Play Dead (14 page)

She met him
today!
Oh, blast it all!
The hairs on the back of my neck were rising like miniature warning flags.

“He was driving by in his car?”

She nodded.

“It wasn’t white, was it?”

“No, why?”

Both Kaitlyn and Keith were looking at me
so intently that I doubted I could pass off the question with, “It’s bad luck
to date a man in a white car,” so I said, “My new client, Beth Gleason, was
murdered this afternoon. Since then, a white sedan has—”

“A client of yours was murdered?” Kaitlyn
said in alarm, hands to her throat. “How do you know her death was murder?”

“She was stabbed. I found the body.”

Keith rose. “This happened to you just
today? Do you still want—” He paused, then said gently, “If you’d like to
take a rain check on our date tonight, I understand. Or maybe we should just go
someplace quiet, where we can talk.”

“Yes, let’s do that last suggestion,” I
said, perhaps a bit too eagerly. “If I just sit at home by myself tonight, I’ll
get paranoid.”

“You’ll have to excuse me,” Kaitlyn said
dramatically as she rose. “I have to get ready myself.” She left the room,
saying, “Have a nice evening, Allida.”

“Thanks. You, too.” I watched her for a
moment. However biased I was by her personality, Kaitlyn truly was pretty,
especially because of her luxuriant auburn hair. There was little basis for my
fear that her meeting a stranger who asked her on a date was anything other
than a coincidence. As was my car getting a flat today. Each day was full of
incidents, and until something as significant as a murder happens, we don’t
consider their connections.

Keith, meanwhile, strode past me and held
open the door. “Shall we?”

I grinned and started to waltz out the
door, envisioning myself as the heroine in a romance novel. Until I realized
that, even with my tall boots on, I was so much shorter than Keith I could
easily have passed right under his arm as he supported the door.

My dog started to whine. “Bye, Doppler,”
Keith said. “Don’t worry. I’ll be good to her.” He closed the door behind us.

He put his arm around my shoulder, but I
froze in my steps. “How did you know my dog’s name?”

“Your roommate told me.” He removed his
hand from my shoulder. “Why?”

“I’m sorry. Apparently I’m getting
paranoid even when I’m
not
left alone with my imagination.”

Keith opened the passenger door of his
car, which was, indeed, the blue Mazda. I got in, silently chastising myself.
Why hadn’t I stopped to realize that Keith could easily have heard Doppler’s
name from either Kaitlyn or my mother? I reached over to unlock his door.

“So, how long have you been working as a
dog behaviorist?” he asked as we drove off.

“Only a few weeks, but I’ve trained dogs
at kennels for years, back in Chicago. I went to school there and stayed in
Evanston afterwards.”

“What brought you back here?”

“I just thought it’d be the perfect place
to open this type of a business. Boulder seems to have more therapists per
capita than any other city, and Boulderites feel so strongly about their canine
population that leash laws make front page news.”

Keith gestured at the digital clock in the
dashboard. “We’ve missed our reservations at Red Lion by quite a bit. Should we
see if they can still fit us in?”

Feeling guilty that my late arrival had
spoiled his plans, I shook my head. “Is there a less fancy place we can go to?
I love that restaurant, but that’s one of those places where they introduce you
by first name to the maitre d’, the waiter, the wine steward, the chef, the
busboy. Sometimes I feel like telling them I’m just there to eat, not to
befriend their staff.”

Keith laughed and said, “Burgers and beer
at Tom’s Tavern?”

“Perfect.”

Tom’s Tavern is located just west of the
downtown pedestrian mall, and we had the predictable battle to find a parking
space—so much so that we would have been better off leaving Keith’s car
at my house and walking. The long, narrow restaurant was crowded, but we
eventually got a booth and ordered. It occurred to me that everyone who’d heard
about me through the show had to know about Sage and was, until the police
could show otherwise, under suspicion. At least Keith had made this date prior
to Sage’s entering my life.

I felt off-kilter throughout the evening.
Every time there was a loud noise behind me, I jumped, half expecting to feel
the point of a knife at the back of my neck. I may as well have had one of
those “invisible fences” around me, operating in reverse to keep men away. And
yet, ironically, this was my second date in the same day, and a third man had
asked me out. Was I suddenly doing something right? Or was my I’m-not-interested-in-a-man-in-my-life-just-now
philosophy drawing men to me faster than canines to a dog whistle? And how long
could I keep up with these unspoken men-as-dogs analogies till I made some
god-awful verbal miscue?

We finished our meals. I became unbearably
antsy and excused myself to phone my mother. There was no answer. Her recorder
kicked on, and I said, “Mom, this is Allida. Where are you? I’m really worried.
I’m going to call back again in a few minutes, and if you’re not there, I’ll
head out there or something.”

My stomach was in knots as I hung up.
Keith asked me what was wrong the moment I returned to my seat.

“Mom’s not home. There’s no reason for her
to be out this late. I know she’s a pilot and everything, but even so, she
doesn’t fly or drive at night anymore. She has too much trouble with her night
vision.”

Keith straightened. “What would you like
to do? Should I take you home?”

“No. Not yet. I’ll call again in a little
while. I’m sorry about all of this. I’m really a fairly nice, normal person
most of the time.”

Keith grabbed my hand over the table and
held my gaze, which was difficult for me, because I felt a bit swoonish—
if that’s a word—under the intensity of his incredible eyes and the
warmth of his hand. “I have no doubt, Allida.”

All of a sudden, I loved my first name,
now that I heard it spoken by Keith. I felt my cheeks warming and knew my face
must be beaming as bright as reindeer Rudolph’s nose. He released my hand,
which I immediately jerked back to my lap. “I’ll go make that call now. Excuse
me.”

“Well, that was really smooth,” I muttered
under my breath as I crossed the room. Now I was feeling suspicious of Keith
for acting more impressed with me than I thought he should be. Talk about a
no-win situation. I dialed and sighed with relief when my mother answered. “Thank
goodness you’re there, Mom. I got really worried when you didn’t answer before.”

“For heaven’s sake, Allie! I was out back
playing fetch with the dogs and I didn’t hear the phone.”

“You were playing fetch in the dark?”

“Yes. I wasn’t the one fetching the stick,
after all, so the darkness really didn’t spoil things for me. Did you cancel
your date with Keith?”

“No, we went out. Keith is wonderful. He’s
everything you said he was, and more. Our date is still going on, as a matter
of fact. I’m calling from the restaurant.”

There was a pause. “When you were sixteen,
you used to have a fit if I waited up for you. Now you’re thirty-two years old,
and you’re calling your mother while you’re out with a man you say is ‘wonderful.’
What is going on with you, Allida?”

I clenched my jaw and tried to count to
ten, but only made it to three. “I’m not calling to chat, Mother! I’m calling
to make sure you’re all right and find out whether or not you’ve talked to the
police yet!”

“The sheriff. Yes. No arrests have been
made, I’m sorry to say.” After a pause, she said, “Is Keith wearing his lucky
hat?”

“Hat?” I repeated, immediately on edge at
the mention of the clothing item that put Sage into frenzy.

“Yes, he has a beat-up hat he always wears
for luck when he flies. I figured, if he’s wearing it tonight, he’s hoping...Never
mind. I don’t like where this thought pattern is taking me.”

“He didn’t wear a hat tonight, Mom.”

“Oh, good. I guess. Do me a favor and don’t
call me during any more of your dates, okay? You might be an adult, but you’re
still my daughter, and I’d just as soon not worry about how your date is
treating you.”

I glanced over my shoulder at Keith in the
booth. He wasn’t looking in my direction. “He’s been what you’d call a perfect
gentleman. I’ll talk to you tomorrow.” I hung up and returned to the table. “Mom’s
fine.” Testing, I added, “She asked about your lucky hat.”

“My lucky hat?” Keith repeated. “What
about it?”

I studied his handsome features, trying to
decide if his reaction was guileless. “She wanted to know if you were wearing
it.”

“I only wear it when I fly. It’s too
shabby-looking for anything else.”

I breathed a sigh of relief, and we
chatted easily as Keith brought me home and walked me to the front door. I decided
to circumvent the first date awkwardness and turned when I was still a step
above him to give him a quick peck on the cheek. “Thank you, Keith. I’m so
sorry all of this happened to me today of all days. Please call me again and
let’s make a new start of this.”

“I will,” he said, smiling. “Good night.”

He waited while I started to unlock the
door, but found that it wasn’t locked. Kaitlyn’s date must have been even more
of a disaster than mine for her to have beaten me home. I said good night and
thanked Keith again, and watched him from my doorway as he drove away. A
floorboard creaked from the back of the house, and I headed down the hall to
tell Kaitlyn that I was home.

As I started past my room, my heart leapt
to my throat. I screamed at the sight of a man rifling through the top drawer
of my dresser.

“Don’t scream!” he cried. He headed toward
me.

I slammed my bedroom door and ran to the
kitchen as fast as I could go, stumbling through the doorway. I snatched a long,
heavy knife from the butcher block holder by the sink and dialed 911 with my
free hand.

The call didn’t go through. The phone made
a rhythmic shrilling in my ear. It dawned on me what the sound meant.
Damn it!
One of the phones in the bedrooms was off the hook!

Doppler had followed me and started
barking his guard dog bark in the intruder’s direction. I dropped the receiver
and turned to see the man in the doorway. He froze at the sight of the long
knife in my hand. Doppler growled and barked as loud as he could, inches in
front of me.

“Don’t come near me!” I held the knife poised,
my heart pounding so hard I could barely breathe. “My other dog is a German
shepherd!”

“Put the knife down,” he said, with slow,
careful enunciation. “I’m Bill Wayne, Kaitlyn’s husband.”

I stared at him, taking in the five-o’clock
shadow on his lantern jaw, receding hairline, sunken eyes. He was of medium
height and build. This was indeed an older, more haggard version of the groom
in my roommate’s wedding photos.

My brain tried to tell my senses that I
was probably not on the verge of having to defend my life, after all. My body
refused to relax. Doppler, however, had toned down his barks to a woof every
couple of seconds, not unlike a bag of microwave popcorn nearing the end of its
cooking cycle.

“What are you doing here?” I kept a tight
grip on my knife and indicated the useless phone with a tip of my head. “You
have five seconds to explain yourself, or I’m calling the police.”

“I have every right to be here. This is my
house. Half of it, anyway.”

“As far as I’m concerned, buddy, you’re in
the wrong half! How dare you go through my things!”

He held up his palms, his vision riveted
to my knife. “I was just trying to locate your name and a work number. I needed
to find some safe, neutral location where I could talk to you about my wife.
She’s not at all well, you know.”

“What do you mean?” Aside from her acting
somewhat manic at times, that is, but I wanted to hear
his
answer.

“Put the knife down and I’ll tell you.”

Unwilling to turn my back on him, I
sidestepped over to the cabinet opposite the doorway he occupied and set the
knife on the counter, within my immediate reach. I crossed my arms and awaited
his reply, calculating that I could and would snatch the knife again if he made
any sudden movements toward me.

“She’s not stable. She wrecked my business
by calling my associates and customers to locate me every five minutes. I got
out before she could destroy what little was left of my life. I want her to
sell this place. I’ll personally refund whatever deposit you might have given
Kaitlyn, if you’ll agree to help me convince her to sell.”

“Why do you need my help?”

“Because as long as Kaitlyn is soaking you
for rent and insisting I come back to her, she’s never going to sell. I want my
half of the proceeds on this house, and I want out of this marriage.”