Red Blooded Murder

by Laura Caldwell

  “They’re by the register, aren’t they? Let me look.” I scurried past her before she could say anything, rushed to the register and bent down, dropping the keys from underneath my arm. I stood back up. “Here they are!” I said.

  A customer came to the register, and I rang up her purchases, trying to breathe, trying not to move too fast, trying to squeeze my breasts together to hold the thong box in place. Never had a greater pectoral exercise been performed.

  Josie came up behind me. “Where were they?” she said when the customer was gone. She picked up the keys that I’d placed by the register.

  “On the floor.”

  “How would they have gotten on the floor?” Her tone was now cold, cool. It was much more nerve-racking than her irritated voice.

  “I don’t know.” I peered through the front window again. The Midwest Gas truck was still there.

  The customer left the store, and suddenly there was a lull. Josie and I were alone. I moved around the register, trying to act nonchalant, straightening some robes that had slipped from their hangers.

  Meanwhile, Josie watched me. Just watched me. Had she heard what the women had been saying, that I looked like the newscaster accused of killing Jane? Did she know I was the newscaster accused of killing Jane? Or was she staring at me because of the key incident?

  “Lexi, I’d like to talk to you,” I heard her say.

  I turned, nodded as casually as possible.

  “Please come here.”

  I walked to the register, trying to make my face bored. But the damn thong box started to slip. I clenched the muscles of my neck and chest, trying to hold it in place.

  “I don’t trust you.” She said it like that, no lead-in, no explanation. Just laid it out.

  “Uh…why?” Because I just stole one of your thongs and I’m holding it between my boobs?

  “I’m not sure.” Her eyes searched my face. “I’m not sure what we should do about you.”

  It was that word-we-that scared me. Did she mean her and “Steve”? Or was she just using the royal “we”?

  Josie and I stood there, just the two of us in the store, her gaze unflinching. Outside, I could hear cars streaming by, then occasional laughter from people walking past. But inside the store, it was silent. Meanwhile, I was starting to sweat, and the thong box slid lower.

  Josie glanced at my chest, frowned deeper.

  I tried to give a breezy smile, but with the energy I was exerting to hold the box, I’m sure it came out like a grimace.

  “What are you doing?” She glanced up and down my body.

  The sweating continued; the box slithered lower. Any minute now, it was going to fall, right onto the floor.

  I let myself grimace again. “I’m not feeling so good. I need to use the restroom again.”

  Before Josie could respond, I headed toward the back, putting a hand on my chest as soon as I passed her. When I got to the back, I ran to grab my purse and stuffed the box inside.

  “Lexi!” I heard her call, and once again I heard the snap, snap of her heels.

  I stood, frozen for a second.

  “Lexi!” I heard again. She stepped into the back room and glared.

  “My stomach feels awful,” I said. “Something is wrong with me.” I put a hand on my stomach. “Sorry.”

  She stared at me suspiciously. She took a step toward me, then another.

  Suddenly, there was a pounding at the back door. We both jumped a little.

  Josie marched past me and opened it. “Hey, Steve,” she said in a distracted tone.

  But Steve didn’t look too distracted. In fact, he was looking right at me, his bearded face twisted not so much into a leer this time, but a hard, pensive expression, as if he was trying to remember something. He ran a hand through his oily black hair. I got a flash of that night in the alley-the brutal crack on the side of my helmet, falling into the garage, a massive shove from behind, blood trickling from my knees. Had he told her about the prowler in the helmet the other night or did they not have that kind of relationship?

  Steve held out a box to Josie, although his eyes didn’t leave mine.

  Blast, it was more pearl thongs. Which meant Josie was about to get that stool, unlock that box and see that one was missing.

  Josie took the box from him, moving away and mumbling thanks.

  Steve stood there, grimacing at me now, some kind of intensity lighting his eyes.

  My stomach started to churn then. I really did feel sick.

  Josie stopped, looked at him. “Okay, thanks, Steve,” she said, obviously trying to get him to leave.

  But he didn’t budge. Instead, he stood, and he stared, and his eyes narrowed further.

  My heart rate tripled. I was trapped. Josie was blocking the door to the store. Steve stood in front of the door to the alley.

  I glanced behind me. It was time to bolt, but neither of them moved. Josie glanced at Steve, then at me, as if she was trying to figure out what was going on. Steve remained still.

  The front door trilled as someone opened it.

  We all looked toward the sound.

  “Hello?” I heard a male voice say. I knew that voice.

  “Hello?” the man said again.

  Mayburn. Thank you, thank you. He must have been watching. He must have sensed I was in trouble.

  “I’m looking for a present for my girlfriend?” he called.

  Josie huffed, then shook her head. “Get out there and help him,” she said tersely to me.

  She didn’t have to tell me twice. “Sure, sure.” Holding my purse, I dashed into the front room.

  The sunlight from the front window hit me in the face.

  Mayburn stood, hand holding open the front door. “Did you get it?” he mouthed.

  I nodded fast and walked right toward him. “Go!”

  Outside, we rushed across the street. Mayburn yanked open the driver’s door of the van and gestured with a hurried hand toward the other side.

  “Wait,” I said. “What about my scooter?”

  “We’ll come back for it,” Mayburn said. “Get in!”

  73

  M y phone kept ringing as Mayburn and I drove through Lincoln Park. I ignored it, instead telling him the whole story and handing over the black thong.

  Finally, I looked at the phone as Mayburn stopped at a light at Armitage and Sheffield. It was Maggie. She’d called four times.

  I didn’t have to fake a stomach illness now. I felt my insides diving and twisting. Was there some news from Vaughn, some rumor on TV, the declaration of Izzy McNeil as official suspect?

  I called her back. “It’s me.” I waited for the worst.

  I heard Maggie sniffle. Bad sign. It must be truly awful. Maggie never cried about work. But then again, it was hard to represent your best friend in a murder investigation.

  “Mags, what is it?” I watched a group of high school guys come out of the 7-Eleven, glugging Slurpees and smacking each other around. I had never wanted to be a seventeen-year-old, Slurpee-glugging guy until that moment.

  More sniffling. “It’s Wyatt.”

  I hate to say it, but I felt relief. “What did he do?”

  “You mean who did he do?”

  “Oh, no.”

  “Oh, yeah. Where are you?”

  “Armitage and Sheffield.”

  “By the Twisted Lizard?”

  I glanced across the street and saw the underground Mexican place. “Yeah.”

  “Perfect. I need a dark bar and something with a lot of tequila. Can you meet me there?”

  “Of course.” I gestured for Mayburn to pull over and told Maggie I’d be waiting.

  Mayburn drew over to the curb and opened the black thong box. Using a pen, he lifted it, grinning.

  “What is it? Why do you look so happy?” I asked.

  “Are you kidding? Eighty-five percent of my job usually involves surveillance. I sit for hours in a fricking car outside a fricking apartment building with a fricking camera
pointed at the front door. This-” he raised the thong higher “-is the highlight of my week.”

  “Men are so weird. I wouldn’t be getting all excited if you gave me a pair of boxers.”

  He held the thong toward me. “This is not the same thing as boxers. This is something different.”

  I remembered putting my thong on, sharing it with Theo. “Good point.”

  “Anyway,” Mayburn said, “I’ll drop this off at the lab. And I’ll get your scooter. Either I’ll have someone help me get it in the van or we’ll drive it for you. Give me the keys.”

  I handed them over. For some reason, I didn’t want to leave the van, which seemed like a little container of quasi-normalcy. Joking with Mayburn about thongs was as far away from a murder investigation as I could get.

  “What are you doing the rest of the day?” I asked Mayburn.

  “I have to meet Lucy at her kid’s soccer game in ten minutes.”

  “Wow. The soccer games now, huh?”

  “Shut it.”

  “I’m happy for you,” I said.

  “Don’t get all sentimental.”

  I opened the door. “See ya.”

  Fifteen minutes later, Maggie was tiptoeing down the stairs of the Twisted Lizard into the dimly lit bar. She wore dark jeans cuffed at the bottom, her little feet in pink loafers. Her golden hair was a mess, as was her face.

  I hugged her, then grabbed a napkin from the bar and wiped the mascara from under her eyes. “What do you want to drink?”

  Maggie ordered a margarita. “On the rocks. With double tequila.”

  “What happened?” I said when her drink was delivered.

  “It was just like last time.” She sniffled, started to cry. “I mean, you told me it would be the same thing. You told me.”

  “I was just guessing. And hey, he looked devoted to you the other night at my mom’s house.”

  “Yeah, exactly. He looked devoted. And he acted devoted to me at his house after dinner. It was amazing. I was actually thinking we might get engaged this summer.”

  “Really?”

  “Yeah, and then…” She trailed off, gulped her drink, and glanced at me. “Why aren’t you drinking?”

  “Didn’t sleep well last night.”

  “Yeah, I’m sure.” More sniffling. “But you have to drink with me!”

  She began to cry, so I quickly waved at the bartender and ordered a Corona.

  “Okay, Mags,” I said. “What happened?”

  “Like I said, same thing. I mean, almost exactly the same thing. We went out last night. Had an amazing time. Today, I left around noon to work on your case. I wanted to do some research about the term ‘person of interest’ and how often those persons are converted to suspects.”

  At the thought, my stomach gripped.

  “When I got to the office, I worked for a while,” Maggie said, “and then I decided to work out. My gym bag was at his place, because I’ve been staying there so much. I knew he didn’t have anything going on today, so I just dodged over there.”

  “Don’t tell me.”

  “Yep. He was with someone. I mean, they weren’t having sex. It wasn’t exactly like last time, but they were getting ready to go out to lunch. She was clearly picking him up for a lunch date, like no big deal, like I hadn’t been there just an hour before.” Her face crumpled and more tears streamed down her face.

  “Well, maybe it was a friend of his. I mean, did you stop to ask who it was or did you just storm out?”

  “I didn’t have to ask!” Her voice rose. “This was the woman he dated last year, the woman who broke his heart. I knew because of the pictures that are still around his house. And when I came in, you should have seen his face. It said everything. When I took him outside and asked, ‘Is this what it seems?’ he said, ‘Yes.’ Just like that. He said yes!”

  “What a total jerk.”

  This only made her cry more. “He’s not! He’s actually a good guy. He’s just not in love with me.”

  I pushed her drink away and turned her so that she was facing me. “Mags.”

  She searched my eyes. “I know. Don’t defend him. I know.” She sagged forward, crying.

  I held her, gesturing over her back at the bartender that we were fine, just a little crying jag. And honestly, it felt good to be the one propping someone else up for a change.

  When she was done, she wiped her eyes on her cocktail napkin and sucked down the rest of her drink. “What’s going on with you?”

  I looked at the festive colored lights above the bar. “Well, let’s see. Theo came back from Mexico.”

  Her face brightened. “Excellent! And will he tell the cops he was with you Friday night?”

  “We called and left Vaughn a message. Theo says he’ll explain.”

  “So why do you look miserable?”

  “Because I found out that he used to sleep with Jane.”

  “No fricking way.”

  “Yep. He flirted with me when we met to get back at her.” I shrugged.

  “Iz, I have to tell you no matter what his motivation was, this isn’t good.”

  “What do you mean?”

  She grimaced. Glanced down, then back at me. “Think of how this is going to look to the cops. After Jane died, you got Jane’s anchor chair and her ex-boyfriend.”

  74

  R eporters and cameramen littered my lawn. I felt immediate sympathy for my downstairs neighbors for putting up with this.

  Unfortunately, it looked like Bunny Loveland had put her media beatings on hold. I paid the cabbie, then pushed past them all, shoving blindly at those who surged around me. As I hurried toward the building, I kept my head down, ignoring the calls of “Izzy! Izzy!”, deliberately tuning out the questions, although snippets of them permeated my resolve-…kill Jane?…wanted her job?

  I fumbled at the door, trying to get my keys in the lock. I could feel the reporters behind me, could hear the whir of shooters with their video cameras, could hear the snapping of the photographers. I felt trapped there, in front of my door, my fingers groping to get the right key, reminding me of my struggle to get in that metal box only a few hours ago.

  Finally, I got the key in the lock, swung the door open, jumped inside. I slammed the door against the melee. Panting, I stood inside, letting the cool dark of the hallway wash over me. When I’d caught my breath, I started up the stairs.

  But something seemed wrong, felt awry. As if I wasn’t the only person in the stairwell. I froze, listening for any sounds. Nothing. Just my crazy imagination. I took slow steps, seeing nothing, hearing nothing. And yet I felt something.

  Calm down, I told myself. Calm down. I kept climbing, and my breath became short again, partly from the exertion and partly because my nerves were singing from the crush of reporters outside.

  I was about to turn the landing and go up the last flight of steps when I heard a man’s voice. “Izzy.”

  It came from above. It came from my place.

  I halted on the landing, a chill slinking into my bones. “Sam?”

  It didn’t sound like Sam but no one else had keys to my place. No response.

  “Tom? Bill?” I said, mentioning the names of my neighbors, even though the voice hadn’t sounded like either of them.

  Again, nothing.

  My heart started pounding harder in my chest.

  I headed back downstairs, my pulse tapping against my throat. But I stopped. I realized I would have to face the media again. I could understand for the first time why celebrities complained about press and paparazzi. I stood, unmoving, unable to decide what to do.

  Then that man’s voice again…“Izzy.” Then the pound, pound, pound of footsteps coming down the stairs, coming down from my condo. “Izzy?” I heard. The voice was familiar, but I could barely concentrate with the hammering of blood in my ears.

  Pound, pound, pound. The footsteps were coming closer.

  Press or no, I was getting out of there. I started running down the stairs. The
footsteps above me were coming faster now. I was being chased. I held on to the banister, went down as fast as I could, nearly tripping.

  “Izzy, stop!” I heard above me. “Where are you going?”

  I finally recognized the voice. I halted, turned.

  Theo. His face was twisted with irritation. He wore the same jeans, black T-shirt and army jacket that he’d had on yesterday. I had thought the outfit cute then, but now it seemed severe, militant. His long hair hung around his face, nearly hiding his features as he looked down at me.

  “How did you get in here?” I asked.

  “Well, I had to take the train back to the city yesterday. And then the cops picked me up, because I’d called them on the way. I spent the night with that guy Vaughn. The dude is a prick, but I told him everything. Told him we were together Friday night. After the police station, I went home, and I got something to show you, and I came right here.”

  “How did you get in here?” I demanded.

  He shrugged. “I saw all the press, so I waited near the door. I said I was your brother. Your neighbor or somebody left, and I caught the door. I came in and made sure those dudes-” he gestured with his chin toward the front of the building “-stayed out.”

  “And you’ve just been sitting in my stairwell? For how long?”

  He shrugged again. “A couple of hours.”

  I took one slow step back. Then another. He was freaking me out. I didn’t trust him anymore. I couldn’t believe I ever had. “I think you should leave. Right now.”

  “Jeez, girl, I just wanted to show you something.” His face grew more irritated, angry. It scared me to see him like that.

  “You know there are a mass of reporters right out that door?” But even I could hear that the threat was lame. He could get down the steps and grab me in a second.

  “I’m about to leave,” he said. “But I told you I have to show you something first.”

  Pound, pound, pound. He came down the steps, growing closer to me. My heart thumped even louder against my ribs.

  “Stop,” I said, holding up my hand. “Just stop. What do you want to show me?”