He remembered her fidgeting with the bracelet earlier. Okay, he believed her. He believed a lot of what she’d told him tonight, too. She hadn’t hit anyone. Not a fighter, this one. Just a doormat. And he’d pretty much wiped his shoes off on her, too.
Remorse tightened the muscles in his shoulder blades. He noticed the silhouette of body under the thin Mickey Mouse night shirt and looked back at the sink. Silence filled the room.
When he looked back at her, she fidgeted with the bracelet again. He reached for her hand. “Let me help.”
~
“He’s a bastard!” her mama said.
In Cali’s dream, her mom paced around the hotel room where Cali had come for the night. Her mom lectured about Stan while pulling deep drags of cigarette smoke into her lungs as if seeking nicotine solace. “Oh, baby. I picked a lousy time to die, didn’t I? With the holidays and now this.”
“You know this is a nonsmoking room,” Cali said. When her mother didn’t answer, Cali remembered this was just a dream. When she’d heard her mom’s voice back at her apartment, she’d just been panicked. Grief could do crazy things to a person.
“You’re too nice. Too forgiving.” Her mom dropped down on the bed and touched Cali’s cheek. “I should have raised you to be more of a bitch.”
“I’m too forgiving?” Cali thought of Stan, whom she hadn’t forgiven, and the jerk, Detective Lowell. She hadn’t forgiven him either.
“Stan doesn’t deserve forgiving,” her mom said. “The cop was testy, but he has reasons.”
“You can read my mind, too?”
“I’ve always been able to read your mind. But yes, there are advantages to being dead.” Her mom’s eyes teared. “You’ve got to listen to me. Bad things could happen. I’d die if something happened to you.”
“You did die,” Cali said, and they both knew Cali hadn’t yet forgiven her for that.
“Bad things could happen.” Her mom repeated, and her voice seemed to float around the room with the cigarette smoke.
They were already happening Cali thought. Stan was shooting at her apartment door. Her mama was dead. And Cali was crazy because she kept dreaming about her.
Chapter Five
The next morning at school, Cali straightened her desk. Since the funeral, she spent a lot of time straightening, cleaning—her closet, under her bed, her baseboards. Even her catch-all kitchen drawer had been de-cluttered. She’d gotten rid of a lot of junk, a lot of scum, including a louse of a boyfriend. Not that getting rid of him excused her for getting involved. She’d really messed up.
Her classroom door squeaked open. Tanya, wearing a bright red dress and toting an armful of books, walked in. “Hi.”
Cali blinked. Suffering from lack of sleep, it almost hurt to look at her friend. The fact that Cali had made it to school should be considered a near miracle. But she had requested the afternoon off. She told the office she needed to do some work on her mom’s estate. And while she did have the appointment with her mom’s lawyer, she wasn’t sure she could muster enough energy to do anything more than drive back to the hotel where she’d stayed last night. Even her toes cried out for sleep. Yet sleeping brought on dreams and those dreams—
The stack of books landed on Cali’s desk with a thud.
“Hi.” Cali forged a smile.
Tanya, obviously, could spot a forgery. “Dragon slaying went bad, huh?”
“What?”
“You said you had to slay a dragon,”
“Oh. Yeah, it went badly.”
Tanya propped her hip on the desk. “You want to talk about it? Or not. I can deal with either.”
Cali took a deep breath. The chance to unburden herself seemed too good to pass up. “I’ll talk, but . . . it’s Jerry Springer, Judge Judy quality.”
“Good. I love drama.” Tanya wiggled closer. Her earrings, colorful Christmas balls the size of marbles, bounced around her ears. “Spill it.”
Cali recounted the night’s events. The argument. Stan returning. The shot through the door. The cops arriving. “There was blood all over the door. I don’t have a clue from where. I don’t know if Stan was hurt or…” She’d skipped over the part about the dreams. About hearing her mom’s voice. Being crazy was one thing, admitting it another. “That one detective was so rude, and then he thought I was going to use a knife on him. Do I look like a knife-crazed killer?”
“Maybe just a bit around the eyes.” Tanya giggled.
Cali laughed. She tapped a pencil on her desk. The drumming sound felt hypnotic. “The first cop wasn’t rude. And I could swear I knew him from somewhere.”
“Was he cute?” Tanya made a face when Cali rolled her eyes at the question.
“He could have been Brad Pitt. I wasn’t thinking clearly enough to consider it.” Without warning, a visual of Detective Lowell flashed in her mind, all shoulders and…
She grabbed her mental eraser and wiped that image out. Swallowing, she looked back at Tanya. “And then he...” Cali ended her tale of woe by telling how the detective insisted she not stay at her apartment for three or four days. “Thanks to Stan, I can’t go home.”
“That...” Tanya lowered her voice, “dickhead.”
“Which one?” Cali asked. “The cop or Stan?” The more Cali thought about Detective Lowell, the more she wanted to call someone and complain. She wouldn’t though. Partly because her Mom was right, Cali didn’t have enough bitch in her, but mostly because the detective had been right. She’d been stupid to allow Stan to stay with her. She’d brought most of this on herself. But it didn’t excuse his behavior.
“Both of them are dickheads,” Tanya said. “I’d say Stan wins the Big Dickhead award. The cop earns the Little Dickhead award.” She rested a palm on the stack of books. “Where did you stay last night?”
“I started to go to my mom’s house, but Stan knows where Mom lived, so I went to a hotel.” While Stan did know where her mom had lived, in truth, Cali hadn’t felt strong enough to face the Cancer House.
“Why didn’t you call me?”
Cali wondered if Tanya knew how much her friendship meant right now. “It was so late.”
“Doesn’t matter.” Tanya popped off the desk and collected her stack of books. “Tonight you’re bunking with me.”
“No.” Cali shook my head. “I’m fine.” The bell rang.
“No, you’re not. Big Dickhead tried to shoot you. Then the hot-looking Little Dickhead Detective accused you of trying to kill him.”
Cali frowned. “How did you know he was hot?”
Tanya’s smile shot up a degree. “Your eyes went all dreamy when you talked about him. Anyway, you’re staying with me. End of discussion.” A herd of eleventh-grade students buzzed into the room, and Tanya buzzed out through the maze of teenagers.
Suddenly, the room went silent. No chattering. No morning whining. Their gazes sought hers. Cali’s throat tightened at the sight of the sympathy-filled faces. Yesterday, she’d gotten by without most them knowing. Today, she wasn’t so lucky. They knew.
They found their seats like mice who knew the maze. Jami, the designated head mouse, wearing her usual tight jeans and sweater, stood beside her desk. “We’re so sorry, Miss McKay.”
“Thank you.” A knot rose in her throat.
“It sucks,” said another student. “And we promise not to give you grief today.”
“Yeah.” Antonio dropped his backpack beside his desk. “If anyone gives Miss McKay lip today, they’ll answer to me.”
Cali’s throat tightened, but she swore she wouldn’t cry. “Thanks guys. Everyone work on your art journals.” Slipping back into her chair, she started logging grades, anything to keep from crying.
“Miss McKay?” Sara Cane bumped against Cali’s desk. Sara, red hair, green eyes, and painfully shy, seldom spoke.
“What can I do for you?” Cali asked.
Sara pulled at a button on her jacket sleeve. “I. . . It’s none of my business, but what kind of cancer was it?”
Cali put down the pencil, unsure she could talk about it. But Sara’s needy expression loosened the hated word. “Breast cancer. At least, it started there.”
Sara’s breath caught and her emerald eyes brightened with tears.
“You okay?” Cali’s own eyes moistened seeing the emotion.
“My mom found out yesterday she has breast cancer.”
“Come on.” Cali rose from her desk. Wishing with everything she had that she’d kept her mouth shut, she led Sara to the hall. Sara turned and hugged Cali really hard. They both cried. Then Cali quoted every positive statistic on breast cancer she’d heard for the past two years.
Every positive statistic that hadn’t included her mom.
~
Brit walked into his office just after one. He’d grabbed a few hours of sleep, not real sleep, but close enough for his body to remember what it was and to remind him how shitty he felt. Then there had been the dreams. Not just images about Keith, but erotic dreams that involved a blonde in a Mickey Mouse nightshirt. And a blonde out of a Mickey Mouse shirt. He’d reached an all time low—dreaming of victims. He tossed his leather jacket on the chair and ran a palm over his face.
“Back already?” a voice called from outside his door.
Brit looked at Anderson, the officer who’d been at the apartment last night. “You can’t talk. What are you doing here?” Brit sat down. His chair groaned, and so did his muscles.
“Came to wrap up some paperwork. I’m off for four days.” Anderson leaned his thin frame against the door. “I’m taking my girl to Galveston Beach for some action on the sand if it warms up.”
Forcing a smile, Brit looked at his desk where he saw a large brown envelope. Probably images of the jewelry taken from the Goldstein case. He glanced back up. The kid appeared too young and cocky, beaming at the sex he planned to score. Personally, the last time Brit had indulged in beach sex, he’d gotten sand in places where sand shouldn’t be.
“Have fun,” Brit said, trying to remember when he’d been that excited about anything.
“I will. But I wanted to drop this off.” He moved inside and set a plastic bag on Brit’s desk. A can of cat food rolled out. “I’m glad I’m not the only sucker.”
Brit caught the Fancy Feast. He started to blurt out that he didn’t even like cats, that he’d begun feeding the mama cat and her babies because Keith had been doing it. “I’m just—”
“A softy. I know.”
“I’m not a softy,” Brit said. “Hell, I don’t even know what a softy is.”
Anderson grinned. “I saw you feeding them the other day. I called a shelter, but they couldn’t catch them. Said they’d set traps, but they haven’t come back yet.”
“They’ll kill them if they catch them,” Brit said, remembering Keith saying that.
“Nah, I called the no-kill shelter.”
Brit nodded and decided he liked the kid. “Good.” Anderson started out.
“Hey,” Brit asked. “Did you ever get anything on Cali McKay’s boyfriend?”
“Yeah.” He swung around and leaned on the door frame again. “He has a record. You’ll never guess what for?”
“Beating up women.” Brit shook his head. Same ol’ shit—different day.
“A real charmer this one. He put one girl in the hospital.”
“Did he do time?” Brit asked.
“Do they ever? One girl dropped the charges. The one he really bruised up, took out a restraining order and ended up leaving town when he broke it several times.”
“Lovely.” Brit snatched up the envelope, remembering the pretty blonde.
“It gets worse,” Anderson said. “We got a call a couple of hours ago. Someone broke into the chick’s place.”
Brit’s gaze shot back up. “They catch the guy?”
“Nah. I’m guessing it was the boyfriend.”
“She wasn’t home, was she?” This vision came straight from his dream. All soft, doe-eyed, and naked.
“No. Looks like she did what you told her to do and left. Good thing, too. I tried to call her at work to tell her about her place, and her boyfriend’s record, but they said she took half the day off. For some reason, we didn’t get her cell phone number.”
Leaning back, Brit let air out through his teeth. “You need to get in touch with her. Convince her to get a restraining order.”
“Like these women ever do what they should.”
“Maybe not, but our job is to try to convince them.”
“Yeah, I’ll try,” Anderson said, his tone implying he wouldn’t try too hard.
Brit stared, annoyed at the kid’s attitude even while he shared it. Hell, half the cops on the force shared it. Still, someone had to talk to Cali McKay.
“Anderson?” Brit called out as the man started off.
He stepped back into the doorway. “Yeah?”
“Where does she work?”
“She’s a school teacher at Wells High.” Anderson smiled. “You liked what you saw, didn’t you? M-I-C-K-E-Y,” the man started to sing, then laughed. “Mickey had some interesting moves last night. Never seen ears look so perky.”
Brit frowned. “Did she give you any other number?”
“Yeah, I have her home and work numbers, and she wrote down some number by the closest relative, but then crossed it out. I left a message at the school for her to call me though and even called the number she marked out. Got an answering machine. I think it might be her mom. But no one’s called me back.” He looked out to the hall. “See ya.” He pushed away from the door.
“Hey. Make sure you take a blanket to the beach,” Brit offered a bit of wisdom.
“A little sand never killed anyone,” Anderson said grinning.
“Yeah, but it doesn’t feel so hot between the boys and Mr. Happy.”
Anderson laughed. “Make sure you feed the cats,” he said as he walked away.
Brit looked down and opened the envelope from the insurance company. “I will,” Brit muttered. “But I’m not a softy.”
The smell of cigarette smoke seemed to flow from the paper. The first image was of a necklace. And it reminded him how and he and Keith had gone shopping for a necklace for Laura, Keith’s wife, last Christmas.
Closing his eyes, he tossed the stack of photos aside. He didn’t want to worry about missing jewelry or soft-looking blondes getting themselves beat up. He needed to be working on Keith’s case.
He looked at his cell phone on the desk. He remembered the call he’d gotten earlier. The one he hadn’t returned. Laura. Brit figured she wanted to know if he’d caught her husband’s killer. Brit couldn’t stomach the idea of telling her he hadn’t found any solid leads.
Standing up, he yanked his jacket off the chair. The leather fit around his shoulders like a second skin, and he headed out to look for Tony Payne, the man who had info on Keith’s killer. He got just past the door and remembered. Darting back into the office, he snagged a can of cat food.
Outside, he popped the can and put it down beside the storm drain in the middle of the parking lot. The cat obviously thought it was perfect place to raise her kittens. He listened and heard the soft meowing. He stepped back and leaned against his car and watched. The mama cat, a gray short- haired stray that didn’t appear much more than a kitten herself, came out. She looked around cautiously, her gold eyes wide with worry and fear. He knew the moment she’d spotted him. But she didn’t run. They continued to stare at each other. Something was wrong with her ear, part of it was missing. She looked beat up, leery of the world. And he knew exactly how she felt.
A car pulled up on the other side of the parking lot. The feline grabbed the lip of the can and jumped back into the storm drain.
~
Brit got in his car. He had no intention of wasting time on Cali McKay. So why he drove straight to her apartment building was a mystery. Oh, hell, it wasn’t a mystery. He’d told her to stay away but, as Anderson said, when did these women do what they were supposed t
o do?
He parked his car and sat there for a minute before getting out and taking the stairs.
When he got to the second floor landing and found the door ajar, his pulse quickened. He took in the bullet holes again, and reached for his gun just in case the boyfriend had decided to come back. Backing against the wall, he glanced inside the broken window. From here he could see the living room and kitchen. Both empty.
Quietly, he pushed open the front door. Someone had really trashed the place. Knickknacks lay broken, books scattered. He moved toward the bedroom and made the turn down the hall. The door was half closed, limiting his view.
One step, two, and he heard something clatter from behind the door. He raised his gun and put his finger on the trigger.
Chapter Six
He shifted slightly to get a better view.
His breath caught when he saw her. His grip on his gun loosened. She stood with her arms wrapped around her middle, gaping at the mess strewn about the bedroom. Kneeling, she picked up a pair of pink lacy panties.
He holstered his gun and took a few seconds to study her before he made his presence known. She wore loose-fitting black slacks and a matronly looking blouse. Schoolteacher attire, he supposed, but the outfit did nothing to show off the body he thought lay beneath—the body he’d envisioned last night in his dreams.
He cleared his throat and tried to clear his mind. “I told you stay away from here.”
~
The unexpected voice took her by surprise. Cali swung around, and dropped her panties. “You scared me.”
“You should be scared. I told you to stay away for a damn good reason.” He pushed the door the rest of the way open and came inside.
She stared. The man looked like a young Burt Reynolds. Her mom had been a Reynolds fan. Thanks to her, Cali had seen all his movies.
“Who did this?” She stared at his chest covered with a snug-fitting leather jacket. “Did the police do this?”
Murder Mayhem and Mama Page 4