Murder on the Rocks

by Clara Nipper

  We ran up the sidewalk together. Once, I slipped and fell and Sophie helped me up. Then she slipped and fell and as I tried to lift her, I fell again. We laughed; we struggled to rise; we kissed; we laughed and kissed more. Sophie’s eyes were dark with longing. She pushed my coat down around my waist. I watched as she began removing her clothes. Sophie was down to her bra and jeans before I snapped to.

  “Goddamn it, woman! Don’t do that here! Get in the house.” I finally stood securely and lifted Sophie. I gathered her clothes into a bundle and clapped them to her chest. She didn’t clasp them to her but let them fall. I stared in amazement at her red lace demi cup bra as if it were a cobra and I a mongoose.

  “What now?” I managed to say.

  “Jill.” Sophie’s voice was grave. Serious enough to make me look at her face. “This has to happen. I’ve waited too long. Do you understand?”

  I shrugged dismissively. “The only thing between us now is that house key.”

  “I mean it.” Sophie’s face was mean and merciless. “I can’t go through all that again.” I moved to caress and reassure her, but Sophie flinched.

  “Baby,” I said, and at her murderous stare. I said, “Sophie, ain’t no one between us. I’m all yours if you want me.”

  “I do,” she said, her manner as grave as if she were identifying a corpse.

  “Can we go in?” I tried to pull her arm.

  “Finally, you and me. It’s real?” Sophie seemed dazed.

  “Will you at least put on your coat?” I tried to wrap her, but she swatted me.

  “I’m going inside. Care to join me?” I walked to the stoop. Sophie picked up her clothes as if she were underwater and floated to stand next to me. She dropped her clothes again and crushed me to her. She caught my mouth in a deep, delicious kiss and caught me off balance and we fell again, but we didn’t laugh.

  The front door burst open, and Alistair stood there. “What the bloody hell is going on?” He took in the sight of us as we scrambled to stand. Sophie still didn’t cover herself even though her skin was swollen with goose bumps. So I held her coat up like a curtain.

  “The body is not even cold yet,” Alistair said.

  “Alistair—” Sophie started, “you were right—”

  “Sod off!” Alistair slammed the door and the deadbolt.

  “You know why this is funny?” Sophie turned to me, her face solemn but on the verge of laughter.

  “For God’s sake, put your fucking clothes on!” I shouted. The sound carried through the silent ice-encrusted neighborhood like a gunshot.

  “Well, this isn’t the proper direction of seduction,” Sophie mused. “What’s the big deal? This”—she gestured to her plump, taut breasts—“is like a bikini top. I didn’t know you were so uptight.” She slid into her coat. I zipped it up to her chin. “I don’t have my key.”

  My eyebrows rose. “Say what now?”

  “So we will have to beg or call a locksmith.”

  “You’re right. That’s hilarious,” I said.

  “Come on, you can’t blame him,” Sophie said.

  “Like hell!” I banged on the door. “Come on, Al, don’t be a dick!” My voice boomed through the soundless white landscape like a timpani. In response, ice slid off someone’s roof and exploded in frigid shards and a tree limb finally gave out and crashed to the ground.

  “Let me try.” Sophie stroked the door as if it were silk. “Alistair, honey,” she crooned. “Alistair, it’s not you; it’s me. Alistair, ducks…come on, please? I’m sorry…truly and really sorry. If I had my way, I wouldn’t give a shit about this tool; it would be you forever. But I can’t explain my heart and I can’t help it.”

  “Hey, wait a minute,” I said.

  “Sh!” Sophie hissed. “Alistair, dear, please let us in. It’s cold and I have to use the bathroom. Come on, nutmeg.”

  “Nutmeg?” I echoed sourly.

  “Shut up,” she snapped. Then sweetly, “Alistair, don’t do this. Remember Rio? Remember Amsterdam? Come on, please?”

  “You went to Rio and Amsterdam?” I asked. Sophie ignored me. I brushed her aside and hit the door so hard my hand stung. “Don’t be this guy!” I yelled. Then to Sophie, “I don’t have a phone to call a locksmith. I will shoot the door open.” I unsnapped my holster.

  “You will not!” Sophie shouted. “Alistair, Jill’s going to shoot the door open. Please open it or step aside.”

  “How do I always end up in these embarrassing dramas?” I said, flicking off the safety and taking aim. The door jerked open and Alistair grabbed Sophie, yelled, “bugger off!” into my face, and pulled Sophie with him back into the darkness and slammed and locked the door again.

  I reholstered my Glock. I would sleep out here before I would shoot now. I kicked the door. “We’re not going to have a situation, are we, buddy?”

  “Jill! I’m all right!” came Sophie’s muzzy voice. “Just give us some time.”

  I walked to the sidewalk steps and sat, marveling at how different the circumstances were between this episode of being locked out of Sophie’s and just a few days ago, in this same ice storm when I had been a pathetic loser, rabid with longing, sitting here with my bumped head and broken heart, trying to accept the loss. Now I was supposed to be with Sophie, yet I was still locked out. Yep, I laughed to myself, I’ve come full circle and haven’t moved an inch.

  They could be reconciling in there! I panicked and ran to the door. “Stand back!” I yelled. “I’m going to kick in the door!” A couple walking home, their arms laden with grocery sacks, stared curiously.

  “Not bloody likely,” Sophie said from the other side of the door, doing a damn good impression of Alistair. “It’s a steel door in a steel frame. Just calm your randy ass down and give us a motherfucking minute!”

  “Why? Are you making a soufflé?” I said and then grinned and waved at the couple, who walked on.

  The door opened an inch. “He’s crying!” Sophie said.

  I rolled my eyes. “That’s the oldest trick in the book!”

  “Go smoke. Or better yet, take a drive.” Sophie pushed the keys through the crack.

  “Go for a drive? Are you kidding me?”

  “Do what you want; I don’t care. I have my hands full with this mess.” She started to close the door, but I stopped it with my palm.

  “Sophie,” I said as solemnly as she had earlier, “this has to happen.”

  “Yeah, sure, whatever.” Sophie locked the door.

  Chapter Twenty-three

  I got in the Volvo and backed into the street. Sophie’s cell was on the passenger seat. I called the chief at home. “It’s Rogers. Do you know where Sheriff Perryman lives? I heard about her daughter-in-law and I’m on my way over there.”

  “Don’t try to comfort her with sex.”

  “Well, I’m all out of casseroles.”

  “Then get her flowers.”

  “From outta my bum? Pull a bouquet out of my arse?” I could imitate Alistair too.

  “Send her a card.”

  “Come on, Chief,” I said, caressing my Zippo like the talisman it was. He relented, as usual, and looked up the address and read it to me. West side. I turned the car around and drove west. The clouds were breaking up. They thinned and scattered, with hints of forgotten porcelain blue sky. The sun was weak, the temperature remained below freezing, and none of the ice was melting, but the light was penetrating and over bright as if the entire town had been hiding in a movie theater and had been pushed onto the brilliant sidewalk mirrored with ice. As I got on the highway, I saw a convoy of power trucks trundling by. I was tempted to follow them and buy a house wherever they fixed the electricity. But a grieving Perryman expecting my call kept me on course.

  The highway had only one lane open—two treacherous tracks right in the middle. On either side, the road was clogged with untouched ice like a turbulent ocean of white topped with a thin, craggy, glacier crust.

  Since Perryman’s number wasn’t in S
ophie’s phone, I couldn’t call ahead. Oh, well. I finally arrived at a long, Ranch-style brick home with white columns and shutters. There was a thick forest looming behind the house, and it appeared to be shoving the home forward. The front porch light was on. The driveway seemed to be groaning under its load of SUVs.

  I knew this was the sort of house that one only used the back door to enter. And I wouldn’t knock, either. It would vex them and set me apart if I did.

  So I slid the glass door and walked into the heat and noise. The TV was on and there were half a dozen deputies sat in recliners and a pit group watching a game. There were bowls of nuts and chips within arm’s reach of anyone. On the glass coffee table was an impressive pyramid of beer cans, and the big screen was wall mounted so the can construction didn’t interfere with their viewing.

  Four children chased each other over my feet—one on a Big Wheel, one on a tricycle, one on a hoppity horse, and one carrying a pogo stick.

  All the lights, the noise, the warmth…I didn’t hear a generator. Where was Perryman? No one noticed me. I took off my coat and got a beer. As I was savoring the last ice-cold swallow, Perryman came in, wiping her hands.

  “Detective!” She exclaimed. All heads swiveled to me. “What are you doing here?” She threw down the towel, fumbling for her phone. “Did I miss a message? Do we have a meeting?”

  “Nope, just wanted to drop in.”

  Everybody relaxed and forgot me again. It’s funny how I can so easily read the level of prickly tension in a room caused by my presence and at what exact moment that melted. When it doesn’t, I have a problem.

  “Well, that’s very thoughtful…I guess…want a beer?”

  I crumpled my can and resisted the overpowering impulse to lob it into the pyramid and see it topple. “Had one.” I belched.

  “Another then?”

  “Sure.”

  “How long have you been here?”

  “Hours and hours.” I replied as I snapped open my beer.

  “Well?” Perryman seemed nervous that I was on her home turf.

  “Football?” I asked, already hypnotized.

  “Yeah, we got power yesterday. Nothing has been off for one second since. All the deputies have gone without TV and football for so long, and I’m the first with power restored. I think they used the excuse of Wanda’s murder to come over here to watch the game and pretend to support me. I’m just in shock, so I really don’t care.” Perryman rubbed her face. The kids made another circuit of the kitchen.

  “Yours?” I said.

  “No, some of the various deputies’ kids. They’re too young to know what’s going on.”

  “Well, do you have any leads?”

  “It’s such a relief having power,” Perryman said as if I hadn’t asked. She seemed stiff and awkward.

  I stared at her in puzzled disbelief. Then, “well…” I belched again into my fist. “Wanna tell me about Wanda?”

  Perryman wiped the nose of the boy with the pogo stick. She hugged her elbows. “No, not really. I’ll look into the leads I’ve got and I’ll be in touch.”

  I finished the beer and stomped the can flat. I shrugged. “Well, that’s why I’m here.”

  Perryman’s eyes narrowed and her neck reddened. “You mean officially?”

  I snorted. “No. Why would I need to be here officially?” My radar was up. Something here was off. Perryman was such a dynamo, her reluctance with her own daughter-in-law’s murder was a red flag. If I stuck around, maybe something would shake loose. I might overhear something.

  “It’s a homicide. You’re a homicide detective aren’t you?”

  Zippo out. Click. Click. Tread lightly. “Not until the thaw. Got any Cheetos?”

  Perryman absently handed me a bowl piled with a lovely dome of space age orange curls. She chewed her thumbnail.

  “Got any theories?” I asked extremely casually.

  Perryman seemed absent and preoccupied. “Oh, you know. Harris and Gerritts and I all agree. It’s her drug connections.”

  “Drug connections?” I crunched on a handful of Cheetos. I needed to seem as if I believed every word and agreed with her. “I’m sure you’re right on that. Dealers aren’t anyone you ever want to mess with.”

  “Yeah, so we will probably never solve it,” Perryman said and sniffled.

  My eyebrows went up and I dropped my gaze to the Cheeto bowl, sorting through the curls, looking for the cheesiest ones. “Odds are against us, that’s for sure.”

  “Poor Dewey.” Perryman began crying silently. She turned away.

  “Mind if I watch the game?” I asked.

  “No, go ahead.” Perryman disappeared before she finished answering.

  I approached the men. “What’s the score?” The standard male opener.

  “Twenty-seven, twenty-one.”

  “Hey, scooch over, will ya?” I sat on the chaise section of the pit group. Next thing I knew, I was being shaken awake by Perryman. My hand was down the front of my trousers, and I had a taffy string of drool oozing from my mouth to my shoulder. Jonathan was licking Cheeto crumbs off my fingers. The TV was blaring another game, but it was dark outside. All the deputies around me were draped like snoring apes over the furniture.

  “Whazzup, baby?” I rubbed my eyes and sat upright.

  “Go on home now. You don’t live here. This is family time.”

  “What about these guys?” I gestured to the snoring deputies.

  “They’ll be leaving too. It’s just my son and me and we need private time.”

  “Sure.” I stood and stretched, still groggy. “I don’t have a phone yet.”

  “So I won’t expect your call,” Perryman said. “Let me walk you out.”

  “All right, all right.” My fingers on my other hand were still Day-Glo orange. “Can I wash my hands?”

  Perryman’s jaw tightened; her lips pressed into a white line. She fished a tissue square out of her bra, spat on it, grabbed my stained paw, and scrubbed it. I was too dozy to protest. A young man of about twenty-three appeared in the door. His hair was a wild mess and his eyes were red. He picked Jonathan up and nuzzled him. “Mommy?” The young man asked so mournfully that my heart cracked a little and I almost embraced him. Perryman dropped my hand and turned me brusquely toward the door.

  “That’s it,” she ordered, “good-bye.”

  “Is that your son?” I asked to the locked door. Jonathan ran out the cat door after me, sure-footed and frisky on the ice.

  Chapter Twenty-four

  On the slick, treacherous drive back to Sophie’s, I heard that telltale sound of sand sifting onto the car.

  “No! No! No!” I screamed, turning the wipers on frenzy speed as if they could reverse the weather. I screamed “no” for the entire trip.

  I knocked on Sophie’s door, wondering if I would have to sleep in the car. I don’t need this hassle, I thought. Maybe it was time to go home.

  Past time to go, I amended as Sophie opened the door wearing only a red lace bra, red panties, and après ski boots.

  “Where the fuck have you been?” Sophie snapped, jerking me inside and brushing ice chips off my flattop.

  “What the fuck are you wearing?” I said, my voice cracked and hoarse from shouting at the ice.

  “Sh! We talked, he drank a couple of Guinesses, and now he’s sleeping.”

  “That’s a long explanation, but it doesn’t answer why you’re dressed like an alpine whore.”

  “And you are just using evasion to avoid telling me where you’ve been. Let me smell your hands.” She moved toward me and I automatically pocketed.

  “Let me smell yours,” I countered.

  Her mouth tightened like a knot in a balloon and her eyes glittered with fury. “Well, Jill, that’s just fine. I told you, I can’t go through your psychotic hot and cold attitudes and I won’t. You need to pack your shit and go.”

  “I’ll explain if you’ll explain. You’ll laugh when you hear it.”

  “I did ex
plain!” Sophie said.

  “Sh! Sophie’s precious boyfriend is having a nippy nap.”

  “Fuck you. At least I clean up my messes.”

  “What the hell do you mean by that?”

  Sophie stood up tall, her breasts righteous. “You want me to get specific?”

  I rolled my eyes. “No. I’ve had enough of your specifics. Keep ’em. I’ve got a gut full. I give. Now will you take me home?”

  Sophie looked crestfallen. “What about us?”

  I shrugged. “I don’t think it’s a good idea until Rumpole of the Bailey leaves. It’s in poor taste.”

  “You douchebag!” Sophie screamed, launching herself at me. “How dare you? I was going to be the one to say no, let’s wait! How do you always do that?” She pummeled me with her fists, and I grabbed around the waist, hoisted her onto my shoulder, and carried her to the living room. I dumped her on the couch.

  “Fine.” I snapped, throwing my coat in a corner and whipping off my holster and belt. I stripped off my shirt and began unzipping my trousers. “Let’s do it right here, right now. Gimme all ya got. Make me cry.” Sophie placed a well-aimed kick at my crotch. “Damn, girl, you want it rough?” I grabbed her wrists and was about to cuff her like a suspect when I saw the tears dropping down her face.

  “I’m going to bed,” Sophie said, brushing past me; contempt shrouded her like perfume. I almost choked on the smell. I dropped wearily onto the couch, willing my mind blank. As smooth and untroubled as a virgin sheet of ice. I stared into the fire so long, my eyes watered. To rein that in, I clicked and caressed the Zippo one million times. I heard footsteps approaching.

  “Hello, mate,” Alistair said, sitting next to me.

  “So we’re cool?” I asked.

  “Damn sorry about that.” Alistair chortled and ran his hands through his hair. “Quite mortified about it. Can we just pretend it never happened?”

  “Pretend what never happened?”

  “Splendid.”

  “So, airline food, what’s up with that, huh? And what about the drivers in this town? Are they nutty or what?”