by Liliana Hart
“I’m glad you didn’t shoot him,” he said. “The paperwork would’ve gone on for years.”
“And it would’ve made a great headline for Floyd to use against you. Sheriff’s Wife in Drug-Related Shootout.”
I saw the corner of Jack’s lip twitch as we headed toward home. We’d only had a slight detour, and I was hoping the lasagna was still warm.
I didn’t feel myself relaxing until we turned onto Heresy Road and headed toward the house. Despite the fact it had been anything but a safe haven a few months ago when my father had decided to remove a couple of walls with an explosion that had almost cost us our lives—it had cost Lewis his—and I tried not to think about it every time the house came into view.
It had been my mother who’d taken my father’s life. She’d been a double agent for the CIA the entire time, and her death two years before had been as fake as my father’s. The life I’d known had been a lie, but my stability came with Jack. He was my family. He always had been. I no longer had to worry about my father. My mother had crawled back under whatever covert rock she was working under. And our lives had relatively returned to normal.
And though I’d hated the months of constant construction to fix the house, it hadn’t been all bad. I’d gotten to make some decisions on colors, flooring, and furniture, which made it feel more like our house than me just moving into Jack’s house after we’d gotten married.
We turned into the driveway and the three-story log structure came into view. The exterior lights were on, and so were the new lights that had been set up around the perimeter for security. I’d always loved Jack’s house, even before we’d married. It was surrounded by towering pines, and the rough timbers on the outside blended in with the landscape.
“Please tell me you’re not going to have to go back in tonight,” I said, thinking about the lasagna, a glass of wine, and the possibility of a bath for two. The tacos had been more of an appetizer, and I felt like I’d burned a lot of calories back at the gas station. The adrenaline was starting to wane, and I knew from experience I’d either fall asleep where I was standing or I’d have more energy than I knew what to do with.
“I’m not going anywhere tonight,” he said. “The guys have this one covered, the power company is still working on the downed lines. And everyone has finally been accounted for who was missing after the storm. You’re thinking about the lasagna, aren’t you?”
“You know me well,” I said.
“Then I suggest we get food and wine, and call it a night.”
I was a little disappointed. I’d been hoping we could connect in other ways, but I understood how tired he was, though maybe I’d earned a few extra points with my French toast-making skills that morning.
He parked the Tahoe in the garage since the window was missing, and we headed to the front door.
“Come on,” I said. “You’re asleep on your feet. We’ll eat quick.”
He unlocked the door and pushed it open, and the lights came on automatically when we walked across the threshold. Jack dumped his keys in the carved wooden bowl on the entry table.
I made a very unladylike sound as I was scooped up and tossed over Jack’s shoulder.
“What are you doing?”
“I didn’t say anything about going to sleep,” he said, smacking me on the behind. “I just said we should call it a night. I hope you don’t mind cold lasagna.”
“I love it,” I said.
I felt like I’d been run over by a Mack truck the next morning. It was Sunday, and I was hoping Reverend Thomas would understand why we’d be missing morning services. Not that I was going to tell him. He’d probably be more understanding about Jack’s insane work schedule for the week instead of the fact that I was too tired from a night of debauchery. Though I’m not sure married sex counted as debauchery. Unless you were married to Jack.
I was on my second cup of coffee and my eyes hadn’t uncrossed yet. I tried not to let it show on my face because Jack’s ego was big enough as it was, but he smirked every time he looked at me, so I could only guess I was failing.
“Want breakfast?” he asked.
I grunted. “And stop smirking. Nobody likes a show-off.” I refilled my coffee cup from the carafe he’d sat in front of me.
“You’re going to need your strength today,” he continued, irritatingly cheerful. Jack was what I liked to call “a morning person.” His eyes were bright from the second they opened, and his mouth opened not long after. I had no idea what happened from the time he closed his eyes at night to when he woke the next morning, but he always had something to say. I was the opposite of Jack. I couldn’t form actual words for at least an hour after I woke up.
“I’m so glad you asked why,” Jack said, putting fat slabs of bacon on to fry. “I keep thinking about how the body was posed. I want to run like crimes through the FBI database and see if we get a hit.”
That got my attention. “You think the killer is a pro?”
“I think this wasn’t his first kill,” Jack said. “I combed through your report early this morning. Things like the heavy-gauge wire and the use of a cattle prod are different enough. But the way he was posed…”
I stayed silent. Jack wasn’t really talking to me. He was thinking it through out loud. “The positioning of the body,” he said. “It’s almost a Christlike pose, like on the cross. If I remember my Bible history correctly, Judas Iscariot bought a field and hanged himself there after he betrayed Jesus for thirty pieces of silver.”
“The Field of Blood,” I said.
Jack nodded and poured pancake batter on the griddle. “Exactly. He hanged himself, and as he hung in the sunlight, it says his body burst and all his guts spilled out onto the field. Seems a little too coincidental since he was gutted postmortem.”
“Reverend Thomas would be proud of you,” I said. “You’re probably the only person who makes it through his sermons without falling asleep.”
He grinned and said, “John Donnelly is a traitor in many people’s books. We just need to find out who he kissed on the cheek and betrayed.”
“I’m going to assume you’re going to call Carver,” I said. “I’m sure he’ll be thrilled. Michelle said he’s driving her crazy working from home. Apparently, he talks constantly.”
“He’ll be back behind a desk in his office in another couple of weeks,” Jack said.
Ben Carver was Jack’s best friend, and he technically worked for the FBI, even though he was kind of an entity unto himself. He didn’t really have a boss, and he wasn’t really required to follow the rules. I had no idea what his title was, but he could get just about any piece of information, no matter how small, on just about anyone in the world. Which was terrifying, and why I was glad he was our friend and not our enemy.
Carver had been another victim of my father’s crimes, and he was lucky to be alive. He’d had been run off the road and a tree had stopped his fall on the way into a ravine. Just about everything in Carver’s body had been broken, and it had taken months of surgeries and rehabs before he’d been released to go home. He still had surgeries and rehab ahead of him, probably years of both, but he was alive, and he’d managed to keep all his limbs. More importantly, he’d managed to keep his brain despite the scare that he’d have permanent damage. Carver’s brain was a thing to behold.
Jack put a plate in front of me, and I almost wept at the smell. I stopped just long enough to douse everything in syrup before I shoved food into my mouth.
“How did I get so lucky?” I asked around a bit of pancake. “You cook, you’re good looking, and you have premium bedroom skills. I feel like a real slacker.”
Jack’s lips twitched. “You are. But I love you anyway.”
I grinned, feeling much more alert. I was already thinking about taking up where we’d left off the night before.
“I can never tell if it’s food or sex that puts that look in your eye,” Jack said, sitting across from me with his own plate.
“Could be
both,” I said around a bite of pancake, “But this time it’s sex.”
“Good to know. We can multitask in the shower before I call Carver. I need to go into the station this morning and check on things. It must’ve been a full moon or something last night. The criminals were out in full force. Car theft, attempted burglary, shots fired by some drunk moron in his backyard, and three domestic disputes, one of which ended up with a woman in the hospital with multiple broken bones, and Officer Hops in the ER with eighteen stitches to the side of her eye where she got clocked with a broken vase.”
“Wowza,” I said. “Maybe Cole was right. We had a reprieve from crime the last couple of months and now it’s payback time.”
Jack groaned. “Don’t say that. Cops are a superstitious lot. Last time we had a rash of crimes, Smith wore a garlic necklace for a month and Walters stopped changing his socks. It’s just the season. Halloween seems to bring out the crazy in people. Just like Christmas. Crime always spikes around those holidays.”
We finished breakfast, and I somehow managed to find the energy to stay upright while we multitasked in the shower. By the time we got out and dressed, my coffee had kicked in and my brain was functioning on all cylinders. I felt like I could conquer the world.
I gathered up all the dirty clothes and headed to the laundry room while Jack followed behind me with the phone, waiting for Carver to pick up. I was full of energy and feeling very domestic.
“If it isn’t my favorite crime-fighting duo,” Carver said by way of greeting.
“I thought Batman and Robin were your favorite,” I said, dumping the clothes in the washing machine. I heard something rattle and then dug around in the machine until I extracted extra bullets that Jack had put in his pocket. I gave him a look and he shrugged. I’d washed some weird things since we’d been married. Who’d have known life as a cop’s wife could be so exciting.
“I just like the costumes,” Carver said. “Sometimes I dress up as Batman for Michelle. She likes to be Robin. That’s how we ended up with Iris.”
Iris was their infant who’d been born while Carver was still in the hospital.
“Lies!” I heard Michelle yell through the phone.
I chuckled. Carver and Michelle always brightened up my day.
“What have you got for me?” Carver asked. “I’m assuming you didn’t just call to talk. You never do that. You’re a texter. I enjoy your memes by the way. Very clever. But you only call when you have a case you need my help with.”
Jack had known Carver a lot longer than I had, but we both knew the best way to deal with him was to let him wind down on his own. He’d eventually run out of steam.
“So…” Carver finally said. “What’s up?”
“Got called to a scene yesterday morning,” Jack said. “The victim was male, early sixties. And he was strung up on a scarecrow pole in the middle of a farmer’s field. The killer spilled his guts postmortem.”
“Ah, like Judas Iscariot,” Carver said.
“Wow, that was a fast Bible reference,” I said.
“Altar boy,” he said. “You’ll probably find the victim was seen as a betrayer of some kind, either in his profession or a business deal. Something along those lines.”
“Attorney,” Jack said. “John Donnelly. He’s been on the news recently.”
“I don’t watch the news,” Carver said. “It makes my blood pressure go up. I can find better fiction on Netflix. We’ve been watching a lot of The Magic School Bus. That Ms. Frizzle is a real pistol.”
“Donnelly definitely fits your description,” Jack said, getting the conversation back on track. “He’s got a reputation for getting off criminals off. The wealthy kind. He’s brilliant at finding loopholes, and juries love him. There are a lot of terrible people walking free right now because of that man.”
“You’ll need to go through case files,” Carver said. “A guy like that is sure to get some threats.”
“We’ll meet with his secretary tomorrow,” Jack said. “Jaye finished the autopsy and the guy was extensively tortured. He’s got burn marks from what looks like a cattle prod. Lots of broken bones, kneecaps, fingers—the usual stuff that indicates torture. Broken ribs too.”
“One of his eyes was missing,” I said, cutting in. “The body had some scavenger damage so I wasn’t sure if it had been done by an animal or the killer, but I found evidence of a straight-edged cut around the eye socket.”
“An eye for an eye?” Carver asked.
“Possibly,” Jack said, meeting my gaze. “The killer also used a heavy-gauge wire to tie the victim to the scarecrow pole, and a natural-fiber rope to restrain the victim when he was being tortured. I’ve got Cole doing a search for the two items purchased together, but they’re both fairly common. We thought you could run like crimes and see if anything popped, either for how the body was left for us to find or any of the materials used.”
“I can do that,” he said. “Shouldn’t take too long at all. I already beat my new video game, and I think Magnolia has PMS. She’s been very moody today.”
Carver’s relationship with his computers was legendary, if not a little creepy. He had a closer relationship to the “women” in his life, as he liked to call them, than most men had with their wives. When I’d first met Carver, his special lady was Matilda. Then he moved onto Miranda, but she’d been stolen in the car wreck that had almost taken his life. But Carver was no dummy when it came to his computers. No one could access them but him, and anyone who did was met with an unpleasant surprise, so Miranda had self-detonated.
He’d mourned Miranda longer than seemed reasonable, in my opinion, but Carver’s nephew Doug, who was a lot like his uncle, came up with the name Magnolia for his new computer. According to Carver, she was a cross between Dixie Carter and Scarlett O’Hara.
Carver’s wife didn’t seem to be bothered by his relationship with Magnolia. The last time I’d talked to her she’d told me if Magnolia was real, she would’ve baked her a cake for keeping him occupied. Carver was driving Michelle crazy. She was an attorney working from home so she could take care of her husband and four girls, one of which was a newborn.
“If Magnolia is up to it, we’d appreciate the help,” Jack said. “I’m still dealing with tornado cleanup.”
“Michelle told me you guys got hit pretty hard,” he said. “Any casualties?”
“Eight total,” Jack said. “Just found the final missing two yesterday.”
“Sorry to hear that. I’m going to try and sweet-talk Magnolia into letting me stroke her keys. A little sweet talk always works with Michelle.”
“No, it doesn’t!” I heard her yell again.
I laughed outright this time.
“Don’t encourage her,” Carver said. “I’m lucky she hasn’t slit my throat. Having six people on lockdown in the same house is a challenge. Mostly for her. I’ll get back to you soon. Whoever your killer is probably won’t be satisfied with playing God just once.”
“That was our thought too,” Jack said and disconnected.
I followed him back downstairs, and watched him strap on his weapon, and then the backup around his ankle. There was something about the routine that I found comforting.
“I shouldn’t be gone too long,” he said. “An hour, maybe two. I’m going to leave the Tahoe with maintenance so they can fix the window, and I’ll get one of the guys to bring me home. I want to check on Hops while I’m out, and make sure she’s okay. Eighteen stiches to the face is no small thing.”
“She was too cute to be a cop anyway,” I said. “This will season her up some. But tell her to use vitamin E oil when she gets her stitches out. It’ll help reduce the scarring.”
“Will do,” Jack said, giving me a quick kiss.
“I’m heading to the grocery store. Text me anything you want me to pick up.”
“Get those granola bars I like,” he said.
“Text me. I’ll never remember unless I have a list.”
I grabbed my pur
se and keys from the counter, and then remembered to look down to check my appearance. I wasn’t wearing a bra, so I ran back upstairs to put one on and get my shoes. I was wearing old jeans and a University of Virginia T-shirt that had seen better days. I’d always been one of those people to choose comfort over style. Which might have been the reason it took me so long to get married, now that I think about it.
My hair was in a messy bun on top of my head, and my sneakers had a hole in the toe, but it had only taken ten stitches to sew it back together. My suturing skills had always been top notch.
I was in high spirits on my way to the store. It was late morning, which meant the churches hadn’t let out yet, and I probably wouldn’t run into too many people dressed in their Sunday best who were silently judging me for missing service that morning.
Martins’ Grocery parking lot was half full, and if I could get in and out in twenty minutes I’d beat the church crowd. King George Proper was the only town that had the big chain grocery stores. Martins’ had been the only grocery store in Bloody Mary for close to a hundred years.
The automatic doors whooshed open and I walked in and grabbed a basket hoping to avoid what I knew was coming, but I failed. Hilda Martin never missed a thing.
“Morning, Doc,” Hilda said from register one. She was perched on her stool, her Big Gulp on the counter, and Soap Opera Digest open in front of her. Her orangey-red hair was teased within an inch of its life and clashed with her red apron.
“Morning, Hilda,” I said, making a beeline for the produce before she could stop me long enough to talk. Hilda would’ve made a great informant, though she was perfectly happy to spread information free of charge. She had a memory like an elephant, she knew everyone in town, and she paid attention to what people put in their carts.
When Lloyd Ferrell died a couple of years back from a heart attack, she said right at the funeral that she’d told him at the checkout line those Little Debbies he liked to eat by the dozen would be the death of him, and here they were burying him six feet under. She knew who bought pregnancy tests, condoms, and adult diapers, and she’d never met a secret she wouldn’t share.