Don’t listen to him, Karen told herself. He’s a ruthless, dangerous liar.
“Karen, it’s no use. I can see your blood on the roof. Come on in, I just want to talk.”
Sure, thought Karen. Just broke into your house in the middle of the night for a chat. And maybe to play a little golf.
“Karen! Stop this nonsense!” He sounded closer. He was out on the roof. “I can hear the baby, Karen. This is dangerous. Bring the baby inside and we’ll talk!”
Karen peeked over the top of the chimney. Matthew was no more than twenty feet away, moving toward her with short, careful steps. He wore cleated golf shoes with dark socks. The shoes clung to the wet shingles, but Matthew’s feet were half out of them because of the roof’s steep slant. He held the golf club in front of himself like a balancing pole. At the rate he was going, he would reach her in seconds.
Now was the time to scream. She gave it her best shot, but she could tell it was ineffectual amid the pounding rain.
“Come on, Karen! At least give me the baby. There’s no reason the baby has to get hurt. Don’t sacrifice your baby, for Crissake!”
She saw no alternative. He had her. She started to rise. Then she squatted back down. No! she told herself. God knows what he’ll extort if he gets the baby from you. Don’t cooperate. Don’t participate. Whatever he does, he does without your help.
“Give me the baby, Karen!”
She took another look. Matthew was ten feet away and making progress. There was nothing else she could think of to do. She felt horrid regret for her decision to try to hide on the roof, instead of standing her ground and attempting to defend herself inside. Out here, it took all her strength and concentration just to avoid falling. She regretted confronting Matthew, regretted going through his desk, regretted ever getting involved in the Winslow case at all. Putting her mouth to her baby’s ear, she whispered, “I’m sorry, McKinley. Mommy is so sorry for letting this happen to you.”
Matthew’s golf shoes squeaked on the shingles. He was only a few feet away. Karen looked down at McKinley, who had strangely become still, again. Beyond his face she could see rainwater, tinged pink with her blood, running along the flashing at the base of the chimney.
Next to her right foot, a small pool of rainwater had collected in a dent in the flashing. Maybe there was one thing left for her to do. Keep a promise.
Holding tight to the capstone of the chimney with her right hand, Karen bent forward and dipped the fingers of her left hand into the cool rainwater. “Anyone can perform a baptism,” Jake had said. She touched her moistened fingers to her child’s brow.
“McKinley . . . Decker . . . Hayes.” Karen was surprised at the calmness of her own voice. “I baptize you in the name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost.”
A thin shadow passed across her son’s face. Karen instinctively slid her right hand along the capstone. The head of the nine iron struck the chimney in the spot where her hand had been. A chip of concrete flew into her eye, and she tasted bile in her mouth. She moved her hand back the other way and managed to grab hold of the club head for a moment. Matthew jerked it away and had to struggle to regain his balance. Seeing his unsteadiness, Karen flushed with the realization that she might actually have a fighting chance. Matthew looked straight into her face.
“Fucking little bitch.” He spat the words at her. “Who the hell do you think you’re dealing with?”
As if in response, a voice called out, “Stoker!”
Matt twisted awkwardly at the waist and neck to look back at the house. Karen craned her neck to see around him. Jake had one foot inside the attic and one foot on the roof. He held the large brass cymbal from his trap set across his chest, with his wrist cocked.
“Catch,” said Jake. He extended his arm, snapped his wrist, and the heavy brass disc was airborne. It covered the distance from Jake’s hand to the bridge of Matt’s nose in an instant, snapping Matthew’s head back and dislodging his glasses. The cymbal landed on its edge, rolled down the roof and crashed onto the patio. Matt’s glasses slid into the gutter. He took a half step backward down the roof and reached out with his hands to balance himself. The head of his nine iron wavered in the air, inches from Karen’s nose. She gave it a yank.
Matt dropped the club and landed on his backside with a whump that shook the roof. He slid about a foot and stopped, spread-eagled. The heel of one shoe was hooked on a curled-up corner of a shingle. His fingers clawed ineffectively at the wet roof. Blood poured from the gash on the bridge of his nose, pooling in his eyes. He seemed to be wearing glasses with opaque red lenses.
“Help me,” he pleaded. “Help me.”
Karen did not respond. Matthew tilted his head up to look at her. He was drenched from the rain. Blood ran down his wet cheeks in thick rivulets. Karen felt her fear and anger soften at the pitiable sound of his voice.
“Please, help me.”
Karen glanced at her baby on her breast, then looked back at Matthew. “Sorry, Matthew,” she said. “No can do.”
Matt struggled to sit up, his eyes fierce with determination. But the heel of his golf shoe came free from the shingle. He traveled down the steep, slick surface of the roof like a runaway ski and disappeared headfirst over the eaves. Karen turned away and skrieked at the sound of cranium colliding with concrete at high speed. When she opened her eyes, Jake was perched atop the chimney with his hand reaching out to her. She reached back, and Jake helped his family back into the warm, dry safety of their house.
“Why . . . how . . . Oh, Jesus . . . what are you doing here?”
“Inviolable Rule Number One,” said Jake. “I figured it works both ways. I called from the gig, like I said I would, right after the first set. When I got no answer, I blew off the gig and headed home. I kept trying to call while I was driving. I got really worried when the line went dead. I saw you guys silhouetted on the roof a block away.”
Karen buried her face in Jake’s chest. Her legs were spaghetti, her body trembling from wet, cold and shock. McKinley was sandwiched between his parents in the baby carrier, gurgling as if he preferred near death in the rain to a bottle of milk.
“We better call 911,” said Jake. “Although from what I saw I don’t think it’ll do Matt Stoker much good.”
“Is he . . . ?”
“The human neck is not designed to fold at that angle. It’s a terrible shame. I feel sick about it. I might puke.” He sat down heavily on the top step of the attic stairs.
Karen looked down at her husband reproachfully. “How can you say that? He murdered Lorraine Winslow, and he just tried to kill your wife and son!”
Jake cocked his eyebrows sympathetically and shrugged. “He appreciated jazz. I figure any cat who liked Rahsaan Roland Kirk cannot have been all bad.”
“Don’t be so sure,” said Karen. “He may have been jivin’ you, too.”
CHAPTER
30
“There is nothing so exhilarating,” Jake had said, quoting Churchill, “than to be shot at to no avail.̵ For the next two weeks, Karen was in the crosshairs. The physical evidence and Jake’s statement supported her version of how Matthew had ended up dead on their patio. Anne Delaney’s statement and her notes from the cell phone conversation with Matthew bolstered Karen’s account of how Lorraine Winslow had been murdered. But Detective Lopopolo, fueled by defensiveness and vindictiveness, kept the investigation of both deaths open.
Then, in mid-July, Karen received some unexpected help. Ed Luebsdorf, her former secretary’s boyfriend, had taken off for parts unknown with a large cash payoff from Matthew and two gold Rolex watches. After a couple of weeks on the road, Ed found himself overcome with yearning for Margaret. He called her and made a tearful apology for deserting her so suddenly and for swiping her Rolex. Margaret agreed to meet Ed and told him she forgave him.
She lied.
By the time Ed called Margaret, she already had a new boyfriend, a medical resident. When Ed showed up to meet Margaret, he
was met instead by police, who coaxed a confession out of him in twelve hours. The Lorraine Winslow murder was put to bed, along with the death of Matthew Stoker.
The closing of the police investigation into Matthew’s death, however, did not end the matter for Karen and Jake. An Astroturf remnant covered the hideous reddish-brown stain on the patio, but memories of Matthew’s grisly end lingered in the house like toxic mold. Karen was unable to get a decent night’s sleep, and she refused to let McKinley out of her sight. After weeks of discussion, she and Jake put their house on the market. They also arranged a formal baptism for McKinley.
Only Karen’s parents and the minister were in attendance at the short, simple ceremony, but there was an organist playing parts of Jake’s recently completed “Caledonia Suite.” Gene, moved by the music, asked Karen if she had selected the pieces. When Karen told her father the composer was his son-in-law, Gene first swept the floor with his eyes, searching for words, then looked at his daughter apologetically. “Tootsie Roll, I had no idea . . .” he said with a frog in his throat. Karen understood. She had also been stunned the first time she grasped the extent of Jake’s talent.
Her father straightened up and cleared his throat, regaining a bit of his usual parental demeanor. “You know, you should start McKinley on instrumental lessons as soon as possible. The boy has an ear, I can tell already.”
When it came time to hug her father good-bye, Karen clutched his shirtsleeve involuntarily. Gene took her hand, then grabbed one of Jake’s and said, “You take care of each other. You’re both very special.” He climbed into his car, where Elizabeth was waiting to drive him home.
“What’s got into your dad?” said Jake.
“Insight,” said Karen.
“Good timing,” said Jake. “He could have some really cool lives coming up.”
THE FOLLOWING JANUARY, Karen sat behind her desk at Shoreview Memorial Hospital, where she had resumed her position as in-house counsel after resigning her partnership at Van Dyke ~ Eddington. Dressed for the dank, chill day in a gray wool suit, Karen sorted through her mail. She started when she came upon a yellowed envelope with the name “D. Billick” above the return address. The letter inside was handwritten, the penmanship wobbly and uneven.
Dear Mrs. Hayes,
I do not write letters much, so I am sorry for how this looks. I heard about what you did, how you almost got yourself killed cleering me. I am writing this letter to thank you. You probly do not think much of me, with what you seen of me why would you. But if it wernt for you I would still be in jail, probly the rest of my life.
I been sober for near 3 months now and I been thinking how I could say thank you to a person who would do something like what you did. I thought maybe the best I could do is just try to do something with this second chance you given me. I signed into a program and this time I swear I will take it serious.
I know Shari is gone for good and I guess I deserve that. I guess I should stop trying to get things I do not deserve.
Thank you again.
Duane Billick
Good for him, thought Karen, even as she felt a flutter of insecurity. It seemed that Duane was recovering from Matthew Stoker better than she was. The move to a new house in a safe suburban neighborhood had not allayed the nightmares and periodic cold sweats that still plagued her.
She looked out her window through the bare branches of the sugar maple, observing with wonderment how the intricate pattern formed by the patchy melting snow on the brown grass below, by some wild coincidence, perfectly mimicked that of the broken clouds in the gray sky above, as if the ground were the still, reflective surface of a lake. As Karen noticed a vaguely familiar, elegantly coifed redhead approaching the hospital’s front steps, her attention was diverted by the sound of a man with a deep voice clearing his throat behind her. She rotated her chair. Arthur Winslow was standing in her doorway.
“Arthur!” Karen leapt from her chair and accepted a bear hug from her former boss. She had not seen him in six months. Arthur was tanned and fit. He wore a leather jacket over a brightly colored shirt with the collar turned up. His teeth seemed to have been either whitened or capped.
“You look great, Arthur.”
“So do you, Karen.” He settled into a guest chair and crossed his legs. “It’s wonderful to see you back where you belong, holding the hospital together.”
“I heard you’re living in Florida. How long are you planning to stay?”
Arthur made a gesture with his hands like an umpire calling a runner safe. “Permanently,” he said. “There’s nothing for me to come back to up here. Besides, the warm weather seems to suit me. My knee feels better, and my heart rhythm has straightened itself out.”
“Are you working?”
“I’m studying to take the Florida bar exam, believe it or not,” he said. “And doing a lot of fishing.”
“Sounds nice. How’s Amy?”
“Much better,” said Arthur. He opened his hands and raised them in a gesture of gratitude. “Thank God.”
At this gesture, Karen noticed a thin gold band on his ring finger. Not the gaudy diamond wedding ring he had formerly worn and had once described to her. Karen felt her eyes narrow involuntarily.
“Is that a different wedding ring?” she asked.
“Different wedding, different ring.”
“Arthur!” she exclaimed. “Who’s the lucky . . .” Karen paused. Diverse details that had floated about aimlessly in her brain for six months—Jake’s report from a smoky cocktail lounge, pieces of a strange jailhouse conversation, testimony from a tense deposition, an inexplicable entry in a motel register—suddenly collided with the image of a leggy redhead on the front steps of the hospital and made sense.
Karen blinked. “Don’t tell me,” she said. “You married Shari Billick.”
Color rose in Arthur’s cheeks and he flashed an expansive smile. “Well, actually,” he said, “she now goes by the name Sharon Winslow.”
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Michael Biehl graduated from Harvard College and Harvard Law School and was a partner at Foley & Lardner in Milwaukee, where he specialized in law governing health care systems. He’s also a professional musician, playing keyboard with regional blues bands. He and wife Cathleen live in Sarasota, Florida, and Mequon, Wisconsin. In 2007 Michael Biehl Park in Venice, Florida, was named in recognition of the author’s support of the Conservation Foundation of the Gulf Coast. In addition to the Karen Hayes series, he wrote Seven Mile Bridge, also published by Pineapple Press.
Here are some other books from Pineapple Press on related topics. For a complete catalog, write to Pineapple Press, P.O. Box 3889, Sarasota, Florida 34230-3889, or call (800) 746-3275. Or visit our website at www.pineapplepress.com.
Doctored Evidence by Michael Biehl. A medical device fails and the patient dies on the operating table. Was it an accident—or murder? Smart and courageous hospital attorney Karen Hayes must find out: Her job and her life depend on it.
Nursing a Grudge by Michael Biehl. An elderly nursing home resident, who was once an Olympic champion swimmer with a murky background in the German army, drowns in a lake behind the home. Does anyone know how it happened? Does anyone care? Hospital attorney Karen Hayes battles bureaucracy, listens to the geriatric residents ignored by the authorities, and risks her own life to find the truth.
Seven Mile Bridge by Michael Biehl. Florida Keys dive shop owner Jonathan Bruckner returns home to Wisconsin after his mother’s death, searching for clues to his father’s death years before. He is stunned by what he discovers about his father’s life and comes to know his parents in a way he never did as a child. Mostly, he’s surprised by what he learns about himself. Fluidly moving between past and present, between hope and despair, Seven Mile Bridge is a story about one man’s obsession for the truth and how much can depend on finding it.
Conflict of Interest by Terry Lewis. Trial lawyer Ted Stevens fights his own battles, including his alcoholism and his pending divorc
e, as he fights for his client in a murder case. But it’s the other suspect in the case who causes the conflict of interest. Ted must choose between concealing evidence that would be helpful to his client and revealing it, thereby becoming a suspect himself.
Privileged Information by Terry Lewis. Ted Stevens’ partner, Paul Morganstein, is defending his late brother’s best friend on a murder charge when he obtains privileged information leading him to conclude that his client committed another murder thirty years earlier. The victim? Paul’s brother. Faced with numerous difficulties, Paul must decide if he will divulge privileged information.
Delusional by Terry Lewis. Ted Stevens’ new client is a mental patient who is either a delusional, psychotic killer or an innocent man framed for the murder of his psychologist—or maybe both. Ted needs to uncover the truth quickly. His life, and that of his family, will depend on it.
Secrets of San Blas by Charles Farley. Most towns have their secrets. In the 1930s, Port St. Joe on the Gulf in Florida’s Panhandle has more than its share. Old Doc Berber, the town’s only general practitioner, thought he knew all of the secrets, but a grisly murder out at the Cape San Blas Lighthouse drags him into a series of intrigues that even he can’t diagnose.
Secrets of St. Vincent by Charles Farley. Things are not always as serene as they seem in the little Florida Panhandle village of Port St. Joe. When bluesman Reggie Robinson is wrongly arrested for the gruesome murder of Sheriff Byrd “Dog” Batson, old Doc Berber and his best friend, Gator Mica, mount a Quixotic search for the real killer on savage St. Vincent Island. If they survive the frightening adventure, they’ll return with the shocking secrets that will shatter the town’s tranquility forever.
Death in Bloodhound Red by Virginia Lanier. Jo Beth Sidden is a Georgia peach with an iron pit. She raises and trains bloodhounds for search-and-rescue missions in the Okefenokee Swamp. In an attempt to save a friend from ruin, she organizes an illegal operation that makes a credible alibi impossible just when she needs one most: She’s indicted for attempted murder. If the victim dies, the charge will be murder one.
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