The Year's Best Dark Fantasy & Horror, Volume 1

by Paula Guran

  Not this driveway, nor the next, but the third one had the right look. Blue SUV, windchime. Less rental-cabin-like, more home-like. Where did the difference lie? Something to do with the decor. Baskets of orange mums hanging from hooks on either side of the porch steps. The porch ran the entire front of the house, with dormant rose beds below it, trimmed low for winter. The soil was weeded and neat except for some animal tracks.

  She glanced at her phone for the time: 7:33. Probably still too early to knock on a door under normal circumstances, but she wouldn’t have thought twice about phoning a rental office to make this complaint. No coffee, no heat, no electricity. Possibly no shower, depending on the type of water heater. A landlord should expect tenants to come knocking under those conditions.

  The front door stood open, as did the screen, which hopefully meant the owner was awake. Zanna stepped onto the porch and knocked on the doorframe. The mat was turquoise with a picture of a llama on it.

  “Hello?” She realized she didn’t know the owner’s name.

  “Hello!” she called again when nobody answered.

  She stuck her head in the door. There was a grid of keyrings on hooks to the right, all neatly labeled with the cabin addresses, which mystery-writer brain pointed out was an invitation to robbery. Below the grid, a mat with two muddy boots. Beside it, four coat hooks, all holding jackets in hunter’s camo; the owner had been wearing one of those when Shar had knocked the day before. That was the only glimpse of him she’d had from the car.

  She yelled one more time, then turned to look where someone might have wandered to with their door open. This was far enough off the beaten path that people might leave their doors unlocked, but for someone with such a fastidious entrance to leave the screen open too struck her as odd.

  It was only when she walked a few steps left along the porch that she saw the foot. A bare foot, toes up, just visible on the SUV’s far side.

  “Hello?” she said again, walking around the vehicle’s massive front grille.

  He wasn’t going to hello back. A middle-aged white guy lay face up, one knee crooked, like he had tripped backing away from someone or something. His head rested on a rock, though rested was an odd word; the rock was drenched in blood. His expression was the worst part: he looked terrified. Eyes and mouth open, corners of his mouth cracked.

  She stooped to press two fingers to his wrist. No pulse. His skin was cooler than hers. There was gravel on his right hand, but no blood; he’d never even touched the back of his head, so he must have died instantly.

  He wore sweatpants with a bloody tear at the crooked knee and another smaller hole in the seam by the crotch. No shirt, no socks, no shoes. The tattoo above his right nipple said “BREATHE” in reverse, mirror-script; a tattoo for his benefit, not others’. The knee exposed by the rip was pitted with driveway gravel, as were the soles of his feet; they were soft-looking feet for what she imagined was an outdoorsy guy. That detail made her own elbow sting, which reminded her this was real. Not a book.

  A body. A real body, until recently a real person. A real person wearing pants nobody would want to die in. What did you do when you found a real body? What did Jean Diener and the people around her do when murder came calling?

  She dug her phone from her pocket and was relieved to see one bar of reception. It disappeared when she lifted phone to ear, then reappeared when she peeked to see why the call wasn’t going through. She walked a few feet onto the driveway rock and was rewarded with a more stable signal.

  The woman who answered had clearly been sleeping; a yawn came through before her “Nine-one-one—is this a medical, fire, or police emergency?”

  “I found a dead body.”

  The woman swore and the line faded. Zanna shifted to the left, and the voice came back. “—Sorry, that was unprofessional. Are you sure they’re dead?”

  “Yes. No pulse. I checked.”

  “And are you safe yourself?”

  “I think so? I have no idea, actually.” She looked around. What could have scared him badly enough to send him running from his house without putting on shoes? She hadn’t even considered that she might be in danger. She felt oddly calm.

  “He looks like he hit his head.”

  The woman on the line said something unintelligible, and Zanna moved closer to the SUV trying to find the signal. There were animal tracks across the hood. She stared at them as she triangulated reception.

  The operator returned. “Ma’am, I asked what your name is?”

  “Susan Ke—ah, Suzanna Gregory.” Calm, but flustered enough to have almost given her pen name.

  “And where are you?”

  That one was tricky, too. “Ah, I hate to say it, but I have no idea what road this is, and there’s no house number. I’m staying at a cabin, and I just arrived yesterday, and my assistant drove and made the arrangements . . . can you use my cell phone location if I turn it on?”

  “That’ll take a few minutes, and it’ll only tell me which cell tower your call is routed through. Is the body at your cabin?”

  “No, I took a walk. I think it’s the guy who rents the cabins, if that helps. Outside his house.”

  “RusticMountainCabins.biz, by any chance?”

  “Yes!”

  “Does the deceased have gray-brown hair, wavy, longish?”

  She leaned over to look at him again. “Yeah.”

  “Gary Carpenter. You’re on McKearney Road. Do you feel safe staying there until I send someone?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Great. Don’t touch anything and somebody’ll be up there in thirty or forty minutes. Can I get your phone number?”

  Zanna recited her number and promised to call back if the situation changed. While she still had one bar, she rang Shar. Unlike the 911 lady, Shar was instantly awake.

  “I thought you didn’t have reception!”

  “I didn’t. Or power. The whole cabin shorted out this morning when I tried to make coffee, so I tried flipping the breaker, only it was a blown fuse, and there were no spares, so I walked down the mountain.”

  “You didn’t.”

  “I did. I can be resourceful, you know. I didn’t always have you in my life. But listen, that’s not why I’m calling. I’m calling because I got to the guy’s house where you got the keys, and he’s, uh, here, but he’s dead. I didn’t want you to get nervous if you got to the cabin and I wasn’t there. I left a note, but . . .”

  “Dead?”

  Zanna probably should have stopped at ‘dead’ longer. “Yeah.”

  “Dead how?”

  “It looks like he hit his head. There’s a lot of blood.”

  “An accident?”

  “It looks like.”

  “Good. Well, not good, but you know what I mean. Better than some of the other options. Listen, I’m going to come get you.”

  “Nine-one-one lady said for me to wait here.”

  “That’s fine. I’ll come wait with you. No need for you to walk all the way back up.”

  She really was a great assistant. Zanna thanked her and disconnected.

  In her books, Jean Diener would start investigating further. Walk into the foyer, poke around the house now, while emergency services were still far away. In real life, that seemed stupid. She didn’t want her footprints added to whatever was in the house. No sense making it harder for the real detectives.

  She sat on the porch and leaned her head against the railing. She would have said she’d slept well, but tiredness overtook her. Still too early; no caffeine in her system. She closed her eyes. Opened them again when she heard a vehicle on the road. The rental pulled in far to the left to skirt the driveway rock, and Shar emerged with a paper bag and a coffee.

  “Bless you,” Zanna said.

  “I don’t need blessings. Give me your backpack to toss in the car, so they don’t start thinking it’s evidence. Eat the muffin over the bag so you don’t get crumbs on their crime scene. It’s blueberry—they didn’t have chocolate chip. A
lso, I need you to stay put when you say you’re going to stay put.”

  “There was no power. Or coffee. You wanted me to sit there for four hours doing nothing?”

  Shar sighed. “No . . . I . . . it’s just now you’re going to get stuck giving a statement, and maybe be considered a suspect, and you don’t need things distracting from your deadline.”

  “A suspect?”

  Shar nodded in the direction of the body. “You found him. You write detective books. Isn’t the person who found a dead body usually one of the people who has to be ruled out? You had opportunity.”

  “But no motive. Well, except lack of coffee, but that hardly seems worth killing someone over.”

  “You’re not going to joke about it when they ask you questions, right?”

  “Right.”

  “And you haven’t gone poking around by the body? Or inside that open door?”

  “I’d never!” Zanna said, like the thought hadn’t occurred to her. “Okay, maybe not ‘I’d never,’ but I swear I didn’t. I went to the door, that’s all.”

  Shar raised one eyebrow. “I believe you, just . . . when you watch them do their job, try not to make your interest look too prurient, alright?”

  They sat on the porch steps, Zanna sipping a coffee made the way she liked it, two sugars, one cream. A little cool, maybe, from the twenty minute drive up the mountain, but still welcome and drinkable.

  A blue-and-gold Taurus with an enormous antenna pulled into the drive, blocking Shar’s rental car in. Two cops got out, both white men, young. The tall blond one had stubble dusting his cheeks, and his uniform looked slept in. The dark-haired one’s uniform was impeccably pressed, his shave straight-razor close.

  “I’m Officer Dixon, and this is Officer Fischer. And you are?”

  Zanna gave her name without stumbling over it this time, and let Shar introduce herself.

  “And which of you found the body?”

  “I did, Officer. Shar just arrived a couple of minutes ago to give me a ride back up the mountain when we’re done talking.” Zanna pointed in the direction of the vehicle. The two policemen—state, they must be beyond the bounds of the town at the bottom of the mountain—walked over to take a look, taking the long way around the SUV before disappearing behind it, to her annoyance.

  She thought about the SUV. It faced the cabin, and he was on the passenger side. She hadn’t seen any keys in his hands, and his pants didn’t have pockets, so he hadn’t been trying to drive away. Maybe to get something from the car? She looked over to see it was unlocked, or the driver’s side was, anyway. This might be country enough that people didn’t bother to lock, but if that was the case, why not go in through the near side?

  She was back to him being frightened of something and trying to put the car between himself and—who or what? An animal? Whatever ran across the hood? A nightmare? Maybe he was a sleepwalker, or a vivid dreamer. Maybe some medication had messed him up. Or a less legal drug, like meth or some hallucinogen.

  One of the policemen—Dixon—went back to the car, where she could see him on the radio, but frustratingly couldn’t hear the call. Fischer had a camera out and was taking pictures of the body. Zanna sipped her coffee and tried not to look too interested, as ordered. What was the proper amount of interest? Concern with a dash of “when can I get back to my work” seemed about right.

  Dixon walked back over to the house. “Okay, obviously you were right that he’s dead, so I called it in. We’ll have to wait for the examiner to make it official, but I can get your statement and send you on your way. How did you come to find the body?”

  Zanna explained about the coffee and the microwave and the fuse, and walking down the mountain.

  “That’s what, two miles?”

  “I think so.”

  Shar interrupted. “The directions he gave me said one-point-eight miles past his house, if that helps.”

  “Thank you,” said Officer Dixon. “And what time did you arrive here?”

  “Seven-thirty-three. I remember looking at my phone and debating if it was too early.”

  “And then?”

  “Then I walked to the door, and it was open, door and screen, and I knocked on the frame and called inside, but nobody answered.”

  “—And you didn’t go inside?”

  “No, I didn’t.” Zanna gave Shar a pointed look.

  “Did you touch anything?”

  “Only the body, to feel for a pulse.”

  “Oh, sorry. Let me get this in order again. You knocked and called inside, and nobody answered, and . . . ?”

  “And I turned around and then I saw his foot sticking out beside the car.”

  “And you walked directly over?”

  “Yes. Do you need my shoe print?”

  He laughed. “I don’t think so. That loose gravel isn’t going to tell much.”

  “What about to prove I wasn’t in the house?”

  “Which you weren’t?”

  “No.”

  “Nah. You can tell me your shoe size or something if you want, but I don’t think footprints are going to tell us much. He slipped in the dark. Nothing else to tell.”

  “Other than the one spot, right?” She couldn’t resist. Shar glared at her.

  “What spot?”

  She pointed a few feet in front of the body. “There’s a spot where the gravel’s dug away, like he was running and slipped, which makes sense with the torn knee, but then the more, uh, chaotic patch is where he fell, like he spun around and his feet slipped out from under him, but he fell backward when he died, not forward. He had to have fallen twice.”

  “Uh, right. Other than that. I guess you had time to look around a little while you waited for us.”

  “I guess.” She bit her tongue to keep from making any other observations.

  “Anything else you noticed, then?”

  Shar shifted on the stair, a slight movement that allowed her to dig an elbow into Zanna’s arm. “Nothing else, Officer.”

  “Okay, then. I’ll take your phone number and the address where you’re staying, and you can be on your way.”

  “Why don’t you take my number instead?” Shar said. “You won’t be able to reach her up the road, and I can always go find her.”

  Dixon took both numbers, then walked them to their car.

  “‘Other than the one spot, right?’” Shar mimicked as they waited for the officer to move his car out of their way. “You couldn’t resist.”

  “He wasn’t doing his job. He thinks the guy slipped and hit his head.”

  “Firstly, he’s highway patrol, not a detective. Secondly, he doesn’t need to tell you, random lady who found the body, everything that he’s noticed. Thirdly, the guy slipped and hit his head. There are no other footprints. Case closed.”

  “Case closed? How can the case be closed before somebody looks inside to see whether there’s any hint of what scared him?”

  Shar started to reverse, then slammed on the brakes. “Shit. I forgot about that giant rock. If I back over it, we’ll leave the tailpipe behind.”

  “Pull forward. You can’t turn around here.”

  “How would you know? You can’t drive.”

  “I’m familiar with the spatial laws of the universe. You’re going to have to do a ninety-point turn if you do it here. Just pull into the clearing so you have more space.” Zanna licked a drop of coffee off her hand.

  “. . . spatial laws of the universe . . .” Shar muttered, commencing a ninety-point turn.

  “. . . And why are you so sure he was scared, anyhow?” she continued as if there hadn’t been a pause in the conversation. “Maybe he needed something from his car, but he slipped?”

  Zanna considered. “Still kind of weird to need something in such a hurry you don’t bother to put shoes on. Or a shirt, on a night that chilly. And to leave the screen swinging open. He looked like a fastidious guy.”

  “A nightmare, then. Or some personal demon. A guy with a backward �
�BREATHE’ tattoo has something dark he’s getting past.”

  “Sure. A nightmare. Except . . .” Zanna turned her coffee cup in her hands.

  “Except what?”

  “I don’t think they noticed the other print either.”

  “What other print?”

  “On the hood, the one you elbowed me before I could say. He must’ve just washed his car, because it was otherwise spotless—which is impressive given these roads—but there were tracks across the hood.”

  “Tracks? Like footprints?”

  “Animal tracks. Something ran through the flower beds and then across the hood of the car.”

  She dug a marker from her backpack and drew on her coffee cup. “Like two lines of feet with a tail dragging between them. Across the hood, driver’s side near the headlight, to the passenger-side mirror.”

  Shar glanced over. “Okay, so a lizard or a raccoon or something ran over the car. Big deal.”

  “And trampled grass on his other side.”

  “Zanna, you didn’t know this guy, you are not a real detective, you have a very real deadline, and you’ve lost hours of your day already. Let the police do their job.”

  “Hours—Shar, turn around. We still need to get a fucking fuse.”

  Shar reached into her purse and fished out a plastic bag without looking down. “Voila. Stopped at the hardware store on my way to you.”

  “How did you know which size to get?”

  “I didn’t. I got a whole bunch of different ones, and I can return the ones that are wrong.”

  “Huh.”

  “‘Thank you, Best Assistant Ever. You think of everything. You deserve a bonus.’”

  “Thank you, Best Assistant Ever. You think of everything. If I actually finish this book and I get paid, you’re totally getting a bonus.”

  They arrived back at the cabin. Shar, the Best Assistant Ever, unplugged the coffee maker and the microwave, brandished a small flashlight with a price tag still on the base, and headed into the bowels of the cabin to replace the fuse.