Snyder looked over at Smalls. The older detective nodded. “It’s just a sad fact that cases like your sister’s, with a year or two behind them, can get lost in the cracks.”
Snyder looked ready to burst into angry tears. “So you’re saying this is hopeless?”
“Not at all,” Blatch said. “What I’m saying is that you hire us, we’ve only got one patch to fix. Yours.”
Snyder nodded and looked over at Smalls again. “So, besides time, what do you guys have that the cops don’t?”
“Ain’t it obvious?” Smalls grinned. “Charm and good looks.”
“And between us, over forty years’ experience at tracking down dirtbags,” Blatch said.
Snyder appeared impressed by the last remark. “So have you guys solved many cases like my sister’s?”
Blatch nodded. “Yes. But not as many as we’d have liked.”
“So what makes you think you’ll solve this one?”
“We’re focused,” Smalls said.
Blatch stood. “And we both have a vested interest at stake.”
Snyder eyed Blatch curiously. “What do you mean?”
Blatch walked over to a piece of paper pinned to the wall. “See this map here?”
“Yeah.”
“My mother’s house is in the middle. Your sister disappeared within a mile of her place. So did three other people within the last two years. As you can see, I have a very vested interest in solving your case. My mother’s life might be at stake.”
Snyder chewed on the new information for a moment before speaking. “Okay. This letter I got. It might prove who took my sister. But here’s the thing. I’ve got to know if it’s genuine before I tell my mother. It would kill her to stir this horrible shit up again for nothing. If the letter’s bullshit, I just want to drop it like it never happened. I want this kept out of the press. Out of anybody’s knowledge except for the three of us.”
“Four,” Blatch said.
Smalls shot him a sideways glance.
“We may have to tell our secretary,” Blatch explained.
Snyder pursed his lips.
“But only if absolutely necessary,” Smalls added.
“No cops until I say,” Snyder said, and locked eyes first with Blatch, then Smalls.
The two detectives glanced at each other and nodded.
“No cops until you say,” Blatch said. “So, let’s see the letter.”
Snyder shook his head. “I didn’t bring it.”
“You don’t trust us?” Smalls said.
Snyder shrugged. “I had to be sure. Trust is a two-way street.”
Chapter Twenty-Two
“CRAP! WHAT AM I GOING to wear tomorrow?” Deanna said aloud as she rifled through the jeans and T-shirts crammed into the carry-on lying at the foot of her bed. She’d only planned on attending her mother’s funeral, then spending the rest of the time sorting out her affairs and cleaning out the house for resale. Her black suit was too formal. Besides, it was still dirty from her tumble in the backyard. She pulled out a pair of sweatpants and shook her head. A tad too informal, she thought, and closed the suitcase. Nothing she’d brought from New York was appropriate for tomorrow, her first day on the job.
The job. The thought caused Deanna a quick uptake of breath. She pulled the business card from her coat pocket and read it again. The fact that this was real was still refusing to sink in.
Marcus Blatch, P.I.
The man’s name didn’t suit him, Deanna thought. He was more handsome than that. And his openness had, paradoxically, made him more mysterious to Deanna as well. After all the neurotic, self-absorbed types she’d dealt with in New York, Blatch’s unpretentious, self-deprecating manner had been refreshing. Charming. Perplexing.
Exhilarating.
Deanna smiled, recalling the way the detective’s lips moved as he spoke ....
But I lied to him, she thought. Her smile faded. Holding back information isn’t exactly a lie, she argued with herself. But she knew better. A lie of omission was still a lie.
Wait. What happened between us was more like a misunderstanding, she convinced herself. A mistake he hadn’t given me the chance to explain. Tomorrow, she told herself, when I see Marcus Blatch again, I’ll set it all straight. Well, most of it anyway.
In the meantime, Deanna decided to go shopping. She could use a little retail therapy.
WITH A STRANGE NEW lilt in her step, Deanna strolled back into town and spent the afternoon shopping the fashionable new boutiques lining Beach Drive and Sundial Square. Afterward, she stopped at Locale, a bistro, for a late lunch of roasted mussels and toasted bread, accompanied by a very nice glass of pinot grigio. On the trek home, Deanna reflected on how much the rejuvenated city had to offer. She found herself pleasantly surprised. In many ways besides the weather, St. Petersburg held its own against the lure of the Big Apple.
As Deanna rounded the sidewalk edging Coffee Pot Bayou, the image of her mother in her coffin flashed across her mind. She cringed as she looked down at the cute boutique bags in her hands, full of clothes she hoped would impress a man she didn’t even know.
Where are my priorities? she thought. I should be ... what? Mom is dead. There’s nothing I can do for her now. I need to move on. No more guilt! No more regrets!
THE LIGHT WAS FADING as Deanna reached the shabby stucco mansion that now belonged solely to her. She hadn’t remembered turning on the front porch light. But then again, she hadn’t remembered turning it off, either. Her mother had probably left it burning in perpetuity.
In the graying sunset, Deanna couldn’t help but notice how the once-proud house had aged badly. Its dusky pink paint had faded to chalk. Nasty, reddish-orange streaks, like tearstains on a white poodle, ran down the walls where the balconies’ wrought-iron railings had bled rust. Deanna realized if she didn’t do something soon, the place would crumble down around her.
She made a mental note to ask Mrs. Havenall about realtors tomorrow at dinner, and climbed the three steps to the screened door on the front porch. It let out an eerie squeak as she opened it and stepped under the arched entryway. The Spanish tiles decorating the floor were so grimy she could barely make out their exquisite design. It was a pity, because once upon a time, the porch, or “veranda” as her mother had called it, had been an open, inviting space.
Deanna envisioned her mother stretched out on the chaise lounge before her, in a flowery dress, holding court with her latest beau, a cigarette in her gloved hand.
Deanna blinked and the image changed to her mother sitting in the wicker chair, wearing her tiara like a queen as she doled out her judgment of Deanna’s and Jodie’s senior prom gowns and makeup. Deanna sighed, recalling how she’d come in second in Melody’s unwanted and unwelcome beauty contest ....
Deanna shook her head to clear away the tangled cobweb of memories. Both were ancient history, from a time long ago when her mother still saw people socially—before Deanna had left to attend grad school in Gainesville.
Deanna recalled it had been about then when things seemed to go downhill faster for her mother. She remembered returning during winter holiday from the University of South Florida to find the formerly open front porch had been screened in. When Deanna had come home the following April on spring break, she’d found the screened porch as it was now—further fortified with a barrier of cheap, plastic lattice. Her mother had never explained why.
Deanna stared at the mildewed cushions rotting in place on the sagging wicker furniture. With her mother gone, Deanna could face it now. The biggest problem with Melody Young hadn’t been what she’d proclaimed—that the world was out to get her. It was that the world had, for all intents and purposes, forgotten she existed.
In the end, it wasn’t the boogeyman who’d gotten Melody Young, Deanna thought. She’d done her own self in.
AS SHE HUNG HER TRENCH coat back in the closet, Deanna noticed the ratty leopard-skin coat puddled on the floor. She poked it with the toe of her boot and thought, w
hat a waste.
She picked up the moth-ridden fur and tossed it over the seat of the filthy chintz sofa to cover the urine and feces stains, then went to the kitchen to fix a vodka gimlet. Besides the tuna sandwich and apple Mrs. Havenall had left for her yesterday, vodka and lime juice were the only items in the slightly mildewed fridge.
Deanna’s lips twisted into a sarcastic smirk as she stared at the bare shelves. Gimlets and empty iceboxes were the only two concessions she admitted when she compared herself to her mother. She prayed they had nothing else in common.
Deanna made herself a gimlet and flopped onto the couch. She took a sip, then set the drink on the side table beside an open pack of Camel cigarettes. On a whim, Deanna grabbed one from the pack. She could never understand what her paranoid, hypochondriac, agoraphobic, narcissist mother got out of smoking them.
She lit the cigarette and took a deep draw.
The harsh, unfiltered tobacco tingled on her tongue and burned her lungs. Deanna coughed, then tilted her chin upward, pursed her lips, and blew the smoke out in a little funnel, mimicking her mother. As she did, a slight movement across the room caught Deanna’s eye. She dropped the cigarette in her lap.
Staring at her from across the room was her mother’s ghost.
The cigarette burned through Deanna’s jeans and into her thigh before she could tear her eyes from the vision before her—before she realized it was no ghost.
It was something much worse than that.
It was her own reflection.
Deanna looked so much like her mother it scared the living daylights out of her.
“Ouch!” Deanna yelped, finally feeling the burn of the cigarette. She knocked it from her lap, stood, and stomped the ember out on the rug.
She took another cautious glimpse in the mirror. There was no denying it. She had her mother’s mannerisms, her mother’s blonde hair, and her mother’s heart-shaped face—everything except the nose. As Melody had so often reminded Deanna, her looks had been spoiled by the rather large bump along its bridge.
“A gift from your father,” Deanna heard her mother say inside her head.
Deanna turned her eyes from her reflection and prayed that her mother’s outward appearance had been all she’d inherited—that inside, where it counted, she was nothing like Melody Young. Then she grabbed the gimlet, downed it, and offered up a second prayer.
She prayed she wouldn’t dream of spiders again.
Chapter Twenty-Three
“YOU’RE IN A GOOD MOOD,” Deloris Blatch said to her son, Marcus as he came through the kitchen door.
“I am,” he confessed, and kissed his mother on the cheek. “We got our first client yesterday.”
“That’s marvelous!” Deloris put down her teapot and hugged her son. Then she pushed back from him and stared into his eyes. “Does this mean you won’t be moving in after all?”
Marcus studied his mother playfully. “Do you want it to mean that?”
She crinkled her nose. “No. Of course not. Breakfast?”
“No thanks. I’ll grab something downtown.
She opened the cupboard and took out another fine china cup. “Join me for tea, then?”
Marcus crinkled his nose. “You know I prefer coffee. In a mug.”
“I know. But why?”
“Tea is coffee with no soul. Besides, I’m afraid I’m gonna break those silly little cups of yours.”
Deloris laughed. “How about a compromise. Tea in a mug?”
Marcus smiled and nodded begrudgingly. “Okay.”
Deloris poured a mug and handed it to him. “So tell me about this new client of yours.”
“I can’t. It’s confidential.”
Deloris gave Marcus a sideways glance. “Are you sure that’s all it is? A new client?”
“What are you talking about?”
Deloris smiled to herself. “Oh, nothing, son. Here. Have a cookie.”
Marcus rolled his eyes like a teenager. The tone in his mother’s voice meant she suspected he was holding a secret about a girl. She was right. But he wasn’t about to admit it.
“By the way, your cousin called,” Deloris said. “He mentioned he could use an extra bartender this weekend, what with the Thanksgiving holiday. With the way things are with you right now, I told him you might be interested. The extra money wouldn’t hurt, would it?”
Marcus sighed. “Only my pride.”
“Don’t be that way, Marcus. You’d be helping David out. He means well.”
Marcus took a sip of tea and crinkled his nose. “I know, Ma. I know.”
Chapter Twenty-Four
THE SPIDER HAD HER again ... dragging Deanna into its silken web ... wrapping her in its cloying cocoon ... tighter and tighter ... until she felt her life force give up ... her body relax ... and warm liquid stream into a puddle underneath her ....
Deanna woke with a start, drenched in sweat. The smell of urine and feces overwhelmed her. Her mind raced with panic. Dear lord! Have I peed myself?
She reached for the crotch of her jeans and was relieved to find it dry. Slowly, the rest of the room came into focus. Deanna remembered she was in the house in St. Petersburg. In the living room. She’d fallen asleep on the couch. On an old leopard-skin coat. The nasty odors were not hers.
Deanna sat up. The ring of her cellphone startled her anew. She grabbed for it on the coffee table.
“Good morning, sunshine!”
Without a coffee in her, the cheerful tone of her neighbor’s voice sounded like fingernails scraping a chalkboard.
“Hello, Mrs. Havenall.”
“Hope you slept well!”
“I did, thanks,” Deanna lied.
“I know you don’t have a bite to eat in that house. Why don’t you come over? I’ll make you some toast and scrambled eggs, like old times.”
“I’d love to.” Deanna smiled, thinking of all the times she’d snuck out of her house to join Jodie before school for a hot breakfast at Mrs. Havenall’s table. She glanced at the time. To her shock, it was already a few minutes after eight.
“I’m sorry, but I can’t,” Deanna said, her anxiety building. She was supposed to be downtown at nine, and she hated to be rushed. “I ... I promised myself a walk along the waterfront this morning. But we’re still on for dinner at six, right?”
“We sure are. Enjoy your day, honey. And try not to get too broody.”
The last word from Mrs. Havenall’s lips sent a worried chill through Deanna. Am I broody? With an appointment to keep in less than an hour, she didn’t have time to ponder. She sprang from the couch and ran for the shower.
THE HEELS OF DEANNA’S boots clicked in rapidfire on the sidewalk lining Beach Drive. I’m a woman on a mission, she thought as she walked briskly toward her nine o’clock meeting downtown with Marcus Blatch. A fool’s mission.
I should’ve driven, she scolded herself. But she hadn’t wanted Mrs. Havenall to think she’d lied about going for a walk just to put her off. She didn’t want anyone to know about the frivolous adventure she was on. Besides, if parking was anything like in New York, walking would be faster anyway.
Deanna glanced at her watch and picked up her pace. Last night she’d had it all planned. Get up at six-thirty. Take her time getting ready. Take a leisurely stroll to a coffee shop for a quick cappuccino and croissant along the way. But too many gimlets had gotten in the way and she’d forgotten to set the alarm. If Mrs. Havenall hadn’t called, she might still have been asleep on the couch. On the plus side, the mad rush had given her no time to get nervous, or to obsess about the lie of omission she was about to set in stone.
Hi. I’m Deanna Young, communications specialist (and most definitely not a psychologist)—reporting for duty....
Deanna hoped if no one knew she was a psychologist, she could experience life without people clamming up on her like she was the psychic Gestapo, or using her as a mental dumpster. If she was going to reinvent herself, she wanted this to be a major part of the plan.
The building was modest compared to New York standards. But the lobby’s gray marble floors were spotless, and the doors to the stainless steel elevator gleamed. She stepped inside and pushed the button for the second floor.
As the door began to close, a man ran up and stopped it with his hand. He got in and nodded at Deanna. Then he kept glancing at her sideways.
Something about him set Deanna’s nerves on edge. She couldn’t put her finger on exactly what, though. The young man was unremarkable to the point of practically being a generic human being.
He stood about five-foot-eight and had a slightly stocky build. A mop of thick, mousy brown hair sat atop his average-Joe face. Deanna placed him at thirty at the oldest. His blue, short-sleeved, button-down shirt and navy slacks were the uninspired uniform of an average office flunky.
Deanna scolded herself. Who am I to judge? I’m about to become one myself.
“What’s your name?” the man asked as the elevator began to move. His question sounded more like a demand.
Deanna’s back stiffened. Her years in New York taught her it was better to not engage strangers—especially ones with eyes as suddenly menacing as his. She stepped closer to the door, thankful she was only going up one flight.
“I asked you your name,” he repeated.
Deanna clasped her trench coat closed at the neck and tried to ignore him and stepped closer to the door as she waited for what seemed an eternity for the elevator to finish its single-floor ascent. Finally, the bell dinged. As soon as the doors began to open, Deanna squeezed herself out between them. She thought she felt the man’s hand brush the back of her coat as she rushed out.
What She Forgot Page 10