Dead Body Language (33 page)

“Is it the phone?”

He looked at me puzzled, then his face relaxed. “No! No, I’m just trying to think. Connor, it isn’t safe for you to be here—”

Abruptly he turned his attention back to the phone. Again his face grew paler, and his forehead was sprinkled with diamonds of sweat.

The light on the answering machine began to blink.

Mickey was listening to a message.

The message machine light changed from a red blinking dot to the number “1.”

Mickey looked back at me, his face masked in terror. He stared at me for several seconds, as if trying to read my expression.

He jumped, startled by something, and turned sharply toward the metal filing cabinet. His panic-stricken face looked as if it might break from the strain.

“Mickey, what’s going on?” I demanded. The change in him was beginning to scare me.

“Nothing, Connor. Sit down. Don’t move. There … may be a prowler in here. I’m going to check it out. Stay here, Connor. I mean it. This could be … dangerous.”

He spoke slowly, using exaggerated lip movements, as if I were retarded, not deaf. I obeyed orders and sat down on Celeste’s guest chair. Mickey left the room, one hand on his gun, the journal still clutched in the other hand.

There was something about the journal that bothered me. There wasn’t anything truly useful in the thing. I had made up that stuff about revealing names and gaining information. And Mickey knew that when he helped me with the scene at the Nugget.

But that was it: He wasn’t clutching the journal I had given him. Each journal Lacy owned had been a different shade in the pink and purple hues. That one had been, what, pale pink? This one was lavender. Mickey had found the missing journal!

When I had given him enough time to get several steps away, I moved to the metal closet Mickey had looked at with such terror, and tried the door. Had he found the journal inside Celeste’s cabinet? Locked. I jiggled the handle a few more times, thinking it might open magically if I jerked it enough. Nothing.

I was about to take my hand off the knob when I felt something vibrate from inside. I placed my hand on the metal cabinet door. It hummed beneath my fingertips intermittently. Was it catching the vibrations of the air conditioning and heating? Trucks passing by? An airplane overhead?

Or something inside.

I needed a key.

I yanked open Celeste’s desk drawer, checking the obvious hiding place. Nothing inside but some business cards, a few candies, and a half-used container of lipstick. Tropical Sunset. No key.

The key! That was it.

I had to find Mickey.

After a quick search of the main halls, I pushed open the door to the embalming room. Mickey stood next to a steel table, his back to me. He had set the journal down on the instrument table and was holding something else in his hand—

I must have made a sound because he whirled around with a terrified look on his doughy face.

“Mickey! I was getting scared and …”

He raised his hand. The thing he was holding, long and sharp and shiny, was glinting ominously off the room’s dim lighting. He raised it higher.

A scalpel.

“C
onnor,” Mickey said, shaking his head. “For God’s sakes, I told you to stay put. You shouldn’t have followed me here, not from the café, and not from the other room.”

He took a step forward. I took a step backward.

“I didn’t want you involved in this, Connor. That’s why I told you to stop snooping around. Things are much more dangerous than you realize. I tried to warn you, Connor. Don’t you understand?” It was difficult to read his face in the shadowy light. Was that a look of helplessness? Desperation? Or was that fear?

He took another step forward. I took another step back and hit the edge of the door. It swung shut.

“I wanted to help you with your newspaper stories, especially the murders, so you could make the
Eureka!
the newspaper you really want it to be. See, I understand you, Connor.”

Mickey’s face became a kaleidoscope of emotion. The look of alarm changed to compassion, to eagerness, to empathy, all within seconds. I tried to mask my own feelings of growing terror. I reached behind me, felt for the doorknob, slowly twisted it, and inched the door open.

“You could have helped me, too, Connor. Helped me get some credit for all the work I do to make this a safer place to live. I’ve done a lot for this town, but nobody knows that. I wanted you to know, so you’d understand me.”

I almost felt sorry for him, he looked so vulnerable. But the scalpel in his raised hand reminded me constantly that this was no victim I was dealing with, and it scared the shit out of me. I hadn’t made much progress with the door. Mickey stood only a few inches away. I noticed, with more than a little trepidation, that he was referring to me in the past tense. He definitely had something on his mind.

I knew there was no reasoning with him. He had already killed two people—maybe more. It was all part of his plan: Mickey Arnold wanted to be Super Cop.

Mickey moved in slowly, his face twisted into a look of barely controlled benevolence, as if I were a runaway rabbit he was cautiously trying to recapture, then have for dinner. With the door opened slightly, I turned to run, but he grabbed my wrist and yanked me back abruptly.

“Easy, Connor. You’re with me now. We’ll go to Celeste’s office together. I want to show you something.” His grip tightened with every word. Out of the corner of my eye I could see him caress the back edge of the scalpel with his thumb. There was a hint of mint.

I screamed, hoping someone might hear me.

Mickey just smiled. He must have known there was nobody at the mortuary but the two of us—among a couple of embalmed bodies. Holding the back of my hair, he pushed open the door and forced me down the hall to Celeste’s office. There’s something about a death grip on your hair that keeps you from doing much struggling.

Once inside the office, he closed the door and pressed me to the floor, next to Celeste’s desk. The small lamp on the desk cast the room in a ghostly glow.

I sat up carefully as Mickey dropped into a chair opposite me. I looked at him while scanning the room
with my peripheral vision. The lamp cord was only a few inches from my hand.

“You know that Smith guy, Connor?”

I inched my hand toward the cord, distracting him with my other hand by brushing my hair out of my face.

“He wasn’t your type,” he said with a chilling smile that set my skin tingling.

A few more inches. I desperately fluffed my hair.

“I found out some things about him and I had to—”

With a swift swing of my arm, I yanked the plug from the socket. The room went dark. I reached for the lamp, made contact, and threw it across the room to where I hoped Mickey would still be sitting.

I didn’t know if I’d struck him or not. The room was pitch black and neither of us could see a thing. But he still had the advantage; he could hear.

I scooted under the desk, feeling my way, trying to figure out how to get out of the room without traveling by casket. I had to distract him if I wanted to get to the door, I thought, then bumped my head on the underside of the desk. Shit! I felt my hearing aid dangle out of my ear and fall.

My hearing aid! I searched the area around me, running my hand across the floor, and found it under my left thigh. I felt for the tiny volume control dial and turned it up full blast. Counting on the ear-piercing squeal that so irritated my hearing friends, I set it down on the floor and backed out quickly from beneath the desk. I hoped the screech would lead him to believe I was still there. If he didn’t buy it, I was in more trouble than I counted on.

I scooted away in the darkness, not knowing where Mickey was or what condition he was in. Crawling around the edge of the room, I felt my way, terrified I’d bump into him.

If the lamp hadn’t hit him, the hearing aid would probably only distract him for a few moments. Once he found I wasn’t where he thought I was, he’d waste no time going for the door. And once opened, it would fill the
room with light. If I didn’t make it to the door by then, I wouldn’t have a chance.

I kept inching along the wall, hoping I was quiet. It was an eternity before I reached the door frame. Moving in slow motion, I felt for the knob. A few more seconds and I’d be out of there. I turned the knob slowly—

Something stung my right ear. I touched it—it felt wet and sticky—and numb. Mickey had thrown something at me and narrowly missed. I didn’t want to think what it might have been. I felt a drop of sweat run down my back. How did he know where I was?

My right foot was abruptly pulled from beneath me. I grabbed for the doorknob to keep from being swallowed up by Mickey’s strength but I lost my balance and fell. Bracing my back against the door, I tried to kick him with my other foot, flailing blindly in the dark. Good old five-pound Doc Martens. The shoes carry quite a punch when they make contact. I managed to get off one good kick before I grabbed once again.

As Mickey tried to wrestle me to the floor, I reached out for the doorknob again and gave it a twist. The door opened slightly; light from the hallway filtered into the room.

Mickey had my foot in one hand and seemed to be scrambling on the floor with his other hand, likely searching for what he had thrown. I kicked and screamed, heaving the full impact of my Doc Martens into his contorted face. Suddenly he let go. In stunned pain, he covered his face, then wiped the increasing flow of blood from his nose.

He pulled his hands down and I could read his lips easily; they were outlined in red. “You ungrateful bitch!”

I scrambled for the door but he lunged, grabbed my arm and slammed me against the metal cabinet, knocking the wind out. I couldn’t breathe for several seconds—enough time for Mickey to reach into his pocket for something: his keys. Quickly he fumbled for the one he wanted. As blood dripped down his face and onto his hand, he opened the metal closet.

Out tumbled Celeste, unconscious.

“And now for the big finale. Let’s see, Connor. How
about this for a mystery puzzle? Celeste stabs you with the scalpel. And then she slits her wrists. I discover the bodies, realize who the murderer is … then I call the sheriff and wait for the TV cameras to arrive. Guess we’ll have to forget about the local coverage. You won’t be in any position to write a good story. But that’s all right. I expect to make the
Sacramento Bee
this time.”

Mickey raised Celeste’s arm, about to drag the scalpel over her wrist, when I kicked the office door shut, dousing the lights once again. I felt for Celeste’s guest chair where I’d seen it last, picked it up, and flung it in the general direction of where Mickey had stood. I had no idea if I’d made contact.

I scooted away from the door so Mickey wouldn’t know my location, and groped for the phone on the desk. Fully aware I had very little time I removed the receiver. By feel, I punched what I hoped were the numbers 911, hoping the buttons made no sound, then left it off the hook. No need to say anything. If I had dialed correctly, they would hear the disturbance through the receiver and read the automatic location on the screen.

Except, I remembered, the dispatcher was at the café having dinner. Would the sheriff be there to take the call?

I couldn’t wait around. Mickey would be finished with his plan long before the sheriff arrived. And ready to take the credit.

Scrambling on my hands and knees, I reached the door, which was now blocked. Celeste’s body. I gave her a shove and rolled her over, then grabbed for the doorknob and opened the door as far as I could. It would only budge a couple of inches.

I looked behind me. Mickey’s bloody, distorted face glowed in the eerie light. I gave Celeste another shove with my foot and squeezed through the door as Mickey leapt up in an adrenaline rage. I snatched the door handle and pulled the door shut behind me. It closed hard on Mickey’s hand.

The scalpel he’d retrieved from the wall dropped to the floor at my feet. Quickly I scooped it up. As he reached
out to grab me, I plunged the scalpel forward, ramming it through Mickey’s already bloody hand.

I didn’t wait to see his reaction. I took off down the hall, through the front door of the mortuary, down the driveway, to the dark street, and smack into what felt like a brick wall. Reeling back from the impact, I bent over to catch my breath, then straightened.

“Dan!”