She knocked a third time, and she had a sinking feeling as she wondered what they were going to do now. She'd been sure that this was the right move, but now she felt uneasy.
May looked up and down the street. What she was looking for was any sign of a chatty neighbor. The house to the right didn't seem to be open. It was all locked up, and even the curtains were closed. But the house to the left was different. May saw the curtains were open, the garage was open, and she could hear music coming from inside.
With any luck, this neighbor might know where Esther was.
"Looks like someone else is home," she said to Owen. He nodded, and they walked over to the neighbor's house.
As she neared the house, she could hear the music a little more clearly. It was an indie rock track, the kind of thing she'd heard on the radio when she was younger but had never been a fan of.
She knocked on the door, and the music lowered in volume. The door opened, and a young man with a spiky hairstyle, several tattoos, and wearing a leather jacket, looked out.
"Oh, hello," he said in surprise. "You're the cops?" A flash of guilt crossed his face.
"We're looking for Esther Gregory," May said. "I'm hoping you might know where she works?"
"Did she get into trouble about what happened the other day? I wondered if she would," the man asked curiously.
Now, May felt curious too.
"What happened the other day?" she asked.
The young man shrugged. "Esther was out walking, and some guy started harassing her—or so she said. Anyway, she sprayed him with her can of Mace."
May's eyes widened. She gave Owen a sideways glance.
"Is that so?" she asked.
"Yeah. The man was very upset. Said he was going to press charges for having caused him pain and suffering. He was really mad about it."
"We're not here about that," May said. "We haven't received any reports about it. We need to speak to her for another reason." But she thought the mention of Mace was interesting. Very interesting, in fact. Clearly, Esther possessed Mace and wasn't scared to use it. Was this just one example of her behavior, and had she taken this further?
"She works in the tattoo parlor up the road," the helpful neighbor said. "It's on the top floor of the shopping center, above the Indian restaurant."
"Thanks," May said.
She and Owen climbed back into the car, and they drove down the road to the shopping center. May couldn't stop thinking about that Mace incident. It had to mean something. They had to be getting somewhere, didn't they?
“Pepper spray,” she said to Owen, and he nodded.
“It has to be significant,” he said hopefully.
The shopping center was a small, local mall that contained a couple of restaurants, a grocery store, a hair and nail salon, and the tattoo parlor upstairs. May climbed the stairs and headed for the tattoo parlor at the end of the passage.
May didn't know much about tattoos. She'd never had one, and although she'd considered getting one with Lauren's initials on her ankle, just to remember her sister by, she'd always hesitated at the idea because doing this seemed so final. It was like admitting to herself that Lauren was gone forever.
"Have you ever thought of getting a tattoo?" she asked Owen as they approached the door.
"Yes, a few years ago, when I was still at the accounting firm, and it was all so corporate and stuffy, I thought of getting one as an act of rebellion," Owen said. "Just because they sent out a company memo saying that they dealt with high-end clients and no tattoos were acceptable."
May laughed. She'd never thought of Owen as a rebellious type, and in fact, she didn't think he was, particularly. But she could see how that would rile anyone, being forced into making a life decision—or not making one—just because it was company policy.
"Then I joined the police," Owen said. "And I was quite surprised that their policy is that non-offensive tattoos are acceptable—on the arms, and other reasonable places, obviously not the face or neck. Of course, that being the case, I then didn't want one so badly anymore. But maybe one day."
"Maybe one day," May agreed.
When she walked inside, she thought that the place looked clean and professional. There were three tattoo artists at work, and since two were men, it was pretty easy to see who Esther was. She was the redhead at the back of the room, with a tattoo of a rose on her forearm, several piercings in her ears, and wearing a black, tight-fitting top and pants that showed off her curvy figure.
May could see why she had been an object of desire for many of the boys, back in her school days, and that she was clearly still a wild rebel at heart.
