A Particular Darkness

by Robert E. Dunn

  “Limbaugh showed up,” Billy shot a thumb over his shoulder. “I left him covering the access road. That Russian guy was pitching a fit.” We must have looked guilty or Billy’s ears were burning because he stopped and gave us a look. “Everything all right here?” he asked as Riley wandered back to his car.

  “Right as rain,” I said and opened my book to a blank page.

  * * *

  Officially the girl was a Jane Doe, or simply, unknown victim. Unofficially there was no way she was anyone but Sartaña. For a very long time I played a game of pretend, filling the first page of my pad with nonsense scratches, staring at what I drew without seeing. I didn’t want to look at the girl. I didn’t want to watch the world blowing brown around me again.

  I’m tempted to say the feeling passed. But it is not like that. It never seems far from me. Instead it faded once more into the background and I was able to get on with my job.

  Sartaña’s body was in the shoreline scrub and cattails. She was lying on her right side with her face toward the water. I sketched her out showing the orientation of her arms. The right was forward, almost pointing at something unseen by anyone living. The left was lying behind her back with her fingers and palm up. Her legs were splayed widely, giving her the appearance of leaping, as though she’d tried to escape her fate by bounding over the lake. One bare foot was in the water.

  As I drew out what I was seeing, Billy mounted a battery-operated work light on a stand and pointed the beam right at Sartaña.

  The LED gave everything a blue cast that gave her skin, already wan, a pallor. For some reason it reminded me of something old fashioned, like one of those Victorian photos of the dear departed. It was a trick of light only. Sartaña was wearing a short dress and it had been pushed up above her hips showing worn and threadbare underpants. It wasn’t just the situation of the dress either. Her hair, dark to almost the color of the night overhead, reflected a shimmer of blue from the work light. The very darkness and the sheen communicated an ethnicity the Victorians would not have been so interested in.

  Thunder rumbled so close I could feel it in my chest when I crossed below her feet to get a look at Sartaña’s face. Blood ran in two tiny rivers from her scalp and her nose. It wasn’t until I was wading into the water that I could see clearly enough to make any kind of judgment about her injuries.

  Because of the slope of the bank and the lie of her body, her head appeared to be resting on her arm when I looked from behind. From in front it was lying over the arm twisted a little too far.

  Her neck was broken.

  I was certain. Not that it would be my call. The coroner’s assistants were waiting patiently on the road outside the perimeter. With them was our tech and two more newly arrived deputies. Everyone was waiting on me.

  I had all I needed for the moment but I kept sketching. More avoiding.

  “You doing okay there?”

  It was Billy asking. Was he being protective or helpful? Either way it bothered me. I didn’t want to be helped or to need help. And I was certainly no damsel who needed rescuing.

  “Who made you the babysitter tonight?” I asked, tinging the question with a little extra venom. I regretted it immediately and waited for a reply just as pleasant.

  “You think you need a babysitter?” he asked and without the bile.

  “Sometimes,” I looked at him. “I honestly don’t know.”

  “Well, when you do know, call me.” He laughed like it was just a casual comment with no weight to it.

  There I was, up to my knees in cold lake water, my boots stuck in mud, eight feet from a dead girl, with a man, probably laughing at me. The sheriff was right. I needed a friend. And standing there, looking across water, and death, and probably other metaphors I wasn’t picking up on, it was clear that Billy Blevins was my friend. It was just as clear to me that I had never been his friend.

  “Billy,” I said.

  When I didn’t go on, he asked, “Are you stuck in the mud?”

  “No.” But I wasn’t sure if that was true. I didn’t want to try moving my feet just in case it was. Old business first. “A while back, before so much happened and I ended up with Moonshines.”

  “Yeah?”

  “I was just wondering. Why did you stop playing music?”

  “I didn’t.”

  “No,” I explained like he didn’t understand my question. “You haven’t even been in there since . . .”

  “I still play music. Just not there.”

  “Oh,” I said, feeling as foolish as I sounded. “Why not there?”

  “Busy,” he answered. I think it was the first time I ever heard him lie. Then he added, “I just never fit it in. I still play sometimes. Weekends, if I’m not on duty, down at the Dogwood.”

  He was talking about the Dogwood Mountain Resort. It was a lakeside development with cabins that look rustic but have room service. The whole thing is centered on a restaurant and a lounge that I just learned had live entertainment.

  “Quite the place,” I said.

  “The people who go can afford it.”

  I wondered if that was a dig at me or the people who go. I’d never been. Dogwood was built as a vanity project by a rich romance writer and her third husband. It didn’t take long before it was making more money than the book business.

  “You like it there?”

  “Why are you asking?”

  Taking a genuine interest in people was harder than I remembered. I shrugged. It really wasn’t possible to look very casual standing in a lake. I nodded over at the shore where I’d gone in, well away from Sartaña’s body.

  “Give me a hand getting out of here,” I told him.

  We both started making our way to the same point. Billy shoving aside the weeds to make a path. He had his feet planted and a hand out by the time I got there.

  “I was just interested,” I said as soon as my hand was in his.

  “In what?”

  He wasn’t pulling. We were standing, in mud, weeds, and water, clasping hands. I was staring at him like a deer caught in headlights. The lights were behind him so Billy’s face was in shadow. I had to be illuminated as brightly as a movie marquee. Like a marquee, I was pretty sure everything was written on my face.

  “Can’t a friend ask?”

  He laughed. Honest to God, Billy laughed at me. Then he pulled and I staggered out of the water. There was a thick coating of mud on my boots making my feet heavy and slick. I almost fell but extra embarrassment was the last thing I needed.

  “Is that what we are now?” He was still chuckling. His face and voice were full of good humor. Billy was enjoying my discomfort.

  “Well I thought we were.” I don’t think there was much good humor in my voice.

  “Seems to me we had this conversation before.”

  He was right we had. I should have left it at that.

  “You don’t really have friends do you?” he pressed still smiling.

  “Do me a favor,” I said, looking past him into the glare of lights. Up the hill, beyond the lights, shapes moved on the road—spectators or deputies. They were revealed as real people only in the white flash of light bar strobes. Outside the immediate circle of light the world seemed not to exist. Darkness reigned beyond the perimeter tape because so much energy was thrown within. It was a disorienting feeling.

  In the distant overhead, cold, silent lightning stuttered in the stacked clouds. The world had a roof that seemed to be made of pain. Electricity from deep in the thunderhead flashed before breaking out into the clear. In free air it forked in jagged branches that left their impression on the eyes. In the afterimage I could swear I saw brown dust blowing toward me and the thunder was hard rubber rolling too fast on uneven asphalt.

  “What?” Billy asked me.

  I shook my head.

  “You said, ‘Do me a favor.’ What favor?”

  I remembered. “Go check out the Russian in the RV.” I pointed but you couldn’t see anything at the far e
nd of the road through our circle of light. “Check out that story. And ask about why Mike was there.”

  “Mike Resnick?” he asked still a little too pleased with himself. “Another one of your friends?”

  Billy started to laugh but I’d had enough. “Just do it. See what he was doing up there.”

  “With the Russian?” He wasn’t laughing.

  “Yes. I saw him.”

  “When?”

  “Now.”

  “No. When did you see him?”

  “When I was talking with the feds.” I didn’t mean to sound angry. It wasn’t Billy’s fault. I touched the scar at my eye then caught myself. Instead I rubbed the lids of my eyes and felt grit, like fine dust under them.

  “It’s not the place,” Billy said.

  “It’s never the place,” I hit back. “It’s never the time.”

  “Breathe,” he told me. But he said it gently, soothingly like you would talk to a skittish horse. “Breeeathe.” He said again dragging the word out. “It’s not what I meant.”

  “What?”

  “When I said it wasn’t the place. I was talking about Dogwood. It’s not the place that I like.”

  I took away my hands and opened my eyes.

  “It’s just playing. I like the music and singing. I like playing my guitar. I enjoy the people listening.”

  I nodded, understanding.

  “It’s about the music, not the place. Okay?”

  “Yeah.” I agreed. “I can understand that.”

  “You going to be okay?”

  “Why wouldn’t I be?” The best denial was always a good offense. “I don’t need a babysitter.”

  “You said that.”

  “Then what are you doing still here?”

  “Just keeping an eye on a friend.”

  When I was in the Army, there was a phrase that the women picked up. It was something that said more about us as women in a man’s world, but still managed to convey a level of deep surprise, and stunning impact. I couldn’t help but think of it: It was like I’d been kicked in the nuts.

  What can I say? Being a lady was never my strong suit.

  “I’ll check on that Russian guy,” Billy said. He was already walking away.

  I slogged up the bank. As I went up, the tech, coroner, and deputies came down.

  Chapter 10

  When Billy came back to tell me that the Russian and his RV were gone, the rain broke. There was a quick scramble to clear the scene and get Sartaña into the coroner’s van for transport to autopsy. I helped pull in the emergency lighting and get it stowed. All the spectators had bolted back to tents or trailers.

  It didn’t take ten minutes until I was alone with Billy sitting in my truck.

  “Are you going after the Russian tonight?” he asked.

  I started the engine and set the defroster to high. Billy was wet from the rain. I was soaked.

  “How did he get past the deputy at the park entrance?”

  “Limbaugh had it covered. He said, an FBI agent told him to let the RV through. So he did.”

  “Givens.”

  Billy nodded. “This is a nice truck.”

  “I like it,” I answered not really wanting to talk about it. “It’ll be a lot nicer once the defroster heats up.” The moisture on our clothing and breath, and the dropping temperature outside, worked to fog the windows. I turned the fan on high and wiped a hand on the windshield. Something about being in a parked vehicle with a guy and having the windows fogged made me feel seventeen in the most awkward way possible.

  “I was thinking.”

  Exactly like I was seventeen.

  “About the defroster?” I intended it as a joke. I needed a deflection.

  “About the Russian.”

  That time it was my turn to laugh. Not because anything was funny but I was so relieved that there wasn’t more friend talk. Or worse.

  “What’s funny?”

  “The heat is finally coming through the defroster. It feels good.” I didn’t really think he was buying it so I pressed on. “What about the Russian?”

  “You said Mike was talking to him.”

  “I saw Mike. At the RV the Russian was in,” I detailed. “They spoke for a moment then I had to deal with the federales.”

  “So, that made me think about the fish.”

  “What about them?”

  “Caviar. Russian. Conservation agent. It fits. And, I’ve heard about a Russian man who comes to Dogwood. I’ve never seen him, but people talk about him.”

  “What do they say?”

  “Mostly that he’s crazy and you don’t want to get on his bad side. Some of the servers say he’s like a favorite uncle. I don’t know. I might even be confusing two people. But from what I hear, he has a wholesale bait business in that strip of warehouses north of Forsyth.”

  “It does fit.”

  The glass was clear so I turned the control to heat and hot air started rushing out at us. We both put our hands up to the dash vents.

  “Something else I just thought about.” He sounded smug.

  “What?”

  “They serve a lot of caviar at Dogwood Mountain Resort.”

  Even though it was only about a hundred yards away, I dropped Billy off at his cruiser. Since I was apparently no longer suspended, I could have kept working. There were reports to do and my logs to fill out. I could go out the Starry Night Salvation show to talk again with Roscoe about why he—or his big land yacht—had been at the crime scene. Or I could do a little research on the Russian. There was always work to be done when murder was involved.

  I did none of that. I went home to sleep off the weight of a long day and an interesting life.

  * * *

  At four a.m. ghosts woke me. I entertained them for a half hour or so before I fell back into an exhausted, black sleep. At seven, the alarm ran me out of my dreams and my bed. In the shower I had an idea. With soap still in my hair, I went out into the cold bedroom to retrieve my phone.

  “Duck?” I said as soon as it connected. Donald Duques, everyone called him Donald Duck or just Duck, was our lead jailer. Many years ago he’d been a lousy deputy. He made a good jailer because he liked order and sitting indoors. It just goes to show, there’s a place for everyone.

  “Katrina?” he answered, sounding out each syllable. That usually meant he was about to share the kind of joke that caused Human Resources nightmares.

  “Don’t even start,” I cut him off. “I don’t have time.”

  “Oh, you got time to call the old Duck, you just ain’t got time to talk wit’ him.”

  “I need to know about a prisoner, Duck. It’s important. Has Silas Boone, that guy I put in day-before-yesterday been kicked loose yet?”

  “I got papers. No arraignment. Nothin’. I was gonna put him outside as soon as I got to that end of the row.”

  “Do me a favor—”

  “Oh, now we got time for favors?”

  I threw him a bone. “I can’t talk, I got out of the shower to call and I’m wet and dripping all over the floor.” In my defense of using that imagery to get what I wanted from a man—it was at least true.

  “Good God, Hurricane. What you need, girl?”

  Yeah I was ashamed. Not so ashamed I wouldn’t ask him to wait another half hour before opening the cage on Silas Boone.

  I got back under the water and rinsed off.

  My mood was actually a pretty fine one. Usually the mornings after I converse with my dead husband in the small hours I feel like I’ve been put through the gears of a machine and come out mangled but walking. That morning had been different though. What had come in my sleep were not quite nightmares, more of a feeling. I had sensed the ghost, Nelson’s or someone else’s, standing over me and listening as I talked. In any other life it would have been terrifying, I guess. For me it was mild. That was the reason I didn’t think too much about it until I trotted downstairs to find a bottle of my favorite whiskey on the kitchen counter. Beside it wa
s a highball glass still holding two cubes of un-melted ice.

  Suddenly, the blood in my heart was as frigid and solid as the ice. I wouldn’t have thought it possible to feel anything colder until I turned my back on the tempting still life. I wanted to take refuge in Nelson’s painting, the one of him and me in two rowboats. It was there in the same place as always, still perched on the easel in his workspace beside the big, river-stone fireplace. It was different. There was a stripe of black paint down the center of the canvas separating us in our dark and light spaces. That stripe was like death itself lingering between us.

  Whoever had attacked me that morning didn’t know me as well as they thought they did. Had they left only the whiskey, temptation might have worked. The moment I’d seen the bottle my mouth watered and my center felt empty. The phrase, one won’t hurt, was dangling from my tongue. And that’s one of the most dangerous lies ever told.

  It all vanished when I saw that smear of black. Vandalizing the painting made me angry enough to resist. And I know from experience, that the one thing stronger than my need for drink, is the furnace of anger that remains stoked in my heart at all times. I turned the whiskey bottle upside down in the sink then left it gurgling as I went to my truck.

  As I drove I worked the phone. First, I called the SO and asked for someone to cruise by the house a few times today. After that, I called a contact from Nelson’s list, a paint conservator. She promised she could fix it.

  When I pulled up outside the jail, just in time to spot Givens and Keene, I wasn’t scared or tempted. I was furious. They were in the same rental car. It looked slightly worse for its encounter with Kyle and Keith Dickerson.

  My idea in the shower had been that since these two wanted Silas out, they might want to see where he went. I wanted to see that too, but even more, I wanted to see if they just followed or if they spent any face time with Mr. Boone.

  Face time it was.

  They picked him up at the bottom of the hill and took Silas to breakfast.

  I made a mental note to call the sheriff and ask if he’d had that talk with the feds supervising Givens and Keene. My thought was he had and it had been a bad one. Why else would they meet openly with a man they claimed to be investigating, unless they were sure the locals had been put on a leash?