Haunting Refrain (21 page)

“
Fettucine
alla
carbonara
.
My mother usually made this or a frittata on Sunday evenings. No one worried about cholesterol then.” He made small talk while he cooked. “Why don't you put some music
on.
”

“Okay.” She had seen the equipment in a corner of the dining room. His system looked manageable, so she knelt to select a CD.
Although he leaned toward opera and classical, he had a broad selection.
She finally chose an old Lena Horne recording, and slid the disk in as the mixed aroma of bacon and Parmesan cheese reached her.
 
She returned to the kitchen to see him deftly cracking eggs by popping them on the counter with a flick of his wrist. He dropped the egg into his other hand, letting the white slide through his fingers into a cup. He dropped the yolks into the pasta mixture. An empty cream carton sat on the counter next to a butter wrapper. She could almost see the calories simmering in the skillet. She inhaled deeply.
“Um-mm.
That smells wonderful.”

He washed his hands and returned to the stove, quickly stirring in the yolks. After a minute, he turned off the burner and brought the creamy pasta dish to the table. “Let’s eat.” He took a bottle from the refrigerator.
“Wine?”

She nodded and he poured her a glass of chilled
Frascati
. They ate slowly, exchanging occasional comments. By the time
Lena
got to “Stormy Weather,” Kate was swaying to the music, a blissful look on her face. She finished the last bite and closed her eyes, savoring the rich taste. “You may be my new best friend. Do you cook often?”

“Occasionally.
What’s your contribution going to be?”

“I'll take your picture.” She cocked her head and studied him. “Let's see. Not in a chef's hat. Maybe gloating over a table covered with cholesterol—cream, butter, eggs, you know.
And something red—tomatoes, apples.
And long, spiky pasta.”
Warming to her theme, she continued, “Of course, there would have to be a worm in one of the apples.”

“That's low, McGuire. And for that, plus the shoe trick, you get to do the dishes.”

“Sore loser.”
Laughing, she started clearing the table. “I'm doing this only because you cooked. It has nothing to do with my fleetness of foot or your lack thereof.”

He waited until she had filled both hands with dishes. “My revenge,” he said, stepping in front of her. Catching her around the waist with both hands, he dropped a light kiss on her lips.

“The dishes!” she gasped.

He saved the teetering crockery by placing his hands underneath hers to help hold the two stacks upright, keeping her hands pinned. This time, his kiss was longer.

When she caught her breath, she said, “Could we at least put the dishes down?”

Warily and without taking his eyes off her, he put the dishes on the counter. “I don't trust you, McGuire.”

“Then we're even.” She smiled and wrapped her arms around him, pulling his head down to hers. As the kiss deepened, all thoughts of mischief disappeared.

Kate slowly withdrew and turned to the sink. She watched it fill with warm, soapy water while she struggled with her equilibrium. Then she started on the dishes. John stayed behind her, close enough that she could feel the heat from his body. She wanted to feel his arms around her again, to be pressed against his chest. Was it only yesterday she wanted to kill him? She said, “Why don't you sit down? This will only take a minute, and then we can talk about the case.”

He didn't answer, didn't move. What was he waiting for? She could think of nothing to say. How could she have gone from a shrieking shrew to a lusty wench in such a short time? After another minute of silence, she raised her head and looked warily over her shoulder.
 

John stood right behind her, waiting for her to turn around. He brushed her lips lightly with his and grinned. “You're right, I can't be trusted. Want some coffee?”

“I'll remember that. And yes, I'd love some coffee.” She concentrated on finishing the washing up while he measured out the coffee.

They worked in silence for a few minutes, careful not to touch each other, and then sat back at the table with their coffee.

A faint breeze wafted through the window, and Kate lifted her hair off her neck, letting the night air cool her hot skin. For two weeks she had been trying to get her mind off Kelly Landrum. Now she couldn't seem to keep her mind on the woman. “The Nelsons didn't have much information.”

“No. I didn't think they would, but it was worth a try.”

“Did you meet them when you did the story on Charlene?”

“Yes. Why?”

“It seemed like you had sort of a special feeling for them. You were very sensitive to them.”

“They had been through a bad time, that's all.” He shifted on the chair. “What do you know about Helmut Kusch?”

Kate couldn't decide whether he was uncomfortable or uneasy, but something caused the abrupt change of subject. Now it was her turn to be uncomfortable. She didn't want to talk about Helmut. “I know he's a nice guy who's had a hard time.”

“Charlene Nelson worked for him before she got the job at Business Express.” He watched her closely.

“Oh, no.”
Surely not Helmut
. He couldn’t be involved in something so heinous. “Gisela must have been there then. She left last fall. That's about the time I started going there with
Venice
. I know he's a little peculiar, but he couldn't be a murderer.”

“Why not?
He knew Charlene, almost certainly disapproved of her. And he may have known Kelly—a lot of the Poinsett students go to the
Black Forest
to eat.” He sipped thoughtfully, staring at his coffee,
then
cut his eyes to Kate. “Maybe he and the mysterious Gisela were having trouble. How do you know she went back to
Germany
?”

“Because he told me.
And he was devastated by it. John, I know him. He's a genuinely nice person, just different.”

“Is J. B. a genuinely nice person, too?”

Kate blinked. “J. B.? Why, yes, of course. He's—”

“According to the people I know, he's a slick, manipulative jerk.” Her expression caused him to throw up his hands in mock surrender.

“Okay, okay, we won't talk about him,” he said, adding 'for now' under his breath as he left the room to put on some more music.

“I heard that. Not now, not later, not ever.” She hated to spoil their easy mood, but she had no intention of discussing J. B. with John.

Billie Holliday's wistful voice floated out on the breeze. Dimming the light, John pulled Kate into the empty dining room. “Dance with me.”

“No, I—,” she said, melting into his arms, unable to resist. Shaking her head ruefully, she smiled and let herself drift to the slow, bluesy notes.

Finally she said, “John, this has been a lovely day, the best I've had in quite a while, but I really need to get home now.”

He let her swing away from him. “Okay. If you'll drop me at the paper—my car, remember?—I'll follow you home.”

“Of course I'll take you to your car, but I can get home all right.”

She picked up her purse and fished out her keys.

He locked the front door and followed her to her car. “With everything that's been going on lately, I'd feel better if I saw you safely in.”

She knew he had something on his mind, but what? “What are you thinking? It’s okay. Even the prophet has been quiet since the police took him away.”

“The prophet?
Have you seen him again?”

“No, not a glimpse.
He’s probably gone back to his cave by now.”

“He’s more than a crazy fanatic. He comes down from the hills about once a year to raise money for his ‘mission.’ Calls himself Ezekiel, but the police know him as Aaron Youngblood. He has a record. Minor disturbances, mostly, but he’s been in some nasty bar fights.”

“I'm being very careful. After that lunatic the other night, I even stick to the main roads.”

“What lunatic?” He turned to face her, switched off the radio. “Tell me.”

“Nothing really happened,” she said, alarmed at his reaction. “It was after the
para
group meeting when
Wolynski
came. Some fool in a pickup truck tried to run me off
Paris
Mountain
. Fortunately, my car was made for roads like that, so I scooted by on the shoulder and left the SOB in the dust.”

“Jesus Christ! Why didn't you tell me? Did you report it?”

“Why would I tell you? It was hardly a news event. And no, I didn't report it. I had no proof, no information, and they already think I'm nuts. The guy would have been long gone. He probably lived up there and was already in bed sleeping it off by the time I got home.”

“Oh, Kate.”

That was all he said, but his tone reminded her of her father when she had done something really stupid. “What's wrong? What did I do?”

“It's not you,” he said, reaching over to gently massage the back of her neck. “I have a very bad feeling about this.”

What could she say? She, too, had bad feelings about it. She turned into the
Times Herald
parking lot and stopped beside his Mustang, unsure again. “Goodnight, John.”

“I'm following you home, and I'm coming in with you to check your house. Accept it.” He left her and quickly got in his car.

She might have lost him on the back streets, but since he knew where she lived, it would be pointless.

John left his car parked on the street and glanced quickly around as Kate pulled into the ramshackle garage. He edged past the car and carefully locked the door behind the Mazda. The garage touched the house at the corner, forming an offset extension. A wooden door almost beside the car door led to the narrow back yard and, a short distance away, the back door of the house. White roses vied with rampant honeysuckle in an effort to strangle an overgrown hedge of privet; together, they created an impenetrable barrier around the perimeter of the yard. That and two large oaks, plus a number of scrubby volunteers struggling upward through the hedge, separated Kate from the neighboring houses. The thorny barricade could keep out marauding lions. It would be nearly impossible to get into—or out of, he mused.

Under the light of a bare bulb in a porcelain socket, he checked the lock on her back door. “It would be a lot easier to get through your door than your hedge.” He frowned at the simple skeleton key lock. A thin curtain barely obscured a view of the kitchen through the tall glass panes in the upper half of the door.
But hey!
Why bother with the door?
A set of triple windows stretched invitingly across the back of the house. Feeling the need to make some comment on her deplorable lack of security, he said, “You at least need a good deadlock that opens with a key. Is the rest of the house like this?”

She shrugged. “See for yourself.” It did look a little flimsy. “I have a very effective early warning system.”

“What, a goldfish?”

“No snide remarks, Gerrard.
And no, no pets.”
She turned on the kitchen light.

The first thing he noticed was the number of doors. The kitchen, not all that big, had four. And where there wasn't a door, there was a window. The windows all seemed to have large panes, the kind one could easily break and enter through. The only thing lacking was solid walls. He looked further. Aside from a large worktable in the center, the dining room had a triple window, two doors, and a wide opening to the living room. A few easy steps put him in front of a green loveseat angled across a corner between two windows. A quick inventory around the room showed him another triple window, a single window, fireplace, stairs, an open hall, and the front door. “Christ, Kate. This place is an open invitation to a burglar. The dining room windows, conveniently hidden from the rest of the world by the jungle around your yard, would be my choice. The back yard is the most secure place in it. My suggestion is to move or camp out back.”