THE DEEP END

by Mulhern, Julie

  The policemen milled about like shoppers outside a store where a sale is about to start. The firemen got back in their truck and drove away.

  I stared at the blood. There seemed to be an awful lot of it. Who knew there was so much blood in one body?

  Oh dear Lord. I was a horrible person. An awful bitch. A witch of the first order. I was more concerned with the blood on my driveway than my dead husband. Worse, I couldn’t dredge up a bit of grief. All I could do was wonder over how much he’d bled. I ought to feel something. At least guilt. I’d killed him. I was going to have to tell Grace I’d killed her father.

  I struggled to breathe. The air was too heavy, and I couldn’t get enough of it into my lungs. Lights danced at the edge of my vision, swirling with the blue and red strobe lights cast by the police cars and the dark stain beneath Henry’s head. Then the world turned black.

  The air was cool and dry as opposed to warm and damp. My head rested on something soft. I thought about opening my eyes but if I did, the lights, the car settled into my hostas like a bird in a nest, and the body would all be real. I’d killed my husband. Of all the ways I’d thought about ending Henry’s miserable existence, I’d never considered backing over him while he lay prone on the driveway. My car fantasies had taken more of a run-him-down turn. They’d been fantasies. Not anything I ever planned on doing. I wasn’t ready to face reality. I kept my eyes closed and listened to the voices in the room.

  “I’d say a couple of hours.”

  “You’re sure?”

  “Hard to be exact in the driveway. Plus, it was a warm night. Call it a best guess until I get him to the lab.”

  “So she didn’t kill him.”

  “Not with her car. It looks to me like someone bashed him on the head.”

  I peeked through my lashes.

  Detective Jones stood in my living room wearing pressed khakis and a pristine button down. A homicide detective should have looked out of place standing there on my Mahal rug surrounded by six generations worth of antiques. He didn’t. In fact, he probably fit in better than I did with my rumpled shirt, wrinkled shorts, and the faint whiff of...vomit. Oh goodie.

  “Any idea what hit him?” Detective Jones asked.

  The other man was older with droopy eyes and a face like a basset hound. “I’ll let you know once I’ve had a closer look.”

  Detective Jones glanced my way. “You’re sure she’s okay?”

  The basset hound man shrugged. “She fainted.”

  I fainted? I closed my lashes and considered that. On the surface, it seemed impossible. I wasn’t the kind of woman who fainted. Except...how else could I explain waking up on the couch?

  “She could have hit her head.”

  “The ground’s soft.”

  A hand grazed across my forehead and my lashes fluttered. The gentle fingers on my skin paused then disappeared. No point in playing opossum now. I opened my eyes.

  Detective Jones leaned over me. His expression was warm enough to melt chocolate, almost tender. It had been so long since a man looked at me like that—for a moment I forgot that Henry lay dead on the driveway. For a moment, I forgot my own name.

  The basset hound man barked a cough and Detective Jones pulled away. Damn cough.

  “Thanks, Meeks.” Detective Jones dismissed the man. Maybe he planned on gazing at me some more. A woman could hope. Staring into Detective Jones’ nice brown eyes beat the hell out of reality.

  Meeks cleared his throat in a way that suggested Detective Jones was behaving like a complete idiot, then he disappeared into the hallway.

  Detective Jones sat on the end of the couch. The end near my feet. Too far away for any gazing. “You want to tell me what happened?”

  Not really. “I got in the car to go to the club and backed up. When I felt the back wheels run over something...” My stomach lurched at the memory. “I stopped. I got out, saw legs, and called the police.”

  “Tell me about last night.”

  “I got home from the club around ten. I think Grace got home around ten-thirty or so. Powers stopped by elevenish.”

  “So late?” Detective Jones raised a brow.

  “He’d heard what happened at the club...sort of.”

  “What happened at the club?”

  “Henry and I had an argument. He slapped me.”

  “And?”

  “He stalked off. I didn’t see him again.”

  “What did you argue about?”

  I dragged my gaze away from Detective Jones and stared at the ceiling. “I told him I wanted a divorce.”

  Detective Jones said not a word. He sat at the end of my couch and waited for the rest of the story.

  I looked at the ceiling. There was a small crack near the corner, a jagged line marring its smooth white expanse. I stared at it for a while. If I narrowed my eyes, it looked like a lightning bolt. Divine retribution.

  Detective Jones remained silent.

  I sighed and looked at the man sharing the couch with me. “Henry was angry and said he’d never give me a divorce.”

  “Why was he angry?”

  Because I’d danced with another man. “Because I stood up to him.” I went back to staring at the crack.

  “What happened after Mr. Foster left?”

  “I went to bed.”

  “Did you hear anything?”

  “Nothing.”

  “Did you kill your husband?” His brown eyes had lost their warm expression. They were cold enough to freeze a pool full of water in mid-July. Cop eyes.

  “I didn’t mean to.” My stomach flipped and twisted and rebelled, bile rose in my throat. I pointed at a trash basket. “Would you get that for me?” I asked through locked teeth. All things being equal, I preferred not to ruin my rug. I’d already ruined my life.

  He put the basket on the rug near my head. “Running over him didn’t kill him.” He sounded almost kind.

  The muscles in my abdomen loosened. “I didn’t kill him?”

  “He was dead before the wheels touched him.”

  I swallowed. “How did he die?” I knew. The basset hound man had mentioned it. Someone had bashed Henry in the head. My stomach tightened again and I reached for the trash basket.

  “Detective Jones.” A policeman stood in the doorway. “We found something.”

  “Something?” I echoed.

  Detective Smith ignored me.

  Detective Jones’ eyes lost all their niceness and a cool mask covered the warmth of his smile. Full cop mode. He crossed to the door. “Where’d you find it?”

  “The shrubs.”

  My poor hostas. First Roger parked his car on them, then four brawny men deposited my car among their leaves, and now the police were pawing through them. They might never recover.

  They left the room and I pulled myself off the couch. I stood still for a moment, waiting for the stars to stop twinkling at the edge of my vision. The telephone and the door to the hallway vied for my attention. Call for help or find out what killed Henry? I took a step toward the door and the phone rang. Loud and shrill and intrusive. I answered it.

  “May I please speak with Ellison Russell?” a voice asked.

  “This is she.”

  “Ellison, it’s Hunter. Someone called and said you needed me. Are you all right?”

  I considered the question. My husband had been murdered. I was going to have to tell Grace her father was dead—the child slept like a rock but even she was going to wake up with all the commotion. My stomach felt like I’d ingested five or six cones of cotton candy then spent an hour on the Tilt-a-Whirl. Too bad the phone cord didn’t reach the spot where I’d left the wastebasket. I was not all right. “No. Henry’s dead.”

  The silence on Hunter’s end of the phone was
so thick and dense with thought it was almost tangible. After what seemed like an eon, he offered one word. “How?”

  “Apparently someone banged him on the head.” It was my turn to pause. I stared at the shiny black phone, the gloss of the walnut table it sat on, the colors of the rug. “I ran over the body.” My stomach tilted with the whirl.

  “Crap.” Who knew Hunter Tafft swore? “Ellison, listen to me. Don’t say anything to anybody. I’ll be there in ten minutes.”

  Not a problem. No one was talking to me anyway. The police were busy and if I stayed inside, the nosy neighbors, still dressed in their nightgowns and pajamas covered by hastily pulled on seersucker robes, wouldn’t be able to ask me any questions. I owed at least one of them a thank you for calling my attorney. Although, I didn’t want to think about the amount of gossip required for them to know who was representing me. “Hunter, who called you?”

  “I’m on my way,” said my lawyer. “Don’t talk to a soul.”

  “Who called you?” I insisted.

  “Detective Jones,” said Hunter. “Don’t talk to him.”

  Then he hung up.

  Twenty

  Once upon a time, I might have done as Hunter asked and stayed in the living room with my hands in my lap and my lips firmly sealed. Those days were gone. I wanted to know why Detective Jones had called my lawyer.

  There were fewer flashing lights when I stepped outside, but the cluster of neighbors had grown to a clump. Their rest disturbed, they stood untouched on the outside of a tragedy. Later they’d drink an extra cup of coffee and complain about how very tired they were. They’d trade gossip like stock tips while Grace came to terms with her father’s murder. I scowled at them.

  They stared back at me like I was an exotic animal in a thoroughly mundane zoo. I shoved my hands in my pockets so I wouldn’t gesture what I thought of their ghoulish curiosity.

  A station wagon with a medical examiner’s logo painted on its doors was parked next to Henry’s blanket-covered body. Half of the policemen loitered nearby. The other half gathered round my flattened shrubs where a photographer took pictures. Flashes from his camera cut through the dawn.

  I stood in the doorway, gnawing on my thumb knuckle, and considered. It wasn’t too late. I could still go back inside, wait for Hunter, let someone else handle the nightmare unfolding in my front yard. Except someone had murdered Madeline, attacked me, and then murdered my husband. Grace might be in real danger. I descended a step, then another, then another until I was standing on the driveway.

  My mouth was as dry as an unwatered sand trap. I inched closer to the circle of policemen, discovered the camera clicked before it flashed, and learned to close my eyes in anticipation of its blinding light.

  Walking with eyes closed, even inching with eyes closed, is a dangerous proposition. I tripped over a metal tent some policeman had left in the drive and opened my eyes to see asphalt rushing toward me...or me rushing toward asphalt. Bare knees and the heels of my hands took the impact.

  I didn’t move for a second. The sting of skinned knees rose to my eyes and they began to leak again. The embarrassment of falling in front of a gallery of pajama-clad onlookers and a healthy percentage of the police force warmed my cheeks. Not to mention Detective Jones. He raised his gaze from whatever nestled in my hostas to come help me.

  He bent, clasped my elbow, and half-lifted me off the drive. “Are you okay?”

  “Fine.”

  He released my arm, took a step backward and regarded my legs. “You ought to go inside and clean those up.”

  I glanced at my knees. Not one but two strawberries. Impressive ones. Knees an eight year-old boy would brag about while recounting an unlikely story about diving for a fly ball. Blood trickled down my shins.

  I wasn’t going back inside. I was tired of being a spectator in my own life, watching with detachment as my husband cheated and lied. I was tired of pleasing Mother because it took less energy than arguing. I was tired of abdicating responsibility. “What killed Henry?”

  Detective Jones shook his head. “You really ought to go take care of those knees.”

  “I’m fine. What killed him?”

  “A golf club.”

  Figured. How many times had I imagined some poor unsuspecting golf ball as Henry’s head? Obviously someone else had the same fantasy. “What kind of club?”

  “Golf.”

  “Yes. You said that. Left-handed or right-handed? What brand? Is it engraved?”

  Detective Jones blinked. “You can tell by looking if a golf club is left-handed or right-handed?”

  “Yes.”

  “Come take a look.”

  A three-iron lay in my hostas, its head darkened with blood. My stomach and what little was left inside it lurched. I took a deep breath and moved my gaze from the club face to the shaft and grip. Then I turned away.

  “It’s a left-handed club.”

  “Can you tell me anything else?”

  Hunter’s warning—don’t talk to him—reverberated in my ears. No need to tell Detective Jones it looked like a MacGregor. My MacGregor. My golf clubs were in the trunk of my car. It would be all too easy for someone to slide an iron out of the bag then hit Henry with it. The police might think that someone was me. “I’d like to sit down.”

  Detective Jones led me to the front stoop and I claimed the top step. Then I rested my elbows on my thighs and let my head sink to my hands.

  I expected Detective Jones to go back to the golf club in the shrubs. Instead, he sat next to me. “Where’s your daughter?”

  “Asleep.”

  He took a moment to inventory the flashing lights and policemen and vehicles in my front yard. “Through this?”

  “You don’t have teenagers, do you?”

  “No kids.”

  I raised my head from my hands. “Grace could sleep through the apocalypse.” The policemen around the three-iron were moving. Maybe they were going to pick it up, take it into evidence, and discover my initials engraved just beneath the grip. EWR. My ticket back to the police station. Maybe my ticket to jail. “Thank you for calling my lawyer.”

  Detective Jones’ gaze remained fixed on the crime scene in my front yard. His body tensed. “I’d appreciate it if you didn’t mention that to anyone.”

  “Done.”

  I’d found two bodies in less than a week. My husband and his mistress. Even I thought I looked guilty. Yet, he’d still called my lawyer. “Why’d you do it?”

  He raised a brow.

  “Why did you call Hunter Tafft for me?”

  He opened his mouth. He might have answered me, but Mother and Daddy chose that moment to push past the policeman at the end of the driveway. For perhaps the first time in her adult life, Mother didn’t look bandbox perfect. Backcombed hair was flattened on the left side of her head and she hadn’t bothered to tuck in her shirt.

  Mother charged up the drive like an enraged rhinoceros, brushing past uniformed police officers, near trampling someone in a medical examiner’s uniform. “Ellison, are you all right?”

  “Fine,” I lied.

  “You don’t look fine.” She stared at my bloody knees. “You look pale. Is that blood on your face?”

  I glanced at my bloodied palms. “Probably.”

  Detective Jones stood, cleared his throat.

  Mother ignored him. “Elaine Markham called me. She said the police were here.”

  Daddy took Detective Jones’ spot on the stoop and cradled my hand as if it was something precious. “You okay, sugar?”

  “Henry’s dead. Murdered.”

  Mother’s sharp intake of breath was audible above the chatter of the neighbors, the conversation of the police, the too loud beating of my heart.

  Daddy wrapped his arm around my shoulders. �
��Who killed him?”

  I shook my head. “I ran over his body.”

  “Ellison!”

  All the air Mother had drawn into her lungs was expelled with one word.

  “I didn’t kill him. He was already dead.”

  Mother goggled. Scandalized. “You ran over your husband’s body?”

  “It was an accident. I didn’t see him in the driveway.”

  “I just don’t understand how this happened. If you had—”

  “Enough.” My father’s voice cut through whatever list of complaints my mother had been about to begin. His gaze cut toward Detective Jones.

  “Mother, Daddy, this is Detective Jones. Detectives Jones, these are my parents, Frances and Harrington Walford.”

  My parents stared at Detective Jones. He stared back. Mother was the first to look away. “Nice to meet you.” Then, unfortunately, her gaze returned to me. “You can’t stay here. You and Grace will have to move in with your father and me until the police,” she inclined her head toward Detective Jones, “catch this maniac.”

  Move in with Mother? Getting whacked on the head again would be less painful. On the other hand, how could I make Grace stay in a house where both of her parents had been attacked? I gritted my teeth. “Thank you, Mother.”

  Mother’s chin dropped, her eyes narrowed, and she pursed her lips. I’d deprived her of an argument she’d looked forward to winning. She rallied quickly. “Go in and pack.”

  “Not now.”

  “Pardon me?” Mother’s brows, perfectly groomed arcs of disbelief, rose to her forehead.

  “Grace is still asleep. She doesn’t know yet. We’ll come later today.”

  Daddy squeezed my hand, which hurt like hell.

  Mother’s lips thinned then she reached up to pat her perfect hairdo and discovered the flat area on the side of her head. Her hand dropped and the morning’s half-light revealed an uncharacteristic flush on her cheeks.