House of Skin (5 page)

He felt her kneel beside him and he craned his neck to look up at her. From the way she was crouching, her buttocks resting on her heels, he could see how defined she was. The muscles in her legs were long and slender and hard.

She was holding a hypodermic needle.

“What are you doing with that?” he asked, voice tightening.

“I have to do this,” she said. Her voice trembled a little.

He realized it was the first time she’d spoken since entering the basement. He wished she’d stayed quiet. Her fear, he realized, could be good or bad. Good if she could be frightened into letting him go. Bad if it made her irrational.

Judging from the needle, his money was on the latter.

“Julia, just let me up so we can talk about this.”

“Please stay calm,” she said.

“You’re joking, right? You knock me out and drag me down the stairs—hell, maybe even
throw
me down the stairs. You tie me to the
floor
.” His brow creased as he followed the ropes to where they connected—the stairway, two water pipes, the workbench fifteen feet away. He saw something gleaming on the edge of the workbench, some sort of large knife, and the fact that he couldn’t even hope to reach it made his teeth grind together.

He felt himself tottering precariously on the brink of panic. “Look, Julia. Don’t you think this has gone far enough? I know I offended you, but I’ve apologized for it and I think I’ve paid for it in spades.” He laughed a little hysterically. “Don’t you think I’ve endured enough crazy shit to learn my lesson?”

“Please hold still,” she said, and he could tell by the intent sound of her voice that she was concentrating on finding a vein in his arm.

“Can I at least ask what you’re putting in me?”

“It’s safe.”

“I fucking hope so, for chrissakes.” He shook his head. “‘It’s safe.’ How about you tell me just how the hell this is supposed to help me.”

But the needle was already sinking into his arm, the silver tip piercing his vein as easily as it would a string of warm licorice.

“Almost done,” she said and depressed the plunger. “This will give me time to think.” The milky fluid flushed into his open vein.

He yanked his arm away and the hypo nodded in his flesh like a road sign swaying in a strong wind. He cursed her for as long as he could but soon the liquid reached his brain and the words lost their momentum, congealed in his mouth, and his head felt heavy even after he let it rest on the grimy cement.

Chapter Four

July, 1948

The night of the first death, Myles Carver was trying to bed his brother’s wife. He stared at her through the French doors, the partygoers buzzing around him like gnats, his own date Maria tugging at the lapel of his best black jacket like a goddamned kid.

“Myles,” she said. He smelled the sweet tang of wine on her breath, studied the large breasts peeking out of her dress, but those things did nothing for him.

Annabel did.

She was out there on the veranda, leaning forward so her rump stuck out, taunting him, the pale skin of her shoulders luminous in the night air.

He moved away from Maria, thought he’d escaped her when she gripped his arm. Then she was jabbering away at him and he realized she was drunk. Despite the band playing next to them atop the ballroom stage, her shrill, slurry voice bit through the noise and turned heads.

“Why can’t you respect your brother? Why can’t you leave her alone?”

Jesus. Airing their dirty laundry out here in front of everyone.

“Look at me, Myles.” Both hands on his lapels now. “She doesn’t want you. If she did she wouldn’t have married David.” Maria threw a sidelong glance at the men and women gawking at them. “That’s right, I said she doesn’t want you.” Getting into it now that she had an audience. “So why don’t you leave like your little brother. Robert knew she’d never have him so he left for Memphis. Why don’t you run away too?”

She needed a good smack in the mouth. Painted little whore with a little boy at home watched by his grandma tonight because his mother would rather have a man between her legs than a son on her lap.

He thought of saying all that, thought of saying what everybody already knew about her, but he didn’t. Instead, he said, “You’ve no room to talk,” and walked away.

As he shut the French doors behind him he heard her say, “You’re a coward.” But she said nothing more because she was afraid of Annabel. Little Maria with her big mouth shut up quick whenever Annabel was around. Lovely Annabel.

Myles stood watching her.

He knew if he didn’t say something soon he’d lose his nerve, so standing beside her he said, “Smoke?”
 

Elbows on the cement wall bordering the veranda, she stared quietly at the forest, making no sign she’d heard him or was even aware of his presence.

Playing it cool, Myles tapped one out for himself, lit it. He leaned there beside her showing her he was comfortable with the silence too. He stole glances at her, though, because he couldn’t help it. Thin, sculptured nose below large blue eyes with lashes so long she needn’t cake them with that black shit Maria smeared on hers. Annabel had her blond hair pulled back tonight. Myles realized his hands were shaking. He had to say something.

“Where’s David?” he asked.

“I’m not sure,” she said. As it usually was, her delivery was toneless, maddening.

“It’d be nice if he came to his own party.” When she said nothing, he added, “And paid some attention to his wife.”

Had there been the slightest hint of a smile? Without looking at him she said, “He does.”

“I don’t mean in the bedroom, I mean when there are fifty people at his house drinking his liquor and having sex in his rooms.”

“They’re your rooms, too, Myles.”

“And I’m here, aren’t I.”

Annabel turned and moved toward the veranda steps.

“That’s it?” he said and despised the plaintive note in his voice.

She descended the steps into the lawn, and for the first time he noticed she was barefoot.

He was about to shout at her, tell her that David didn’t deserve her, that he was probably off in the woods with another woman, when a cry erupted from within the house.

It wasn’t a normal cry, like a man who’d been cuckolded or a woman who’d been groped. It was a cry of anguish, of heartbroken doom, and as he pushed through the crowd gathered near the bandstand he realized it was Maria’s wail he was hearing. It rose up to the chandeliers, knifed through his eardrums, and he spotted Maria’s mother then, old and haggard and covered with blood. He thought at first she’d been stabbed, but then the crowd opened up and he saw Maria kneeling there in a lake of blood, her little boy clutched to her blood-shiny chest, her dead little boy whose throat was slashed so deeply it hung open like the mouth of some toothless animal.

Myles turned to look for his brother, for David, who would know what to do in a situation like this. But David wasn’t around. Everywhere he looked were shocked faces, weeping men and women who were too stunned to move. Myles turned, not wanting to face the grotesque spectacle any longer but unable to block out the sound of Maria’s wailing, and as he did he beheld a solitary figure standing in the open French doors, leaning there in a shimmering white dress.

It was Annabel, and she was smiling.

Chapter Five

Sam Barlow was in the middle of a nightmare when the phone rang. He sat up, disoriented. He slapped the snooze button on the alarm clock, dropped onto his side, but the ringing persisted and he realized something was wrong.

He’d run for sheriff expecting to have many dreams interrupted by the ringing of the phone, but the truth was, Patti rarely bothered him at home. Shadeland had its share of domestic disputes and ornery teenagers, but all in all, he knew he had it good.

“Um-hmm?” he asked.

“Patti here.”

“Yeah. I figured as much.” He couldn’t bring himself to be annoyed with his secretary. She bothered him too seldom for that.

“We’ve got a bit of a situation down here, Sam,” she said, sounding flustered. He found himself waking up fast.

“What kind of situation?” he asked.

“A missing person,” she said. Then, quieter, “Well, he’s not technically missing. He’s only been gone for a few hours, but still…”
 

“Who is it?” Sam scooted up against his headboard, rubbed crust from his eyes.

“A lawyer. His name is Ted Brand.”

“Never heard of him.”

“He’s not local. He came to deliver something to the Carver House.”
 

“The Carver House?” Sam slid forward, his bare feet slapping the cold wooden floor.

“For the new owner.”

“I didn’t know there was a new owner.” Sam reached over and twisted on the lamp. It was black, and there was a hula girl on it. He’d seen it at a garage sale a few years back and liked it. The half-naked girl watched him, frozen in mid shimmy. Had he married, he never would have been allowed to keep it.

It was little consolation.

“…and she really seems distraught, so I figured—”

“I’m sorry, Patti,” Sam broke in. “I missed part of that.”
 

“The lawyer’s wife is here. She’s convinced something bad happened to her husband.”

“She giving you a hard time?”

“It’s not that,” Patti said. “She’s very civil.” A pause. “Look, it’s probably better if you come down here yourself, Sam.” Patti’s voice went lower. “It’s probably a matter of the lawyer stepping out on his wife, but I can’t very well tell her that.”
 

Barlow smiled, whatever unease that had been building since the phone rang vanishing under the light of Patti’s logic.
She ought to have been a cop
, he thought.
She’d have been better than me
.

“Be right over,” he said.

“Thanks, Sam. Sorry.”

“Don’t worry about it. You’ll just owe me one.”

“Uh-huh,” she answered, and he could see her grin through the telephone.

Being on the wrong side of fifty wasn’t much fun, he thought as he plodded through the gloomy bedroom. He splashed cold water on his face, careful not to notice the graying hair at his temples.

He was still active—he ran three times a week—and once he got moving, the years seemed to fall away. But the recovery periods were longer, and the mornings after a long run were an aching hell.

Sam refused to be one of those guys who denied their age, though. He simply wasn’t going to let his body fall apart. They could keep their artificial hair dye and their erection pills; he’d manage in those areas just fine. Besides, Patti told him the gray at his temples made him look distinguished, and he figured he might as well believe it. As for his hard-ons, well, they weren’t as frequent as they once were, but the old dog still managed to stand up and bark when he needed it to.

Ten more minutes and he was pulling into the station. He could see one of his deputies, Tommy McLaughlin, sitting across from Patti.

On the green vinyl couch next to Patti’s desk was a woman who looked a little younger than his secretary. Forty, maybe. Not a knockout, but comely enough. Her curly brown hair looked tousled.

“Hi, Sam,” Patti said.

Sam nodded. Tommy McLaughlin got up and gestured for Sam to follow. On the way into his office he could feel the lawyer’s wife’s eyes studying him, searching for signs that he would be her salvation.

He closed the glass door and nodded at Tommy. The young man’s handsome face was careworn, a strained look replacing the cocky good humor Sam had grown accustomed to. Tommy’s blond hair was darkened with sweat and matted to his forehead, reminding Sam of a little boy who’s just awakened from a nasty nightmare. As often happened when he was with Tommy McLaughlin, Sam felt a moment’s regret at never having children, never getting the chance to take a boy fishing or walk a daughter down the aisle.

“I assume Patti’s filled you in already,” Tommy said.

“Not really,” Sam said, his mind clearing. “She just said the lawyer—what’s the guy’s name?”

“Ted Brand.”

“Patti just said that Brand was missing and his wife was worried over it.”

Tommy grunted. “Suicidal’s more like it.”
 

“How long has Mr. Brand been missing?”

Tommy glanced through the window at Mrs. Brand. “She said her husband left the office at five o’clock yesterday afternoon.”

“And he was coming here?” Sam said.

“He was transferring the ownership papers to the new owner of Carver House.”

Sam said, “It takes about two hours to get from Indy to here, right?”

“At the most,” Tommy answered.

“So even if Brand is alright—which he probably is—we might not have good news for his wife.”
 

Tommy nodded, examined his shoes.

“Why don’t you check the hotels. See if Brand checked in somewhere.”