by Dana Dratch
I rapped on the door again. “Candy-gram!”
I tried peeking through the curtains but couldn’t see a thing. So I slipped my hand inside my jacket pocket and used it as a glove to press down the door lever. It gave.
“What did you do, Lucy?”
“Hey, Ethel, it’s open.”
“What’s with the jacket trick?”
“No fingerprints. If she gets mad and calls the cops, there’s no physical proof we let ourselves in. It’s her word against ours.”
“B&E 101? The things they teach in J-schools these days.”
“If the door’s unlocked, it’s not breaking. Just entering.”
“Thanks, Ruth Bader Ginsburg. I’ll be sure to remember that when Bruiser asks what I’m in for.”
I pushed the door open with my foot and called in, “Jennifer! Hey, Jennifer, it’s Trip and Alex.”
“Oh sure, do something semi-illegal and suddenly I get top billing,” Trip hissed.
“Well, she likes you,” I whispered back.
“We thought you might be hungry,” I shouted, stepping across the threshold. “So we brought you a little something!”
In that moment, I knew.
The room was a wreck. And the smell. Metallic. Jennifer wasn’t upstairs calling the cops. Jennifer wasn’t going to be calling anyone ever again.
I forced myself to look across the room. And that’s when I saw her. Almost hidden behind one sofa, her forearm covering her head. Her long brown hair matted with blood.
“Oh. My. God,” I breathed. “Oh, God. Oh, God. Oh, Trip! Oh, God.”
My knees felt like jelly. For a split second, I thought they were going to buckle. I took a giant step back. Right into Trip. He clamped an arm around my shoulder.
“Come on, honey. Let’s get out of here. We can’t help her now. We’ll call the cops from the car.”
“This isn’t right. This is so wrong. They can’t get away with this.”
“They won’t. But we have to leave. It’s not safe here. Come on.”
I didn’t want to look. Yet it seemed wrong to look away—like I was ignoring someone in pain or need.
“Oh, God, give me a sec.” I forced my eyes to sweep the room. The place had been savaged.
A glass coffee table was completely shattered. What had probably been a tall bookcase was now nothing but shards of glass and a toppled teak frame. Books and sharp pieces of colored glass and pottery were strewn across the room.
A set of low, sleek black leather sofas had been slashed end to end, leaving traces of blood on the leather and exposed stuffing. Meaning someone had killed first, then used the same weapon to brutalize the sofas.
Finally, I brought my eyes full circle to Jennifer. That’s when I saw it. Next to her elbow.
My stomach dropped.
One delicate, silver earring. My earring. One of the pair that belonged in the box I’d found in Walters’ desk.
I took a step toward her. Trip moved his arm to block me. “What the hell are you doing?”
“Trip, that’s my earring.”
He craned his neck and squinted. “Next to her arm? Oh, shit. This just gets better and better.” Still balancing the cake box in his other hand, he dropped the phone into his jacket pocket and fished around.
“Here, at least use this,” he said, proffering a starched linen handkerchief. “It’s monogrammed. So try not to get blood on it.”
“Like you’re ever going to use it again.”
“I’m going to burn it as soon as we get back to your house. But I don’t want to be arrested for murder before I can destroy evidence. See? I went to J-school, too.”
I stood as far from Jennifer as humanly possible, leaned over, grabbed the earring with Trip’s handkerchief, and stuffed the whole wad into my jeans pocket. Then I crossed myself.
“OK, not to be selfish, but do you see anything else that could in any way be linked to me?”
“Hey,” he said. “Do you smell that?”
“I’m honestly trying not to.”
“Not that,” he said. “The perfume. Do you smell perfume?”
“Oscar.”
“Oscar,” he confirmed. “Did Jennifer wear it, too?”
“Un-uh,” I said. “Opium. It was her trademark.”
“Then it’s official, sweetheart. Someone is definitely trying to pin this one on you.”
Chapter 47
In the next fifteen minutes, neither of us said five words.
Thanks to Trip’s knowledge of the neighborhood, we were able to hoof it two blocks up and double-back to the car.
“Do you think anyone saw us?” I asked, once we were headed for the highway.
“I hope not. Knowing Sweetie, she’ll put my arrest photo on her next Christmas card.”
“What do you think the police are going to do when they find out I tampered with evidence?”
“Technically, the murderer tampered with evidence by planting your earring,” he said. “You just tidied up for the CSI guys.”
“If anybody saw us, I’m going to jail,” I said.
“You? What about me? I brought cupcakes to a crime scene.”
“Spill your guts to the cops. At worst, you’ll just be an accessory.”
“And you know what they say, ‘accessories are everything.’”
“Thank you,” I said.
“For what?”
“If I had to find a body with anyone, I’m glad it was you.”
“I wonder if Hallmark makes a card for that?”
“God, I hope not.” I popped open the bakery box and inhaled the scent of frosting.
Trip looked over. “You can’t possibly be hungry.”
“Aromatherapy. I’ve got to get that metallic smell out of my nose. Besides, at this rate, I may never eat again. Or wear Oscar. God, Trip, I just keep seeing her. We knew her. With Coleman, it was almost theoretical. I knew he’d been killed. But I never actually saw the body. But seeing Jennifer. Like that. Whoever did that was evil. Just pure evil. And it had to be Walters.”
He nodded, grim. “With the earring and the perfume, that’d be my guess. The problem is, we have no proof.”
“Thanks to me. The same evidence that implicated him also pointed to me. And I took it.”
“You did what you had to do,” he said. “At this point, we’re playing defense. And admittedly not great defense. I think we’re going to have to move you and that traveling circus you call a family out to the Farm until the cops lock up someone besides us.”
“Something’s bugging me,” I said.
“The fact that we just found a body? Or that the murderer is your ex-boss? Or that he’s framing you?”
“Besides all that.”
“At this point, if we have bigger worries, I’m not sure I want to hear them.”
“Ripping the place apart like that. The love nest? That doesn’t feel like Walters. That feels like Margaret.”
“Yeah,” he agreed. “And I can see her Hulking out like that. What I can’t see is her then dusting off her hands, spraying around a little perfume and tossing an earring over her shoulder on the way out the door.”
“Maybe her meds finally kicked in,” I ventured. “Or her booze ran out.”
“I’m beginning to wonder if C&W is home to more than one homicidal maniac. What the hell are they putting in that coffee?”
“Vodka and fistfuls of money.”
“We hit the house,” Trip said. “Tell everybody what happened, grab toothbrushes and the beast, and we can be at the Farm in thirty minutes. Once we’re there, you can call Holloman, and see what we do.”
“Fine.” I grabbed my purse and dug through it for my phone. I dialed Nick.
No answer.
Trip took the I-66 on-ramp. “Red, it’s going to be OK,” he shouted over the wind.
“She mentioned me,” I hollered back.
“What?”
“On the recording,” I yelled. “When Jennifer was trying to blackmail Walters.
She said I was investigating C&W. That I was looking into things there. She was right, even if she didn’t know it. And now she’s dead.”
Trip steered the Corvette into the far left-hand lane and pressed the gas pedal to the floor.
Chapter 48
Nick’s car was there when we pulled into my driveway.
“Hey, no fair jumping out until I come to a full stop,” Trip hollered.
“Just need to do a quick head count and make sure everyone’s OK,” I said, running for the door.
But the house was quiet. Everyone was gone. So were Nick’s platters of cupcakes, cookies, and scones. All that was left in the kitchen was the lingering scent of baked goods, mingling with the smell of the goulash still simmering on the back of the stove.
I ran from room to room.
Nothing. No one.
My heart dropped to my stomach.
“Red! Come quick!”
I ran toward the bathroom and Trip’s voice.
He was bending over something crumpled on the floor. A motionless, auburn lump.
Lucy.
“Oh, my God!” I said. “What happened!”
“I walked in, and she tried to stand up and just collapsed,” he said. “Her breathing’s labored.”
I looked into her liquid brown eyes and saw pain.
Trip gently stroked her side. Lucy flinched. She let out a low whine, then went quiet and her eyes fluttered shut.
“We’ve got to get her to a vet. Now. Where the hell is everybody?” I scooped her up and ran for the car.
When I hit the porch, Nick, Gabby, and Baba were coming up the walk.
“Lucy’s hurt,” I said. “Bad. We’ve got to get her to the vet. I don’t even know where her vet is.”
“Lucy? Baby? How’s my little baby?” Nick crooned.
Lucy stirred and licked his hand, but didn’t open her eyes. She let out another soft moan.
“I know where it is,” Nick said. “Eighth and Poplar. We took her there for her puppy shots last week.”
“Will they be open now?” Trip asked.
Nick nodded. “They have an animal ER that’s twenty-four hours.”
“Good man,” Trip said. “You take Lucy, and I’ll drive. We’ll see just how fast that car of mine can fly. Alex, you load everybody into Nick’s car and meet us there. Eighth and Poplar. No stops.” He gave me a meaningful look.
Nick took Lucy from my arms, talking to her the whole time. “Come on, baby. Come to Daddy. Open your eyes. Look at Daddy. Time to rise and shine, little girl.”
Lucy let out another low moan. She opened her eyes. Then closed them again. Her breathing was ragged.
Nick carried her to the Corvette, cradling her like a dozen eggs wrapped in dynamite.
A half-minute later, Trip gunned the engine and they were gone.
“We were just out of the house for a few minutes,” Gabby said. “We had to carry the stuff over to Sir Ian’s place for the party. Nick puppy-proofed the bathroom and put her in there so she wouldn’t get into trouble.”
I ran into the house and turned off the stove, ran back out, and locked the front door. Gabby and Baba were already in the car. I climbed in the passenger side, and we were off.
At the first red light, I glanced into the backseat at Baba. She was kneading her hands, mouth in a grim line.
I reached around and gave her a quick pat. She nodded but didn’t smile.
“Look, there’s no easy way to say this . . .” I started.
“Sugar, she’s going to be fine,” Gabby interrupted, never taking her eyes off the road. “We have to think positive.”
“Not that. When Trip and I were out, we went to visit Jennifer Stiles.” To Baba, I said, “She’s a woman who used to work at my old P.R. firm.”
“The glamorous one who was boin . . . uh . . . involved with your boss?” Gabby asked.
“That’s the one. And they weren’t just involved. She was pregnant. She tried to blackmail the other partner, Walters, for a piece of the company. She was also threatening to help the state and federal regulators. And she was promising to talk to me, too.”
“That girl wouldn’t last a week in Las Vegas,” Gabby said, shaking her head.
“She’s dead.”
“Nooo-ooo.”
“Unfortunately, yes. When Trip and I showed up, we found her. It was pretty awful.”
I slid my eyes over to the rear-view mirror and saw Baba quickly cross herself.
“Anyway, we all have to get the heck out of Dodge for a couple of days, until they catch whoever it is. Trip’s family owns a place in Manassas. He’s going to put us up. It’s remote, they have their own security, and no one will think to look for us there.”
“You really think that’s necessary? I mean, you weren’t threatening anybody. Or sleeping with anybody.”
“We have Jennifer on tape saying I was calling her, trying to get an interview. And she was promising to spill everything to me. Whoever killed her might have wanted to shut her up. But they probably don’t know she never talked to me. Which means I’m in danger. Which means anyone around me is in danger, too.”
“Is that what happened to Lucy? Did someone poison her?”
“She was in a closed bathroom inside a locked house, so I don’t think so.”
Please, God, I hope not.
When the three of us hustled into the vet’s office, Trip was sitting in the waiting room alone.
“They’re examining her and running a few tests,” he said. “Nick is with her.”
Baba planted herself in the chair closest to the front entrance and fixed her gaze on the doors that led to the exam areas.
Gabby sank into the chair next to Trip. “It’s funny. But Lucy just took to Nick right off. The first time she saw him, she acted like he was some long-lost relative. Wriggled into his lap and stayed there. I mean, I found her in an alley and brought her home. But Nick? The love of her life.”
I had noticed that. It was one of the reasons I loved that crazy dog so much. She adored him.
Twenty minutes later Nick came out to the waiting room. His face was dry, but his eyes were red, and his lashes were still clumped together.
“They palpated her gut. There’s a blockage. She’s getting weaker by the minute, so they don’t want to wait. They’re operating now. She’s so small.” His voice broke, and Gabby wrapped her arms around him. Baba materialized silently beside us. Trip reached out and took my hand.
For the next two hours, we all clustered together, like a living worry knot.
When the vet finally came through the swinging doors, I tried to read her face. Concern. Exhaustion.
We gathered protectively around Nick.
“She made it through the surgery. And we got all of the obstruction. But she’s very weak. She’s a mixed breed, and she was in excellent health prior to this, so that’s on her side. But she’s still a puppy. Tonight’s going to be critical. I wish I had better news.”
“What was it?” Nick asked. “The blockage?”
“A sock.”
“A sock?” Trip repeated.
“An athletic sock,” the vet said, nodding. “She ate it. Probably sometime in the last twenty-four hours. She managed to swallow it, but the bigger pieces got lodged in her stomach and small intestine.”
“She’d been quiet most of the day,” Nick said. “She was curled up under the kitchen table. I was so wrapped up in the damn baking, I just thought she was dozing and enjoying the smell of food.”
“Until it became acute, there wouldn’t have been any symptoms to notice,” the vet said. “Her appetite may have been a little off, but that’s about it.”
“Everyone always feeds her behind my back. I didn’t think anything of it.”
The vet smiled. “So she’s a little moocher, huh?”
Nick nodded.
“You’re welcome to stay with her tonight. I’ve noticed it seems to help when they know their people are around. I’ll be here throughout to keep
an eye on her.”
We all nodded. The pup was small, but she belonged to a large pack.
“Definitely,” Nick said. “Is she awake? Can I see her?”
“I’ll take you back now. She’s still out, but she ought to be coming around in the next ten minutes or so.”
Gabby gave him a hug, and Baba patted his back.
“Tell her we’re all here,” I said.
Nick smiled. “I’ll tell her.” He gave a little wave and disappeared behind the swinging doors.
“Looks like the Farm will have to wait a day,” I whispered to Trip.
“The idea was to get you all out of the house, to some place a crazed psycho killer wouldn’t find you,” he said. “I’m betting an animal E.R. definitely qualifies.”
Chapter 49
Nobody slept much that night.
I stretched out over two chairs and caught about an hour. Baba nodded off sitting up, only to jerk awake when her head almost hit her own shoulder.
Gabby found the coffeepot in the break room and kept it going all night. For sheer acid, it gave the cop shop a run for its money.
And we all took turns with Lucy.
I read to her from the children’s books I found in the lobby. Nick told her about the fun they were going to have when she came home. Trip read her restaurant reviews from the paper—putting special emphasis on the meatier words, like “filet mignon” and “roasted pork.” Baba spoke softly to her in Russian.
Through it all, the pup dozed.
And Gabby more than lived up to her name. She marched into the recovery room armed with an Us magazine from the back of Nick’s car. When I walked in, she was going off-the-cuff about who was dating who in Hollywood.
“Run out of magazine?”
“Hell, that thing is two weeks old. Half those couples have split by now.”
“You gotta keep the little dog current.”
“Your brother named her, you know.”
I shook my head.
“I was still calling her ‘Puppy.’ The first time he saw her, he started calling her ‘Lucy.’ I asked him why. He said, ‘She’s a crazy redhead, and she’s into everything.’ Then he did his silly Desi Arnaz voice, ‘Heeey, Loo-cy?’ She just went nuts and started licking his face.”