Killerwatt (9 page)

As Rhetta pulled into the parking lot in front of
her office, the front door flew open, and Woody rushed out to meet her. His
cartoon-character tie flapped in the breeze he created.

“What are you doing here?” Woody reached the car as
she opened the door. “Shouldn’t you be at the hospital with the judge? I can
take care of things here.” He held the door for her. Her arms were full with the
cleaning supplies she bought three days ago, which she hadn’t unloaded. Woody
wound up toting the plastic sacks with pine scented cleaner, while she carted
in the bags containing paper products.

“I know you can. I’m not here to work. I want to run
something past you, but I need coffee first.” She disappeared into the kitchen
and put away the supplies.

Rhetta filled a ceramic mug from the large pot that
was always on. The smell of fresh coffee always made her yearn for a cup. She
was the first to admit she was shamelessly addicted.

Rhetta took her cup to the conference table. Woody
poured a cup for himself, grabbed a handful of sugar packets, and followed her
to the table.

“Randolph’s been hurt badly. But he’s going to be
okay.” Rhetta stared at her coffee.

Woody opened the first of the packets and emptied it
into his cup. He followed that by dumping in the rest of the packets and
stirred the mixture vigorously. “Take as much time off as you need. Even though
LuEllen won’t be back for a while, I can take care of the office.”

“I need your help, Woody.”

“Sure, I told you, I can take care of things here.”
He raised the coffee mug to his lips.

“Not the office. I know you’re fine here.” Rhetta
stirred her coffee then took a sip. It was still piping hot, requiring her to
blow across the surface of the liquid. “I need to bounce something off you.”

She explained about the empty Jim Beam bottle and
the pending DUI charges against Randolph, the missing manila envelope, and,
most significantly, the scratches on the truck.

“Sounds to me like someone ran Randolph off the road
and you think that’s what happened to Al-Serafi.” Woody tore open more sugar
packets, and dumped them into his coffee. He stirred, the metal spoon clanking
against the side of the cup. Normally, the noise irked her. Now, it didn’t seem
important.

Rhetta set her cup down. “That they both got run off
the road is significant. This isn’t a happenstance.”

Woody cleared his throat. “I hate to bring this up.
I heard on the news that the judge’s blood level tested high.”

Rhetta’s stomach knotted.
Great. Now it’s all
over the news
. “Randolph probably had a drink or two at home before he came
here yesterday, but I know he didn’t have anything else to drink after noon.”
She shook her head for emphasis and ran her hands through her hair.

She stood, changing the subject. She didn’t enjoy
being the object of gossip. Woody, God love him, loved gossip. “I’m going to
take that original schematic that we found and lock it in my safe deposit box
at the main bank. I don’t want to leave it here.”

“
We
found?” Woody peered at her over his
coffee cup. “Right,” he said, setting his cup down a little too hard. Coffee
sloshed over the side.

“Okay, okay, me. I took it. Whatever. Don’t be
making a federal case out of this.” She snatched her purse and began rummaging
through it. “Wait, maybe we should make a federal case out of this.”

“Are you calling the FBI again?” Woody sighed as he
mopped up the spill with a paper towel.

“Not yet. I need to ask Doctor Reed something.”

Snatching her phone, which she’d set on the table,
she scrolled until she found his cell number.

Reed answered before the second ring.

“Kenneth, it’s Rhetta. Randolph was sleeping so I
left for a bit. I’ll be back later this afternoon.”

“What can I do for you?” he answered, his words
clipped, his voice terse.
I probably interrupted him in the middle of
something important.

She forged ahead, prevailing upon their friendship.
“I need your help. Everyone is convinced that Randolph was drinking. I believed
Randolph when he told me he wasn’t.” She went on to explain about the Jim Beam
bottle. “Billy Dan Kercheval backs him up, too. Randolph had just left Marble
Hill after he and Billy Dan met up at Merc’s. They drank nothing but coffee.”

She waited. When Kenneth didn’t say anything, she
persisted. “How could Randolph’s blood test that high? Could the test have been
skewed?”

When Kenneth didn’t answer for several more seconds,
Rhetta thought he must be thinking about how that could have happened, too.

She heard him sigh.

“Rhetta, a skewed test is not possible. You don’t
want to believe that Randolph was drunk. I’ll do what I can to heal him, but
talk like this will cause you nothing but trouble. I have to go now.”

The line disconnected.

She stared at the receiver. His response wasn’t what
she expected
.

What’s wrong with Kenneth?

CHAPTER
17

“Kenneth doesn’t believe me.” Rhetta set her phone
down, and slid the coffee cup aside. Kenneth’s tone had killed all desire for
coffee.

Woody drained the last of his, then took both their
cups to the kitchen. On his return, he detoured toward the office safe and
withdrew the original schematic he placed there for safekeeping.

He handed it to Rhetta. “I’ll go with you. Let’s
take a lunch break.”

With that, he began penning a “Be Back Soon” note
and taped it to the front door. Then he held the door open for her.

*
* *

After
locking the schematic away in her bank safe deposit box, Rhetta drove Woody
back to the office.

“I’m going to the hospital,” she said, letting him
out in front. On the way, they’d swung through the drive-through at Subway. She
wasn’t hungry. Earlier that morning, she’d persuaded the cantankerous vending
machine on the fourth floor at the hospital to discharge a Snickers bar after
feeding it double the amount the candy cost, and kicking it a time or two.

Woody, however, claimed to be on starvation’s
doorstep. He clutched his sack containing two, foot-long Italian sandwiches and
a gallon of sweet tea, and climbed out. Stopping midway, he turned back. “Have
you heard from Doctor LaRose?”

Rhetta rested her head on the steering wheel. “I
didn’t think to call him.”

“I’ll try and reach him. You should go check on your
husband.”

“Thanks. Don’t scare Peter, yet somehow warn him not
to talk to anyone about the schematic.”

*
* *

She
made it to St. Mark’s in ten minutes. After locking Cami and remembering to
drop her phone into her purse, she strode to the visitors’ entrance—a set of
two perpetually revolving glass doors under a brick archway containing a statue
of St. Mark the Evangelist. As she stepped inside one of the doors, her iPhone
began playing Woody’s ring tone. She continued revolving all the way around
until she was back outside.

“I can’t get Doctor LaRose to answer,” Woody said.
“I called his office and his cell.”

“Keep trying. I’m going up to check on Randolph.
I’ll call you in a little while. I have to turn off my cell phone while in his
room. Hospital regulations.”

She re-entered the revolving doors, glancing up in time
to see Kenneth Reed talking on his cell, and striding across the lobby toward
the exit to the doctors’ private parking spaces. He hadn’t seen her.
She
checked her watch: 1:15. She continued watching Kenneth through the all glass
doors until he stopped before a parked car and pointed his remote. He climbed
into a black BMW-Z4 convertible. Without lowering the top, he sped out of the
lot, still talking on his cell.

Nice ride.

*
* *

The
door to Randolph’s room stood open a few inches. Rhetta pushed it open a foot
wider and peeked in. Although it was midday, all the window blinds were tightly
closed, shutting out any daylight and leaving the room in near total darkness.
Randolph lay on his side, asleep. She tiptoed in, scribbled a note, and propped
it on his bedside tray.
You were sleeping-be back later. XXXOOO 1:20 PM.
She
pulled the door back to the same position she found it.

While riding the elevator down, she wondered if
Woody reached Peter yet. When the elevator stopped, she rushed out, strode
across the lobby and back through the revolving doors to the sidewalk outside.

Once there, she powered up her phone and dialed
Woody.

“Never did reach Doctor LaRose,” Woody said by way
of hello, obviously recognizing Rhetta’s cell number.

When she got off the phone, she checked her
watch—plenty of time to drive to Peter’s apartment.

CHAPTER
18

Rhetta groaned in dismay as she inched her way along
an overly crowded Main Street. She forgot about the three-day Rivers West Music
Festival due to start later that evening. She found herself smack in the midst
of music lovers scouring the streets for curbside parking near the venues.
Every bar, eatery, and gallery was prepped for the occasion with most hosting a
singer or a band. Every kind of music would be represented, from gospel to rock
’n’ roll, and everything in between. There would be individual contests for
bluegrass, gospel, rock, and jazz. All events were touted on brightly colored
posters that papered every post or pole in the entire downtown.

After circling the six-block area twice, Rhetta
eased Cami into a parking space in front of a bistro three blocks from Peter’s
apartment. She ignored the finger salutations and horn honking from a pair of
festival fans who had unsuccessfully jockeyed their Dodge Neon on their first
attempt into that same space. She stole the space when they pulled ahead to
reposition. She didn’t have time to apologize. Besides, she wasn’t the least
bit sorry.

The humid air crackled with strains of music seeping
from every building on the street. Food and beverage vendors lined their carts
up along the sidewalk. The mingling smells of cotton candy, corn dogs, and
fried shaved potatoes assaulted her nostrils. Walking three blocks, Rhetta
elbowed her way through the crowds and finally located Peter’s building, only
to discover that the stairs to his apartment were in the rear. All the walking
had caused her to perspire heavily. Her hair was plastered to her skull.
Instead of hoofing it another crowded block to get around to the back, she
squeezed into the narrow alley between Peter’s building, which housed a
cannabis collectors store on the ground floor and the boutique floral shop next
to it. The distance between the two old buildings was scarcely wide enough for
her to pass. The stench of stale urine grew stronger the farther she ventured.
She carefully eyed where she placed her feet, mindful of what she could be
stepping in.

She made a mental note to visit the cannabis store
someday.
What could they possibly sell there? Isn’t marijuana illegal?

Arriving at the rear of the building, she eventually
spotted the steep wooden staircase leading up to Peter’s apartment. Rhetta
peered skyward, took a deep breath, and began the climb. The hundred-year-old
building still had the original steps, and the spacing between the narrow
treads was uncomfortably steep. She was reminded of the time she and Randolph
tried to climb the narrow steps to the top of the Pyramid of the Sun, near
Mexico City.

At the top, she stepped onto the wooden porch and
paused to catch her breath. She gazed around at the many back lots. She
identified the building’s parking lot with Peter’s Taurus parked against the
back fence. The car had been hidden from view until she’d reached the porch. If
she had chosen to walk around the block instead of squeezing between the
buildings, she’d have passed right by the parking lot and seen Peter’s car. She
prayed Peter was at home and hadn’t left to join the revelers.

Near his front door, an old-fashioned white rattan
rocker and glass top side table sat crowded together on the porch, which
scarcely measured six feet square. Above the table, a hanging basket planter
spilled brightly colored trailing petunias. Several magazines lay spread out on
the table. Sighing with relief, she rang the doorbell.

No answer. She tried again. Still no one responded
to her insistent ringing. Rhetta thought she spied a table lamp glowing inside
the apartment when she peered through the glass panel on the side of the door.
Using her knuckles, she rapped loudly on the white wooden door. No one
appeared. Shielding her eyes with both hands, she squinted again through the
window. She knocked even harder and was about to give up, thinking that perhaps
Peter had walked downtown, when she impulsively tried the door. It opened
readily. She pushed it open all the way, stuck her head in, and called out,
“Peter, are you home?”

In spite of the sweltering heat of the day, Rhetta
shivered. She didn’t like surprising people in their own homes. She stepped
slowly across the threshold, continuing to shout Peter’s name. She was
assaulted by the reek of rotting meat.
Not much of a housekeeper, our Peter.

“Hello? Peter, are you here?” She took in the
modestly furnished apartment and the hundreds of books stacked everywhere—on
the floor, the coffee table and on a kitchen table in a narrow alcove off to
the side. The cramped living room held a green plaid sofa, two TV tables, and a
plasma television screen that covered the entire wall opposite the sofa. Every
available space on every table also held a stack of books. She picked her way
through the cluttered living room toward the hall. The stench increased.

All the window blinds were closed. It took a moment
for her eyes to adjust to the dim interior. She called out again. “Peter? It’s
Rhetta McCarter.”

Passing alongside the sofa, she noticed an open book
lying face down on the arm. Twisting to get a better look, she identified the
volume—an English-Arabic, Arabic-English dictionary.

The temperature in the apartment had to be nearly a
hundred.
Why hasn’t Peter turned on the air?
Her initial shivering gave
way to fat sweat droplets dripping off her nose. She swatted them away. She
heard a low buzzing noise, but the louder hum of a noisy refrigerator drowned
it out. If the refrigerator was still running, then the rotting meat smell
couldn’t be coming from the kitchen. She threaded her way down a short hallway
crowded with stacks of books. The sickening odor intensified the closer she got
to a door that she suspected led into a bedroom. She buried her nose in the
crook of her elbow in an effort to avoid the stink.

Again she called out, “Peter.” Her voice cracked. Fear
clutched her senses, commanding her to turn around and run. Instead, she took a
deep breath and gagged at the foul odor that engulfed her when she pushed open
the door. She was immediately beset by swarms of bottle green flies, their
buzzing deafening.

She found Peter.

He wouldn’t need air conditioning.

CHAPTER
19