Violet Dawn

by Collins, Brandilyn

  Silence.

  Blood whooshed through her veins. Her gaze cut to the barely visible form of Edna San’s body. She pictured the bruises around Edna’s pale, bloated neck, remembered the water-wrinkled feel of her skin. Edna must have been in the hot tub for at least a couple hours. The sound in the forest was merely an animal. Whoever had carried Edna here was long gone, smirking that he’d staged the perfect frame for his deed.

  Why me?

  Was it someone who’d witnessed the scene between her and the actress? Who’d been in Simple Pleasures at the time? Other than the two sisters, Paige wouldn’t recognize the other customers.

  She pulled her arms across her chest, bowed her head. She had no one to help her, and Edna San’s body could not be found here. There was only one thing to do now.

  The reality of the night and all that must follow wrapped around Paige, cold and smothering. How many times before had she felt like this? Abandoned, vulnerable, time and the unknown stretching before her.

  Time.

  Paige yanked up her chin, surveyed the sky. How many hours did she have? Northern Idaho dawns came ridiculously early in July. When she’d first arrived, at summer solstice, she’d awakened at three thirty to see the first vestiges of light. Four weeks had passed since then. Now the most she could hope for was total darkness until a little past four o’clock. Nascent lightening of the sky would begin about that time, with sunrise around five.

  Paige looked back to Edna San’s body. It wasn’t going to move by itself. She had to pull herself together. Do what had to be done.

  She swiveled toward the house to get dressed.

  SIX

  In her bathroom Paige tossed her towel on the counter. A light click sounded by her feet. She jumped. Now what? She bent down, examining the floor. One of her golden heart earrings with the red stone in the middle lay by her toe. She picked it up and threw it into the top drawer.

  From her dresser in the bedroom she pulled out black jeans and a black T-shirt. Good thing her short hair was black as well.

  Paige dressed by the light of a muted television. Even though the nearest neighbor lived far away, the night seemed to loom with a thousand eyes. She could not risk some nocturnal snoop across the lake raising binoculars toward her house, spotting a light.

  In the kitchen she fumbled for her purse on the counter, withdrew her car keys.

  Her garage door opened with jarring loudness in the still night.

  Paige backed out her old Ford Explorer, turned around at the end of her graveled driveway, and reversed into the garage. Once inside, she hit the button to close the garage door and slid from her car. Opened the hatchback, the vehicle’s inside light turning on. This would be her only illumination when the automatic garage light switched off in one minute. Climbing inside the car, she unlocked the lever to each side of the divided backseat and laid the sections down flat. She slid out of the Explorer and stepped through the garage’s rear entrance into her backyard, leaving the door open.

  Heart churning, Paige turned right to mount the two side steps up to her deck and shuffled toward the dark lump. With a grimace she looked down, loath to touch that skin again, to smell it. How cold would it be now? Nausea snaked through her stomach. She needed gloves.

  Moving as swiftly as she could in the darkness, she skirted the body, slid back the glass door that led into the kitchen. Feeling her way to the front hall, she opened the closet and groped on the top shelf for the black gloves she had bought on a summer sale, preparing ahead for winter. She found one; fingers scrambled for the second. Where was it? She pushed farther into the closet, burying her nose in the musty smell of a leather coat. Reached up and back as far as she could. There.

  Back in the kitchen she pulled the gloves on.

  Her pulse kicked up in her throat.

  She stepped out on the deck, closed the sliding door. Stood over the body, thinking. If Edna had been such dead weight in the water, imagine how much worse it would be now. And if she just pulled the body off the deck, wouldn’t it leave some kind of trail? Paige tried to imagine possible evidence. She did not expect anyone to come looking for signs of Edna here. The huge San estate lay across the lake, at the water’s edge. Still, she could take no chances.

  Paige went back into the house. When she returned, she carried a folded bedsheet. Stepping around the body, she spread it out on the deck. Then, turning off her mind, she grabbed Edna’s arms and rolled the body onto the sheet.

  She straightened, staring at the splayed sight. Had Edna San ever made a horror movie? Surely Paige had fallen headlong into one.

  Paige bent again, gathered the end of the fabric into her fists.

  Pulling, she turned the corpse ninety degrees and thumped it feetfirst down the steps. On the grass, she dragged the load toward the garage, over the threshold, and onto the cement floor.

  Now came the worst part. Getting the body into the back of the car.

  She pressed her lips together. The corpse needed to stay on the sheet. It shouldn’t lie on the hatchback floor. What if it left some tiny piece of skin or hair? Paige couldn’t imagine anyone thinking to check her car for that kind of evidence.

  Then again, neither would she have imagined this night.

  Paige folded the material on either side of Edna over her body, covering her completely. Now — how to get this gruesome load into the hatchback?

  Suddenly her resolute focus fell away, replaced by renewed terror. Paige pictured herself driving down the road with a wrapped body in the back of her car. At that point there would be no turning back. What if her car was stopped? What if she had an accident?

  She flinched away, gloved knuckles against the sides of her cheeks. I can’t do this, I can’t do this. Maybe she should call the police. She could dump the body back into the hot tub, pretend she’d just discovered it.

  Her thoughts segued to Whoever It Was out there who’d placed her in this position. He would be waiting for Edna to be found. And if she wasn’t . . .

  So what’s he going to do, Paige? Tell the police the corpse he dumped in your hot tub disappeared?

  Paige straightened. Dawn approached and she had little time to waste.

  With a deep breath she bent over the wrapped body. Struggling, she forced her arms underneath its back and legs and lifted it like a giant baby. Her knees staggered under the weight, the scent of chlorine-saturated skin, wet silk, and perfume wafting into her nostrils. She held her breath, heaved higher, until the body just cleared the open hatchback. Grunting, Paige shoved it farther into the car until she could close the door. An arm flopped out of the sheet, and wisps of hair. Paige crawled into the hatchback, pushed the limb and hair inside the sheet, making sure all was covered.

  She backed out of the car, leaving the hatchback open so the Explorer’s inside light would stay on. She pulled off her gloves, now tainted with the mixed scents of Edna’s death, and tossed them beside the body.

  For a moment she rested against the car. Then she hurried back outside, lugged the hot tub cover onto the deck and over the water. Paige stepped into the kitchen and locked the sliding glass door. From a drawer she fetched a heavy long-handled flashlight, then entered the garage once more. She closed and locked its back door.

  Now for something to weight the body.

  Her first week in the house she’d heard noises at night.

  Scratches. Heavy scampering. She knew the sound. Rats.

  She could have gone to Mr. Ryskie, her elderly landlord, but he was hard of hearing and crotchety. Paige opted to take care of the problem herself. At the local hardware store, she asked for advice, then bought the suggested large traps. Peanut butter would serve as bait. The worst part involved crawling inside the smelly, low area under the house to place the traps. At least she’d done it in the daytime, when some light filtered in from the far window.

  That’s when she found the old-fashioned boat anchor attached to a thick chain. Long forgotten, it lay partially buried in the hard, packed d
irt.

  Paige walked to the crawl space door, pulled up its rusty latch, and dragged a filled trash can over to prop the door open. She knelt and peered inside. Pitch-dark. Paige turned on the Maglite and shone its beam into the gloom. The circle of light moved over dirt, rocks, the cavelike silence.

  Paige shivered. She didn’t want to go in there. A terrorizing scene fizzled through her mind. Somebody outside, watching through her garage window, breaking in to latch the crawl space door behind her, trapping her inside . . .

  If you can handle a slimy dead body, Paige, you can handle the dark. She squeezed her eyes shut, willed her heart to slow. Think now. Where’s the anchor? She pictured herself crawling around, setting the traps . . .

  About halfway back and over to the left, near the wall. That’s where she’d seen it. She aimed the flashlight beam in that direction, panning slowly, until a faint gleam of rusty metal caught her eye.

  There. And time was ticking.

  Paige steeled herself and crawled into the blackness.

  SEVEN

  “I found myself in the blackness of a little room. When my eyes got used to the dark, I saw it.” Chelsea shivered. “The walls were crawling.”

  Leslie Brymes smacked the book closed and tossed it beside her on the bed. Second time she’d read Milt Waking’s true crime, and it was proving just as creepy as the first. Especially after two in the morning.

  She sat up straight from her multiple pillows and stretched. Even though she didn’t have to work in the morning, she really ought to be turning out the light. But reading Web of Lies was like drinking a triple-shot mocha at Java Joint. Felt good going down and left you zinging afterward. For the millionth time Leslie told herself she’d give ol’ Milt a run for his money one day. With his suave good looks and nose for a story, the FOX News correspondent had waded into the thick of three nationally watched cases. He’d managed to help solve two of them, netting exclusive footage of the bad guys going down. The final case, which had occurred just last September, he’d written a book about. Man. Leslie would settle for half his good fortune.

  She dropped against her pillows with a sigh. The very thought of running down a major news story sent a quiver through her veins. Serious quiver, like when Dwight Lomas kissed her on the dance floor at senior prom two years ago. Whooey.

  But even that magical night couldn’t really compare. Under the glittering dance lights, clad in her satin blue gown and feeling Dwight’s lips on hers, she’d known the moment was ephemeral. They’d be graduating in a month, and Dwight had his plans lined up — duffle bags packed, he’d be down at the bus station in June, going off to the army along with his buddy Tim Edwards.

  His buddy who came home early, in pieces, for burial.

  Leslie scrunched her eyes closed. No, she wasn’t going to think about that right now. She was thinking about making it big as a reporter — for the rest of her life. The constant dream she pursued in her head, even as she slogged at her computer day after day in the drab and messy little Kanner Lake Times office, chasing down information on lost pets and fender benders and the occasional theft. Edna San’s move to town had been Leslie’s first thrill of a major story, but even that had fizzled over time.

  Kanner Lake was too quiet. What Leslie needed was to move to some major city. No doubt she’d have to start at the bottom of the heap, but in time she’d work her way up to television news anchor. Hey, she had the looks for it, right? Blonde and petite? High-cheekboned. Large brown eyes and perfect lips.

  Okay, that last one sounded arrogant, but fact was fact.

  Hold on to that pseudo confidence, girl. You’re gonna need it.

  Reality washed over Leslie in a chilling wave. She thumped her hand on the book and drummed her fingers against its slick cover. Truth was, she didn’t possess near the courage she feigned. Deep down she wasn’t sure of herself at all. Flamboyance and verve on the outside — and a sticky marshmallow within. Besides, how would she ever pay her own way out in the world on a lowly reporter’s salary? Living in her parents’ home — now there was some cheap rent. She did have that one classmate who’d left town as soon as she could and moved to Seattle, but Leslie didn’t know her very well. Not real conducive to picking up the phone and asking if the gal needed a roomie.

  Drat it all.

  Leslie folded her arms and made a face at Milt Waking’s book. Then picked it up with frustrated resignation, flipping pages to where she’d left off. She found the chapter, read two lines, and threw the book down again. It bounced off the mattress and plopped on the floor. Oh well. She’d let it lie until morning. Right now it was time for some serious z’s.

  She threw all but one pillow off the bed and reached to turn off the reading lamp. Settled down in the darkness, seeking sleep. A little rejuvenation was all she needed. By morning Leslie Brymes would have her mojo back.

  EIGHT

  The smell hit Paige in the face. Dusty, stale. Rank with old rat droppings and the cutting, metallic scent of pipes and dirt. Darkness cloaked her with a palpable and ominous cold. As she crawled, the flashlight in her right hand banged against hard dirt, its circle of light jumping. Through her pants the uneven ground scratched at her knees. The farther she moved from the entrance, the more the blackness swallowed her whole.

  Wait.

  She stopped. She had taken out all the rat traps, hadn’t she?

  Balancing on her left hand, she shone the flashlight over the ground. Ridges and loose pieces of earth materialized under the arcing light, then faded. She saw no traps. Paige raised the flashlight a little, searching again for that telltale shine from the anchor. There. About twenty feet away. She held the flashlight in that direction and crawled forward.

  The air chilled, the darkness congealing like cooling tar. Were the walls closing in? Paige resisted the urge to turn her head, check how far she’d come from the opening. If she looked back, she just might panic —

  Something pierced her left palm. Paige gasped, drew back her hand. Tipped the light upon it. A small, sharp rock stuck into her skin. She set the flashlight down, lowered her hand into its beam, and used a shaking thumb and forefinger to pluck it out.

  Why hadn’t she kept her gloves on?

  Picking up the flashlight, she forced herself forward. When she thought she could stand no more, she reached the anchor.She put the flashlight on the ground and studied the rusted metal. The long, thick chain was attached to its top. Its bottom lay more deeply buried than she remembered. The whole thing leaned to one side, only partly visible. What if she couldn’t pull it out?

  Her fingers tested the surrounding earth. Packed down tight. She balanced awkwardly on her knees, put one hand under each side of the anchor’s bent horizontal section and lifted.

  It didn’t budge.

  She tried again. No movement. A third time, her arm and pectoral muscles straining. The anchor didn’t move an inch. It might as well have been cemented down.

  Fresh fear cleated up Paige’s chest. She had to get this thing out now. Dawn approached and she had nothing to weigh down the body she must bury in the lake. Paige imagined the sun rising —and herself stuck with Edna San’s corpse. She would have no choice but to put it back in her hot tub, call the police.

  Her life would be over.

  Oh, please, God — somebody — help me.

  She wrapped her fingers around the top of the anchor and alternately pushed and pulled, trying to loosen it. It gave way a tiny bit. She yanked the thing back and forth, harder, harder, beads of sweat itching her forehead. Still it hardly budged.

  Paige dropped her hands and bent over her knees, drawing in rancid air, her chest heaving. She needed some kind of digging tool. She jerked up the flashlight, pointed it at her watch. Almost three thirty.

  She had little more than thirty minutes of fully covering night.

  With a small cry she shuffled around and crawled as fast as she could toward the opening. The knuckled ground beat at her hands, her knees, but she gave it no heed
. Far ahead through the door she could see the dark-blue side of her car, its inside light on. The flashlight banged and bumped in her gripping fingers. She endured the suffocating darkness, the smell, her fear as she scuttled like the rats she’d once hunted. By the time she reached the crawl space door, her palms burned from scrapes.

  Paige burst through the opening onto cold garage floor, gulping fresh air. She pushed to teetering feet, feeling the cramp of muscles too quickly extended. Stumbling around the car, averting her eyes from its gruesome cargo, she headed for Ryskie’s heavy metal cabinet of garden tools in the far corner of the garage. The cabinet was a near antique and rusty, sitting on two-inch metal legs. Its door squeaked as she pulled it open. Her eyes darted across the shelves, over rakes and hoes, gardening shears and gloves. There — a hand trowel. Sharp at the end, meant for digging. She snatched it up, trotted back to the car, and retrieved her gloves. Might as well save what skin she had left on her palms.

  At the crawl space door she sucked in fresh air, then into the blackness she returned, veering to the left, toward the anchor that would save her. The flashlight and trowel bumped and jostled against her glove-protected hands, the smell of ancient rodent droppings welcoming her back, mixing with the odor of her own terror-sluiced sweat. She pulled up to the anchor, breathing hard, little sounds spilling from her lips.

  How much time had passed? Five minutes?

  Dig, Paige.

  She set down the flashlight and attacked the hardened earth with furious strokes of the trowel, both fists gripping its wooden handle. Again and again she stabbed the dirt, chipping, chipping away, around the front of the anchor, its sides. Perspiration rolled down her temples, the thunk, thunk of blade against stubborn ground ringing in her ears.

  She threw down the trowel and yanked the anchor. Back and forth, back and forth, working it loose from the ground’s mouth like a giant tooth.

  Paige jerked up the trowel and hacked at the dirt once more, chunks flying. A particle landed in her eye and clawed. She let out a hiss, dropped her tool and smacked a hand over the eye, blinking rapidly, willing the cleansing tears to come. Her world blurred as she blink-pushed the dirt out. Then back to her digging, her movements increasingly jerky, panic-stricken. Minutes ticktocked, and soon the sun would thrust impatient fingers through the curtain of night.