Innocent Prey (A Brown and de Luca Novel) (8 page)

“Of her?” He nodded, and I frowned. “I thought she was telling the truth.”

“About what?”

“About everything. I didn’t get a lie vibe from her once, and barely any emotions at all.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. When she mentioned her brothers there was warmth, and sadness, too, for the one she lost. When I asked her about Stephanie giving her a hard time, I think she was a lot more irritated than she admitted to. But I’d have done the same thing in her place. You don’t want to call a bitch a bitch if the bitch in question is in danger of turning up dead, right?”

“Right. Especially when you work for her father.”

“Right. And then when she said she was widowed. Little bit of an ‘I don’t want to talk about this’ vibe.”

“Right. Anything else?”

“She thinks you’re hot,” I told him.

“Oh, for crying out—”

“Seriously, babe. She was totally feeling the Brown magic.”

“That sounds like toilet humor.”

“Only to an eleven-year-old.”

“Josh will enjoy it, then.”

“Are we done yet, boss?” I asked. “I’ve got books to write, followed by a date with a detective.”

“I’m taking you home as we speak.”

“Good.” I took a deep breath, watched the trees go by for a while, then turned to him. “Something bad is happening to that girl, Mason. I think we have to convince her father to make it official.”

“I think we have to make it official whether we convince the judge or not,” he said.

* * *

Stevie didn’t know how she knew Venora was cutting, but she did. The cell was heavy with darkness and sleep. She’d been sleeping, and Lexus was snoring a little bit on the bunk above her. But there was that sound, soft as a fingertip dragging across paper. And in her mind she saw the sharp edge of a broken cot spring slicing across Venora’s skin and leaving a trail of ruby beads behind it.

“Venora, hey,” she whispered.

The sound stopped. Stevie thought she smelled blood, then decided that was impossible. You couldn’t smell blood. Could you?

“What?” Venora asked, almost defensive.

“Just...hey. That’s all. How are you doing? You okay?”

Venora didn’t reply. The silence drew out until Stevie rolled toward the wall and pulled her blanket over her shoulder, thinking the girl would never answer. And then she said, “I had a dream I was gonna die.”

Stevie sat up. It wasn’t entirely voluntary. “When?”

“Before the Asshole grabbed me. Before anything happened. I dreamed I was gonna die.”

Stevie shook her head, denying it automatically. “You know, some people say if you believe in that shit, you can make it come true.” That crock-of-shit writer de Luca that her mom and Loren kept pushing on her, for one. “So stop believing it. We’re gonna be fine. We’re gonna get out of here. All of us.”

“I don’t think so, Stevie.”

Stevie got out of the bed, pulling her blanket with her. She crossed the room and sat on the edge of the other girl’s cot. “Shove over.”

“What the hell?”

“Put the damn shiv down and shove your ass over, Venora.”

Venora moved over. Stevie lay down on the bunk beside her. She tucked her own blanket around her.

“What do you think you’re doin’, Stevie? You think you’re my mamma now, is that what this is?”

“I think you’re not gonna cut yourself anymore tonight, that’s what I think. Now get some sleep.”

Venora lay very still for a minute. Then she sighed and rolled onto her side, facing away from Stevie. But still touching.

5

M
ason put on his wedding suit, and made a mental note to invest in a new one. This one was getting old, and he needed something for Jeremy’s graduation, which was only seven weeks away now. Hard to believe.

He jumped behind the wheel of the black 1974 Monte Carlo he’d modified himself. Driving the Beast was one of life’s most cherished pleasures. He would never admit it to de Luca, but driving her T-Bird was a close second. It would be even better if she would let him get under the hood and tweak it a bit, but she wanted no part of that. What? Risk getting grease on the yellow paint just for a few extra horses and a sweet growl? No way.

He drove through the open gate and up to her lakefront home. Yep, driving this car was one of his favorite things to do. Being with Rachel was another, but he couldn’t really tell her that. She wanted to keep things light and easy. He did, too. Or had.

Now... Now it felt like it was time for a little bit more. Maybe. But if he said so, he might ruin what they already had, so he wasn’t going to say so. Rachel wasn’t exactly the shy-and-retiring type. If she wanted more, she would tell him. Until then, he’d just have to—

“Ho-lee crap.”

Rachel came out the front door, and started down the steps and toward his car. She was wearing a short, clingy black number with sexy lace sleeves and a pair of open-toed stilettos, the kind he had personally heard her refer to as “fuck-me shoes.”

He got out of the car and actually wobbled. When he finally finished devouring her from the feet up and met her eyes, she was smiling.

“Apparently you approve.”

“You look like a million bucks.”

She flashed him her trademark smile. “Yeah, I clean up okay.” She nodded at his suit. “Your wedding suit?”

“Yeah. I’ve worn the funeral suit to too many of these already.”

“Maybe it’s time for a new suit? You’re gonna need one for Jere’s graduation.”

“Stop reading my mind. And PS, I hate suits.”

“Reason number five thousand, three hundred and seventy-five not to take the chief’s job?”

“At least.” He went around the car and opened her door.

“Gee, I put on a dress and get treated like a lady. Go figure. If we come to a puddle, are you gonna throw your jacket over it for me?”

“If that’ll get me out of wearing it.”

She grinned at him as he took his spot behind the wheel and got them underway.

“You know,” he said, “now that you mention it, I should probably start planning a graduation party for Jeremy.”

When she didn’t reply he looked across the car and saw her staring at him wide-eyed. Then he started noticing little flecks of green hiding in her blue-sky irises—or at least it looked that way in the dashboard lights—and he forgot what they’d been talking about.

* * *

“You haven’t even
started
planning Jere’s party yet?” I said when I’d finally managed to stop gaping like a fish out of water. He was staring into my eyes in a weird way that tripped about twenty alarms in my brain and body, including the two labeled “uncomfortably close to mushy” and “horny.” I set them aside to go with “irritated at him for being such a typical male about some things.”

Not many things. There wasn’t a lot about Mason Brown I’d call
typical.
But in this...yeah. “I figured it was already all done,” I said, feeling the biggest “damn, why didn’t I bring this up?” moment ever. “You never mentioned it, so I assumed you and your mother had it covered. Jeez, Mason, you realize it’s in, like, six weeks, right?”

“Seven.”

“Seven weeks!”

“So? I buy some food, order a cake...”

“You need invitations. You need decorations. You need a location, for crying out loud. This is a big deal.”

He glanced my way, maybe a little alarmed. “A location? I thought the backyard would...”

“Backyards only count if they have something in them. Like a pool or a baseball diamond or a lake. Yours just has a barn. What the hell are they gonna do with a barn? Square-dance?”

“You think I still have enough time?”

“If I help. And Amy helps. And my sister, Sandra, helps. And the twins help. And we start tonight. Yeah, you have time.”

“What if you help, and we start tomorrow?”

I realized I was sounding a little psycho and reined it in. Then I made a face and sucked air through my teeth in an exaggerated manner. “I don’t know, man. Could be dicey.”

He nodded slowly, a little relieved, I think, to see me off my freak-out wagon. “Ordinarily we’d have thrown the party up north, at the lake house, but...”

He trailed off. He didn’t have to say the rest. I filled it in myself, in his voice.
But since my dead serial-killer brother used it as a dumping ground for his victims, it’s kind of lost its charm.
The house had been for sale since January. Not. One. Nibble. Too soon, I figured, since the dragging of the lake for bodies. Lots and lots of bodies.

“We can have it at my place,” I said. “It’s huge, and we have the reservoir right there. We can rent a pontoon boat, maybe even some of those paddleboats, too, and let the kids have at it. Of course, we’ll have to make sure someone’s watching at all times and probably breathalyze them first,” I said.

He frowned at me like I’d lapsed into Swahili.

“Mace, you know how graduation parties work, right? You remember?”

“I didn’t really have one.”

“What the fuck do you mean, you didn’t have one?” I bit my lip, held up a hand. “No. We’ll talk about that later. Right now I’ll remind you how they go. Each parent throws a party for his or her own kid, to which all the relatives come. Each kid spends an obligatory hour at his own party and then goes to another kid’s party. And then to another. And then to another. If they can cop a drink at each one, they’re buzzing by nightfall. It’s easy to do, because everyone has an Uncle Ken who thinks one drink on graduation day is harmless and well-deserved. After they’ve finished hitting all their friends’ parties, they retire to an isolated spot in the state forest, around the back side of the res, where there will be a fire pit, a mountain of junk food and a tapped keg, and they drink themselves into a state of oblivion and sleep right there in the woods.”

He had, I realized, stopped at a red light that had since turned green and was staring at me like my hair was on fire.

“What?”
I asked him. “Weren’t you ever eighteen, Mason?”

“I just... That’s not how I remember it.”

Having met his mother, I thought I understood. He’d probably led a sterile, pretentious “don’t get dirty” sort of a childhood. Poor Mason. No grad party? No tapped keg in the woods? Even I’d had that experience, and I was freakin’ blind. Man, it stunk on ice to be him.

“And that’s
definitely
not how it’s going down with my nephew,” he added.

“Oh.” I shrugged and bit back the stream of sarcasm itching to come out. When I could safely speak again, I said, “Okay then.”

“If he thinks for one minute that he’s going party hopping and drinking—”

“I know. I know.”

“It’s zero tolerance, Rache.”

“Got it. You want to drive the car now, Mace? The light’s gonna turn red all over again any second now.”

He looked at the light like he’d forgotten it was there and drove through as it turned from green to yellow. Then he went back to talking party. “Your house sounds good. And thanks for the offer. But no alcohol.”

“Not even for the grown-ups?” I asked, pouting and wishing I could take it all back. He was sweating over it now. I hadn’t meant to make him worry. But damn, the guy was living in a bubble where those boys were concerned. “Not even a secret stash, a tiny little one, for the adults?”

“I’ll buy you a round during cleanup if you’ll help me with this.”

“Make it a double. By then we’ll both need it,” I said, and knew it was true. What the hell had I gotten myself into?

* * *

We were only a half hour late, which, I assured my gallant date, was actually on time. I figure you get a ninety-minute grace period at fancy-ass gatherings of three or more hours in duration. No, it’s not an arbitrary number. It’s one of a whole series of opinions I’ve developed over time. I reached this particular conclusion by timing my arrivals at fancy-ass parties a bit later and a bit later until I hit the point where I felt the pissed-off reaction of the hostess. Just past 90 minutes. Hence my rule. You can get away with an hour and a half, not one minute more.

At any rate, we were only a half hour late, which is actually on time, as I’ve explained. We saw the crowd of beautifully dressed people milling around on a side patio and headed that way to join in. Judge Mattheson’s wife was already three sheets to the wind, which is actually drunk. It’s just a more polite term for it. Or at least a more descriptive one. As a writer, I appreciate such things.

Mrs. Mattheson was leaning heavily into her husband’s arm near the buffet table on the edge of the patio when Mason whispered, “That’s Judge Mattheson and his wife, Marianne,” and indicated them with his eyes.

“There you are!” Chief Subrinsky boomed from just inside the open French doors. He waved at us, so we meandered around the bodies spilling onto the patio and made our way into the house, which was stunning. The main room had a cathedral ceiling with a crystal chandelier bigger than any I’d ever seen. Not that I’d seen that many.

“I was starting to think you weren’t going to make it,” Chief Sub said, then turned to the guests standing with him. “For those who don’t know him already, this is the detective I’ve been telling you about, Mason Brown.”

The chief was surrounded by well-dressed, fat white men past their prime, who all looked our way. Talk about an old-boys network.

Mason drew me by the hand until we were a part of the circle, then had to release my hand to shake all of theirs. He clearly already knew many of them, the assistant D.A., some retired cops, a couple of lawyers. There was even a congressman. I was impressed.

“The man who brought down the Wraith,” said the politician, shaking Mason’s hand and clapping his shoulder. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Detective.”

I couldn’t help my inner scanner’s quick burst of activity. It read:
Kissing ass, laying the groundwork in case he needs Mason’s help later.

It was the same kind of feeling I got from the whole bunch of them as they greeted Mason. Flattering and predatory. It made me shiver, and I was so busy getting my hackles up that I let my focus drift a little.

Then an uncomfortable silence brought me back, and I had to quickly review. Right, Chief Sub had said, “And this is Rachel de Luca, Mason’s...”

He’d stopped there, looking to Mason to save him by filling in the blank.

Mason was paling before my eyes as he searched his panic-stricken brain for the right word.

I took pity and saved him. “Favorite author?”

The fat white men all laughed. Then they shook my hand, too, and most of them said they knew of my work but hadn’t read it. All their handshakes were too fleshy, too warm, and some of them were damp.
Ick.

I complimented the chief on his home, asked him to point out his wife so I could wish her a happy anniversary. He did, and I followed his finger and reacted in surprise. His wife looked like she belonged in a commercial for the innocence and natural beauty of Wyoming. “What anniversary did you say this was, Chief?” I asked.

“Forty.” He was gazing at her across the room as he said it. She met his eyes, and I closed mine fast, because I wanted to feel that
thing
that passed between them. And I did. It was warm and deep and old and
real.

Then I looked up at Mason and caught him looking back.

He leaned closer to me while the chief started talking about something else, and whispered, “I didn’t bring an anniversary card.”

“Yeah, I didn’t figure you would.” I was prepared. I pulled my just-in-case card from my handbag. “It says the gift is on its way,” I whispered in his ear. “I suggest you go online and order something as soon as you get home. I signed it ‘Mason and Rachel.’ Is that okay?”

“Of course it’s okay. You saved my ass. Thank you.”

He totally missed the point of my question. He didn’t get that signing the card “Mason and Rachel” meant something. It was significant. It labeled us a couple.

Dammit, maybe it was too soon.

“Rache?”

“Uh, yeah. You’re welcome.”

He took the card, and I told my head to get back on the job. We were here for a reason. Okay, we were here because his boss had told us to be here, but we were also here so I could wrap my senses around some of the principals.

“I’m gonna get busy,” I told him.

“Okay.” He leaned in for a peck on the mouth.

“Well, that was weird.”

“Yeah, it was.”

“What are we, Ozzie and Harriet now?”

“I know. Sorry.” He was looking me in the eye, searching for what, I don’t know.

“Stop looking into my eyes, Brown, my boobs are down there,” I said, pointing them out with my chin.

He grinned. “Get to work, will you?”

I wandered away from him toward the chief’s wife, not just because it was her party and I ought to greet her and wish her well. But because she was in deep conversation with Judge Howie’s wife and looked a little bit alarmed.

I meandered, doing the nod-and-smile thing, while keeping eye contact minimal enough not to get drawn into conversation. It was a new skill and one I was still working on perfecting. Too far one way, you look rude, too far the other, everyone thinks you want to cozy up for a nice long chat.

Eventually, though, I made my way to the two women without looking like that was what I was attempting to do. And then I bumped into Mrs. Chief. “Sorry! Oh, Mrs. Subrinsky! Hi. What a wonderful party. Happy anniversary.”

“Thank you.”

“I’m Rachel,” I said, extending a hand, but then I froze, because Marianne Mattheson had gulped a little, drawing my eye, and it was obvious she’d been crying. “I’m interrupting. I’m so sorry.”

“That’s all right,” the chief’s wife said, her right hand going momentarily to the other woman’s shoulder. “I’m Liddy, by the way. That ‘Mrs. Subrinsky’ stuff gets old.” She extended her hand and tipped her head to one side. “So you’re Mason’s Rachel?”