The Little Death (46 page)

“Give him this for me,” Mel said.

Mel was holding a comic book. The cover showed a Frankenstein face looming over a puffed-chest Superman. The title was
Escape from Bizarro World
.

“I don’t think he’ll appreciate the joke,” Louis said.

“Yes, he will,” Mel said.

Louis took the comic book and walked out to the beach. Queenie was in full gallop after a stick, Swann watching her with pride. Queenie snagged the stick and started back to them, her body lithe and graceful as she bounded across the beach. In the slanting afternoon sun, her copper fur shone like wavy silk threads against the canvas of white sand.

“She’s a beautiful animal,” Louis said.

Swann heaved the stick again and faced Louis. “Yeah. I fell in love with her the first time I saw her.”

“Where’d you get her?”

“She found me,” Swann said. “I was sitting in a park reading, and she just wandered up. No tag, no collar. I put ads in the paper, but when no one claimed her, I kept her.”

Louis nodded and looked at the two crutches in the sand, then at the second bandage on Swann’s left shoulder.

“You’re crazy to be up on that leg so soon,” Louis said.

“I know, but I wanted to come over and say goodbye to you and Mel.”

Queenie came back and dropped the stick at Swann’s feet, then started a dance around his legs. Swann gave her another throw and looked at Louis. His eyes paused for a second at the thin scar on Louis’s cheek.

“So, when do we arrest the senator?” Swann asked.

“We don’t.”

“Why not?”

Louis told him the story, including the face-to-face outside the Osborn home. Swann listened but in the end seemed less surprised than Mel, if that was possible. Maybe that’s what happened to normal people who stayed there too long, Louis thought. They became shock-proof.

“You know,” Swann said, “the worst part is that without a prosecution of Carolyn Osborn, we’ll never find out
why
they did it.”

“Samantha Norris was a psychopath,” Louis said softly.

“That’s a legal label for a very complicated personality,” Swann said. “What about Tink Lyons and Carolyn Osborn? What was going on in their heads that made them vulnerable to someone like Samantha Norris in the first place?”

Louis was quiet, watching Queenie.

“Did you know there’s not been one documented case of a female serial killer using the level of violence we saw here?” Swann said.

Louis sighed.

“And what few female serials there have been have almost always used poison or some other impersonal method of murder. They don’t kill for lust or thrill,” he said. “That’s what makes Samantha Norris so fascinating. I mean, think of how much we could learn if—”

Louis looked down at the sand.

Immediately, Swann felt silent. Queenie was back, nuzzling his leg, but he didn’t seem to notice her.

“Christ, I’m sorry,” Swann said.

“Forget it.”

Swann finally noticed Queenie and gave her another run with the stick.

“I’ve been thinking a lot about Burke Aubry,” Swann said after a long silence. “I was thinking how lucky he is.”

“Lucky?”

“Yeah, the guy hasn’t got anything, no money, no family, lives in that broken-down house with only a dog for company.”

Louis didn’t say what he was thinking, that Burke Aubry still had a woman he had loved for decades, and the memory of their son.

“But that man loves what he does.” Swann paused, squinting
out at the ocean. “My dad is like that. I used to hate him for it. Now I think I envy him.”

They were both quiet, watching Queenie chase a flock of gulls.

“I sent away for an FBI application,” Swann said.

Louis turned to face him. “The FBI?”

Swann nodded. “I got the idea when I was reading about the serial killers. I speak four languages and have a degree in psychology. Maybe I can be useful there.”

Louis nodded. “I know someone up there in the Behavioral Science Unit,” he said. “I can give her a call and try to open some doors for you.”

Swann smiled. “That would be great. I’ll need some help explaining why I got fired here.”

“You were fired for the right reason, trying to do your job. Sometimes they like hearing that kind of honesty.”

Queenie came back, and Swann tossed the stick again.

“Did you tell your father yet?” Louis asked.

“I’m going to wait until I’m accepted. That way, it’ll be easier to finally thank him for cleaning up my record all those years ago.”

“I think he’d appreciate that.”

The silence flowed in again.

“So, what about you?” Swann asked.

“I’m going home, sit on my beach with a beer, and wait for the next case to come along,” Louis said.

When Swann didn’t say anything, Louis looked over at him. Swann opened his mouth to say something, then looked out over the water.

“What?” Louis asked.

“Nothing.”

“You want to bust my chops one last time about how PIs are just pieces of shit?”

“Are you kidding?”

“What then?”

Swann shook his head. “I just don’t get it. You’re really good at this stuff. Why’d you give up the badge, man?”

“I didn’t have a choice,” Louis said. “I was run out of Michigan.”

“Why not try again here?”

Louis kicked at the sand, wishing this rusty box hadn’t been opened. When Queenie returned with her stick, Louis picked it up and gave it a hard throw. He watched the dog lope down the sand.

“Hey, I know how hard it is to start over,” Swann said. “But you can’t just sit on the beach waiting for shit to come to you.”

Louis couldn’t look at Swann. Queenie brought the stick back and dropped it in front of Louis. He picked it up and held it out to Swann. “I’ve got to get going,” he said.

Swann took the stick. “Well, listen,” he said, “it’s been great working with you. I mean that.”

“Same here, Andrew.”

“And thanks for getting me fired.”

Swann stuck out his hand. Louis shook it. “Good luck, Andrew.”

“Say goodbye to Mel for me.”

“Oh, that reminds me.” Louis pulled the comic book from his back pocket. “Mel wanted me to give this to you.”

Swann unrolled it and chuckled. “I looked it up, you know.”

“What?”

“Batzarro. I know he was a fuckup.”

“Mel has a warped sense of humor.”

Swann rolled up the comic book and smiled. “Tell him I’m going to frame this and hang it on my wall at Quantico. It’ll be something to help me remember you two assholes.”

Chapter Forty-five
 

When Louis came back in from the beach, Mel was finished with the pigpen. He handed Louis the black
Social Register
.

“You want this?”

“Toss it.”

Mel put it in the plastic garbage bag at his feet. He put the lid on the file box that held all of the case information they had accumulated in the last eleven days.

Mel picked up the box and set it by his suitcase at the front door. Louis’s own duffel was there, his rumpled blue blazer draped across.

“You okay?”

Louis nodded. “Is there any beer left?”

“Might be one still in there.”

Louis went into the kitchen. It was spotless, burnished to a gleam by the invisible Eppie. Louis yanked open the refrigerator and peered in. Someone had stocked it with Perrier, two bottles of Veuve Clicquot,
and a fifth of Rodnik vodka. There were fresh eggs, orange juice, and two tins of osetra caviar.

But no beer.

Louis went back to the living room. “Where’d the groceries come from?”

“I figured Reg could use some goodies when he got home. So Yuba and I hit the Publix this morning. And yes, I kept the damn receipt so you can write it in your little notebook.”

Louis smiled.

“Are you smiling?”

Louis dug in his jeans and pulled out Margery’s check. He gave it to Mel.

“What’s this?”

“Our payment.”

Mel brought the check up to his eyes and squinted. “Twenty-five hundred bucks? Not too shabby.”

“Add some zeroes.”

“Twenty-five thousand?”

“Add another zero.”

Mel stared at Louis.

“We have to split it. And if it’s okay with you, I’d like to give Andrew fifty grand.”

“Hell, he earned it.” Mel smiled. “And maybe now you could break down and buy a decent blazer.”

Yuba came out of the back bedroom carrying a suitcase. “All packed,” she said. “You sure you’re okay with this, Louis?”

Louis had been surprised when Mel said he wanted to bring Yuba back to Fort Myers. She had quit her job at Ta-boo and still had plans to go back and get her degree. But for now, she was going to move into Mel’s little
apartment. No promises, she had told Mel. None expected, he had told her.

“At least I’ll have someone to talk to on the drive home,” Louis said with a smile.

He watched as Yuba linked her arm through Mel’s and gave him a kiss on the cheek. He started toward the bedroom.

“Where you going?” Mel asked.

“Final walk through,” Louis said.

He went through each of the rooms, but they were spotless. In Mark Durand’s bedroom, he paused. All of the items were still there on the étagère, and the pastel shirts were lined up in the closet like mints in a box.

The spot of red and green on the wall above the bed caught Louis’s eye. It was David’s painting.

He went over and took it off its hook. He was certain Reggie didn’t want it. He was certain, too, that Burke Aubry wouldn’t mind if he took it.

When he went back out to the living room, Yuba and the suitcases were gone. Through the open front door, he could see her putting them in the trunk of the Mustang.

Mel was gathering up the pile of
Shiny Sheet
s and stuffing them into the garbage bag. He paused, peering down at a page.

“What’s that?”

Mel held it out.

Louis took it. It was the page with the photograph of Sam and the lawyer. Flowing blue dress, milk-white skin, and carrot-red hair.

“You okay?” Mel asked.

“Yeah.”

“You hit her in the heart.”

“That’s what we’re trained to do.”

“But it was a woman this time.”

“I’m fine, Mel. Let’s just get out of here.”

Louis crumpled the paper, stuffed it into the garbage bag, and hoisted the bag. He followed Mel outside, making sure he stopped to lock the door. Then he slipped the key into a flowerpot as Reggie had requested, put the garbage bag in the trash can, and got into the Mustang.

They headed south, passing the velvet greens of the country club and the geranium-bedecked entrance to the Breakers hotel. At the old stone Bethesda-by-the-Sea Church, Louis had to stop to allow the long line of cars to exit. He had no choice but to pull the Mustang behind the funeral cortege that was taking Tink Lyons to the cemetery.

At the Palm Beach police station, Mel and Yuba waited in the car while Louis went in and paid his “ugly car” fine. When he got back, Mel had put the Mustang’s top down and was slumped in the passenger seat. Yuba was in the back, face turned up to the sun.

“Let’s go home, Rocky,” Mel said.

They drove west on Royal Poinciana Way and across the bridge. After a quick stop to drop off the file box with Major Cryer at the Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office, they headed due west on US-80.

Louis’s mind was racing ahead. And there was a lightness in his chest, like he could breathe for the first time in a week. No, for the first time in years.

Maybe it was Andrew’s questioning. Maybe it was the firmness of Major Cryer’s handshake and the respect in his eyes. Maybe it had been there, buried inside him for a long time now, and had only taken Joe’s words to bring it out.

I want you to want something for yourself.

Whatever it was, he had made a decision. It had come to him suddenly as they left the sheriff’s office parking lot, hitting him like a sharp stab to his heart.

He wanted to get back in. He wanted to feel the weight of a badge on his chest. Even if it meant going to Lance Mobley and begging, he was going to try once more.

He couldn’t wait to get home. The first call would be to Mobley. But he knew he had to make a second call to Joe. He needed to try once more with her, too.

The strip malls and gas stations disappeared, and they were out in the scrublands. Soon they reached the swaying green curtains of the cane fields.

Mel was slumped in the seat, asleep. Louis glimpsed Yuba in the rearview mirror. Her head was back, her eyes closed, her lips tipped in a secret smile, long black hair fanned out behind her.

Louis looked back to the road, squinting hard into the sun.

He had made love to her

He had killed her.

And now he had to forget her.