Savage Rendezvous

by R. T. Wolfe

She lifted her brows. Even they hurt. "I mean I get your point. You're right. Don't rub it in."

  "That's it? That was our first engagement fight?"

  It was painful, but she maneuvered over to sit next to him. She patted his knee. "Don't worry. I'm sure there will be worse ones."

  "I thought you were..." He lifted his hand and brushed his thumb over her goose egg. "We need to get out of here."

  Dave walked to the back of the ambulance. "We found a blood trail. The K-9 unit from Rochester is on the way." He held up a plastic bag. Inside, she could make out a branch with dark red stains brushed along the leaves. Her mind went to the day she escaped Moody's white house as a young teen. She, too, had to run alone through the trees in the cold. There weren't as many trees as there were here, and it wasn't as cold as this crazy winter, but the whole scenario was damned justifying.

  She wanted that bag. She knew Zheng would be long gone and she wanted the bag, wanted to have Hurst and Goodrich run the DNA through CODIS.

  "You slammed on your brakes, didn't you, Nick?" Dave asked.

  Duncan rudely interrupted before she had a chance to answer. "Locked 'em up." He even had the nerve to imitate her voice.

  Dave nodded. "That an engagement ring on your finger?"

  "Yes." She hadn't felt so guilty since the first grade.

  "Anything else major you haven't told me?"

  "Nope. That about covers it."

  Dave smiled and nodded. "Congratulations. Both of you." He turned to Duncan. "She's a good woman. You should take her home. We can finish up in the morning."

  * * *

  He was coming. He was coming and Nicole was ready.

  They'd put her in the red room. Each was named for the color of the walls. How stupid. They made her wear a white, lacy bra with matching underwear. She didn't even have enough boobs to fill a bra. They didn't put any makeup on her. They wanted her to look like a virgin. She hadn't been one of those for a long time.

  This one liked her, she remembered. He called her Savage like everyone else. She would be a savage, then.

  He came in, busting out in laughter over something the man who stood at the door had said to him. Lifting his hand to the guard, he shut the door and turned his beady eyes to her. She hurried to the edge of the bed and curled her legs so she was like a ball. It was only sort of an act.

  He laughed so hard, he wheezed as if he had asthma, then emptied his pockets like her father did when he came home from work.

  "I hoped you'd be that way, honey." He talked to her like she was a little girl. They'd taken that away a long time ago, too.

  She shook with fear, more because of her plan than because of him.

  He tossed his jacket over a chair and pulled at his tie.

  "They," she croaked. "They record us, you know."

  His hands stopped. He didn't move his head, but moved his eyes from one side of the room to the other.

  "There," she said, pointing to the lion head on the wall.

  He continued with his tie, tossed it on the bed, then untucked his shirt.

  He didn't believe her. No. He had to believe her. Please believe her. He was going to ruin everything.

  He took off his shirt. His blubber hung over his pants so bad she couldn't tell if he wore a belt. Taking his jacket from the chair, he tossed it over the lion head before he came to her. "There we go, honey. Now, it's just you and me."

  She put her mind somewhere else. Somewhere safe. Her lip trembled as the weight of him on the bed rolled her toward him.

  "Now, where did we leave off last time?"

  Braced, she let him yank her horizontal and reached with her arm as his clammy body pressed against her. She could smell smoke and alcohol as his hands prodded inside the bra and underwear.

  She found it. She found his tie and she was going to do it. She took it and started thrashing like a fish. He'd expected it. That's why he liked her. Always be smarter than the bad guys, she reminded herself, as she wrapped the tie around his neck.

  Startled, he stopped. It gave her enough time to scramble around to the back of him, twist the tie around his neck and pull until her arms shook. Lifting, he turned from side to side, reaching for her. But he was too fat, and she was too strong. She was like a savage and held on. Even when the muscles in her arms ached, she hung on. Even when he quit moving and fell forward, facedown.

  Her arms shook, partly from the ache of what she just did and partly because she really did it. Her eyes jerked from his lifeless body to the door, to the covered lion head, to the window. Like she planned in her head a hundred times, she ran to the silk robe they made her wear. In the pocket, there were old slices of bread and some Cheetos.

  She didn't even think to put on the robe; she just ran. Ran to the window, opened it and jumped to the ground, dropping the food. She picked up as much as she could before she sprinted to the trees, to anywhere away from the white house. The dogs were coming. It was okay, she reminded herself. She knew what to do.

  She stopped and stuck one knee to the ground, holding out the food. The dogs wagged their tails when they spotted her. She'd worked for months gaining their trust, and she rewarded them with the bread and Cheetos before she headed for the tree closest to the fence.

  Her feet were cold, but Duncan wrapped a blanket around them, warming them instantly.

  The feel of his gentle hands woke her. She blinked and looked around. She wasn't outside, and she wasn't a young girl. She was home.

  "You were dreaming."

  "I remember."

  The sadness in his eyes told her he knew what she'd been dreaming about. "You covered my feet."

  "They were sticking out. You tossed and turned the blankets into a heap. I thought your toes might get cold."

  She didn't wake up swinging. She'd dreamt the dream and didn't wake swinging her fists. She was going to make it. She would be all right. "How do you feel about getting a dog?"

  * * *

  Duncan smelled the cocktail of Nickie's shampoo and lavender-scented body lotion. It was a drug.

  "The ends of your hair curl when they're wet." Still barefoot, she lifted on her toes and set her warm lips on his. She'd covered the large bump on her forehead with makeup. It wasn't going to fool anyone.

  He linked fingers with her left hand and brought them into the small space between them. "I like this," he said and kissed the ring on her third finger.

  Her free hand slithered around his back and she spoke in a low, sexy tone. "I heard couples are supposed to kiss for at least six seconds before they leave for work in the morning and again when they get home."

  Dropping his lips to hers, he took in the soft warmth. His hands laced through the back of her hair, then he sank deeper. The curves of her female shape pressed against him, sending him from zero to sixty in seconds. When she pulled back, they were both breathing heavily. She pressed the back of her hand to her mouth.

  "So the idea," he said between breaths, "is that leaving a man with a hard on makes a marriage stronger?"

  "Seems like." She adjusted her blouse and shook her head. "I was planning to ask you something. A favor."

  He lifted his brows. "Does it have anything to do with a four-legged animal?"

  "Oh, well that too. But the Juracek case has got me in tangles. I was hoping you might take a look at it with fresh eyes."

  "What does Miranda have to say about it?"

  "What does the A.D.A. have to do with anything?" she said as she slid her bruised arm gingerly through her holster. She paused and craned to look in the compartment that held her plastic gloves. "Hey, did you put your GPS thingy in here, yet?"

  "Possibly. And Miranda is the A.D.A."

  She sighed before checking the safety on her Smith and Wesson. "She keeps trying to warn me that I don't have solid evidence yet."

  "She doesn't know your record."

  "She could look." Gently, she sat down on the settee. "And she's right. I have a body. I have about a dozen motives and suspects, but I don
't even have a murder weapon."

  "We could play hooky, get you naked, have... energetic sex in the pool, then let me work on your painting." He sighed, realizing she hadn't yet truly started healing from the car accident and that he wasn't speaking with the head on his shoulders. "Or I could take a look at your files. I have an eight o'clock. The rest is busy work I can juggle around."

  "You'll stop in around ten, then?" She paused and spun on her heels. "Unless you've already hacked into my files and checked it out."

  "We're going to be married. I wouldn't do that without your knowledge. Although, I could take a look from the computer at my office."

  She rolled her eyes as she placed her bag over her shoulder. "I hear nothing, see nothing. I appreciate the extra set of eyes."

  She gave him a much shorter peck before heading for the stairs. Her feet stopped before she reached the door. He wondered when she would realize.

  "About my car...."

  "Take the Audi. There is, surprisingly, no snow in the forecast. It will be the most comfortable."

  She shook her head as she turned the knob on the French doors. "Comfortable? The guys will never let me live this down."

  Chapter 20

  Duncan owned the entire top floor of the tallest office building in downtown Northridge. Since that was only four stories, it wasn't as impressive as it sounded. His was the first car in the parking lot and entered through the back door.

  Old man Jimmy's janitorial cart clicked over each ceramic square as Duncan headed for the elevator. "Good morning, Mr. Reed," Jimmy croaked in his decades-of-smoking voice. "Fine morning we're having now, isn't it?"

  "That it is, Jimmy, and please call me Duncan."

  "Will do, Mr. Reed." He nodded as he made his way down the hall.

  Duncan grinned as he rode the elevator to the top. His part-time secretary would be here in forty-five. His appointment shortly after. It gave him enough time to dip into the Northridge Police Department database and take a look at Nickie's files on Juracek. He could hear his brother scolding him for hacking into a government site from work. He had permission, but that might not exactly count.

  After setting his Keurig, he sat down to work. He didn't know how to leave the intricate maze of trails and lack of entrails that Andy did, but his work wasn't incompetent.

  The file stated time of death, stomach contents and a list of surviving loved ones. He leaned back, considering the fact that Juracek's family had been without a body for funeral proceedings all this time.

  Reports from the questioning of each family member and person of interest were included. He soon understood what Nickie meant when she said the case had her in tangles. Everyone had a motive and seemingly the psychological state of mind as well as a weak alibi.

  It was the photographs that most interested him. The body bag clearly said premeditated. It wasn't a clean hit. The three shots were sloppy; only one of them was a kill shot. And the circular wounds. He zoomed in on each, then compared them to the ones Leslie Rickard took of the wounds as the body lay on her stainless steel table.

  They were perfect circles, or partials of. One had additional abrasions inside the circle. He zoomed closer yet and realized it was another circle.

  As long as he was in, he would check if they extracted DNA from Zheng's blood samples yet and if they ran them through CODIS. It read, In Process.

  He planned to ask her to let him study the scenes of Juracek's murder, both the actual murder and where the body had been recovered.

  It seemed as if only a few moments had passed, but he heard the purposeful footsteps of his secretary, then checked the clock. Seven forty-five. Damn. He doubled back the way he'd gone in and shut down, just as Andy had taught him.

  * * *

  It was a terrible time for Nickie to ask Duncan in on this. She knew he had to fly out as soon as he could. Luckily, when you own your own plane, you don't have set departure times. She felt like she needed to give him a disclaimer before entering the jewelry store. "I have to warn you," she said as he pulled to the side of the alley behind Jackson & Juracek Jewelers, "the missus isn't the most stable brick in the building."

  The place was just opening for the day. Since the showroom wasn't where they'd be looking, she thought they didn't need to do this after hours. She wasn't sure yet if it was a good thing that Mrs. Juracek was the one doing the opening. Every time Nickie saw her, she was a mess and she said she hadn't worked the store in over a dozen years.

  Nickie had gotten the okay from her captain to use Duncan as a resident specialist. Oddly, that process was becoming easier and easier. She supposed when you had a good track record, the boss trusted your judgment.

  It was a warmer morning, but still below freezing. A dozen snowfalls had changed the landscape around where Juracek's body had been found. Duncan traded his leather driving gloves for his thicker ones, then cut the engine of his SUV. He got out and wandered to the dumpster. She followed and decided less was more and didn't ad-lib. The cool air soothed the still-purple bump on her head.

  Squatting, he checked beneath the dumpster. Even without the yellow tape or chalk lines, he knew right where the body had been disposed of. So, he had read her files. He walked around the dumpster, down the alley and up. He looked toward the roof. It was nearly exactly what she had done six weeks ago.

  "Is this is the door?" he asked, gesturing to one of the unmarked, steel doors that led to the alley. She nodded. He tried the knob, then rapped on the door.

  "I told Mrs. Juracek we'd call when we were ready to come in. I don't think she'll open a door that doesn't have a peephole." She pulled out her cell and searched for the number.

  "Jackson & Juracek Jewelers. How can I help you?" Mrs. Juracek's voice was clear, confident and sultry.

  "Good morning, Sylvia. This is Detective Savage. My advisor and I are the ones knocking on your back door."

  Her voice dropped several decibels. "I didn't hear any knocking. I'll be right there."

  "Every time I've seen her, she's had a bad case of the red eye. I'm not sure if it's from the antidepressants or from crying or both. She's got motive. She's the only inheritor of the business at the death of her husband. There was loads of talk about passing it on to the stepson."

  She looked to him and tilted her head. "You already know all of this."

  He lifted a corner of his mouth as the door opened. Not to be picky, but it had been a solid five minutes since Nickie had called her.

  "Oh, there you are. Come in."

  Mrs. Juracek wore loads of makeup and a tight-fitting navy blue suit. She slumped as she walked.

  She and Duncan followed her to the scene of the crime. The tape had been removed from the door leading to the J & JJ business office. The desk still stood with a hole in the corner. The bullet had been removed and sat in evidence.

  Duncan entered the room, and did his thing where he stopped and looked around. It was like he was rolling a video feed of the area. Nickie assumed that was exactly what he was doing.

  The missus fidgeted, checking the hallway often.

  "Mr. Juracek was standing here." Nickie stood and faced the way the reenactment dictated he'd been placed and facing. "The bullet that entered and exited landed in this wooden desk... here." She walked over and pointed out the splintered hole.

  With one foot out the door, Mrs. Juracek spoke in a squeak, "I should assist our newest staff with the front end."

  "What do you keep in the safe?" Duncan asked her before she had a chance to escape.

  Mrs. Juracek turned and focused on the built-in floor safe at the corner of the office. It looked like one of those mini-sewers where you could only put shit in and nothing out unless you had the combination, synchronized keys and possibly knew the secret dance.

  "Not that one." He walked around the desk and gestured his hand toward the low paneled wall.

  "Wait." Nickie almost yelled. She handed him a pair of gloves.

  He put them on and ran his fingers around the outs
ide of a single panel. It was at about his hip level and was one of a dozen matching panels that circled the room in a horizontal line.

  "This is wainscoting."

  Nickie figured he was talking to her and not Mrs. Juracek. He gestured with his plastic gloves to the bottom half of the wall. "See how the trim creating this panel is separated from the backing? The backing is a separate piece." His fingers continued around the perimeter of the frame thing, pulling and seemingly checking for weak spots.

  Casually, Nickie glanced to judge Mrs. Juracek's reaction. She was back to looking either drugged or numb or both.

  Pop. The panel opened like a mini-fridge, revealing a metal door that had been hiding behind it. "Oh, dear," Mrs. Juracek exclaimed.

  Oh, dear? Nickie was losing her patience with the widow.

  She forced her voice to remain cooperative. "May we have the key, please, Sylvia?"

  "I don't think I have a key."

  "You don't think you have a key to a safe in your store?"

  "I am telling you exactly that."

  Mrs. Juracek seemed surprised enough. Seemed wasn't going to hold up in court. "Can you call your father, ma'am, and ask him about it?"

  Her expression was thoughtful. "Hang on a minute." She left. Her heels clicked behind her.

  "I can't believe you saw that." Nickie turned to Duncan. "I also can't believe I just said that."

  "I've worked on furniture with my uncle long enough. It's not natural for the trim on a panel to be separated like this."

  Mrs. Juracek came back with a large metal ring of keys. This could be a long morning. She skipped a few, then started with the smaller ones.

  Looking around Mrs. Juracek's back, Nickie turned her eyes to Duncan, then shrugged. He was still analyzing, she could tell.

  Click. The hinges squeaked as Mrs. Juracek pulled the small door, then gasped and clutched her chest. It was a shallow space, no bigger than a small P.O. Box. Nickie supposed many jewelers might have one. It made sense. A place to keep the better rocks, extra cash. But this one held just one thing. A nice, shiny gun. It looked like a Colt from this distance.

  * * *

  The safe came up clean. No prints. A safe in a business with no prints on the outside? Inside? Or on the gun? That alone told her it was the murder weapon. Forensics said the same was true for the gun and bullets. The make of the gun matched the one that killed Juracek, but Nickie still had to wait for a positive ID. The boys were going to get to play with shooting the Colt, then compare the shell casings with the ones taken out of the vic.