I followed more slowly, gazing up at the U-shaped building. Four floors, cheap, close to cash jobs, and anonymous. Dixie liked to disappear in a crowd. The front doors were on open walkways with railings that faced the interior courtyard, and in the dark afternoon, lights shone in a few of the windows.
“Which one?” he asked.
“Number fifteen. I’m not sure which that is from the outside.”
He was already examining a directions sign and taking on a set of interior steps. When I reached the second floor, Kane had already identified the correct front door.
“Shite security. Knock, will ye?”
“Do you ever try saying please or would that void your warranty?” I rapped with my knuckle. “Dixie? It’s Lovelyn. Can you open up?”
No reply came.
To my left, the front window was unlit. I knocked again then leaned in to listen for any sounds. “I don’t think she’s here.”
“But this is where she lives?”
“Correct.”
His curled lip told me what he thought of Dixie’s accommodation choice.
He had a point. Dixie had made bank at the warehouse. She’d been one of their most in-demand sex workers. She could afford a fancy apartment on the harbour.
In the flat beyond Dixie’s, lights from a TV flickered in the window. I knocked on that door, raising a finger to Kane so he stayed back. We didn’t need the great lump scaring the neighbours.
Movement came inside, though the occupier didn’t speak.
“Hi,” I called. “I’m friends with Dixie. She isn’t answering. Have you seen her?”
The door opened a crack, a security chain clinking. A woman peered out, probably in her sixties and with a tabby cat in her arms. “Who are you?”
“Lovelyn, a friend from work.”
The lady looked me up and down. “At the whorehouse on the river?”
“The warehouse, yes.” Big difference in payroll and consent. “Have you seen her? I’m worried.”
She closed the door, opening it again with the chain off. She peered past me, and I glanced back, but Kane was thankfully nowhere in sight.
“You’re really her friend?”
“I am. I care about her.”
“Funny that she didn’t tell you she was leaving.”
“What do you mean?”
“The landlord was hammering on the door this morning. Told her if she was listening, he’s emptying the place so he can put in new tenants. Figured she hasn’t paid rent.”
My heart sank. “But you didn’t see her go?”
“Do I look like the Neighbourhood Watch committee? I only paid attention because the banging disturbed my pussy.” She stroked the cat, gave me one final look, and slammed the door in my face.
I stared at the frame for a moment then trotted back to where Kane lurked around the corner.
His expression told me he’d heard. “Where could she have gone?”
For the whole drive back, I’d been replaying every conversation I’d had with Dixie, searching for clues. Any favourite haunts or references to where she’d grown up. There wasn’t much. For all that she was a sweet and beautiful twentysomething woman with endless kindness to others and a love of gossip, her favourite saying being ‘bestie, you’ve gotta hear this’, Dixie had been a closed book when it came to her own life.
