by Bill Alive
We just didn’t know.
And eventually, we ran out of ways to say that. We lapsed into awkward silence.
The gray sky finally started to dump rain.
Mark tried to pull up Unwinnable State on his phone, but the rain and the mountain location were trashing his reception. He cursed and stared moodily out the rain-covered windshield.
I felt like when I was in junior high and my parents made me ride to school with this sullen senior. The car was his space, his complete private world … I’d always felt like a sloppy, unwanted puppy who was trying so hard to make friends, but wound up shedding and pooping everywhere.
Finally, Mark grunted, “You should call Ceci.”
I wanted to say no, but I didn’t have any better ideas. Apparently I had enough reception to get to her voicemail. “Hey Ceci,” I said, feeling even more awkward with Mark right there. Ceci and I hadn’t talked since the drive home from that wake, and we hadn’t even talked much then, except for her making it clear she was off Pete Chauffeur Duty for the foreseeable future. “Um. I’m not trying to get a ride, I just … call me when you get this. Thanks.”
I hung up.
More silence.
It was getting dark. We hadn’t thought to bring food.
Eventually, I had to pee. The incessant rain didn’t help. I waited and waited and waited, but the rain wasn’t going to let up. Finally, I resigned myself to getting soaked. I reached for the door handle.
“Don’t,” Mark snapped. He’d perked up. “Listen.”
Under the pounding of the rain, I could barely hear the crunch of tires on gravel.
“Is it them, are you—”
“Ssh!” he hissed. He squinted through the streaming glass. On the road, a blurred car lurched past. It was black.
Mark muttered, “They’re arguing.”
I couldn’t even see their faces. A chill shivered me … I was parked in a cold crappy car in a cruddy driveway on the side of a mountain in a Virginia autumn rain … the dreariest, most mundane spot you could think of. But this dude could vibe strangers through the rain.
After they drove past, I said, “I really have to pee.”
“Are you kidding me?”
“I’ll be quick,” I said, and jumped out before he could stop me.
I almost wasn’t quick enough. Tires were crunching back toward us in the distance when I dove back into the car, drenched and freezing.
“Anything else before we go?” Mark snapped. “A pedicure, perhaps?”
“He didn’t see me!” I said. “He’s only coming now, see?”
The black sports car rumbled past.
Mark gave a grim smile. “The game is afoot,” he said, and fired up Thunder.
“Holy crap, that’s loud!” I shouted, as we lurched onto the gravel road. “I hope he’s listening to music!”
“It’s raining, and he’s not going to recognize the sound of our engine,” Mark muttered. “We sound like a badass truck.” But he kept an awfully long stretch of road between us and our prey.
It wasn’t super fun trying to trail a black car at night, in the rain, in Friday traffic, hanging back so we wouldn’t Thunder his attention. But we managed to stay with him, all across town to a nice development of townhouses they’d built near the highway during the bubble before the Recession.
Fidelio parked and raced up a walkway toward a prim little house. It had window baskets overflowing with red flowers.
We pulled in as close as we dared. Mark cut the engine, but he risked leaving the battery on so we could run the wipers. We had a perfect view as Fidelio banged on the door and nervously preened his hair.
Both Mark and I leaned forward, holding our breath with excitement.
My phone rang.
“Crap,” I said. “It’s Ceci.”
Mark growled. “You’re not going to take that.”
“Hey Ceci,” I said quickly. “What’s up? Is it urgent?” I may possibly have sounded impatient.
Her drawl crackled in my ear. “You called me!”
“Right! Sorry.”
“Quiet!” Mark snapped. “I’m trying to vibe!”
Fidelio was still fidgeting at the closed door.
“What is it?” Ceci said. “Where are you?”
“Not sure,” I said.
“What?”
Mark frowned. “Somehow this neighborhood feels too nice for him.”
The door opened.
“Holy crap!” I cried. “It’s Jivanta!”
Chapter 29
I couldn’t believe it. Jivanta, a.k.a. Dr. Kistna, a.k.a. Waterbury’s daughter, was standing in the doorway, staring up at Fidelio with surprise but also total recognition.
I remembered the Mystery Man “Harry” she’d been texting at the winery. Harry. Samson. Hairy Samson. Crap.
“You’re with that doctor chick?” Ceci said. “Again?”
“It’s not like that!” I said. “We’re doing surveillance.”
“You’re stalking her?”
Jivanta snapped something angry at Fidelio, punctuated with an angry gesture. He shot back a furious reply.
Mark nudged me. “Are you seeing this?”
I pressed the phone to my chest and leaned toward him. “They’re not together,” I stage whispered. “They’re arguing, they’re obviously just friends. Work friends. Drug dealer work colleagues.”
He shook his head. “They’re not just friends.”
“You can’t know—”
Jivanta lunged at Fidelio, seized his face, and kissed him hard.
“Oh, come on!” I cried. “They’re making out?”
My phone yipped. “You’re watching her make out?” Ceci demanded.
“Yes! No! I mean … just wait a minute!” I leaned toward Mark again. “What are we going to do?” I whispered.
He kept watching, his lips creeping into a smile as the couple entwined. “I’m cool for the moment. She is pretty hot.”
“I mean do we call Sibyl?” I whispered furiously. “She said she’d kill him!”
“I know we’re investigating a murder, but that’s just how people talk. Besides, that was when she thought he’d been cheating with her sister.”
I forgot to whisper. “Right, it’s going to be so much better that it’s a drop-dead gorgeous twenty-six-year-old doctor with a body that could mesmerize a small European country!”
“Are you done?” Ceci snapped.
“Look, why don’t you ask God what he was thinking making a tiny minority of women into a mind-altering substance!”
“You’re assuming he gave you any minds to alter!”
“Would you two quit it?” Mark said.
Then his phone rang.
“Huh,” he said. “Sibyl.”
“Don’t take it now,” I said.
“She could have the password.” He pressed the phone to his ear. “Hey!”
Sibyl blared out his phone so loud I could hear every word.
“I figured it out!” she said. “I’m in!”
“Awesome!” Mark said. “What’s the password?”
“It was totally simple, I just got mixed up with the sounds of the words,” Sibyl said. “Not ‘a gun’, but ‘again’, you know?”
“‘Again’?” Mark said. “So that’s the password, ‘never fish again’?”
But Sibyl didn’t seem to hear him. “This is crazy, I had no idea she took so many stupid photos. There’s like everything here, so much random shit, and …”
She gasped.
Mark frowned. “What? What is it?”
“Oh god.”
At my ear, Ceci said, “Pete? Who is that?”
“Ssh!” I whispered. “Quiet!”
“Oh god god god,” Sibyl said.
“Sibyl!” Mark said. “What is it? What do you see?”
She screamed. The tinny shriek pierced the air. “Get away from me you—”
She choked.
“Pete!” Ceci said. “Who screamed? Pete!”
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But as coughs and choking noises gasped from the phone, Mark started coughing and grabbing his own throat.
“He’s choking!” I yelled. “Oh my God, he can’t breathe!”
At my ear, Ceci went to Nurse Mode. “Who’s choking?” she snapped. “If someone’s choking, you need to get behind them.”
On Mark’s phone, Sibyl was strangling. There were thuds, feet kicking, someone breathing heavy behind her.
Mark was clutching his throat and writhing. His eyes bulged.
“You need to get behind him,” Ceci insisted. “You need to make a fist—”
“It’s not like that!” I yelled. “It’s his phone!”
As soon as I’d said it, I knew I needed to break the connection. I lunged for his phone.
But he dropped it.
The phone slid between his seat and the stupid cup holder thing in the center with the emergency brake. From that crack, Sibyl kept choking and dying.
I jammed my hand down but couldn’t reach the damn thing. Mark was straining against the seat and making horrible gasps.
“Shield!” I shrieked. “Shield, damn it!”
He didn’t seem to hear me.
“You can’t let whoever this bastard is get you too!” I yelled.
He kicked against the floor, then fell back, suddenly limp.
All at once, I knew what I had to do.
“Damn it!” I yelled. I threw my phone on the dash and took a deep breath. Then I got on my knees and bent over him, grabbed his bald head with both hands, and pressed it to my forehead. His sweaty skin was burning like a fever, but I put that out of my mind. I put everything out of my mind.
And I shielded.
I saw a golden sphere surrounding us both. The sphere shimmered and shone with protection … for a second … then it wobbled and faded out, and the strangle noises stabbed up from the phone. But I focused away from them, away from her dying thuds and Ceci yelling and Mark’s hot sweat smearing my face, and I only saw the light, the glittering membrane. I couldn’t imagine it all at once, so I kept circling, front, right, back, left, front, shoring it up, and sealing myself in slow breaths, in, out, in, out … in … out …
… and I realized Mark was breathing with me. In, out, in, out.
I pushed away and crouched in my own seat.
We regarded each other. He looked half dead.
“You look like shit,” I said.
He gave a weak smirk. “I love it when you talk dirty.”
“Dude, that’s like the worst line ever,” I said. “Why do people say that? No one would ever actually say that.”
“No, no … shit … dirty … see?” He tried to chuckle, but it rasped into a coughing fit.
“Oh man,” I said. I snorted. Then I started giggling.
“It’s not that funny,” he gasped. But he started cough-laughing.
I was laughing so hard I was crying a little.
On the dash, my phone squawked. “Pete? Pete? Is Mark okay? What happened?”
I picked it up. “He’s fine,” I said, with a last idiotic laugh. Then I sobered up. “But I think Sibyl is dead.”
“What? I thought she just called you!”
“She did. And she got strangled or something.”
“Just now?” she demanded. “Who did it? Did you hear them? Are they still there?”
“Crap! The murderer is right there!” I said. “At her house! What do we do?”
Mark had stopped coughing, and he was lying collapsed in his seat with his eyes closed. “Call the cops,” he murmured.
“Really?”
“Hell, yeah. And go home.”
“Ceci, we’ve got to call the cops,” I said. I glanced at Mark. “Actually, Ceci, if you wouldn’t mind …”
“So that’s why you called,” Ceci said. “You missed your secretary.”
“Ceci! I’d totally do it, but Mark’s kind of messed up. He just—”
Eyes still closed, Mark poked me hard to shut up.
I rolled my eyes. “He’s not feeling well, and I need to get him home. If I try to explain this to Gwen now—”
“Fine,” Ceci said, with cold dismissal.
“Thank you so much, C. Don’t worry, it’s not like we’re going to be always calling in murders—”
She’d hung up.
I sighed.
I’d forgotten all about Fidelio and Jivanta, but the front door was closed, and they were long gone.
“So Fidelio’s miserable, older, addicted wife just got murdered,” I said. “Now he’s a millionaire with a hot girlfriend. But … he didn’t do it?”
“Maybe,” Mark said. He winced and rubbed his throat. I couldn’t be sure in the dark, but it looked like it might be bruising.
“You okay?” I said.
“I think you’d better drive.”
“What do you think Gwen’s going to say?”
“That,” he rasped, “will be the least of our problems.”
Chapter 30
We went home and watched Unwinnable State until four in the morning. We’d crashed on the couch in our pajamas, and we kept watching till we finally fell asleep.
I jolted up next morning to a very official-sounding knock. Bang bang bang.
I stumbled off the couch, heart racing. I checked the window. A police car glowered in the driveway.
“Crap!” I whispered. “The cops are here!”
Mark yawned and stretched. He sat up lazily and rubbed his head, which had fuzzed over and needed a shave. “So open the door,” he said.
I hesitated. It was probably Gwen, and even though I hadn’t officially liked her for years, it’s still not my favorite thing to be so unkempt and unshowered in front of a gorgeous Viking.
“Don’t you want to at least put some pants on?” I said. Mark’s preferred nightwear is no shirt and whatever enormous shabby boxer shorts he wore that day. They’re not quite as ridiculous as that Dick Van Dyke swimsuit in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, but the two could definitely hang out.
Mark smirked. “I’m good. I’ll start the conversation while you do your makeup.”
“Whatever,” I said, sizzling. A less classy Pete would have said, “Screw you,” but that’s not my style.
I opened the door. Gwen strode in, in full cop dress as always, followed by a mildly heavy cop in his mid-forties with a strong chin and bright, nervous eyes.
Mark leaned one bare muscular arm on the couch and grinned up at Gwen. “You’re up early.”
If his outfit or lack thereof affected her at all, she didn’t flick an eyelash. “It’s ten-thirty.”
“On a Saturday,” he said.
Her sidekick spoke with a squeak of tremulous importance. “We’re here to ask you about last night.”
“Oh?” Mark said. “I thought you were just hoping to catch me in my underwear.”
Gwen stiffened. It was like the opposite of a blush — she got, if possible, even paler. “Mr. Falcon, if you think you have the right—”
“I didn’t mean you,” Mark said. “I meant your friend here.”
Her sidekick goggled. “Me?”
Mark grinned. “Just kidding, bro.” Then he cocked his head and gave him a more careful look. “Actually, maybe I will get some pants on,” he said seriously. He hopped over the couch and skipped to his bedroom.
The sidekick blushed scarlet. “I don’t … is he implying …”
I hadn’t thought of this angle, that you might vibe when dudes liked you.
But Gwen cut him off. “Drop it,” she said firmly. “Mr. Falcon takes a special pleasure in being an idiot.”
The sidekick looked relieved.
Mark sauntered out in a tank top and jean shorts, vaulted back over the couch, and grinned at Gwen. “Take a seat,” he said.
Stiffly, Gwen turned one of the table chairs towards Mark and sat. In a cold, official tone, she said, “Last night, Sibyl Samson was found strangled to death in her home.”
Mark’s face clouded. “I’m sorry
to hear that,” he said.
“Apparently you already did. Ceci told us you were actually listening on the phone as she was killed. Why did you call her?”
“She called us!” I said.
Mark flicked me a warning glance.
Gwen sighed. “We’re going to check her phone records anyway.”
“You couldn’t just look on her phone?” Mark said sharply.
The sidekick, who’d taken a chair beside Gwen, piped up. “We couldn’t locate her phone.”
Mark cocked his head and eyed him. “Or her laptop,” he said.
“That’s right,” said the sidekick. “Wait—”
“Why wouldn’t we find her laptop?” Gwen said.
“Because the night before Lindsay died, she texted Sibyl that she wanted to show her something,” Mark said. “Something she couldn’t explain over a text. And the minute before Sibyl died, she had logged into Lindsay’s account and was searching her photos.”
“And?” Gwen said. She glanced my way to corroborate the story, and when I nodded, she leaned forward, a rare excitement gleaming in her eyes. “What did she find?”
“We don’t know,” Mark said bleakly. “But whatever it was, she was horrified.”
Gwen grunted in frustration. Then she brightened. “We’ll see what Samson has to say about that.”
“Are you talking to him next?” I said.
Mark eyed the sidekick, who looked quickly away, like he’d been staring. “They already have him in custody,” Mark said.
The sidekick looked seriously startled, and even Gwen’s eyes flickered with surprise.
“Fidelio?” I said. “But he couldn’t have done it!”
“Dude!” Mark snapped. “Let’s not push our amateur theories on the cops.”
I stared at him. Fidelio was under arrest, and we were going to not tell the cops we’d physically seen him during the actual murder?
Mark’s frown was clear. Nope. We weren’t.
But without even looking at her, I could also feel Gwen’s Laser Focus Suspicious Stare.
Mark vs. Gwen. Great.
Well. I had to grow up sometime.
I swallowed. “Sorry. Good call, Mark.”
I considered that a win, but Gwen was just getting started. “Why couldn’t Fidelio Samson have killed his wife, Pete?” she said, with icy calm.