An Unquiet Grave (Louis Kincaid Mysteries) (9 page)

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Authors: P.J. Parrish

BOOK: An Unquiet Grave (Louis Kincaid Mysteries)
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As Charlie Oberon staggered closer into the light, everything came into focus. His bloody sweatshirt. A woman’s lifeless, naked body, Charlie’s long fingers pressed into her thighs. Arms, hanging limp, shreds of dark, wet leaves stuck to them. Her hair . . . long, blond, and thick with blood.
“She won’t wake up,” Charlie cried. “She won’t wake up.”
Louis broke into a run toward him.
CHAPTER 9
 
Louis reached for his gun, but he didn’t have it. It was in the glove box of the Impala. He had no cuffs either. And he had no idea what he was looking at.
Charlie was motionless now, his face slick with sweat despite the cold, and his arms were trembling under the weight of the woman.
The woman was naked, her skin a pasty blue gray with splotches of red, small bits of leaves and twigs stuck to it. Caked blood streaked her blond hair.
“Set her down,” Louis said.
Charlie’s eyes filled with tears.
Louder and sharper. “Set her down. Now.”
Charlie looked behind Louis at Alice, his eyes begging her for some sort of help. Louis motioned Alice forward, and as she stepped up next to him he could hear her quickened breaths.
“Talk to him, Miss Cooper,” Louis said. “But don’t get too close.”
When she did not speak, he snuck a glance. Her hand was at her lips, her powdered skin colorless.
“Talk to him.”
“Charlie,” Alice managed, “put Rebecca down.”
“She won’t wake up,” Charlie said. “She’s cold. She’s cold.”
“Put her down, Charlie,” Alice said again.
Her voice was stronger now, her gaze steady on Charlie. And she took a step closer, then another. Louis started to reach for her, but she moved away from him.
“Charlie,” she said, “put Rebecca down, please. Carefully.”
Charlie dropped to one knee, easing the woman to the grass. She fell toward Louis, arms limp, head cocked to the side.
Bruises. On her face and shoulders. Raw, red marks around her wrists, ankles, and neck.
Louis forced his eyes away from the woman to Charlie. He had not moved, his head hanging low, arms at his sides. He was staring at her as if she were a broken toy he knew he could not fix.
“Charlie, back away from her,” Louis said.
Charlie didn’t seem to hear at first. Then he took a few steps backward, then a few more, finally collapsing on the ground about fifteen feet behind the body. He drew his legs in and crossed his arms over his belly, still staring vacantly.
Alice edged closer. Louis caught her arm. “Go call the police,” he said.
Alice hesitated, her head jerking from Charlie to the dead woman and back to Louis. Her makeup was streaked with tear lines, and she looked scared.
“Go call the police,” Louis repeated. “Now.”
Alice ran across the grass. Louis eased toward Charlie. Charlie was still frozen, huddled into himself. Louis knelt near the body.
Her eyes were open, brown glassy pools. Her neck looked crushed, the skin reddish purple, deep finger marks clearly visible. He knew she was dead, but still he held a finger to her neck, then her wrist. But there was nothing. She was cold to the touch.
He looked at Charlie. “Did you kill her?”
“She won’t wake up.”
“Did you hurt her?”
Charlie looked up at Louis, his face drawn tight, his eyes pained. Louis had no idea what was wrong with Charlie mentally or how he comprehended the world, women, life or death, or anything else. And he didn’t know how to talk to him.
“Charlie, where did she go to sleep?” Louis asked.
Charlie pointed back to the trees.
Louis rose. “Will you take me there?”
Charlie didn’t move, his gaze drifting back to the body. Louis took his arm, urging him to his feet. When he stood, Louis tapped his shoulder to make sure he had Charlie’s attention.
“Take me to where she fell asleep.”
Charlie turned slowly. His sweatshirt was unzipped, half off his bony shoulders, but he didn’t pull it up. He walked slowly into the brush, then the trees, careful to hold the branches back for Louis.
Louis kept glancing behind him, afraid he’d lose the way back to E Building, but he didn’t want to stop. If there was a crime scene out here somewhere, he wanted to see it. And maybe preserve it.
The trees were thick now, the brush sharp and tangled, but Charlie moved unfazed through it. Finally, he stopped. It was a tiny clearing, filled with a thick blanket of leaves. Right in the center lay a white nurse’s shoe, speckled with blood.
“Where are her clothes?” Louis asked.
Charlie didn’t answer him as he eyes drifted to the ground. At his feet were two small plastic flowers. Yellow daisies, the petals faded and cracked from the weather. Charlie bent to pick them up, but Louis grabbed his arm.
“Don’t touch them,” Louis said.
“They’re mine,” Charlie said. “I put them on her eyes. She needs them to wake up.”
“Where did you get the flowers?”
“The cemetery,” Charlie said.
Louis’s eyes moved slowly over Charlie’s shirt. The bloodstains were light smears, put there by cradling Rebecca’s body against his chest. But Charlie had no blood on his green cotton pants. Or his face or his hands, except a few light smears. It was obvious the woman had been dead far longer than a few minutes, so if Charlie had killed her, when had he done it? Last night? Early this morning? And if he had killed her, why carry her out into the open?
Jesus. You’re dealing with a crazy man, Kincaid. You have no idea what he did to her or why. You don’t even know what’s wrong with this man.
But he did know he needed to keep asking questions. And that he needed to keep it simple.
“Charlie, do you know what dead is?” Louis asked.
“Yes.”
“Rebecca is dead,” Louis said.
Charlie hung his head, drawing a hand across his face, smearing dirt on his cheek.
“You didn’t mean to hurt her, did you?” Louis asked.
“I didn’t . . . no. I didn’t. But she cried . . . she cried all night. All night. I listened to her cry all night.”
“Where was she when she was crying?” Louis asked. “Can you show me where she was?”
“I couldn’t see her but I could hear her.”
Damn it . . . this isn’t making sense. Try again.
“Where were you when you heard her crying?” Louis asked.
“In the cemetery,” Charlie said.
“You were in the cemetery last night?”
“I walk in the cemetery every night,” Charlie said. “I talk to them.”
“The dead people?”
Charlie rubbed his face again, looking off into the woods. For a few seconds, he was quiet, as if he was suddenly aware that talking to graves was something he shouldn’t share. Louis wondered if there wasn’t a small part of Charlie that understood he saw the world differently than most people did.
“The graves cry,” he whispered. “I try to talk to them, but they never hear me.”
“Do the graves talk, too?”
“No,” Charlie said. “Just cry.”
Louis started to ask another question, but he heard the distant wail of a siren. Charlie heard it, too, and his head shot up, his eyes scanning the trees.
“Police,” he said. “The police are coming.”
“Yes. Let’s go back.”
“No. No police. No police.” Charlie’s arms came out, fingers spread. “No policemen. Please. No.”
“They won’t hurt you.”
“No police, please. Police hurt Mama.”
Louis pulled on Charlie’s sweatshirt to get him moving. Charlie tried to reach out to grab a branch, but Louis firmly eased him forward.
“Take me back, Charlie,” Louis said. “Take me back to Rebecca now.”
Charlie wiped his face again, the tears mixing with the mud and blood. “They’ll take me away,” he said.
“Take me back to Rebecca.”
Charlie started moving, pulling nervously at the straps of his wool hat as he trudged through the brush. Every few steps, Louis would hear a soft sob or a low muttering about the policemen.
The siren suddenly cut off as Louis and Charlie broke the trees, coming back out into the compound behind E Building. There were two police cars parked on the grass. White with a streak of blue across the side. Alice was standing near one, her coat pulled tight around her.
Two cops were bent over Rebecca’s body, and Louis directed Charlie toward them. He pressed back against Louis’s hand, but Louis urged him forward, and as they cleared the trees, one of the cops looked up.
He wore a navy blue windbreaker with a thin gold stripe and a cap embroidered with Ardmore P.D. on the front.
“I’m Chief Dan Dalum,” he said.
Dalum’s face had the pink puff of a newborn baby, but a healthy gray-blond mustache and wire-rimmed glasses set his age close to forty. His voice was deep and melodious like that of a D.J. on a classical radio station.
“Louis Kincaid,” Louis said.
“You’re the visitor,” Dalum said. He looked at Charlie.
“So that makes him the patient then, the man who carried her out here?”
“Yes.”
Dalum tapped his officer on the shoulder, then faced Charlie. “We’re going to handcuff you, Charlie,” Dalum said. “It’s for your protection and ours. Do you understand?”
Louis could tell Charlie didn’t understand, but Charlie let the officer handcuff him, his eyes searching for Alice. He saw her near the cruiser, and when the officer led him in that direction, he went easily.
Dalum looked back at the body in the grass, and then moved around her, positioning himself on the other side. His face was rigid, and Louis thought he saw him blanche slightly. Then his blue eyes came back up, settling on Louis.
“Why did you and Charlie go back there in the woods?” Dalum asked.
“I wanted to see if there was a crime scene,” Louis said. “I was hoping he might talk to me.”
Dalum’s eyes stayed steady on Louis. “You talk like a cop.”
“Ex-cop. I’m a private eye now,” Louis said.
“Here in Michigan?”
“Raised in Plymouth, live in Florida now.”
Dalum tipped up the brim of his ball cap. “And you’re here at Hidden Lake why?”
“I’m just trying to locate a former patient for a client. Alice and I were coming out of that building,” Louis said, pointing to E Building, “when we saw Charlie coming out of the trees, carrying her.”
Dalum turned to look at Charlie, but he was almost invisible in the back of the cruiser. “Charlie say anything to you back there in the woods?” Dalum asked.
There was a defensive edge in Dalum’s voice, and Louis understood why. No local cop wanted to be upstaged by an out-of-state P.I., especially on what was probably the town’s first homicide in years.
“I’m not sure,” Louis said. “It didn’t make any sense to me, but maybe when you question him you’ll hear something I didn’t. Alice may be a big help, too. She knows him.”
“Did you find a crime scene?” Dalum asked.
“No, it looks like she was killed somewhere else and just dumped there. No blood, no clothes, except for one shoe.”
Dalum was quiet for a moment, his eyes drifting back down to Rebecca. Her skin had gone even bluer, and she looked more like a toppled marble statue than a human being.
“Let me get something from the car,” Dalum said.
Louis nodded. Dalum walked back to his cruiser and leaned into an open window, picking up his radio from inside. Louis guessed he was calling the medical examiner or crime scene techs. When he was finished, Dalum walked to the trunk of the car and opened it. He returned with a green blanket that he laid over Rebecca. Then he looked at Louis.
“Show me this place you think she was dumped.”
Louis led Dalum into the trees.
“I’m going to ask for your discretion on this, Mr. Kincaid,” Dalum said.
“Of course.”
“Most people around here are damn glad to see this place go away, and this kind of murder will just bring more looky-loos out here again.”
“I understand,” Louis said.
“For years, we’ve been swatting away reporters who wanted to write about people like Donald Lee Becker.”
“Or the eyeball eater,” Louis said.
“There was never an eyeball eater. It was just a myth,” Dalum said, ducking under a branch.
“I know,” Louis said.
“Yeah, but a lot of other people don’t. They think he was real. Like the stories of torture and brain removals that were supposedly going on inside.”

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