Killer Physique (A Savannah Reid Mystery) (18 page)

“Even guys who look like Jason Tyrone?”

“Especial y guys who look like Jason. The rest of the world thinks they’re a hunk, but they think they’re a shrimp.”

“That’s messed up.”

“You have no idea. Apparently, it takes over their whole lives. They neglect their friends and families so that they can work out constantly. They obsess about their diet and eat way more protein than they should. And they take gobs of supplements—without any kind of doctors’ advice. And then, of course, you’ve got the steroids, diuretics, the human growth hormone. They abuse stuff like that constantly and put their health at risk, just like Ryan said.”

“Are you tel ing me that this is a serious problem?”

“Apparently it’s a big deal now. Tammy said that even high school boys are developing this disorder. They think that a man can’t be masculine unless he’s al muscle-bound.”

Dirk shook his head. “That’s like al the girls who think they have to be stick thin to be pretty. It’s a shame.” Ahead they could see the signs, indicating the entrances to the Ventura Freeway.

Dirk said, “Which is it going to be—north or south?”

Savannah knew what he meant. They could head north, go home, and get back to their normal lives. She could paint the downstairs half bath, launder her dusty curtains, and maybe even find the time to go shopping for some sort of futon for the guest room. And, of course, she could give Dirk his very first honey-do list. Enforcing it would, no doubt, prove to be a chal enge. But it was never too early to begin training one’s new husband.

Or they could take the freeway south to the 405, and then jog over to Beverly Hil s. On a second piece of paper lying on her lap was Jason Tyrone’s address.

“Are we real y going to take this al the way?” Dirk asked her.

“With nothing but an ‘accidental death’ ruling from the coroner, it seems kind of sil y. We don’t have one shred of evidence that this was a murder.”

“Very true,” Dirk said. “Nobody would blame us if we just dropped the whole kit and caboodle right now.”

“Exactly.”

The entrance ramps were coming up. One with a big “S” for south, and the next with its “N” indicating north—home, home improvement, and impressing the new relatives.

“The smart thing would be to close the case and let them just bury old Jason in peace tomorrow.” Savannah held her breath, waiting to see which he would choose.

A moment later, the Buick was taking the tight ramp a bit too fast. So fast, in fact, that the tires squealed a bit.

And then they were headed south. Toward Beverly Hil s. Toward Jason Tyrone’s home.

Savannah smiled and said, “But then, we’ve been accused of many things over the years—and being smart ain’t one of them.” Chapter 16

As Dirk watched Savannah pick the lock of Jason Tyrone’s Greek revival mansion on a hil top in Beverly Hil s, he was speaking on his cel phone to Tammy. “I don’t suppose an old place like this has an alarm system,” he said. “But could you find out? The last thing we need is to alert the whole neighborhood the moment we get in the door.”

“How are you getting in without a key?” Tammy asked.

He sniffed. “I have Savannah with me, and you would ask a question like that?”

“Oh, right. Duh.”

“She’s going to have it open in about five seconds, so if you could check on that alarm system for me . . .”

“Or if you could have given me more than a five-second warning, I might have been able to help you. You know, Dirko, I can perform the impossible on demand. But it’s nice if I can have two minutes or so.”

“Never mind,” he said, as he fol owed Savannah through the newly opened door and into the foyer of the old plantation-style house. He looked around, searching the wal s with their cabbage rose–print paper.

“There’s no alarm box,” Savannah told him. “I would’ve seen it through the beveled glass in the front door. And I wouldn’t have picked the lock if there’d been one.”

She walked over to him, took the phone out of his hand, and said into it, “We’ve got it, babycakes. Sorry to have bothered you.”

“It was no trouble,” came Tammy’s polite reply. “But give Dirk a big, nasty raspberry for me, when you get a chance.”

“You’ve got it, kid.” Savannah turned off the phone, handed it back to Dirk, stuck her tongue out at him, and gave him a grotesque, wet, noisy raspberry—as requested.

“That’s from Tammy,” she said.

He grimaced. “I sorta figured. One of these days, if she becomes my sister-in-law, she’s going to have to start showing me some respect.”

“Why? I’m your wife and I don’t show you respect.”

“True.”

The playful grin she gave him belied her words. That was one of the things she liked best about Dirk—it was almost impossible to real y, deeply insult him. He knew she would die for him in an instant; it had been that way for years, even back when she was just his partner on the force. So a bit of mountain oyster breaking once in a while could be overlooked.

“What do you reckon we’re going to find here?” she asked him.

“You know the dril . We never know what we’re looking for until we find it.” As they walked across the black and white checked floor of the foyer, Savannah looked up at the graceful y curved staircase with its elegant wrought-iron and wooden railings, and she had to resist the urge to hum “Dixie.”

“Al that’s missing,” she said, “is a Southern bel e in a hooped skirt floating down the stairs.”

“I know what you mean,” he replied. “The theme from Gone with the Wind keeps running through my head.” They walked into the parlor, which was decorated with exquisite, Victorian-era antiques. A matched pair of diamond-tucked fainting couches in claret velvet were drawn up to a massive fireplace with a carved mantel. And everywhere Savannah looked she saw luxurious fabrics that invited a touch. A fringed, brocaded scarf was spread over an old piano. Drapes of thick, lush velvet hung from the windows.

And on the wal s hung mirrors, scenic paintings, and portraits, al in gilded frames.

“It might be a little bit gaudy in some ways,” Savannah admitted, “but it’s stil an awesome place. It reminds me of that antebel um mansion just outside of my hometown. You were there. Remember Judge Patterson’s old house?”

“How could I forget? That was the spookiest place I’ve ever been. This one isn’t so dark or creepy, but then, nobody got murdered here.”

“That we know of.”

“Yes, that we know of,” he said. “But does this look to you like a house that a guy like Jason would live in?”

“That wouldn’t be my first guess,” she replied. “But when it comes to people, you just never know. Maybe he was an Elvis fan, like you, and this place reminded him of Graceland.”

Dirk nodded thoughtful y. “Yeah, that would work for me.”

“Then if someday one of those lottery tickets you’re always buying pays off big, are you gonna buy me a place like this?” He slipped his arm around her waist and gave her a big squeeze. “If that’s what you want, babe, that’s what you’l get. We’l name it Graceland West.”

“And Granny wil come visit us, and we’l never be able to get rid of her.”

“That’s fine with me. I never get enough of your grandma.” He paused for a moment and gave her a nervous smile. “I hope you feel the same way about my family, once you get to know them.”

“If they’re even the least bit like you, darlin’, I’m gonna be crazy about ’em.”

“Is that true?”

“Why, of course it is, babycakes. Leastwise, til I change my mind.”

“That’s reassuring. . . . I think.”

As they meandered through the mansion, they grew increasingly frustrated, failing to find anything they would classify as significant.

The refrigerator was fil ed with al sorts of liquid concoctions. Most of the labels bore the words “super” and “energy” and the omnipresent

“power.”

Looking over the bottles and jars, Savannah shook her head and said, “You couldn’t make a decent meal out of the ingredients in this icebox.

Human beings weren’t meant to live on liquefied lettuce.”

“Except Tammy,” Dirk added.

“Yes, except for our Tammy, who could run a marathon and light up a lighthouse with the energy she gets out of one measly carrot.” They found not one, but three separate workout rooms brimming with heavy steel contraptions that Savannah didn’t recognize. They looked like medieval torture devices.

“Boy, I wish I had some of this stuff at home,” Dirk said in a tone usual y used by little boys who were coveting their best friend’s train set. “I could put it in the garage and—”

“And I could hang the laundry on it, as soon as I took it out of the dryer,” she interjected gleeful y. “No more wrinkles!”

“That’s almost blasphemous. You don’t know what he’s got here. This is about a zil ion dol ars worth of the highest-tech bodybuilding equipment in the world.”

Savannah gave the world’s best-equipped private gym a dismissive wave of her hand as she walked out of the room. “Any guy who spends more money on a stationary bike than a private limousine that can actual y take him somewhere—wel , that guy’s two pups short of a litter.”

“I didn’t see you pooh-poohing the results when you were gawking at him up there on the screen.”

“That’s when I thought it was al natural. Now that I’m learning al he had to do to get it, I’m plum disil usioned.” They proceeded on to the master bedroom, where they found only one thing that was ever-so-slightly interesting.

“Look at this,” Savannah said, pointing to a framed picture on the nightstand. It was a glamour head shot of Alanna Cleary. It had been signed in the lower right-hand corner, “Love always, ’Lanna.”

Instinctively, Savannah pul ed out the top drawer of the nightstand and looked inside. There it was—a similar photograph of Thomas Owen. And like Alanna’s, it was signed, “Love always, Tom.”

“Never believe what you read scribbled on a picture,” Savannah told Dirk, showing him Thomas’s photo. “One day you think your love’s gonna last forever, and the next day you’re facedown in a drawer, staring at a TV remote control and some empty condom wrappers.”

“Life sucks.”

“For some more than others.”

Savannah closed the drawer. As she walked around the room, she couldn’t help noticing how many mirrors there were. The front of the armoire, the wal over the dresser, the back of some bookcases, a standing cheval mirror, and several tabletops—al had mirrors. And on the underside of the canopy suspended over the bed were bronzed mirror tiles.

It occurred to her that, if you were making love in Jason’s bed, you could not only watch and critique your own performance, but the bronzed mirrors would give your image a nice tan as wel .

She said, “Tammy mentioned that part of this disorder is an obsession with constantly looking at yourself in mirrors.”

“Hey, the jury’s already come back with the verdict on Jason having that bigorexia thing. But that’s not what we’re trying to find here.” Savannah was standing in front of the closet, which held only the most mundane contents—the simple evidence of a man leading a surprisingly simple life.

Except for a deadly disorder.

“That’s true,” she said. “We’re looking for evidence that might indicate he was murdered. And we aren’t finding it.” She turned back to Dirk. She could see her own frustration reflected in his eyes. “This is just so weird,” she told him. “Finding out that somebody died accidental y rather than as a result of foul play—that’s good news, right?”

“Yeah. You’d think so anyway.”

“So why does al this good news make me feel sick to my stomach?”

“Me too.”

“Oh, crap! I forgot al about the futon!” Savannah said that night as she, Dirk, and the kitties cuddled in bed.

“The what?” he asked. He rol ed away from her, as the romantic mood he had been trying to kindle dissipated.

“The futon. You know, the fold-out bed thing-a-ma-doodle for the guest room.”

“What guest room? You mean my man cave?”

Her annoyance meter ticked up a few notches. She wasn’t in the mood for any static tonight—especial y when it had to do with making his parents comfortable during their weeklong stay.

“Just FYI,” she said, “for the time that your folks are here, you don’t have a man cave.” He rose up onto one elbow, and she could feel him staring at her in the darkness. “But that’s my room, my sanctuary. That’s where I get away from it al .”

“And by ‘al ’ you mean me.”

It took him so long to answer that she knew she’d scored several points with that one.

But Dirk was as good at offense as defense. “You told me that you like it when I watch my boxing in my cave and let you watch your chick flicks in the living room.”

He had her there. If she were truthful, she would admit that the man cave benefited her as much as it did him. If she had to be total y honest, she would admit that, as a person who had lived alone for years, she greatly enjoyed those precious moments of solitude.

But honesty was sometimes overrated in the middle of a marital spat.

“I know you enjoy watching your sports alone,” she said, with just the right touch of whine in her voice. “And being an independent woman, I don’t take it personal y when my husband expresses a need to be alone once in a while.” He lay back down and cleared his throat.

She knew the old throat-clearing trick. He used it when he was trying to think of a good reply and needed to buy some time. Final y, he said, “I appreciate that, Van. I hear other guys complaining that their wives demand their attention al the time. I’m glad you’re not like that.” She could hear a note of apology in his words, and she felt a little bit ashamed of herself. She reached over and trailed her hand down his arm.

“Thank you, sugar. You’re the best husband on God’s green earth,” she said. “And I gotta tel you, if I had a woman cave, we’d use that instead when your folks are here.”

“It’s okay. I understand. I just hope they don’t mind sleeping in a room that’s decorated with Harley stuff.” Savannah groaned inwardly, sensing that their momentary peace was about to be shattered al over again. “No, darlin’,” she said. “It ain’t the two of them who’s gonna be sleeping in there. It’s you and me.”

“What?”