With Vics You Get Eggroll (A Mad for Mod Mystery Book 3) (3 page)

Cleo set the Chihuahua on the porch. “It’s okay. They’re such good friends by now.” Rocky extended his leash the full distance and jutted out his head trying to get to Daisy.

“I’m going to be working with chemicals today and I have to ask that the dogs be kept away from the house.”

“Of course. I’ll take them to the backyard with me.” She stooped down and ruffled Rocky’s fur.

I handed over the leash and we went separate directions. In a couple of seconds I heard the mingling barks of Rocky and Daisy coming from the backyard.

Whatever had brought Cleo and Dan Tyler to Dallas, Texas for their home away from home was a mystery to me, but I wasn’t going to complain. They’d loved my proposed renovation and paid me a sizeable deposit up front to bump them to the top of the job queue.

I stepped into the coveralls and pulled the sleeves over my arms one at a time. With the hardhat tucked under my elbow, I headed through the house. I wouldn’t need it until I started deconstructing the wall of glass bricks that divided the living room and dining room, and truth was, I hoped Hudson would be available to oversee that part of the job. If only I knew where he had gone when he left Lakewood, and if he was planning to return.

Cleo returned to the living room. “What’s on the agenda today?”

“I thought I’d work in the bathroom. I ran a test on the sink yesterday and it’s not really a white fixture. Once I strip it down to the porcelain, you’ll have an original Mamie Eisenhower pink bathroom.”

“A pink bathroom! Very of-the-era. Are you sure you don’t want to rip out the fixtures and start over?”

“Then it wouldn’t be original.” Not for the first time I wondered about this renovation and why Cleo and Dan had come to me to perform it. When I found out the apartment building I owned had pink fixtures hidden under industrial paint, Hudson and I spent the weekend stripping each and every one of them. The next morning I added a description of the pink bathrooms to the rental listing. Cleo seemed somewhat confused by the meaning of “mid-century” and the excitement of exposing it.

I rooted through the bag of stripper, gloves, sponges, and wooden spatulas that I’d brought. Four paint chips littered the bottom of the bag. Paintin’ Place, a local paint store, had become my destination of choice for supplies. The store sat in the corner of the Casa Linda shopping center where Kate Morrow had been abducted. The owner, Mitchell Moore, ran his store with personalized service and offered residents of Lakewood products you couldn’t find at Lowe’s or Home Depot. After I’d exposed a counterfeiting ring and become something of a local celebrity, he’d invited me to endorse a capsule collection of mid-century modern paint colors. We’d poured over hundreds of swatches, finally agreeing on shades of red, yellow, aqua, and taupe. The only thing left was for me to name them. The job with Cleo and Dan Tyler had taken over my life and I’d back-burnered the task. Mitchell had called a few days ago, saying he wanted to advertise the paints in his end-of-month mailer. That gave me a week to be clever.

My fingers closed on two of the swatches. Daisy Yellow? Malt Shoppe Taupe?

No. And nope. I tossed the swatches back into the bag. “I’m leaving the windows open while I work. The chemicals are strong and I’ll need the ventilation.”

“Let me call Dan. He’ll buy you a fan while he’s out.”

I tied a pink and white bandana around my head and set to work. A mild breeze pushed the curtains into the bathroom. I started working on the sink, pouring epoxy remover into the basin and using my gloved fingertips to smooth the gunk over the paint. It took a few minutes for the chemicals to react, and then the smooth surface bubbled up and separated from the sink like a layer of cheap rubber. I used a wooden spatula to ease the temporary coating from the original pink surface. Long ago I’d found wooden spatulas from the dollar store to be a good bet when it came to stripping porcelain. The rounded tip was more forgiving at delicate junctures, and the size of the tool was perfect for the size of my hands. What I couldn’t do with a spatula I did with a chopstick. I bought them in bulk from the local Thai market.

By the time the paint was stripped, the noxious fumes had left me lightheaded. I peeled off my gloves and tossed them into the trash, and then went through the great room to the sliding doors that exited to the pool out back. Cleo lounged on a turquoise and white chaise, sipping from a glass of tea, watching a sizeable television set that sat on a small cart.

“I hope you don’t mind some company. I needed some fresh air,” I said.

“Oh, my,” she said, fanning her hand back and forth past her nose. “Honey, that’s not Chanel No. 5. Is that what the chemicals smell like?”

“Can you smell them? I must be immune.”

“Sit down for a second. Let me get you a glass of tea.”

I glanced at the empty chaise next to hers, but couldn’t picture myself stretching out in my coveralls next to her in her Grecian poolside ensemble. On the TV, the show she was watching was interrupted by a news brief. Chief Washington stood behind the podium on a stage. Blue curtains hung down on either side. A row of uniformed officers stood next to flags of the United States and Texas. The chief shuffled a few papers and cleared his throat. I fumbled around the buttons of the remote and turned up the volume.

“Based on evidence found at the crime scene of Kate Morrow, we have linked one of our officers to the crimes of the Lakewood Killer.”

A chill swept over me from head to toe, despite the heat and humidity. I stepped backward once, then again, and bumped into Cleo. I whirled around and tea sloshed out of the plastic tumbler she carried. “Hold on, there, honey,” she said.

“I have to leave.”

“What happened?” She looked behind me to the TV. “Did they catch the guy who killed those women?”

“I don’t think so,” I said.

“Yes, they did. Look, he’s right there.” She pointed at the screen and I followed the extension of her finger. Next to Chief Washington stood Tex, and he didn’t look happy.

THREE

A press conference was underway. Chief Washington greeted the audience and thanked them for coming. He made brief statements about what he would discuss and what he would not, and finished by saying when he was done, he would not be taking questions. He paused, looked at Tex, who nodded. The chief picked up his statement and spoke.

“Because of circumstances relating to the recent abduction and murder of Kate Morrow, it is my belief that Lt. Thomas Allen’s presence may cause distractions to the ongoing investigation and the operation of the police department. At my request, Lt. Allen has agreed to take a voluntary leave of absence. This is not an accusation, nor is it an admission of guilt. Lt. Allen has served the city of Lakewood for twenty-four years and is looking forward to the matter being resolved so he can return to his job of protecting our community.”

Tex stood next to the chief, his hands in front of him. His jawline was rigid and his blue eyes were troubled. When Tex had left me at the pool that morning, he said he needed to find out what the police knew. He had told me not to look for him. I couldn’t imagine what had happened in the next couple of hours to lead to him being asked to take voluntary leave.

I gulped for fresh air but only took in the sticky humidity that surrounded me. The lightheaded feeling from working with the chemicals in the bathroom returned, and I reached out for something to stabilize myself.

“You don’t look so hot, sugar,” Cleo said. She took my elbow and led me to her chaise. This time I had no compunctions about dropping into it. “Drink this,” she said. I took the glass and guzzled the tea until it was gone.

Cleo sat next to me and put her hand on my back. I stared ahead at the expanse of blue swimming pool. “That man didn’t do it. He didn’t commit those crimes,” I said.

“The police lieutenant? Do you know him?”

“He’s a friend. A close friend.”

“Well, normally I would think having a police lieutenant friend would be a good thing, but now I don’t know what to say.” She patted my thigh. “Sure is handsome,” she added.

“If you don’t mind, I’m going to have to cut my day short so I can find out what happened.”

“I don’t think that’s such a good idea,” said a voice from the back door.

Cleo and I looked up at the same time. Her husband, Dan, stood in front of us, holding an oscillating fan in one hand. He was shorter than Cleo and had the solid build that came from lifting weights. His hairline receded, and what was left of his hair was combed straight back over the top. Razor sunglasses covered his eyes, but I felt them piercing me all the same.

“Did I overhear you say you know that guy?” he asked.

“Yes. He’s a friend. He helped me out in the past—”

He held up a hand. “He might be the type to help old ladies with their groceries for all I know. He looks to be about, what, late forties?”

“That’s right.”

“Police lieutenant. You know much about the psychology of cops?”

“I never really thought about it.”

“What do you think it takes to get someone to sign up for that kind of life? Thrill seeker. Thrives on chaos and danger. Pushes boundaries. Does any of this sound familiar?”

I hated that he was talking about Tex, a man who had entered my life with just about every cliché you could think of and had become one of the few people who I trusted. I hated that everything he said was dead on.

“Do you know why cops have the highest suicide rate of any job? The stress gets to them and they gotta find an outlet. Physical expressions of violence are one. Working out, firing guns. Abusing women. High rate of alcoholism among them too. It’s another way to blow off steam.”

“How do you know all this?” I asked.

Cleo put her hand on my arm. When she spoke, her voice was steady. “Dan’s brother was a cop for twenty years. He died in a drunk driving accident.”

“I’m so sorry,” I said, looking back and forth between their faces.

Dan pulled the glasses off his face. His expression hardened into a mask. “Don’t be sorry. My brother’s blood alcohol level was 1.9. He was on his way home from a cop bar. He lost control of his car and killed two girls in a head-on collision. The whole precinct knew what happened, but they buried the story. They didn’t want to tarnish the reputation of one of their own. It’s bad enough knowing my brother was responsible for the death of those girls, but to know that the police department was so corrupt they’d hide the truth was even worse. That’s what kind of moral fiber you’re referring to as a friend.”

He turned and went back into the house, leaving Cleo and me alone.

“It’s going to take Dan a long time to reconcile his brother’s death. They were close as kids but lost touch shortly after George went to the police academy. I think Dan saw signs of George’s aggression manifest early on and tried to do something about it. George didn’t like it—his younger brother telling him what to do.”

“When was this?”

“Right around the time Dan and I got married. George was best man at our wedding.”

“And when was the accident?”

“Five years ago. George had been on the force for twenty years. If he was alive, he’d be retiring this year.”

She looked away from me and stared at the grass at the edge of the concrete pool deck. I sensed she had gone into her head at the memory of her wedding, but judging by the look on her face, the memory wasn’t all sunshine and roses.

“I think maybe you were right. You should cut your day short. I need to talk to my husband.”

We both stood. I picked up the empty plastic tumbler and Cleo took it from my hand and set it back on the table. “Leave it. Molly, our housekeeper, will be here shortly and she’ll clean up.”

Something about having a housekeeper come while her house was mid-renovation seemed ridiculously indulgent, but my mind was too far from our conversation to ask her about it.

“Thank you. I don’t know if I’ll be here tomorrow. I’ll call in the morning to let you know.”

She nodded her understanding and slid the back door open. I followed her through the great room to the bathroom and peeked in. The Mamie-pink fixtures looked close to brand new, a whimsical note completely anachronistic to the news about Tex. I pulled the door shut, collected Rocky, and headed to my apartment building.

Without Hudson, I’d had to fall back on the list of contacts I had to complete small repairs in the apartment building, a problem that seemed to matter less and less as my tenants moved away. I considered putting the building up for sale, but I knew I’d get a fraction of what it would be worth without the necessary upgrades.

I cut through a series of residential streets to get there as fast as possible. I parked behind the building, bypassed the four security measures I’d had installed on the back, and went down the hall to the front door. A pile of newspapers had been fed through the mail slot. I scooped up as many as I could and climbed the in-need-of-replacement royal blue Berber carpeting that covered the staircase to the second floor. The corners had pulled away from the wall and were frayed, spiking out plastic threads. It was one more sign of neglect, of tasks I couldn’t handle on my own.

One of the reasons I didn’t like spending time here was the almost complete silence. About two and a half months ago, I’d turned my apartment over to the police to search for evidence in a counterfeiting operation. Their search had destroyed the floor: pulling up planks of the hardwood, leaving subflooring exposed. The incident caused most of my tenants to move out and look for new housing. I’d spent my forty-eighth birthday alone in the building, doing what I could to minimize the damage.

The police search had also done a number on my role as anonymous landlord. My tenants had come to view me as a friend. A friend who occasionally got mixed up in some trouble, but a friend, nonetheless. Once they’d learned that I’d been the one collecting their rent—the same person who had first brought a killer to the building, and then a counterfeiter—things changed. Lease renewals went ignored. New units weren’t rented. Several assured me it had nothing to do with me, per se, but more with the idea that someone they considered a friend had lied to them. There were no words for me to offer to undo that particular violation of their trust.

Truth was, any coziness and sense of home I’d once had at my apartment had been shattered by a series of unpredictable events and violations of my own trust. I now equated this building with lies I had been told and the lives that had been taken. It didn’t matter much that I owned the place. I’d added additional locks to the front and back doors, a coded gate to the entrance to the parking lot in the back, and an emergency phone in the hallway. No matter what I did, I didn’t feel safe.

Now that ten of the eleven other residents of the building had moved out, the small two-floor structure felt like an abandoned fallout shelter. The lack of white noise that accompanied aloneness was what threatened my way of life the most.

I unclipped Rocky’s leash and turned the TV to the local news. I’d been spending more and more time at Thelma Johnson’s house, but kept enough food that, if I chose to be here, I wouldn’t starve. While a commercial tried to sell me on the latest antidepressant to hit the market, I microwaved a Tupperware of leftover paella and filled Rocky’s bowls with fresh food and water. He buried his nose in the food and I carried my own to the living room and set it on the desk by the computer. The act of eating was more out of habit than necessity; after hearing that Tex was on voluntary leave, I wasn’t really hungry.

Impatient for news, I cued up the internet and searched for something on the Lakewood Abductor. I found several links to articles that repeated the same bits of general information: Based on evidence found on the body of Kate Morrow, Lt. Thomas Rexford Allen of the Lakewood Police Department had been brought in for questioning. None of the articles mentioned what the evidence was.

I divided my attention between the internet and the television behind me. The information became a blur—what came from where?—but I pieced together what the police knew about Kate.

Her car had been reported as abandoned by a maintenance worker at the Casa Linda shopping center. In the back seat was a shopping bag from the grocery store and a receipt time-stamped for two days earlier at 6:30 p.m. Her body had been found by two hikers in the field by Lockwood Park. She hadn’t been sexually assaulted. The police pulled the security feed from inside the store and recorded every person they saw enter and exit. Once they identified Kate, they requested the security tape for the parking lot, which was when they learned the camera didn’t work.

A witness, one of the store’s cashiers, claimed to have seen a man in uniform approach a young woman in the parking lot and offer to help her with her packages. Her description of the man was light on details, save for the fact that he was fit. They’d walked to her car together, and then the cashier went back to work. That had been the last time anyone had seen Kate Morrow alive.

Ever since the first abduction, the police had been warning Dallas residents to take extra care when driving alone. After the second missing person’s report, the police focused their warning toward women. No one knew who the killer was or what was driving him. He didn’t send cryptic notes taunting the police like criminals do in the movies. He didn’t drop a calling card or follow up with the media and take credit for his crimes. Weeks went by, then a month. Police beefed up their presence on the streets, but no new evidence turned up.

And now, one of the missing women had been found dead and a witness linked her to the very people who had sworn to protect us. It seemed even with additional police presence in public areas, there was no way to protect yourself anymore.

I moved to the chair in front of the TV and listened to what they were saying. Phrases like “based on what we know,” and “voluntarily turned himself in,” told me things were far from open and shut.

Suddenly, Rocky raced to the door of the apartment and barked. His shrill yaps were meant to alert me that we were no longer the only people in the building. I double-checked the locks on the front door and moved to the bedroom where I could see the parking lot through my windows.

Right now the building was mostly empty; the only two occupied apartments were mine and Effie Jones, a soon-to-be college graduate. She was looking for a job and didn’t want to take on the added stress of finding a new place to live. Plus, she had a thing for Rocky. Effie’s MINI Cooper was parked in a haphazard manner across two spaces. The door to the car was open but the young woman wasn’t there.

I left Rocky in the bedroom and shut the door behind him, grabbed a can of pepper spray, and unlocked the front door. I crept down the carpeted stairs. Effie’s terrified face stared through the glass pane at the center of the back door. Her eyes connected with me. I couldn’t hear her through the window, but I read her lips. “Help me,” she said.

I unlocked the door from the inside. She came in and slammed the door shut behind her, throwing deadbolts and securing the lone padlock. She threw her arms around me.

“Madison, I didn’t think I was going to get away. He was after me! I thought I was going to be the next victim!”

She shook like an electric toothbrush. “It’s okay. You’re here. He’s not going to get you,” I said.

“But it’s not okay! He’s still out there!” She pulled away from me and looked behind her. “He knows where I live, Madison. He knows where you live too.”

“Who?”

“Lt. Allen—he tried to kill me!”