by Karen Harper
So passionate, so convincing. Deeply moved, Claire could only nod yet again. Instead of hugging this time, they shook hands.
* * *
Later that evening, Claire was ecstatic. Maybe she could have it all—a wonderful family life, an understanding husband she was madly in love with, and a safe and exciting at-least-part-time career. Nick had agreed and had even been intrigued by her consulting offer, which she would actually accept or reject after she visited the Black Bog dig, met the Vances and saw the terms of her contract. Nick, who had worked hard to build his father’s criminal law firm and run his South Shores project on the side to help people determine whether the deaths of their loved ones were murders or suicides, had thought that was a good plan.
They had dropped Lexi and Trey off at Claire’s sister, Darcy’s, house for the early evening, because they were going to help their newlywed friends, Bronco and Nita Gates, clean up the house they had bought for an excellent price with a loan partly financed by Nick. Bronco worked as a security guard at Nick’s law firm. Nita was their part-time nanny for Trey and Lexi, and the four adults were close friends.
Though they were still living in an apartment, Bronco and Nita had bought their new house in East Naples, a one-floor stucco painted aqua in a middle-class development just off the Tamiami Trail. The price had been good because the house had been owned by a recently deceased elderly woman who was a hoarder, and it would need a lot of work even after being cleared out. It had been a private sale by the woman’s son, Dale Braun, who was a junior partner at Nick’s law firm, Markwood, Benton and Chase. The housing development covered a large piece of land where a mansion once stood at the back of the Braun estate.
“Nita loves the color of the house,” Claire told Nick as they parked in front. “‘The color of the sea,’ she says.”
“She’ll love it a lot more once they get all that stuff hauled out of here, but they’re making progress.” As they headed for the house, they passed a rented dumpster sitting in the driveway, full of various junk to be thrown out.
“We’re here!” Claire called as they knocked, then went in through the unlocked screen door.
Juanita, whom they called Nita, a lovely Mexican-born woman, appeared, wiping her hands on her jeans. “Been digging through so much and sure can use your help,” she told them. “I’m in the kitchen area, and Bronco’s out back, Nick. There’s stuff spilling out of that little shed behind the garage. Don’t know how someone could live this way. Does her son have a messy desk at work?”
“No, it’s evidently not hereditary,” he told her with a smile.
“Go ahead,” Claire encouraged him. “I’ll pitch in with Nita here.”
“Good thing you dressed the part,” Nita told Claire as Nick went out back. “That little room off the kitchen is jammed full of stuff, a lot of it piled on top of an old freezer.”
“I’ll bet that’s an electricity hog if it’s still plugged in,” Claire said.
“Oh, si, still running. The way she threw nothing out, bet it’s full of old food,” Nita said and gestured at the big chest freezer.
“You’ll need a team to get that heavy thing out of here. At least you’ve been making good progress unloading the things on top of it,” Claire told her, eyeing the piles of items not only on it but sitting on the floor.
“Wish I’d find some hidden money. Just kidding. I’d give it straight to Mr. Braun. Doesn’t pay to do anything illegal in this life, that’s for sure. Maybe there’s something we can sell round here, though, ’cause Mr. Braun said all of this is ours if we want to use it, if it’s not tied direct to him or his family. He’s not married though, broke up with his fiancée, a neighbor said. Mr. Braun told Bronco he’s looking for another place to live now ’stead of next door since he doesn’t have to worry about his elderly bats-in-the-belfry mother anymore. Honest, Claire, that’s what he said.”
“It doesn’t take much looking around here to realize she was eccentric at the least. Maybe she had dementia because that increases the tendency to hoard. Let’s keep clearing stuff out.”
From atop the old freezer, they lifted and carted out stacks of moldy newspapers and magazines, then two boxes of Christmas decorations, including a big one with a smiling plastic Santa Claus with a frayed extension cord dangling from its innards. Once they had unburied the freezer, which was still humming with power, they unlatched and lifted the heavy lid together. A cloud of moist, stale air wafted up at them.
“Quite the antique,” Claire said, fanning her face to see better as they peered into the crowded depths. “Maybe the manufacturer will buy it back as proof their product lasts.”
“I’m just hoping there are steaks or lobster in here,” Nita said with a nervous laugh. “This house has been quite a treasure hunt.”
“Looks mostly like frozen vegetables. Wow, I haven’t seen this Birds Eye brand packaging for years. Even though this stuff is frozen, you’d better not eat it. There must be an expiration date on this,” she said picking up a package of rock-hard frozen broccoli and scanning it. “With the piles of things on the lid, she obviously didn’t get in here much and not for years. What a waste, so sad.”
While Nita rooted around at the other end of the long freezer, Claire moved a large opaque plastic bag that looked as if it might contain whole strawberries. And under that, as if she’d unearthed her from her icy tomb, the frozen face of a young woman stared upward with her eyes and mouth wide open as if in shock or horror.
2
Their screams brought Nick and Bronco running.
Nita leaned against the wall, her hands covering her face, while Claire steadied herself, gripping the open freezer and staring into it. This reminded her of standing by her mother’s casket with her sister beside her. Darcy had been crying, Claire trying to hang on to sanity just before they’d closed the lid.
“Claire, what?” Nick’s voice jolted her back to reality.
Nita threw herself into Bronco’s arms. Claire pointed and cried, “There! A dead woman—frozen!”
Nick peered down and gasped. “She’s real,” he whispered and pulled Claire hard against him. “Nita, do you know who this is? Bronco, take a look. I’m going to call the police and the medical examiner.”
Nita took another look and Bronco peered inside. Shaking her head and trembling, Nita whispered, “Never seen her.” Pressing her hands over her mouth, she started to cry again.
“Me neither,” Bronco muttered and pulled Nita back into his arms. “She is—was—kinda young. Boss, this gonna mean trouble for us in our new house, even if we’re still in our old apartment for now?”
“Just for a little while if we handle this right,” he said, digging his phone out of his jeans pocket and thumbing in numbers. He put one hand on Claire’s shoulder as she continued to stare down at the frozen face.
“Yes, an emergency,” he said into the phone. “This is attorney Nicholas Markwood. We have discovered a dead body in a newly purchased house that’s been empty for about two weeks since the death of its previous owner. No—it’s not the previous owner’s body. We don’t need a squad but send officers—I’m requesting Detective Ken Jensen, if he’s available, and the ME. Yes, I know. I promise you we won’t move or touch anything, though we did open the freezer where we found her.”
He gave them the address, then took a photo of the woman in the freezer using a flash. Claire looked down at the woman again, her features lit by that sudden jab of light: maybe late twenties, a pretty blonde, staring up at them through boxes of frozen vegetables and clear-wrap packages of chicken breasts. How absurd. How horrible.
“You took that picture to ask around who she is, boss?” Bronco asked. Big and burly as he was, he was trembling too. “Won’t the police do that?”
“Probably. But since this house was recently owned by Dale Braun, one of the firm’s junior partners, he may be questioned and I may be too,
so I’ll keep this photo. Sadly, I’m always thinking like a criminal lawyer—plan ahead for every contingent.”
“Yeah, I know who he is from checking him in at my guard post,” Bronco said. “A real go-getter, comes early, stays late. He’s a handsome dude, acts like it too.”
“Oh, that junior partner,” Claire said. “The one who always seems dressed up and doesn’t have a dark hair out of place. Since this was his mother’s house, it ties to him and so to the firm. And Nita and my fingerprints are all over that stupid freezer.”
“You both have a rational explanation and no ties to this corpse,” Nick assured them. “I just wish she didn’t have her eyes and mouth open like that. And I hope it’s not just her head without a body.”
Nita said, “It makes this house feel—well, not good now—kind of not ours.”
“They’ll clear it out good as new,” Bronco insisted. “Hey, I hear a siren already.”
“Me too,” Nick said, pulling Claire away with him as Bronco and Nita followed. They waited in the small cluttered living room. It was paramedics who pulled up in front, but what could they do for a definitely dead and frozen, no doubt murdered, woman?
They saw two police cars and an unmarked vehicle arrive in front too. Nick greeted them at the door with Bronco right behind him. The detective, Ken Jensen, with whom they had worked before, asked an officer to put police tape around the front of the house, and told the paramedics to wait to see if the ME’s office brought a van.
“I’m glad you got word that I asked for you, Detective,” Nick told the man. They hadn’t seen him since the shallow grave case they’d worked six months ago. He shook hands with the tall blond detective, who also greeted Claire.
“I understand why you turned down our department’s offer to consult on cases, Claire,” Detective Ken Jensen said. “Congrats on the new baby. But here you are discovering a case of your own.”
“Not our case, this time,” she insisted. “Pure, sad chance.” She extended her hand too, then introduced Bronco and Nita as the new homeowners. “None of us know the victim. Nita and I were just clearing things off the top of the freezer while the men worked out back. The previous owner, an elderly woman, was a hoarder—and was evidently unknowingly or knowingly hoarding a very dead, frozen body.”
Nick moved his knee against hers to stop her. Damn, he thought, she sounded like she was testifying in court like she had so many times, as a forensic psychologist expert witness to help clarify cause and manner of death. She had real instincts for psyching people out, but he didn’t want her any more involved in this than she was, because he was afraid he might have to be. He only hoped there would be no link between the dead woman and his junior partner who had sold Bronco and Nita this house. No—no way, or Dale would have made sure the body wasn’t here to be found, though stranger things had happened.
“Sorry, detective, maybe too much too soon,” Claire added, her voice sounding steady at last. “Back in my forensic psych mode.”
“Well,” Detective Jensen said, “if this does become a case that goes to trial, you could be called to testify, but not in that capacity. Let’s have a look at the body before the ME gets here. Lead the way.”
Bronco went first, holding Nita’s hand, then Claire, then Nick and Ken Jensen. The five of them crowded into the small room with the freezer. Frosty air still wafted upward. Jensen looked inside and jerked a bit at the sight.
“She looks like she’s shocked and screaming.” He said the obvious. “Like she is being attacked right now.”
No one said a word while he took several flash pictures with his phone, then used it to call for a crime scene photographer and evidence technicians. He moved them back to the living room and called one of the policemen in. “I see there’s a curious neighborhood crowd gathering outside,” he told the officer. “Take my phone with this photo and see if anyone can ID this woman. Send the ME in when he or his people get here while I take statements.”
They sat on unpacked boxes in the living room, waiting to individually give their statements to Detective Jensen out back in the small Florida room. Nick dug his phone out again and texted Dale Braun, who was not at his house next door, but got no answer back. If it hadn’t been a Sunday, he would have called him at the office. Dale was a dedicated worker, a little hard to get to know, very bright but not really socially adept for a guy so good-looking. He was in his early thirties, an upper-range millennial.
Claire looked stunned. Nita too, even after talking to Jensen. Nick jolted when one of the cops knocked on the door near where he sat, and Jensen got up to answer it. The detective had closed the place up and turned the air-conditioning on full blast, as if to keep the already frozen corpse cold for the ME. With an assistant, he would dig the body out for a preliminary onsite investigation before they took the corpse to the Collier County morgue for an autopsy.
“Hey, Detective Jensen,” they heard the officer at the door say as he handed Jensen’s cell phone back. “Got a positive ID of the deceased from a neighbor lady two doors down, a Mrs. Betty Richards. Says it’s the former fiancée of the guy next door whose mother owned this house, ah, a Dale Braun, a lawyer no less. Even knows the name of the victim—Cynthia Lindley. We’ll go next door and see if Dale Braun’s there.”
Nick’s gaze slammed into Claire’s. He’d been hoping for more time to find and question Dale. This would implicate him, pull the firm into the investigation. The husband, the boyfriend, the fiancé—always the first one the cops looked at.
“I’ve been trying to reach Dale Braun,” Nick told Jensen. “He’s a junior partner in my law firm. He’s not home next door and not answering his phone.”
“But you’ve seen him recently?”
“At the firm on Friday.”
“No kidding, Counselor,” Jensen said, jotting that down in his notes. “Hate to say it, but the plot thickens about who could have hurt that girl.”
“All circumstantial so far, as you know,” Nick said. He wanted to say much more, that Dale Braun seemed like a straight arrow, though Nick had not known he had a fiancée, let alone a former one—evidently a missing one. It didn’t make sense that Dale would sell this house if he knew a woman’s body was still in it, knowing he could be tied to it so easily. And where was Dale and would he show up to work tomorrow morning or at his house next door before that? No doubt the cops would be there in both places waiting to question him.
Claire reached out to take his hand. She sat up straighter and only narrowed her eyes, unlike Nita, who had not stopped crying. Yeah, Claire looked stunned but steady. But then what a shock to open an old freezer and find a human face staring upward. A pretty face. A face contorted in a silent scream.
* * *
With Jensen’s permission, Nick took Nita and Bronco home with them that evening to stay in their guest room rather than letting them head home to their apartment, in case the police or the press showed up there. If they were implicated at all—and he knew they weren’t guilty of anything—he’d assign someone from the firm to represent them—or even take the case on himself. Before he and Claire headed to pick up their kids at Claire’s sister’s, he had wanted to get some warnings out of the way.
“No way you can hang around a crime scene,” Nick had told them before they went out to their cars. “But I’ll bet you’ll get back in a couple of days.” If people don’t stand around staring at the “death house,” he did not tell them. “I wish I—or they—could locate Dale,” he went on. “It’s going to look like he fled, which I hope he didn’t. He’d better have an airtight alibi.”
“You’ll defend him if he asks?” Claire asked.
“If he’s indicted either I, or at least the firm will, but let’s not jump to conclusions any more than Ken Jensen evidently has. You just go away from all this with your friend Kris tomorrow, and Nita can stay with Trey. Bronco, you just do your security job at the firm tomo
rrow and don’t answer questions from anyone but me when word of this breaks,” he said, frowning out at the neighborhood gawkers. “The newspaper and TV reporters will be here soon with a frozen dead woman for a headline. The four of us plus the kids are going to lock ourselves in our house tonight with no comment. That’s at least until tomorrow when we see what the ME and Jensen come up with. Everybody got that?”
“Sure, boss, Nita and me are fine with that, right honey?”
“Si. I just want our new house back with no more awful surprises,” she said and blew her nose.
“Aye, aye, Captain,” Claire said to his orders, but he could tell her clever brain was spinning. He hoped she was thinking about visiting the Black Bog dig with her friend tomorrow—dead people, sure, but ones that would cause them no trouble. He’d seen that Claire had not only texted her sister they would be there soon to pick up Lexi and the baby. By borrowing his phone, she’d also taken another look at the picture of the dead woman, Dale Braun’s former fiancée whose stare sliced right through you as she opened her mouth to scream and—and then someone killed her.
3
“I’ll bet you’re relieved to be going to the land of the long dead instead of the newly dead. Sorry if that came out wrong,” Kris told Claire as she drove them in a Jeep on the Tamiami Trail toward Black Bog. Kris had told Claire their destination was beyond Seminole State Park, east of Blackwater Bay, which was only about a half-hour drive. “I just mean after you had that terrible experience yesterday.”
Kris frowned and bit her lower lip hard as if she wanted to say something else, but kept it back. Sometimes Claire wished she didn’t read body language. But maybe her friend only regretted she had brought that up after Claire had recounted the horrific find in the freezer, not that it wasn’t public knowledge on all the news media this morning, including some national programs.