The Corpse with the Ruby Lips

by Cathy Ace

  “How do you know it’s hers?”

  Bud pushed it under John’s nose. “Smell it. That’s Cait Juice—Coco Chanel. Her perfume.”

  John sagged. “That might not all be her blood. In the glove? Probably. On the ground? Maybe not.”

  Bud’s jaw tightened as he regarded his friend, who was no more than a silhouette in the headlamps. “She was on this road, and here’s this glove. I’m not dumb, John. Chances are that blood is hers. Question is—is she dead, or alive? And, either way, where is she?”

  “Let’s see if there’s anything else around here that can help. Tracks, marks of any sort, some indication of the type of incident we’re talking about.”

  “Right. We’ll use the headlights and work a grid.”

  An hour later the two men were inside the car, heading toward Budapest. The evidence they’d seen had puzzled and worried them both. Three bodies had been dragged through the snow a little way, then lifted into what looked like two different vehicles, both with wide-tread tires. Cait had been on the scene. Bud was keenly aware he’d found her glove near the area with the most blood.

  Photographs of the tire treads had been sent to John’s team for analysis, and the report had come in that a full sweep of Cait’s apartment had revealed no listening devices or bugs of any sort. The tech team also confirmed her computer appeared to not be infected with any spyware at all.

  “I wonder how whoever left that message in her bathroom knew what you two had been saying to each other in her apartment on Skype, Bud. Any ideas?” asked John as he drove through the darkness, the lights of the city now in sight.

  Sitting next to him Bud shook his head. “None. Maybe they went back into the apartment and cleaned up after themselves?”

  “My guys said if they did, they were the best in the business at doing it, because they hadn’t left a single trace of having been there. Place was clean as a whistle.”

  Bud snorted. “Don’t tell me they said the place was tidy. Because if it was, then someone other than Cait has certainly been there. She goes for organized chaos. She’ll remember where everything is, so she doesn’t need to have it sorted out.”

  “Heck of a thing, that memory of hers.”

  Bud was deep in thought. “I wonder if they’ve contacted all the hospitals yet.”

  “They’ll call when they have.”

  “Yeah, I know. Look, if she’s not at her place, like your guys said, why don’t we try the Takács/Seszták house in town instead? The girl, Zsófia, or the Örsi couple might know something, if they’re still there.”

  “Okay. Let’s try that. Tell the office we’re going there. Don’t want them to lose track of us. And get me the address from the file will you? I know the street, but can’t recall the number.”

  Speaking About the Dead

  THE SMALL DOG BARKED FURIOUSLY as Bud Anderson introduced himself to the short, round woman wearing a cook’s apron holding open the impressive door. With the greatest reluctance she finally allowed the two men to enter. Insistent they not leave the spot they were occupying on the mat inside the door, she ran up the soaring staircase, throwing suspicious glances in their direction as she went.

  A few minutes later a tall, slender woman with sleek, dark hair, pale skin, and puffy eyes appeared at the head of the staircase.

  “You’re Cait’s husband?” she called. Her voice echoed in the marble entryway, making her sound disdainful, if not disbelieving.

  “Yes,” replied Bud, daring to leave his designated place and move toward the foot of the stairs. “My friend John has kindly brought me here this evening. I can’t seem to find Cait anywhere, you see, and I wondered if she might be visiting you. I understand there’s been a family emergency, so I thought maybe she’d popped by to help out?”

  Resting on the bannister, the women looked puzzled. “My brother killed himself last night. That’s not the sort of thing you let strangers get involved with.”

  Bud took this revelation as his cue to make his way up the stairs, to offer a heartfelt handshake. “Mrs. Takács—it is Mrs. Takács, isn’t it?—I’m sorry for your loss. What happened?”

  The woman looked him up and down, her arm slipping, her gaze wandering. “Overdose. They pumped his stomach, but they couldn’t save him.” Her arm slithered off the bannister. Bud reached out to catch her before she tumbled, his eyes not registering any surprise when he was close enough to smell her breath.

  “Can I help you upstairs? John, maybe a hand?”

  Alexa’s dark eyes peered at him from within pink folds of flesh. “Thanks. Appreciate it. Come meet the family.” Her voice carried no emotion.

  Bud and John helped the unsteady woman across a wide carpeted landing into a brightly lit salon-lounge where the décor was sumptuous.

  “It’s Cait’s husband, everyone. Come to find his wife.”

  “Come, sit, Alexa. You are exhausted,” said a small elderly woman who stood with surprising alacrity and helped the reeling Alexa into an armchair.

  “Drunk as a skunk, more like,” whispered John into Bud’s ear as the two men smiled politely and introduced themselves to the family group.

  A young woman with unkempt red hair and a blotchy face stood. “I’m Zsófia Takács. Cait stayed with me at my great-aunt Klara and great-uncle Tamás’s house last night,” she waved toward the elderly woman, “but we had to rush here in the early hours. I feel terrible that we abandoned her, but it wasn’t her problem to deal with and—” Zsófia blushed, “I couldn’t wake her at all. She was absolutely sound asleep.”

  “She can get that way. Sleeps like the dead sometimes,” said Bud, his voice wavering with his final words.

  Zsófia smiled weakly. “I tried to phone her to tell her I couldn’t leave Mama and that I needed to stay to help with the police, and the ambulance, and so forth, but she didn’t answer. She phoned you last evening—oh! I thought you were in Canada. You’re not due until Saturday, are you?”

  Bud managed to make his voice sound almost cheerful. “I managed to get away sooner than I’d planned. I thought I’d surprise her, but it seems the surprise is on me. She did get a message through to my parents, though, and in it she said she was at your home.” He nodded at the elderly woman. “But John and I were there earlier, and the place was deserted. Has she, by any chance, gotten in touch with any of you? I’m getting kind of anxious about her whereabouts, what with the weather, you know.”

  “She’d have phoned for a cab, I’d have thought. That’s what I would do. She was due to give a lecture today, and I’m sure she must have managed to get there somehow. It’s really not that far. The people at the HUB should know where she is.” Zsófia’s face was puffy and her eyes raw. She made an effort to conjure up a smile.

  “She’s not at the university, or her apartment. This was the last place I could think of to check.” Bud managed to keep the panic from his voice.

  “This is a difficult time for my family,” said Alexa sharply. “We do not know where she is. It’s unfortunate, but not something we can help you with. My brother’s death has been a great shock to us all. We must grieve. Alone.”

  “Mama, stop,” said Zsófia softly. “Uncle Valentin’s beyond our help now. Cait’s not. She was trying to help this family, maybe now we can help her.”

  Bud’s shoulders straightened. “Is there anyone else you can think of she might turn to, Zsófia? Her cellphone isn’t doing anything other than going to voicemail, and I think it might be switched off. Is there anything you can tell me?”

  Zsófia sighed deeply. “I don’t think so.” She pulled at her lank, vivid hair. “I feel so bad about this. I should have made more of an effort to wake her. We should have brought her with us, but Mama needed us to get here fast, so . . .”

  “Don’t blame me,” slurred Alexa. “She’s none of my concern.”

  “Oh, Mama, please be kind. Cait was kind to us.” The girl’s voice was rough from crying. “She spent some time with Patrik Matyas, one of my other p
rofessors, but they weren’t really friendly. Maybe she’d turn to a colleague if she were in distress? But why wouldn’t she just go home to her apartment? It makes no sense unless—do you think something has happened to her?”

  “You mean an accident? On the road? In the snow?” asked Klara, her deep voice crackling with age and tiredness.

  “Yes, maybe an accident. I don’t suppose you’ve seen anything on the news today?” asked Bud sounding almost hopeful.

  “The news? The news?” wailed Alexa. “The only news in this house today is that my brother is dead. He tried to strangle my daughter a couple of days ago when he was having an episode, realized what he’d done, and, last night, took his own life. He’s gone. My brother is gone! He killed himself because of what he did to you.”

  “Mama, please,” cried Zsófia, her chest heaving with sobs.

  Bud strode toward the young woman and comforted her. “Hey, come on. It’s not like it was your fault. Cait told me what had happened with your uncle. He couldn’t help what he did. You know, maybe he realized what was ahead of him, and made a decision to not take that path. Nothing to do with you. So don’t carry this guilt with you through your life. It’s not yours to bear. I’m sure he wouldn’t have blamed you.”

  Alexa waved her arms, gaining everyone’s attention. “He didn’t blame her—oh no, left her the lot, didn’t he? Wrote his suicide note on the back of a codicil to his will, which he got his nurses to witness, if you please, swearing he was in control of his faculties when they did it. All the money from the final book, the sixth book, will be hers, that’s what he said. And after all I’ve done for him, all these years.”

  “Mama, you’re upset. Please don’t shout at me,” pleaded the woman’s daughter. “The manuscript for the last book is gone, it’s missing, so it doesn’t matter, Mama. The Bloodline Saga will never end—people can work out their own finale.”

  Alexa let out a whooping laugh as she struggled to her feet. “Gone? Has it gone?” She giggled like a naughty little girl, snorting as she laughed, and scampered unsteadily across the room to a large bookcase. “Where do you hide a book when you don’t want anyone to find it?” she said with a wicked grin. “Right where everyone can see it—among a load of other books.” She pushed her hand behind a collection of tall volumes and pulled out a thick wad of paper. “Ta-da!”

  Zsófia leapt to her feet. “Mama, you had it all the time? Why didn’t you say anything? I was looking for the manuscript when Uncle got mad with me. Why have you got it? What have you been doing with it?”

  Waving the manuscript above her head as though it were some sort of trophy, Alexa weaved her uncertain way back across the room. “What was I doing with it? Reading it, dear child. My ever-loving brother told us we were all in it, and that he would tell the truth about us all—so I wanted to see what he’d written. And do you know what? He did tell the truth. And that’s not right. There are some things in life from which I can still protect you, Zsófia. So this is where it’s going . . .” Twirling on the spot in front of the fireplace, Alexa swooped down and dumped the pages onto the roaring flames.

  Zsófia screamed, “Mama, no!” She tried to pull her mother away from the hearth, where pages were curling, singeing, and flying upward, ablaze. Alexa laughed throatily as she blocked her daughter’s flailing arms like like a football player protecting a quarterback. She was enjoying the game, and her daughter’s anguish.

  Klara was aghast, while Bud and John stood frozen, their faces conveying a mixture of uncertainty about trying to save the pages, and general impatience with the scene playing out before them. In moments the sheets of paper were no more than ash coating the crackling logs. A couple of pages had escaped the flames, and Zsófia, finally able to push her giggling mother aside, gathered them up, weeping.

  “His story will never be finished now, Mama,” she sobbed. “Why did you do that? I never thought you could be so cruel. All his work, gone. Like him. Oh, Mama.” She sat down on the floor, hard, the ragged sheets in her lap, her face in her hands.

  Bud moved to comfort Zsófia, and helped her to her feet.

  John pulled his ringing phone from his pocket. “Excuse me, I must take this.” He stepped away from his colleague, who was attempting to pacify the sobbing girl.

  John pushed his phone back into his coat. “Bud, we need to go. They’ve found Cait.”

  Bud’s face contorted with a mixture of joy and panic. “Is she . . . ?”

  “Alive. She’s at the Péterfy Sándor Hospital.”

  Bud’s head and shoulders dropped, his eyes closed. Before he spoke aloud, his lips moved silently for a moment. “Do you know what kind of shape she’s in?” His voice was quieter than the crackling of the fire.

  “Sorry, old chap. Unconscious is all I know. But I also know the hospital’s less than ten minutes away. Coming?”

  “I’d like to come too,” shouted Zsófia as the two men made for the door.

  Bud stopped and turned on his heel. “You’re welcome to come, Zsófia. But we need to go right now.”

  Zsófia didn’t hesitate; she grabbed her purse from the floor, stuffed the pages of the manuscript inside, and yelled over her shoulder as she ran to catch the men, “Sober up, Mama, for once. I’ll phone you to tell you what’s happening, Klara.”

  Dumb, But Lucky

  I COULDN’T MOVE. I COULDN’T SEE. The first thing I was aware of was Bud’s voice. Am I dead? Dreaming?

  “You’re safe, Wife.” The sweetest words I’ve ever heard. “Don’t try to move, and don’t try to talk. There’s a tube in your throat, a mask over your mouth. If you can hear me, try to move a finger.”

  I wiggled the fingers on my right hand.

  “Cait? Go on, try to move at least one finger if you can hear me. Either hand, I can see them both. Just let me know you can hear me.”

  This time I wiggled the fingers on both hands.

  “Maybe she’s still unconscious,” said a voice I wasn’t expecting to hear.

  John Silver? What was he doing here? Wherever “here” was. The last time I’d seen him, Bud and I had just handed him a case on a platter in Amsterdam. Am I in Amsterdam again?

  “Her readings tell us she is likely to be awake now.” Doctor? Nurse?

  “Do you think she can’t hear me then? Has her hearing been affected by the overdose?”

  I can hear you, Husband. What overdose? I began to flap my hands about until my wrists hurt.

  My body felt as though it was floating in jelly. I was comfortable, and so happy to know Bud was with me. I felt warm, and loved, but confused. A few moments later I could make out shapes, but I felt I was seeing the world about me through a voile curtain. Was that Zsófia Takács’s red hair? So I’m still in Budapest.

  “The lack of reaction is normal for an overdose of fentanyl, as is the difficulty with her breathing, and the seizures she’s suffered. We’ve been giving her doses of naloxone since she got here. The man who brought her in was able to show us exactly what she’d been injected with. He’s been distraught. If fact, he’s still here, outside, waiting. You must have passed him in the corridor. I have assured him he did all he could. Unfortunately, we couldn’t pump the fentanyl out of her system, because it was injected into her back. It would have helped a great deal if we could have given her the antidote sooner, but . . . We still can’t be sure of all the effects the seizures have had upon her nervous system.”

  I’ve been injected with fentanyl? That’s a painkiller. Is that why I don’t feel any pain?

  “So the ventilator is helping her breathe, I can see that,” said Bud urgently. “When do you think she’ll be able to breathe for herself?”

  I can’t breathe for myself?

  “I’m sorry, Mr. Anderson, I cannot say.”

  I could see Bud’s hand sliding up and down my face, but I couldn’t feel a thing. I don’t like this. This is scary.

  Moments later the doctor asked Bud if he would meet the man who’d brought me to the hospita
l, then I heard a voice I recognized. It was Tamás Örsi.

  I couldn’t hear everything that was said, all I caught was, “She kept changing direction. I was trying to shoot the wolf with a tranquilizer. I had already got one down, but there was another one. There usually is. She was running toward it. I don’t think she knew it was there. I feel very bad about this. I did not mean to hurt her. The fentanyl in the tranquilizer rifle is very dangerous, I know this. I also know I should have taken a dose of the antidote with me, but I could not find it when I left the house. It is supposed to be with the darts. I was called out when I was very tired. I know they have given me a younger man to help me, but he had taken a short break. We had been on the trail of the animals for a long time. It is very bad, all of this. Very bad. I am grateful the dart only scraped her. She was moving about so much, you see. I couldn’t help it. Honestly I couldn’t.” Tamás Örsi shot me? There was another wolf?

  I wanted to shout to Bud, “Keep him here. Don’t let him go, ask him about the wolf,” but I couldn’t speak, I was so tired.

  I have no idea how long it took me to close and open my eyes, but eventually I heard Bud whooping, “She blinked at me. John, you saw it, didn’t you? Cait? Cait—if you can hear me, blink again. Can you do it twice?”

  I knew I’d managed it when I saw Bud and John shaking hands and patting each other on the back, which is all I’d ever seen them do, even though I knew they’d been through some tough times together, and thought the world of each other. It appeared I’d made some sort of breakthrough, and I allowed myself to feel pleased about it. But it seemed blinking was exhausting, and I decided I’d just close my eyes for five minutes to recover.

  I woke from what must have been forty winks to hear Bud talk with the boring old doctor, who, it turned out, looked much younger than he sounded.