With Vics You Get Eggroll (A Mad for Mod Mystery Book 3) (12 page)

SIXTEEN

I didn’t know what to make about that one particular detail, but I knew it was important. I also knew that Emil Lyndy was Hudson’s friend and, in some ways, responsible for teaching him what he knew about carpentry. Could the small man be somehow responsible for the attacks? I didn’t want to think so, but when he showed up in my storage unit wielding his knife, he’d certainly scared me.

When Effie came out of the powder room, I met her halfway. “I’m sorry to have upset you,” I said. I smoothed her long hair back and looked at her red face. “How about Rocky comes to visit tomorrow? We’ll only talk about what you want to talk about.”

“Okay,” she said. She sniffled again and I sensed that the tears were only very barely under control. I hugged her tightly and promised to be back the next day.

It was close to eight by the time I returned to Hudson’s house. I could have made it there earlier, but I got turned around outside of the Luxury Uptown Lofts and ended up taking three left turns before I was headed the right direction. I left three voicemails and two text messages for Tex, who was still missing in action. I even went out of my way and drove through the neighborhoods near the Casa Linda shopping center. I didn’t think I would actually find him, but I was giving him a chance to find me. He didn’t.

Hudson had left the garage open. An arrow had been cut from neon orange paper and attached to a sign that said “Park here and come out back.” I pulled the car inside and closed the garage door.

Hudson was in the yard behind his house. Two thick steaks sat on a plate to the left of his grill next to a couple of misshapen blobs wrapped in tinfoil. Rocky sat at the base of a tree, looking up. I followed his stare and found Mortiboy sitting on a low branch.

“Perfect timing,” he said. “I was about to toss a couple of steaks and potatoes on the grill. Mortiboy and Rock thought they were getting something fancy tonight.”

“They still might,” I said. I scooped up Rocky and gave him a kiss, set him back down and held a hand up for Mortiboy to sniff. “I’m not all that hungry.”

Hudson set the tongs down. He gently turned me around, placed his hands on my shoulders, and massaged my muscles.

“Do you want to talk about it?” he asked

“Not yet.” I reached over my shoulders and put my hands on top of Hudson’s. “What I would like is a cool shower. Do you mind?”

“Use mine. Mortiboy’s litter box is in the one in the hallway. I’ll throw the potatoes on the grill.” He gave me a couple seconds more of massage, and then pulled his hands away. “Once the potato clock starts ticking, you’ve got forty-five minutes.”

Hudson’s bedroom was the only room in the house I hadn’t explored when he gave me the opportunity. I slowed down as I approached it, as if opening that door and going inside was significant.

Where the rest of his house maintained the early seventies style his grandmother had favored before passing away, his bedroom was less decade-specific. His bed was made but the covers were folded back. White pillowcases. White sheets. A plaid comforter in shades of navy blue, forest green, and yellow rested by the foot of the bed. Two small tables sat on either side of the headboard. One held the lamp I’d given him for Christmas two years ago, a white ceramic Chinese man with a Fu Manchu mustache. When I’d found the lamp, it had been little more than a paperweight. Hudson was the person I turned to for object d’art restoration, but in this case I sought out the help of an employee of Lowe’s, who sold me a lamp kit and gave me the confidence that I could fix it myself. It had taken the better part of a Saturday afternoon, but when I gifted it, the light bulb over the Chinese man glowed like he had a great idea.

On the other nightstand was a worn Agatha Christie paperback. There was no television set in Hudson’s bedroom, only a small cart with an old turntable on top and a collection of dog-eared albums underneath. I crossed the room and lifted the top of the record player to see what he’d been listening to. An old Julie London album was on the turntable. The jacket was on top of a Clash album. I pressed the power button on the record player and placed the needle on the record.

As the sounds of bluesy horns and throaty vocals filled the room, I walked around the bed, my fingertips trailing over the cotton of the comforter. Along the wall in front of the bed was a tall maple armoire, and on the armoire were Hudson’s keys, an ashtray of loose change, a pair of sunglasses, and a couple of guitar picks. A hook over the back of the door held a necktie hanger filled with skinny ties. I’d never seen Hudson in a necktie. I’d never seen him in anything other than a T-shirt and jeans until the night I’d found him in his pajamas. But the evidence in front of me told of a life of his that I wasn’t a part of. The twinge of jealousy I felt surprised me.

I’d spent long enough wandering around Hudson’s room to feel like I was borderline violating his privacy. I went into his bathroom, stripped off my clothes, and turned on the water. I climbed in and pulled the shower curtain closed. A large round spigot directly above me poured water onto my head like I was standing in a downpour.

I scrubbed at my skin with the green bar of soap from the caddy then rinsed under the cool water. The sensation reminded me of my childhood summer vacation at the Jersey shore. Outdoor showers had been installed in the yard of the cottage where my family rented a room. After walking back from an afternoon spent at the beach, my parents and I took turns rinsing off the sand and sunscreen before going inside and changing out of our bathing suits and into real clothes. That felt like a lifetime ago, those days when I had a family, when I had people who took care of me. When I asked advice and sought approval. Ever since the month they passed away unexpectedly, I understood that I was the only person who could make decisions for me. I had dropped out of college and taken a job working for a mid-century modern interior decorator in Philadelphia and had been taking care of myself ever since.

I’d spent my days at the showroom and my nights studying Doris Day movies. Sharing a birthday with the actress had provided a natural connection that my parents had encouraged by buying me one of her movies every April third. In those early days of being alone, in the dark with no company but Doris and one of her leading men, I felt like my parents were there with me. I had wrapped myself in the vintage styles I saw in the movies and created a world of my own, where nobody could tell me I didn’t fit in.

Twenty-seven years had passed since their death, and my private world had become a tower of emotional isolation. The only person I had let in had violated my trust in such a way that I closed and locked the tower doors and threw out the keys. I was content to live my life with Rocky as my companion. I was good at decorating, and the job allowed me to maintain a connection with the world through my clients while not risking my heart.

But somehow, when I least expected it, my tower had been demolished. I found myself longing to become a part of something bigger than the world I’d created. The chaos that had surrounded me in the past year had awakened emotions that I’d long denied, but had also awakened the fear of loving someone who might not be there when I woke up the next day. Chronologically, I was forty-eight, but emotionally I was back in touch with my twenty-one year old self with an unmistakable fear of abandonment.

Forever twenty-one wasn’t necessarily a good thing.

I heard a knock on the door. “Madison?” Hudson’s voice asked. “You okay in there?”

I dunked my head under the water and tried to answer. “Yes,” I said. I hadn’t realized I’d been crying until I choked on my reply.

The door opened and Hudson’s tanned arm reached into the shower and turned off the water. I held the shower curtain up in front of my body and looked at his face. He tore the curtain down from the silver hooks that held it in place, snapping the plastic from the holes one at a time. I wrapped the curtain around my torso and he wrapped his arms around the plastic. I fell against his shoulder and melted into him.

He put his knuckle under my chin and tipped my head up so I was looking at him. “It’s going to be okay,” he said.

“You don’t even know why I’m upset.”

“It doesn’t matter. Whatever it is, it’s going to be okay.”

He brushed a kiss against my lips, and then a second one. His lips were soft and tender, like a ripe tomato. They lingered for only a moment. I caught his breath in my own.

The third kiss was more intimate than the first two. Our bodies pressed together. I became very aware that I was wet and naked under a plastic shower curtain.

When we pulled apart, he rested his forehead against mine. “I’ve wanted to do that for a long time,” he said in a gravelly voice barely above a whisper. “Why don’t you get dressed and meet me outside?” I wondered for a second if my emotions were as transparent as the shower curtain. “If I don’t get back to that grill, our steaks are going to taste like shoe leather.”

I waited until he closed the bathroom door behind him to look at myself in the mirror. My blond hair was in clumps around the sides of my face. My eyes were bloodshot. The cool water had kept my face from turning a blotchy patchwork of red like I’d feared, but my reflection was far from my A-game.

I dried off and changed into a yellow sleeveless sundress with a drop waist and a full skirt. Yellow and white brick-a-brack in the form of a chain of daisies decorated the collar and the faux placket down the front. I slipped into green ballerina flats, combed my hair away from my face, and added a touch of mascara to my fair lashes. I was taking too long and I knew it. What I didn’t know was what I was avoiding. Telling Hudson about finding Cleo Tyler? Or giving in to the attraction I’d fought for so long?

Rocky sniffed me out and scratched the outside of the bathroom door. I let him in, closed the toilet, and sat on the lid. Rocky jumped onto my lap and licked the side of my face. I hugged him and then he wriggled out of my arms and ran away.

I dusted some translucent powder across my nose, packed everything up in my overnight kit, and looked out the window. Hudson stood by the grill with the tongs in his hand. He had a straw hat on his head and his black hair curled against his collar from under the back of it. Rocky had returned outside and now jumped around Hudson’s ankles. Mortiboy was on the hammock where Hudson had been earlier. It could have been a photo shoot for the Sears catalog. A smile replaced the sadness. Whatever had brought me to this particular moment was worth it.

I carried my personal items out of the bathroom to my suitcase in the spare room. I heard Hudson’s voice and figured he was talking to Mortiboy the way I talked to Rocky. I headed to the back of the house and put my hand on the latch to unlock the sliding door.

And then I saw who Hudson was talking to. Tex!

SEVENTEEN

I purposely hadn’t told Tex where I’d stayed last night. It was supposed to be my secret. So why was he here? And what did this visit mean?

I dialed back the initial instinct to whip the door open and ask them what the hell they were planning and instead pressed myself against the side of the refrigerator and listened to their conversation through the open window.

“Madison’s been great, but this whole thing has gotten bigger than I thought. I can’t put her in danger. If you see her, do whatever you have to do to keep her from getting involved,” Tex said.

“Allen, I wonder if you know what you just asked me to do,” Hudson said.

“I know I couldn’t take it if she was hurt because of something that had to do with me. The best way to trap this guy is to make myself vulnerable. Draw him out. I can’t do that if I think Madison is at risk.”

I peeked outside. Tex crossed his arms and stood with his feet shoulder width apart. It was his intimidating cop stance. It didn’t seem to have any effect on Hudson.

Hudson flipped the steaks, but didn’t say anything. I wondered if he’d told Tex that I was in the house. It didn’t sound like it. But Tex wasn’t stupid. Once he figured I wasn’t at my studio or my apartment or Thelma Johnson’s house, it would have only been a matter of time before he came looking for me here.

“You do what you have to do, man,” Hudson said. “And if I see Madison, I’ll do what I can. But I’m not you. I’m not going to tell her what she can and can’t do. She’s got a brain and she’s going to do what she thinks she should.” He picked the potatoes up and set them on the plates, and then tented tinfoil on top of each of them. “That’s what we both love about her.”

Love.
The word hit me like a taser to the heart. Hudson looked up at Tex and the two of them stood there staring at each other for what felt like an hour but was probably two seconds. I shouldn’t be listening, but I couldn’t step away.

Tex pulled his sunglasses off of his face and tucked them into the pocket of his T-shirt. He held his hand out to Hudson. “Thanks,” he said. Hudson shook his hand and nodded. Tex’s eyes cut to the two plates, the two potatoes, and the two steaks. He scanned the backyard, as if expecting to find me hiding behind a bush. “I’ll let myself out,” he finally said.

He turned toward the house. In two steps he’d be close enough to see me. I dropped to my hands and knees and crawled through the living room to the hallway, and then stayed low and ran to the spare bedroom with Rocky by my side. I pushed the door shut behind me and shushed Rocky.

The back door opened. The back door shut.

The front door opened. The front door shut.

A loud roar of an engine started. I stood on the twin bed and peeked out the window. A large white camper pulled away from the curb and drove off. I memorized the plate number before it was out of my line of vision.

It wasn’t until after the truck was out of sight that I wondered exactly why I’d been so worried about Tex finding me at Hudson’s house. I let Rocky out from the spare room and wasted a little time plugging my phone into a charger in the kitchen, and then followed the scent of the steaks to the backyard.

“Hey,” Hudson said. “I was starting to worry about you.”

“I would have been out sooner but I saw…” My voice trailed off. I studied the expression on his face and I realized with very clear certainty that he was not going to tell me about Tex’s visit.

“Saw what?”

“Your collection of Agatha Christies. I didn’t know you were a mystery fan.”

He smiled. “It was my granddad’s collection first. They came with the house. That’s my favorite thing to read at night. I like that Poirot.”

“How’s dinner coming?”

“Just about done. Can you hand me the plates?”

I held the white china plates out while Hudson used the tongs to transfer the steaks and potatoes to each of them. When he finished, I carried them to the wooden picnic table on the small concrete rectangle of patio that separated his back door from his yard. He followed close behind me, with a bottle of wine in one hand and two glasses in the other.

“Red okay?”

“Sure.”

He filled the glasses and handed me one. For the next few seconds, conversation ceased while we each dressed our potato and cut into our steaks. Juices ran out and mingled with the melted butter, pooling on the lower corner of the plate and indicating that the table was not 100% level.

For everything I’d ever wanted to say to Hudson, I found myself surprisingly tongue-tied. I knew why. With Tex, I could say anything. We were so different that the barbs we shared were anticipated. From the minute we’d met, neither one of us expected to get along. That had been the surprise. But I wanted to confide in Hudson. I wanted him to know how scared I was.

I set down the knife and fork. “I’ve been working on a house on Sweetwater. A couple from Hollywood—Dan and Cleo Tyler—decided they wanted a mid-century ranch and bought one sight unseen. It’s a Cliff May in serious disrepair.”

Hudson whistled. “Restoring a rundown Cliff May. Nice.”

“The bones of it are intact: east-west windows at the top of the wall by the ceiling joints, open floor plan, partitions, but the last owner did a number on the interior with a bad eighties remodel. The Tyler’s heard about us on the news. That’s why they hired me.” I didn’t mention their plan to buy the rights to the Pillow Stalking case because now, with Cleo’s abduction and subsequent release, it no longer seemed relevant.

Hudson drank his wine. “Sounds like a big project.”

“I’ve been spending three days a week at their house—Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. The husband fired me this morning.”

Hudson looked surprised. “Why?”

“I was at their house the day the police announced the evidence that Lt. Allen was involved in the abductions.” I studied Hudson’s face for an indication that he knew this, or that he was going to acknowledge that Tex had just been at his house. When he didn’t respond, I continued. “Dan’s brother was a cop. He died in a drunk driving accident. He was the drunk driver. Two teenage girls died in the same accident. Dan is anti-cop, and he’s especially anti-Tex. I don’t know why.”

“Cleo and Dan Tyler. Why do I know their names?”

“Cleo Tyler was abducted two days ago.”

“And?”

“She was found today. Still alive.”

“That’s good news. Where was she?”

This was no time to beat around the bush. “Hudson, I found her. I’d made plans to meet Lt. Allen in the Casa Linda parking lot, and that’s where she was. I went out there to find him but I found her instead.”

I told him about her being inside the Jeep that matched the make and model of Tex’s car. I told him about how I’d figured out that it wasn’t Tex’s car, and how the police officer seemed to already know that. “I figured a few things out today and I need to talk to Tex. I don’t know where to find him. He’s trying to figure this out alone.”

“Maybe he
needs
to figure it out alone. Sometimes that’s the best way to find answers.”

“Is that why you left? Because you needed to be alone to figure things out?”

He reached his hand across the table and set it on top of mine. “I left because I couldn’t stay. I had closure. You didn’t. And I had to let you make your own decisions.”

“You might not always like my decisions.” I raised my hand and entwined my fingers with his, stroking his palm with my thumb. “My circle is fairly small, Hudson. When I moved to Dallas, I thought I knew all the people I was going to know in my life. And then, when I hired you to help with Mad for Mod, I knew I wanted to spend more time with you.” I swatted at a mosquito that was buzzing around my head. “Do you know how many times I thought about us—you and me—together? But I was scared of what would go wrong so I blocked those thoughts. What we have now is pretty special. I don’t want to jeopardize it. I don’t want to risk not having you in my life.”

“Madison, I’m not going anywhere.”

“Hudson, Lt. Allen is in my life too. Turns out I don’t like isolation as much as I thought. I need to do what I can to protect my circle.”

“Who am I to you?” he asked.

“Is this a quiz?”

He ran his fingertips down the length of my nose. “Your life is so rooted in Doris Day. She had a lot of leading men. Is that what I am to you? One of a cast of leading men?”

“I can’t explain who you are to me,” I said softly. “I can’t explain any of these emotions.”

He dropped his hand and curled his calloused fingers around mine. “Madison, I walked away from you once. I’m not doing it again.”

“Even if it means I might tell you something you don’t want to hear?”

Hudson’s hand stilled, but he didn’t pull away. “You’re trying to tell me something now, aren’t you?”

I looked away from his amber eyes, wishing the mosquito would return to provide a distraction. Even Rocky and Mortiboy were being particularly well behaved, providing me no escape from what I had to say.

“Do you remember Effie, the college girl who lived in my apartment building?”

“She watches Rock sometimes, right?”

I nodded. “A few nights ago, she was approached by a guy dressed like a police officer outside of the Landing. She thought it was Lt. Allen.”

“How do you know it wasn’t?”

“It was the same day someone found his badge in the woods near where they found Kate Morrow’s body. Tex was with the police chief on a live TV interview. There’s absolutely 100% no way it could have been him.”

Hudson nodded. “That’s not what you want to tell me, is it?”

I shook my head. “I went to see Effie today. She’s staying with her boyfriend. She’s the only person who had an encounter with this person and walked away unscathed. I thought maybe she could tell me something new, something everybody’s overlooked.”

“Did she?”

“The guy approached her on foot. He was in uniform, and he said she had a broken tail light and asked her to get out of the car. She saw the knife the guy was carrying and took off instead. It was the same one your friend Lyndy had.”

He pulled his hands away from mine and his face went rigid. “Lyndy’s not a killer,” he said.

“Hudson, I don’t have the same history with Lyndy that you do. I saw his knife. I gave his name to the police.”

“You think he had something to do with these women getting abducted?”

“I don’t know. The police wanted a list of every contractor that I spoke to, and of everybody on that list, he’s the only one who came to me instead of me reaching out to him. He popped up at my studio the day after my client was abducted.”

Hudson stood up quickly. The picnic bench he’d been sitting on flipped backward. He stormed into the house, the screen door banging against the frame after he disappeared. Seconds later he returned.

He held up a blade like the one Lyndy had set by my feet. “It’s a carpet and linoleum knife. Cuts on the pull,” he said, miming the motion of hatchetting the knife into flooring and pulling toward him. “I told you Lyndy’s trade is carpet installation. He’s one of the best.” He set the knife on the table between us in the same manner that Lyndy had set it down on the ground. He tapped the wooden handle with his index finger. “This knife cost me less than four bucks at the hardware store. I’ve had it for twenty years. I’m surprised you don’t have one considering you’re a decorator. There’s probably a carpet knife in every garage in Dallas.”

For every part of a renovation job that I did myself, carpet tear out and installation was one job that I left to the professionals. It was a physical limitation, not a professional one, that kept me from adding it to my resume: my bad knee.

When I moved to Dallas from Philadelphia, I’d brought two things: a van filled with my meager possessions, and a torn ACL. I bought the apartment building, started my business, and adopted Rocky all after moving. The knee injury was a constant reminder of the days before I shut out the world and made a life for myself. Because I didn’t like to ask for help, I’d learned to do most things for myself, but kneeling on the floor while installing or tearing out carpets was one act that I’d never be able to do.

I picked up the knife and traced my fingertip along the side of the blade. Hudson’s faith in Lyndy was as unshakable as my faith in Tex. I couldn’t fault him for his loyalty. I focused on the tip of the knife. I’d been so sure that the knife meant something that I wasn’t willing to admit that it didn’t.

“Madison,” Hudson said softly, “it would be one thing if you found Lyndy’s knife at the scene of the crime, but you didn’t.”

“How would I know Lyndy’s knife?”

“His daughters gave it to him for Father’s Day, two weeks before they died. It has his initials scored on the handle.”

I looked at Hudson. “How did Lyndy’s daughters die?”

“Car accident,” said Lyndy, appearing at the side of Hudson’s house. “Five years ago my daughters were killed in a head-on collision with a drunk police officer.”