Page 80 of See Me After Class

Panic tightened its grip. I had to move fast.

"I'm not drinking that swill," I muttered as she poured a pale yellow concoction into a cup.

"What choice do you have, darling?" She smiled softly. "It's either this or an injection."

33

Leon

It was a fortunate thing that I had no cases to attend to this morning. Finding Dessie was the only and most important thing on our agenda.

John, Viktor, and I made a beeline toward Ms. Wainwright's cottage. I always found the woman a funny little creature with her silvery hair and those owlish eyes. She gave me a distinct impression of someone who enjoyed solitude a little too much. But then again, every creature had a particular quirk. Perhaps this was hers.

Letitia's cottage was a ghost against the twilight, shutters drawn like blind eyes. Viktor, ever the impatient brute, didn't bother with knocking. Two swift kicks splintered the flimsy door, and we swarmed inside, boots thudding on dusty floorboards. The place reeked of stale flowers and something else, a cloying sweetness that remined me of spiders in jungles at night.

"Lovely décor," I drawled, surveying the cluttered living room. It was all too perfect. OCD, perhaps?

Viktor, already waist-deep in Letitia's desk drawers, grunted something about a "hoarder's paradise."

John nudged me toward a pretty little staircase, decorated with what looked like painted vines. "Umm..." I choked out, suddenly hesitant.

"What?" he barked, already halfway up the steps.

"Not sure I dig exploring an old lady's boudoir," I mumbled, feeling like a schoolboy forced to dissect a frog.

John whirled around, his jaw clenched. "Oh, for God's sake, Leon! Grow up." He jabbed a finger at the staircase. "Most noble purpose you'll ever have for sniffing around a woman's bedroom, that's for damn sure."

I rolled my eyes before obliging him.

Upstairs, we stopped before her bedroom before John all but pushed me across the threshold.

As if summoned by my words, a photo on the mantelpiece caught my eye. A younger, softer-looking Dessie, her arm draped around a tall, bearded man with eyes that held the glint of distant galaxies. My gut clenched. "Viktor, check that picture frame."

He yanked it off the wall, and a cascade of yellowed newspaper clippings spilled onto the floor. One headline screamed,Local Artist Muses on Loss, Love, and the Allure of the Tragic. Below, a familiar face stared back, a decade younger and sporting a wilder mane of hair. Oswald.

"Well, well," I whistled, picking up the clipping. "Seems like Oswald's housekeeper was a fan."

Viktor grunted, his eyes scanning the other articles. "More than a fan, Leon. This woman was obsessed. Photos, interviews, even sketches of him… This is crazy. I wonder if Oswald ever reciprocated any of it. And more importantly, if Dessie somehow got caught in this mess."

"What stalker ever gets what they want?" John breathed. "I'm going to see this as a worst-case scenario. It looks like this could lead us to Oswald's killer."

My heart hammered against my ribs. Could Letitia also be the reason Dessie was gone? Had she lured her away, wrapped her in some twisted web of morbid fascination? The thought was cold steel against my gut.

A floorboard creaked above. Viktor, John, and I exchanged a silent look, adrenaline snapping in our veins like live wires. We tiptoed upstairs, each step a gunshot in the dead silence. The attic was a dusty mausoleum, cobwebs clinging to the rafters. Mice scampered around.

In the center, a makeshift shrine made me stumble back. Newspaper clippings plastered the walls, a mosaic of Oswald's life, concerts, awards, even a grainy paparazzi shot of him buying groceries. A single, faded flower lay wilted on a makeshift altar, its petals like drops of dried blood.

"Jesus, Leon," John whispered, his voice barely above a rasp. "She was worshiping him."

Viktor rubbed his eyes wearily. "How the hell do we figure out where to go from here? She could be absconding, for all we know."

John dropped down on an old chair. "Good God."

I sat down on the floor beside him, caring nothing for the dust. There was another stack of newspapers beside me. The topmost one had an interesting headline.

Bestselling author Lila Monroe buys 1349 Woodland Hills Estate in Ashcroft.

Ms. Wainwright had circled the whole headline multiple times. Beside it, in neatly scribbled handwriting, were the wordslure the rat here.

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