The 6:10 To Murder (The Maude Rogers Crime Novels Book 3)

by Linda L. Dunlap

  “Better than what?” Inez asked. “Is there something wrong?”

  “Maybe we could sit for a minute. Would you mind?” Joe was concerned for the woman and how she might react to the news of her husband’s death.

  “Why yes. Please come in,” she said. “Forgive my rudeness; I am not accustomed to entertaining the police.”

  The couch looked well worn, but comfortable. Maude chose a straight-backed chair that would make it easier to get back on her feet. Her arthritic knees had some difficulty with low seating, but Joe gladly sank into the leather cushions and leaned back against the wide arms of the furniture. Maude remembered the days when she could still enjoy such comfort, but wrestling with criminals in hard places like concrete, pavement, and tile floors had worn the ligaments down in both of her knees. When the necessity was there, she was always the first to pile on if a suspect tried to escape from custody at booking. It came with the turf. Some jail officers referred to it as pig-piling, almost like the pile of football players in a game when someone held the ball at the bottom of the mound.

  Inez sat in disbelieving shock when the detectives told her about Henry. When Maude asked her about the track incident and anything that Henry might have said, she replied, “No, I don’t know any of Henry’s business at work. I’m sorry, it’s just we never talked about his job, nor mine. You see, I work in discount retail, and it’s a real bitch sometime, but was never very interesting to him. And I just never saw the lines of people going back and forth on the train to be the elements of good conversation, so we got into our habits.” She sat gazing off into the kitchen, a few tears making tiny tracks in her pancake makeup, the mascara framing her leaking gray eyes melting as stage black.

  “Will you be all right, Mrs. Fonda, or would you like for me to call victim services to get someone over to help you with your loss? Sometimes people need others in cases like this where there’s been violence.”

  “No, no, I’ll be fine, I have friends. Thank you for coming and I’m sorry I can’t help you any.”

  “Then we’ll go on about our business and find the person who did this to your husband,” Maude said, rising from the chair.

  Once outside, she said to Joe, “I’m beat. Where to? I’m going home.”

  “Run me by the house if you don’t mind,” Joe said. “Think I’ll turn in early.”

  Chapter 8

  Joe’s apartment was three miles from the Cop Shop, and until recently, when the weather became so unbearably hot, he had pedaled his bicycle to work and back, choosing the physical exercise in the early and late part of the day. The heat had been intense for a week, destroying his desire for a three-mile ride at the end of shift. Maude, as senior officer, had use of the city car, and had lately been giving him a lift to work. She enjoyed his company. That evening when she dropped him in front of the apartment, Joe noticed the front door was open. Problem was, he remembered closing it that morning.

  “Wait up, partner,” he said, unsnapping the holster on his waist. “Someone’s been in my apartment. Could be the manager, but let me find out before you leave.”

  “No problem. I’ll take a walk with you,” she said, killing the engine then stepping out of the car.

  The door was open a crack, the cool air leaking outside from the window unit running in the small living area. He hated that; his electric bill was already high enough without that kind of waste.

  “Come out,” he yelled. “Police. Come out of the house.”

  The door opened and a blonde female stepped outside with her hands in the air. “I give up,” she said with a droopy smile. “Don’t shoot,” she continued, staggering toward Joe.

  “Sheila? What are you doing here? How did you get in my apartment?” Joe was firing questions to get over the surprise of seeing his ex-wife.

  “Well, I told the manager I’m your wife and he let me in,” she said laughing.

  Joe wasn’t laughing; in fact, he was angry and disturbed that the manager had allowed a stranger into his apartment. He knew Joe was a cop, which made it worse. Turning toward Maude, Joe shrugged, a defeated expression on his face.

  “You can go. I know her,” he said, waiting until his partner drove away to turn back to his ex-wife.

  “So who’s the grandma? Rowrrr, a cougar. I never knew you liked older women, Joe,” she said drunkenly.

  “Go inside, Sheila. Tell me what you’re doing here. Where’s the boys?”

  “Shure thang,” she slurred, settling on the couch. “The boys are fine. How about a drinky-winky?”

  The person in front of Joe was a caricature of his ex-wife, a drunken, messed-up woman who looked ten years older than she should. It hurt to see her that way; the three years she had been gone were hard years for him. He had learned to cry again after she left—deep, racking sobs that left him empty and sad. Nights of squeezing the pillow, pretending it was her body, ran quickly through his mind. Part of his mended heart thrilled at the thought that she was here.

  He unloaded his equipment while Sheila helped herself to his liquor cabinet and sang to the apartment community. No matter how he tried to shush her, she kept it up, causing him distress that someone might knock on the door from the department with a citizen noise complaint. He went into his small kitchen and removed two chicken breasts from the freezer, put them in cold water to thaw, and began to change his clothes.

  “Umm, you look good,” she said, easing up behind him, rubbing his back. “Haven’t seen you looking this yummy before.”

  “It’s the workout I do to keep my job.” He was nervous, the feel of her fingers so familiar, yet foreign at the same time. A thousand times he had dreamed of her fingers on his skin, touching him in the old way when they were first together. A warning shot through him: Can’t go there. She’s drunk; she’s not the same. She doesn’t care for me, doesn’t even like me.

  He removed her fingers and finished undressing in the bathroom, finding his workout pants hanging on the shower rod where he’d left them that morning.

  “I’m going on a run. Be gone when I get back.” The words hurt him to say, but rightness accompanied them.

  “You mean you don’t want me?” she slurred, the drink in her had wobbling, threatening to spill. “Where you getting it? Huh, who’s giving it to you, Joe? You know she’s not as good as me, can’t make you feel like I can.”

  “Just be gone when I get back,” he said.

  “Aw, come on, Joe. Don’t you remember how good I make you feel, the way you like to hold me?”

  “I remember how badly you made me feel when I wanted you with every nerve in my body and you didn’t care, but I don’t want you anymore. You took my kids! Now take your drunk self out of my apartment. Be gone when I get back,” he said for the third time.

  “Liar! Of course you still want me,” she screamed. “You loser, I’m leaving. Who needs you anyway?” Her arm was shaking, her head bobbing with the hateful words she spat out. “Loser cop, you’ll never be anything else. I came here to see someone else, but he was out for a while, so I thought I would see poor, sad Joe. Even his kids hate him. But you can rot, as far as I care. You hear me, Joe? You’ll always be a loser.”

  He ran out of the door, stumbling over the sidewalk in an effort to get away from the vitriol in her voice, the hateful words slamming him as he ran. The city was noisy with traffic moving from downtown to the outskirts, where more people were living every year, but Joe couldn’t hear anything except the hate in his ex-wife’s voice. He ran farther than he had before, giving her plenty of time to get out of his apartment, praying she would be gone when he got back. He wondered if she was lying about his kids hating him. They were still young and impressionable. She could sway them if she wanted, but he had never believed she would stoop to that. Not caring about him was one thing, but she wanted to hurt him that night because he had rejected her. He had to believe that, or everything else he’d ever believed about her was a lie.

  Two hours later, Joe walked in his living room t
o find it in disarray but empty. He breathed a sigh of relief then headed for the shower after putting the safety chain on his front door. The manager would be getting an earful the next day; he could put money on that. As soon as his shower was done, Joe picked up his phone and called Lilly Ann, and was immediately cheered by her sharp wit, so much like Maude’s.

  “Hey, Joe, couldn’t stay away from my sultry voice?” Lilly Ann was just what he needed to break the spell his ex-wife had laid on him.

  “No, not for a minute,” he said, and breathed deeply. “Not for another minute.” They talked for a while then closed it off, each getting back to their schedules. Before the phone was disconnected, Lilly Ann said that a visit to her aunt would be a welcome getaway from home, and maybe her mother would like to visit as well. She said she would call her aunt and set it up. “If so, I hope your dance card isn’t full,” she said. “I’ll let you know when.”

  Joe smiled on the way to the kitchen, taking a minute to open the refrigerator and grab a cold beer. He had an hour or so till bedtime and decided to spend it going over some old notes on Robert Dawson, just on the chance the criminal in the hospital was more coherent than everyone thought. Two beers later, Joe had a picture of the man and the ways he had fooled police agencies for almost twenty years. The detective rose from the easy chair’s deep cushions and paced the floor, putting it together, using his old forensics training. Criminals with personality disorders were terrible because none of society’s rules applied to them. Nothing mattered in their world except what they wanted. If Dawson’s mind was awake and scheming, he could easily fool a roomful of doctors, yet be planning a deluge of murders all the while. Joe knew he and Maude needed to visit the inmate in the mental hospital. A face-to-face with the man was called for.

  The next day Sheila called him no less than ten times, apologetic, begging him to take her back. She said that life was hard in California and she was lonely without him. She begged him for one more chance. Just to meet for coffee after work, and talk. Joe agreed, but was unimpressed with her contrite request. He went for the boys’ sake, not for hers or his.

  He met her after work and they talked, or, that is, she talked and he listened. She wanted him to move to California and get a job, doing something besides police work. She guaranteed their life would be good. Joe could only stare at the woman who was once his wife, wondering when it went wrong. For a long time he’d blamed their divorce on his preoccupation with work, but watching her across the table, as she tried to convince him that all could be solved if he would just change, suddenly Joe was freed of any feeling of guilt that he had lost her. The truth was, she didn’t love him, probably never did.

  “No thanks, Sheila. It’s too little, too late. I love my job, and my boys are the only reasons I would ever go to California. I’m sorry your life is rotten right now, but it isn’t me you want.”

  He stood at the table and looked down on the woman he’d once loved. “I love my sons, but I don’t want to live with you. Goodbye, Sheila.”

  Walking away from her tears didn’t hurt, but it didn’t feel great either. Joe made his way back home, sad that his marriage had ended so badly.

  On the other side of town, Maude slapped mosquitoes and smoked her last cigarette of the day. She wished for a cold shot of gin but resisted searching the house for any, trying to be content sitting outside in the coolest part of the day. Her stomach ached with the need, and her thoughts were raging. Just one drink to settle down with. What could it hurt? She had been drinking for years and she wasn’t dead yet. Just a glass of tonic then, poured over ice. That should help. No, too much like the real stuff; the next minute would have her in the house, looking. Playing games with her mind, Maude knew she was in trouble when the rage started coming to the top. She had to get a handle on it.

  John Eberhart had told her one time to call him if she ever needed help with drinking. She’d told him then, in her smart aleck voice, that she never needed anyone’s help with drinking. She did quite well by herself. Picking up her phone, she searched through the contacts list until she found him. It was 10:30 at night, though, and she hated to call

  Anyone, especially a coworker, that late. Eberhart answered on the second ring, which was a good thing, because she was about to hang up.

  “Yeah, Eberhart here,” was what he said. She really wanted a drink.

  “John, it’s Maude Rogers.” She finally got the words out. “You said for me to call.”

  “What do you need, Maude? How can I help you?”

  “I’m not sure, John. Probably a bad idea calling this late.” The disconnect button was just about under her index finger.

  “Is it your drinking?” he asked, kind of quiet, so no one could overhear his words.

  “Yeah,” she mumbled, embarrassed.

  “Have you been drinking tonight?”

  “Not yet. Do you go to those meetings?” Telling personal details of her life wasn’t Maude’s way.

  “I do,” Eberhart said. “That’s my private business. If you really want help, think about why you called, pray about it, and tomorrow I’ll go with you to a meeting.”

  “You don’t intend to hammer me about this?” she asked him warily.

  No, Maude.” He sighed. “I won’t hammer you.”

  “Good. Tomorrow, then.” Maude said a quick goodnight and punched the button on her phone harder than was needed. She was scared of admitting to others her dependence on alcohol. Gin, the drink of sneaks who hid their sins from the world, had a tight hold on her: cold, in a water glass, no one but her to know the difference. The memory of Grace’s cancer slammed her then, the days when there was nothing but pain for both Maude and her mother. The cabinet in her mother’s house held some medicinal spirits: a small bottle of bourbon whiskey for colds and a half-pint of gin left behind by her brother. He’d never been one to drink much; his lady-in-waiting was meth and her cousins. But the first taste of gin seemed to calm Maude’s nerves, made her cry less, even when Grace finally died. After that, there were other reasons to continue until there was no reason to stop. She hated the compulsion now, the need to feel the familiar comfort of a pint bottle under her pillow.

  Wrestling with her desire for a drink, Maude thought about praying, suddenly ashamed it had been so long since her last talk with God. She tried it, muttering words of contrition, hoping He didn’t see her for the failure she felt. Finally, in the midst of a word, she fell asleep sober for the first time in a long time.

  The next morning her mouth was dry and her stomach heaved as she barely made it to the bathroom, the bile from an empty stomach burning as it emptied into the porcelain toilet. Her head was worse than if she’d passed out drunk. The first cup of coffee tasted like the bile she’d just spewed, but she drank it laced heavily with cream and sugar, the memory of her brother crowding other thoughts. She’d seen him many times, clinging to a syrupy-sweet cup, filling his system with sugar when he needed to get high.

  Thankfully, Tuesdays were usually slow, mostly paperwork days, a time to reflect on the cases needing closing. That was a good thing; her movements were slower, her mind befuddled as she tried to shower and dress. The first cigarette of the day had its own life force—the nicotine went straight to her alcohol-starved brain, the effect almost dizzying.

  “I am a mess,” she said, “an old lady drunk on an overnight dry-out.” The truth stared Maude in the face, all the wondering she’d been doing confirmed. She made more coffee and loaded it again with sugar, a thing she’d never done before this morning. Maybe as soon as she got to work things would level out. She was picking up Joe from his apartment, and had to hurry through her front yard full of leaves, stumbling along, her body hurting from the thirty or so hours of self-imposed sobriety. The keys shook in the hand reaching for the ignition, not enough to be a problem, but enough to notice. Thankfully, Joe lived about five minutes away. She was once again glad he had moved away from his old address, out of the area where car tires were regularly slashed and a
cop could die waiting for help from his neighbors.

  Finally arriving at Joe’s apartment, Maude honked the horn a couple of times, feeling the vibration in her aching head. The sugar in her belly was burning its way through with ups and downs of energy, sending false messages of good health to her brain. Joe ran out his door, almost spilling his coffee, headed for the passenger side of the police unit. When he saw her sitting there, he shot a questioning look toward her then shrugged and opened the driver’s door.

  “Morning, partner. To what do I owe the privilege of being your escort?” If it had been anyone but Joe, the message would have come out as snarky, but his sense of humor could usually be counted on when addressing a strange situation. Joe could read Maude pretty well, and that morning he could see she was troubled. “Somebody steal your cookies this morning?” he asked.

  She looked at him then, her face haggard in the early morning light, the red streaks through white in her blue eyes telling. She’d pulled a drunk or needed a drink. Joe had seen those eyes many times in his twenty-nine years. First in his dad, then later his older brother got caught up in a sorry lifestyle with bad women, booze, and other people’s money. Joe guessed he was as close to Maude as he had been to either of the two. She was his partner and mentor at work, as well as someone he respected deeply.

  “Yeah,” she said, “the whole box.”

  They drove the last few minutes to the Cop Shop without conversation, a rarity, Joe thought. He wondered if it was the train murder that had her going, bringing back bad memories. Not wanting to push too hard, he eased into the conversation.

  “Well, are you going to tell me or not?” he said, looking sidelong at her. The early morning wrinkles in her face seemed deeper than yesterday, making her age more apparent.

  Silence was all she gave, shaking her head a little, telling him to back off.

  “Okay,” he said. “I’m here if you want to talk.”

  A look of relief passed over her face then, an acknowledgement that, no matter what, she could depend on his friendship.