Fran Rizer - Callie Parrish 06 - A Corpse Under the Christmas Tree (14 page)

I have to confess the thought of being an undercover deputy excited me.

• • •

“If your father or brothers saw you right now, they’d be looking for someone to kill,” the sheriff said.

At home I’d taken him at his word and spent several hours becoming a battered woman. My left eye appeared totally blackened, and there was a large makeup bruise on my right cheek. My left arm was in a sling with multiple fake contusions on the hand. I’d concentrated the made-up injuries on the left side so that I didn’t risk rubbing off makeup when using my right hand.

“Do you have a new name and a story for me?” I asked Wayne.

“No, it’s not like we’re putting you into witness protection. You can make up your own story for this. You’ll probably need to spend the night there to gain Naomi Spires’s trust. One thing I didn’t tell you though is that her child is only ten months old and the crib is in Mrs. Spires’s room, so you may not have a very peaceful night.”

“Oh, great!”

“Usually mothers with kids at Safe Sister don’t have roommates if the children are sharing a room with their moms, but holidays seem to cause more abuse, and they’ve had to add single beds in with the mothers who just have an infant or toddler in a crib. Mrs. Spires knows that, so she won’t be surprised when they take you in and introduce you.”

“Okay. What else do I need to know?”

“We’re going to wire you.”

“Wire me?”

“Well, with today’s technology, the device doesn’t actually involve a wire, but we still call it that. I’m thinking the best place for the microphone is on the back of your arm inside the sling.”

“Do I have to turn it on and off?”

“Nope. Just don’t take the sling off in front of Mrs. Spires.”

“Are you taking me over there?”

“No, too many people know me, and I don’t want anyone seeing me through the window and letting everyone know the sheriff brought you. Detective Robinson is taking you over there in civvies and his personal truck. The story is that he’s your brother who picked you up from your house after your boyfriend attacked you.”

Just then, my front doorbell rang. “Who could that be passing by the yellow crime scene tape?” I opened the door and saw Dean Robinson standing there with a wad of yellow tape in his hand.

“This can come down now. Are you ready to go, Sis?”

“She will be after we attach this,” Wayne said and held up a tiny electronic device. I slipped my arm out of the sling and he attached the wire, which, like he’d said, wasn’t a wire at all.

Dean asked, “Are you ready?”

“Yes, I’ve got a gown and change of clothes in here.” I handed him my overnight case. He shoved it right back. “Women who run from their homes to escape violent men don’t usually have time to gather up things into a nice little case like that.”

“Sure they do,” I answered. “I’ve seen too many shows on television that advise women to have a bag packed and hide an extra set of car keys so they can get away fast when necessary. If I’m going to pretend to be a victim of domestic violence, I’m going to pretend to be a smart one.”

Wayne laughed. “I warned you, Dean. She’s feisty at times.” He turned toward me.
 

“Being prepared is one way to be wise, but the smartest thing for a battered woman to do is to get away for good as soon as abuse begins.”

“You’re right,” Dean said and grinned. “I would say, ‘but she’s pretty,’ except right now she’s not. That’s very convincing makeup.”

“I do this in reverse for a living.”

“In reverse?” Dean questioned.

“Yep, I cover bruises and discoloration to make decedents look better and alive. This time, I’ve created bruises and discoloration to make me look worse and lucky to be alive.”

The three of us stepped out on the front porch. I couldn’t help glancing down at the chalk outline where Amber Buchanan’s body had lain in her Santa suit. Now that the tape was removed, I wanted to take the tree down ASAP. In fact, I was ready to remove all Christmas décor from my apartment.

Wayne drove away before Dean and I did. “What’s your story going to be?” Dean asked as we got into his car.

“I thought about making up a fake name to go with my tale, but I realized that almost everyone in St. Mary attends a funeral at Middleton’s at some time or other, and one of the women at Safe Sister could recognize me, so I’m using my own name.”

“Then you can’t accuse a husband for those bruises. Someone might know you’re not married. Gonna say your boyfriend did it?”

“I don’t know. That would be like when a person cuts school and says their grandmother died. I was always afraid to say anyone who wasn’t dead had passed away for fear that it would come true.”

“Then please don’t say your new boyfriend beat you up because I’d never hurt you and I’m hoping to become your new boyfriend.”

No answer for that. I still hadn’t heard from Patel, and though I was confused, I had to confess that there did seem to be chemistry between Dean and me.

I was surprised when Dean parked beside a small yellow building and escorted me toward the door.

“I don’t think you can go in,” I told him.

“This is the office building. Men can go inside. It’s the residence houses that are restricted to women and children. Of course, there
are
males in there—young boys who are sheltered with their mothers.”

My paperwork had already been completed by my “brother,” and a nice, middle-aged lady named Evelyn said she’d drive me to the transition house where I would be staying. I hadn’t realized that Safe Sister had more than one residence, but Evelyn said none of them were located in the same part of town nor within walking distance of the office. When I asked why they were called “transition” houses, she said, “Because we don’t plan for women to live there indefinitely. Our purpose is to help them change their lives so they can be self-supporting and stay away from whoever has abused them.”

We went out a back door into a parking area with a tall wooden fence around it. Evelyn’s nondescript car was an ugly shade of green not quite repulsive enough to be memorable.

“I’m filling in for Amber Buchanan. It’s just awful that she’s left us.” The way Evelyn said it might have implied that Amber had quit her job, but I knew Amber was dead and that in the South, “left us” is another euphemism for “died,” like “passed away,” or “kicked the bucket.”

“Where is this place you’re taking me?” I asked.

“We have several locations. You’re going to one that already houses six women. Two of the women have one room, but the other four share with their children. Since Mrs. Spires only has one child, an infant in a crib, we’ve added a single bed in Ms. Spires’s room for you. There are no numbers on the house, and we don’t give out the street address. We also discourage our ladies from using their cell phones while staying with us, but it isn’t forbidden. It’s not that we think an angry husband or boyfriend might trace someone, but we’ve learned through experience that some men can talk a woman into giving them too much information.”

I self-consciously touched my cleavage where my cell phone rested comfortably between the girls, who were bountiful due to my inflated bra. Without that underwear, I have no cleavage.
 

 
Evelyn put on her turn signal and slowed down in front of a small brick house. When she turned into the drive, I saw that it was brick across the front and wood painted white on the sides. She parked in the backyard and used a key from her purse to let us in.

Elegant? No. Fancy? No. Warm and inviting? Definitely yes! We went through a long, narrow kitchen with a refrigerator decorated with children’s Christmas drawings—lots of triangular trees and round Santas—to a large living room where several women sat on comfortable-looking couches and recliners. Bruises in various stages of healing showed on some of them, and one woman had a cast on her right leg. Children sat on the braided rug playing with dolls and Tonka trucks, and some gift-wrapped packages remained under the Christmas tree.

“Ladies and children,” Evelyn said. “This is Callie. She’s going to stay with us and will be rooming with Naomi.” When she said that, the ladies turned and looked at a thin, blond-haired woman whose nod and smile silently told me she was Naomi. She motioned toward a curly-haired infant in a playpen.

“Will ya’ll watch Betsy? I’ll help Callie get settled in.” Naomi stood and led Evelyn and me to a room that opened directly off the living room. “This is your bed,” she said and motioned toward the single bed farthest away from the portable crib. “The routine here is that they left clean folded linens for you on the bed. I went ahead and made it for you. We share the chest of drawers, so I moved all of my things to the bottom drawers. You can have the top two. I’m sorry about all the baby things in here, but I need them for Betsy.”

“Oh, no, the baby things don’t bother me at all, and I’d rather you take the top drawers.” I held up my overnight case. “This is all I brought.”

“Well, Safe Sister supplies soap, shampoo, a new toothbrush, and toothpaste. I put your box of supplies on the shelf in our bathroom. If you need something else, I’ll be glad to share, and anything I can do to make things easier with that arm in the sling, please just tell me.”

Naomi was so nice and welcoming to me that I felt guilty for deceiving her. Evelyn told us goodbye and left.

I followed Naomi back into the living room. “Have you had dinner?” she asked.

“No, have you?”

“Not yet, but it’s about time for me to feed Betsy. Let me introduce you.” She named off each of the other three women. I didn’t bother to try to learn their names. The house was pleasant, but knowing why these people were here touched my heart, yet made me uncomfortable. I wanted to get Naomi to talk so I could get out of there. “Judith and Sylvia are in the kitchen,” she added. “We have a schedule for who cooks each meal.”

I stayed in the living room while Naomi went to the kitchen to feed Betsy. The other ladies tried to include me in their conversation, but I wasn’t really interested in most of their chatting, which was about their kids. Don’t get me wrong. I like children or I wouldn’t have wanted to be a teacher, but I haven’t been blessed with any of my own, so nonstop talk about when each one potty-trained didn’t interest me a whole lot.

Dinner was sliced ham, oven-fried potatoes, carrots, and a crusty apple dessert. The food tasted good, but the conversation stayed primarily about children with an added discussion about haircuts. A couple of them wanted to make arrangements with Evelyn to either go to a beauty shop of have a beautician come to the house. I’m trained in cutting hair, but I didn’t volunteer. Mainly sat and listened.

At eight o’clock, the mothers went to their rooms to put children to bed. I sat with Sylvia whose kids were grown and lived in their own homes, not at Safe Sister.

“Weren’t you one of the cooks tonight?” I asked.

“Yes, I made the Apple Brown Betty. Not a lot of people make that dish anymore, but I learned the recipe from my mother, and I like it.”

“It was delicious.” Now if Jane had been there instead of me, she and Sylvia could have talked about cooking and recipes all night long, but my family and friends can assure you that I, Calamine Lotion Parrish, am not much of a cook. I swear I can make a dish exactly by the same recipe as Jane or someone else, and mine never tastes quite as good.

“Is there a set time for adults to go to bed?” I changed the subject.

“Not really, but almost everyone winds up in bed by ten or eleven. The others will be back here in the common room after they get the kids to bed. We sometimes play games. Would you like to play Scrabble?”

I hadn’t played that game in years, but anything would be better than just sitting around, so I said, “Sure.”

Sylvia hadn’t warned me that she was the Scrabble Queen of Safe Sister. I used to beat my brothers regularly at Scrabble, but that woman knew more words than I could imagine, and they were
real
and spelled correctly. I know because I checked most of them in the dictionary she’d brought out from the cabinet with the Scrabble board. I’m not about to share the score, but Sylvia whipped my padded fanny totally and completely.

By the time we completed the game, the other women had joined us and were standing around watching. I was relieved when they cheered the grand finale as Sylvia finished her last word with a “q” on “triple word score.”

Before long, the ladies had separated into two small groups—three of them playing Yahtzee, at the game table while the others flipped open a portable card table and pulled out a deck of cards. Now that’s a different story for me. I’ve played cards with my brothers and Daddy since I learned my numbers.

“Want to join us?” Naomi asked.

“I’d love to.” I helped open folding chairs and place them around the table. Then it hit me.
What if they play bridge or something like that? I’m good with cards, but we always played gin rummy, canasta, or poker.
No problem! These ladies played poker for pennies—just my game!

Not only did I hold my own, but when Naomi and I went to our room, I’d won most of the pennies. There are some advantages to growing up in a house full of brothers.

“Do you shower at night or in the morning?” Naomi asked after she peeked in the portable crib at Betsy who looked beautiful sleeping with a smile on her face.