by Lisa Jackson
“Where was he last seen?”
Zaroster, testing her tea, held up her free hand and shook her head. “I said I don’t know anything. It’s just gossip at this point. It’s not our case.”
Yet, Montoya thought uneasily, remembering how close the Pomeroy estate was to Abby Chastain’s house. What were the odds that her ex-husband would end up murdered the same week her next-door neighbor turned up missing?
“Oh,” Zaroster said, sipping from her cup. “I called my uncle up at All Saints.”
“Yeah? And what did you find out?” Brinkman asked as he, hitching up his pants, strode into the kitchen and grabbed the pot of coffee, pouring himself the last of the dregs. “Don’t tell me, the coven meets at seven every Sunday night like my aunt’s bingo group.”
“Yeah, that’s it.”
“And so, instead of homemade cookies and punch, they all bring their vials of blood for a little drinkie-poo?”
“Was Courtney’s roommate that bad, or is he just being a prick?” Zaroster asked Montoya.
“You tell me.”
“All I know is that my uncle said there’s this big Goth movement up at All Saints. Nothing scary, just some kids into black hair, boots, lipstick, and white face makeup. It’s not that big of a deal.”
Brinkman snorted.
“But there are a few who take it a little more seriously.”
“Like little Miss O, I’m bettin’,” Brinkman said.
“Maybe. There’s always gossip, of course, and there is talk of some vampire worship and blood drinking, you know, the usual college stuff.”
Montoya laughed.
“What’d I tell ya?” Brinkman took a sip of his coffee and scowled. “Next thing ya know they’ll be sacrificing virgins, except now that Mary LaBelle is already dead, they won’t be able to find any. She had to be the last virgin in college.”
“You might be surprised,” Zaroster said, irritation showing.
“Yeah, right.” Brinkman took a swallow from his cup, and his face drew together as if he’d just sucked on a lemon. “This tastes like shit.”
“Then make a new pot,” Zaroster advised and, when he started to open his mouth, added, “And don’t give me any garbage about you not knowing how or it’s a job better suited for a woman, okay?”
“Well, it is.”
“I’m not in the mood.”
He lifted a shoulder.
“How much of a baby are you? Look, the packs are premeasured.” She pulled a sealed foil package of coffee from a basket filled with packages of tea, coffee, and smaller packets of sweetener. Then she held the foil envelope in front of Brinkman’s nose. “Pretty damned easy. You flip one of these into the basket of the coffeemaker, add water, and push a button.” She dropped the unopened package back into the basket. “And presto, in a few minutes, you’ve got fresh brewed.” She skewered him with a don’t-mess-with-me-anymore look. “Any Cretin can figure it out, so I’m assuming someone with a B.S. in Criminal Law should be able to whip up a pot without too many problems. Oh, don’t forget to open the pack first. You know, take the foil off.”
Her cell phone jangled and she picked it up, then, carrying her cup of tea in the other hand, stormed out of the room.
“Whew. She must’ve gotten up on the wrong side of the bed,” Brinkman grumbled, watching her backside as she disappeared around a corner. “Now that’s something I’d give a week’s pay to see, her gettin’ out of bed with her hair all mussed.” He took another sip and squinted at the thought. “Imagine her in heels and her shoulder holster. Nothing else.” He sucked his breath in through his teeth. “I bet she’s hot.”
“Tell her that and she’ll have you up on harassment charges so fast your head will spin. That is, after she’s busted your balls.”
Brinkman chuckled and Montoya walked back to his desk. He thought about Asa Pomeroy. What were the chances that the millionaire’s vanishing act was connected to the Gierman-LaBelle murders? That was a stretch really. Or was it? Just because some rich old coot didn’t show up for work, or hadn’t slept in his own bed, didn’t mean someone had killed him. And so what if his estate was close to Abby Chastain’s property; that was probably just circumstance. It was nothing. No link whatsoever.
Nonetheless, the uneasy feeling wouldn’t leave him as he checked his e-mail and waded through phone messages that had come in over the night and early morning. He picked up the phone and called Missing Persons. No harm in finding out all he could about Pomeroy.
Just in case.
“…the funeral will be at eleven,” Luke’s brother Lex was saying, “and I thought you might want to know. The service will be at St. Michael’s. No casket. He wanted to be cremated. Oh, God, I can’t believe I’m talking about this. It just really hasn’t sunk in yet, I guess.”
“I know.”
“So…maybe we’ll see you there.”
“Yes,” Abby said, “thanks for calling.” She hung up her cell phone and sighed. The thought of the funeral was depressing. Not only would it be surreal to meet all the people who had known Luke in life and witness their grief, but it was just so hard to believe that he was actually gone, that he would be eulogized, that she would have to smile while everyone told all their “good ol’ Luke” stories. And then there was facing his mother and father. “Not fun,” she said to Hershey as she slid the phone into her pocket.
She’d been working in her studio all afternoon. Her digital camera was connected to her computer, which was set up on the desk. After digitally cropping the pictures, she printed those she needed, checked them again in case she wanted to change the parameters, then once she was satisfied with what would become the prints, she burned them onto CDs for her clients as well as kept copies on her hard drive and a separate CD for herself. She always printed out the final shots as well, then sorted and filed them.
She’d been at it for hours, barely taking off any time, except to get a cup of coffee or tea. Breakfast had been toast and peanut butter, then she’d spent a couple of hours packing and taking down some pictures from the walls, then removing the nails, using a hammer on the most stubborn ones. Afterward, around ten, she’d gone to work in the studio and she’d been too absorbed to break for lunch. The hours had flown by, and now, it was after eight. Her stomach growled, her back ached; she rubbed her shoulders and neck where a headache was starting. She only hoped she had a microwave meal in the freezer. She was stretching her back when Hershey, lying in the corner on her blanket, shot to her feet. Growling low, head down, she stalked to the door.
“Now what?” Abby muttered as all afternoon the dog had been nervous, wanting in, wanting out, barking at squirrels who scolded from the magnolia tree on the back patio.
The hackles on the back of Hershey’s neck rose and her head lowered. Unmoving, she stared at the studio door.
“Give it up, Hersh,” Abby said as she stared at her computer monitor and pictures of the Shippman wedding. She discarded the ones where the bride’s expression was dour or the groom’s cowlick showed prominently.
Hershey growled again.
“Stop!”
She studied the monitor again.
Every hackle on the dog’s neck was raised. This time the growl was almost inaudible, but it was enough to break Abby’s concentration. She finally gave in. “Okay,” she said, refusing to be infected by whatever it was that made the Lab nervous. “Show me.” She decided to call it a night and shut off the computer, then switched off the lights and opened the studio door.
The dog shot out like a rocket, barking and running back and forth along the back edge of the veranda, glaring into the dark trees beyond.
Abby felt a frisson of fear slide down her spine. Hershey was making her edgy, that was it, but she didn’t need any help in that department. Ever since finding out about Luke’s murder, she’d been nervous. And if she’d thought visiting Our Lady of Virtues would help her deal with the past, she’d been dead wrong. She hadn’t slept well since walking through those forgo
tten hallways. Three images had stayed with her from her visit—her mother’s locked door, the shutting of all the doors on the second floor, and the shadowy image of a man behind the third-floor window’s glass. Even now, just at the thought, her skin pimpled.
She dead-bolted the studio, followed the short walkway to the house, and unlocked the door. Hershey was still growling, hair ruffled, eyes trained on the woods, when Ansel suddenly streaked across the patio and shot straight into the house. The big Lab galloped after the tabby, tail wagging furiously.
“Great,” Abby muttered. She didn’t know which animal she should throttle first. “You scared me half to death, Hershey.” Angrily she turned the dead bolt. “You’re supposed to be a guard dog, but you do not, and I repeat, not, have to protect me from Ansel, okay? Sheesh!” She kicked off her shoes. “Ansel is not the enemy. Try and remember that!” The tabby had hopped onto the counter and was perched near the window, his tail flicking in agitation, his pupils still black and dilated. Bristled up to twice his size, he hissed at the dog. “You knock it off, too. Both of you…give me a break. I can scare myself. Got it? I don’t need any help from either of you!” Abby scooped the cat from the counter and set him onto the floor. She opened the freezer door and found only extra coffee and an ancient pizza.
“Bon appetit,” she said as she pulled the pizza out and preheated the oven. The pepperoni looked as if it had been made in the sixth century, the cheese showing little crystals of ice, the crust possibly freezer burned. But it was all she had and she figured she could get creative, slice up a tomato and onions. When she rummaged in her pantry, she came up with a tiny can of black olives. “Gourmet,” she told the animals, then, as the oven warmed, dug in the cupboard and found a bottle of red table wine with no other information on it and a curled gold ribbon with a tiny card that said, Thanks for the hospitality! Love, Alicia.
Abby smiled, remembering Alicia’s last visit. They’d discovered a little wine shop on Decatur, where they’d found the bottles of white and red table wine placed next to shelves of imports from Germany and France, and they’d loved the plain white labels with big black letters: WHITE TABLE WINE and RED TABLE WINE. No color, no foil, no fancy script.
“Don’t you love this?” Alicia had said, holding a bottle by its neck, “It’s so unpretentious, so uncool. Not wine-fashionable at all!” She’d rotated the bottle under the dim lights of the tiny shop, ignored the owner’s pinched-mouth expression, and read, “‘Smith Winery, Napa, California.’ Smith Winery. Like, where’s that?” Her green eyes had twinkled. “Do you think there’s really a Smith Winery, or is it just an alias? You know, like when lovers supposedly sign into a no-tell-motel for a hot night of sex?” She’d lowered her voice. “Not that I have ever done that, mind you.” Then she’d tossed back her head and laughed in that naughty, fun Alicia way. “We have to have this…and the red, too!”
They’d uncorked the bottle of white, seated outside on the verandah, listening to the sounds of the evening, picking at barbecued fish. Luke had called and said he was going to spend the night in town. “Work” he’d mentioned, “getting ready for a new format. I’ll see you tomorrow. Love ya, babe.”
Yeah, right. When Abby had hung up, Alicia had said, “He’s such a loser, Abs. Divorce his ass and be done with it.” She’d poured them each a second glass as the wind had sighed through the trees while a night bird had trilled. “But let’s not let him ruin our night. That son of a bitch is so not worth it.”
Oh, how right she’d been, Abby thought now. This bottle of red had been pushed into the cupboard, where it had collected dust for over two years. She’d made Alicia promise they would drink it the next time she visited, but that hadn’t happened and now she was selling the place.
Time to uncork it. Who knew the shelf life of such a unique blend? She would open the bottle and call Alicia, tell her to pour herself a glass of wine, too, and they’d drink together while on the phone.
She opened a drawer to find the corkscrew. Her eye caught on Hershey standing frozen, not a muscle moving, eyes fixed on the darkened living room. Since she’d been working in the studio all day, the sun had set, and the house, aside from the kitchen, was dark.
“I’m not falling for this,” she told the dog, thinking Ansel was hiding under the couch. Except that at that moment the cat hopped onto her kitchen stool and he, too, peered into the darkened part of the house. “Enough!” she said, but felt something, a shift in the atmosphere, and she hesitated. What was it? Something earthy and damp…not so much a smell as a sensation.
“Figment of your imagination,” she whispered. Spying the hammer on the counter where she’d left it earlier in the day, she picked it up.
Yeah, like you’re going to club someone to death? Get real, her mind taunted. You, the woman who finds a moth in her house and captures it to release it outside.
“Yeah, but I’m hell on hornets,” she muttered, her fingers tightening over the hammer’s smooth wooden handle.
Was it her imagination or did she hear something? The soft scrape of…what? A leather sole on hardwood? A door softly closing? She flashed back to the hospital with its ghostly opening and closing of doors. A whisper of fear, cold as a reptile’s eyes, touched the back of her neck.
She held the hammer in a death grip.
Oh, God, don’t do this to yourself.
Swallowing hard, she walked into the living room, quickly snapping on a Tiffany lamp. A rainbow of colors washed over the room, illuminating the dark corners.
No bogeyman here.
Hershey growled.
“You’re freaking me out, so just stop it!” Abby said, irritated. For her own peace of mind she carefully, hammer firmly in hand, walked through the hallway, feeling her pulse increase and anxiety seep through her blood as she flipped on one light after another, opened closet doors, peered under her bed and the guest bed.
In the bath, holding her breath, she raised the damn hammer and, with images of the shower scene from Psycho flashing through her brain, scraped the shower curtain back in one quick motion. She cringed, but there was no one inside the tiled walls, not even a frightened, exposed spider scuttling into the drain.
“See…nothing,” she said, her heart still pounding wildly, her stomach in knots.
There was only one other room on the first floor. She opened the final door to the laundry room and stopped short.
The window was open.
Her heart clutched.
She nearly dropped the hammer.
The window had been closed, hadn’t it?
Her mind raced as she tried to remember.
She sometimes opened it when she did laundry to air out the room as the dryer, with its faulty vent, tended to heat and steam up the room. But she hadn’t done a load today, didn’t remember opening the window.
Think, Abby. Don’t go nutso over this. You had to have opened it.
Fear brought nervous sweat to the surface of her skin, her fingers slick on the hammer’s handle.
Don’t lose it. You could have forgotten to shut it last night when you did the load of towels.
But she knew better.
Every night she double-checked the doors and windows, and though this one sometimes stuck, she always made sure it was closed.
But not necessarily locked, her mind taunted. Even after hearing about Luke’s murder, she didn’t always check the window latches, just made certain the windows were closed.
So why is this one open?
Try as she might, she didn’t know. Stepping into the tiny alcove, she slammed the window shut, then tried to latch it. But she couldn’t get the lock to hold. The window was too swollen from years of humidity. Great, she thought, knowing she’d have to jury-rig something to keep it closed—a board from the garage, maybe.
As she was deciding what to do, a chilling thought slithered through her brain.
Would she be locking the bad guys out, or would she just inadvertently lock some unwanted intruder inside? She sti
ll hadn’t checked the upstairs. “Oh, crap,” she muttered, turning around and walking directly to the end of the hallway, where a steep staircase led to her den.
She set her jaw.
She hadn’t been upstairs in her office all day. Surely no one was hidden away in the converted attic. And yet she had to find out. She knew she’d never sleep a wink tonight if she didn’t check every damned nook and cranny in the house. “Come on, Hershey, you started this,” she said to the dog. Opening the door, she turned on the sconce that lit the stairwell. Then, still clutching the damned hammer, she mounted the steep, narrow stairs, hearing them creak against her weight, feeling the skin on her nape prickle with new dread.
This was crazy. So the window was open, so what? So the damned dog was going bananas? Wasn’t that Hershey’s nature? This Lab wasn’t known for her intelligence, and she would hate to think what Hershey’s canine IQ might be.
With each step, the temperature of the hallway increased, the heat of the day having risen to the rafters and ceiling of the attic. There were no windows in the room, only a skylight mounted in the sloped ceiling that she could crank open. Heart pounding, she reached the top of the stairs and snapped on the bright overhead light
The room, of course, was empty.
Aside from her desk and one old folding chair.
