No Such Thing as a Free Ride (14 page)

“Really, Fran, I have more on my mind than Bobby’s love life.”

“Uh huh. Just thought you should know it’s with Tina.”

“Get out! I was stopped in the middle of the doorway and looked up to see a little old lady scurrying away. She looked terrified.

“Are you okay?”

“No, I’m not okay! Eddie is Bobby’s best friend. Before you know it, you guys will start double dating and I’ll be weird, old Aunt Brandy, the babysitter, who can’t get a date but is great with kids, watching Barney videos with them and teaching them how to knit!”

“That’s not going to happen, Bran,” Franny reassured me. “You don’t know how to knit.”

“Fran, if I wanted sarcasm, I would have spilled my guts to John.”

“Sorry, hon. Really, I am.” She didn’t sound sorry. In fact, she sounded like she was stifling a laugh. My suspicion was confirmed a moment later.

“Oh, by the way, weird, old Aunt Brandy, don’t forget we have La Maze class on Thursday night.”

“Fran?”

“Yeah?”

“Bite me.”

*****

I stopped by the Farmers’ Market on the way home to pick up some fresh fruits and vegetables for dinner. My mother doesn’t believe in fresh vegetables. She figured if God had meant for green beans to be eaten straight out of the ground, He never would have invented cans to put them in.

It had started raining, one of those east coast summer downpours that are over in a minute but leave you soaking wet and wreak havoc on your hair. I really should keep an umbrella in my car, but I always thought it was sort’ve wimpy. However, the sprint from the curb to my front door left me looking like a contestant in a wet tee shirt contest.

Adrian came bounding to the door to greet me, knocking the bags out of my hands and onto the floor. The vegetables spilled out and he immediately pounced on them, grabbing the “bunch carrots” and running around in circles playing “keep away.” I let him keep them, figuring he could use a little roughage in his diet.

I was starving, so I threw a potato into the microwave and was on my way upstairs to change when the door bell rang. I peered through the spy hole. It was DiCarlo.
Shit.

“Just a minute,” I yelled, figuring I could be upstairs, showered, changed, hair blown dry and maybe a touch of make up in about fifteen.

“Come on, Alexander, let me in. I’m getting drenched out here.”

I sighed and let him in, figuring we were both caught in the same downpour, how good could he look?

Unfortunately, he looked damn good.

Bobby crossed into the living room, droplets of water hanging from his dark curls. He shook them loose and peeled off his long sleeved, over-shirt, settling down on my couch. From out of nowhere Rocky appeared and began purring at his feet, welcoming him like some long lost paramour. It really ticked me off.

“She acts this way with all the guys,” I told him, as he bent to scratch behind her ear. Rocky rolled over and stretched out on her back so that he could rub her tummy. “See? She’s a total slut.”

Bobby eyed me, a smile playing at the corners of his mouth.

“Is that so?”

“That cat will roll over for just about anyone. I don’t want you thinking you’re something special.”

Now, he full-on grinned. “You’re not talking about the cat, are you?”

“Of course I am. Who else would I be talking about? And stop grinning.”

“Are you mad at me?”

“No… yes.”

“Why?”

“I don’t know.” I sat down next to him and scooped the cat into my lap.

“It’s just that—well,
I’m
supposed to be moving on in my love life and you’re supposed to be sad about it. Only
you’re
the one moving on.”

“So, you want me to pine after you for the rest of my life?”

“No, not necessarily. Just let me get a head start.”

“Oh, so in other words, this is just a competition to you.”

“God, when you put it that way, I sound like such a brat.”

“I love the brat. And I’d be perfectly willing to pine if I knew it would eventually lead somewhere. But I’ve got to move on too, whether you’re ready to accept it or not.”

“Yeah,” I said, “only, jeez, Bobby, why’d it have to be Tina?”

The timer went off on the microwave, giving him a temporary reprieve. He followed me into the kitchen.

“So why are you here, anyway?” I asked, taking an oven mitt out of the drawer.

“I passed by your house on the way to Sophia’s daycare. You’d called so I figured I’d just stop in. Yo, are you actually cooking something?”

“Don’t act so surprised. I can cook.”

“Since when?”

I tossed him a look. “I never thought I’d hear myself say this, but you sound just like my mother.”

He smiled and helped himself to a TastyKake while I reached into the microwave with a gloved hand and extracted the potato. It had been in there for fifteen minutes but it still felt rock hard.

I checked to see if the power level was on high. It was. I picked up the potato with my bare hand and began to squeeze it, trying to decide if I should pop it back into the microwave.

The skin was crisp and unyielding so I squeezed a little harder. Suddenly my thumb poked a hole straight into the core of the potato, releasing a whoosh of steaming hot air. Intense pain shot through me as the potato clamped its jaws around my thumb.

Holy Mother of God!
It must’ve been a thousand degrees in that sucker! I tried to yank it off with my gloved hand, but the mitt was huge and awkward and I couldn’t get a grip on it. My eyes started to water as part of my anatomy baked inside the potato shell.

Frantically, I began shaking my hand, trying to dislodge my thumb before Bobby noticed what was happening. He turned to me and I slipped my hand behind my back.

“What are you hiding back there?” he asked.

“Nothing.”

“Then you won’t mind if I take a look.”

He reached around my waist and caught hold of my wrist, drawing my hand out in front of me, the spud still attached to my digit.

“Don’t!” I yelled and pulled hard against his hand. The potato flew off and sailed across the room, landing in Adrian’s water bowl.

Bobby stood there, dumbfounded, as I held out my hand to inspect the damage. My thumb looked like a cartoon special effect, all blistery red and bulging with steam wafting off it.

“That’s gotta hurt,” DiCarlo sympathized, only he was struggling to keep a straight face.

“Don’t you dare laugh. And if you tell a soul about this, you are so dead.”

“Sorry, Sweetheart,” he said, losing the battle. “This is too good to keep to myself. Only you would get your thumb stuck inside a baked potato.”

“Oh, fine,” I told him. “Go ahead and laugh.”

I hated to admit it, since it hurt like hell, but it really
was
funny.

Bobby fished the potato out of the dog bowl while I slathered antibiotic ointment on my rapidly swelling thumb. I guess he felt sorry for me, because he offered to take me out to dinner. Well, sort’ve. He and Sophia were going to Chuck E. Cheese’s and I was welcome to tag along. It wouldn’t have been my first choice, but it would give me an opportunity to pump him for information in the Olivia Bowen case. I knew it would be a battle to get him to tell me anything, but at least he wouldn’t yell at me in front of his kid.

“Hi Bandy,” Sophia called, climbing into her car seat. “I learned a new song. It’s called
Now I Know My ABC’s Next Time Won’t You Sing With Bees.
Do you know that song, Bandy? I could teach it to you.”

I turned in my seat to face her. “That is very nice of you, Sophia. Maybe your daddy would like to learn it too.”

“Okay,” she giggled, “it goes like this. Now I know my abc’s next time won’t you sing with bees. Daddy, I didn’t know bees singed. I thought they just buzzed.”

“Sophia, Sweetheart,” Bobby said. “Daddy’s got a little headache.”

“I’m sorry, Daddy. I will sing you a song and help you feel better.”

“Could you sing it in your mind, honey? That will help me feel a lot better.”

“Okay dokey.”

I had to wait until Sophia was safely ensconced in the play area of the restaurant before I broached the subject of the dead case worker.

“Come on, Brandy, you know I can’t divulge anything that could compromise the case.”

“But I’m not asking you to. All I want to know is if she’d had an appointment scheduled with that girl, Star, on June 15th. How does that compromise anything?”

“It doesn’t,” he conceded. “I just know you. It may start out with you wanting to find this girl, Star, but before you know it you’ll be knee deep into investigating Olivia Bowen’s murder.”

“Well, you’ve got to admit, it’s a little suspicious. Do you think there’s a tie-in?” I asked, all excited.

DiCarlo sat down on the edge of the ball pit, eyes closed, rubbing his temples and muttering softly to himself. Sophia climbed out and put her little arms around his neck, pressing her cheek against his. “Did your headache go away, Daddy?”

He opened his eyes. “Not yet, honey.”

I’m sure it was just a co-incidence that he was looking directly at me.

*****

It was almost midnight by the time I got home. Janine had called while we were scarfing down rubbery pizza. It seemed her mother was having a nervous breakdown over the guest list for Franny’s shower. Fran wanted to keep it small—ten to twelve of her closest friends and relatives, while Mrs. DiAngelo thought it would be impolite to exclude anyone within a fifty mile radius. After all, she reasoned, who wouldn’t want to be included in the festivities for the birth of her first grandchild. I told Janine I’d meet her at her mom’s and talk her through the crisis.

Janine drove me home. She pulled up in front of my house and cut the engine. “Do you want me to walk you in, Bran?”

“Janine, I appreciate the thought, but I am
so over
being scared. Honestly, I’m fine…”
That’s weird, I was sure I’d turned a light on when I left the house.
“Um… y’know, Neenie, you haven’t seen the dog in ages. I taught him to beg. It’s the cutest thing ever.”

“Well, I can’t just take your word for it,” Janine said, climbing out of the driver’s side. “I’ll have to come in and see for myself.”

When we got to the front door I checked the deadbolt. It was still in locked position. I breathed a little easier, inserted the key and pushed open the door.

Adrian ran to greet us. He was making little gagging noises, the way he did one time when he mistook my mom’s meatballs for something edible.
Oh jeez, what did he eat now?
As I kneeled down to take whatever it was out of his mouth, Janine flipped on the light. An unnatural silence hung in the air. I looked up.

“Oh, Holy Shit!” Janine whispered. “Is she dead?”

Heather Koslowski sat motionless in the middle of my living room. She was tied to a dining room chair that had been dragged over the rug, the track marks still visible. Heather’s head lolled forward on her chest, revealing a walnut sized lump behind her left ear. Her hair was matted and caked with blood.

Every nerve ending stood on guard as I listened for signs that the intruder could still be in the house. “Call 911,” I told Janine quietly, while I knelt beside Heather to feel for a pulse.

Gently, I lifted her head and almost dropped it back down again. A message had been scrawled on her forehead in permanent marker. “I’m coming 4 u.” There was no signature, but there was no need for one. Over her eyebrows, someone had drawn two perfect bunny ears. Sick and highly effective.

I felt for a pulse and Heather stirred. I began untying the ropes. They were just tight enough to make sure Heather was still there, front and center, when I came home.

Janine walked in from the kitchen, the phone still in her hand. “The cops are on their way.” She stared down at Heather’s tattooed face. “Bran, you know who did this, don’t you?”

“I have a pretty good idea. Heather, it’s Brandy,” I said, gently shaking her shoulder. “Can you open your eyes?”

With great effort, Heather slowly opened her eyes. “What happened?” she moaned, holding the back of her head.

“We were hoping you could tell us.”

“I don’t know. I-I think I’m going to be sick.”

I ran for a wastebasket while Janine helped Heather untangle herself from her constraints. Obviously, Bunny had come looking for me and had stumbled across Heather instead. It made me dizzy with fear and guilt and outrage that someone would take out their hatred of me on an innocent victim. I wanted to find Bunny and beat the living shit out of her.

Mike Mahoe had been patrolling the area when the call came in. He arrived two beats ahead of the paramedics. More cops appeared out of nowhere and, guns drawn, they searched the house and yard, in the unlikely event that the perps were still there.

Satisfied that they were long gone, Mike came back into the living room to check on Heather. An EMT was bent over her, taking vital signs and asking her to look into the beam of his flashlight. As horrible as her ordeal had been, she seemed to be enjoying the attention.

According to Heather, she had come by at around 9:30 p.m. to see if I wanted to watch a movie with her. When she got to the front door she heard voices coming from the back yard.

“It sounded like you were having a party, so I went around the side of the house to see. Your back door was open and it looked like the glass had been shattered. I was just about to call your name when I heard someone come up behind me. And then I felt this really sharp pain in the back of my head.” She touched her skull and winced.

The EMT’s insisted on taking Heather to the hospital. Before she agreed, she made me swear I’d take Mr. Wiggles over to my house for the night. Her parents were out of town and he didn’t like to sleep alone. I knew just how he felt, only Mr. Wiggles wasn’t exactly my first choice for a bed buddy. That’s okay, I probably wasn’t his first choice, either.

We watched Heather get loaded into the ambulance and then Mike walked Janine and me back into the house.

“You’ve been uncharacteristically quiet, Neenie. What’s up?”