by Elaine Viets
“No, it was the dress on the corpse in the opening of Six Feet Under.”
Helen flashed on Kristi with her white-lace dress and lily bouquet, inviting the leather man into her coffin. Of course. It all made sense.
“That’s why you had white lace and lilies last night,” Helen said. “The Six Feet Unders. What exactly do they do?”
“Not much.” Kristi rolled her eyes. “It’s some kinky old guys and a couple of weird women. They like to screw in a coffin. They’re old and boring and think it’s a big deal. Maybe it is for them. They’ll be in their own coffins soon enough.”
“One question,” Helen said. “You don’t have to answer if you don’t want to. Is it comfortable doing it in a coffin?”
“It’s not bad, once you get over the idea. It’s roomier than the back seat of a Toyota but not as big as a twin bed. It’s got a mattress. The springs don’t squeak, either.”
Savannah interrupted in a flat, dead voice. “My sister was doing this? Wearing grave clothes and . . .” She couldn’t bring herself to say the rest.
Helen suddenly felt ashamed for asking about sex in a coffin.
Kristi smiled, showing small pointed teeth. It was a predator’s smile. She would enjoy hurting Savannah.
“For awhile she was real popular. Those fat old guys go for the spunky blondes. She had big tits, too. The geezers like to grope those.”
Savannah’s hand trembled on the trigger, and Kristi realized she’d gone too far.
“But she stopped,” she said, quickly. “She really did.”
“When?” Savannah said.
“Just before she disappeared. She said she found something that was going to change her life. Something big. Laredo said she wouldn’t be just a pair of tits. She’d be somebody important. She’d get married and live in a mansion.”
“What did she find?”
“Uh . . .”
“Tell me what you saw or you’ll never see another thing.” Savannah’s finger twitched on the trigger. Helen held her breath. If she lunged for the bottle, Savannah would shoot Kristi for sure.
“It was a computer disk.” Kristi’s voice was a high-pitched shriek of panic. “It was red. Plain red. She showed it to me. I saw it. She said that little disk was her winning lottery ticket.”
“What was on it?”
“I—” Kristi started to cry.
“Answer me, or you’ll really have something to cry about.”
“It was stuff from Hank’s computer. She said he’d been laundering money. He was into some other fraud, too. She said I’d be surprised at who was involved. Big names. That’s all she said.”
“What did she do with the disk?”
“She put it in her purse. Later, she told me she hid it.”
“Where?”
“If I knew that, it wouldn’t be hidden, would it?”
Savannah moved the spray bottle closer to Kristi’s eyes. “I didn’t want to know,” Kristi said. “Laredo was gone and Debbie was dead. I was afraid I’d be next.” She was crying hard now. Her white face was now an ugly red. Her nose was running. “You can point that thing at me all day, but I don’t know any more.”
“You got any family?” Savannah said.
“A sister in Missoula.”
“I suggest you take a nice long visit home. The last woman we talked to wound up wearing real corpse clothes.”
Chapter 18
“Some of the greatest actors of all time had a period of hired sex in their past,” Savannah said. “Marilyn Monroe, for instance.”
Helen said nothing. She was still shaking from the encounter with Kristi. Or maybe it was from riding in the Tank. The car was shimmying like Elvis’ hips. The troll doll was dancing from the rearview mirror. Her stomach was in a spin cycle.
“My sister wasn’t a hooker.” Savannah sounded like she was trying to convince herself. She clutched the bucking steering wheel with both hands. If she held onto it, she might hold onto her sanity.
“Savannah, I work rotten jobs just like you,” Helen said. “Dead-end jobs hurt your body. They grind down your spirit. Anyone who talks about the dignity of labor has never worked them. After a day on the phone in the boiler room, I can hardly move my neck, it hurts so bad. I come home at night and fall into bed—alone. I don’t have the time or the energy to date.
“I’m tough. You are, too. But someone as young and pretty as your sister might do anything to escape.”
A single tear slid down Savannah’s dry, freckled face, as if she had no more left. Helen could hardly bear to watch its slow progress. “Laredo put on those weird clothes and climbed into a coffin with flabby old men. My little sister. How could she?”
“She must have been a great actress,” Helen said.
Savannah seemed to find Helen’s comment comforting. They rode in silence for a mile or so, if any time in the jiggling, jittering Tank could be called quiet. An SUV driver gunned her engine and drove around them, narrowly missing the Tank’s bumper as she flipped them off.
“Can I ask you a favor?” Helen said. “Can we pull over and ditch that spray bottle? It makes me nervous. If we have an accident, bleach and ammonia are a highly volatile substance.”
“It’s just plain ammonia,” Savannah said. “There’s no bleach. I wasn’t going to take a chance like that. I told you I’m trained in the use of household products. I brought the masks for effect. They scared Kristi good.”
“Scared me, too,” Helen said.
“Sorry about that. I wouldn’t really use such a dangerous substance. But I knew Kristi wouldn’t tell me the truth. I had to frighten it out of her. She’s a hooker, however much you dress it up in white lace and lilies. Hookers are good at lying. It’s what they do for a living.”
More silence. Laredo, the pinup-pretty blonde with the sassy red high heels, was in the car with them. Helen could almost see her laughing—and lying to her sister. Even the rattling Tank couldn’t shake their sadness.
“Well,” Savannah said, because she couldn’t say anything else. “Wanna get something to eat?”
Helen realized breakfast had been her last meal, and it was four o’clock. “Sure. My treat.”
“No, mine. I ruined your appetite. Least I can do is help you get it back.”
They pulled into the Heywood Family Diner, a mom-and-pop place on U.S. 1. Exactly what we need right now, Helen thought. Hot buttered grease. Waitresses who call us “honey” and bring us comfort food.
Savannah got out, unscrewed the top on the spray bottle, and dumped the contents on the parking lot. Then she tossed the empty bottle in the back seat. It landed on a pile of yellowing newspapers and old takeout bags. She threw the two masks in the restaurant Dumpster.
Inside, the Heywood diner looked exactly the way Helen hoped it would. There was a long row of blue plastic booths. Comfortable-looking waitresses carried pots of hot coffee. The daily specials were chalked on a blackboard. The air smelled of fried eggs, fresh biscuits and hot coffee. Home. They found a booth in a corner shielded by a glass-brick planter filled with dusty fake ferns.
“Coffee?” the waitress said. She carried two hot pots at once, a feat Helen could never master.
“You bet,” Helen said.
The waitress poured and said, “We got a tuna-melt special with cole slaw and fries for four ninety-five. A bread-pudding dessert comes with that.”
“Sold,” Helen said. “My grandmother made terrific bread pudding. I love the stuff.”
“Make that two,” Savannah said. “We’re easy.”
Their food was on the table ten minutes later. “This is just what I needed,” Savannah said.
The world did seem brighter with hot food. Savannah quit gnawing on herself and worked on her tuna melt. Helen ate everything down to the last salty fry. The waitress brought another round of hot coffee and bowls of fragrant bread pudding.
“They used lots of cinnamon,” Savannah said. “This is the good stuff.”
“What do you call
that yellow sauce on your bread pudding?” Helen asked.
“Hard sauce,” Savannah said.
“That’s what my Southern granny called it. Nobody else knows what I’m talking about.”
When they pushed back their bowls and had more coffee in front of them, Savannah was ready to talk about Laredo.
“What do you think my sister really had on that disk? Kristi said it was money laundering and some fraud with big names. I can’t imagine what she means.”
“How much did Laredo know about computers?” Helen said.
“A lot more than I do. Computers are second nature to someone her age, and she was darn good. She could have had a career in them. But she said computer jobs were boring and didn’t pay enough. Plus, she thought the guys were geeks.”
“Did your sister mention anything about breaking into Hank’s computer?”
“No,” Savannah said. “But she didn’t always tell me everything.”
That was the understatement of the year, Helen thought.
“Laredo did tell you something: Hank treated her like dirt at his house and she got mad. She also got even. She told you she used his computer for video poker. I bet she was playing a more dangerous game. She broke into his financial records. She could have been blackmailing him.”
“But what did she find—and why would the names surprise us?” Savannah said.
“Hank goes to parties at the Mowbrys’, and they’re connected to some powerful people in South Florida. Maybe he’s mixed up with the Six Feet Unders. He could be in some weird business like snuff films. People who like sex in coffins may also get off on watching people die.”
Savannah shivered, and Helen didn’t think it was the air conditioning. “God, I hope you’re wrong. Could you go back to Hank Asporth’s house and check out his computer?”
“No way I’ll ever get in his house again,” Helen said. “Not after my date there. Besides, Hank isn’t stupid. Once Laredo threatened him, he’d have gotten the incriminating records out of there.
“We have to find Laredo’s disk. It’s important. Hank hasn’t found it yet, or he wouldn’t have trashed your place, my place, and Debbie’s apartment. Where did your sister hide things?”
“In her shoes,” Savannah said. “She used to keep rolled-up money in the toes of her high heels. But all her shoes and clothes are gone.”
“She couldn’t hide a computer disk in a high heel. It would be too easy to see.”
Savannah sipped her coffee and thought for a minute. “When we were little, she used to hide stuff in her mattress. She’d cut a hole in the side and slide it in. When she was thirteen, she stashed her diary in there. I found it and read all about her adventures in Jeremy Ames’ red pickup. I gave that boy what-for and he never came around again. After our trailer got trashed, that’s the first place I looked. Nothing.”
“Any other favorite places?” Helen said.
“Her car. Under the floor mat and in the trunk under the spare. But her car is gone, too. There’s nowhere else I—-”
Helen looked up and nearly dropped her coffee. Fred and Ethel had walked in.
“Oh, God,” she whispered and ducked down in the booth.
“What the matter?” Savannah said.
“It’s the awful couple in 2C. I don’t want them to see me. They’ll invite themselves to sit with us and never leave. They’re so boring they make my socks roll down.”
Savannah peeked over the dusty ferns. “She the gray-haired lady wearing the WORLD’S BEST GRANDMA T-shirt? And he’s the guy with a gut? His shirt says, SORRY YOUR GOD IS DEAD—MINE’S ALIVE AND WELL.”
Helen groaned. “It’s Fred and Ethel, all right.”
“You’re safe,” Savannah said. “They can’t see you behind the planter.”
But Helen could hear them. Their voices were so loud, she felt like they were sitting in her booth. She wanted to flee, but she couldn’t leave while they were there.
They both ordered tuna-melt specials in booming voices. “We don’t like bread pudding,” Ethel said. “Can we have rice pudding, instead?”
“Sorry, ma’am,” the waitress said. “No substitutions.”
“Can you take fifty cents off the price?” Ethel said.
“Nope. Can’t do that, either.”
“Some people are so cheap,” Helen whispered. “Can you believe that?”
“They do throw pennies around like manhole covers.” Savannah took another peek over the booth top. “But they’ve got their food already and they’re really chowing down. It won’t be long before they’re gone. I’ll get us more coffee. Just relax. It will be over soon.”
“That’s what my dentist says.”
There was a fearful scream.
“Good lord,” Savannah said. She looked over the fern barricade. “It’s Ethel. Blood is gushing from her mouth.”
Helen poked her head up through the ferns. “Do you think her tuna bit her?”
Ethel was moaning and holding her jaw. Blood dripped through her fingers and onto her T-shirt.
The waitress came running over. “What’s the matter, ma’am? Are you hurt?”
“This piece of metal was in my tuna melt,” Ethel said. “I bit right into it. I’m cut bad.”
“I’m taking my wife to the emergency room,” Fred said. “What’s your manager’s name?”
“Mr. Wilson,” the waitress said. “He’s in back. I’ll get him.”
Fred helped Ethel up and put his arm around her. She was dabbing at her face with a napkin, smearing the blood around.
The manager came running over. He saw bloody Ethel and turned the color of yesterday’s oatmeal.
“My wife hurt herself on a piece of metal in your food,” Fred said. “Look how she’s bleeding. I’m not a suing kind of man. But she needs to be stitched up and I got a four-hundred-dollar deductible for my emergency room insurance.”
“I’m sorry, sir,” the manager said, wringing his hands like an old dishrag. “If you’ll bring your receipt from the ER, we’ll be happy to pay the deductible.”
“In cash?” Fred said.
“Absolutely,” the manager said. “Here’s my card. Just call and we’ll settle up. I hope your wife will be OK. We’re so sorry. Next time, your dinner is on us.”
Ethel was still holding the bloody napkin to her mouth and dripping dramatically. Helen saw she developed a limp as Fred helped her out to the car. Strange. That metal had been nowhere near her foot.
“There’s something funny going on,” Helen said. “Let’s see if they really go to the emergency room.”
Savannah threw down some bills and they ran to the Tank. Fred and Ethel didn’t notice the lurching, smoke-belching car. They went nowhere near a hospital. Instead, they drove straight to the Coronado. When Ethel got out of the car, there was no blood on her face. She was smiling. A blue wind-breaker hid her bloodstained shirt.
“I knew it,” Helen said. “She faked that injury.”
They drove past, so Fred and Ethel wouldn’t see they were being followed. A half an hour later, Savannah dropped Helen at the Coronado. The sunset had painted the sky a glorious rose-pink. Wild parrots settled into the rustling palms. The soft evening breeze was scented with chlorine and Coppertone.
This was Helen’s favorite time of day. A few months ago, she would have been sitting by the pool, toasting the sunset with white wine. Margery and Peggy would have been relaxing on chaise longues, Pete patrolling Peggy’s shoulder while she discussed her latest lottery scheme. Margery would snort and smoke and ignore Pete’s squawks. They would all be laughing.
Now Peggy and Pete sulked inside. Margery was barricaded in her home.
Their poolside evenings had been hijacked by Cal, Fred and Ethel. The couple claimed to be teetotalers. Helen thought they were drunk with disapproval.
Florida was warm and accepting, more interested in committing sin than condemning it. Fred and Ethel’s moral superiority had soured too many evenings. Ha. They were nothing but small-
time scam artists.
Helen banged on Margery’s door until the jalousie glass rattled. Helen knew her landlady was home. Her car was in the lot.
“Margery, it’s me,” Helen said.
The door finally opened. Swirls of cigarette smoke poured out. Helen choked.
“Quiet. I’m avoiding the pool party,” Margery said. “They’ve already complained twice. Fred said the chlorine was too strong in the pool. Ethel saw a palmetto bug.”
“Only one?” Helen said.
Even in the darkened kitchen, Helen could see Margery was a mess. Her purple shorts were wrinkled. Her red lipstick had crawled up into the cracks in her lips and her nail polish was chipped. She was drinking a screwdriver that didn’t even have a full shot of orange juice.
“You need your vitamin C,” Helen said, heading for the fridge. She poured a hefty jolt of juice into Margery’s half-empty glass of booze. Then she opened the blinds.
“Let in some light. We need to celebrate. We’re getting the fun couple out of here. I caught Fred and Ethel in a big fat fraud.”
Helen gave Margery the details. She could see her landlady perk up with every sentence. By the time Helen finished, Margery looked ten years younger. The wrinkles were even gone from her shorts.
“Are you working tonight?” Margery said. “No? Good. It’s the Mertzes’ bingo night. They leave about six thirty. We’ll wait until they’re gone and check out their place. I have a passkey.”
At six twenty-six, Fred and Ethel left. Cal trailed along with them. Margery and Helen heard two cars start on the parking lot. They waited another half hour to make sure the trio didn’t come back. Then they crossed the yard and went up the steps to 2C.
Fred and Ethel’s apartment was a furnished unit, done in wicker and seashells. “She keeps the place clean, I’ll say that for her,” Margery said.
The living room was tidy, except for the wicker couch. It was covered with stacks of newspapers. The coffee table had a pile of torn-out restaurant ads, mostly for family restaurants.
“The next victims,” Helen said.
The kitchen table had been turned into a desk. A laptop and laser printer were set up on it. “Bet that’s where they do their fake emergency room receipts,” Helen said.
