Mercy Dogs

by Tyler Dilts

  He unzipped the bag. The black ballistic nylon had stiffened and the zipper wasn’t as smooth as it used to be. What he was looking for was right on top. All he had to do was nudge the Kevlar vest aside and he saw it. The box of latex gloves. When he opened them, though, he realized they’d been sitting there in the heat of the garage for years. The gloves were dried out and stiff and tore when he tried to pull them out of the box.

  After a moment of disappointment, he cursed himself for his stupidity, went into his father’s bathroom, and took a fresh pair out of the box on the counter that he’d brought home from CVS less than a week ago.

  Honestly, he wasn’t sure Becerra would even search the studio, or, if he did, that he’d bother checking for fingerprints. But if there was even a chance of that, Ben wanted to be careful. If they did dust the place, it would be normal to find a fair amount of the landlord’s prints in a tenant’s apartment, but if Ben did a thorough search, his prints would be everywhere, even on things Grace had clearly brought with her when she moved in. That would be enough to earn him a spot on the suspect list.

  Peter was sweeping inside. He was way off of his normal schedule. Usually by this time of day he’d have the floors swept and the dishes done and be ready for lunch. Ben left half a cup of coffee and a quarter of a Hershey’s bar for him on the counter.

  “How you doing, Dad?”

  Peter put a hand on his stomach and said, “Hurts, but not too bad. I’m almost finished.”

  “Okay,” Ben said. “I left some coffee and chocolate for you. I’m going to be out in back for a while.”

  His father nodded and started in again with the broom.

  Unlocking the door, Ben noticed a slight tremor in his hand and felt his chest and abdomen tighten. He ignored it and stepped inside. The plan was to start next to the door and methodically work his way around the perimeter of the room, looking for anything that might be out of place or that might give any information about Grace or anyone she was involved with. A new Moleskine was in his shirt pocket. He’d written GRACE on the blank beige cover with a Sharpie.

  Next to the door was the small dining table. Her MacBook was still there, closed, in the same position it had been in the previous time he’d come inside. That would be last, though. He’d decided that before he started. After he was done with everything else, he’d remove it so he could take his time going through whatever he found. There was nothing else on the tabletop except a stack of mail. Ben went through it piece by piece. Nothing but junk. A couple of catalogs with women’s clothes, a credit-card offer, and a stack of bulk-mail discount-ad flyers.

  He flipped open the notebook.

  1/12 12:42p

  STUDIO

  Table

  Mail

  Computer (save, search later in house)

  The sofa bed was next. He looked underneath, took the cushions off, unzipped the cover of each one, and worked his hand all the way around the foam inside each one. Then he unfolded the bed and worked his fingers across every inch of the surface, top and bottom, feeling for the unusual or unexpected.

  It wasn’t until he’d folded the bed back into the frame of the sofa and tucked the cushions back into place that he realized the tension and uncertainty he’d felt on the threshold had disappeared.

  Sofa

  He didn’t dwell on it, though, he just moved on to the end table, the chair, and the bookcase. She didn’t have a lot of books. Some novels Ben figured were popular because he’d been vaguely aware of the titles that began with The Girl Who or The Girl With or The Girl On. His focus drifted for a moment as he wondered what a novel about Grace might be called.

  Concentrate, he reminded himself. Focus.

  There were some nonfiction books, too. Several memoirs. A few that looked more political. Bad Feminist. Between the World and Me. A couple of low-carb cookbooks. Ben thumbed through the pages of each one, looking for anything that might be tucked inside. There were a few stray receipts and slips of paper that looked like they were being used as bookmarks. Only one thing seemed like it might be useful. In an oversized paperback called Atlas Obscura—a kind of encyclopedia of weird and unusual places—he found a pale-blue Post-it note that read Call Amy about job. He left it where it was, but took out his phone and snapped a photo of it. Maybe something, he thought.

  Bookcase

  POST IT—WHO IS AMY? WHAT JOB? (see photo)

  He was almost halfway around the room now, and any doubts about the rightness of what he was doing had faded with the note in the book. Maybe he would actually find something useful. Maybe he would be able to help.

  Next was the chair. He knew there had to be a name for the style—small, squarish, with brown tweedy upholstery. There was nothing under the seat cushion or inside its cover. Nothing in the crevices and crannies other than the few crumbs of random detritus found in any piece of furniture that had been used for any length of time. He flipped it over and examined the bottom. A few of the staples that held the gauzy backing in place were missing, but there was nothing else to see. Ben wondered if they might have been removed intentionally in order to slip something inside. One of the staples, though, even though it was detached from the wood frame, still clung to the fabric. If you were going to go to the trouble of removing it, why would you leave it like that? It might scratch your finger or snag on whatever you were trying to stash inside. And there was nothing inside, anyway.

  Chair

  There was an end table next to the chair. He picked up the lamp on it and examined the felt cover on the bottom. Securely attached. There was nothing else, other than a single, unremarkable coaster. Ben reached underneath and ran his fingers along the underside. Nothing.

  Table

  There was nothing in the entertainment cabinet except the Blu-ray player Ben had installed when the TV was mounted on the wall above it, and the half dozen or so movies he’d left there himself. Still, he opened each case, one by one, and found nothing but the discs. Elf looked like it had a scratch, but whatever it actually was came off when he rubbed it on his flannel shirt.

  Blu-ray Cabinet

  Grace’s dresser was next. He’d felt somewhat uncomfortable when he began searching, but that feeling had gradually slipped away as he became more engrossed in the process. Finally, he felt like he was doing something, taking action. But now his fingers hesitated on the knob of the top drawer. Was this a line he was ready to cross? The woman in the framed photo on top seemed to be staring at him. It had been taken on a bright day, outside, in what looked like someone’s backyard. Lawn furniture and a row of flowering bushes along a wood-plank fence in the background. Who was she? He’d never asked Grace, but they looked like they could be related. There was something in the brown eyes. Not just the color, but in the shape as well, in the way the brows arched over them. The woman looked like she was in her late thirties or early forties. Was she old enough to be Grace’s mother? Maybe, especially if the picture was a few years old.

  Ben looked at her as he opened the drawer. He knew it was only his imagination, but her expression seemed to change as he did it.

  “Sorry,” he whispered.

  Inside were several pairs of underwear. Mostly white or pastel cotton, but a few with lace trim, made out of something silky. Not quite as many bras. He couldn’t tell if there were any matching sets. Along the back of the drawer was an assortment of socks rolled into ten or twelve identical little balls.

  He only moved them enough to make sure there was nothing concealed underneath.

  Something was off. He wasn’t sure, but it seemed to him that there should have been more in there. Maybe she hadn’t done laundry in a while. There wasn’t a laundry basket anywhere. He’d be sure to look for one when he got into the bathroom.

  The next drawer down held tops—T-shirts, tanks, a couple of lightweight sweaters, all folded and stacked by type.

  That was how his drawers used to look. Before. Everything folded and neat. Now most of his clothes resided in two piles, cle
an and dirty. Once in a while, a shirt with buttons would find its way onto a hanger in the closet, but—he caught himself.

  Focus.

  Again, he ran his fingers under the clothes to make sure nothing was concealed below them, then moved on to the bottom drawer. Jeans, shorts, sweats. Something light and stretchy. Yoga pants? He wasn’t sure, but this drawer wasn’t as full as he expected, either.

  Dresser

  enough clothes?? check for laundry

  Ben couldn’t decide if he should search the bathroom next or go past the door to the closet and then go back. In the old days, he would have gone room by room. But the old days were different. He didn’t expect a crime-scene unit or an assist from a partner, and he’d never be turning his notes into a report. There was no need for a systematic record that would make sense to someone else. No brass, no prosecutor, no jury. It made sense to him to work his way along the wall around the perimeter, so he went into the bathroom and flipped on the light switch.

  The reflection in the mirror caught him by surprise.

  “Someone’s going to live here?” Peter asks.

  “Maybe, Dad,” you say. He’s asked you the questions half a dozen times a day since you started cleaning the place out and painting.

  “Who?” he asks again.

  “Don’t know yet.”

  He looks worried.

  “We’ll get somebody good,” you say. “I promise.” With the hammer, you tap the nail into the newly pale-blue wall over the toilet and rehang the framed sunflower print your mother chose for the spot. “How does that look, Dad?”

  When he doesn’t answer, you turn and look at him. He’s crying.

  Before long, you are, too.

  Ben looked worse than he had in a long time. The dark circles under his eyes were back and the stubble on his fattening cheeks looked grayer than ever. He’d have to—

  Focus.

  There was nothing in the laundry basket except a blue sports bra and the old green oversized T-shirt with the owl on the front Grace used to wear when she hung around the house.

  There was less makeup than he expected to find and nothing in the medicine cabinet except some Tylenol, a few other over-the-counter remedies, and one old prescription bottle. He picked it up and squinted at the label. Sertraline, the generic version of Zoloft. Grace had never mentioned taking antidepressants, and he knew he’d talked about them with her, how he and his father took some of the same meds. Still, would she be comfortable discussing something like that with him? His problems, and Peter’s, too, were a lot more overt, and it felt natural to be open about them with her. Especially as they got to know her better.

  Looking closer, though, what surprised him even more was that the name on the bottle wasn’t hers. Lisa Briard. Was that Grace’s real name? It would make sense to change it if she was trying to hide from whoever she’d been set to testify against. Ben had never done a background check because he trusted Rob’s recommendation.

  This was something important.

  Bathroom

  ANTIDEPRESSANTS—LISA BRIARD—GRACE REAL NAME???

  After that discovery, the closet felt anticlimactic. Ben went through everything, checking pockets, looking for anything unexpected. He found nothing other than a few receipts, a movie-ticket stub for La La Land, and a barely used cylinder of Burt’s Bees lip balm. There were a few nice dresses but mostly casual clothes, a couple jackets, and an assortment of shoes. There was nothing personal. He’d been hoping for something—a photo album, a box of mementos, or maybe even a journal. But there was nothing like that. Everything felt oddly impersonal.

  Closet

  There was even less in the kitchenette. A little bit of food in the small fridge. An assortment of dishes and utensils appropriate for a single person with no plans of entertaining company.

  Kitchen

  The only thing left was the area rug in the center of the room. He lifted it up, one corner at a time, until he was sure there was nothing underneath.

  With that, he was back where he started, standing by the open door surveying the studio.

  There was almost nothing of Grace here.

  As he thought about it, though, he began to understand that it made a certain kind of sense. Maybe Rob had even advised her to keep her personal connection to the place as light as possible. To leave nothing there that linked definitively to her identity.

  Was this all just temporary? Was she hoping to return to her old life when the case was made and she no longer had to worry about whoever Rob was trying to put away?

  He could see that.

  But where was she now? If she fled, why wouldn’t she tell Rob? Had something happened between them? Had she discovered something about him that caused her trust to falter?

  Or was it something worse? Had she been abducted? Or even killed?

  The one thing that gave him some hope that she’d left on her own was the red Camaro. Ben was convinced that the car hadn’t just been some rando passing through the alley, but rather someone specifically looking for Grace. If someone was looking for her, that meant they didn’t have her, and they definitely hadn’t killed her.

  Judging by the studio, Ben knew she had at least some idea of how to cover her tracks. Would it be enough now that she had two cops—one good and one bad—looking for her?

  NINE

  Ben went back into the house with Grace’s computer under his arm. He was headed into the office when he saw Peter in the living room, looking out the front window and pacing back and forth.

  “Dad?”

  Peter stopped and rushed over to him, a look of relief washing over him.

  “What’s the matter?” Ben said.

  “I didn’t know where you were.” He was anxious and shaking.

  Ben put the MacBook on the table and hugged his father. “I was just out in back.”

  Peter shook his head. “I looked in back.”

  “I was in the studio.”

  “I looked outside where the car is. I thought you should be here because the car is there.”

  “I was here, Dad.”

  He still looked confused, so Ben continued. “I was inside the studio, so you wouldn’t have seen me unless you went all the way back and looked in.”

  “In the back where she is?”

  Ben nodded.

  Peter looked down at the floor.

  “What’s the matter?”

  “I think she’s mad at me.”

  “What? No, she’s not mad. Why would you think that?”

  “She doesn’t come anymore.”

  “She’s not mad, Dad. I promise she’s not.”

  “Then why doesn’t she come anymore?”

  Ben thought about trying to answer, to explain everything to him again. Instead, he said, “She just had to go away for a little while. She’ll be back soon. She misses you, too.”

  “She does?”

  “Yeah. She really does. How about some lunch?”

  While you’re making the grocery list, you see Grace has joined your father on the patio. You were a little late getting breakfast ready, so you figured you’d missed her for the day. With a fresh cup in each hand, the yellow pad with the list tucked under your arm, and a pencil clenched between your teeth, you go out and join them.

  “I’m going to Ralphs in a little while,” you say to her. “Can I pick you up anything?”

  She thinks about it and says, “No, I don’t think so.”

  You wonder if she’s just being polite or if she really might want something. “You sure?”

  “Yeah. Thanks, though.”

  “Is there more . . . stuff?” Peter says.

  “What kind of stuff?” you ask.

  “For, uh, you know.”

  “I don’t, Dad. What do you mean?”

  He looks over at Grace, then back at you. There’s something he doesn’t want to say in front of her and you don’t have the slightest idea what it might be. He motions you closer and when you get up and lean in close,
he whispers, “For wiping.”

  “You mean Kleenex?” you say. “For your face?”

  He shakes his head and whispers even more quietly, “For behind.”

  You feel the edges of your mouth pulling up and look at Grace, who has heard every word. She’s trying not to laugh. “I’ll go check, okay?”

  He nods and turns to Grace with an awkward and embarrassed smile.

  After excusing yourself, you go back into your father’s bathroom and look in the cupboard under the sink. He’s down to one roll. You make a mental note to add toilet paper to the list when you get back outside.

  You also notice the toilet needs a little attention. You pour in some Mr. Clean and run the brush around inside a few times, then grab several baby wipes and use them to clean the seat, the tank, and around the rim of the bowl. The wastebasket is full, too, so you tie the corners of the plastic bag together, remove it, and replace it with a fresh one. Out in the kitchen, you think about leaving the bag by the door, but on the off chance Grace decides to come inside, you take it out to the trash can in the alley.

  When you come back into the kitchen, you see Grace and your father outside at the table. It looks like she’s adding something to the grocery list. But she keeps looking at Peter, then scribbling on the pad, then repeating the process. You watch for a few moments before you realize it looks like she’s sketching him.

  Outside, you see she’s flipped the page on the pad. “I didn’t know you were an artist,” you say.

  “It’s just a doodle.” She holds it up for you and your father to see. “What do you think?”

  The portrait is remarkable. It’s a good likeness, but that’s not what you find so striking. Somehow, with only a few minutes and a crappy pencil and notepad, she’s managed to capture a portrait of Peter that makes him look simultaneously joyful and sad. There’s a light in his eyes that looks familiar, the sparkle of intelligence that you see slowly dimming day by day, fully restored.