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“Thank you. You said he left some stuff?”
She nods, digging under the counter. “I don’t usually hang onto stuff that gets left here for this long, but I didn’t want to throw out pictures. And the cops came back hoping he’d listed some emergency contact or something since his ID turned out to be fake. I figured when they tracked down his family, I could give them back.” The words are spoken matter-of-factly, without any judgement or surprise. I imagine it wouldn’t be the first time someone has used a fake ID here.
Calli’s eyes light up at the mention of photos. “Thank you so much for holding onto them.”
“You’re welcome.” She pushes a small carboard box across the counter. “This is everything. Excuse me.”
Two women are screaming at each other in the parking lot. The clerk sighs and accompanies Jill outside to break it up.
“Let’s take it to the car, alright?”
She agrees and walks past the scene outside without giving it a glance. The box gets deposited into the trunk. “I’ll wait until we get back to the hotel to go through it.” Instead of getting in to leave, she grabs the container of her mother’s ashes. “I just need to do one more thing.”
“Where are you going?” I ask as she heads for the alley that runs alongside the hotel.
“To throw this in the dumpster.”
CHAPTER 34
CALLIOPE
“Calli!”Arlow calls, rushing to catch up with me. He captures my wrist. “Are you sure you want to do this? You’re upset right now.”
My steps slow, but I continue to the metal dumpster that sits flush with the side of the hotel. “I’m sure. He died here. His ashes are in some mass grave. Why should she get a pretty final resting place? I want to be done with it. I need to let them both go.”
“Okay.” He lays his hand on my back.
“Just keep an eye out because I doubt this is legal.” The garbage truck must’ve recently been by since the dumpster is empty, but it still reeks of old trash.
“There’s nobody around.”
There are no words that I need to say. She’s long gone, I know that, and they would’ve been wasted on her anyway. Nothing I said ever mattered. I loosen the top of the cardboard urn that was lightly glued on, pull it off, and dump it unceremoniously into the dumpster.
A loud clang rings out and Arlow’s gaze leaps to mine. “What was that?”
“I don’t know. Bone, maybe?”
“It sounded like metal.”
“Maybe she had pins from a broken bone or something. Do they leave those in cremated remains?” I step up on a nearby crate to look inside. Arlow leans over to pluck something from the inside wall of the dumpster. “What is that?”
He holds it out where I can see it. “It’s a GPS tracker. A magnetic one meant for cars. It stuck to the side when you dumped the ashes.”
Both of us stare at each other for a long moment as the pieces fall together. “That son of a bitch,” I exclaim. “That’s how Carl found me. He put a fucking tracker in my dead mother’s ashes to be mailed to me.”
The whoop of a siren is accompanied by red lights that chase each other down the side of the building. The police aren’t interested in us, only the fight that’s going on near the lobby. Still, we need to go.
“Throw it back in there,” I order and drop the empty cardboard container, stomping it flat before tossing it into the dumpster as well. “Let’s get out of here.”
Arlow nods, and I hear the tracker ding against the metal again. We return to the car and head for our hotel.
“Are you alright?” Arlow asks, squeezing my knee.
“Yeah.” I shake my head, scoffing. “I worried about him finding out my new name and where I was, so I had the ashes sent to a PO Box. At the time, I thought I was being too paranoid. I guess not.”
“Jesus, Calli. He was crazy.”
“He was. I’m surprised he thought of it, to be honest. He wasn’t that smart.” A realization hits me. “If I’d dumped the damn thing in Cincinnati before I moved like I should have, I could’ve spared both of us all this trouble. Or if I would’ve ignored the stupid email in the first place and not accepted theurn.” Arlow wouldn’t have killed a man for me. If only I hadn’t toted around the ashes as some kind of reassuring trinket.
