Key West (32 page)

The ugly little dog from next door eyed him from beneath the oak table. “Hey, Wimpy,” he said, snapping his fingers.

The dog yawned and made chomping sounds with small, prominent teeth.

“Oh, you are a beauty, aren’t you?” Chris said, grinning at the pop-eyed face. “Where do you think you’re spending the night? You’d better go outside.”

“Chris?” Sonnie sounded as if she was standing on the stairs. “Are you talking to Wimpy?”

“I am. He’s ignoring me.”

“Maybe he’s got good taste.”

He grimaced. “Thanks. I’m going to put him out for the night.”

“No! What are you talking about? He can come up here.”

Wimpy grinned, definitely grinned. Chris curled his lip at him.

“Do you hear me?” Sonnie said.

“I hear you.”

“Chris?” Halting uncertainty loaded that word.

“Yeah.’

“On the counter there’s a scarf. Α green silk scarf. Bring it up, would you?”

“Okay,” he said, although—as he’d figured—he didn’t see any scarves.

He didn’t know how he’d tell her there wasn’t one thing to substantiate what she’d told him, and yet still convince her he believed in her. The damnable thing was that he did believe in her—even if he was being forced toward thinking she was a sick woman. What he believed was that she was right when she said someone was backing her into a corner where she could easily be painted as insane.

Later he’d wrestle with what it would take to pull off such a thing.

He hadn’t taken two steps toward the entry hall before Wimpy dashed ahead and led the way upstairs. He nosed his way into Sonnie’s bedroom and stood there, looking back as if waiting for Chris to catch up.

With her fingers laced together, Sonnie hovered near a chair. “Where is it?” she said, craning her head forward.

“No green scarf,” he said. “We’ve got our hands full, but people who play this kind of number always leave tracks. We’ll find ‘em, kid. Into bed with you.”

“I want to help you look for clues.”

“Not now, you won’t. Do as I ask you.”

She shook her head, and started when Wimpy took a leap onto the bottom of the bed, where he sat displaying his prominent teeth and panting.

Chris smiled. “We’ve got one happy customer present. He likes us.”

“I can’t keep still,” Sonnie said. “I feel as if things are crawling around under my skin. Jumpy.”

If he suggested they got her something to calm her down she’d never forgive him. “Me, too,” he lied. He held up the bottle and glasses. “Talon’s fix-all. Now I don’t want you thinking I spend a lot of time drinking my worries away.” And that wasn’t a complete truth, either. He’d cut himself off from the booze when it had looked like it was becoming a problem, but not before a few mornings when the hangover made him wish he didn’t have a head—and what he remembered of the night before was unclear or nonexistent.

Sonnie whipped past him so quickly, so unexpectedly, that he didn’t have time to try to stop her. She limped rapidly along the hallway, turned past the room where the fire had occurred, and went into a room on the other side. “Come on,” she called. “This is yours.”

He took the time to pour two brandies and leave them on her bedside table before following.

“What kind of beans did you have for dinner?” he asked. It wasn’t fumy, but it was the best he could do.

“No beans,” she said. “No dinner.”

“I meant because you’re jumping all over the place. This is great. Bedroom, sitting room, bathroom. Suite fit for a king..”

“Nothing would be too good for you.” She colored. “I mean, I wish it was cozier. This was the first place I cleaned, though. The sheets have been changed and everything’s vacuumed. Where’s your stuff?”

She frowned so deeply, he flexed his hands to stop himself from reaching for her. “Downstairs,” he told her. “Won’t be a minute.”

Sonnie looked from the balcony into the entryway while Chris ran down the stairs and out of sight, to return with the leather saddlebags from his motorcycle over one shoulder. In his denim shirt and jeans, with his lean, tanned face turned up to hers, he reminded her of a cowboy. Not that she’d ever seen a real cowboy.

“Do you ride horses?” she asked. If he didn’t already think she was bizarre, he wasn’t too observant. “I mean—”

“It’s the saddlebags.” He grinned. “Hopalong Talon comes to town. I like to ride but I don’t get a lot of opportunities.” He dropped the bags at the top of the stairs and extended a hand to Sonnie. She came to him slowly and he led her back into her bedroom, where Wimpy waited patiently.

“In you go,” he told Sonnie, propping up her pillows. When she did as he’d asked, he gave her a glass of brandy. “Sip that slowly. It’ll relax you and help you sleep.”

She sipped obediently, then pointed past him.

Wimpy turned circles on the bottom of the bed and finally flopped down. He arranged a paw over his stubby nose and studied them with his shiny eyes.

“Guard dog,” Chris said. “Or just an opportunist, is more likely.”

“Sit with me,” Sonnie said. “I’ve got to do something to prove I’m not losing it. I’m not, Chris. Really, I’m not.”

Tipping up his own glass bought a little time to think. “Whoa, that sterilizes the tonsils.” He coughed. “You don’t want to talk now, sweetheart. Sleep. We’ll go over everything in the morning. Meanwhile, remember I’m going to be near enough to hear you breathe. And I’m a rough, tough guy. You don’t have a thing to worry about.”

“You talk a good story, but you’re not rough and tough.” She swallowed more brandy and he actually saw her face start to relax. He mustn’t forget that she didn’t weigh much. A little strong liquor would go a long way with her.

“I’m tough,” he told her. “If you don’t believe me, I can find a bunch of people to convince you.” Not that he was proud of that—not anymore.

“I’m not ready to go to sleep yet. Talk to me.”

Talking was something they needed to do, but he wouldn’t take out any bets that she’d want to touch the subject he had in mind.

“Sit here.” She patted the bed beside her.

Uh-uh, Chris. Pack up the hormones and sit in a chair while you still can.
Without commenting, he got a chair and sat close, but not too close. The cotton nightie gave his imagination a boost. His fascination with Sonnie’s small breasts didn’t make much sense when he thought about his supposed taste in women. Not that there had been anything wrong with the women he’d known before her. No, sir, not a thing wrong with them.

“The brandy’s good,” she said, looking into her glass. “I think it tastes better as it gets warmer or something. You think that’s it?”

It tastes better the more you drink of it.
“That could be it. I bet you had real pale hair when you were a kid.”

Her eyes were wide, her pupils dilated. “When I was a kid? Mmm—pale. White. Billy was the colorful one. I was the colorless one. That’s what people used to say.” She giggled. “I’m glad because it made her happy. She lives in the world. I live in my head. That makes me happy.”

“That doesn’t surprise me. Are you sure you don’t want to go to sleep now?”

“Sure,” she said, frowning. “I couldn’t sleep yet. I want to talk.”

Okay, so she wanted to talk, Chris thought. “I went out to the airport today. And to Stock Island. Asked a lot of questions. I’ve been to the police station and talked to a few people. I tried to find out what they’re thinking about Edward’s death.”

Sonnie raised her shoulders. Chris couldn’t stop himself from looking at them. Smooth. And her arms were so slender. He’d like to pass his palms up and down, up and down, and settle her on her back, and cover her mouth with his, and…

“What did they say about Edward?”

“Oh, they didn’t say a whole lot. They got the tissue samples back. I found that out from my friend at the desk. Intravenous shots of local anesthetic. Procaine and lidocaine. A lot of it. Caused cardiac arrest.”

She was quiet at that.

“But the police aren’t killing themselves to do much about it. I suppose they’ll get to it. They talked about his being a druggie. Don’t ask me why. And don’t ask me if they think he was a contortionist who gave himself shots in the backs of his arms, shots almost guaranteed to kill him.”

“Ena’s still shut up in her house. I didn’t see her all day. She’s taking this hard.”

“Yeah. Sonnie, you met the plane, didn’t you?” Catching her off guard might work. It was worth a try.

“Met the plane?”

“The one Frank was supposed to come in on.”

She licked the rim of her glass and said, “I don’t remember.” She had to tell him the truth about the phone call. “I lied about who called me tonight. You won’t believe me but I’m going to tell you anyway. It was Frank, not Romano. It was so strange. I got sick afterward. He said all the things he said the other time. When it happened.”

The back of Chris’s neck prickled. He didn’t respond. Better to let her continue.

“He said I was going to have to meet him at the airport in the Volvo. The Volvo was wrecked.” She raised her eyes. “But you know that. He told me I had to be ready to go there in a hurry because he needed my help. Just like before. He got angry with me.”

Chris flexed muscles in his jaw. “How come?”

“I don’t know. Maybe because I was too shocked to say the right things.”

“What would the right things be?”

“Whatever he wanted me to say, of course.” The brandy might be making itself felt.

“Did he frighten you?”

“Frank likes to frighten me.” Sonnie covered her mouth and shook her head. She whispered, “I didn’t mean that the way it sounded.”

“How did you mean it then?”

She pressed her lips together and averted her face. “What am I supposed to do? I told Romano and all he wants to do is get me what he calls ‘help.’ If I’ve lost my mind, I know it—I didn’t think that was the way it was supposed to be. I don’t even dare call the cops. I know I won’t find a single person who’ll take me seriously. Can you even imagine how that feels?”

“I think so.” Time to come at this from another direction. “You did go to the airport. That first time—when Frank had called you and told you to be there.”

“I don’t know.”

“After the plane landed, you had a conversation with Romano, didn’t you?”

She shook her head. “I don’t remember.”

“Why?”

“I can’t.”

“Can’t? Or don’t want to?”

“Can‘t.”

The anger was something he’d learned to press for during interrogation. He didn’t like doing this to Sonnie.

“You got in your car and drove. You drove faster and faster.”

She threw back the covers and pulled up her right foot. “It still hurts,” he said, remorseful. “I should get you some ice.”

“It jammed under the gas pedal. I was lucky it didn’t stop me from being thrown out on the sand.”

Chris looked at: her sharply. “I thought you didn’t remember.”

While she rubbed the foot, she showed the smooth underside of her leg all the way up to the lace edging on her white panties. “I don’t remember. They must have told me.”

“Didn’t I read that they avoid telling amnesiacs any details they want them to remember for themselves?”

“I don’t know what you read.”

“Frank frightened you a lot, didn’t he?” It was a shot in the dark, but that was all he had—shots in the dark.

She didn’t answer him. With her head bowed, she played with strands of hair. From time to time she paused and smoothed two fingers up and down her cheek.

“Tell me all about it,” he asked her. “I’m only here for you. I don’t have one thing I owe anyone else.”

“You don’t owe me,” she said quietly. “I’ve asked too much of you.”

“Was your husband abusive?”

She shook her head almost violently.

The admission that they’d tolerated abuse often shamed women—or men. “Did he hit you sometimes?”

Gripping the glass in both hands, she emptied it and held it out for more. He didn’t want to refuse, but rather than pour more, he gave her a little from his own glass.

So he wouldn’t push that any more for now, but he thought he had his answer. “When you left the airport, you drove along South Roosevelt. At Bertha, you missed your turn and hit the wall. That curved wall. Smathers Beach is right there. That would be the driver’s side of your car.”

“No.” She shut her eyes. “No, I don’t know.”

“You were told some of this. You said you were.”

“But I’ve forgotten now.”

He could push a woman until she broke. He ought to know, he’d…

She covered her eyes with one hand and took the glass to her lips with the other.

“The report said you were going too fast. Gathering speed rapidly.”

“Don’t remember.”

“Then you hit that wall. The car caught on fire and they thought you were still inside. You were thrown a long way and you landed on rocks on the beach. They couldn’t see you there at first.”

“I won’t listen to you.” The hand that had covered her eyes went to her stomach. She spread wide her fingers and pressed them to her.

Thinking about the baby.
He detested himself. “You weren’t wearing a seat belt. Why wouldn’t you? Especially at such a time.”

She pointed at him with a shaking forefinger. “You stop it right now. Who told you to do this to me?”

Damn, damn.
He took her glass, and she didn’t try to stop him. “You’re wonderful, know that?” If he could smile he would. He couldn’t. “Υοu’ve got guts. I do believe you, Sonnie. There’s so little we have to work with, but so much out there to find. Patience and luck—and Sonnie’s brand of guts. That’s what we need.”

She rested her forehead on her knees. “Thank you. It’s…You feel so helpless when you’re afraid you won’t be believed. And when you can understand why people wouldn’t believe you.”

Chris stroked the back of her hair.

He trailed his hand over her back, across her shoulder.

The nightie gaped at the neck. He looked elsewhere, but not before he’d seen what made it difficult to keep his pants zipped.

“I’m going to bed,” he said abruptly, and stood up. “We’ve got a lot to get done tomorrow. Or a lot to get started on. Call if you need me.”