Blood, Dirt, and Lies

by Rachel Graves

  “Towel someone off?” His bright blue eyes were still perplexed. For a minute, I lost myself in the way they sparkled in the sunlight. I only ever got to see that sparkle in dreams. It was hard to pass up a chance to admire it.

  “I used the dead bear to go after the wolf. That left me covered in blood, and the rocks the wolf threw me on left my back scratched up. Lucas insisted I get clean but I was too tired to do it myself. Trust me it wasn’t fun at all.”

  “He mentioned you weren’t his type.”

  “That kiss was completely out of line. I may have to smack him for it on Monday.”

  “You don’t think breaking his jaw was sufficient?”

  “I’m not the one who matters here.” Jakob was wonderful, loving, and caring, but he could also be vicious. He’d been kept by a rapist once, a man who hurt him in ways I hated to think about. The kiss would’ve brought all that back. I suspected he’d killed men for much less.

  My worry must have shown on my face because he laughed.

  “I was shocked, but not shocked into murder. Besides he saved your life; that earns him some mercy.”

  “Some?”

  “Some. A second kiss would not be a good idea.”

  “Nice to know what I’m worth.” We laughed together for a while in the sunlight before I woke up.

  Chapter 11

  My Sunday was bliss, absolute perfection. Sure, my back hurt, bruises and scratches never make for a fun next morning, but the thing that happened made it all right. The thing? The most important thing? The Saints won the Championship game. In two weeks my team, the team I adored and worshiped, would play in the Superbowl.

  My father’s Saints jersey, faded and tired, was the only thing I had of his. It hung neatly in my closet six days a week. My dad watched football with me when I was seven; our special time together each Sunday with snacks and treats, a time for just the two of us. I watched alone after he died, imagining him next to me but I’d never imagined anything as great as the Saints heading to the Superbowl.

  Monday morning I dropped off my weekly donuts in the break room and headed to my desk where I found Amadeus’ coffee cup right where it always was, only this time it was upside down, resting on a clean paper towel, neatly washed; sometimes that man could be almost human.

  A case came in almost immediately, a man whose wife had changed her personality overnight. It was a frivolous case; one I didn’t expect the lieutenant to let us take. But he did, insisting that the media and special interest groups weren’t going to dictate how he ran his squad room.

  We spent three days tracking down the people he thought might be responsible, hunting for a charm or a spell that could be doing it. We found several, all of them designed to keep him guessing. The change in her personality? That came from her new boyfriend.

  By Thursday, our docket was clean and I wanted to see Christine’s boyfriend again. He’d been dodging my calls for too long to show up in a newspaper article calling me ineffective. In another three days January would be over and I planned on having the case solved before the calendar flipped over. Danny and I rode together to the MetroTech Chemical Corp. processing labs.

  “I’m thinking of having a Superbowl party. Would you come?”

  “American Football?” Danny scoffed and I knew I was in for it. “Why waste a Sunday? Now if you want to ask me about the World Cup and how Ireland is doing this year…”

  “So that’s a no, for you?” I ignored his question. The girls would come. Phoebe could bring Ethan. It would be a nice little party. Of course, if Phoebe brought Ethan, Anna would bring Nancy who I didn’t particularly love, but hey, that’s the breaks. Sometimes your friends make bad choices in their love life and then they let them move in and you’re stuck with them…

  “We’re here,” Danny interrupted my party planning.

  I didn’t care for the industrial side of town. I knew it had to exist, to process the drugs and chemicals that made our world what it was but I didn’t like it being there. The giant white tubes coming out of the ground and then back into it sprawled like enormous white ants, predatory insects poised to march on the city.

  I frowned a bit remembering all the morbid things I’d seen in this area: two werewolves gutted and hung from the rafters of an empty building, a car full of dead drug addicts, and a vampire who walked into the sunlight only to burst into flames. Looking at the asphalt parking lot, its surface bleached white with the constant sun, brought back the smell of chunks of burning vampire in my hair.

  I shook it off and followed Danny into the building. The front door opened onto a very small desk, where a helpful receptionist was more than willing to dial up the guy we needed. A few minutes later Christine’s boyfriend arrived out of a side door. His unkempt hair along with the dark hollows under his eyes told me things weren’t going any better in his work than they were in mine.

  “We left you some messages.” Danny practically walked in front of me. Guess my tone was too adversarial; I still had trouble being friendly to people who annoyed me. Fancy that.

  “After the newspaper article, we knew you were concerned the case wasn’t getting the attention it deserved. Perhaps we could go over things again?” Danny asked politely.

  “No.” He shook his head. His white lab coat was wrinkled and stained, nothing about him looked good. “I can’t. Really. I’m not dodging you. I’m sorry about the way the article sounded. That guy called me and had me on the phone for like two minutes. But I can’t. The samples are screwed. They don’t make sense. I can’t take the time. I’m sorry.” He kept apologizing as he walked back toward the door.

  “Wait, what’s wrong with the samples?” I asked, remembering the report from Representative Lloyd’s office.

  “They’re acidic, like the treatment process isn’t working at all, like we’re dumping straight wastewater into the river.”

  “Wasn’t that the problem when Representative Lloyd started looking into it?”

  “How did you know?” He blinked twice. “Forget I asked. It doesn’t matter, not really. Yes, you’re right, way back when I first got this job the samples showed the same spike. But it was just that, a spike. All of Christine’s data didn’t show anything, she left, it spiked, and then it went back to normal, until now.”

  “And it’s too acidic?” Danny checked.

  “That’s what I said, isn’t it?” he snapped. “I’m sorry; I really need to get back to work.”

  He pushed the door open and left.

  ****

  We didn’t head directly back to the office. Danny was usually the king of useless trivia, a title he’d earned after working in his uncle’s pub on quiz night, but today the fact he wanted eluded him. So instead of heading back to the office to file a report or check in to make sure we hadn’t gotten any other calls we stopped by his house.

  The split-level rambler was quiet; all the girls were at school and Katie was at the gym. The debris of family life greeted us when he opened the door. Swim bags and Emma’s dance bag hung on hooks waiting for the day of the week they were needed. Around our feet toys and shoes were dumped with the total lack of care that came from children.

  Farther into the house you could see where Katie staked her claim. The kitchen was spotlessly clean, no crumbs from breakfast, no sticky jelly spots on the counter, just scrubbed white countertops and neatly stacked dishes hiding behind the glass cabinet doors.

  I followed Danny wordlessly through the living room where I watched kids’ movies with the girls when I babysat and into the pink hallway. The story went that the two older girls loved pink and demanded pink everywhere. The hall was all right, pink walls and a pair of neatly framed botanical prints of pink roses. The bedrooms were insane, pink on pink on pink.

  Nora’s room held at least five shades of pink. As the oldest she didn’t have to share. In Maeve and Emma’s room there was a thick piece of painter’s tape on the floor; one side of the room was pink while Emma’s side was cream accented by a neatly m
ade bed in kelly green and at least two dozen gleaming gold step-dancing trophies.

  What Danny was looking for was there, in the stack of books lurking behind the trophies. He grabbed 101 Chemistry experiments for a rainy day and headed back to the kitchen. There he rummaged in a box on top of the refrigerator and in the cabinets.

  I didn’t ask what he was doing; I wanted to work it out for myself. We chatted about the Superbowl party and which type of football was best. He didn’t bring up the case again until we were back at the squad room and he sat at his desk, two paper cups in front of him.

  “Care to explain, Mr. Wizard?”

  “Happy to. What did Christine Sweeny have under her kitchen sink?”

  “Baking soda,” I answered. “Lots and lots of baking soda.”

  “Right and the thing I can’t remember is what baking soda does to PH. Does it make it higher or lower? Can’t remember.” He poured a few drops of orange juice from a nearly empty plastic bottle into a cup. He filled the rest of it with water and did the same to the cup next to it.

  “Sorry, social work major, can’t help you. What’s that?” I gestured to the thin strip of blue paper he dipped into the mixtures.

  “Litmus paper. It tests PH levels, a lot less impressive than Christine’s lab but it’ll work.”

  “You keep Litmus paper in the house?”

  “Girls got a science kit for Christmas.” He waved me off and dipped in the paper. The strip for the orange juice turned bright pink while the water strip stayed blue. He shook in a good amount of baking soda from a bright orange box and repeated the process. This time both strips stayed blue. “That’s what she was doing.”

  “She altered the samples, not the test results. That way no matter which of the samples they checked the independent lab showed exactly what her results showed.”

  “And she did it with baking soda, which is easy to get and doesn’t leave much trace,” Danny continued. “While her boyfriend was washing his hands.”

  “Not her boyfriend,” I corrected. “She’s having an affair with a senator, remember? Just a guy she slept with so she could get to the samples.” The words of the woman from the representative’s office echoed in my head, Christine uses people, she manipulates them.

  “So…” I stared at the makeshift science experiment and wondered. “How does this help solve her murder?”

  Danny pressed his lips together, staring. “I don’t know.”

  We offered to reproduce the experiment for the lieutenant but he didn’t want the theatrics. He did want us to call the representative’s staff and the MetroTech Chemical people. It took a while but eventually everyone who needed to know knew what had happened.

  One of the biggest environmental scandals of the year had been discovered by two cops with a fourth-grade chemistry set. I suspected the newspaper wouldn’t cover the story. In fact, the MetroTech lawyers talked about confirming our findings and keeping this out of the media enough that I doubted anyone would ever know.

  I thought about Christine when I had a few minutes, about the kind of person she must have been. Being the victim of a violent crime didn’t make you a good person, but rarely had I found someone so questionable. She wasn’t evil, didn’t kill or rape, but she’d lied and doctored samples.

  Phoebe’s new boyfriend and environmental zealots like him would have said she was worse than some of the murders, but I wasn’t sure. I wasn’t sure about her at all and I still had no idea what her final message to me, “Stop them,” had meant.

  I didn’t have any plans and I wanted to do something fun even if it was a Thursday night. I thought about calling Jakob but sometimes what you really need is frivolity. I dialed Anna, followed by Isaura, and finally Phoebe. Phoebe was worrying about how she and Ethan were doing. She decided to join the rest of us for dinner, and I went home to shower off my day before I met my girlfriends.

  ****

  The girls picked Indian food. I knew from the light blue boxes sticking out of their purses the proximity to Indigo’s chocolate shop had something to do with it.

  “So why didn’t I get to go eat chocolate with you?” I asked, tearing into a piece of hot naan.

  “What?” Phoebe asked her cheeks starting to glow.

  “We didn’t…” Isaura started but Anna laughed.

  “Sure you did, I’m a detective, remember? You can’t hide candy from me.”

  Anna’s wide smile got wider. “We’re not hiding from you; we’re hiding from each other.”

  “Wait, you went, too?” Phoebe asked Anna.

  “You mean, you did?” Isaura replied.

  The accusations lasted long enough for us to order and receive our food. When we finally worked it out, it seemed they had all barely missed each other at the chocolate shop. We spent a good while dissecting how good Indigo looked, but Anna was bored enough to change the subject.

  “Tell us about the new guy in Phoebe’s life, Mal,” she commanded.

  “Well, he’s short but cute and he seems nice.”

  “That’s it?” Phoebe exclaimed, outraged. “He’s great, he’s sweet, he’s wonderful.”

  “Has she been this annoyingly vague about him the whole time?” Anna asked.

  “Yup,” Isa put in.

  “Right then, okay Phoebe, what’s wrong with him?” Anna asked.

  “Nothing, I mean absolutely nothing, I mean he’s great, he’s sweet—”

  “You said that,” I interrupted. “Is there something wrong with him?”

  “Well,” she drew the word out for a few seconds then fiddled with her fork. “Not exactly wrong…”

  “What is it?” I insisted.

  “It’s no big deal, I’m sure the two of us will work it out…it’s just…” She stopped looking at her plate and stared at Isaura in shock. “Actually, Isa, educate me. How do Jewish people have sex?”

  Isaura rolled her eyes. “The same way you do, Phoebe.”

  “No, not the point. I mean, if I jump Ethan, which I really, really want to do—”

  “We noticed,” I interrupted.

  “Right, so if I do, is he going to think I’m a harlot or a jezebel or something?”

  “Wait, you haven’t slept with him?” Anna asked, incredulous. “You’ve known him more than a week and you haven’t slept with him?”

  “I’ve known him for several weeks, but I’ve only known we were dating for a little while, and no, I haven’t slept with him.”

  “Bright Lady, it’s a record!” Anna said stunned. “You really have turned over a new leaf.”

  “I have not, I mean, whatever.” Phoebe gave up and turned back to Isaura. “I don’t want him to think I’m a slut, so how long until can I do him?”

  “It’s not that easy; there’s no rule in the Torah that says wait two months and then sex is okay.”

  “Two months?” Phoebe looked pained but our resident expert on Judaism ignored her to go on.

  “I mean there are as many varieties to the Jewish faith as there are in the pagan faiths. The way my family has only one set of dinner plates would be criminal in an orthodox community but reformed groups wouldn’t even care. Then there’s the whole Jewitch movement and Jews for Jesus. You can’t label Ethan Jewish and expect to be done with it.”

  “Fine.” Phoebe pouted. “So what do you propose I do then, hmmm?”

  “Maybe you could try talking to him?” Isaura said.

  “Actual communication? Now, who would suggest something crazy like that? I wonder…” I didn’t bother to hide the sarcasm in my voice.

  “Fine. I’ll talk to him, but if he tosses me aside as some loose woman, it’s all your fault.”

  “Whose?” Isa asked. “Mine or Mallory’s?”

  “I’ll take the blame!” Anna announced, grinning widely.

  ****

  Isaura wanted to be home to do some online gaming and Phoebe wanted to talk to Ethan so the dinner broke up early. Anna and I teased Phoebe that talking wasn’t on her mind before we headed our
separate ways. It was around nine when I settled on the couch to read for a little bit before heading to bed. The phone rang only a few pages in and I answered it a little annoyed.

  “Mallory, I’m going nuts.”

  “Going nuts how?” I looked up from the book in front of me, reluctant to give the phone my full attention. Anna’s fashion issues didn’t thrill me much.

  “I’m driving to Houston.”

  “Texas? Why would you want to go there?” That got my attention. It was nine on a Thursday night; Anna should be doing laundry with Nancy or maybe telling her about how dinner went not driving to another state.

  “Aden lives there.”

  “Aden?” The name sounded familiar and she sounded guilty but nothing was coming up in my head. It certainly hadn’t come up at dinner.

  “The guy. The one I went home with.”

  “From last weekend or what the weekend before last?”

  “Two weeks, almost three, and yeah, that guy.”

  “Oh no, no Anna, you’re not. You’re not driving four hours away to see some guy while your girlfriend sits at home. Please tell me you’re not.”

  “Just got onto I-10,” she said grimly. “I told her it was for work, a modeling thing. But I realized someone should know where I’m really going, so I’m going to see Aden. His last name is—”

  “Wait. Stop. Pull over. Think about what you’re doing. You have a relationship, you…” But then I stopped because the cute little candle I lit to brighten the room was burning a foot high. For all its size the flame hadn’t melted the wax into a puddle; something supernatural was burning my candle.

  “I’ve been thinking about him all day. I called to get his home address, and he said he’d been thinking about me. I know I said I hated what we did and I’d never do it again but for some reason…I thought dinner would distract me and I’d move on but…look I need to get him out of my system.”