To Sketch a Thief (3 page)

Her father, who generally left the worrying to his wife, would have reached for the remote in much the same way that a toddler might reach for the comfort of a pacifier. Of all Rory’s relatives, Aunt Helene was the only one who might be counted upon to take the mention of a ghost seriously. Her eyes might bulge out of her eyelids, and she might stumble over all the questions that sprang into her mind, but she would treat Rory’s claim with respect and an eager desire to meet her ghost.

There were times when Rory so longed to have someone, anyone, in whom she could confide about Zeke that she nearly called Helene. What invariably kept her from reaching for the phone was the fact that Helene was notorious for not being able to keep a secret.

The only other person Rory had considered telling was Leah Russell, her mentor and colleague when she’d worked for the police department and still her dearest friend. They confided in each other about every aspect of their lives. Zeke was Rory’s one holdout on her and she actually felt guilty about it, as if she were hiding some dirty little secret. Yet she couldn’t quite bring herself to say the words out loud. Leah would surely want to believe her, try to believe her, but Rory was afraid that their relationship might never be the same.

Of course the easy solution would have been to invite Leah and her family over for a meet and greet. It would be hard . . . no, it would be downright impossible to deny the existence of Zeke if the rugged, six-foot-one lawman were to materialize in front of them. But the marshal had wanted no part of it.

“I’m not some damned ol’ rodeo nag you can trot out to entertain folks,” he’d said harshly.

“I don’t see what the problem is. You certainly didn’t waste any time trotting yourself out to meet
me
.”

“That’s different. You’re sharin’ this place with me, same as Mac.” His face had been set hard, his jaw clamped down in a way that let her know it would be futile to pursue the issue any further.

“You gonna be long?” Zeke asked once they reached the front door.

“I doubt it. It’s hard to garden in the dark.”

“That may be true, darlin’, but when you make up that mind of yours, there’s precious little that can change it.”

Look who’s talking, Rory thought, struggling not to say it aloud. It was sometimes just easier to let him have the last word. She paused at the coat closet to pluck her denim jacket from its hanger, then she unlocked the front door and went outside.

After depositing the gardening tools beside the farthest flower bed, she pulled on her jacket and got down to work. She’d been tugging away at the weeds for no more than fifteen minutes when something unpleasantly cold and wet slid across the back of her neck. She whirled around and came face-to-face with a huge dog, gray and white and shaggy as a yak. She could barely make out its eyes through the cascade of hair on its face. The dog seemed delighted to see her. His plumed tail wagging madly, he wriggled closer to lick her face, miscalculated the distance and sent her sprawling into the flowers.

She sat up, laughing and brushing off the loose soil that was clinging to her. The dog seized that moment to slather her face with his wide, raspy tongue. When she reached out to hold him off, her hand hit the metal tag hanging from the collar in the thicket of fur around his neck. Leaning closer to read what it said, she bought herself another bath in doggie saliva.

According to the tag, his name was Hobo and he lived at 9 Cooper Street, a mile or so away. His name fit him well. He looked like a dog without a nationality or a pedigree. He had the coat and bulk of a bearded collie, but he was also clearly part Samoyed or husky or one of a dozen other breeds, because his ears stood up straight, just the tips folded over as if caught in genetic indecision. Rory doubted there’d been a pureblood of any kind in his family tree for many generations.

“Hobo,” she said, “what are you doing all the way over here?” He cocked his large head to one side and then to the other as if that would help him to better understand what she was saying. The tips of his ears flapped up and down with each movement, adding to his quizzical expression.

“Are you lost, boy?”

Rory braved another look at Hobo’s tag, hoping there was a phone number. She found it on the reverse side, and since Hobo had paused for a snack of pansies, she managed to avoid any additional moisturizing.

She reached into the pocket of her pants, pulled out her cell phone and dialed the number. The phone rang five times before it went to voice mail. It was possible that Hobo’s owner was even now out looking for him. She left a message along with her number and weighed her options. If she lived alone, specifically without a ghost who had developed an aversion to dogs, she would have invited Hobo inside while she waited to hear back from his people. As it was, she decided to drive him back to his home and wait there for someone to return. The flowers would have to wait another day to be rescued. Of course, a good third of the pansies were no longer an issue, since they were already making their way down Hobo’s digestive tract. It was a good thing she’d planted edible flowers.

She stood up, grabbed the dog’s collar and headed toward her car in the driveway. Apparently Hobo enjoyed car rides. As soon as he saw where they were going, he took the lead and Rory had to run to keep up with him. She opened the door and the dog bounded in, taking up most of the backseat.

“Be a good boy. I’ll be back in a second,” she promised, shutting the door. She went into the house, slowing down just enough to maneuver around Zeke.

“What’s goin’ on with that dog out there?” he asked with a sour look on his face.

“He must have gotten out of his yard,” she said, grabbing her keys from the bench near the stairs. “He has a tag with his address, so I’m just going to take him back.”

“You oughta just let him be,” Zeke grumbled. “He’ll find his way home sooner or later.”

“He could run into the street and be hit by a car or something,” Rory said, surprised by his reaction. “What do you have against dogs anyway?”

“Dogs and I don’t get along well since I cashed in my flesh and bones.”

“It’s not like I’m asking
you
to drive him home,” she said with some attitude of her own. She pulled the door closed behind her and ran back to the car.

Hobo had smeared the side window with drool in the two minutes she’d been gone. She turned on the engine and opened the window enough for him to stick his muzzle out, but not enough for him to think about jumping ship. And off they went.

She found Cooper Street without a problem. The houses, all brick and clapboard Cape Cods, were set closer to one another and to the street than in the area where she lived. But they were well maintained and inviting, lawns mowed, bushes trimmed, woodwork freshly painted. She turned into the driveway at number 9 and parked behind a Honda Civic. “I think we’re in luck,” she said to Hobo. “Looks like someone’s home now.”

She opened the car door and was immediately trampled by Hobo, who’d jumped into the front seat in his zeal to get out first. He made a beeline for the front door. Rory ran after him, hoping he wouldn’t be distracted by a squirrel and take off on another jaunt. As she rang the bell, she noticed that the door had been left ajar. Hobo didn’t waste a moment. He trotted right inside.

Rory waited on the cement stoop for the owner to respond to the bell. A minute passed. She called out, “Hello, anyone home?” No answer. She stepped inside and found herself in a small, neat living room. She called out again, but the only sound was the clicking of Hobo’s claws on a floor somewhere in the rear of the house. Having decided she’d done all that social protocol demanded, Rory followed the noise through the living room and dining room to the kitchen. There she found Hobo whimpering and licking the ashen cheek of the middle-aged woman who lay sprawled on the floor in a dark pool of blood.

Chapter 2

R
ory hunkered down beside the woman, being careful not to disturb the puddled blood that formed a grim outline around her. She put her finger on the carotid artery. No pulse. Not that Rory had expected to find one. The kitchen knife that had killed her was still embedded deep in the left side of her chest. She’d never stood a chance.

Rory rose and made her way around the body to where Hobo was now lying. He’d stopped licking the woman’s face as if he’d accepted that she was beyond awakening. His head lolled on the floor between his paws and he was whimpering. His sense of loss was so keen that Rory felt her eyes filling in empathy. It had been only a few months since her uncle Mac had died. Losing him was a unique pain, quite unlike any she’d known before in her twenty-eight years. Even when the ache in her heart seemed to have played itself out, it never actually left. It crouched in silence beneath the placid surface of her emotions. Sometimes it was reawakened by a simple memory, like Mac laughing as she raced to finish her ice cream cone before the sun melted it, or holding Mac’s hand and ice skating to Christmas music until their noses were as red as Rudolph’s. And sometimes all it took to reanimate the pain was the mirrored sorrow of another’s loss.

Rory shook her head and blinked away the tears. There were procedures to be followed, people to be notified, a crime scene to be protected. Grateful for the demands of life, she reached for Hobo’s collar. With a gentle voice and soft words to console him, she tried to coax him away from the woman who’d been the center of his universe. Hobo wasn’t moving. He lifted his big head and howled at the heavens. Rory tugged harder. She had to get him out of the kitchen. He’d already stepped in the blood and possibly even licked away a hair that belonged to the assailant or a microscopic bit of fabric from his clothing, evidence that would be crucial in bringing the killer to justice.

She tried a stronger voice, a more demanding tone. Hobo dragged himself to his feet, his shoulders slumped with despair, and allowed himself to be led to the kitchen door. Rory stepped outside alone first to do a quick recon of the backyard. It was all fenced in and the gate at the side of the property was latched. The killer had apparently come and gone through the front door. Either it was someone the victim had known or a stranger who had strongarmed his way in when she’d answered the doorbell. Hobo had no doubt escaped that way as well.

He was standing at the kitchen door where she’d left him, watching her dully. She had to go back inside and put both hands on his rump to shoo him out. Even then he looked over his withers at her as if to ask her why he was being banished.

Since Rory didn’t have an answer that he was likely to understand, she forced herself to move away from the door and the distraction of his misery. She pulled the cell phone out of her pocket and dialed the local precinct to report the murder. She was immediately put through to a Detective Cirello. Having put in five years with the Suffolk Police Department, she knew a lot of detectives in the county, but she’d never met Cirello. She identified herself as a private investigator and retired detective and gave him a brief assessment of what she’d discovered, along with the victim’s address. When he asked for the deceased’s name, she couldn’t supply it. It hadn’t been on Hobo’s tag and she hadn’t wanted to waste additional time looking around the house for mail or other papers that might have provided that information. Rory heard the cold edge of suspicion in the detective’s tone when he ordered her to stay put and wait for the police. She’d had no intention of leaving, but it occurred to her that she would be in a better position if she’d bothered to bring her purse along with her ID. Too bad she couldn’t just give Zeke a call and ask him to drop it off.

After she’d finished with Cirello, she called headquarters in Yaphank, which housed the homicide division for the county. Cirello would have to contact them anyway, but Rory wanted to speak to Leah directly.

“Can’t stay out of trouble, can you, McCain?” Leah said, once Rory had brought her up to speed.

“Not guilty. This time trouble came looking for me in a fur suit.”

“I’m not even going to ask.”

“Doesn’t originality count for anything these days?”

“Lord knows it should. Hang out till I get there?”

“It’s not like I have a choice. Besides, I’d never miss an opportunity to be questioned by the best.”

“You know you don’t get points for sucking up.”

“Hey, it was worth a shot.”

Rory pocketed her phone, feeling a little lighter of heart. Leah had that effect on her. Like the vent on a pressure cooker. She looked at her watch. She had a few minutes before the police showed up. She would have liked to look around the rest of the house to see what she could turn up, but that was out of the question. There was always the possibility that she might leave a stray hair or another bit of DNA behind and further confuse the case for the crime scene investigators. But since she’d had to walk through the living room and dining room to reach the kitchen, a fact that the police would have to take into account anyway, she decided there was nothing wrong with browsing through those rooms as long as she didn’t touch anything.

She retraced her steps to the front of the house, passing first through the dining room, where a large oak table and six bulky chairs dominated the space, leaving no room for anything else. No need for further scrutiny there.

The living room had far more potential. Rory made a careful circuit around it, really looking at everything for the first time. The furniture was old, but not yet shabby. The couch and two armchairs were done in cocoa-colored imitation suede, liberally decorated with Hobo’s fur. They were grouped around a rectangular oak cocktail table that was dust free, but marred by numerous fine scratches and a few deeper gouges. Half a dozen magazines were stacked on one end of the table, the top one a copy of
Newsweek
. Rory stepped closer to read the mailing label. The subscriber was Brenda Hartley, and since the address on the label matched the address of the house, Brenda was also likely to be the home owner. But there was still no way to be sure that she was the woman whose life had drained away on the kitchen floor. The victim could be another member of the family, or even a friend who’d stopped in to take care of Hobo while Brenda was at work or out of town.

There was a small brick fireplace, its mantel crowded with photos in an assortment of sizes and frames. All but two of them featured Hobo and a tiny white mop of a dog with dark eyes and a topknot of fur tied up in a pink bow. Of the two remaining photos, one was a faded black-andwhite of a bridal couple, the other a group shot of four women wearing summer colors and broad smiles that had probably erupted into laughter a moment after the photo was snapped. Brenda was the second one from the left. It was hard to connect this vital Brenda with the woman who was lying dead just two rooms away.

Rory was on her way back to the kitchen when a flash of movement in her peripheral vision brought her to an abrupt stop. She spun in that direction, her heart shifting into overdrive. Nothing was there. Maybe it had been a moth or a fly that had caught her attention. She looked around the room. For a moment nothing moved. Then brief snatches of color and texture flashed in front of her and one thing was certain—it wasn’t an insect.

Bits of Zeke kept appearing then vanishing as if he were trapped in a transporter malfunction on the old
Star Trek
series. She couldn’t imagine how he was doing it, but one thing was certain—his timing was awful.

“You have to stop this right now,” Rory said urgently to the empty room. There was no way to time her remarks to coincide with his brief appearances. She just hoped he could hear her and, more important, that he would listen.

“The police will be here any minute. We’ll talk when I get home.” She held her breath and waited. To her relief, the room remained empty. If Zeke started popping in and out like a jack-in-the-box wherever she went, life was going to get a lot more complicated, but she didn’t have the time to dwell on the problem just then. She glanced at her watch. She might still have a few minutes before the police arrived.

She made it back into the kitchen without further interruption. Since the room was small and already crowded with a breakfast table and four molded plastic chairs, as well as Brenda, Rory took up a position by the back door. From there she could see the entire room as well as the yard. She peered outside to check on Hobo. He was at the fence line, watering an arborvitae whose lower branches were already brown from his past attentions.

She turned back to inspect the room. The counters were clean and uncluttered, with only an electric coffeemaker and a dish rack that contained a cup, several utensils and a pair of hot pink rubber gloves. But the kitchen table held some items of interest. There was a checkbook, a pen and a haphazard pile of papers that looked like bills. Brenda had probably been sitting at the table about to tackle those bills when she was interrupted by her assailant. One moment paying the mortgage was the most important issue of her day, the next it didn’t matter at all. It was dizzying how swiftly the currents of life could change.

Rory debated the ethics of looking through the papers for the better part of a minute before she reached for one of the paper napkins that sat in a dog-shaped holder on the table. Draping the napkin over her thumb and index finger as a buffer, she managed to sift through the papers without actually touching them. There were bills from the electric company, the phone company and a place called Boomer’s Groomers, along with one from a Dr. Stanley Holbrook, who was most likely a veterinarian, since a cartoon dog and cat decorated his letterhead. It seemed Brenda had taken good care of her animals.

Rory stuffed the napkin into the pocket of her jeans. She’d reached the limits of her investigation. She’d ask Leah to keep her posted as the case went forward. She felt strangely invested in it, maybe because she’d been the one to find Brenda or maybe because of poor, bereft Hobo. She was lost in these thoughts when a horrified scream jolted her nervous system with the power of a lightning strike.