Don't Be Afraid (28 page)

The most surprising thing about the Harrigans’ house was that they had one of her photos hanging in the master bedroom. It was a female nude reclining, soft shades of gray and white. Amy recognized it as one in a series of portraits she’d done about five years ago, shortly before she’d given birth to Emma.

“That’s my work,” she said to Poppy Braxton, pausing to admire where they’d hung it in place on the wall behind the massive king-sized bed, covered in a caramel-colored satin quilt and dozens of matching pillows.

“I advised them to take it down,” Poppy said, glancing at it as she swept nonexistent wrinkles out of the comforter. “People can get touchy about nudity. Not good for sales.”

The house was in a newer plan in what had once been part of a woodland estate. Amy thought of it as fantasy housing. Every house had some touches of original housing from the area, but bulked up, like the builders had gone on steroids. Large windows in the master bedroom looked out on a kidney-shaped pool built to resemble a pond, complete with a natural rock fountain.

A pool house stood beside it on the edge of a small emerald square of lawn and on the other side of the pool was a portico separating the main house from a two-car garage.

“Like all homeowners, they want the house sold for asking price yesterday,” Poppy complained as they finished their inspection of the second floor and made their way down a back set of stairs into the mammoth kitchen.

“I think they’re asking too much,” Amy said, “but they wouldn’t come down.” She coveted the six-burner Viking stove and granite countertops. A Lean Cuisine box had been left out like an affront to the cooking potential of the space. Poppy clicked her tongue and whisked it into the trash compacter.

“Of course they are. They’ve been here barely two years and think because of the housing bubble they’re going to make a fortune. Please. This isn’t Westport, not yet. I’ve told lots of sellers that, of course, but do they listen to me?”

Amy wasn’t listening to her. She was looking out the window at the front of the house, down the sloping lawn to the street where the unmarked cop car was parked. A Ford Taurus. It stuck out like a sore thumb in this neighborhood. The Harrigans, for instance, owned a Mercedes SUV, a BMW convertible and a Hummer. The teenage son drove the Hummer.

She could see Officer Feeney standing next to the car. He’d been assigned to watch the house and had walked through it first, checking all rooms, all closets, while Poppy complimented him on his thoroughness, at the same time lamenting the necessity of doing it.

She was here as overseer of the open house, making no secret of the fact that she thought Amy needed to be shown how it was done. “Let’s just make sure nothing happens,” she said, as if her presence could deflect crime.

As Amy watched, Detective Juarez arrived to sit with Feeney. They would monitor the open house while Detective Black joined a contingent of other officers watching Amy’s house.

“The likelihood of him trying anything is slim,” Juarez had said. “You’ll be in a house in broad daylight in a plan with other houses and nosy neighbors.”

Amy couldn’t imagine trying anything when it was so obvious that police were on the scene. The second unmarked car was another Taurus. Feeney’s ill-fitting suit and the way he was scanning the neighborhood while Juarez talked to him all made it pretty obvious.

Poppy had insisted the police stay outside the house, informing them with as little subtlety as possible in typical Poppy Braxton fashion. “We’re trying to sell homes,” she’d explained to Feeney. “To do that, we have to create a certain kind of ambience. You are not part of that ambience.”

Rolling the cover off the pool and pulling out two deck chairs and cushions created ambience. Poppy coerced Officer Feeney into doing this work, commenting shamelessly on how strong he was as she stood back and directed. The weather was cooperating—an unseasonably warm fall day, not warm enough to swim, but warm enough to remember how good it felt. Satisfied with the house inside and out, Poppy gave it her finishing touch by lighting cinnamon candles throughout.

“The weather’s almost too nice,” she said to Amy, fussing with the flowers in a vase on the dining room table where Amy had displayed packets giving potential buyers information on room sizes and taxes. “I hope this isn’t a total waste of time.”

The first visitors were neighbors, most of who confessed to being just curious, but still took plenty of time meandering through the house. Amy asked every visitor to sign a visitors’ log, but some people were reluctant to do so. They didn’t want to be hectored by real estate agents and Amy certainly couldn’t tell them that she was trying to keep track of potential suspects.

The first hour passed and Amy started to relax. There were no strange people, nothing out of the ordinary. She described the features of the home to older couples, young families, a single woman and a father house-hunting for his son. She pointed out exceptional features, suggested different uses of the five bedrooms depending on the audience, and trooped up and down stairs and in and out doors until her feet hurt.

She checked her cell phone when there was a lull, sitting down at the kitchen table and kicking off her shoes. She’d already checked for messages twice, but there could be a call from the hospital. That was her justification and not that she was looking for a message from Ryan. He hadn’t called, but it was possible he’d left a message on her home machine. She let her other messages play while thinking about him.

She wanted to believe he’d called because she didn’t want to believe that he might be regretting what happened. Perhaps he was afraid that he’d saddled himself with a mother and her kid and she didn’t want him to think that. She’d had sex without any expectation beyond that of satisfying a primal need to be held and loved.

Sudden footsteps on the stairs startled her. An older, bearded man in a full-length wool coat stepped into the kitchen and stopped short, blinking at Amy through small tortoiseshell glasses.

“Excuse me,” he said in a gruff voice. “I didn’t mean to disturb you.”

“No, that is, you didn’t,” Amy said, slipping back into her heels and pocketing her phone. “I didn’t realize anyone was still here. Have you seen the kitchen?”

He nodded. “The other woman told me there was a door through here to the garage?”

Amy showed him to it. “Would you like me to show you the rest of the property?”

“That isn’t necessary. I’ll just look around.”

“Of course.”

As soon as he’d exited, her cell phone rang. Detective Juarez sounded breathless. “They’ve spotted a strange car near your house and I’m heading over there. Don’t be concerned, it’s probably nothing, but we’ve got to check it out. Officer Feeney will remain outside.”

She looked out a front window on her way upstairs and could see Officer Feeney sitting in his car. He looked like he was eating something.

She could hear a couple in the master bedroom and knew they’d been fooling around on the bed by the sudden scrambling noise and red faces as she walked in.

“Can I answer any questions?”

“Does any of the furniture come with the place?” the man asked with apparent casualness but his eyes strayed to the bed.

When they’d headed down to see the kitchen, Amy lingered, looking out the window and seeing the older man walking along the side of the pool. He looked as if he might topple in.

In all, close to fifty people came through the home, which was almost an unheard of number, according to Poppy. “If you’re lucky that young couple I was talking to will make an offer. He’s an investment banker and she’s a broker. I’m sure their financing will be a snap.”

Late-afternoon sun streaked the dining room with light while they gathered the materials. “If you’ll get the lights and windows upstairs,” Poppy said, “I’ll shut up the pool and the garage and then I’ve got to get going. Jack’s made reservations for us at Shade Blue.”

Amy didn’t know where she and Emma would be eating. Probably a rest stop McDonald’s.

The Harrigans weren’t returning until Monday, so the home had to be completely secured. Amy checked the windows in every room on the first floor and drew the blinds. The light was fading fast and the streetlights had switched on. She was a little annoyed that Feeney hadn’t made it back in the house yet to check things. She’d called him five minutes ago. At least he was out there; she could just see his form in the car.

 

 

“Wait. Let’s not take him yet. We’ve got to wait until he approaches the house.”

Juarez spoke tersely into the mike and got a grunt of acknowledgement from Detective Dickson in the other unmarked. The dingy white car circled the block again, cruising slowly past Amy’s house. This time Juarez caught a glimpse of a white man wearing a knit hat behind the wheel.

He could feel the adrenaline coursing through him, giving him power. This was what he liked about police work, the hunt, the chase, the moment when all the hours of boring work paid off.

The white car circled for the fifth time and this time it idled near Amy’s house. They could see the guy looking up at the porch and then around him. Juarez slid farther down in his seat. The motor stopped and the door opened. A lanky white guy stepped out wearing dark blue jeans, worn white at the knees and the seat, and a brown corduroy jacket patched at the elbows. A blue knit hat was pulled low on his head.

“Let’s see what he does,” Juarez said into the mike, and then crooned, “C’mon, man, head for the house. You know you want to.”

Instead the man ducked back into the car, but he emerged just as suddenly holding something wrapped in cellophane. A bouquet of flowers.

Poppy headed out the back door as fast as she could in her Manolo Blahniks. She loved these shoes and the way they made her legs look and Jack certainly responded to them, but they were a bitch on cement.

She groaned when she saw the lounge chairs. They had to go back in the pool house. Well, she wasn’t hauling these herself. Young officer pizza face could help—he certainly hadn’t done much else. So much for tax dollars at work.

Of course she’d have to traipse down the driveway to get to him. That would just make her later. Sighing, Poppy headed for the chairs.

The door to the pool house had been left ajar. All the better. She began dragging one of the lounge chairs toward the open door. It was loud and very heavy. She looked toward the house, hoping Amy would see her and come out to help, but no such luck.

Chair number one got stowed in the space specially created for all the pool junk the family had acquired. Then she had to work on chair number two. She was securing it in the locker designed for them when she heard footsteps in the doorway.

“Nice timing,” she said, irritably without turning around.

 

 

Amy hurried up the wide carpeted steps to the second floor, trying to quell the sense of fear that came from being in the house alone. The Harrigans’ faces smiled out at her from photos hanging on the walls and she hurried past them, checking the windows in two of the children’s bedrooms before heading into the bathroom next door.

A candle flickered in the darkness, catching the face of a clown-shaped soap dispenser and throwing its shadow high against the brightly painted wall. Amy blew it out and hurried out of the darkness into the next room. She glanced out the window at the pool as she passed through the master bedroom and was surprised to see that it was still uncovered. Wind was rippling the water and a few leaves had blown across the surface. Poppy must have forgotten it.

She checked that the windows were locked and drew the curtains and did the same in two more bedrooms before hurrying down the back stairs to the first floor and the kitchen.

Her heels clicked on the tiled floor, echoing in the vast room. The stainless-steel appliances mirrored a blurred reflection of her as she checked to make sure things were off and the windows were locked. She walked through the mudroom to the back door that opened out to the portico and the pool.

The minute she got the door open she could hear banging. The door to the pool house was open and slamming into the wall behind it as a strong wind blew against it. Focused on the door and irritated that it had been left open, it wasn’t until Amy was almost level with the pool that she noticed the dark form floating in the center.

Poppy’s body was nailed to a board and floating faceup.

 

 

“It’s him!” Dickson’s voice hissed over the mike. “He’s got the flowers! Let’s nail him.”

“Wait!” Juarez commanded. “Let’s see what he does. Just wait.”

The guy avoided the walkway at the front of the house, coming in from the side, climbing up the small hill quickly, his sneakers slipping in the leaf-covered lawn. He passed the swing set and disappeared from view around the back of the house.