When Sally Dunphy looks for her fiance's murdere, he starts looking for her.
Sally Dunphy has had a rough eighteen months. Then she hears her ex-fiance has taken a dive off a bridge. Convinced that Joe, who had everything going for him, would never kill himself over her, as his note implied, Sally demands some answers. She teams up with rugged rugged Duke Spikowski, an old friend who's also a police detective, to investigate what looks like foul play.
Excerpt
MANTRAP
By Louise Titchener
Text copyright 1994 by Louise Titchener
All Rights Reserved
RAVES FOR LOUISE TITCHENER'S HOMEBODY
"An exciting seat-of-the-pants thriller with so many twists and turns that readers remain in constant suspense ... an instant hit." —Affaire de Coeur
"Ms. Titchener makes nice use of Baltimore locations fans of Mary Higgins Clark should enjoy this suspenseful tale." —Baltimore Sun
“Homebody is one of the best suspense reads of the year. Populated by a cast of interesting and colorful characters, fast-paced and smoothly plotted, the story unfolds with unrelenting suspense that builds and strengthens, culminating in several pages of nail- biting edge-of-the-chair vicarious terror."
—Gothic journal
This is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents, and dialogues are products of the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Other Mystery Novels by Louise Titchener
The Oliver Redcastle Historical Mysteries:
Gunshy
Malpractice
Hard Water
Trouble in Tampa
The Toni Credella Baltimore Mysteries
Homebody
Buried in Baltimore
Burned in Baltimore
Bumped Off
Table of Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
5
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty One
Chapter Twenty Two
Chapter Twenty Two
Chapter Twenty Three
Chapter Twenty Four
Chapter Twenty Five
Chapter Twenty Six
Chapter Twenty Seven
Chapter Twenty Eight
Chapter Twenty Nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty One
Chapter Thirty Two
Chapter Thirty Three
Chapter Thirty Four
Chapter Thirty Five
Chapter Thirty Six
Chapter Thirty Seven
Chapter Thirty Eight
Chapter Thirty Nine
Chapter Forty
Chapter Forty One
Chapter Forty Two
Chapter Forty Three
Chapter Forty Four
Chapter Forty Five
Chapter Forty Six
Chapter Forty Seven
Chapter Forty Eight
Chapter Forty Nine
Chapter Fifty
Chapter Fifty One
Chapter Fifty Two
Chapter Fifty-Three
Chapter Fifty Four
Chapter Fifty Five
Epllogue
Chapter One
Four days after I moved into my Federal Hill townhouse, I had burglars.
When I first heard the noises, 1 thought they came from the street. Federal Hill overlooks Baltimore's Inner Harbor. With the restaurants staying open until all hours and the guys in black fishnet T-shirts roaring around on cigarette boats named Wet Dream, weekends get noisy. But this wasn’t a weekend.
Remembering that. I jerked fully awake. Tensed, my heart thudding, 1 pushed myself up against the headboard and checked the clock on the nightstand. Two. Two o'clock in the morning! Oh, God!
Creak, click, drifted in from the living room. Tinkle, tinkle, lust the faintest of noises, but enough so I knew I had trouble.
What 1 did next I’d practiced in drills. Quietly, I got out of bed and padded to my closet. When I took the Ruger out of the shoebox hidden under a pile of sweaters, it felt heavy and cool against my palm. Click, creak, click. Were the noises getting closer to the stairs? My bedroom door hung open.
My heart thudded, my breathing came quick and shallow, and my hands were icy. Stiffly, I put a full ammunition clip into the gun and loaded a cartridge into its chamber. Then I headed out into the hall and down the stairs.
At the foot of the steps I paused just before the entrance to the kitchen. I caught the skittering play of a flashlight's beam and heard whispered voices.
"This place a fuckin’ mess. How'm I sposed to find anything?"
"Jesus, Jamal, just grab the TV and VCR. so we can get out of here."
"I can't find the fuckin' VCR, and the TV's small. It ain’t worth shit."
I took a deep breath and pulled back the slide on the Ruger. Its metallic snick stabbed the darkness, signaling my intruders that they had trouble. I wanted them to hear the noise and run.
Three seconds of paralyzed silence, then Jamal's voice and bedlam. "Get the fuck out!"
I heard a high-pitched yip succeeded by a crash.
My china, 1 thought, and pictured the unpacked boxes stacked atop the glass coffee table. Unable to stand there in the dark doing nothing any longer, 1 flicked on the light switch. Steadying the gun, I stepped forward.
Out of the corner of my eye I spotted a skinny blond girl who looked about thirteen. One horrified backward glance at me and she dived through the open window. Though 1 heard her land with an anguished "oof" on the patch of grass outside, I wasn't paying too much attention. Most of me focused on the small but muscular black youth.
Sprouting cornrows, he lay sprawled on the floor amidst my broken plates and saucers. I guessed his age at somewhere around sixteen.
The kid had knees made of steel. One second he was down. The next, like a duck-walking Cossack, he sprang to his feet and crouched to lunge. But plainly, the way 1 held the Ruger before me gave him pause.
He stood tensed, knees flexed to spring, hands clenching and unclenching. "White lady, you ain’t gonna' pull the trigger on that big cannon."
"Take one more step and I will."
"You ain't got the balls."
When I didn't answer, but just stood there with the barrel aimed at his belly, he straightened slightly and shot me an insinuating grin. "That some fine nightie. Show off them sweet titties real good. I hope your man appreciates you."
1 hadn't given my flimsy nightgown much thought. I'm proud to say that my eyes stayed fixed on the kid, my hands held the gun steady.
His grin widened. Giving himself an arrogant little shake, he turned and swaggered to the door. When he'd opened it, he glanced back over his shoulder. "Time you straighten up your place. Only a pig would live in a mess like this." Then he closed the door quietly behind him and was gone.
"And you just let him walk off like that?" On the other side of my desk, Maggie Brown splayed her hands on her solid hips. Her milk-chocolate face, framed by its aureole of tight pepper-and-salt curls, grimaced indignantly.
"Mag, it was either let him walk or shoot him.”
"Then maybe you should have blasted the punk."
“Mag!"
"Oh, I know, I know." She rolled her eyes at the ceiling. "It's just sometimes I get so, so . . . you won’t believe what Intake handed me this morning ... a nine-year-old caught with his pockets full of crack. Still a baby and already he’s dealing."
She pincered a file folder between her thumb and forefinger as if it were contaminated. The big diamond on her ring finger flashed and I caught a whiff of Joy. No matter what, Maggie always smells and looks great. "Now I have to go check out his home situation,” she groused. "We both know what that’s going to be."
Yes, we both knew. Probably a crumbling rental in an area of the city where drive-by shootings are common. More than likely Maggie's nine-year-old dealer came from a family where drugs and alcoholism, welfare checks, and hopelessness had been a fact of life for two, maybe three generations. Maggie and I and every other juvenile counselor in the department had seen it a hundred times over.
"God, Sally, why do we stay in this rotten profession?" Maggie demanded.
It was an oft-asked rhetorical question. "1 know why you do it. It's because you’re studying to be a Baptist saint."
Maggie let go of a chuckle. "Yeah, yeah, that’s gotta be the truth because I know it isn’t my itty bitty paycheck inspiring me. Speaking of inspiration"—she tucked the file back under her arm along with the dozen or so others already clamped there—"saw your ex sitting in his fancy box at Camden Yards last night. He was alone."
"Yeah. So. while I was being burgled, Joe had been watching a baseball game. At least he hadn’t had a date. I felt myself tighten up. Whenever anyone raises the subject of Joe Winder 1 still go stiff as a lamppost.
Maggie, who can sweet-talk a hornet's nest, but who can also have the tact of a freight train, searched my face. "I don't suppose there's any hope of you two getting back together."
"No hope." I began to rifle through the stacks of files carpeting my desk. 1 was going to be spending the day out in the field, interviewing teachers, cornering hostile parents. Pointedly, I glanced at my watch.
"Hookay, I know when I'm poking my nose into a nest of bloodthirsty, man-eating fleas." Maggie turned to go, then glanced back over her shoulder. "Speaking of fleas, get yourself a dog.”
"What?"
"Child, every woman living alone should have a dog and a gun and—if she's smart—a man she can call in an emergency. You're glad you had that gun, aren't you? If you'd had a dog barking its head off, those kids might never have bothered you."
"I've already called about getting a security system installed."
"Burglar alarms are fine, but dogs are better. Think about it."
I thought about it all the way down to the parking lot. A dog? What would it be like to have a dog? Except for tropical fish, I’d never owned a pet. How much care did you have to give them? What would it cost to feed one? Where did you go to get one? Would a dog really have stopped Jamal and his girlfriend from climbing through my window in the first place?
The late spring morning was windy and overcast and the Bureau of Juvenile Services parking lot, never a beauty spot, looked bleak.
As I headed for my ’ancient Ford Mustang, 1 scanned the premises. You never know what you're going to meet in city parking lots these days. Only last week a couple of kids were caught stealing the tires off our supervisor's state vehicle.
1 had just slid in behind the wheel when a Chevy Cavalier pulled into the empty space alongside and blasted its horn. My head jerked around in time to see the driver lean across the empty passenger seat and roll down the window.
"Top of the morning to you, Sally."
"Morning, Detective Spikowski." I grinned. "To what do I owe this pleasure?"
Through the open window, Duke Spikowski gave me the once-over. He's a big man in his late thirties with a square, blunt-featured face, short, curly sand- colored hair, and shrewd gray-green eyes that size you up against some yardstick he keeps to himself. I've heard him laugh, so I know he has a sense of humor. He just doesn't trot it out often.
It's a little hard to explain our relationship. He’s sort of a foster brother, I guess. But since Duke was away in the army when his parents took me in, I never really got to know him well the way I did his kid brother, Peter. We've always been a little wary of each other.
"I hear you had a B and E last night."
"Word certainly gets around."
Ignoring my caustic tone, Duke killed his motor and then got out and came over. He was wearing his detective suit, a boxy gray job set off by a maroon tie with a little diagonal stripe. I swear the man must have a closet filled with copycat gray suits and maroon ties. When he's working I never see him wear anything else. Same thing with his socks. They're always the identical shade of the tie.
Admittedly, I don't see all that much of Duke. Sometimes we go for months without running into each other. Then when we do, it feels as if we re sharing a secret. Damned if I know what the secret is, though.
He leaned an arm on the hood of my car and peered down into my upturned face. "You okay?"
"Do 1 look okay?"
His gaze flicked my features. "A little pale, maybe. Tough, all you've been through and then just moving into a new place and having something like this happen."
Duke was referring to my assault. It happened nine months ago. A guy tried to rape me. When he found that his weapon of choice wouldn't cooperate, he beat me up instead.
When it happened, I was engaged to be married. The trauma broke Joe and me up. Duke was right. My life, of late, hadn’t been balloons and chocolate drops.
"I’m fine, Duke. I appreciate your concern, but last night was really nothing. Two minutes after my uninvited guests left, I dialed 911. An officer named Miller came by and took my statement. He was very sweet. You should give him a promotion."
"Rookie officers don’t get promotions for being sweet. Listen, I read your statement. I’d like to talk to you about it, but I guess now’s not the time."
"Sorry." I took my hand off the key in the ignition and patted the bulging briefcase next to me on the passenger seat. "Got work to do.”
He straightened and took a step back. "Okay. I’ll give you a call and set up an appointment. In the meantime, here’s something to mull over. There’s been a rash of B and Es in the Federal Hill area. We’re theorizing it might be a gang."
"A gang?"
"Yeah. I’d like to hear more about these burglars of yours." He waved. "Have a happy day."
So now I had two things to think about, a dog and the couple I'd surprised in my living room. Not that 1 hadn't been thinking about Jamal and his blond girlfriend all along.
Every day I work with kids who are in trouble. The city budget being what it is, I sometimes juggle eighty cases at a time. Frankly, a lot of those youngsters don't make that deep an impression. I mean, if they did I'd be in the funny farm by now. Still, all too often, one really gets to me.
This time two had really gotten to me. I’d caught only a glimpse of the girl, yet her image hung in my mind. She hadn’t been much to look at. Skinny as a rake with transparent skin stretched over a face that was all bones and eyes. But the blight mixed with terror that I'd seen in her had cut straight through me.
The boy, Jamal, had been memorable, too. I liked the way he'd told her to run and then stayed to cover her retreat. Chivalry is rare these days. What was their relationship? I wondered. He might be her pimp, but somehow I doubted that. What would have happened if I hadn’t had the gun? Would he have attacked me, done me serious harm?
I doubted that, too. But here I knew I was on shaky ground. My instincts about people aren't always too good—witness what had just happened with Joe. Intriguing though I found Jamal and his girlfriend, I didn't want to run into them again. Especially I didn't want to run into them again at two o’clock in the morning in my living room.
Chapter Two
Several hours later on the way home from work, I veered off the main road into a narrow entrance. I'd seen the sign for the animal shelter many times. On occasion I’d even caught sight of people walking down the steep drive that is its entrance. They’d caught my eye because they’d been holding two or three leashes attached to frisking dogs. How much longer did the ones left in the pound have, I’d wondered. A week? Two weeks?
I guess those questions had made more of an impression than I'd realized. Now I charged my Mustang up that road as if I'd been planning a rescue raid for months.
"I want a dog," I told the girl at the reception desk. Her badge said her name was Suzy.
"Great. What kind of a dog?" She looked me up and down. Through the closed metal doors behind her I heard frantic barking.
"1 want a big dog. A German shepherd or a Lab or something like that. It's for protection."
Adopting a pet is a lot more complicated than 1 would have imagined. You have to sign a covenant that rivals Rumpelstiltskin's. But the worst part is walking down those rows of cages and meeting the eyes of their doomed inmates and having to choose. Halfway, 1 spotted a German shepherd. 1 was making for him when I saw the black rag mop in the cage next door.
Curled up tight in a canine fetal position, she was covered with matted black ringlets. Her long floppy ears hung down over her snub-nosed face like beaver tails. When I paused in front of her, she pulled herself up on all fours. Wobbling from side to side, she peered out at me with the biggest, saddest brown eyes in the world.
"What kind is she?" I asked Suzy.
"Just a mix, part cocker, part something else. She wouldn't do for a watchdog. Too small and gentle."
“Yeah. I guess so."
Suzy sighed. “It's too bad. Poor little thing."
"She's so cute. Who would give her up?"
“Oh, it happens all the time. People decide to give their kid a puppy for Christmas. Then when he doesn't take care of her and she gets big enough to need spaying, the parents decide she's too much bother. So they dump her here.”
As if acknowledging the cruel scenario, the rag mop gave a little moan. 1 couldn’t stop myself. I reached out and poked a finger inside her cage. Suzy started to warn me against that, but it was too late. I’d already felt the warm, wet pressure of the rag mop’s pink tongue. Our gazes met and held, mine weak, hers pleading.
Then I saw the red tag tied around a top bar on the cage. "What does that mean?"
"We keep track of how long the animals have been here with those."
I glanced around and noticed tags on all the cages, but not all in the same colors. Some were yellow, others blue, white and green. "Does that red mean she's in the danger zone?"
"She’s been here awhile. We can't afford to keep them long, unfortunately."
"So, how much longer does she have?"
"Tomorrow’s her last day."
"Tomorrow?"
I glanced over at the German shepherd. He was a handsome beast and would probably make somebody a great watchdog, but his tag was green.
Well, so that's how I happened to take home a dog that would probably welcome future burglars as honored guests. Doubtless, she would lead them to all the valuables, pointing out any they might otherwise have overlooked, and then escort them to the front door happily wagging her stump of a tail.
By the time I got home with Mopsy—that's what I'd started to call her—it was past eight at night. I unearthed a bowl from one of my yet-unpacked boxes and filled it with some of the start-up kibbles Suzy had provided. Then I shed my business clothes for jeans and a sweatshirt and fixed myself a turkey sandwich and a glass of diet Coke.
While I ate, I watched Mopsy. After delicately nibbling a third of the food in her bowl, she selected a corner of the kitchen next to the refrigerator. She lay down with her paws crossed and regarded me anxiously.
“It’s okay," I told her. "I'm a nice lady. You'd have to do something pretty awful before I'd take you back to those cages with red ribbons. This is your new home. Why don’t you check it out?"
She made a noise and I laughed. "Yeah, 1 know. It's pretty messy. Well, see, I just moved in and I haven't had time to get set up. Maybe I’ll do some of that tonight. What do you say?"
I rinsed my plate, poured myself another diet soda, and went out into the living room. Mopsy followed, claws going clickety on the bare wood floor. While she threaded a path around the boxes and settled herself in another corner, I stood surveying the clutter.
The broken dishes where Jamal had tripped and fallen still lay on the floor. The boxed VCR his girlfriend had dropped when I surprised them lay wedged against another box at a crazy angle. I relived the scene and my breathing grew ragged. What if I hadn't had the Ruger and known how to use it? Before I was assaulted I'd never even touched a gun. It was only after that, at Duke's suggestion, I'd made myself learn. What if it hadn't been a pair of kids but a guy with a knife, like that other guy?
My aloneness closed around me like a fist. Nobody here to protect me but me. Taking a deep breath, I told myself to cool it. Then I dropped to my knees and began scooping up the shattered dishes.
An hour later I had the floor swept and four boxes unpacked. "Looks a lot better, doesn't it?”
Mopsy panted and woofed politely. While I'd been working. I'd kept up a running conversation with her. It hadn't all been one-sided, either. She’d whine, or thump her tail as if she actually understood what I was saying. Really, it was almost like having a friend. Maybe this dog thing was going to work out.
I was shaking couch pillows out of a green plastic bag when the doorbell rang. Dumping the bag, I peered over the top of my closed shutters, spotted the maroon Lexus parked under a streetlight, and identified my visitor. "Who is it?” I yelled just to give myself time to get my breathing under control.
"It’s me, Joe. I need to talk to you, Sally.”
My hands quivered as I undid the deadbolt. He was on the stoop. For a moment I just stood gazing at him.
It's not true that absence makes the heart grow fonder. It is true that when you’ve lost something you really start to appreciate it.
My ex-fiance is a tall, well-built Johnathan Rhys Meyers look- alike. He's the CEO at C&G, a brokerage firm with an office tower in downtown Baltimore. The hand-tailored English suit he had on told me he must have been working late and come directly from the office. My gaze played over him. His hair had been razor cut short and crisp to the micro inch by a master barber. His intent ice blue eyes were a stark contrast in his deeply tanned face.
The silver at his temples is Joe’s only concession to having celebrated his forty-eighth birthday. Fitness is his religion. When he isn’t locking up million-dollar business deals, he's either working out at a gym, playing tennis, riding horseback, or diving. In fact, the first time I saw him he was scuba diving in a tank full of tropical fish at the National Aquarium. We met because we were both off-hours volunteers there.
Okay, so maybe you're wondering why a thirty-year-old woman is the ex-fiance of an almost fifty-year-old. All I can say is that Joe is the most vital, exciting man I’ve ever met. At first the age difference made me a little wary. But he pursued me like a retriever on the trail of a wounded canvasback. Calls, flowers, candy, romantic telegrams. When he rolled up to my door and wafted me off to the opera in a rented white limo, I fell like a crane off a fifty-story building. That night we made love, and Joe proved himself as vigorous and thoroughly competent in bed as he was everywhere else. From then on, the age difference just didn’t matter.
After we’d lived together for a year and decided to make it permanent with a small but perfect wedding in the spring, the flame still burned high. Then that guy came at me with a knife.
Chapter Three
"What do you want to talk to me about?"
“Can I come in?"
“Yes, sure. The place is kind of messy. 1 haven't finished unpacking."
As Joe strolled past me, I held myself stiffly. That didn't keep my eyes from straying wistfully to the back of his head. Our separation didn't appear to be doing him any harm.
Seeing him made me feel resentful, even though in a lot of ways the breakup was as much my doing as his. After the assault I was impossible to live with— touchy, depressed, paranoid. Long after my bruises and cuts healed, the wound to my psyche stayed raw.
“Nice little place," he said, glancing around. "I can see you could use some help. Is there something you'd like me to lift?"
Opportunists are survivors. "Well, in exchange for a cold beer, you could put the TV and VCR back into that cabinet.”
He shot me his quick, glinting smile. "Deal."
When I returned with the beer, Joe was on his knees threading wires through the back of my entertainment center. “I'm kind of surprised you've decided to move so close to my place on Warren."
Joe owns two houses, a three-story yellow brick Victorian across from Federal Hill and a big spread in the Greenspring Valley. Monday through Friday he lives in the city close to his office. Weekends he usually heads for the county.
His valley property is gorgeous, with horses pastured in meadows surrounded by white rail fences. While I lived with him he gave me carte blanche to decorate both his homes. Now he has them all to himself again.
"I like Federal Hill, always have. I think it's big enough for both of us."
"I didn't mean it wasn't, Sally. I’m just a little concerned with you living here all alone."
“Well, don't worry your head. Besides, I'm not living alone. I've got protection." I pointed at Mopsy. who was listening with her head cocked.
Joe followed the direction of my glance and laughed. "A dog? Hairy, too. Where'd you pick it up?"
While I explained, he held out his hand. Females respond to Joe like popcorn in a microwave. Mopsy came waddling over, tail thumping. He petted her and she licked his fingers as if they were coated with Alpo.
"How'd you know where to find me?" I asked.
He peered up at me and then gave Mopsy a final pat before rising smoothly to his feet. "Duke Spikowski told me.”
"Duke? You mean you looked him up?"
Joe shook his head. "He stopped in at my office to see me. Wanted to let me know your new place had been broken into."
"Why'd he do that?”
“Sally, for Chrissake, we were engaged to be married. Maybe he thought I’d care!"
"Do you?"
We stood looking at each other, a million unspoken thoughts hanging between us. Joe groaned and laid his right hand on my shoulder. The heat of it burned through the fabric of my shirt and I felt the old familiar ache in my gut and in my groin. It had been months since I'd had sex, or wanted it. Suddenly having Joe standing so close let me know in no uncertain terms that I did.
"Of course I care, Sally." He moved his hand to my wrist and drew me toward him. "I care a lot. I always have, and I always will."
“Oh. Joe...” I resisted, but not as hard as I should have. Being with Joe had always made me feel safe, secure, and loved. Desperately, I wanted to feel that way again.
He searched my face. "Duke didn't look me up just to tell me about your break-in."
"What?”
"He was testing the water."
I didn’t understand what Joe was talking about.
"Sally, he wanted to find out if we really were quits. Is there something going on between the two of you?"
At that, my eyes widened. "There’s never been anything between Duke and me."
"Yeah, I figured that. Of the two brothers, Pete’s always been your favorite."
That was true, but all I could think about now was Joe and how close he was standing to me. “Well, I’ve never dated either Duke or Peter, even before they were each married. I think of them as my brothers."
"Are you dating anyone?"
"I’ve been out a couple of times, just to prove to myself 1 could do it. Why the cross-examination? What do you care?"
"Oh, God, Sally—" Joe drew me to him and pressed his mouth down on mine. I started to respond and then caught myself. With all my being, I wanted to kiss him back. The dates I'd had since our separation had been disasters. And not because of the men I'd gone out with. Because of me. 1 just hadn't wanted to get started again with another man. I hadn't had the heart for it.
The breakup had been Joe's idea, not mine. I missed him and what we’d had together terribly. "Joe," I whispered, turning my face aside, "why are you doing this? What did you come here to talk to me about?”
At that, he stopped. Then he gave a big sigh. "You’re right. I shouldn’t be doing this. I need to tell you something."
'What's that?" I sensed there wasn't going to be any more kissing now, so I stepped back.
Joe looked slightly embarrassed. He jammed his hands in his pockets and paced to the window and then back. All the time, even when he turned to face me again, he didn’t meet my eyes. "I guess this is going to sound pretty funny, but I came to tell you that I've been seeing a lot of Janet lately."
I just stood there frozen, Janet was his ex-wife. They’d divorced two years before Joe and I met. "1 thought you and Janet couldn't stand each other."
"That’s what I thought, too. But she's changed and so have I. Scott is going to graduate from high school this year. I've been feeling guilty about not seeing him as much as I should. After you and I split, I started going out there. One thing led to another. Sally, I think Janet and I are going to give it another try."
"Another try? You mean, like remarry?"
Joe shifted his stance. Finally, his eyes met mine. "Well, not right away, of course. But it's a possibility. I just thought the decent thing was to tell you before you found it out some other way."
“Decent!" I balled my hands into fists and struggled for breath. When I found it, I gasped out, “You come here uninvited, start trying to kiss me—Jesus Christ, Joe!" I grabbed the beer he’d set on the coffee table and threw it in his face.
Chapter Four
All those sessions at his executive health club have given Joe quick reflexes. He yelped when the can struck his forehead and caught it before it could fall on the floor. Nevertheless, the beer splashed out. It wet his eyelashes and dripped down his cheeks.
"You son of a bitch!"
"Now, Sally—"
"Don’t Sally me! Get the hell out of my house, asshole!" I yanked the door open and glared at him.
I was so steamed that at first I didn't notice his gaze had gone beyond me and he had a funny expression on his face. I turned and saw Duke Spikowski standing there on the stoop.
He, too, wore a funny expression. "I just thought I’d drop by to talk to you about your B and E," he said. "Guess I caught you at another bad moment. I'll try again tomorrow." He nodded at Joe and then turned and walked back out to his car. As he got in, he was whistling.
There I was, alone in my living room cursing Joe and pacing like a windup toy. Mopsy whimpered and scratched at the door I'd just slammed.
"So, what’s your problem? Don't tell me you’re sticking up for that jerk! Listen, he didn’t walk out in your time of need. He didn't sweet-talk you and then go back to his wife when things got rough."
I glared at Mopsy, but she only scratched at the door again. By that time I'd figured out her problem. 1 sighed. "Okay, okay. I gotcha. Time to water the grass."
Outside, Mopsy finished up and looked at me inquiringly. 1 glanced back at the house and shook my head. My insides were too scrambled over what had just happened with Joe to want to coop myself up. I needed exercise. "How about we take a little walk," I told her. "Get some fresh air."
You might wonder what a woman traumatized by a near rape was doing strolling around a city at night. Well, the irony is that even though I spend my working life in all the worst city neighborhoods. I was attacked while jogging in the early morning on a tree-lined country road about a mile from Joe's Greenspring Valley paradise. Truth is. now I actually feel safer on a city street than I ever will in the country again.
As Mopsy tugged me along. I tried not to think about Joe. Instead, I reflected on how unhealthy the life I lead is. Five days a week I’m either downing gallons of coffee at meetings in stuffy office buildings, or waiting to testify in courtrooms, or riding around in a car trying to track down delinquent parents, overworked teachers, service officers, or cops.
Lunch is usually what I can grab at a McDonald's and cram down my throat while I steer one-handed. I’m medium height with a wiry build and have always been skinny and strong. But I’m never going to see twenty-nine again. Pretty soon my decadent ways will catch up with me.
Gradually, I got into the rhythm of strolling with Mopsy. While she sniffed trees and cracks in the narrow sidewalk, I relaxed some and took pleasure in the cool night breeze riffling my hair. I kept an eye out for potential muggers, but saw only couples strolling arm in arm and other people walking dogs.
Still not wanting to think about Joe and his announcement, I started speculating about the burglary ring Duke had mentioned. Even now Jamal and his girlfriend might be picking out their next mark. That set me to musing. I found myself sizing up each townhouse Mopsy and 1 passed. How close were the windows to the ground? Did they have grates or closed shutters? Any signs of a burglar alarm? Was the place well enough kept to suggest that it might have good stuff inside? What kind of car was parked at the curb?
Now, there was an easy gauge, I thought. BMWs,
Mercedeses, and top-of-the-line Japanese sedans caught my eye and I started taking special note of the houses they were parked closest to. But if Jamal and company used that yardstick, why had they burgled my place when I drove an aging Mustang? Oh, yes, my neighbor had a new Camry and he’d been parked practically at my door last night.
Pleased at my powers of deduction, I gave a satisfied chuckle that made Mopsy turn around and look at me again. We'd walked several blocks. Without consciously intending to, I’d directed my steps to the high-rent district at the top of Federal Hill where not so long ago I’d lived during the week with Joe. Big old Victorian brick townhouses gazed serenely out over the park and the harbor. Below the end of the street where 1 stood, the water from the bay wound like a skein of shiny black silk. Lights on the streets and on the boats moving back and forth caged it in a changeable web of diamond glitter.
Once, twice, I filled my lungs. I felt bad about the way I’d yelled at Joe. A scene like that could only make the pain of our parting worse. In fact, maybe I should work at making things better. Maybe I should tap on Joe's door and wish him well. Why say good-bye forever on such a sour note?
Five minutes later I stood on the sidewalk outside Joe’s house and stared up at his living-room window. It was un-shuttered and brightly lit. Framed against it, I saw Joe and another man. I recognized Joe’s guest from his shock of reddish hair and slump-shouldered posture. He was Frank Leftwich, an accountant who worked for C&G under loe and who was also a volunteer at the aquarium. This must not be my ex’s night for tranquillity. He and Frank appeared to be having an argument, or at least a heated discussion.
Frank was a fussy bachelor. It was hard to imagine him getting up the nerve to argue with anybody. And indeed, he looked even more upset than Joe. He hung his head like a frightened kindergartner tattling to the teacher about a rough playmate and not getting a very good reception.
Chapter Five
What is it about watching people on the other side of a lighted window? Strangers are interesting, but ex-lovers are truly fascinating. Since he had company, I'd abandoned any thought of tapping on Joe’s door. Yet I must have stood there staring at him for a good five minutes. Then Joe and Frank moved away.
I gave myself a shake. "C'mon," I told the patiently waiting Mopsy. “This is not the time for a final reconciliation scene with the ex-love of my life.”
Several times during the next few days 1 thought about calling Joe and burying the hatchet. Yet I didn’t. That Sunday night I sat curled on my couch in my bathrobe and slippers, going over case files, listening to the eleven o'clock news. A news item made me jerk my head around and gape at the screen.
"Tragedy here in Baltimore tonight. A prominent C&G executive plunged to his death from the Chase Street Bridge."
It was Joe.
After work the next day, still in shock over Joe s death, I stopped off at Mama Spikowski’s. In the living room I found her younger son, Peter-the-candidate, meeting with half a dozen eager campaign workers. After I'd given Pete a weak high sign and he’d waved back distractedly, I tiptoed past and closed the door between the kitchen and living room.
"Sally, doll, whatcha’ been up to?"
“Nothing much.” After pecking Mama on the cheek, I dropped my briefcase on the floor and perched atop a creaky red-painted stool. Dumbly, I sat breathing in the fragrance of canned peaches and fresh bread.
Mama, who likes to bake and never gives calories or cholesterol a thought, was sprinkling brown sugar and chopped nuts over a thick slab of dough slathered with butter. Maybe I'd better explain that her real name isn't Mama. It’s Pat. But I’ve never heard anybody call her that.
She’s a big woman, built like a pear on stilts, and imposing. The neon knit tops she wears upholster an impressive pair of cantaloupe breasts. Her marshmallow face, with its kohl-rimmed blue eyes, is marvelously expressive. Atop it, she sports a pile of bottle-blond hair.
Back in the sixties Baltimore was famous for its beehive hairdos. Mama's coiffure isn't exactly a beehive, but it is elaborate, a varnished cornucopia of complicated curls and waves that testify to her skill at her calling. She operates a beauty shop down on Eastern Avenue called The HairStop.
Mama is my foster mother. Vivian Dunphy, my birth mother, is an alcoholic. I lived with her until I was twelve. Well, to oversimplify a complicated story, I ran away. When I was caught, I got turned over to the Spikowskis, and I’ve been on the straight and narrow ever since.
’’Sally, you look like the world's been beating up on you." Mama said as she clomped to the refrigerator. ’Still pining over Mr. Fancypants?”
”Joe? I guess you haven’t heard.”
“Heard what?”
“He committed suicide last night.” Even as I said the words, I still couldn't believe them. Joe, dead? It couldn't be possible.
Mama stopped what she was doing and stared at me. "I didn't know. Are you sure about this?"
"It was on last night’s news. I called the police right away and they confirmed it."
"They didn’t want you to identify the body or anything?"
"His ex-wife's already done that."
Mama rubbed her chin. "I’m surprised Duke didn’t tell me. He was out of town yesterday. That must be the reason." She looked at me hard, that searchlight look she used to give me when I was a kid coming home from school after something rotten happened. "Are you all right?”
I nodded. "Guess it hasn’t really hit me yet. I just feel sort of numb."
"You don’t sound so good. Disjointed, like. You don't look too hot, either. When you first came in, I thought maybe you had a bug, you’re so pale.”
I'd been sitting there like a lump. Now 1 started to wring my hands. “Oh, Mama, I don't know what to do. Joe's dead and I wouldn't even have known if I hadn't heard it on the news. It’s so crazy.”
Tears leaked down my cheeks. I took a swipe at them and then hugged myself and shivered.
"Sally, you poor baby " Mama wrapped her arms around me and let me cry into her soft, floury-smelling bosom. While I sobbed and hiccupped, she stroked my hair.
"I can't believe he did it," I kept saying. "1 just can’t believe he killed himself."
When I finally let up some, Mama said, "You aren’t blaming yourself, are you, Sally?"
"I don't know." I lifted my head and leaned away. Mama got a box of tissue, from the top of the refrigerator and handed it to me.
"What do you mean, you don't know?"
"Mama, the last time I saw Joe we had a terrible fight. I felt bad about it afterward. I was going to call him and try and set things right. But I never did."
Mama rolled her eyes. "For God’s sake, Sally, I don't believe what I’m hearing. You honestly think Joe Winder committed suicide because you had a fight with him?"
"No." I blew my nose. "1 just can’t believe Joe would commit suicide over anything. He wasn't the type to kill himself at all. I certainly can’t picture him taking a dive onto the Jones Falls Expressway. 1 mean, Joe dressed in five-hundred-dollar suits. He was vain about his appearance and meticulously neat. It sounds awful to say it, but he wouldn't want to risk getting messed up."
Mama peered at me. "What do you know about what a man will do when he’s feeling low? From all I know of men, they're an unpredictable breed. He could have had a million troubles in his life that he never told you about."
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