Stalker (9780307823557)

by Nixon, Joan Lowery

  “Jennifer,” he said, “do you know where Bobbie Trax is now?”

  Jennifer looked at him without blinking, as steadily as she could manage. She gripped the arms of her chair so tightly that her fingers ached as she answered, “No, I don’t.”

  2

  It’s hot. Sticky heat. Itchy heat. Head hurts. Maybe that’s why my head hurts. The damned heat. Yeah. Think about the heat. Don’t think about anything else. It happened, so it had to be. Don’t think about it. What’s done is done. Don’t think.

  Pure luck that the kid went out.

  The heat smells like oily gluck from the ship channel. Maybe that’s why my head hurts. Don’t think. I guess it’s good that I got in so easy, and no one but Stella was there. I wasn’t about to let anyone get in my way.

  Just one thing worries me. Where did Stella keep the stuff? I should have made her tell me. I suppose if it’s hid that good it might never turn up.

  But what if someday it does?

  3

  Jennifer stood at the screen door, watching the detectives’ unmarked gray sedan wobble over the potholes in the street, brake lights blinking like two sore eyes. Beyond this street of small frame houses, marked with explosions of unkempt lavender and pink crepe myrtle bushes and wind-twisted water oaks, rose the uptown skyline of the city, the picture-postcard backdrop for the curving sweep of the bay. She had been born in Corpus Christi, and she liked it; liked the tropical shrubbery overflowing the yards; the breeze that consistently blew in from the sea; the sudden, drenching rainstorms; the weekend sailboats that dotted the water with small rainbows; and the heavy steamers that plodded through the channel, under the soaring bridge, into the harbor.

  She knew this city well. But now she had the strange sensation that she had been moved to an unfamiliar place without landmarks, that she was lost and alone, and the terror of it made her tremble.

  “Don’t see how you can be cold in this weather, but instead of just standin’ there, shiverin’, go put on a sweater.” Grannie’s voice, directly behind her, startled Jennifer so much that she jumped. “You did good, the way you spoke up nice and polite to those police,” Grannie added. “I know you were feelin’ real bad.” The matter-of-factness in her voice broke the spell.

  “Grannie, I’ve got to go out,” Jennifer said.

  Grannie’s eyes narrowed. Jennifer didn’t know if it was protection from her cigarette’s smoke, or if she was trying to peer inside Jennifer’s mind. “Who’re you goin’ to see?”

  “Mark,” Jennifer answered.

  Grannie studied her another moment, then nodded, satisfied. “Go ahead. You had a shock. Mark will talk to you, help you feel better about what happened.”

  As Jennifer grasped the metal latch on the door, Grannie’s tone changed, and a sigh skipped through her words. “Don’t mind about fixin’ supper. I’ll just heat up some leftovers.”

  “Oh,” Jennifer said, and she took a step back into the room. “I forgot all about supper. I’ll make it.”

  “No.” Grannie held her arm. “I said I’d do it. Just leftovers. No problem. Tomorrow night’s different, though.” She tucked her chin in and scowled. “That woman who works at the flower-plant nursery with your daddy is comin’ by to supper.”

  “Her name is Gloria. I keep telling you that, Grannie.”

  “Makes me no never mind what her name is. We just got to put together somethin’ nicer than usual for supper, or your daddy isn’t gonna be happy.”

  “I’ll think of something. Maybe pot roast.” Jennifer hurried out the door and down the porch steps, leaving her grandmother’s words for her own ears: “What he sees in that woman—”

  It wasn’t far to Mark’s house. They even took the same route to and from school. Convenient. Maybe that’s why they had started going together. A year ago he was a new student in school. He had suddenly appeared at her side as she ran down the steps of the red brick building, glad that school was over for the day, and said, “I’ll walk you home.”

  She had stopped, looking up at him, interested because from the moment she first saw him, passing him in the hallway at lunch period, she had been well aware of his blond good looks. She was even more interested now, because his eyes were as warm as his smile.

  “Do you know where I live, Mark?”

  “I wanted to know, so I made it a point to find out.” He paused. “You know my name.”

  “I wanted to know,” she had said, and they laughed.

  Now she needed to talk to Mark. And she needed his car.

  She found him where she thought he would be—in the garage, tinkering with the motor of his old moss-green chevy that looked shrunken inside its four oversize tires, on a frame that lifted it high in the air.

  He smiled as he saw her. He wiped his hands on the heat of his jeans and came toward her eagerly.

  “You haven’t heard about Bobbie’s mother,” she said.

  “Bobbie’s mother?”

  “Sit down,” Jennifer said. She pulled Mark to a patch of thickly tufted lawn next to the driveway, and she told him all that she knew.

  When she’d finished, he kept staring at her. “Oh, God!” he said. “I didn’t know.”

  “I need to borrow your car.”

  He blinked, bewildered at the change in topic. “What for? I mean, I’ve got to be at the supermarket by six. I’ve got a late shift this week.”

  “I know you do, and you’ll get to work on time. It’s getting close to six o’clock now. I can drop you off. When the store closes I’ll be there to pick you up. Okay?”

  His mind had apparently clicked into gear, because he said, “You’re going to wherever Bobbie is. Right?”

  “Do I have to tell you?”

  “No. You don’t need to tell me. It’s easy to figure out what you’re planning. Did she call you?”

  “No. I haven’t heard from her.”

  “Then how do you know she’ll be there?”

  “I just know.”

  “Do you want me to go with you?”

  Jennifer took his hand and held it. The strength in his fingers kept hers from trembling. “Thanks anyway, but I don’t think you should. You’d get in trouble at the market if you didn’t show up. Remember how rotten the manager acted when you were out with the flu.”

  “He’s nothing but talk. He was shorthanded then and didn’t care why I was out.”

  “I don’t want you to go with me. I just need your car to get there.”

  Mark looked at his car, then back at Jennifer. “Okay,” he said slowly. “But remember she goes faster than it feels like, so watch your speed. And if you put her into four-wheel drive the clutch still sticks a little, so when you move the stick through keep it slow and easy.”

  “Thanks,” Jennifer said. She stretched up to kiss him lightly, automatically.

  He patted her shoulder, but he was clumsy and awkward, and his touch was hard enough to bounce her forward, off-balance. She knew he was trying to tell her he understood that the fear she felt for Bobbie had flooded every particle of her mind, leaving no room for any other emotion. “Come on,” he said. He stood, pulling Jennifer to her feet. “Keys are in the ignition. You can drive me to the store, and that way I can see how you handle her.”

  She knew how to drive Mark’s car. She had driven it a couple of times before, and they both knew she was a good driver. But she patiently allowed Mark the ritual of trauma as he turned his prized possession over to someone else.

  Jennifer pulled up against the yellow-painted curb in front of the store’s wide glass windows and slid the gear into park. Inside, among the gaudy array of merchandise, customers, and signs, she could see the manager scowling at whoever dared to stop in this no-parking zone.

  Mark had seen him, too. He opened the door on his side, stretching his long legs toward the ground and aiming his kiss somewhere near her right ear. “Good luck,” he said; and as he shut the door and leaned his arms on the open window, he added, “Tell Bobbie—uh—tell her—�
�

  “It’s okay,” Jennifer said. “Bobbie will know what you mean.”

  Smoothly she pulled away from the curb, steering this high-seated monster through the busy lanes of the parking lot, back to the street. She cut over to Padre Island Drive, glad for the open freeway and the way Mark’s little car quickly picked up speed with just a slight touch to the accelerator. It was hard not to speed. Bobbie. She had to find Bobbie.

  She crossed the Oso, that narrow tongue of water that licks inward from the bay. Across the flat, blue expanse, under the gray-tinged pile of clouds that were blowing in from the Gulf, she watched a needle-nosed silver plane glide to a landing at the Naval Air Station. The scene was lazy and unreal, part of someone else’s world. She kept her eyes on the road. Careful now. Careful. Just a few blocks through the poky traffic in the town of Flour Bluff, then open road on the Kennedy Causeway, across the Laguna Madre—its peaceful waters dotted with fishermen—to North Padre Island … and Bobbie.

  Weatherbeaten tourist stores—small wooden shelters still piled with shells and printed T-shirts—were clustered with late-night convenience markets and gas stations along the road. Jennifer slowed the car as she came to Whitecap and followed the curving street to the strip of condominiums that faced the open waters of the Gulf. In the spaces between them she could see the rolling green-gray surf and the empty stretch of white sand. Not many people would be here. It was too late for the summer crowds and too early for the winter Yankees.

  It would have been easier to drive down on the sand, but she wanted to bring Mark’s car back to him without a spot on it. So she parked beside the last condominium and climbed the dunes to the empty stretch of beach that lay to the north.

  The hard-packed sand at the water’s edge was easier to walk on, especially since she had to work against a steady wind that blew from the sea. Jennifer took off her shoes and ran, hair whipping across her face, ignoring the occasional foam that swept up the sand and over her feet, splattering and soaking the legs of her jeans.

  There was a special place she and Bobbie had found last year, an old lean-to tucked back in the dunes and abandoned, too far from the condominiums to be discovered by the people who stayed there, and too far to be on the regular beach patrol. They had visited the spot often, carrying in bags of sandwiches, potato chips, and Cokes; snuggling inside the shelter, talking about guys and love, letting the rhythm of the surf wipe out the problems they had brought in, too.

  Sometimes they had hitchhiked to the island; sometimes one of them had been able to borrow the family car. But no one else knew about this place, not even Mark.

  Jennifer kept a careful watch on the sand, jumping over an occasional purple blob. Even when dead, the Portuguese man-of-war had a poisonous sting. She was winded, gulping in great breaths of the damp, salt-packed air; more eager than ever to reach Bobbie.

  And there it was ahead: the lean-to, its roof partially covered with a drift of sand.

  Jennifer moved slowly now, fighting off the sudden thought that maybe she was wrong, that maybe Bobbie was far from here.

  She stopped. “Bobbie?” The wind snatched her words, and she shouted again, pulling away a strand of hair that plastered itself against her lips, cupping her hands around her mouth. “Bobbie!”

  There was a movement at the open side of the lean-to, and Bobbie crawled out, straw-yellow hair whipping around her head. She scrambled to her feet. “Hey! Jen!” she called. “What are you doing here?”

  Jennifer stopped, taking long, deep breaths to steady herself, waiting for Bobbie to come to her. She knew it! Bobbie hadn’t killed her mother. She didn’t even know what had happened!

  Bobbie stumbled through the loose sand and stood in front of Jennifer. “Hey,” she said again, and smiled. “Don’t look so miserable. Stella and I just had another shouting match, and I thought I’d stay away a couple of days.” Her smile tightened as she added, “She won’t miss me.

  Jennifer reached out and grabbed Bobbie’s arms. “Listen to me,” she said. “Something terrible happened. I suppose there’s a right way to tell you about it, but I don’t know how.”

  Bobbie’s eyes widened, fixed on Jennifer’s, as she waited.

  Jennifer pulled a strand of hair from her mouth, tossing her head against the wind. “It’s about your mother.”

  She couldn’t continue, and Bobbie said, “What about Stella? Did she get arrested? Is she sick? What?”

  The words came out in a cry. “Somebody murdered her!”

  “No.” Bobbie shook her head, saying it over and over. “No, no.”

  Jennifer stepped forward, trying to hug her friend, but Bobbie moved backward, still staring at Jennifer. “How? Who killed her?” Bobbie asked.

  “I don’t know,” Jennifer said. “And there’s more.”

  “Do the police know who killed her?”

  “Listen, Bobbie, I said there’s more. Right now the police think you did it!”

  She wished Bobbie would cry, would get angry, would feel something. But Bobbie was like one of the wood carvings in the museum. And her voice was flat. “Why?”

  “Because it must have happened after you left your house. The police think you killed your mother and ran away.”

  Bobbie closed her eyes, and when she opened them something inside her had wilted. “I didn’t. You know that. I didn’t.”

  “Of course I know that.” Jennifer wrapped her arms around Bobbie’s shoulders. “That’s why I’m here.”

  “What will I do?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Maybe I should go to the police and tell them I didn’t do it.”

  “I guess. As long as you hide out they’ll think you’re guilty.”

  “Yeah. Okay.” But Bobbie began to shake. “What if they don’t believe me? I’d like to get away from here. Maybe Mexico. I could hitchhike.”

  “That’s no good,” Jennifer said. “Don’t worry. We’ll find out who did this thing. I promise.” She held Bobbie tightly until the shaking stopped. “Are you going to be all right?”

  Bobbie nodded against Jennifer’s shoulder. “Sure.”

  Jennifer was suddenly aware of the sand stinging her face. The wind had become stronger, and the water and sky were darkening, with tag ends of clouds out over the sea reflecting the pinks and golds of a hidden sunset.

  “I’ve got Mark’s car,” she told Bobbie. “Let’s go.”

  She felt Bobbie stiffen only an instant before she heard the shout from above the dunes.

  “Don’t move!”

  Instinctively she released Bobbie and stepped backward, twisting to stare upward.

  “Hold it! I said, don’t move!”

  Against the twilight sky stood four uniformed policemen, their pistols aimed at Jennifer and Bobbie.

  4

  Newseye Tonight. Good evening. Just a short time ago police apprehended, as an alleged suspect, the daughter of a local hairdresser who died last night after being brutally strangled. Police, who have booked the suspect, Bobbie Trax, an eighteen-year-old student at Corpus Christi High School, for the murder of her mother, Estelle Trax, refuse to release any further information at this time. We’ll go to Margie White on film shot this afternoon in front of Estelle Trax’s home in northeast Corpus Christi.

  “Margie White here, and I’m outside the modest home where Estelle Trax’s body was found today by her next-door neighbor, Mrs. Lila Aciddo.

  “Mrs. Aciddo, how did you happen to find the body?”

  “I—uh—don’t know if I should—uh—”

  “It’s all right, Mrs. Aciddo. Just tell me what you told the police.”

  “Well, it was Stella’s day off from the beauty parlor, and she was supposed to—uh—come over so we could—uh—you know, go shopping.”

  “And—”

  “She—uh—didn’t show up and, well after the fight yesterday—”

  “What kind of a fight?”

  “I told the police about it. That girl and her mother were sh
outing at each other so loud I could hear it, even with my window on that side of the house closed tight, because it got painted stuck. And then it was quiet, so I looked out the window, and I seen Bobbie—that’s the girl—go out the front door and run down the block. I didn’t think nothing about it then, because that wasn’t the first time they had it out with each other. So this afternoon I guess I kinda thought I ought to make sure everything was all right and find out from Stella what happened, you know, and that’s when I went over there, and looked in the back window, because the doors were locked, and it was awful.”

  “Thank you, Mrs. Aciddo. Today police are searching for Bobbie Trax who—”

  I don’t believe it. Crazy. It’s darned crazy how things work out. Yeah, I heard them arguing, and I even saw that nosy old biddy come to the window and pull the drapes aside to get an eyeful. She didn’t see me. None of them saw me. It was dark in those bushes back there by the garage. But all I had to do was wait, and then it was easy to get in.

  Now the cops have their suspect.

  I wouldn’t have planned it like this. Couldn’t have.

  Maybe they’ll stick the kid with it. Maybe not. Depends on what evidence they’ve got. Depends on what kind of an alibi she can come up with.

  Gotta think. Gotta get some aspirin to take care of this headache. Stupid kid. Who’s it gonna be—you or me?

  Let’s see what I can do to make sure it’s you.

  5

  “You through crying?”

  Jennifer wadded the soggy tissue between her hands and glared at the detective who faced her across the narrow desk. The interrogation room was a small cubicle with tile walls that reminded her of the bathrooms at school. At her left was a glass partition open to a large room that held desks and rows of files and was decorated by two walls filled with bulletin boards. Now and then someone passing through the homicide department glanced in at her without curiosity.

  “I cry when I get angry,” she muttered.