Dead Man's Carve (A Tickled to Death Mystery Book 1)

by Kym Roberts

  “No. If this is a setup, he used something that belongs to you.” Stone grunted in my ear.

  “Are you okay?”

  He didn’t answer, just continued to give orders. “Look for it. It’s there in plain sight, for the police to find.”

  Stone hung up without another word. I grabbed the leash and turned to the dog sitting next to the door, panting, eyes aglow with excitement.

  “No eating. That’s disgusting.” I scolded.

  Bogart’s head drooped, shame displayed in the slump of his shoulders. But the sparkle remained in his eyes. I snapped the leash on his collar and wrapped it around my hand to keep him close.

  “Stay close.” Like he had any choice with the death grip I had on him.

  Watchful, we made our way at a snail’s pace out the back door. The porch creaked and I froze in place. With his ears on high alert, Bogart looked at me like I was stupid.

  “I’m not good at this bravery shit. Give me a break.” I yelled in a whisper.

  He pulled my feet forward, my whole body bristling with every step. Hands numb, my fingers flexed around the flashlight in my free hand in an in vain attempt to increase the blood flow.

  Once we hit the grass, I was thankful for the quiet crunch under my feet as our pace increased, until we reached the leaves. Then, between the two of us, the noise was deafening. I stopped at the opening of the garage to fill my lungs. The short distance across the yard had somehow turned into a marathon. Breath rasping, chest clenching, my muscles were beyond stiff with fear. Once again, I took a deep breath of fresh air before entering the garage. Then, like Stone instructed, I entered the building using Bogart as a human shield. I flicked the light switch this time, wanting the whole place lit up. And the B-rated horror flick reared its ugly head as the switch clicked up, then down. And up again with no results.

  Once again I searched the building from top to bottom for intruders with only a flashlight — and an eighty-pound dog — for protection. It was empty — nothing except the human waste in front of my car.

  With a shallow sigh, I was ready to move onto the next phase. “Where do I look for the murder weapon?” I asked my doggy weapon.

  Bogart turned and licked my hand. What had Stone expected him to do if a killer jumped out at me — tongue him to death?

  Bogart pulled me toward the body. I pulled back.

  “That’s not dinner. Forget about it.” I pulled again at the leash and muttered. “That’s what I’m trying to do.”

  But the dog wouldn’t give up. He pulled me forward, and just as I was about to let him loose and run the opposite direction, he sat down by the front tire and whined. “Mmuuhh, mmuuhh.”

  Uncertain a dog could possibly have the intellect I was giving him credit for, I asked, “You want me to start the search here?”

  “Aaarrruuufff.” Bogart laid down and watched me with his head between his front paws.

  I looked at the car. He was actually right. It was a pretty good starting point. I looked around the floor, waving the flashlight around the shadows. All I needed was a grid. That’s how search and rescue looked for missing people on the mountain, with grid lines. Different people responsible for different areas, then we methodically move forward as a team. All I had to do was mark the garage with imaginary lines and begin searching.

  I drew red laser lines across the floor in my mind and the search was on. Bogart leaned against me, both of us taking baby steps toward the light — where I wanted to stay. But when the search yielded absolutely nothing on either side or underneath the car, I prayed I’d find whatever I was looking for inside — cause I wasn’t about to get any closer to that body.

  I opened the driver’s side door, realizing it was pretty stupid of me to leave it unlocked, with my garage located right behind a strip club. Then I realized how lucky I was that the body hadn’t ended up inside my car.

  The driver’s seat was void of any objects and I sat down, thankful for the brief reprieve. “If you were going to hide something in my car, where would you put it, Bogart?”

  “Pppfft.” He sneezed and laid down, butting the door with his nose in the process. Which only made him sneeze a couple more times.

  I looked in the door pocket, locating a pack of gum, some change and a tire gauge. Then I looked above the visor, through mounds of paper in the glove boxes and console and through my trashcan. Nothing. I looked under the seats. In the back seat. In the trunk. Again, I came up empty handed. Or at least minus any kind of weapon. I did find about two dollars in change to add to the collection in the driver’s door.

  Slumping down in the driver’s seat, relief washed over me. I wasn’t being set up for murder. It was just a coincidence that this guy groped me, stuck his tongue in my mouth and then ended up dead in my garage. The police would probably find out he’d been a victim of a robbery maybe a dope deal gone bad.

  “I should feel bad that he’s dead.”

  Bogart’s eyebrows wiggled. I imagined he was saying, ‘Maybe, maybe not.’

  “I’m sure there’s someone out there who cares about the guy, but I don’t seem to feel anything except grossed out that he ended up in my garage. Are there companies that clean up the goo?”

  Sirens wailed in the distance.

  “They can’t be coming here.”

  “Awwrrr.” Bogart’s yawn seemed to disagree.

  “But who would have called them?” The wail now closer, I could make out the distinct sound of two sirens on different vehicles.

  Church bells chimed in my pocket notifying me of an incoming call.

  For whom the bell tolls, rang through my head.

  That ringtone was definitely history before the sun went down on another day. Pulling out my phone, I saw Stone’s number on display.

  “Stone, I couldn’t find anything. That’s good. Right?”

  From the racket on the other end, I guessed him to be in an all-out sprint. “I’m coming up on your place. Two county sheriffs are heading into town. Meet me at your back porch. Hurry!”

  He hung up before I could say anything, making my pulse kick up a notch with fear of going to jail. I jumped out of the car, slammed the door, regretting the noise that could probably wake the dead.

  Which could actually be an asset in this situation. I glanced at the dead guy. He was still dead.

  I ran with Bogart at my side the whole way, stride for stride as we ran back to the house. Sirens echoed through the trees, getting louder and louder. And Stone broke through the bushes, running faster than I ever could.

  “Take off your hoodie!” he demanded.

  “What? Why...”

  “Just do it, Rilee!” Hair sticking to the side of his face, his chest heaving as he pulled off his t-shirt to reveal the rock hard abs at his midriff, Stone was dripping with sweat. And looked better than my imagination had given him credit for.

  I obeyed his order because I didn’t know what else to do, and Stone pulled my hat off before yanking his shirt down over my head.

  “Your shirt is wet.” I complained to deaf ears. In all honesty I kind of enjoyed the man smell. It’d been a long time, and I was trying not to notice the naked flesh on his chest that looked too damned good to be real.

  “Put your hoodie back on.” Stone’s breathing had slowed to an almost even pace. I wasn’t sure how far he’d run, but he had far more control over his body than I did.

  Zipping up my sweatshirt was like embracing myself with his warmth and scent. Much better than my garage. But the shirt hung down to my knees, well below my hoodie.

  “Did you check the glove boxes?” Stone put my Ducks cap on his head, then ran his fingers through my hair, fluffing up my hat-hair.

  “Yes, I —”

  “The console?”

  I nodded.

  “The doors?”

  Another nod.

  “The little compartment under the radio?”

  “Yes, Stone. I —” I almost fell on my ass as the blood drained from my head. The compar
tment under the radio.

  Stone grabbed my arm. “Rilee, did you check the compartment under the radio?”

  I shook my head, unable to speak as the sirens stopped in front of my store.

  “Go! I’ll stall them.” Stone shoved me in the direction of the garage while he ran inside my house with Bogart on his heels.

  Even though I didn’t want to go back into the garage, especially since I was now alone, I was absolutely positive I would not be able to say one word to the police without breaking down and crying. No doubt Stone could see that on my face as well.

  Stumbling into the garage, I didn’t stop to look around. No one would be stupid enough to walk in where a body of evidence that would lead them to the electric chair. No one except me.

  The door opened quietly on the Prius and I reached in and pushed the smoky black plastic compartment below the radio. It opened in slow motion. Like the slow reveal of the last power-ball number — everything riding on the luck of the draw. And my luck ran out.

  The engraved wooden handle of my favorite carving knife — a Pheil #2 — with the initials ‘RD’ stuck out at me. Calling my name in a singsong melody.

  Ri-lee! Ri-lee! Ri-lee!

  I was pretty sure it would continue by telling me You’re Screwed, if I let it. But I didn’t. I snatched it out of there so fast, I didn’t have time to react when the piece of meat fell off into my trash can below the dash.

  Meat.

  As in human meat.

  Oh. My. God.

  “Rilee! Are you out there, honey?”

  Stone’s voice brought my mind back to the task at hand. I couldn’t act squeamish. If I did I’d be somebody’s bitch behind bars in a couple hours.

  I shoved the knife in my trash can. Pulled the plastic bag loose and tied it up before shoving, bag, trash, knife and human meat in my coat pocket.

  Don’t think about it. Don’t think about it.

  I jumped out of the car and ran to the front of the vehicle desperately looking for someplace to hide the evidence in the wooden planks of the garage.

  “There you are, babe.”

  Twisting around, a guilty yelp escaped my lips. Blackness filled the processing center of my mind. Nothing to say or do, I just stared at Stone’s near nakedness and the two uniforms behind him.

  “Rilee? Is everything okay?” Stone looked genuinely concerned. Like maybe I was going to faint. Or maybe I was going to blow everything he was trying to do for me. I didn’t know. I didn’t know anything.

  Nothing. Except that I was standing within a foot of a dead body, with the murder weapon — my carving knife with my initials burned in the handle, stuffed in my pocket along with a piece of human being. My entire future rested in the balance, and it was beginning to darken at the edges.

  Until something grabbed my ankle. Long, cold, snake like fingers coiled around my ankle just above my sandal.

  The noise that came out of my mouth was long. High pitched. And deafening. The officers drew their guns. Stone ran at me. And I was kicking the crap out of the dead zombie.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  “Rilee! Stop!” Stone bear-hugged the violence right out of my body.

  I stopped kicking the man who was curled into a ball, thanks to the perfectly placed sandal to his groin. I was glad my toes were protected by the rubber tips.

  He should have been as well. I could have had my steel-toed work boots on.

  “Is he a — alive?” I asked with my hands pinned down to my side.

  “He was before you started kicking him.”

  I twisted in Stone’s grip to see the smile on his face. Then he got a whiff of undead Carl and his face scrunched. “Damn. That’s horrible.”

  “Ms. Dust.”

  I recognized the bored voice of Officer Martin. When he’d drawn his gun, he’d actually looked like his pulse increased to above the rate of comatose. And I hadn’t been sure he wouldn’t shoot me, or the zombie lying on the floor.

  “Officer Martin.” How do you explain the guy on the ground had been dead to you for almost a half hour, without confessing you were trying to hide a murder?

  Stone set me down, wrapping both our arms around my waist in a very friendly embrace. His caressing fingers just under my chest weren’t helping my concentration. “I’m sorry, I thought it was a dead body when I came in here. Then you arrived and — and, he grabbed my ankle.”

  “So you’re a sthcreamer?” The toothless man of my nightmares added as the other officer helped him to his feet.

  I couldn’t help but notice the officer had put rubber gloves on before touching the guy’s filthy, khaki green jacket. Carl’s jeans weren’t much better, but the stench was new from the last time I’d seen him.

  “I’m kind of a stheep man mysthelf. Baaaaaa.” The squeaky tenor of his creepy voice sent shivers up my spine.

  “Do you know this man?” Officer Martin looked at me with a hidden question in his eyes. The whole thing felt like a setup for something much worse.

  “I...I...” guilt overwhelmed me as I looked at the stab wound on the man’s right side.

  “We were at Woody’s last night and this man thought Rilee was a dancer. As you can see, he doesn’t know how to treat women.” Stone’s voice held back enough contempt to be civil. It was soft enough to be in control. But unfortunately, it wasn’t distracting enough for Officer Martin to miss where my eyes traveled. His took the same path.

  No sooner had he seen the blood on the geezer’s jacket than the dirty old man saw it as well.

  “She thot me!” He screamed in a higher-toned squeal than I’d used. His hands pulled at his clothing, frantically searching for the source of the blood. Pulling up his jacket and shirt, he dug at flabby skin covering a fish-belly white pooch. Nothing but dirt marred the disgusting sight.

  I wanted to turn and look at Stone’s chest. Create yet another new memory to wash this one out of my brain. Instead I leaned against it for strength.

  “There’s not a scratch on you, old timer.” His voice full of humor, Stone made it clear there was obviously no crime committed on my part.

  But the old SOB wouldn’t let it go. His fingers snaked through the hole in the front of the coat. “Look whath she did!” He accused.

  “How did he end up in your garage, Ms. Dust?” Martin had gone back to that sneaky way of watching me while pretending he wasn’t.

  My knees started to shake.

  “I don’t know. I’d just found him when you got here.”

  “He’s the one you should be questioning.” Stone added. “He’s trespassing. How do we know he wasn’t hiding out here to attack Rilee?” Anger chilled his voice. His body puffed like it had the night before. He became protective, his intentions obvious to all when he moved in front of me.

  “Relax, Stone.” Then Martin addressed the zombie geezer. “What’s in your pocket that’s stained the front of your jacket?”

  “There’s nothin’ in my pockeths.” His sweep of his jacket said otherwise and Martin’s partner grabbed his hand before it could go inside the pocket. His free hand once again began feeling his chest and belly. Martin joined in the struggle. “She thot me! Thath’s my blood, I justh need thoo find where she thot me.”

  Officer Martin and his partner had him cuffed before he could pull whatever he had out of his pocket, then Martin began patting the pocket carefully. Paper crinkled, a pill bottle rattled and the geezer stopped.

  “What’s this?” Martin’s voice was calm, non-pulsed.

  “Thath’s mine! Don’th thouch it!” But when he tried to head-butt the officer to keep him away, Martin’s partner placed some kind of police baton between his arm and body and cranked it into place.

  Carl squealed and acquiesced to the search he could have avoided.

  Martin cautiously pulled two objects from Carl’s chest pocket with a light grip.

  Peeking around Stone’s shoulder while he played protector and blocked anything from coming my way, I got to see Officer Martin smil
e. Actually smile, as he turned over the Whistle Burger sandwich in his hand. Flattened from the old guy’s body lying on it all night, catsup covered the entire wrapper. Smeared all over the outside of the paper, it had subsequently stained the interior and exterior of the man’s coat along with a bottle of pills and Martin’s rubber gloves. But what wasn’t so humorous was the obvious stab wound in the middle of the pocket.

  “She thabbed my burger!” The toothless wonder screamed.

  No I hadn’t, but he should be thankful he’d had it in his coat. Obviously someone thought they’d killed him and set me up for the murder. And the proof was in my pocket. My carving knife with what I’d thought was human flesh, but what would undoubtedly turn out to be — hamburger.

  “If you’ll calm down, I’ll forget about your attempt to assault me, and take these cuffs off.” Martin was giving the guy a break, but zombie Carl howled, showing how mindless he actually was, and bit the officer’s hand.

  Okay, gummed might be more appropriate way of describing the bite. But there was no mistaking the intent. Carl had rubber fingers in his sights, not the spoiled burger. And it earned him a face plant on the hood of my car with the other police officer on top of him, his baton still in place. A grunt and a growl escaped the Carl’s lips.

  “Do you have someplace I could get rid of this?” Officer Martin asked holding up the bloody catsup burger.

  “No! thath’s my breakfath!”

  “Where you’re going, they don’t serve day-old burgers for breakfast.” Martin said as he put the burger in a plastic bag I’d retrieved from a shelf. He hesitated with the bottle of pills and looked at the label.

  “Who’s John Frazier?” Officer Martin asked while reading the label.

  “I’m John Frazier.” Carl answered a little too quickly.

  “Last night one of the dancers called him Carl.” I answered with a little ‘pay-back’s a bitch’ tainting my tone.

  “We’re familiar with Carl.” Officer Martin responded while pealing his own rubber glove off his hand and allowing it to wrap around the bottle of pills. “Thank you. If you folks will excuse us, we’ll take him out of here. Did you want to file charges for trespass, Ms. Dust?”