by Kate Flora
Then I took a deep breath, remembering something Roland had said. Sometimes we know more than we think we do. I closed my eyes and tried to focus. To play the game Andre and I liked to play. Trying to be helpful instead of hysterical. "Black or dark green. Double cab. One headlight is dimmer than the other. Right front if you're in the driver's seat. Tape over a broken taillight. Left rear."
"You're a wonder," Andre said. "I'll be there in ten. Keep breathing."
Breathing. If you can breathe you can respond. I breathed in. And out. And in. And told my honey goodbye. "I'm going to go down and check the basement. See if Mrs. Ames is there."
"Be careful," he said.
I said it to him. He said it to me. People always said it to each other. As if the rest of the time we were careless. But I knew what it really meant: be more than usually careful.
I would be. Very careful. Of spiders. I didn't think there were more bad guys hiding down there. But then, I hadn't expected the first bad guy.
Armed with my trusty flashlight, I went back down the stairs to the basement. Crazy? Maybe. But what if what I'd seen was a pool of blood? What if Mrs. Ames was lying down there injured and I was cowering up here because I'm such a chicken? What if she died?
What if I lived a different life and none of these things ever happened to me?
Slowly, I went down the two flights of creaky stairs and back into spider land. Back through the air thick with mildew and dust toward that suspicious pool on the floor, scooping up my pepper spray on the way, and shoving it into my pocket. I reached down and touched the pool. Stared at my red-blotched fingers and sniffed. It was definitely blood.
I shifted some boxes and bins and there was Mrs. Ames, lying on the icy floor with a pool of blood under her head. My heart jumped. She looked so still. I knelt and touched her face. Warm. Leaning closer, I could see that she was still breathing. Then her eyes opened.
"Help is on the way," I told her. "You're going to be okay."
I didn't know if it was true, but it was what people said. What the injured needed to hear. I crossed to the heaped-up laundry basket and found an old quilt to cover her. It smelled as musty as the rest of the room, but warmth was the priority here. I tucked it carefully around her, then stepped past her to the silent furnace. Maybe there was something I could do to get some warmth down here. The emergency switch had been turned off, probably by Randy to lure me down here. He'd gotten Mrs. Ames instead. She'd probably heard noises or seen something and come down to investigate. Or gotten very cold. Despite the locks and the lights, she wasn't timid; she was intrepid, a stubborn, self-assured, nosy old biddy. She wouldn't have hesitated to come down here and give an intruder what for.
I flipped the switch to "on" and there was a reassuring roar in response. I was so relieved I wouldn't have to spend the night in a freezing apartment that I almost hugged the ugly beast.
I went back to Mrs. Ames. "I'm going to go outside and see if the police are here yet," I told her. "And the ambulance. I'll be right back."
"Thea. No. That man," she whispered. "That awful man, he might be..."
"Gone. I hit him and zapped him with pepper spray and he ran off."
She patted my hand. "You're a good girl, dear." She moaned and closed her eyes.
I didn't want to leave her, even though Mrs. Ames was what people around here would call a tough old bird. But I didn't know if the police could find us down here in the basement and she needed more than a quilt and some reassuring words. I crossed to the bulkhead door, which was still open, and went up the steps. A police car, lights flashing, was just turning into the driveway and I could see pulsing red in the distance, surging through the trees, that I hoped was the ambulance.
I walked around the house to meet the officer who was getting out of the cruiser. He looked about twelve years old and had a nervous hand on his gun. "Brandon Cooper, ma'am," he said. "Your call said there was a man in the basement?"
Despite the hand on the gun, he was looking at me like I was one of those nervous nellies who are always hearing strange sounds in the basement. In my not-so-humble opinion, if you're going to give a twelve-year-old a gun, you ought to give him some judgment as well. I suppose I could have taken off my shirt and showed him the bruise where Randy's fist had landed. But it was cold out here and anyway I only take off my shirt for one very special cop. And yes, I was tired and cranky and irrational and I didn't want to deal with any more difficult people today. I wanted help, not suspicious looks, and someone competent to take care of Mrs. Ames.
I also wanted a hot bath, a real dinner, a drink, and chocolate cake, followed by twelve hours of deep sleep. I wanted my knight with the shining gold band to ride up in his unmarked and take over this whole mess. Never mind that he was probably just as tired and hungry and cranky and wanted a shower and a drink and baked potatoes and chocolate cake, too. He'd been looking for Randy. I'd found Randy. Or Randy had found me. I didn't know how. Maybe he'd gone through Ginger's files just like he'd gone through her wallet.
From what Ginger had said, I hadn't thought Randy was violent. He'd shown me that he was. And now I wanted to turn the page. It was beginning to look like what Andre and I needed was not a house but a castle, complete with moat and drawbridge. Maybe some knights to defend it as well. I was so sick and tired of bad guys.
"The man I called about is gone," I said. "He attacked me. And my landlady. I fought him off and ran upstairs and called you. Then I heard the bulkhead door crash open and he ran across the lawn and got in a truck." I pointed toward the highway. "He went that way."
Yes. It took all myself control not to say thattaway. Like they used to say on TV. Bad guys always went thattaway.
He looked at the road and then back at me, like he still thought I was a timid sort who'd imagined a strange man in the basement. Bizarre, because I don't think I look timid or helpless. I'm tall and strong and I was wearing serious professional clothes. Those 'ditzy little woman' looks don't go down very well with me.
"I don't know his last name, but his first name is Randy."
The cop was looking over my shoulder, like he was waiting for my parents to show up and take charge. I had to resist the urge to put my finger in front of my nose and say, "Focus. Right here. That's right, look at me and pay attention."
Instead, I raised my voice. "The man who was here, who attacked me and Mrs. Ames? He was the boyfriend of that woman who got killed yesterday. My realtor. Ginger Stevens. The police have been looking for him."
That seemed to register in his boyish little brain. "Ma'am, how long has he been gone?"
I had no idea—time had lost its meaning for me since I'd started down those basement stairs—so I guessed. "Five or six minutes."
He spoke into his radio and took a step toward his cruiser, like he wanted to roar off in pursuit. Then he turned back toward me, remembering his duty to serve and protect. His disappointment at being left here to deal with the ditzy broad and the injured old lady instead of roaring off with lights and sirens blazing in pursuit of a wanted man was all over his face. "Ma'am, are you all right?"
He didn't want my honest answer to this question. "Shaken. Otherwise fine. But my landlady, Gladys Ames, he attacked her. She's in the basement. She's been bleeding. A head wound, I think. She's conscious but in pain. And she's an older woman. I hope there's an ambulance on the way?"
I wasn't wearing a coat, and the icy wind whipped through my clothes. I didn't know whether I was supposed to lead him to the basement where he could take charge of Mrs. Ames or whether we both had to stay there and wait for the ambulance, which seemed to be taking its sweet time driving that last mile. Maybe it had gotten lost? One thinks of public safety vehicles as always being able to find their man or woman, but the roads around here were kind of a tangle. I wrapped my arms around myself, as though that might make me warmer, and stared out toward the road.
The ambulance and Andre's unmarked arrived at the same time, Andre courteously pausing to let the ambul
ance go first, but he was parked and out of his car before the EMTs were out.
"Thea," he called, "is the bulkhead still open?"
I nodded. Remembered that it was dark, and called, "Yes. She's on the floor behind those boxes near the furnace."
They all headed that way, and I followed, because I was down here without my key and it was my only way back upstairs. Except that when I got to the stairs, young Officer Brandon Cooper blocked my way. "Sorry, ma'am," he said, "but you can't come in here. This is a crime scene."
And I was a crime victim. Also freezing, tired, and totally out of patience. I tried to push past him but he blocked my way. Using pepper spray on him was probably a bad idea, so I said, "Can you ask Detective Lemieux to step over here for a moment?"
Maybe he had some people-reading skills, because he pressed down his officious desire to tell me to go wait in his cruiser, and fetched Andre.
"Detective," I said. "I need to go back upstairs. The door is locked and I don't have my keys because I came down through the basement. Do you suppose you could persuade this officer that it's okay for me to go up the basement stairs to my apartment?"
I could see how badly he wanted to laugh. How much more badly he wanted to shove Brandon aside and sweep me into his arms. Just from the tiniest expressions on his face, and only because I've been reading his face for a long time. Most people wouldn't have seen it.
"Maybe this will help." He dug in his pocket and handed me his keys. Then his radio crackled. They'd stopped a man named Randy Small. He had a broken nose and a head wound and they were taking him to the ER. Did Andre want to meet them there?
Small was a lot like Clark and Jones, wasn't it?
I looked at Cooper. I looked at Andre, who was about to snatch back his keys. "Just let me in first, okay?"
Cooper looked puzzled as Andre stepped past him and the two of us walked away.
"Do you need me to ID him?" I said.
"Maybe later. In a lineup. Just describe him for me."
He unlocked the door, led me through it, and we went up the stairs.
In the kitchen, he pulled out his notebook and I told him what I could about Randy. About 6'2", an easy two fifty, probably heavier. Work boots, jeans, black ski parka with white piping and some kind of logo embroidered on it. Needed a haircut. Needed a shave, missing a canine. A tattoo on his left arm. Big fists. Smelled of sweat and booze. Not bad looking in a thuggish, motorcycle outlaw sort of way.
"Jesus," he said. "And they say eyewitness ID isn't any good."
"I was trained by the best," I said. I stepped closer and he pulled me into his arms. "He was looking for something," I mumbled into his chest. "Something that belonged to him. Some stuff he said Ginger had sent me as insurance. He said she'd chosen me because I was a detective."
He dropped his arms and stepped back. "Did she send you something?"
I shrugged. "I haven't gotten today's mail. Until now there's been nothing. I would have told you. But it doesn't make sense. Why would she send something to me? I wish he'd been clearer about what he was looking for."
But I hadn't been in interview mode, I'd been in survival mode. What had he said? Stuff? Something that belonged to him? I couldn't remember.
"Did he say...?" He broke off. "I'm sorry. We can do all this later. It's just. I don't want..."
He didn't want to go and leave me here alone. I didn't want him to go. But what could I do? I'd married a cop and he was on a case. "Come with me," he said. "I don't want to leave you here. I'll do what I have to do at the hospital and then we can get some dinner."
What girl doesn't swoon at an invitation to the emergency room? Or to bad food in a hospital cafeteria? Which is what it would probably be. Hospitals were notoriously slow and the evening was already crawling on. But I'll do a lot for his company.
"Okay," I said. "Let me get my coat."
"Hey," he said. "Really. Are you okay?"
Hard to hide anything from his cop's eyes. I was moving like the wounded and that was something he was very used to. Before I could answer, he was unbuttoning my blouse and pulling it open so he could inspect the place where Randy's fist had landed. It had been a big fist. Now Andre's warm fingers moved gently on my bruised skin.
Neither of us heard him coming up the stairs until Cooper was in the room. Then what we heard was a strange hissing sound as he sucked in a breath and tried to decide what to do next.
Besides stare at my breasts, that is. Exposed in all their glory. Peeping at my husband like creamy half moons over the top of a black lace bra.
"Officer Cooper," I said, "meet my husband, Detective Andre Lemieux."
Chapter 17
Cooper had the grace to lower his eyes. "Detective," he said. "Ma'am."
Being called ma'am always makes me feel ancient.
"He hit you pretty hard," Andre said. "Are you sure..."
"It's a bruise, detective. That's all. Wait 'til you see the other guy." Trying for tough when what I wanted was for Cooper to go away, for duty to go away, and to just stay in Andre's arms until the world felt safe again. Instead, he dropped his hands and I buttoned my blouse and got my coat and purse while Cooper consulted with Andre about whatever he'd come up here to discuss. Then Cooper went back to the basement and we walked out to Andre's car.
Once we were buckled in, he started the engine and was asking questions before we'd gotten onto the road. "Tell me about it. Everything," he said.
"There's not that much to tell. You know what people say. It all happened pretty fast."
I hesitated, reviewing the events before I laid them out. "I was really looking forward to swordfish and chocolate cake, you know."
"No more than I was."
We let the silence of regret and missed opportunities fill the car. I knew he was impatient to hear what had happened and assess it for information and clues and I appreciated his patience. He likes to muscle through things and get them done, has had to school himself in the patience necessary to be a good detective. I'm pretty much the same. We just deal with different populations. Sometimes it takes an effort not to do that with each other. What I wanted to do right now was close my eyes and let the rhythm of the tires lull me to sleep. Now that I wasn't in the midst of crisis, exhaustion had enveloped me like a shroud. I couldn't ever remember feeling this tired.
His hand left the wheel and found mine. Warm and reassuring. "Take your time," he said. We both knew there wasn't much time to take. When we got to the hospital, he'd need to be up and running, already briefed on what had happened.
I knew he wanted to say that I shouldn't have gone down to the cellar, but the truth was I'd just done what any sensible person would have done. Gone down to check the furnace when there wasn't any heat. Regular people don't expect to find bad guys lurking in the basement or bleeding victims behind a pile of boxes. They expected to find the fuel gauge on empty or something inexplicable that would lead to the repairman and the returning burst of warmth. They might expect spiders but they wouldn't expect thugs. Regular people didn't check under their cars or look in the backseat before starting the engine, either. Regular people didn't have industrial strength flashlights or carry pepper spray in their pockets.
Our struggles lately had been toward becoming more like regular people, so this felt profoundly unfair. Not that it mattered. Fair or unfair, the incident had happened, just like the one with Ginger, and would have to be dealt with. I swallowed, summoned up some energy, and told him everything that had happened since I got home.
"Flashlight and pepper spray," he mumbled, when I was done. "I never wanted you to live like this."
"Me neither. I was just trying to buy a house."
I stared out into the dark. Not so foggy tonight, and without precipitation. The headlights cast long bluish shafts of light down the empty gray road. Snowbanks on either side made it feel like we were in a tunnel. It was warm in the car. On another errand, it might have been cozy, alone together and talking in the dark.
; "I hope he did it," I said. "I hope when you talk to that piece of crap you find that he's the killer. But I never got that vibe from Ginger."
"Maybe she didn't know him, either," Andre said. "It's rare, but it happens. A guy doesn't show his true colors until the woman tries to leave, and then all that caveman controlling possessiveness comes out. The 'if I can't have her, no one can,' stuff that leads to violence."
"But the attack on Ginger felt so planned. Not like an impulsive burst of violence."
"It didn't," he agreed. "But think about stalkers. They're the ultimate planners. We've had guys who've been convicted and spent years in jail and when they get out, they pick up where they left off. Had a victim once, we finally told her the only thing she could do was get a gun and shoot him, because nothing else would ever stop him. It was hard, telling her that. We're not supposed to give that kind of advice and we're supposed to keep people safe. But we couldn't. No matter where she went, he found her, and we knew, and she knew, that eventually he'd kill her."
That was a story I really didn't want to hear. Bad as Ginger's death was, I didn't want to think of her spending her last days, as well as her last hours, in awful fear. Ridiculous, I knew, wanting to protect her, even though there was nothing anyone could do for her. Except that wasn't entirely true. The one thing we—or least Andre and the other detectives—could do for her now was be sure that her killer was caught.
"I wish we could just drive forever."
"I wish we could go out to dinner, then go home and make whoopee."
Wishing. If only we lived in a Disney world.
"I wonder if Roland learned anything in Florida? It seems like someone, somewhere, had to know who Ginger really is."
"I haven't heard anything."
Tomorrow was another work day. My phone had been buzzing but I didn't want to check it. After a day this long and this complicated, I was, like Pooh, a bear of little brain. I didn't have anything to offer my colleagues or my clients right now. As management experts like to remind us, the world will not end if we aren't there to manage it. I was trying to believe that. And I truly did believe I didn't have to be wedded to my phone every hour of the day.
