apartment. I grabbed the pocketknife thingy from my purse, a rather humorous gift from a former lover who, after I ditched her, suggested that since I had b.a.l.l.s I should act like a man. Little did either of us know at the time I could use the little contraption to break into an apartment. Fortunately for me, as I was struggling to open the little knife, I leaned on the door and realized the leftover fabric from Tabitha's coat was wedged in between the door and the lock, so while the lock was set, the door wasn't pulled all the way into the frame. I guess since Tabitha only pulled, not pushed, the k.n.o.b, she had no idea her lock paranoia didn't pay off. I just pushed the door open and walked right in.

As soon as I did, I felt like I had been hit over the head. I fell to the ground and pa.s.sed out and when I awoke, it was dark inside and I was cold and damp, still lying on the floor. I gave my eyes a few moments to adjust then I crawled to the table in search of a lamp to flick. As soon as the apartment was flooded with light, I remembered why I was instantly struck. It wasn't a bop over the head that did me in. It was the sight of the larger than life shrine to my sister. There were photos of Ash everywhere, along with some of her jewelry and trinkets, and right at the center of it all were Ash's two missing diaries that were stolen from my apartment. I felt like I was in a horror movie, my own Silence of the Lambs, with mementos from the murder victim all around me. Had Father and Tabitha lured me away from the apartment with that bulls.h.i.+t lecture so Tabitha could break in and steal these things? Why were there vestiges of my sister everywhere in this loft?

I stayed in the apartment the rest of the day, rifling through the drawers and cabinets. I tossed through the closet, a veritable smorgasbord of outfits and disguises that would fit Tabitha and my sister both. While the front room was an Ash shrine, the bedroom was an erotic play land. The armoire held leather couture of all sorts, whips, floggers, masks, even a face mask with a leather d.i.l.d.o attached where the mouthpiece would normally be. How could that even work? Handcuffs and feathers and oils and tons of silicone toys were strewn about. There were erotic magazines, including dozens of old copies of a black and white lesbian magazine called On Our Backs. There were more than a couple of Pookie Michaels films, each emblazoned with my sister in all her glory on the front of the box. My G.o.d, my stepmother knew about my sister's p.o.r.n past. What else did she know? What did Father know? Had he been here? Or was this apartment Tabitha's secret love nest?

I read through the remainder of Ash's journals, the ones that were taken from me and another I had never seen before. She talked about lesbian play parties and orgies and showing a group of women how to have a.n.a.l s.e.x with some girl named Tristan. Clearly, there was pathos in there, a desire to t.i.tillate and shock the reader-which was who? Tabitha? Me? But so much of it was matter-of-fact. I couldn't help but be turned on, and the one way I could stick it to Tabitha for stealing my sister was to m.a.s.t.u.r.b.a.t.e in her bed. I grabbed the red dress from the other night and put it on. It smelled of Nana de Bary perfume and perspiration and desire and maybe a little shame. Or maybe that was just me. I didn't know, but I was aroused by the magazines and the movies and the orgies and I plunged my hand between my legs and just started rubbing like crazy until I felt everything constrict and I began to scream like a banshee.

Only, this time I didn't feel good afterward. I felt...guilty. I was at the foot of a shrine to my sister, in my stepmother's dress, in the house of a killer-maybe-and I was feeling jealous and aroused and focusing on having an o.r.g.a.s.m? What kind of monster had I become?

I was so aghast at what I had done, what I had become, that I did the only reasonable thing: I demolished the apartment. I took all of my rage out on the furnis.h.i.+ngs. Nothing would wash away my guilt like showing Tabitha I was on to her, on to them. I slashed the sheets with her scissors, tore up the sofa pillows, and emptied all the dresser drawers. And then I did the most devastating thing: I destroyed the shrine to my sister's memory. I tore down the photos, threw all the trinkets in the fireplace, and shoved the journals into my bag. I stood there in the middle of the room, knee deep in destruction, and wanted more. I wished I could see Tabitha's face when she walked in and found what I had done.

But like any artificial high, my demolition-fueled delirium ended abruptly and sent me spiraling into the seven rings of self-deprecation. How could I have done what I did? Where did that violence, that hatred come from?

I thanked all things holy that Tabitha had not been there during my annihilation frenzy, because I feared what I might have done if she'd been in the room. Would Tabitha have ended up in little pieces on the floor, mixed in with the shredded remnants of her loft? Was this the same impetus that had led to my sister's death?

I did not see Tabitha's face when she discovered what I had done to her loft. We did see each other at dinner not too long after and she was as stone-faced and cordial as ever. Father was as cold and withdrawn. He lectured me about the deficient career choices I had made and the dire economic impact I could expect to harvest from such poor selections. Apparently, Father did not approve of his surviving daughter becoming a journalist, especially not one who regularly wrote about having s.e.x. I had had no idea he even read my column. While he was intent on belittling me, I was feeling rather pleased with myself for having garnered his attention. Who knew that was all it took. Maybe Ash started filming p.o.r.nos for the same reason. Could she have felt as invisible in this house as I had?

No. I didn't think so. As Father continued to belabor the point, I pushed my chair closer to Tabitha's. In doing so, the back of my hand brushed her thigh. A charge of electricity snapped between us like static cling and then was gone. Perhaps I'd imagined it. Tabitha sat prim and proper with perfect posture in her chair as though nothing had happened. Maybe it hadn't. Or were her cheeks just a little rosier than they'd been a moment before?

”Just how safe are all theseum” Father struggled for the appropriate couth wording. ”These dealings? How safe are they, Megan?”

Having long lost interest in his paternalism, I allowed Father to drone on. I wasn't about to ease his consternation regarding my column, but the truth of the matter was that my own interest in the subject was waning. I didn't think I'd be Portland's adventure s.l.u.t much longer. My pa.s.sion was too big to be bridled by this city's handful of underground erotic adventures. I needed to be a pioneer in a different way, to open up a new s.e.xual frontier. Just how, I didn't know yet. I imagined Tabitha opening up to me like a desert flower, and it was my turn to blush.

”You don't want to end up like your sister,” Father concluded.

With that, I came back to the conversation. ”You mean dead on the pool house floor? I can't imagine how that would happen to me, Daddy-O. Don't you agree, Tabitha?”

I winked at her. I was bolder now, too. I wasn't just little Megan, peering out a window at my sister's Sapphic fun. I was the master of my domain and I was the one calling the shots in life now. Tabitha should fear me, because I was on to her little game. Maybe she even wondered why I hadn't already told the cops about her secret double life. But I was keeping something for myself.

Still, when the color drained from her face, I instantly regretted the flippant way I'd recalled that traumatic night. I didn't see Father raise his hand. Rather than warning me, the light breeze on my face only confused me. For a millisecond. Until his palm reached my cheek. The slap was so fierce it rattled my fillings loose and knocked my molars akimbo, the way earthquakes displace fence lines. I was sure it left an angry, crimson handprint behind, far outshadowing the pink of my blush.

Tabitha inhaled so sharply it sounded like the door of an airplane being ripped off mid-flight and pa.s.sengers were being sucked out by the vacuum it created. ”Bradford Thomas Caulfield!” She shrieked like an angry mother condemning and errant child. ”Apologize!” Tabitha yelled.

”I'm sorry,” I responded automatically.

Tabitha ignored my authentic act of contrition.

”Bradford.” She demanded.

Oh, my G.o.d, I realized, looking at the determined set of her jaw, this woman was f.u.c.king hot. There was something about courageous women that turned me on. No, not courage. It wasn't bravery that lead a diminutive female of the species to stand up to my father and demand an apology-it was recklessness, a sheer and utter disregard for one's personal safety. And I'd never seen anything s.e.xier.

Father did not apologize. He had never once acknowledged personal wrongdoing in all the time I'd known him. When things went so unbelievably wrong that he could no longer ignore them, he always managed to find a convenient patsy to blame it on. I wasn't even that alarmed by the whole scene. I had changed from the kid who wanted only to please her father and fall under the radar, in my sister's shadow. I was older and bolder and less interested in making Father-or anyone else for that matter-happy. I left the table with Tabitha still glaring at Father. They would probably fight for hours over the disagreement, but for me it was water off a duck's back. I needed to get my beauty sleep. I had more spying to do in the morning.

Ca.s.sandra, who I bored of after a week or two of tumbling and floor exercises, was just embarra.s.sed enough about dipping her pen in the company ink, that she allowed me the freedom to make my own hours at the paper-as long as they were opposite to her own.

So I started working from my home or the coffeehouse nearly as frequently as I made it to the office. That gave me more time to watch Tabitha. The funny thing was, the more I followed her, the more intrigued I was by the woman. She was such an enigma to me. Every day there was something unexpected in her life. Last week, it was Taboo-an adult store where she spent an hour, while I waited for her to leave, keeping tabs on the door from the parking lot across the street. What could a woman do for an hour in an x.x.x video store? Did she actually watch the films there?

Yesterday, she disappeared into a house on 82nd Avenue that had a giant sign outside announcing it as a business named Honeysuckles, and billing itself as a ”lingerie experience for men.” What the h.e.l.l was Tabitha doing at all these places? I thought my s.e.xuality was aberrant, but hers, well, it made me look like a castoff from Little House on the Prairie.

The more I saw Tabitha in these playlands, the more intrigued I became. I wanted to know Tabitha-not just biblically, but as a person. I wanted to know what brought her to these places, what her fantasies were, and who she wanted to share them with. Just who was this woman? Did my sister find out about her secrets? Was that why she was killed?

Chapter Sixteen.

It's an old adage that often the truth isn't what we are truly seeking. I was starting to think that might be the case for me. I had been following Tabitha for weeks now and I was noticing that I was feeling as enraptured by her as other women were over my sister. I started inconspicuously following her to stores, cafes, and even to a strip club, although I could never go in to these venues for fear of being caught spying on her. Instead I hunched down behind the wheel of my rental car, eating Doritos and watching. Watching to see how long she was inside and when she did come out whether she was still alone. Tabitha remained alone-going in and coming out.

Soon, watching from afar just wasn't enough. It was no longer giving me the thrill I'd had when I originally started stalking her. I decided to escalate. I managed to ”b.u.mp” into her at a few establishments she fraternized, the ones where I could randomly imagine turning up.

To my surprise, Tabitha didn't seem frightened to see me. Quite the opposite. She seemed genuinely happy to have happened upon me. Usually she'd invite me to lunch or out to the house or just to finish up her shopping with her, the latter of which I did enough times that I was starting to enjoy it.

”Try these!” Tabitha smiled and threw another set of trousers at me.

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