by Lois Winston
By the time I got them both into the house and unwrapped, it was 11:40 A.M. and Mona still hadn’t shown. Grumbling, I carted the pictures into the spacious living room and propped them against the wall.
Mona’s house is large and sprawling, unlike my own which is so cramped that people and furniture have trouble co-existing. Andy and I had planned to add on, but we’d never managed to save enough money to do more than dream. Now, with the impending divorce, money was even tighter. It wasn’t that Andy was being nasty about it. Bottom line is, he’s a pretty decent guy. Unfortunately, he’s also unreliable as all get out and practically penniless.
The financial fallout from Mona’s divorce was different. Her husband was a first-class sleaze, but a rich one. Although he’d fought her tooth and nail over everything from the country club membership to the leftover Christmas wrap, Mona had wound up with a more than satisfactory settlement. She got the house and a sizable portion of their assets, while Gary got the furniture, Persian carpets, and china, all of which he was eager to install in the even bigger house he and his wife-to-be were building on the edge of town.
I’d only seen Mona’s house once in its former, sumptuous state. It had been decorated to the nines with massive and, to my taste, overly ornate antiques. Impressive certainly, in a formal, heavy-handed way, but not the sort of place where you’d want to kick off your shoes and stretch out. At that time the walls had been adorned with gold framed hunting scenes and pseudo Rembrandts. In forging her life anew, Mona had gone from one extreme to another. She was now into serious minimalism. The walls were white, the floors and windows bare, the furnishings sparse. Libby’s was the only room that actually looked inhabited. And it was a mess. Exactly what you’d expect from the teenage daughter of a woman who’d elevated empty space to new heights.
I checked my watch again, then stood back against the fireplace to get a feeling for the two pictures together. I liked the effect, though of course Mona would have the final say. If she ever got there. I couldn’t imagine what was keeping her. Or why she didn’t at least call.
Damn her anyway, I thought. I’d arranged my whole morning around her schedule. Mentally giving her the what-for, I stomped off into the kitchen, newly refurbished in white and chrome, and put on a kettle of water for coffee. Mona had told me she had something to discuss, and with Mona this meant coffee. It would speed up the process considerably if the coffee was ready when she was.
And that would have to be soon or we’d never get to the conversation part of the visit, which seemed, from Mona’s tone, rather pressing. She wasn’t the only one with an afternoon commitment. I had a one o’clock meeting, a final planning session for the upcoming school auction, and I’d promised Sharon I’d stop by the bakery on my way over. God forbid we should have to do all that planning without the benefit of oatmeal bars and brownies.
The water began to boil. I measured the coffee and then pulled down the cups, taking care not to knock against the two crystal tumblers sitting next to the sink. They hadn’t been emptied completely, and had that heavy, boozy odor you never notice until the morning after. I dumped the contents, then rinsed them carefully. While I was at it, I dumped the ashtray, as well. Company and a late night, I thought, maybe that explained it. Mona had probably slept through her alarm this morning and had been running late ever since.
If that was the case, though, she probably hadn’t had time to pull together the fabric samples I’d asked for. We were looking for a large, horizontal piece to hang above the couch in the den. I wanted to measure the space and maybe take one of the throw pillows to use in matching colors. I poured the water through the coffee, and then while it dripped, went to the den to gather what I’d need.
The smell was what I noticed first, even before I reached the den. An indistinct, slightly rank odor, like rotting leaves or a garbage disposal that hasn’t been run through. Inside the room it was stronger and more fetid. I gagged slightly, thought about opening a window, then decided against it. Mona was not the fresh air freak I was.
I was halfway to the sofa before I noticed a shape mounded at one end, and even closer before it hit me.
The shape was Mona.
She was slouched against the back cushion, sweat pants twisted around her outstretched legs, one arm flung out to the side, the other draped across her chest. Her tee shirt had ridden up, exposing a band of bare skin across her middle — skin that seemed oddly tight and waxy. Her head had rolled back so that she was facing the ceiling, her expression frozen and masklike.
I closed the distance between us in a flash, grabbed her arm and felt for a pulse. The flesh my fingers touched was cold. Clammy and lifeless, as I’d known it would be. The prescription bottle and half-empty fifth of scotch on the table left little room for doubt.
“Mona. My God, Mona. Why?” My mouth was too dry to actually form the words, but inside my head someone was shrieking, and sobbing her name over and over again.
I stumbled back to the kitchen where I called the paramedics, although I knew there was nothing they could do. Then I hung up and placed a second call to Lieutenant Michael Stone.
~*~
Want to know what happens next? Click here to buy Murder Among Friends.
About the Author
Jonnie Jacobs is the bestselling author of fifteen mystery and suspense novels, and several short stories. A former practicing attorney and the mother of two grown sons, she lives in northern California with her husband.
Connect with Jonnie at the following sites:
Email: [email protected]
Website: http://www.jonniejacobs.com
Books by Jonnie Jacobs
Kate Austen Suburban Mystery Series
Murder Among Neighbors
Murder Among Friends
Murder Among Us
Murder Among Strangers
Kali O’Brien Legal Mystery Series
Shadow of Doubt
Evidence of Guilt
Motion to Dismiss
Witness for the Defense
Cold Justice
Intent to Harm
The Next Victim
Non-Series Books
The Only Suspect
Paradise Falls
Lying With Strangers
Payback
Skeleton in a Dead Space
A Kelly O’Connell Mystery, Book One
By Judy Alter
Kelly O’Connell never thought real estate was a dangerous profession. But while updating early-twentieth-century Craftsman houses in an older neighborhood in Fort Worth, Texas, she stumbles over a skeleton and begins unraveling an old murder. The police call it a cold case, but Kelly knows she must solve the murder if she is to finish the house and sell it. She and her two young daughters quickly become the target of threats and vandalism, and someone is telling her ex-husband in California what’s going on. Tim Spencer arrives to protect his daughters by taking them to California with him but is soon found shot to death. Then a new client barges into Kelly’s life, and she finds herself facing a gun, a deadly killer, and the solution to the mystery of the skeleton and Tim’s death.
ONE
I am passionate about a few things—my daughters, old houses, the neighborhood I live and work in, white wine, and chocolate. But certainly not skeletons. I could have lived my life without ever seeing a skeleton. And yet that’s just what I saw one fall morning after I answered the phone at my real estate office. I had no idea of the twisted and scary road that skeleton would lead me down.
I reached for the phone hoping, maybe, for a new real estate listing or a buyer panting after one of the Craftsman houses I had redone. But not something dead, something dead a long time. It was an October day, with North Texas at its best—sunny, temperature in the 70s, a light breeze, and trees that were beginning to turn because we had a cold snap. The girls—Maggie, seven, and Em, four—had been laughingly happy when I took them to school. I was finalizing the details of a contract—a nice real estate sale that would b
oost my firm’s income for the year, so when the phone rang, it was an intrusion.
“O’Connell and Spencer Realtors,” I answered automatically, my tone somewhat terse. I admit I don’t handle interruptions well, but I can’t bear to let a phone ring unanswered.
“Miss Kelly, you come right now. Mother of God!” Anthony Dimitrios, the carpenter and jack-of-all-trades who renovates houses for me, yelled into the phone. He is volatile, given to outbursts of various emotions, from anger to joy, and I don’t take any of that seriously. But this was different. This was panic.
“I’m on my way,” I said, even as I heard the phone click dead. No chance to ask him what was the matter. Slipping my feet back into shoes and grabbing my purse and keys, I headed out the door. Where was Keisha? My office manager had disappeared. She’s probably gone to get lunch. I locked the office, my thoughts tumbling. Whatever was the matter with Anthony, I had a bad feeling about it in the pit of my stomach.
~*~
I am the O’Connell part of O’Connell & Spencer—Kelly O’Connell—and my ex-husband, Tim Spencer, was the Spencer part. It’s a small firm in the Fairmount neighborhood of Fort Worth. Though Tim left over three years ago, I hadn’t changed the name. O’Connell Realtors sounded ordinary to me. I liked having the business to myself—well, most of the time. Tim was smart about real estate, but he wasn’t so smart about people, and I found I got along with clients better than he did.
Anthony was working on a house on Fairmount Avenue, a wonderful red brick with a wide, roofed front porch held in by a three-foot solid brick wall and evenly placed round pillars reaching from the low wall to the roof line. The house had leaded glass bay windows, hardwood floors, and solid oak woodwork, once painted white but now painstakingly being restored to the original varnished state. It was a two-bedroom, or I’d have thought about moving the girls and myself into it.
Anthony stood on the front porch, wiping his forehead with a big handkerchief and running his hand through his hair, a nervous gesture. He was a big burly man of about sixty with dark curly hair just touched with bits of gray and usually laughing eyes His eyes weren’t laughing now. He’s standing there so it can’t be that bad. “Anthony, what’s the matter?”
“Wait till you see,” he said, leading me into the house, through the living room and dining room and into the kitchen.
The kitchen was once redone, maybe not too long ago. It was now a galley kitchen, which didn’t match the house at all. In the name of frugality, we decided against trying to puzzle out the original configuration, but one thing bothered both of us. On the left wall there was a deep cabinet—we decided to put pullout drawers on rollers, so that the back space could be easily reached. Next to that, though, was a shallow cabinet with shelves no more than three or four inches deep, enough for spices or one row of canned goods but nothing more. Beyond that the oven and microwave extended much farther back. What was behind the spice cabinet? We laughed about that dead space, and then Anthony suggested we make the spice shelves swing out like a false door, so that the occupants of the house could utilize the space behind. I thought it was a terrific idea.
Today, he’d pulled out the spice shelves and the sheet of wood that held them, all in one piece. It leaned against the counter on the other side of the kitchen. But when I entered the kitchen, he pointed to the space behind where they’d been, and then he wiped his brow again. The space looked like an empty cabinet with nothing put into it. Whatever, I wondered, could be wrong with him? I looked inside the dead space, but it was too dark to make out much except a wooden box, sort of like an old orange crate only larger. “Pull that out,” I said to him.
“Mother of God, no, not me.”
“Well, give me your flashlight.” I shined the light inside the box. A skeleton, a human form, was curled in a fetal position inside the box. I gasped and pulled back. Anthony was no help. Some instinct told me not to move the skeleton. What had I read in all those mysteries? Don’t mess with a crime scene.
“I’m sorry, Miss Kelly.” He always calls me Miss Kelly, which irritates me a bit. I don’t call him Mr. Anthony. “I wanted to warn you, but...” His large shoulders shrugged.
“Nothing to be sorry about, Anthony. You didn’t put it here.” My heart was pounding.
He held up his hands, palms out, denying any knowledge.
I wasn’t sure what I felt—shock, surprise, fear. A skeleton was once a living human being. How had this person died, stuffed in a box? The horror of it made me clasp my hand to my mouth, afraid I was going to be sick. And a bit of me—not the better part, I admit—felt repulsion. A skeleton is gross. I was also apprehensive, dreading that this discovery would only lead to something worse.
Holding my breath, I looked closer. Mummified bits of skin around the mouth pulled it back into a grotesque grin. Bits of hair, faded now so that no color was discernible, clung to the skull, and scraps of fabric clung to the bones. It was impossible to tell without touching—and I didn’t want to anyway—but I thought the fabric was lightweight, maybe once even floral. Now it was dirty gray. A woman, I decided, and, from the size, a young woman. But for all I knew, it could have been a young boy.
Digging in my purse, I handed Anthony my cell phone and ordered, “Call 911.”
He took the phone and went to the front porch. I stood by the box, as though the poor creature needed someone to watch over her—or him. Within minutes, I heard the wail of sirens, and it dawned on me that Anthony didn’t tell them it wasn’t a fresh body.
Two police officers rushed in, not quite with guns drawn but looking on the ready, checking out the situation. One was an officer I knew—Mike Shandy, who was assigned to the Fairmount neighborhood. I sometimes ran into him at neighborhood meetings and at the Old Neighborhood Grill on Park Place, where locals went for food and gossip. His wholesome, ex-Marine look—dark blonde crew cut, really blue eyes, and a nice grin—was appealing. I told myself I didn’t notice such things, especially when I was standing over a skeleton.
“Hey, Kelly,” Officer Mike Shandy said. “Didn’t expect to see you.”
“Hey, Mike,” I replied. “We own this house. But there’s no need to hurry. This one’s been here a long time.”
Shandy peered into the box and let out a loud, “Oh, my God!”
The other officer paled.
“What do you know?” Shandy asked.
“Not a thing, except that Anthony found this just now when he took out those shelves.” I pointed to the shelves leaning against the counter. “We wondered what was on the other side of them.” My voice was shaky at first, but as I talked it gained some strength.
“How long have you owned this house? Previous owners?”
“I bought it about four months ago from a young couple who’d lived here two years. I don’t think they were ready to be urban pioneers once they found out they were going to be parents.” Urban pioneers was what Fairmount residents often called themselves, living in a neighborhood where an updated home was likely to stand next to a run-down, paint-peeling, porch-sagging structure with a refrigerator on the front porch and cars parked in the front yard.
Things went along like all the police procedurals I’d ever watched on late-night TV, when sleep wouldn’t come. The evidence team arrived, photographed everything, dusted for fingerprints—a huge waste of time, to my mind, since they’d find Anthony’s and not much else, maybe mine. Then the medical people arrived. They quickly decided to take box and all to the morgue—transferring the fragile contents to a gurney presented insurmountable problems. I hung around because I felt I ought to…and because I was curious.
When all the technical people began to leave, Mike looked at me, and said, “Don’t leave town.” But he said it with a wry grin that I liked, the kind of grin that might be a slight bit of flirting. Then it hit me again—flirting over a skeleton, even if it was now gone out of the house? Couldn’t be.
“Of course not, but I’m glad we found this instead of some new owner. Tell me
, how does a living, breathing person end up a skeleton in a dead space in an old house?” I thought a minute and then added, “I think it’s a she.”
“So do I,” he said. “But we’ll get a medical report. It takes longer with skeletal remains.”
“Can they tell how long it’s been here?”
“From what I understand, that’s the hardest part. They can tell age, weight, previous injuries—all that sort of stuff—but how long is pretty much a guessing game. If we had a clue who she—or it—was, we might try for dental records. But that’s a long shot until we identify the, uh, body. When was the house built?”
“1916.”
He whistled. “Wow. Almost a hundred years. Theoretically, we’d have to look through newspapers, missing persons’ reports, and all that since 1916. No telling how long it takes a body to get in that condition—if it was someplace really cold or really dry, you’d have a mummy. But not in Texas. Varmints had something to do with turning the body into a skeleton. They can get into places we think are sealed tight.”
There were rats and mice all over Fairmont, and I knew that, but the idea still gave me the creeps. I wondered if the body smelled at one point—enough to alert neighbors that something was wrong. Sure, skeletons don’t smell—but dead bodies do after a few days, and from all the TV shows I’ve watched, the smell is pretty powerful and pretty awful. Didn’t anyone notice? And who lived in the house at the time?
Mike Shandy was businesslike. “I’ll let you know what forensics turns up. But it won’t be quick.” And then he added, “We’ll have to tape off the house for a few days. Guess you’ll have to stop work.”