by Brenda Novak
Madison had seen a lot of sweaty, muscle-bound men at the gym when she was married to Danny. But from a sketch artist’s standpoint, there was something truly beautiful about the way Caleb Trovato was put together. He looked far more natural than any of those men at the gym. When he moved, she could tell his tan ended at the waist, as though he’d gotten it from working or playing outdoors instead of baking naked in a tanning salon. And he seemed unconcerned with impressing others. He put down the bin and shrugged into his T-shirt the moment he saw them.
“There you are,” he said.
“Sorry I’m late.” Madison tried to hold the mental picture of his bare torso in her mind so she’d be able to recall it later. After being relatively uninspired over the past few weeks, she suddenly felt a jolt of creative energy. “I had to do a few things that just couldn’t wait.”
“No problem. I’m nearly finished in the back.”
“I really appreciate your help,” she said, and meant it. Having Caleb around, pitching in, made her life suddenly seem fuller, almost…normal.
He picked up the grass bin and emptied it in the green refuse container. “I found something I think you and your bunny might like,” he said to Brianna.
Brianna had already dropped to her knees and situated Elizabeth beside her. She was digging in the dirt with a stick and pretending to ignore Caleb, but Madison could see her peeking at him, trying to figure out what he was talking about.
“Do you want to see what it is?” he asked when she didn’t answer.
“No.” She continued to dig.
Madison opened her mouth to remind her daughter of the talk they’d just had in the car. But Caleb gave her a quick shake of his head, indicating that he didn’t need her to get involved.
“I’ll bet Elizabeth would like to know,” he said.
Brianna pretended to converse with Elizabeth, but ultimately shook her head.
“Okay.” He started toward the mower with the empty bin.
Brianna rocked back on her haunches. “It’s probably nothing we’d like, anyway,” she called after him.
He didn’t bother turning. “Whatever you say.”
She frowned at his retreating form. “So, what is it?”
“Never mind.”
“You’re not going to tell?”
“You’re not interested, remember? Even Elizabeth doesn’t want to know.”
Grabbing her stuffed animal, she stood up and ran after him. “What if Elizabeth’s changed her mind?”
Madison retrieved her briefcase from the car, smiling at how easily Caleb had engaged Brianna’s curiosity. Then she headed to the backyard to find them both kneeling over a shoebox covered with a piece of plastic Caleb had slit in several places.
“What is it?” she asked, unable to see because their heads blocked her view.
“It’s a praying mantis,” Brianna breathed, as though she’d never seen anything quite so wonderful. “See, Mom? It looks just like a green leaf.”
“That’s how it camouflages itself,” Caleb explained. “Most of the time it blends in with the trees.”
“Will it bite me?” Brianna asked.
“No.”
“What does it eat?”
“Other insects.”
“Yuck!”
“That’s a good thing,” Caleb said. “It helps keep the bad bugs in the garden from eating all the vegetables.”
Brianna’s nose was still wrinkled in distaste. “Ooo.”
“Don’t you find gnats and mosquitoes particularly appetizing?” he teased.
“What’s appetizing mean?”
He chuckled. “Never mind. Do you want to hold it?”
Brianna shrank away from him. “I don’t think so.”
“Come on.” He pulled back the plastic and gently withdrew the mantis. “It won’t hurt you. It has spiny legs that feel a little funny, but it’s harmless.”
Brianna remained skeptical at first, but the longer Caleb let the praying mantis perch on his hand, the more confident she became. “Okay.”
He carefully transferred the insect to her just as Madison’s cell phone rang. The LED readout identified the caller as Danny.
Taking a deep breath, she stepped away from Brianna and Caleb. “Hello?”
“You left a message on my voice mail this morning that you want to talk about Brianna,” Danny said without the courtesy of a greeting. “What’s going on?”
“I do want to talk, but I’m afraid now isn’t a good time.”
“What could possibly be wrong? God, she’s six,” he said.
Madison lowered her voice. “I have some very legitimate concerns, Danny. Our daughter is going through a difficult time, and I’m hoping you’ll cooperate with me for her benefit.”
“She’d be fine if only you’d let her come and live with us. She’s perfectly happy when she’s here. Ask Leslie.”
“I don’t need to ask Leslie anything,” Madison said, irritated by the way he constantly discounted her feelings. “I know my own daughter. And I’m not going to give up my rights to her.”
“Well, I don’t want to conference with you about every little thing.”
“Every little thing?” she replied. “Our daughter isn’t a little thing.”
“I think you just like to bother me, although I can’t imagine why. When we were married you certainly didn’t give a damn about anything other than protecting your beloved father.”
Madison glanced up to see Caleb watching her. She didn’t like him witnessing the discord between her and Danny, but she wasn’t willing to end the conversation just yet. She was tired of Danny’s unrelenting bitterness. He thought she’d ruined his life, but dealing with him wasn’t easy.
“I’m going to pretend you never said that and say what I called to tell you in the first place,” she said in carefully measured tones, thinking she might as well get it over with. “You’re expressing opinions and attitudes in Brianna’s presence that aren’t good for her to hear. It’s as simple as that.”
“What opinions?”
“You’re criticizing me in front of her, and I’m her mother.”
“I haven’t told her anything that isn’t true,” he said, and laughed.
Rolling her eyes, Madison consciously tried to sidestep an argument. “Just…just be careful of what you say in future, okay?”
“I’ll do what I damn well please.”
Another glance at Caleb and Brianna told Madison that her daughter was still absorbed with the mantis, but Caleb was watching her intently enough to suggest he recognized that something was wrong.
“Listen, we’ll have to talk about this later,” she said. “I’ve got someone here.”
“Someone? Don’t tell me you’re finally starting to date.”
She moved farther away from Caleb and Brianna and lowered her voice. “Whether I’m dating or not is none of your business. Anyway, I’m not seeing this guy. I’m renting to him.”
The tension between them turned palpable. “You leased the cottage house?” Danny said, all sign of levity gone.
“I told you I was going to.”
“And I told you I didn’t want you to. Do you even know this guy?”
Madison curled the nails of her free hand into her palm. He thought he could walk out on her and still have a say in her choices; his presumption tested her patience, but she was determined not to lose her temper. “I’m getting to know him,” she said calmly.
“So he’s basically a stranger.”
“A lot of people live in homes that are built closer together than my house is to the carriage house, Danny,” she said. “If it helps, think of us as having a new neighbor.”
“I’m taking you back to court,” he snapped. “You’ll be sorry you didn’t listen to me when I cut my child support in half.”
Disgusted that he’d threaten her with something that would hurt Brianna, Madison let her true opinion of him ooze into her voice. “You’re pathetic, you know that?”
; “Be careful. You really don’t want to piss me off,” he said, and hung up.
Madison was shaking by the time she hit the End button. Caleb was talking about the praying mantis again, but Brianna had finally clued in to the drama unfolding on the phone, despite his efforts to distract her.
“Was that Daddy?” she asked, watching her mother with wide, uncertain eyes.
Madison shoved her cell into her purse. “Yes, but don’t worry, honey, everything’s okay.”
Brianna shaded her eyes against the sun. “Your face gets all red when you talk to Daddy.”
Madison started moving toward the house. “It’s a little hot in this suit. I’d better go change.”
“I’ll bet some ice cream would cool you down,” Caleb said before she could get very far.
Brianna immediately jumped to her feet and clapped and danced. “I want some ice cream! Elizabeth wants ice cream, too!”
“I’ve got a yes from Brianna,” he said. “What about you?”
Madison didn’t want to go out for ice cream. After her conversation with Danny, she didn’t want to go anywhere. Especially with her handsome renter. Letting another man into her life was like embracing a tornado. But she knew Caleb was trying to help her, so she made a conscious effort to let him. “Ice cream sounds good,” she said.
THREE HOURS LATER, Caleb sat at a table at a McDonald’s not far from Holly’s house in Alderwood Manor, a suburb between Whidbey Island and Seattle. He tapped his pen on his leg, waiting impatiently for Detective Gibbons to answer his call as Holly inched forward in line. He’d spent most of the afternoon with Madison and Brianna, but he hadn’t been able to get anything new out of Madison about her father or the murders. Even while they were having ice cream, she’d been too preoccupied by that phone call she’d received from her ex.
Caleb couldn’t blame her. From what he’d overheard, Danny Lieberman was an ass.
When Gibbons finally came to the phone, Caleb had to yank the receiver away from his ear before the loud, foulmouthed, twenty-year police veteran blasted out his eardrum.
“Trovato, what the hell are you doing calling me at home on a Saturday?”
Chuckling, Caleb leaned forward as Holly momentarily disappeared behind some hanging plants. When he’d ordered, she’d refused to eat, but he’d finally talked her into getting a hamburger and wanted to make sure she was still in line to order it. As soon as they finished a quick dinner, they were planning to canvass Susan’s neighborhood again, just in case they’d missed someone or something. They didn’t have a lot of other options. The private investigator was supposedly hard at work doing background checks on just about everyone who’d ever been associated with Susan, and the police were digging, too, searching for Susan’s car, but no one seemed to be finding anything.
“What, you only accept calls when it’s convenient, Gibbons?” he teased. “If I didn’t know you better, I’d say you’re in it strictly for the paycheck, man.”
“You don’t know what the hell you’re talking about, as usual,” he grumbled, but the old affection was still there. Caleb could feel it beneath the surface of everything that was said. “What do you want?”
Caleb wadded up his hamburger wrapper and shoved it inside his empty cup. “I have some evidence that might connect the Sandpoint Strangler case to—”
“The Sandpoint Strangler case!” he interrupted. “I have a woman who looks like Catherine Zeta Jones on her way over to fix me dinner, less than five minutes to clean up this dump, and you call me, acting like there’s some kind of emergency on a case that’s totally cold?”
Caleb had a hard time believing Gibbons could get a woman who even remotely resembled Catherine Zeta Jones to cook him dinner. Short, balding and a little on the heavy side, he had a blockish head with bulldog jowls. To make things worse, he had a disconcerting way of shouting almost everything he said. “Just listen to me for a second, Gibbons. I think there might be a connection between the Strangler case and the Susan Michaelson disappearance.”
“Don’t give me that, Trovato.”
“Susan Michaelson fits the profile. She’s small, she’s in the right age range and she was abducted from the same area.”
“That could just as easily be coincidence as anything else. Quit looking for something exciting to put in one of those damn books you’re writing these days.”
Holly moved forward in line. Dressed in a denim jacket with fake fur at the collar, she studied the lighted menu overhead as though she hadn’t seen it a million times. “I’m not working on a book right now. I’m trying to find Susan.”
“Then why are you calling me? I’m not assigned to the Michaelson case.”
“I think you should get yourself assigned to it, because I’m telling you there’s a connection.”
“Listen,” Gibbons responded. “I’d give my right nut to know how that bastard Purcell did what he did. But you know as well as I do that the Sandpoint Strangler is dead. So, if that’s all you’ve got, call me on Monday.”
The phone clicked and Gibbons was gone.
“Damn,” Caleb muttered, and dialed him again.
Gibbons answered on the first ring. “She just pulled up,” he complained. “What the hell is it this time?”
Caleb came right to the point. “I’ve got a picture of Susan the night she disappeared.”
His words were met with a few moments of silence, then, “How? Where?”
A doorbell rang in the background. While Gibbons let his lady friend into the house, Caleb explained how he and Holly had come across the photo.
“So Tuesday night’s the last time anyone saw her alive,” Gibbons said.
“Anyone we’ve found so far.”
“I want to see that picture.”
“I thought you were too busy with Catherine Zeta Jones to get involved in someone else’s case,” Caleb said. “It’s Saturday night, remember?”
“Kiss my ass, Trovato. I was heading back to the office in a couple of hours anyway.”
“There’s the hopeless workaholic I know and love.”
“Criminals don’t only work nine to five.”
“Well, I’ve got something that’ll get your attention. In the background of this picture, there’s an ’87 or ’88 Ford, blue, with a white camper shell. It’s identical to the one Purcell drove.”
Gibbons gave an audible sigh, hesitated as though weighing this information, then said, “That could be a coincidence, too.”
“Too many coincidences usually means there’s no coincidence,” Caleb said. “What’s this I hear about a woman who’s gone missing from Spokane?”
“That’s probably completely unrelated.”
“Holly says there was an article in the paper detailing the similarities. Some Rohypnol was found in her car, along with a piece of rope.”
“We haven’t even found her body yet. You’re a cop, for hell’s sake. Or you used to be,” he added. “Don’t start jumping to conclusions like everyone else. For all we know, that Spokane woman could be languishing on a beach somewhere.”
“Or the Sandpoint Strangler is back in business.”
“I think the Sandpoint Strangler is dead.”
Caleb didn’t mention that at one point Gibbons had thought the janitor at Schwab Elementary was the strangler.
“I guess it’s possible that we’re dealing with a copycat,” Gibbons said. “Spokane’s not in our jurisdiction, but I’ll talk to Lieutenant Coughman and see if I can’t help out a little with the Michaelson case. I know the lead detective was expecting the preliminary findings on some of the hair and fiber evidence recovered from her apartment, but I haven’t heard anything yet.”
“You find out, and I’ll drop by in a few hours.” Caleb saw Holly making her way toward him with a child-size hamburger and the change from his twenty. “One more thing,” he said.
“What is it?”
“Would you do me a favor?”
“That depends on what it is.”
Caleb
pulled out the license plate number he’d written down last night. “I need you to run a plate.”
“Why?”
“Just covering a few bases.”
“I’ve gotta have a better reason than that, Trovato. You’re not on the payroll anymore.”
“I saw Johnny Purcell last night. He was in an old Buick Skylark with this plate.”
Another long silence. Finally, Gibbons muttered, “What the hell. This is probably a waste, but…get me something to write with, will you, Kitten?”
“Kitten?” Caleb repeated.
“Go f—” Catching himself, probably for the lady’s benefit, Gibbons lowered his voice. “Screw you,” he said. Then he took down the plate number and hung up.
WHY, AFTER DRAGGING HER feet at every mention of moving, did her mother want to sell the house now?
Madison paced the floor of her living room, with the movie Chocolat on her DVD player, wondering what she should do. She felt a headache coming on, was exhausted from her busy day and her lack of sleep the night before, but she couldn’t let herself rest. Neither could she concentrate on the movie. She had to make a decision about that box before her mother’s neighbor started clearing out the crawl space.
House for sale…Nightmare in the making…
Madison rubbed her temples, hoping to ward off her headache. Her mother’s neighborhood was a mixed bag of brick, wood and stucco homes, the timeless and well-maintained next to the old and dilapidated. But it was close to the university, had appealing narrow streets, rows of tall shady trees and, like the ivy-covered, redbrick buildings of the campus, gave the impression of traditional values and old money. Her mother’s place should sell right away—except for the fact that it was the home of an alleged murderer and the location of a suicide. That would draw more curiosity seekers and ghouls than serious buyers.
The telephone rang, startling her. Snatching up the receiver so the sound wouldn’t wake Brianna, she murmured a soft “Hello?” She’d expected it to be Danny again. Brianna had called him before bed to tell him about the praying mantis. Caleb was letting her keep it in her room until Monday, when she planned to take it to school to show the class.
