“I’m sure they were. Mine, too.”
“Then it’s not just me? I’m not just…” She blinked back some tears and her lip trembled. “…just weak?”
Savannah reached over and patted her hand that lay on the arm of the sofa. “You? Weak? Not at all, honey. You aren’t a weak person. I’ve never, never thought of you that way.”
Tammy didn’t say anything, but her tears began to flow in earnest.
Savannah squeezed her hand. “Tammy, there are all kinds of strength in this world. The ability to pull a trigger and take a life in the defense of other lives…that’s just one kind of strength. You’re strong in your own way.”
“What way? How am I strong?”
“In so many ways! Tammy, you amaze me with the intensity of your own personal power.”
“I do?”
“Absolutely. You manage to see the sunshine in the middle of the darkest day, every day of your life.” Savannah laughed. “I used to think you were a bimbo who just didn’t notice that it was cloudy and raining, but now I know you better. And I understand that you see the rain, you see the evil all around, the misery of the human condition, but you make a conscious effort to concentrate on the good, the love, the beauty that’s around you. I try to do that, but you actually do it. That takes a kind of strength that I don’t have.”
Tammy’s tears came even faster, and Savannah handed her a bunch of tissues from the box on the side table.
“Tammy, you’re my rock. You’re always here, ready and eager to help any way you can and for nothing but the pennies I throw your way when I can. You could have left here ages ago, got a real job, and bought yourself that little house on the beach that you want so badly. But you keep living in that apartment of yours, scrounging and saving, and for what? So that you can come here every day and do my books and search the Internet for ideas about how we can stay in business? That kind of dedication and daily discipline takes strength.”
Tammy sniffed and wiped her eyes and nose with the tissues. “I do it because I love the work.”
“I know you do.”
“And because I love you, Savannah. I love all of you guys. You’re like my family.”
“And you’re mine, too, honey. Don’t you ever forget that.”
Savannah leaned over to hug her, but someone pounded hard on the front door. A distinctive, all-too-male knock.
They looked at each other.
“Speaking of family members who we love but don’t always like,” Tammy said. “That’s gotta be Dirko.”
Savannah got up and let him in. But the moment he stepped through her door, she said, “Lord have mercy, boy. You reek to high heaven!”
“Well, nice to see you, too,” he snapped.
“No really. You smell like Gran’s hound dog when he’s been rolling in something rotten. Oh, no…a DB?”
“Yeah, a dead body, but not connected to this case.” He walked on through the living room, giving Tammy a concerned, but quick, glance. In the kitchen, he opened Savannah’s refrigerator and pulled out a can of soda. “Man, what I wouldn’t give for one of those beers in there,” he said. “They sent me up into the hills this morning on a suicide case. Some guy shot himself in his pickup there in the boonies, and he’d been there for days in the heat. Shit, that was an ugly one! Major insect infestation and—”
“All right, all right. Enough already. But since you handled the body maybe you should go shower and change clothes before you rejoin the land of the living.”
“I didn’t touch him, I swear! I smell this bad just from being in Dr. Liu’s wagon with him. I’m telling you, on a scale of one to ten for wicked nasty, that one’s a twenty.”
“Well, either way, why don’t you let me throw those clothes into the washer. I can have them washed and dried in less than an hour. You can shower and—”
“Stop with the hygiene nagging, woman. I just dropped by to tell you a couple things and then I’ll be out of here, okay?”
“Yeah, I reckon. But let’s go sit out in the backyard.”
He looked hurt. “Really? I’m that ripe?”
“Oh, sugar, my hair is curlin’, just standing next to you. Bring that soda pop out here in the fresh air, and Tammy and I will sit downwind of you.”
Once settled under her wisteria arbor, Savannah could stand to be close to Dirk, as long as she breathed through her ears. She noticed that Tammy was leaning as far away from him as possible.
But once he started to deliver his news, both girls temporarily forgot all about the stench of death.
“We found a rifle when we searched Field’s house this morning,” he said. “A really nice one, a Weatherby Magnum. The lab is checking it now against the slug that we dug out of the dirt there in Papalardo’s backyard, the through-and-through that killed the gardener. It was still in pretty good shape, so they should be able to tell if it was from that gun.”
“Chances are good it will be,” Savannah said.
“Yeah, the ammo that was in it was the same as the slug from the dirt. You’ll never guess where we found the rifle.”
“Where?” Tammy asked.
“Hidden in a tray underneath that damned lizard’s cage.”
“Oh, I always keep my gun in my cats’ litter box,” Savannah said. “Doesn’t everyone?”
“Only people who are trying to hide something would choose a place like that,” Tammy said. “The top of the bedroom closet wasn’t good enough for him, I guess.”
“The more I check into this guy, the more I don’t think he’s ordinary at all,” Dirk said.
“Really? How?”
“For one thing, he lived really well in that fancy house of his with the great view. That property’s pretty expensive for a guy who hasn’t had a job of any kind for the past five years.”
“Maybe his parents are rich,” Tammy suggested.
“No.” Savannah shook her head. “I saw his mother at the morgue, and she didn’t strike me as somebody who had more than a couple of shekels to rub together. And she said she had to work hard to support herself and Cameron after his dad died years ago.”
“Well, he’s making good money someway. And we found something else under the lizard’s cage besides just the rifle. Over fifty grand in cash, all bundled up with rubber bands in five batches of ten thou each.”
“I must admit that’s a bit unusual,” Savannah said. “I’m fond of my kitties, but I don’t put bundles of cash in their litter box. When I have a little extra cash and can’t get to the bank, I stick it in the freezer with my two favorite guys, Ben and Jerry.”
She was about to tell them about the bonus that Dona had given her, but Jesup and Bleak came spilling though the back door into the yard. Bleak had an oversized duffel bag in one hand and a black, plastic garbage bag in the other.
“He’s leaving me,” Jesup yelled as she hurried over to Savannah and grabbed her arm. “My husband is leaving me, and it’s all your fault.”
“My fault?” Savannah pushed her hand away. “Now wait a cotton-pickin’ minute here. I’ve been blamed for a lot of things in my life, and I was guilty of most of them. But this? Are you kidding me?”
Jesup stomped her foot and shook her fist like a homicidal kindergartner. “No, I’m not. We could have gone anywhere for our honeymoon. We could have gone and seen the Charles Manson family ranch. We could have gone to New Orleans and seen Anne Rice’s house and the voodoo queen’s tomb. We could have gone to New York and seen the Amityville horror house, but no-o-o, we had to come see you.”
“Yeah,” Bleak chimed in. “‘Come meet my sister!’ Jes said. ‘She’s this famous homicide detective. She’ll let us tag along while she’s solving her cases. We’ll get the inside scoop.’ But you were too busy to even hang with us.”
“And now look at us,” Jesup said, starting to cry. “We’re breaking up. Our marriage is over!”
Savannah stood there, looking at her sister, then her brother-in-law, then back at Jesup. “Let me get this strai
ght,” she said. “You two nitwits get hitched as soon as you meet. You drop in on me from out of the blue. And then, when I have to work—yes, some of us actually do work—you complain that I’m not entertaining you. And you blame me for the two of you breaking up…because of boredom?”
Jesup turned to Bleak. They lowered their voices and whispered to each other for a few seconds. Then they turned back to Savannah. “Yep,” Bleak said, “that’s about it.”
Savannah turned her back on them and marched inside. Grabbing her phone from the kitchen counter, she dialed Dr. Liu’s office number.
The doctor herself picked up. “Jennifer Liu.”
“Hi, Jen. It’s Savannah.”
“Savannah. I’m so glad you called. I’ve been worried about you. That was a ghastly thing you had to endure, running into his mother. I am so sorry!”
“I’m all right, thanks,” she said. “But I have an enormous favor to ask you.”
“Of course. What is it?”
“Dirk says you picked up a suicide there in the hills today.”
“Yes, we did. I was just about to start on him.”
“Is he really as bad as Dirk says? Or should I say, ‘as bad as Dirk smells?’”
Dr. Liu laughed. “Oh, Dirk isn’t lying and neither is your nose. This guy is foul even by my standards. Why do you ask?”
“I have a score that I really need to settle. My sister and her new husband are death junkies, ghoulies from the word go. I think I mentioned them to you before? Well, I think it’s time they got a dose of cold reality. Can we pay you a visit?”
She chuckled. “Sure. It’s a suicide, not a homicide. I can allow civilians in, if they promise not to contaminate the body in any way.”
“Oh, don’t worry,” Savannah said with an ugly smile. “When they hurl, I’ll make sure it’s into a sink.”
Chapter 26
“O h, shut that thing, Bates,” Savannah told Kenny at the front desk, when she walked in with Jesup and Bleak, “or you’ll catch flies in it.”
He was standing behind the counter, his mouth hanging wide open. Apparently, Officer Kenneth Bates didn’t spend a lot of time with people who wore white makeup on their face, painted their lips and nails blood red and drew bats on their cheeks and snakes on their foreheads.
And what bothered Savannah most wasn’t that Kenny was shocked by their attire and makeup. It was that she wasn’t shocked by it anymore. In fact, she hardly even noticed it.
But Bates was more than noticing the dark-red velvet corset that Jesup was wearing, as well as the black, ripped fishnet stockings she had on under her leather miniskirt. He had gone from mouth-wide-open shock to tongue-hanging lust in ten seconds.
Savannah walked over and began to sign the ledger: “Moe, Curly, Larry.”
“Who are these people?” he asked when he finally regained use of a few brain cells. “Are you arresting them? Wait, you can’t arrest people, so—”
“These are my family!” she said. “So watch what you say about ’em.”
“Oh, okay. Whatever.”
He leaned over to get a better look at Jesup’s legs as Savannah led them toward the hall.
“Hey, Savannah,” he whispered. “Do you ever dress up in stuff like that?”
“Do you ever wear a real tie, Bates, instead of that lame clip-on?” she asked him, her blue eyes boring holes into his. “A real tie—worn really, really tight, that is. Until your tongue sticks out and swells up and turns black, and your eyeballs pop out of their sockets and down onto your cheeks? I’ll get you one. I’d be happy to even tie it around your neck for you.”
She herded the happy twosome down the hall toward the autopsy suite. Bleak was practically dancing in his black velvet pants and knee-high riding boots. Jesup seemed slightly less eager, but happy to see her man so excited for a change.
“Wait here,” Savannah told them outside the stainless steel doors. “Let me find Dr. Liu, and see if she’s ready for you.”
She peeked inside the doors and sure enough, there was Dr. Jen suited up in surgical greens, a disposable paper cap over her hair and booties over her shoes. She was standing between the autopsy table and a gurney that had a bagged body on it.
Even with the big fans over the table going full force and the bag still sealed, Savannah got a whiff of the corpse and her stomach lurched.
She had always had a high tolerance for anything visual. Sooner or later, she could get over almost everything she saw in her line of work.
Almost.
But she never got over the smell.
“Did you bring your little gore junkies along?” Dr. Liu said as she snapped on a pair of surgical gloves.
“Oh, they’re waiting right outside, as chipper as a couple of kids on Christmas morning.”
“So, they’re virgins?”
“White as the driven snow. Slice-’em and dice-’em movies—that’s it.”
Jennifer rubbed her gloved hands together with Vincent Price glee. “Hee-hee, my favorites. Lambs to the slaughter. Bring them in.”
Savannah walked back to the door and waved Jesup and Bleak over to her. “It’s showtime,” she said.
“All right!” Bleak practically ran her down getting into the room. Jesup followed a few halting steps behind.
“Dr. Liu,” Savannah said, “I’d like to introduce you to my sister, Jesup, and her new husband of only a few glorious days, Bleak Manifest. Jes, Bleak, this is Dr. Jennifer Liu, the first female coroner ever in this county and the absolute best, too, I might add.”
The doctor registered no surprise whatsoever at their appearance. Savannah knew that Dr. Jen traveled in some rather “alternative” groups herself when not on company time, and it appeared to take a lot to shock her.
“It’s so nice to meet you,” the ME said. “Savannah says that you’re particularly interested in the forensic sciences.”
“Mostly just the dead bodies,” Bleak said. “I’m going to start my own body farm just outside of Vegas.”
“When you grow up someday?” Dr. Liu asked with a deadpan smile that didn’t betray whether she was serious or insulting him.
“Uh…yeah, I guess. I have to get people to donate the bodies and all.”
The doctor gave him a too-sweet smile. “Well, there are always some obstacles on the ladder to success.”
She walked over to a cabinet, opened a drawer and pulled out three surgical masks and a jar of vapor rub. Handing one to Bleak and another to Jesup, she said, “Here, you’ll want to put these on, but smear a big glob of the vapor rub inside the mask first. It helps cut the smell. A little.”
Jesup took the mask and rub, and began to do as she was told.
But Bleak shook his head. “Naw, I don’t need anything like that,” he said. “I can handle stuff like that. I’m…like…into stuff like that.”
Dr. Liu gave him a big smile. In fact, she nearly laughed in his face. “O-o-okay,” she said. “Whatever you like. But I have a rule in here. If you get sick, you do it in one of these plastic bags.” She pulled a couple of large bags from her pocket and held one out to each of them.
Again, Bleak refused.
“Okay,” she fixed him with a stern eye. “Then if you throw up, you’d better do it in that sink over there, because anything that misses the sink, you clean up. And I’m talking major disinfecting, not just a swipe with a paper towel. Got that?”
“Yeah, yeah, whatever.”
She offered a mask to Savannah. But Savannah refused as well. “Actually,” she said. “I think I’ll just wait this one out in the hallway. I’ve seen my quota of DBs this week.” She turned to Jesup. “But I’ll be right outside the door if you need me.”
Jesup’s eyes were big and filled with apprehension. And under other circumstances, Savannah would have warned her or at least felt a bit of compassion for her.
But she needed to know right now what life with Ghoul Boy was going to be like.
Body farm, indeed.
“See y�
�all later,” she said brightly as she walked though the swinging doors and into the hallway.
She glanced at her watch.
She’d give them two minutes. Three tops.
But it was only ninety seconds later when Jesup came crashing through the doorway, her plastic bag over her face. And she was gagging, coughing and hacking like she had eaten five pounds of week-old hamburger.
Savannah suppressed a giggle as she walked over and put her arms around her sister. “Are you all right, sweet pea?” she asked.
“No! Oh, my god! You should have seen—” More gagging, more choking, more retching. “You should have smelled…oh…that was the worst…ah…”
Savannah glanced toward the door that was still swinging from the impact. “I guess Bleak’s doing okay, though, huh?” she asked, just a little disappointed.
“Oh, no! I think Bleak’s dead!”
“Dead! No way! He can’t be dead! You can’t die just from—”
“I’m telling you,” Jesup said, trying to catch her breath. “The doctor unzipped that bag, and we saw, oh, mercy…and we smelled, oh, and…and Bleak just keeled over right there on the floor, deader than a roadkill skunk.”
Again Savannah fought down a fit of giggles. “Well, maybe you should go back in there and try to give him CPR or something. Maybe you can give him the breath of life. Just think how romantic that would be!”
Jesup shook her head. “No way! I’m not going back into that stinkin’ room for love nor money. He can just stay dead for all I care. Hell, he sucks anyway. Where’s the bathroom?”
Savannah pointed to a door further down the hallway. As she watched her sister’s retreating figure, she said, “Oh well, so much for the love of a soul mate.”
She knew she should go in there and help Dr. Liu with the recently departed Bleak Manifest. But she knew that Dr. Jen was a whiz when it came to bringing the dead back to life. A simple swipe under the nose with an ammonia inhalant—plain old-fashioned smelling salts—and those in a dead faint usually came right around.
Savannah Reid 12 - Fat Free and Fatal Page 24
