The Scent of Murder (24 page)
She raised it, aimed at my chest and fired. I could hear something whizz by my ear as I ducked. I kicked out at the gun. It flew out of her hand and I leaped for her. We rolled over in the mud. I could feel her nails clawing at my face. Then she put her head down and bit my shoulder. I screamed and punched her head. She let go of me and started crawling towards the gun.
“Don't bother,” I told her, as I dragged her back by her leg. Then I punched her in the face and she fell back down.
I ran back to the car. Manuel was lying across the seat moaning. There was blood all over the place. “Thanks a lot,” he said, when he saw me.
“I'm sorry Manuel.”
“I guess you really were pissed at me, after all.”
I started to laugh. I couldn't help it. “Where'd she shoot you?”
“My shoulder.”
I tore the sleeve of his shirt off and looked at the wound. It wasn't as bad as I thought it was going to be. Walker had clipped him as I pulled her wrist up.
“What happened?”
I told him, as I helped him up and untied his hands.
“You know what?” he said.
“What?”
“From now on, I think I'm going to stick to females my own age.”
“Good idea.” And I hugged him.
Chapter
35
35
T
here were a couple of inches of snow on the ground, as George, Manuel, Gerri, Amy, Mr. Bones, and I walked down the path to Murphy's grave. We'd all managed to squeeze ourselves into my cab, since George's car was still in the shop. It would be another week before it was fixed. Fortunately, insurance was picking up the tab, but, even so, George told me he'd never let me get behind the wheel of a car of his again, even though he allowed that he would have done the same thing himself.
here were a couple of inches of snow on the ground, as George, Manuel, Gerri, Amy, Mr. Bones, and I walked down the path to Murphy's grave. We'd all managed to squeeze ourselves into my cab, since George's car was still in the shop. It would be another week before it was fixed. Fortunately, insurance was picking up the tab, but, even so, George told me he'd never let me get behind the wheel of a car of his again, even though he allowed that he would have done the same thing himself.
I snuck a look at Amy as she chatted with her mother. She was out on a day pass from Cedar View. Two weeks had made an enormous difference. She'd dyed her hair reddish brown and gotten rid of the heavy black eye makeup and the white lipstick. It looked as though the old Amyâthe one I'd seen in the early photographsâwas re-emerging. She caught me looking at her and smiled.
“I want to thank you,” she said.
“It's okay.”
“My mom said I should do something to make up for all the trouble I caused.” She fidgeted. “I was thinking, maybe I could work in your store a couple of days a week when I get out of Cedar View.”
I nodded. “It sounds like a good plan.”
By now Gerri was talking to George and Manuel. Amy drifted over to my side. “So how's Mr. Bones getting on with your mother?” I asked. Gerri had come to the store and picked him up a couple of days after I'd delivered Amy to her.
Amy grinned. “Go figure. She thinks he's cute.”
“Well he is.”
“She just doesn't want him running around the house and pooping everywhere.”
“That seems fair.” I leaned over and stroked Mr. Bones. “He looks very dapper.” Amy had put his harness on for the occasion.
“I'm going back to school in a couple of weeks.”
“What about art classes?”
“I'm going to take those at night at the university. Then, when I graduate, I'll have a portfolio.”
I broached what I was going to say next carefully. “Listen, if this upsets you, you don't have to talk about it, but if you want to, I'd really like to know how you found out about your father's diamonds.”
“No, I don't mind.” Amy kicked at the snow with her boot. The flakes flying up glittered like mica in the sun. “The first time I went up there, Dad was in the middle of shaving. He was really surprised to see me, let me tell you.” She laughed as she recalled the expression on his face. “Anyway, he let me in and told me he'd be right back. And there was this little packet on the coffee table in the living room. I figured maybe it was drugsâDad had been taking tranqs and sleeping pillsâso I opened it. To see what was inside.” She looked sheepish. “I thought, what the hell, maybe I'd take a few. Only it was diamonds. I don't know, I just put them in my pocket and ran out the door.” She shrugged. “I guess that wasn't very nice, was it?”
“It certainly wasn't very smart.” But then at her age, I hadn't been very smart, either.
Amy kicked up another clump of snow. “Maybe I was feeling guilt, or maybe I was smoking some bad weed, but I kept on thinking my dad was gonna find me and have me put in jail, and then I remembered what Murphy had said to me about you. I thought maybe you could get in contact with him, or something. I was working up my nerve to tell you, when I saw those cops waiting outside of your store and I freaked. The door to your office was open. I saw the desk and threw the package under it and ran.”
“Then what happened?”
“I decided I'd better talk to my dad, so I called him and he told me to come on up. But when I got there he ... was,” her voice dropped, “gone. I didn't know what to do.”
“So you called me,” I finished.
She nodded.
“Why did you keep running away?”
“I don't know. I wanted to talk to you, but everytime I was going to, I kept getting this idea in my head that you were going to call the police and turn me in. I thought they'd arrest me for Dad's murder. I didn't think they'd listen to anything I had to say. At least that's what Toon Town kept telling me.”
“Well, there you go.” By now we were almost at Murphy's grave.
“He wasn't a very good person to listen to, was he?”
“I think it's safe to say that when a twenty-five-year-old man starts hanging around with a fifteen-year-old girl, he has a few problems.”
“Tell me about it,” Manuel grumped. I'd been so involved talking to Amy that I hadn't realized that Manuel had drifted back to join us. His gunshot wound was almost healed and, although he'd have to go to physical therapy for a couple of months, he was going to have complete mobility in his arm. “I'm definitely sticking to women my own age.” He turned up the collar on his ski parka.
“Nice jacket,” I commented. I think it was the first weather-appropriate piece of apparel I'd ever seen him wear.
“My mother made me put it on,” Manuel said. “Walter bought it for me. I think it makes me look like a jerk.”
“No. It's okay,” Amy said.
“Really?” Manuel straightened his shoulders. “You're not shucking me?”
“No,” Amy answered. “I'm working on not lying so much anymore.”
I moved up in front of Murphy's tombstone and joined Gerri and George. George took out a couple of bottles of Sam Adams out of the bag he was carrying and opened them up.
“He did try,” I said, indicating the tombstone.
Gerri nodded. “I think he meant well.” She pulled her sheepskin jacket around her.
I nodded back in Amy's direction. “Are you going to tell her?”
“I've been toying with the idea.”
“I think you should.”
“When she's stronger.” Then Manuel and Amy came up and Gerri fell silent.
They continued whispering to each other, while George poured the two bottles of beer over the grave. He made a short speech, and I did the same, and we both promised Murphy we'd come and visit him at least twice a year. Maybe if he had more company, he'd cause less trouble. On the way back to the cab, George pulled me aside.
“When are you going to pay me my twenty-five dollars?” he said.
I did wide-eyed innocence. If it worked for Elizabeth Walker, maybe it would work for me. “I don't know what you're talking about.”
“You lost the bet.” He put his hands on his hips. “Didn't you think I'd be able to smell it?”
“Actually I was hoping you wouldn't.”
“Don't you have any standards at all?”
“A few. But I'm working on getting rid of them, too.”
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Barbara Block lives in Syracuse, New York, with her three sons and a variety of pets. She is the author of five Robin Light mysteries: CHUTES AND ADDERS, TWISTER, IN PLAIN SIGHT, THE SCENT OF MURDER and VANISHING ACT (now available at bookstores everywhere in hardcover). Barbara is currently working on her next Robin Light mystery, which will be published in September, 1999. She loves hearing from her readers and you may write to her c/o Zebra Books. Please include a self-addressed, stamped envelope if you wish a response.
Please turn the page for an exciting sneak peek of
Barbara Block's newest
Robin Light mystery
VANISHING ACT
now on sale wherever
hardcover mysteries are sold!
Chapter 1
“T
rue story,” George said, his voice hoarse, the way it always is late at night. “A cop jumps in and rescues someone who's taken a dive into the East River. Three days later he finds out this is the guy who shot his mother in the head.”
rue story,” George said, his voice hoarse, the way it always is late at night. “A cop jumps in and rescues someone who's taken a dive into the East River. Three days later he finds out this is the guy who shot his mother in the head.”
“What's your point?”
“My point,” George replied, sounding aggrieved that I hadn't gotten it, “is that you never know whether or not you're doing something good or bad until later. You can do something that you think is good at the time but then it leads to a bad result.”
“So don't do anything.”
“Doing nothing is still doing something.” I heard the rustle of sheets and then felt George's breath on my face as he turned his head toward me. “Doing nothing is a physical impossibility. A black hole is still energy. Negative energy. Robin, are you listening to me?”
“More or less.”
“What the hell am I going to do with a fourteen-year-old boy?” he demanded for what must have been the tenth time that evening.
“The same thing everyone does. Get an ulcer.”
He grimaced. “Seriously.”
I shrugged and adjusted my pillow. “So tell your sister that Raymond can't come up.”
“I can't do that.”
“Why not?”
“Because it's family. What am I going to say? âCecilia, sorry, but I'm too busy to help you out'?”
“Mine would.”
“Well, mine doesn't work that way.” He looked as if he wished that it did. “Big families don't. It must be nice being an only child.”
“Not really,” I murmured.
“By the way,” George continued, his voice floating out on the darkness, “I almost forgot. Bryan Hayes is going to call you tomorrow morning.”
“Who?” I mumbled.
“Hayes. His sister Melissa is the one that went missing around Thanksgiving.”
“Right.” I'd seen the fliers on the hill but hadn't paid them much mind other than to think, another person gone.
“He's in one of my classes. He was asking if I knew anyone that could help him, so I gave him your name.”
I sat up. “What does he want me to do?”
But George didn't answer. I glanced over. His eyes were closed. He was asleep. I, on the other hand, was now wide awake. It figured.
Bryan Hayes called me at the store shortly after ten. By then I'd remembered what I'd read about the story, which wasn't much. We set up a meeting at four-thirty that afternoon at the Yellow Rhino, a campus hangout that was known for its bad beer, greasy chicken wings, and cardboardlike pizza. I arrived on time, but Bryan didn't.
I was standing in the doorway digging around in my backpack for my lighter, when a kid tapped me on the shoulder.
“Are you Robin Light?” he asked, his breath coming out in little gasps. A light sheen of sweat covered his forehead. He looked as if he'd been running.
“And you're Bryan Hayes?”
He nodded. I pegged him for mid-twenties. He was about six feet two inches, medium build, with a roundish face and brown eyes set a shade too close together.
“Sorry I'm late. I got held up.”
I snagged a table while Bryan went to get a couple of beers. He came back with four pieces of pizza as well. I took a bite from one. It was as bad as I remembered it being, but Bryan either didn't share my view or didn't care, because he gobbled down two pieces immediately.
“First thing I've had to eat all day,” he explained.
I made a polite comment and took a sip of my beer.
Bryan reached for the third slice, then stopped, hand hovering. “Do you want this?”
I shook my head. “Go ahead.”
“So,” Bryan Hayes asked after he was through, “how do you know George?”
“We met through mutual friends.”
Bryan wiped his hands on a napkin. “He's interesting.”
“Yes, he is.”
“He said he used to be a cop.”
“For eight years.”
“So how did he end up in grad school?”
“Why don't you ask him?”
“I did. He said he wanted a change.”
I leaned forward. “But somehow you think there's more, right?”
Bryan flushed and adjusted his hat. “It just s-seems unusual,” he stammered. “I mean, you don't associate a guy who looks like that with medieval history.”
“A guy who looks like what?” I asked innocently, curious to see if Bryan would mention that George was black or that he was enormous or that he not only looked as if he could break someone in two with his hands, but that he would enjoy doing it.
“He could be a linebacker for the Oilers,” Bryan replied, skirting the issue. “You just don't expect to find someone like that sitting next to you in a class on manors and land rights.”
“True,” I allowed. I guess the Ralph Lauren clothes George was wearing weren't as effectively reshaping his image as he hoped.
“I'd hate to get on the wrong side of him,” Bryan observed.
“Me too.” Actually George was a sweetie pie, much nicer than I was, but why tell Bryan that and spoil the image. I changed the subject to the one we'd come here to discuss. “So tell me about your sister,” I said. Even though I remembered the story, I wanted to hear it in Bryan's words.
“Right.” Bryan pushed his glasses back up the bridge of his nose with his thumb. “Actually, I think you met her. She was in your store this summer. She wanted a sugar glider, but the guy who works behind the counter said they didn't make good pets.”
“They don't.” Sugar gliders were the latest in a long line of fad pets. Tiny gliding opossums that come from Indonesia, New Guinea, Australia, and New Zealand, they are small enough to carry around in your pocket.
“He said they have complicated nutritional needs.”
“Tim said that?”
Bryan nodded.
“Interesting. I always thought they did fine on fruits, vegetables, a little cheese, and mealworms, myself.”
“That's what Melissa fed hers.”
“I'm glad to hear it.” The kids sitting at the table next to us were arguing about what kind of pizza to get, and I had to raise my voice to make myself heard.
“Melissa sent for it. From a magazine.”
“It's amazing what you can get in the mail,” I said, thinking back to the viper someone had sent to one of my employees.
Bryan began folding the edge of the white paper plate back and forth. “George said you were pretty good at finding people.”
“I've had some successes in the past,” I allowed. “Why don't you tell me what happened, and I'll tell you if I think I can help you or not.”
“That's the problem. I don't know. One moment Melissa was here, the next moment she wasn't.” Bryan's voice quivered for a second, then he regained control. “I dropped her off at the dorm, and when I went to pick her up, she wasn't there.”
“That was how long ago?”
“Forever. Well, it seems like forever. Since right before Thanksgiving.”
“And it's the middle of March now.”
Bryan looked embarrassed. “I know it's a long time, but the police have been telling me to sit tight, to be patient. But I can't be patient any longer.”
“When did you notify the police?”
“I called the campus police almost immediately. They told me to wait, so I called the city police. They said the same thing, that I had to wait twenty-four hours before I filed a missing person's report.”
“Which you did.”
“Yes. But nothing's happened. I keep calling and they keep telling me they're doing everything they can, but I don't think they are.” Bryan swallowed. “I've talked to the dean of the school here, I've talked to the head of security, I've talked to Missy's R.A.” Bryan's mouth tightened with anger as he remembered the responses he'd gotten. “Everyone keeps telling me she must have run off with someone and that she'll be back. Well, she hasn't come back.”
“Maybe it's true. Maybe she has gone off with someone.”
“If you knew Missy, you wouldn't say that. She's very responsible.”
“You really never know what's going on inside someone's head,” I observed.
Bryan hit the table with the palm of his hand. It wobbled. “Believe me. I know my sister. She'd never walk off like that. She's never even late.”
Sharon hadn't been either. “Did she take her wallet?”
Bryan frowned. “Her bag's missing,” he conceded. His voice was truculent. “But that doesn't mean anything. She always takes it with her wherever she goes.”
“Why?”
“Because she's had money stolen out of it a couple of times when she left it in her room. They never found out who took it either,” he said to what was going to be my next question.
“How about her clothes?”
“I don't think anything is missing.” Bryan scratched the side of his neck.
“But you're not one hundred percent sure.”
“I don't keep an inventory of her wardrobe.” Bryan's voice rose. “And even if a few things are gone, that doesn't mean she took off. Something happened to her.”
“Maybe. But you have to realize thousands of people disappear in this country every year. Most of them haveâfor a variety of reasonsâjust decided to walk away from their lives. Maybe she's one of them.”
“Not my sister.” Bryan's voice was filled with certainty.
“What makes you so sure?”
“Our mother is dying,” he said, the look on his face daring me to utter any of the usual banalities of consolation.
I didn't. I've never been good with that kind of stuff. Instead, I contented myself with observing that appearances to the contrary, maybe Melissa was having trouble dealing with what was happening in her life.
“No.” Bryan poked himself in his chest with his finger. “I'm the one who has the trouble going to the hospital, not her.” He swallowed, fighting to get himself back under control. “Jesus, all my mom does is ask for her. Every time I go to see her in the hospital, she wants to know if I've found Melissa. She wants to know what happened to her. She's expecting me to find out.”
I chose my next words carefully. “Are you sure you want to?”
Bryan leaned forward. “I don't have a choice. I have to find my sister. Whatever state she's in, dead or alive, I have to find her and bring her home.”
“Why?”
“Because,” he informed me in a determined voice, “for once I want to do the right thing.”
Other books
Midnight Sun by M J Fredrick
Brian's First Day of Submissive Training by Red Phoenix
Death of a Kleptomaniac by Kristen Tracy
Dead in the Water by Glenda Carroll
The Fight by L. Divine
Damaged by Elizabeth McMahen
Services Collected Boxed Set by Nikki Steele
A Candle for a Marine (Always a Marine) by Long, Heather
The Road to Macon: A Zombie Novel by Gurley, Micah
An Ideal Wife by Sanjay Grover