Pretty Corpse

by Linda Berry

  She heard subtle shuffling behind the door, then it swung open and her father appeared, wearing a plaid bathrobe over rumpled pajamas, his feet shoved into worn leather slippers. Thinning wisps of gray hair framed his head, and wrinkles from his pillow were creased across one cheek. Obviously, he’d gone back to sleep after she called from the city. Without his glasses, her father’s deep brown eyes squinted against the morning light, trying to bring her into focus.

  “Hi, Dad.” She embraced him warmly, feeling his grizzled cheek against her own. Childhood memories tumbled out of hiding as she breathed in the familiar scent of cedar-wood soap and pipe tobacco.

  “Hi, Rugby,” he said sleepily. “Eaten yet?”

  “No. I’m starved.” She smiled at the nickname, pinned on her during her teen years spent as a consummate tomboy. Lauren shared an interest in cars and motorcycles with the neighborhood boys, and even lifted weights with them. She had also developed a keen interest in her father’s forensic procedures, which ultimately led to her career in law enforcement. In her father’s presence, Lauren immediately felt safe and loved, unconditionally.

  “I have Raisin Bran, Special K, Total, and ….” Dr. Starkley’s baritone voice trailed behind as he slowly shuffled to the kitchen, a room completely lacking in homey frills. Books and scientific journals were scattered across the tiled countertops and stacked on the table and several chairs. He opened the fridge, took out a quart of milk, and set it on the table next to two bananas. Lauren grabbed bowls and spoons.

  “I don’t have anything peppy,” he said, staring into his pantry. He pulled out two cereal boxes and looked at her ruefully. “Just old people food. Bran flakes, and did I mention Total?”

  She laughed. “Anything’s fine, Dad. As long as it comes with coffee.”

  “Deal. You make the coffee. I’ll attend to my morning candy.” Leaning against the sink, Dr. Starkley proceeded to wash down his array of prescription drugs with a large glass of milk.

  Over the years, her father’s immune system had made painful enemies of his joints, and the medications became his lifeline, numbing the pain of rheumatoid arthritis. Sadly, the deterioration forced him out of the job he loved passionately for twenty years, Chief Medical Examiner of Oakland, and into a sedentary lifestyle. Last year at the young age of fifty-eight, he took early retirement. Mornings were especially hard on him until the meds kicked in. As the coffee dripped into the pot, she joined him at the table. They filled their bowls with cereal and milk, and Lauren sliced the bananas, knowing the simple task would be hard for him. She poured the coffee and set both mugs on the table.

  Dr. Starkley put on his black-framed glasses and looked at his daughter clearly for the first time.

  “Taking up boxing?” he asked, crunching on his bran flakes and lightly touching her chin.

  “Yeah, with Mike Tyson in stiletto heels. Looks worse than it feels.”

  “Who won?”

  “He took the brunt of it. Trust me.”

  “That’s my girl.” Sunlight blinked off his glasses and he lowered his head to his bowl.

  “Dad, did you read about me in the paper last week?”

  He looked at her, chewed, swallowed. “You get another valor award?”

  “No.”

  “Won an Iron Woman contest?”

  “No, Dad, this is serious.”

  “Sorry. I rarely read the paper. Sensationalized spittle. Rhetoric. Blasphemy. Bah, humbug.” He flashed her a brilliant smile that transformed his face, momentarily reviving his once striking good looks. The smile faded and his face returned to the ravages of his disease. “So, what did the paper say about my little chickadee?”

  Lauren opened her handbag and fished out a crumpled copy of the front page of The Daily and handed it to him. “Bottom page, right side.”

  His frown deepened as he read. “You were shot at?” He looked up at her, the lightheartedness gone from his voice.

  “Yes.”

  “Christ Almighty.”

  “It’s okay. I’m okay.”

  Looking unconvinced, he said, “Tell me every detail about this case.”

  As she spoke, Dr. Starkley listened attentively. “So,” he said, when she ran out of steam. “We have one clever culprit terrorizing a populace of millions. His power must be exhilarating.”

  “I’m sure his ego’s off the chart.” She sipped her coffee. “He could look like anyone, Dad, blend into society without drawing attention to himself.”

  “While scouting out new victims.” His thick gray brows knitted together. “It’s worrying that he’s singled you out, Lauren. Though I’m not surprised. Strong women challenge these kinds of men.”

  “What’s he trying to prove?”

  “He’s testing himself by testing you. Testing his skills, his intelligence, and stoking his ego when he eludes you. That’s another worry.” The creases deepened in his face. “If you push this man too hard, he might retaliate. Go after an easier mark.”

  “Courtney.”

  “Yes.”

  A chill touched her spine. “I didn’t ask for this, Dad. I was just doing my job.”

  “Nonetheless, you’re stuck with him. He isn’t going away.”

  Reflecting on the gravity of her father’s words, Lauren finished her coffee, noticed her father’s mug was empty, and refilled both mugs. “I could use your help.”

  “Name it.”

  “I need to know what the sex inspectors know, what’s on the lab reports of his three victims. To get a handle on this guy, I need to learn how he thinks and operates. You have connections, Dad.”

  “Hmmm.” He turned his attention to his cereal bowl and finished the last few spoonfuls in silence.

  Lauren sat quietly, knowing better than to rush him.

  He hauled himself up from his chair. “Bring our coffee.”

  “Sure.” Balancing the mugs, she followed him down the hall to a large sunlit living room, which her father had turned into a library. Three walls of shelves overflowed with books, forming a literary cocoon around his nerve center, a thick mahogany desk holding his computer, phone, and stacks of files. Facing the desk were wingback chairs and a well-used leather sofa that Lauren remembered from childhood. She loved this room. The air seemed to be energized by her father’s restless intellect and his passion for scientific quests. The mingling scent of worn leather, musty books, and cherry-wood pipe tobacco enveloped her.

  Dr. Starkley lowered himself into a swivel chair behind his desk and reached for his coffee. Lauren made certain his fingers with their enlarged knuckles encircled the mug securely before letting go. He sipped and set the mug on the desk. “Virtue is like precious odors. Most fragrant when incensed or crushed.”

  “Virtue is best when crushed?” She plopped down in the wingback chair closest to the desk. “Translation, please.”

  He picked up his cold pipe, clamped his teeth on the stem, lit a match, and held it to the bowl, alternately sucking and puffing. A cloud of sweet smoke seasoned the air. “I quoted Francis Bacon. In less poetic words, I agree with your decision to investigate on your own, despite repercussions from the station. There’s a real threat here. To you, to Courtney, to other youngsters. The banality of bureaucrats must not deter our quest.”

  She caught a twinkle in his eye. “Our quest?”

  “I’ll make a few calls. See what I can do.”

  Lauren smiled, but she felt her stomach knot when her gaze fell upon a framed photo on his desk. Taken fourteen years ago, Lauren, her parents, and her sister Allison, stood posed at a backyard barbeque in a convincing display of suburban bliss. That get-together, Lauren remembered, had been one of the last great hoaxes Ann had played on her unwitting family. Weeks later, she abruptly separated from her father and moved into an apartment in San Francisco. Lauren still felt the sting from the life-shattering event.

  Her father’s eyes met hers. “I found that picture in an old trunk in the garage. Brings back memories, doesn’t it?”

  �
�Yeah,” she said sourly. “Bad ones. Mom was already planning to leave you when it was taken. How can you flaunt that picture? How can you forgive her?”

  “Now hold on, Lauren. That’s unfair. There were happy times with your mother, too. Twenty years’ worth.”

  “That doesn’t excuse what she did. You were good to her, Dad. Even while she was eating through your bank account.” Lauren remembered the forced ballet lessons, the new luxury car every year, the vacations in fancy hotels when the rest of the family just wanted to camp in a national park.

  “Lauren, don’t make judgments about your mother based on ignorance. You can’t possibly know what went on between us. Our relationship was complicated, and private.”

  “She left you when you needed her most. When your illness became an impediment, and an embarrassment.”

  The two fell into a strained silence.

  His eyes darkened with melancholy and his voice grew husky. “I’m sorry the divorce hurt you so deeply.”

  Lauren felt instant remorse for hurting the man she held most dear in life. Her anger had erupted without warning, an uncontrollable weapon. She had never forgiven her mother for replacing her father with a man who was infinitely healthier, richer, and more powerful. Her father had been discarded like a worn-out suit, the richness of his mind cast aside. A mind from which Lauren had been harvesting treasures her entire life.

  Lauren circled her father’s desk, looped an arm around his shoulders, and kissed him on the top of his head. “I’m sorry, Dad. I’m too outspoken for my own good.” To give them both some breathing room, she excused herself and went to the guest room, now serving as his bedroom. Last year he closed off the second level of the house when he could no longer climb stairs to the master bedroom.

  Lauren circled around the unmade bed to the bathroom; a small, airless room with a shower stall, sink, and toilet. She splashed cold water on her face and reached for the towel on the back of the door, but it wasn’t terrycloth her fingers clutched. She turned and stared in wonder at the silky fabric she held in her hand. A woman’s nightgown. Pale blue with lace etched around the edges and imbued with a faint scent of jasmine. Lauren opened the medicine cabinet and focused on the items on the bottom shelf: lipstick, moisture cream, jasmine toilette water.

  She returned to the library. “Dad?”

  The phone receiver was pressed to one ear, and he raised a hand for silence. She listened absentmindedly until he hung up. “Dad, are you seeing someone?”

  Color rushed from his neck up into his face.

  “When were you planning on telling me?” She smiled. “When do I get to meet her?”

  Her father leaned back in his chair, his knobby hands relaxing on the armrests. “Soon.”

  Lauren’s gaze shifted out the window to the woods, where brilliant leaves shimmered in the morning breeze. “Let’s go for a ride in the country, Dad.”

  With a grin, he slowly rose out of his seat. “I’ll be dressed in ten.”

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  LAUREN recreated a road trip the two had taken many times together over the years, following the Pacific coastline to Moss Beach. Her father popped a CD into the player, and a Chopin concerto accompanied the visual gems stolen all along the way. Fields were dotted with pumpkins and lush green farmland stretched back to autumn-tinted woodlands. Brisk wind churned the ocean’s surface into frothy whitecaps, and great cresting waves exploded into foam on the shore.

  At Moss Beach, Lauren pulled into the lot of her father’s favorite eatery, Dave’s Dive, a ramshackle wood shed perched on a rickety pier jutting into the bay. It boasted dilapidated charm and freshly caught seafood. A colorful assortment of fishermen straddled wooden stools along the counter and the place smelled of musty wood and fresh fish. After she and her father ordered the special of the day scrawled in chalk on the blackboard—chowder, grilled snapper, coleslaw, and crusty French bread—they seated themselves at an outdoor picnic table where pesky gulls vied for handouts. Breathing in the salted air, they talked about life in general, and inevitably, her father’s life as a retiree. He made light of the loss of his life’s work, but she detected a tinge of sadness beneath his matter-of-fact tone. She knew he sorely missed day-to-day operations and the camaraderie of his medical team. By the time they were finishing their meal, the animation was fading from his eyes, his joints were stiffening from the cold, and his mind began to wander. Time to go.

  The quiet drive home lulled him to sleep. She dropped him off and caught her breath as he hobbled away, painstakingly negotiating the three steps of the porch. Her father, whom she always thought of as invincible, had turned into a frail old man.

  ***

  Lauren drove back across the bay, crossed town, and pulled into her driveway at three p.m. She swallowed two pain pills and passed out in bed, grateful for a night off. The muffled sounds of Sofie and Courtney arriving home woke her, and someone peeked into her bedroom and shut the door. With no other disturbances, Lauren slept through the night. The phone’s shrill ring startled her awake. Emerging from a deep sleep, she fumbled for the receiver. “Hello.”

  “Morning, Rugby.”

  She was instantly awake. The clock on her nightstand read six a.m. Her father never called this early. “Are you okay?”

  “Fine.” His voice was bright with enthusiasm. “I’ve got info for you.”

  She sat up in bed. “What? Tell me.”

  “You better come out.”

  “I’ll be right there.” Now wide-awake, Lauren clicked off the phone and headed for the shower. It seemed The Strangler case had invigorated her father, as Holly said it would. She was grateful to leave the house early, avoiding Courtney and Sofie and their anxious questions about her bruised face. Leaving a note on the kitchen counter, she fled the house.

  ***

  Lauren arrived at her father’s house to find the front door slightly ajar. “Dad?”

  “In here.”

  His voice led her to the library, where she found him lying face down on a massage table, wearing nothing but pajama bottoms. His physical therapist, whom Lauren had never met, leaned over him, skillfully kneading his back to the tune of his pleasurable grunts. Despite her substantial girth, the woman moved around the table with innate grace. Her pillowed body reminded Lauren of a fertility idol and presented a striking contrast to Dr. Starkley’s lean build and jutting angles. After sucking back in the air pressed from his lungs by her strong hands, he introduced her to Lauren as Dagmar Welt.

  Speaking with a German accent, Dagmar raised a round, pleasant face. “I soon be finished.”

  “Don’t mind me,” Lauren said. “I’ll find something to read.”

  “Goot.” Dagmar’s smile revealed small even teeth and her cheeks plumped into dumplings.

  Selecting a random book and settling into an easy chair, Lauren stole occasional glances in their direction. Dagmar’s golden hair was woven into a single braid that fell halfway down her back and swayed to the rhythm of her movements. She worked her father’s body with familiarity, even intimacy, at times pressing her breasts into his back, and preceding painful maneuvers with soft guttural sounds he clearly understood.

  “Now we do legs.”

  Her father’s expression tightened as she worked his hips. When the torture was over and the color came back to his face, she gently helped him to a sitting position, then to his feet. He teetered and momentarily braced himself against her sturdy frame.

  Dagmar’s nurturing persona convinced Lauren that her father was in excellent hands. As a PT, the woman was well acquainted with suffering, and she demonstrated a compassionate pragmatism Lauren had never witnessed in Ann’s response to her father’s illness.

  After helping Dr. Starkley into his pajama top, Dagmar left the room. Lauren and her father sat in comfortable silence, no words needed. In his quiet way, her father had just revealed the mystery woman who had marked her place in his bathroom with sparingly few possessions. Lauren had never discussed with him th
e inevitability of his complete reliance on others, and she assumed she’d become his primary caretaker. Now she understood that her father’s spirit still burned strong within its frail prison, and he had no intention of leaving his home. Tears misted her eyes. She quickly looked down at her book, feeling immense gratitude that he had attracted a devoted companion who provided him with loving care.

  ***

  The library was warm. Sunlight fell through the windows in diagonal shafts, illuminating galaxies of dust motes. Seated at his desk, Dr. Starkley adjusted his glasses on the bridge of his nose, picked up a manila folder, and said with a small measure of pride, “These faxes are the lab reports on The Strangler’s three victims. An Oakland detective, an old pal of mine, discussed the case with me in detail.”

  Lauren sank into the wingback chair across from his desk and leaned forward.

  “Don’t get your hopes up. There’s not much.” He opened the folder and fanned the faxes on his desktop. “First, the abductions. Apparently, the assailant’s MO was to lay in wait, then attack a victim from behind swiftly and forcefully, covering her mouth with cloth soaked in chloroform, then he transported her to a small windowless room, possibly a garage or storage shed.”

  “How do they know this?”

  “Personal accounts and lab reports. Each girl woke in a room that felt closed in, had unfinished walls, and was dimly lit by candles. And each glimpsed her attacker.”

  “He allowed himself to be seen?”

  “Fleetingly, but deliberately.”

  “We have a description of his face?”

  “No, unfortunately. He wore a dark hooded robe, with a bandana covering his face, except for his eyes. They’re blue, as you know. Some of these details were recounted days after the attacks.”

  “Why is that?”

  “Loss of oxygen from asphyxiation damages brain cells linked to memory. Over time, the cells regenerate. Memories resurface.”

  “So it’s possible that in time Melissa might remember details.”