A Deadly Encounter (A Seagrove Cozy Mystery Book 3) (8 page)

The front door slammed and a hooded figure carrying a small case ran down the stairs and out into the street like there was a tiger on his tail. Two heartbeats later, before either Sadie or the chief had reacted, the Hyattsville mortician came flying through the door after him.

“Catch him,” he shouted. “He’s ruined my corpse.”

The chief vaulted the porch railing and ran out into the street after the first figure. Sadie let him go. She wouldn’t be able to keep up, and besides, she wanted to see what a ruined corpse looked like. She went inside to Slumber Room Two, where the mortician was almost in tears.

“They’ll be arriving in any time,” he fussed. “And just look. How am I going to fix this before anyone sees him?”

Sadie took a look in the casket. “Oh my,” she said. Victor’s face had been covered in white stage makeup with big red circles on his cheeks and black triangles over his eyes. His mouth was a red smile that was painted almost to his ears. It was ghastly. The kind of image that could give you nightmares for a month. She quickly looked away.

“Quick,” she said. “Roll him out of here.”

He looked startled.

“Listen,” she said, “this could be a problem if anyone comes early. Better he not be here than for someone to come and catch you trying to fix this mess. Show me where you prep them.”

They rolled the casket out a rear door and into a private antechamber.

“You must have some makeup remover,” she said.

The mortician looked glum and shook his head.

“Cold cream? Coconut oil? Vegetable oil?”

His head just kept shaking back and forth.

“Well what do you do if you make a mistake?” Sadie asked, exasperated.

“I don’t make mistakes,” he said.

“Everyone makes mistakes,” she said. “What about a razor? Do you have a razor for shaving men?”

He left the room and came back with a straight blade. She pulled out her phone and snapped a picture of the clown face—just in case the chief need it for evidence.

“Right,” she said. “You start scraping the face paint off. I’m going to run down the street to the drug store and buy some cold cream. Okay?”

He nodded, and she grabbed her purse and fairly flew out the door. She ran the two blocks down to the Hyattsville Drug and Save and back in a recode ten minutes, the majority of the time taken with waiting to be served in the near-deserted store.

When she jogged back through Slumber Room Two and into the antechamber, the mortician was still working on scraping the clown paint off Victor’s face. Sadie took the razor from him, turned it over so the dull edge was against the face and scraped with record speed. Then she opened the cold cream and layered it on his face.

“I need a towel,” she said. “A big towel.”

One of Victor’s eyes opened while she was trying to clean the black triangle off. She squealed and jumped back. But she gritted her teeth and in less than five minutes had his face clean enough.

“Get your makeup kit,” she said. “It’s time for you to make him beautiful again.”

The mortician worked with remarkable speed, and it wasn’t long before Victor had a natural-looking face once again. It was a little embarrassing when there was a round of applause as they wheeled him back in. Sadie hadn’t realized that people had begun to filter in.

She snuck out of the room and went to see if the chief was back from his chase yet. He wasn’t in any of the places she expected he would be, so she settled herself back on the bench out on the porch. That way she’d be right in the line of fire when he got back.

It wasn’t long before he came jogging down the block and dropped onto the bench next to her.

“Didn’t catch him?” she asked.

He shook his head no. He was still breathing hard from his run.

“That doesn’t really matter though, does it,” she said. “We know where to find him.”

“We do?” the chief asked.

“Sure. Lance Brownside,” she said. “I can’t imagine anyone else having the nerve to paint a dead man’s face. Can you?”

“Not really,” he said. “Good catch.”

“I always try to do my best,” she said and turned to smile at him. “We can catch up with him any time we want.”

Sadie parked outside the Seagrove funeral home while the chief went to get a search warrant for the mortuary. Strictly speaking, the chief had told her to go home. He’d radioed for a squad car to keep an eye on the building and to call him if Lance showed his face. But there wasn’t a squad car in sight, and Sadie felt that justified her decision to stop there on her way home.

At least that was what she was going to tell the chief when he yelled at her for putting herself in danger. And she knew he would. It was inevitable.

There was movement at the front of the funeral home. The door opened, a figure slipped out and it closed. She’d seen a brief glimpse of muted light that didn’t reach the windows. She wondered if the layout was similar to the Hyattsville place, but then Lance was on the move and she had a decision to make.

Follow? Or call the chief and go home like a good citizen? She didn’t fancy herself in the role of a goody-goody. She was just about to get out and follow on foot when he slipped into a car a few houses down. She turned on the engine but left the lights off.

She drove without headlights until he turned onto Main Street, then she flicked hers on before she turned. She was feeling pretty pleased with herself until she realized she couldn’t tell if his car was ahead of her. There wasn’t much traffic on the street, there never was, but there were three cars headed up the street in front of her, and she had no idea which one was his. This was fine unless someone decided to turn off Main. Then she’d have to make a decision.

One of the two lights in town turned red ahead of her. She groaned at the inconvenience of it all and came to a stop. One car went through the intersection, and she was contemplating running the light when her passenger door opened and Lance Brownside got in the car.

“Do you want to tell me what you are doing following me?” he asked, flashing her a glimpse of a gun under his hoody. She stifled her instinct to make a smart remark.

“What makes you think I’m following you?” she asked.

“Because you were parked outside the funeral home, and unless you recently moved, you are driving the wrong way.” He touched the gun to remind her it was there.

She was outraged. He was
threatening
her?

“Have you lost your mind?” she asked. “Flashing a gun at me? You do know I’m dating the chief of police?”

“But wouldn’t that be poetic? The chief’s girlfriend killed while trailing a suspected criminal. Serves you right for snooping around.”

“I saw you at the Hyattsville funeral home. Standing around with your boyfriend. Thinking you are better than everyone else.”

“You made Victor into a clown,” Sadie said, “because he accused you of making his wife into a clown.” The light turned green and she started to drive, thinking hard about where she should go now. Would he notice if she drove to the police station?

“I made him a clown because he was a clown. He didn’t deserve his wife. If I were her husband she would have lived. I would have made sure of it.”

“But didn’t she die of cancer?” Sadie asked. “What could you do about that?”

“Cancer is survivable with the correct treatment,” he said. “I would have made sure she got it. Besides, if she had been with me she never would have gotten cancer.”

“You could have prevented her from getting cancer?” she asked while thinking he was delusional.

“Of course. Women who get enough attention don’t get cancer,” he said. “Cancer is the immune system’s response to neglect. I would not have neglected her.”

Sadie stayed quiet. He was clearly living in an alternate reality. If she contradicted him he may decide shooting her was his only option. She really didn’t want to get shot. She turned down the street the station was on, and she was right, he was too busy obsessing to notice where she was going. She cruised past the station slowly, but there was no one outside to notice.

She drove round the block, praying he wouldn’t notice what she was doing. Again there was no one in front of the station. She cursed her luck and tried again. How many times could she circle the police station before he noticed?

The third time around he was all of a sudden aware of his surroundings and he shoved the gun in her direction. “Drive to the town beach,” he said. “And make it quick.”

She headed to the town beach, driving as much under the speed limit as she dared, but it still didn’t take long. She parked in a pool of light cast by the lone light pole. She sat while he got out, wondering if he would shoot her if she refused to get out of the car. He pulled her door open and gestured for her to get out.

“Where are we going?” she asked, not moving from her seat.

“You are going into the water,” he said, “and I’m going to watch from dry land.”

“I don’t understand what you are trying to accomplish,” Sadie said. “Everyone knows what you have done. Killing me won’t solve your problems.”

“If I kill you, Chief Woodstone will be too distraught to put together a case against me. It will give me time to get away.”

“The chief is not the only one capable of compiling a case,” Sadie said. “I think it will go better for you if you let me live.”

“Out,” he said.

“I’ll get out if you tell me how you found the murder weapon in my shop. It was in a locked drawer.” Stall, stall, stall, she told herself. Give the chief time to find us.

He laughed. “Nothing easier. Those drawers have a very simple lock,” he said. “When I was in college I had a roommate who earned his way through school by picking locks. He taught me. It comes in handy more than you might think,” he preened, and Sadie thought she might be sick.

“But why where you looking through my drawers?”

“You gave me the idea. Remember when you came home with that potato peeler and you pointed out how it looked as though it could be used to drain blood? I couldn’t stop thinking about it. It did look like it could drain the blood from a person. I wanted to try it. It wasn’t hard to find. It was in the second drawer I opened. I kept it in my pocket for a long time before the opportunity presented itself.”

He smiled a slow smile that gave Sadie chills.

“It worked really well,” he said. “Almost as well as the tool made to pierce veins. He bled out into the river so fast. Almost too fast.”

Again he smiled the creepy smile, and Sadie knew she was out of time.

“Get out now,” Lance said. “Time’s up.”

“No.” The chief’s voice came from behind Lance. “Your time is up, Lance. Sadie is staying right where she is.” His hand came around and removed the gun from Lance’s hand.

Sadie let out a huge sigh of relief. She really had not wanted to go into the water. She listened to Lance’s screams of frustration and anger as he was led away. Her passenger door opened and the chief slid into the seat.

“You okay?” he asked.

“Yeah, I’m fine.” Sadie smiled weakly at him. “That man is off his rocker.”

“He is at that,” the chief agreed. “Completely unglued. Are you able to drive yourself home, or would you like me to?”

“I’m perfectly all right,” Sadie said. “There isn’t any reason I couldn’t drive home.”

“And what have you learned from this evening?” he asked.