Crazy, VA

by Hill, Shannon

Mike Spivey was the former sheriff’s deputy. He’d quit when I was elected. Mike moped around town, and lived off his wife, the nurse over at the Emergicare. He was likely why I couldn’t get a deputy to apply no matter how much I advertised. Mike didn’t like the idea of women cops, and would ride anyone who worked for me. Hard, probably. The sad thing was, the pay was decent and the hours weren’t bad. When the town had a sheriff and a deputy, each one worked an eight-hour shift five days a week, the deputy usually taking some split shifts to cover morning traffic and evening DUIs. When it’s just me, though, I’m working 60 hours a week on my own, and the county cops don’t like having to take over on my days off. I had two days off by the calendar, but I spent a few hours of each dealing with those calls the county boys deemed too petty to get to until they’d run out of other things to do.

  “And how was Boris?”

  “Good,” I told her, and fell asleep before she could ask me another question.

  ***^***

  Boris followed me sedately to the car every morning after that. In rain or heavy dew, he might tip-paw a bit, or stick close under the umbrella, but not a day went by he didn’t come to the cruiser with me. His second week, a crime wave hit Crazy.

  The rumor mill had been turning fast since I’d first brought Boris along for the day, but people seemed to treat it as one of those amusing eccentricities the South claims to love in its law enforcement and preachers. Then, on Friday, I pulled Rick Morse over for weaving all over the road, and sure enough he was drunk. That’s not too uncommon with Rick, except he lives in Nellysford and doesn’t get over my way much. He got out of the car to greet me, alcohol fumes coming off him like the August sun off the pavement.

  “That bitch,” he slurred, “is at it again.”

  The bitch in question is his ex-wife, who lives in Crazy and works at the resort in Wintergreen.

  “Child support?” I asked, as I jotted out the ticket. “Or alimony?”

  “More chi-uld support,” muttered Rick, leaning on his car. “How much can two kids eat?”

  “Growing bones,” I said off-hand, and ripped the ticket off the pad, gave it to him. “You’ll have to go to county court for this one, Mr. Morse.”

  “Shee-it,” said Rick, and then calmly tore up the ticket in tiny pieces.

  “Mr. Morse,” I said flatly, “I’m adding littering to the next ticket.”

  Well, dumb drunk as he was, he tried to swipe my ticket pad. I’m used to it. People try dumb shit on cops all the time. But it was the last time Rick Morse would ever try that stunt.

  With a mighty yowl like a banshee, Boris levitated out of his seat and out the window I’d left down for him so he could enjoy the air. He raced to Rick Morse, and bit the man hard on the leg.

  “Shit!” yelped Rick, and lifted his foot to kick. I put my hand on my gun and Boris took that as some signal to attack. Puffed to twice his usual size, he rose in the air with a feline squall, and clamped himself around Rick’s thigh with his teeth sunk deep not too far from Rick’s groin. Rick started dancing around, hollering curses, and I nearly died laughing before I thought to say, “Boris! Enough!”

  Boris’s teeth let go. His claws were still sunk in, though, and his ears lay flat. He growled, eyes black with rage.

  “Enough! Car, Boris!”

  And like a well-trained shepherd, Boris let go, pranced away, and vaulted into the cruiser. I didn’t speak Feline, but by God that cat knows English.

  Rick examined his leg, ashen. “I’m suing!”

  “Go ahead,” I said. “The town’s got about fifty bucks.”

  “I could get rabies!”

  “I’m more worried about Boris,” I said frankly. “Your blood alcohol level could make him sick. And you’re under arrest.”

  I swear, when I put Rick in the backseat of the cruiser, I heard Boris purr.

  That was Friday. By the next Wednesday, everyone in Crazy found a reason to call the sheriff, to see my deputy for themselves. My patrol‌—‌the town itself, out a mile or so on Piedmont Road and then back into town on Turner’s Gap Road, and up Madison Pike about a mile‌—‌suddenly had the liveliest criminal activity in the world. One elderly lady known to make moonshine went so far as to claim her laundry had been stolen off the clothesline to get me out there. It took me two minutes to find it, neatly folded in a basket behind some bushes, but that gave her all the time she wanted to look at Boris and exclaim, “Lordy! It really is a cat!”

  It was the longest week I’d yet had as sheriff, and at the end of it, Aunt Marge put the icing on the cake. She presented Boris with a new name-tag for his collar, in the shape of a deputy’s star.

  CHAPTER 3

  Aunt Marge gets things done. By the time Boris had been with me for a month, and we’d endured one of the hottest Augusts on record, she was ready to break ground on the animal shelter. One of her ideas I didn’t like was a bronze statue of me and Boris in the shelter’s lobby. Even the most egotistical Littlepages and Ellers don’t go in for commemorative statuary. Bronze plaques left right and center, and a discreet ancestral bust or two, but never the full deal.

  I’m never in much of a good mood as September rolls around, so Aunt Marge ditched the statue idea in an attempt to keep me happy. It didn’t work. It never does. September’s always been what I call my month of doom. My parents died September 3rd. I quit my old life to come back to Crazy September 5th. I don’t even like to think about September 11th. I was supposed to get married on September 27th, and that didn’t happen. And… Well, let’s just say I’m a bitch the closer we get to September, and a nightmare until October rolls around, and I’m safe again for another year.

  That year, on September 1st, I got the call. Kim, of course, first thing in the morning, before Boris and I even got to the speed trap I’d set up on Turner’s Gap Road to catch the people who thought I didn’t know they were using it to avoid the speed trap by Junior’s. I was in a foul mood anyway, counting days until anniversaries I dreaded would arrive, and her tone set me off.

  “Um, Sheriff?”

  Kim almost never calls me Sheriff. And she never sounds shook. Bored, sarcastic, concerned, but never shook up.

  “Spit it out, Kim,” I demanded, glaring. I was speeding myself, and that put me in an even worse mood. I hate breaking the laws I’m supposed to enforce. I pulled onto the shoulder, bit out, “I got traffic here.”

  “Um.”

  “Jesus Christ, Kim, what is it?”

  I don’t usually cuss. Not like that. Did I mention how I hate September? Especially hot, muggy, nasty Septembers?

  “Lil, there’s a dead body in Spottswood Park.”

  And just like that, I didn’t notice the rising heat, or the oppressive humidity, or the fact that Josie Shifflett had just blown past me doing 70 in a 45 zone. The whole world sort of whited out.

  “Lil?”

  “I heard you, Kim,” I said numbly, one hand on Boris. He nudged my fingers, eyes worried. “Who is it?”

  “Um.” I heard Kim gulp. “Well, Mrs. Rush says it’s your cousin.”

  “I’ve got four,” I replied stupidly. “Which?”

  “Mrs. Rush said it was Lisa.”

  Lisa Littlepage Hunter. A name and some rumors. Nothing more. Strange, to think she was a blood relative.

  Then my inner cop kicked in. Lisa Littlepage Hunter. Age 29. Separated from her husband, Nelson Hunter, from a new money family in Charlottesville. Recently moved back to the Littlepage family home in Crazy. High-strung, nonsmoker, nondrinker, played tennis and golf three times a week, no children, one annoying ankle-nipping purse dog named Benito. Drove a Mercedes, took frequent shopping trips to Manhattan, adored sushi as the perfect diet food: “So gross you can’t bear to eat the rest of the day.” Blonde from a bottle, complexion carefully tended by dermatologists, teeth by dentists, body by personal trainers. Glowed with that peculiar aura only the pampered children of the wealthy have.

  Total stranger.

  Dead total stranger.
>
  I hit my lights and siren. Waited for the break in traffic I needed. And screeched off to Spottswood Park to meet my cousin.

  ***^***

  Spottswood Lane was the latest skirmish site between Ellers (aka Eller Enterprises Ltd) and Littlepages (aka LP Inc). A few years ago, Ellers built a dozen highly profitable McMansions on the lane; Littlepages donated and landscaped Spottswood Park, between the McMansions and Madison Pike. Now yuppies who don’t mind a 45-minute commute (one-way, let me add) brag to their city friends how they rooked the hicks, but the truth is, they paid way more than those houses are worth. And the Littlepages countered by unloading one of the worst patches of land in the area at the same time. Whenever Elk Creek floods that patch of land goes from quasi-bog to outright swamp for a week.

  I pulled up, and got out my roll of yellow tape, and set Kim to taping off the whole park. I taped off the stretch along Main, and ambled reluctantly over to the body. It had been dry, hellish dry, so for once the ground was firm and even hard underfoot. That meant no footprints, but it cut back on the number of insects I’d probably find on the body.

  Or not. There weren’t any obvious signs of maggots or flies yet, but the ants had gotten busy. I swore to myself, glared Mrs. Rush back to the civilian side of the tape, and very carefully peered at my dead cousin. In life, she’d had that careless aura of privilege and exhaustive self-maintenance that passes for classy beauty. In death, she was another lump of meat with mediocre features and hair gone dark at the roots. Now that was interesting. I didn’t know her personally, but all I knew of her told me she’d have kept those roots as blond as possible, go in for touch-ups every week. Why go back to the nondescript light brown that characterized most Littlepages? I was an Eller in that respect; I had dark hair in great quantities. For work I wore it in a chignon, and I touched it a moment as if to make sure it was there, branding me different from the victim.

  I checked her hands. No white mark to show where her wedding band had been, though I didn’t read much into the fact. She might tan at a salon, or have not worn it during tennis and golf. Her watch remained on her wrist, white gold with a diamond marking each of the twelve hours of the day. It was still ticking. I checked the rest of her, a once-over that told me five things:

  1. Robbery not a likely motive.

  2. Sexual assault also not likely.

  3. She was stabbed. A lot.

  4. The amount of blood at the scene indicated she’d been dumped.

  5. This was gonna suck.

  The county boys arrived, along with a state cop, and finally an ambulance to transport the body.

  Tom was there, gave me a look of pity. “You know they’ll…”

  “I know,” I said, using my hat to fan myself. I couldn’t take my eyes off the body. “You wanna grab my water off the front seat?”

  “Sure,” he said amiably, and left me to the state cop. “My jurisdiction,” I told him, but he didn’t seem to think I was equipped. Well, I wasn’t.

  “I’ll have it taken up to…”

  “Her,” I corrected sharply.

  “Her,” he said, not quite rolling his eyes. “Taken up to Charlottesville.”

  “Wish you wouldn’t,” I said. “Her soon-to-be-ex is a Charlottesville boy, and he’s got money.”

  His eyes sharpened a bit at that. “Richmond, then. But…”

  I waved my hat very carefully. Funny, the little things we do to keep our tempers. “I know. The county’s got no resources.”

  Tom bounded up with my water bottle. I sipped, absently, as the body was loaded into the ambulance. No chance our medical examiner would do an adequate job. The guy was not incompetent, but unpracticed. This was, to my knowledge, the first homicide in town since 1996. And that was an easy one. Straight-up domestic, the steak knife still sticking out of his throat. Which taught him not to bitch about supper being a few minutes late, I guess, but didn’t exactly challenge the county’s coroner to come up with a cause of death. We needed full-court forensic press for this, not that I thought we’d get it.

  I was right. The state cop gave me a regretful sort of look. “Um. Y’know this won’t be high priority.”

  I remembered a Littlepage is in the state senate. I smiled at him, and said, “It will be.”

  Then I took a last look at the cousin I didn’t know. Shook my head. Told Tom, “Make sure I get copies of all those pictures your boy’s taking.”

  “Will do,” said Tom, then pointed. “Hey! Boris!”

  Tom had left the door to my cruiser open and Boris had apparently decided it was time to work. He sauntered over, stopped abruptly where the body had lain, and hissed, all his hair standing on end.

  “Your fucking cat’s contaminating the scene,” said the chief of the county police, thumbs in his belt. I might as well introduce him. Chief Rucker. You can figure out his nickname for yourself. It rhymes with Rucker.

  I scooped up Boris, and glared. Forebore to remark that his boys had trampled the whole damn scene to pieces. I don’t expect real life to be like a rerun of CSI, but they really weren’t being careful.

  “So she got someone wants to kill her?”

  “Obviously,” I said frostily, “at least one. I’ll talk to her husband. They’re getting divorced.”

  “I think,” said Rucker, his face pork-pink in the heat, “you oughta stick to notifications.”

  My rage almost got away from me. Almost. Petting Boris kept it down. Cat therapy. Every cop should have a furry pet in the car.

  “It’s my jurisdiction, that makes it my homicide.”

  “Well, I’m takin’ it away from you, darlin’.”

  Tom winced. Smart man.

  Boris growled, tail lashing. His claws dug into my arm. I felt him brace for a leap. I hushed him with a soft croon, then glared haughtily at Rucker. “You’ve got…”

  “She’s your cousin, ain’t she?” said Rucker belligerently. “Conflict of interest.”

  Tom looked expectantly at me. I said nothing. I carried Boris back to the car, could have screamed in frustration. That idiot Rucker had parked his car on the shoulder. Right where we might otherwise have found some tire tracks.

  ***^***

  I went up to Littlepage House. The original brick Colonial had become a guesthouse, and they’d replaced it with a huge Greek Revival thing that looked like Tara in Gone With the Wind. I’d never been any closer than a safe distance. The Ellers disdained me. The Littlepages outright refused to acknowledge my existence.

  A maid opened the door. Not surprisingly, she wore a uniform. Not a black dress and white apron, thank God, but khakis and a polo shirt that bore the logo LP Inc.. At sight of my uniform, and the badge I showed her, she nodded crisply, and strode away. A few moments later, I met Uncle Littlepage. David, to people who knew him.

  “Mr. Littlepage.”

  “Sheriff.” He waved a languid hand. If Uncle Eller reminded me of some haughty long-nosed lord in a British period drama, then Uncle Littlepage reminded me of a condescending professor from some Ivy League college, someone who’d done a semester at the Sorbonne and never let you forget it. “I trust there’s no trouble?”

  I hate notifications. No good way to do it, either. “Mr. Littlepage, I’m sorry to bring you this kind of news.”

  He stiffened up. I pitied him.

  “Mr. Littlepage, your daughter Lisa…” I hesitated, drew a breath, and blurted, “She’s dead, sir. Her body was found a couple of hours ago.”

  He flinched, a hand half-raised in a gesture of refusal. His eyes blazed, flicked past me, returned less certain. “That’s not possible.”

  “Lisa’s body was found in Spottswood Park this morning.”

  He tipped his head to one side, polite disbelief and iron composure. “Lisa’s in the guesthouse. She’s staying there. It’s a difficult time for her.”

  I’d noticed the Mercedes in the driveway of the guesthouse, too, and said as gently as I could, “Sir. Mr. Littlepage. She’s gone.”

 
He stepped back, a hand going oddly to his chest, and called, “Mary!”

  A voice floated out from the back of the house. “Yes, dear?”

  “Come to the foyer, please.”

  Amazing, the manners he had under the circumstances.

  A middle-aged woman with that well-kept glow came crisply into the foyer. At sight of me, she attempted expression and failed. I thought, uncharitably I admit, botox.

  “Sheriff?”

  “She says Lisa’s dead,” barked Uncle Littlepage. “Did you call her this morning?”

  “No, dear, not yet. It’s barely nine, she was at a party last night, you know,” said Mary Littlepage in a polished Tidewater drawl. “I thought she could brunch with me later. I’m sorry,” she added, “did you say…”

  “I’m sorry to inform you, ma’am,” I recited dully, “your daughter’s body was found this morning in Spottswood Park.”

  And that’s when I noticed something very interesting. Mary’s eyes couldn’t widen‌—‌I doubt she could sneeze, she was that botox-tight‌—‌but the rest of her didn’t flinch. There was no twitch, no tic, no recoil. Not for a full heartbeat and a half. And my gut told me it wasn’t shock. My gut told me she knew.

  Then Mary Littlepage threw up her hands to cover her face and uttered a long wail of despair. She went to her knees on the Aubusson rug, and crumpled her well-toned body into a curve of grief. Uncle Littlepage went instantly to her side, raised an accusing face to me. “Please leave at once.”

  “I have to ask, Mr. Littlepage, who might want to harm your daughter.”

  The eyes blazed, blurred with tears. “I asked you to leave, Sheriff.”

  I sighed to myself, left my card on the silver salver on its half-moon table, and saw myself out with Mary Littlepage’s shrieks of denial ringing in my head.

  ***^***

  I sat with my feet on my desk and Boris in my lap, staring at the dry-erase board. I had two of them, one a calendar for court dates. This one was for investigations. It never had much on it. Now it had plenty, and I stroked Boris idly, listening to his breathy little sleep-purr. There’s a lot of contentment in having a cat on your lap.