Love Kills (20 page)

“Heaven,” she said dramatically. “It's been heaven, more romantic than even I could imagine, and I have quite an imagination.” She winked slyly at her husband and then dismissed me with a disdainful smirk. “I'm so happy.” She gazed adoringly at Marsh Holt. “We couldn't be happier.”

He nodded in agreement.

“But now”—her voice rose, taking on an unpleasantly shrill edge—“an obsessed woman who has stalked my husband for years has followed us here to ruin everything.”

She flung herself into a porch chair and began to shed noisy tears, punctuated by snorts, snuffles, and ragged gasps.

“Not true,” I said calmly. “The man is lying to you. I only met him once, in Miami.”

The two cops shared an
Aha!
moment and exchanged I-told-you-so expressions.

“Look, Nancy, I'm tired. I've traveled nearly four thousand miles to warn you. The least you can do is listen. Can I talk to you alone for a moment?”

“There's only one person I want to be alone with,” she said, raising her tearstained face to her husband. He smooched it tenderly.

I wanted to gag. For Pete's sake! I thought, and longed to shake her. “Marshall,” I said, “do you remember Vanessa, Suzanne, Rachel, and Colleen? What about Gloria? And Alice?”

He sighed and shook his head, wearing the expression of a weary and beleaguered man.

Nancy was staring speculatively at my belly.

“I told you, sweetheart.” He reached confidently for her hand. “I have nothing to do with that. Britt lives in a fantasy world. There's been nothing between us since high school.”

He'd been expecting me. That much was clear.

His eyes roved out past the police car, beyond the narrow unpaved road, searching. He had obviously expected two of us. Nancy's parents had blown the whistle. They had interrupted their little girl's romantic idyll to tip off the newlyweds after all.

“Shouldn't you be someplace else?” Nancy asked sharply, with a disgusted little shudder. “Lamaze class, perhaps? In a straitjacket, or a nice jail cell?”

“Nancy, think about it,” I urged. “You are not safe alone here with him.”

“Officers!” she bleated. “Doesn't the law protect people from stalkers?” Taking an angry step forward, she pointed a manicured index finger at my heart like a gun. “Keep her away from us!”

“In other words, ma'am,” the shorter cop said, “you're saying you don't want to be rescued.”

“Told ya,” the other cop muttered.

“Let's go.” The first cop firmly took my arm. My pen dropped from my hand and vanished into the thick grass below as he led me down the front steps.

“Ask him to tell you about Vanessa, Colleen, Rachel, Gloria, Alice, and Suzanne,” I called over my shoulder. “They married him too. And they all died on their honeymoons.”

Marsh Holt thanked the officers and wrapped his arms around his bride. She hugged him back so hard they nearly toppled off the porch.

 

They told me to get out of town and warned me not to go within a mile of the honeymooners. If I contacted Marsh Holt or his bride again, I'd be arrested, the cops said.

“Mess with them again and we put your ass in jail,” the tall one said succinctly.

Apparently it was his partner's turn to play good cop. “Look, lady,” he said. “We understand that sometimes people become obsessed with another person who doesn't…uh, return those feelings. But you have to understand that you can't force a person to want you.”

And you can't save someone who refuses to be rescued, I thought mournfully.

“Life doesn't work that way,” he went on. “Suck it up, go home, and get yourself some help.”

He spoke slowly and distinctly, the way one speaks to an unruly child, a misbehaving dog, or a deranged adult.

Humiliated and furious, I let them put me in a cab to the airport. Once there, I dragged my suitcase from the locker, rented a car, found a room at a small local hotel, and beelined back to the Holts' cabin.

It felt late, but it never grew dark. A strange sun never crossed the sky; the dusky orb slowly circled east to north instead, literally rolling around the horizon of this strange and surreal world. I was Alice down the rabbit hole. Clutching the banister, I dragged myself up the front steps one at a time, banged on the door, and turned the knob. The door swung open.

Nancy puttered at a wood-burning stove, her back to me, a long spoon in her right hand. She wore a frilly apron and little else. An enticing aroma came from a big iron skillet simmering over a low flame. Logs crackled in the fireplace. A champagne bottle sat in an ice bucket next to an intimate table set for two. The scene was warm, inviting, and romantic.

The shortie nightgown under Nancy's frilly apron exposed dimpled thighs. Dimples in the wrong place, I noted mean-spiritedly. Who, I wondered, packs aprons in their trousseau? Domestic divas, that's who.

“Bonjour, sweet face.”

She whirled in a giddy impromtu pirouette, lips shiny with raspberry-colored gloss, her expression coy. No sign of the groom. My heart leaped. This, I hoped, was our chance to speak alone.

“Hello, Nancy.”

She howled like a banshee, flung herself back against the pine wall, pointed her long spoon at me, and screamed again. The woman had the lungs of a bagpipe player.

“Stop it!” I pleaded. “Don't do that. Listen to me.”

Marsh Holt burst through the door like gangbusters. Exactly what I didn't need. The firewood he carried clattered to the floor.

“What the hell are you doing to my wife?” he demanded.

I sighed.

“Marsh! Thank God! She sneaked up behind me! Find a man of your own!” she screamed, still waving the spoon like a weapon. “Leave him alone! He's taken! Taken! Leave us alone!”

Her high-pitched screeches literally hurt my ears.

 

The patrol car arrived quickly. You would think the police would have better things to do. These two cops were strangers but had obviously been filled in on the obsessive stalker. Me.

“You were warned,” one said.

“Don't worry, folks,” the other assured the newlyweds. “We'll take it from here.”

Marsh Holt comforted his distraught wife, now wearing a terrycloth robe over her Victoria's Secret ensemble. He stroked her hair tenderly and glared at me.

“She won't bother you again,” the cop promised.

“That's what they told us this afternoon.” Holt sounded indignant. Mr. John Q. Public, taxpayer and good citizen, rightfully upset by the dubious quality of local law enforcement. He played the role well.

I rolled my eyes.

They assured him that this time I was really in trouble.

Nancy's malevolent mascara-smeared left eye peeped out at me from her husband's manly chest.

“He'll try to kill you,” I warned, trying to stay calm. “At least six other women died accidentally when they were with him.” I intended to form finger quotes around the word
accidentally
but was thwarted by an officer who seized the moment to cuff my wrist.

“Sure, and he's Jack the Ripper, Son of Sam, and the Zodiac Killer too,” the cop said, before advising me of my rights. “He's been a bad, bad boy.” He winked at Marsh Holt.

 

Again, I sat alone in the backseat of the police car, like a prisoner. But this time I
was
a prisoner.

“Nobody likes to put a pregnant woman in jail,” the arresting officer informed me, as a female cop patted me down and removed my wristwatch.

She placed her hand on my stomach, and the baby gave it a few swift kicks. “Oh, my,” she said, cheerfully assuring them that I was, indeed, pregnant.

“Some people never learn. You were warned,” the other cop repeated.

You were warned,
I thought. They should write that on my tombstone.

I was desperate enough to eat the bologna sandwich they gave me and drink their watery coffee.

My cell's only positive feature was the layout. The toilet stood only a few convenient feet from my cot. And since it never grew dark, I didn't have to grope about trying to find it during the night. The negative was that it became really, really cold. My fingers and toes and the exposed skin of my face—even my bones—felt painfully cold, in spite of the blanket they gave me.

They hauled me into municipal court first thing in the morning. At least I thought it was the morning. It was difficult to tell whether it was 9
A.M
. or 9
P.M
. The meal at the jail, another bologna sandwich and more watery coffee, offered no clue. It might have been breakfast, lunch, or dinner. The sky looked no different. The temperature had skidded down to a tooth-chattering 35 degrees. “It's the williwaw,” a jailer told me, explaining that was the name of a strong cold wind.

It had to be morning, I finally decided, unless this was night court.

All of us lawbreakers sat in an empty jury box waiting for our cases to be called.

“Heard about chu,” whispered the prisoner next to me, a Native American with thick black eye makeup, big hoop earrings, and a leather biker's jacket. “You go, girl. Kick his worthless butt. Squeeze him for child support every day for the resta his no-good life. Good for you. But today,” she said, wrinkling her nose sweetly, “play nice. Say whatever they wanna hear and get your ass outa here. Jail is no place to birth a baby.”

“You are absolutely right,” I said. “Thank you.”

The judge, the jailers, even the court clerk, a chubby motherly type, looked troubled to see me. But none were as troubled as I. My back pains were more intense, my legs were stiff, my feet hurt, and I was desperately hungry—hungry for Miami, its warmth, its food, its Cuban coffee, and the people I loved.

My public defender introduced herself five minutes before my case was called. She told me that the police had tried to verify my story, that I was on assignment for the
Miami News.
The editor they had spoken to on the city desk overnight was surprised and dismayed to hear I was in Alaska, much less behind bars. She had disavowed knowledge of any assignment. According to her, I had failed to show up for work days ago, without explanation. I was AWOL. Gretchen, the editor from hell, I thought. It had to be. Who else? She got me.

I saw I was outnumbered and caved.

“Your Honor,” I said, “I apologize for my mistakes and deeply regret any trouble I've caused. Hormones may have something to do with it. All I want is to go home to Miami as soon as possible. I'm not feeling well and it would be extremely inconvenient to give birth here, thousands of miles from my obstetrician. I don't wish to be a burden on your state.”

I hated myself. Have you no scruples? I wondered, as I used the baby excuse.

The prosecutor scanned the small courtroom. “The complainants, visitors from Minneapolis, here on their honeymoon, don't appear to be present, Your Honor.”

The judge, an older fatherly type, gazed down kindly at me from the bench. “I'll make you an offer, young lady. I'll sentence you to time served, without an adjudication of guilt,
if
you promise to board the next flight out. Go home and get yourself some help. It's never too late to turn your life around.”

“Yes, sir, I promise,” I lied. “Thank you, Your Honor.”

The prisoner in the black eye makeup and leather jacket smiled and gave me a thumbs-up.

 

My rental car had been towed away from the cabin by the police, so I took a taxi back to my hotel. I yearned for a warm nap, hot soup, and a reconnect to reality, but the desk clerk said I had a problem: my credit card.

I asked him to swipe it again. He did. It came up canceled.

“Give me a minute,” I said confidently, “and I'll take care of it.” I collapsed into a lobby chair and tried to think.

I called Fred at the
News.

“You canceled the credit card,” I said accusingly.

“Thought that might get your attention,” he said dryly. “Nothing else did. I take it you have a ticket home.”

“Yes,” I said. “I bought an open-ended round-trip back.”

“Use it,” he said grimly. “When you left here for Arizona you were told to check in daily. Yet we had no idea where you were until we heard you were in police custody in Fairbanks, Alaska.”

“Fred,” I said breathlessly, “listen. I am not the sportswriter you sent to the Super Bowl two years ago, the one who partied all night, passed out, and didn't wake up until after the game. Or Danny Jacobs, the reporter sent to Vegas to cover the world heavyweight championship fight. He wined and dined a showgirl and bought her an engagement ring, all with the
News
credit card, while you, his wife, and three kids all thought he was working. I am not like them. I'm pursuing a once-in-a-lifetime story. Marsh Holt is here now, with a new bride, a Minneapolis TV personality, if you can believe that. I'm working every minute.”