Doberman pinschers are among the most graceful dogs in the world. Strong muscular dogs with wide chests, a running Doberman is a picture of fluid movement that is pure joy to watch. But a Doberman leaping to attack you is awesome and terrifying.
Reggie and I had both been traumatized. It had sent me into attack mode, and I figured Reggie might be ready to attack somebody too.
Before I opened the door, I talked to him a little bit. “Hey, Reggie, it’s your friend Dixie. I heard you barking and I thought I’d come see what was up. Okay? Stop barking now, and I’ll open the door and let you out. Okay?”
He stopped barking, but continued to whine and scratch at the door.
I said, “That’s a good boy. Good boy, Reggie. You’re a good boy.”
I sent him pictures while I talked, pictures of the door opening and him trotting into the kitchen and wagging his docked tail. Pictures of me giving him a big bowl of fresh cool water. Pictures of me stroking his neck while he stood calmly grinning at me.
I put my hand on the doorknob. I said, “Okay, now, I’m opening the door. That’s a good boy, Reggie.”
The door opened inward, so I had to push it against him until he got the idea and slipped aside and through the opening. He wasn’t wagging his tail or grinning. Instead, he galloped through the kitchen and disappeared, his toenails clicking on the tile floor as he ran toward the back of the house. There was a desperate urgency in the way he ran that made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up.
19
Suddenly frightened, I ran after Reggie. He made straight for the master bedroom, shoved a partially closed door open with his shoulders, and stopped short with his head turned toward the bed. An icy premonition made me come to a skidding halt behind him. He made a shrill sound so pathetic that my skin crawled, a whimper almost human in its sadness.
Horror was sending slithery tendrils up my spine. I argued with it. Maybe Stevie was asleep. Maybe she was such a sound sleeper that she hadn’t heard the bell. Maybe she couldn’t hear me in the hall.
I called, “Stevie, it’s Dixie Hemingway. Are you in there?”
Reggie looked over his shoulder and made that sound again, and I yelled louder.
“Stevie? Stevie, it’s Dixie!”
I waited another second, then began a slow walk toward something I didn’t want to find. As I neared the bedroom door I could see the side of a king-sized bed with a floral bedspread pulled neatly under a matching pillow sham. That could mean Stevie had got up early, made the bed, and left the house with Reggie in the laundry room. That’s what my brain said, but my pounding heart told me it wasn’t true.
The odor hit me, and I stopped. Violent death has a unique odor impossible to describe. The combined scent of terror and decomposing flesh. Of expelled body wastes and shock. Once you’ve smelled it, you recognize it immediately.
I leaned forward, craning my head to try for an entire view of the room. Stevie lay on the bed with her legs dangling off the end. She was naked, her hands folded over a black-and-white photograph laid on her pubic area like a woman caught nude and modestly covering herself. Her skin was blue-gray, and her engorged tongue protruded dark blue like her swollen lips.
Backing away, I made a guttural whimper low in my throat, then turned and ran down the hall and out the front door. In the driveway, I pulled my cell phone out of my pocket and dialed 911.
When the dispatcher answered, my voice was surprisingly calm. I gave her the address and said, “The woman in the house is dead. It looks like a murder.”
“How do you know she’s dead, ma’am?”
“I’m an ex-deputy. I know a dead body when I see one.”
“Somebody will be right there, ma’am—”
Before she had a chance to say anything else, I clicked her off. A sudden burst of fury made me slam my hand against the hood of the car. Adrenaline hit me, and I stiffened my legs and pushed my back against the side of the Bronco and shook. Violent death is so obscene, so ugly, so outside the way a life should end that it seems to disarrange the natural order of the entire universe. Every human being is diminished by one violent death, no matter how far away it happens. Even distant planets probably feel the hurtful energy coming from a brutal murder and wobble in their courses.
When I could move, I walked to the deputy’s open window and shook his shoulder. He snapped his mouth shut and jerked upright, sweaty and embarrassed.
I said, “The woman inside is dead. I’ve called nine-one-one, and somebody will be here in a minute.”
He gaped at me like a hooked fish. I felt sorry for him. He had just blown any hope of a bright career with the sheriff’s department.
I went to my Bronco and sat sideways on the passenger seat and called Guidry’s private line. When I told him I’d found Stevie dead, he barked, “Where’s the deputy following you?”
“He’s here. He’s waiting.”
“Son-of-a-bitch!”
He clicked off, and a green-and-white patrol car pulled into the driveway behind the tail. The deputy who got out was a woman. Somehow I was glad it wouldn’t be a man who first saw Stevie sprawled naked on her bed.
I said, “She’s in the bedroom at the end of the hall, but her Doberman pinscher is in there with her. I’d better get him before you go in. He’s so upset he might attack a stranger.”
The deputy stood aside while I got a cotton loop leash from the back of my Bronco. I went back inside Stevie’s house, walking down the hall toward the bedroom again. Reggie had lain down on the bedroom floor, and when he heard my footsteps he raised his head and looked hopefully at me.
Without looking at Stevie, I knelt beside him and stroked his satiny neck.
“I’m sorry, Reggie, there’s nothing I can do. We have to go now and let other people come in.”
I slipped the leash over his neck and put my arm under his forequarters to lift him to his feet. Docile now, he let me lead him through the house to the breezeway. I slipped the leash off, gave him fresh water and petted him some more, and left him there with a promise to come back later.
When I went out the front door, Guidry had arrived and was slicing, dicing, and mincing the deputy assigned to follow me. The other deputy was standing off looking at the sky and pretending not to hear.
I said, “The dog’s in the breezeway; you can go in. Turn left at the first hall and go straight back.”
Guidry and the second deputy walked through the open front door together. As they disappeared inside the house, I imagined them making that same walk down the hall as I’d made and seeing Stevie splayed on the bed as I’d seen her.
They were back in two or three minutes, Guidry talking on his phone as he came. His face was unreadable as he hooked the phone on his belt and stood in front of me. A muscle worked at his jaw, but otherwise he looked calm. I don’t know how I looked, but every cell in my body was going off like popcorn.
I raised my hand to push back hair that had come loose from my ponytail, and was surprised to see that my hand wasn’t shaking. A year ago, finding a baby bird fallen from its nest had been enough to make me come totally undone. Maybe the pendulum had swung too far the other way and now I’d lost the ability to feel.
Guidry said, “Okay, tell me.”
“I heard Reggie barking and knew something was wrong.”
His eyebrow went up, and I felt rising anger.
“Don’t give me that look, Guidry. I knew something was wrong because of the way he was barking. I checked the carport and saw that Stevie’s car was here. I thought she must have left with somebody else and unintentionally left Reggie shut up, so I used my key and went in to let him out and give him water. He was shut up in the laundry room. When I opened the door, he ran to the bedroom and I followed him and found Stevie.”
“You used the security code?”
“It wasn’t activated, but I have the security code.”
“She had hired you to take care of the dog?”
“I’ve been here every day
since Conrad was killed. Pets get forgotten when there’s a death in the family.”
Okay, so I was stretching it a little. I just didn’t want to open the issue of whether I’d had the right to go in. Guidry gave me a searching look and sighed. Evidently he didn’t want to open the issue either, especially since the only witness had been a deputy asleep on the job.
More cars began arriving, all the professionals who deal in violent death and its aftermath. Yellow crime-scene tape was stretched across the front door, a contamination sheet was posted for anybody entering or leaving the house to sign, and forensic technicians streamed past to measure and photograph and analyze. Media vans weren’t here yet, but it wouldn’t be long before they came.
I said, “Can I go home now?”
The muscle worked in Guidry’s jaw again. “Anybody there?”
“Michael and Paco were both there the last time I checked.”
“Check again and make sure.”
I pulled out my cell phone and called Paco. I wasn’t up to talking to Michael yet. My phone still needed charging. As soon as I got time, when I wasn’t running from murderers or snakes, I would plug it in.
When Paco answered, I said, “Is it okay if I come home?”
“Why wouldn’t it be?”
“Just making sure somebody’s there.”
“We’re both here.”
“Okay.”
I put the phone back in my pocket and surveyed the cars parked behind me.
Guidry said, “I’ll get them to move.”
I’d never see him so cooperative. In no time, all the cars blocking the driveway had been pulled into the street, where they idled while I backed out. I didn’t wave good-bye to anybody, just hauled ass out of there. I didn’t start crying until I was on Midnight Pass Road. By the time I got home, I was cried out.
Three panel trucks were parked next to the carport, all with logos having to do with security or crime-scene cleaning. Paco was leaning against the back wall in the carport with his arms crossed over his chest, obviously waiting for me. He didn’t say anything, just walked with me to the stairs leading to my apartment. Michael was up on the porch with two men who were doing something to my metal hurricane shutters.
I said, “What’s going on?”
“Michael’s having them install a remote so you can control the shutters from the outside. It’ll work like a garage door remote.”
“Cool.”
“They wanted to put bars on your kitchen window, but Michael doesn’t like the idea. He wants you to be able to get out quickly in case of a fire.”
My mind veered crazily away from a scene of a firebomb lobbed through my kitchen window.
Paco said, “What’s wrong?”
I tilted my head on his chest, and he patted my shoulder.
“Dixie?”
“Stevie Ferrelli has been murdered. I found her body.”
“Oh, shit.”
“Yeah.”
“We’re going to get through this, you and me and Michael. It’ll be okay, Dixie.”
“I know. I’m just a little shaken up.”
Paco steered me to the deck and lowered me to a cushioned chaise in the shade of a giant oak. He said, “I think they’re about through upstairs. I’ll get rid of them, and then we can all talk.”
Suddenly overcome with great weariness, I closed my eyes. In seconds, I was asleep, the sound of men’s voices and seagulls’ squawks and birdsong and the sighing surf all forming a blessed current to sweep me away from everything that had happened.
When I woke up, I lay with my eyes closed for a while and took stock of myself. So far as I could tell, I was sane. I wasn’t running amok or anything, and I wasn’t in a fetal position with my thumb in my mouth. Considering that three years ago I’d been more or less in a fugue state, and considering that in the last three days I’d found two murdered people, been chased by a killer truck, and had poisonous snakes put in my apartment, I thought my present sanity was a huge step forward.
Except for squawking gulls and the swishing slap of the surf, everything was quiet. I opened my eyes partway and looked up at my porch. Nobody was there, and my storm shutters were firmly closed. With my eyes partially open like this, I could see heat waves rising from the baked ground between my apartment and the deck. I turned my head and opened my eyes all the way to look around the shaded deck. Michael was floating in the pool beyond the deck, laid out like a walrus on an inflated raft. His eyes were closed, but every now and then he flapped his hands in the water, so I knew he was awake.
I got up and jumped feet first into the pool, sinking like a rock into the cool water. I frog-kicked under Michael’s raft and popped my streaming head up next to his. We looked somberly at one another for a moment, assessing each other as only two people who’ve been together for a lifetime can.
I said, “Hey.”
“Hey yourself. You okay?”
“I think I am, actually.”
“Your apartment is clean as an operating room. The crime-scene cleanup guys went over every inch: drains, cracks, pipes, the works. Paco and I took everything out of your drawers and cupboards. We put in new shelf liners. We went through your closet and washed everything washable. You need new underwear.”
I said, “Thanks, hon.” But I knew him too well. There was something he wasn’t telling me.
He tried to sit up on the raft and turned the thing over, churning up a tidal wave getting himself erect.
Cautiously, as if he were afraid he might push me over the edge, he said, “About that floor safe—”
“I know what you’re going to say. I’ll get a safe-deposit box.”
“Did you have a newspaper clipping in the safe?”
The water seemed suddenly cold, and I shivered. “Just Gram’s ring and my will.”
“You remember the—ah, incident at the funeral? With that freak reporter? I don’t know if you ever saw it, but the picture of your reaction made some newspapers.”
“Oh, my God.”
Terror curled in my stomach as I realized what Michael was talking about. It had happened as I left Todd and Christy’s funeral. A mob had been outside, some to show sympathy, some to wave placards demanding the death penalty for the old man responsible for the accident, some to get a story. Still stunned by the enormity of loss, I’d let Michael and Paco push a path through the throng. A TV reporter had suddenly jumped in front of me and shoved a microphone in my face.
With a vapid red smile, she chirped, “What’s it like to lose your husband and child at the same time?”
That’s when I’d lost it. That’s when all the rage I’d been holding came out. Pure and simple, I’d wanted to kill the stupid bitch. I let out a howl of pure hatred and lunged for her throat. Every camera present caught the moment. The scene played on TV news shows all over the country. Every newspaper in Florida had it on their front page. It even made The New York Times. I hadn’t kept a copy, but the photograph was indelibly printed in my memory: my face contorted in primitive fury, my hands reaching for the frightened woman’s jugular, while Michael and Paco grabbed for my arms, their faces registering shock and pain and compassion.
Somebody had known enough about me to leave a photograph that would recall an excruciatingly painful moment in my life.
Michael was watching me closely, probably remembering the moment outside the funeral with as much pain as it caused me.
He said, “Paco called Guidry, and he came and got it.”
“Guidry was here?”
“Yeah. We didn’t want to wake you.”
Well, that was just too fucking great. Impeccable Guidry had been there while I slept. While I’d been laid out all scraped and sweaty and cat-hairy, he’d stood in his sophisticated linen and watched me drool while I slept. And he had the picture showing me going bonkers in front of the entire world.
I pulled myself through the water and climbed out of the pool. “You say my shower is clean?”
“Spotless. They pou
red stuff down the drain that would kill anything. The new remote for your storm door is on the table.”
I squished across the deck, water pouring off my clothes and sloshing out of my Keds, and got the remote. As I crossed to the stairs to my apartment, I could feel Michael watching me from the pool, no doubt wondering if I was going to crack up in the shower.
20
The remote control sent my storm shutters folding into a slim line that disappeared in the cornice above the French doors. I wondered why I’d never had them set up so I could close them from the outside before. Inside, my apartment was so clean and shiny it amazed the eyes. It also had the peculiar ozone odor left by crime-scene cleanup.
I went into my fumigated and sterilized bathroom and took a long shower, then padded wearily down the hall wrapped in a towel. In my office-closet, where my shorts and Ts had all been washed, dried, folded, and stacked on the shelves with military precision, the message light was blinking on the answering machine.
One call was from clients who had planned to return tomorrow but had changed their plans and were staying over the weekend. I took their number to call and confirm. One was a hard-voiced man wanting to know my rates and grinching that I didn’t have a Web site with my rates posted. I didn’t take his number. I don’t want a Web site. I don’t even want a computer. I can’t type worth shit, and I’m so technologically retarded that I forget to charge my cell phone. I sure as heck wouldn’t be able to handle a Web site.
The third was Birdlegs Stephenson. “Dixie, I asked around about that truck and I have a name for you to check out. But you didn’t hear it from me, okay? Two different people said look into a guy named Gabe Marks. Has a little place in the country near the Myakka River. From what they said, he’s one mean sumbitch, not somebody you should tangle with by yourself. Like I said, if you talk to the cops about him, you didn’t get his name from me.”
I sat with my pen poised over my notepad staring at the machine. I’d never heard of anybody named Gabe Marks. Whoever he was, Gabe Marks had no reason to want me dead. Unless somebody had hired him to kill me.
Duplicity Dogged the Dachshund Page 16
