Resurrection Dreams (17 page)

She sat on the edge of the bed. Blond hair hung over Ace’s face. A few strands were caught in the corner of her mouth. Vicki brushed the hair aside. Ace didn’t wake up.

The clock on the nightstand showed 8:05.

Maybe I should let her sleep, Vicki thought. No. She can spend the rest of the day sleeping, if she wants, but I’ve got to talk to her now.

She gently shook Ace’s shoulder, heard her moan, saw an eye open slightly. “Wha…?”

“Dexter’s been killed.”

She raised her head.

“I just heard it on the radio. He was murdered last night.”

“Holy shit.” Ace rolled onto her back. A wrinkle on the pillow had pressed a red, scar-like crease down the right side of her face. “Murdered? Our Dexter?”

“Yeah.”

“Melvin do it?”

“They seem to think it was some nurse. The one who disappeared a few days ago.”

“They get her?”

“They’re looking for her.”

“Oh, weird.” She struggled against the mattress, sat up and leaned back against the headboard. “Let me have some of that.”

Vicki handed the mug to her. Ace took a few swallows, and sighed. “That nurse, they figured she’d been nailed by some roving nut-case.”

“I know. Dexter, he’d warned me…”

“His little morning lectures…”

“Yeah, about the disappearances. Then the latest missing gal turns up in his apartment and kills him. At least, they think she killed him.”

“Melvin sure as hell threatened to kill him last night.”

“Is it just a coincidence?” Vicki asked.

“I wonder what makes them think it was the nurse.”

“They found something in the apartment. It sounded as if they’re pretty certain she’s the one who killed him.”

“Be nice if it was Melvin. They could put him away, he’d be outa your hair.”

“It doesn’t sound too likely.”

“Maybe he’s in on it with the nurse.”

“Oh, sure.”

“You sound like you don’t want it to be Melvin.”

“We just shouldn’t jump to conclusions,” Vicki said.

“A, he’s nuts. B, he threatened to kill Dexter. C, Dexter got murdered. That doesn’t sound like jumping to conclusions. Not to me, it doesn’t.”

“So how’d he get the nurse to do it?”

Ace shrugged, and drank some more coffee.

“You know how Dexter warned me about all those missing gals?” Vicki asked. “Suppose he’s the one who was doing it?”

“Our own local Ted Bundy?”

“Maybe he’s the one who abducted the nurse. Maybe kept her tied up in his apartment, or something. Last night, she got loose and killed him. You know, to save herself.”

“Big problem with that theory, Watson. She would’ve run straight to the cops.”

“Well…” Vicki realized that, if she thought about it, she could probably come up with several reasons why the nurse might not have run to the cops after killing Dexter. He’d been a cop himself, after all, and…That would be stretching it, though. Ace was right. If the nurse had been his prisoner, she would’ve gone for help the moment she escaped.

“You honestly don’t think Melvin had anything to do with it?” Ace asked.

“God, I hate to get him involved if he’s innocent.”

“If he’s innocent, I’ll eat my shorts.”

“I guess we should tell the police what we know, huh?”

“Yer durn tootin.’

“Oh, boy,” Vicki muttered. “I’ve never done anything like that. What do we do, just walk into the station?”

“Hell no. Let them come over here.”

Vicki wrinkled her nose. “Okay. I guess I’ll…what, just call them up and…?”

“You want me to do the calling?” Ace asked.

She felt enormous relief. “Well, I could do it, but…Yeah, you want to?”

“Why not.”

“You’re a pal. Thanks.”

“Don’t thank me, buy me a Ding-dong.” She gave the mug to Vicki. “I’ll call right now, before we come to our senses.” She tossed the sheet aside. Vicki stood and turned toward the door. “Think I’ll try Joey Milbourne at home. Let him get the glory.”

In the kitchen, she checked her address book and dialed. Vicki refilled the mug with coffee. “Hello, Iris? It’s Ace. Joey there?…He was? That’s great. That’s what I want to talk to him about…” Ace rolled her eyes. “No, I didn’t call to get the gory details. I know something about it. Vicki and I were with Pollock last night…Fine, you don’t want to wake him up, I’ll call the station and somebody else can be the one to break the case wide open. I’m sure Joey will thank you for it.” Covering the mouthpiece, Ace whispered, “Twat.” Then, she nodded. “Yes, why don’t you.” Again, she covered the mouthpiece. “Going to see if he’s awake. He was at Dexter’s last night. She’s gonna check and see if the phone woke him up.”

Ace took her hand away. “Morning, hot stuff. Sorry I woke you, but I thought you might want to trot over here and interrogate me and Vicki Chandler. We were with Dexter at the Riverfront last night at about ten-thirty and we know something…Yes, about the murder…Half an hour’s fine. See you then, sport.” She hung up. “You might want to check this guy out.”

“I remember him.”

“He’s a hunk. You could do worse.”

“Who’s Iris?”

“His mother.”

“He lives with his mother? He must be at least thirty-five.”

“Closer to forty.”

“He’s that age and lives with his mother, he’s got problems.”

“So, who doesn’t?”

Vicki ignored that. She filled a mug for Ace, then headed for her bedroom. She had showered after her morning run, and was wearing her robe. She changed into white jeans and a yellow blouse, and went into the living room to wait for Joey’s arrival.

A hunk. Pollock’s murdered and we’re planning to finger Melvin and Ace is playing matchmaker. The guy lives with his mother, no less. Last thing I need.

Ace came into the room. She was barefoot, wearing paint-spattered cut-off jeans and a baggy sleeveless gray sweatshirt.

“I see you dressed to impress the hunk,” Vicki said.

“Don’t want to steal your thunder, hon.”

“Oh, thanks.”

“You could do worse.”

“How come you’re not after him?”

“I’ve had my turn.”

“What’s wrong with him?”

“Nothing.”

“I’ll bet.”

“He’s not my type.”

“Oh, but you think he’s mine?”

“As we say in the sportswear biz, can’t hurt to try it on for size.”

“As we say in the doctor biz, bend over and spread ‘em.”

Ace snorted.

A few minutes later, Vicki heard the faint thud of a car door shutting. Then came the quick sound of footsteps on the walkway, then the doorbell. Ace opened the door. The man who entered was as tall as Ace. His light brown hair was cut short, and he had a neatly trimmed mustache. Vicki could see why Ace considered him a hunk: his face was tanned and handsome; his white knit shirt hugged bulging muscles and a flat belly. He looked tightly packed into his faded jeans.

Vicki remembered him as a baby-faced beanpole. He’d grown the mustache and apparently taken up body building since she last saw him.

“Joey, you remember Vicki Chandler?”

“Of course. Vicki? I hear you’re working with Charlie Gaines over at the clinic.”

“Just started last week,” she said. “How are you doing?”

“I could’ve used a couple more hours of sleep.”

“You’ll be glad I woke you.” Ace told him.

“I actually require eight hours to function at top form, so I’m two hours short.”

“Better take a load off before you collapse.”

He arched an eyebrow at Ace. Then, he sat at the other end of the couch and crossed a leg over his knee, which must’ve been painful in those tight jeans. He rested a clipboard against his upthrust leg. “Now,” he said, “I understand that you two were with Pollock last night.”

“At the Riverfront,” Ace said. “We were there with Melvin Dobbs.”

“What on earth for?”

“He seems to have the hots for Vicki.”

Joey looked at Vicki. The eyebrow went up again.

“I’m not encouraging it,” she explained.

“I wouldn’t. He’s an odd bird. So, the four of you were drinking at the Riverfront.”

“The three of us,” Vicki said. “Me, Ace, and Melvin. Then Ace left the table to get some peanuts…”

“Salted in the shell,” Ace added.

“You should be careful of salt,” Joey said. “Bad for the cardio-vascular system.”

“While she was away, Pollock showed up and started bothering us.”

“Bothering you how?”

“I’d been a tenant in his apartment building, but he kept pestering me so I moved out. He wasn’t very happy about that.”

“Pestering you how?”

“By being his normal lecherous self,” Ace said.

“He’d stop me in the hall, make crude remarks, that sort of thing. Supposedly trying to warn me about running early in the morning. He seemed to think I was asking to get myself assaulted.”

“Which is probably what he wanted to do,” Ace suggested.

Joey frowned at her. “The man’s dead.”

“That doesn’t make him suddenly a saint.”

“His point may have been well taken. There have been several incidents, recently, of attractive young women disappearing without a trace.”

“Like the nurse who turned up at Pollock’s last night?” Ace asked.

“I think we’re straying from the point here,” Joey said. He looked at Vicki. “So you were drinking with Dobbs, and Pollock showed up and began bothering you? What time was this?”

“About ten-fifteen, ten-thirty.”

“And his behavior was abusive?”

“I’d say so, yes.”

“Was he alone?”

“He seemed to be.”

“Did you notice anyone in the establishment wearing a nurse’s white dress?”

“No. Not that I saw.”

“Me neither,” Ace said.

“So how does this tie in with the subsequent murder?”

“Melvin threatened to kill him,” Ace said.

Both Joey’s eyebrows shot up.

“I thought that might get your attention.”

“Exactly what did Dobbs say?”

“‘I oughta kill him.’”

Vicki nodded agreement. “Those were his exact words.”

Joey wrote on his clipboard. “And by ‘him,’ he was referring to Dexter Pollock?”

“No, Eddie Rabbit. Of course he was referring to Pollock. Why do you think we’re telling you this?”

“So, both of you heard him threaten Pollock’s life between ten-fifteen and ten-thirty last night?”

“That’s right,” Vicki said. “But we were all upset with Pollock. I poured some beer on him, myself.”

“Why was that?”

“He was getting cute. The thing is, he was being a jerk and Melvin’s remark seemed pretty normal, under the circumstances. I could’ve said the same thing, myself.”

“But you’re not a lunatic who’ll go out and do it,” Ace pointed out.

“What transpired after the altercation?”

“Ace and I went home.”

“What about Dobbs?”

“He left the bar when we did. Right after we got rid of Pollock.”

“So the three of you left the Riverfront together.”

“At about ten-thirty or so.”

“And went directly home—here?”

“Here.”

“What about Dobbs?”

“He came with us and we had an orgy.”

Joey narrowed his eyes at Ace. “We’re talking about a murder investigation.”

“So sorry.”

“Melvin didn’t come with us,” Vicki said. “We don’t know where he went afterward.”

“Was Pollock still in the tavern when you left?”

Vicki looked at Ace. Ace shrugged. “He might’ve still been there.”

“I didn’t see him leave,” Ace said.

“You both came directly here after leaving the Riverfront? Did either of you leave the house again last night?”

“What, are we suddenly suspects?” Ace asked.

“I’m just asking.”

“We watched TV,” Vicki said, “until about one o’clock. Then we went to bed.”

“Anything else to add?”

“That’s about it,” Ace told him. “So, you going over and question Melvin?”

He slipped his pen under the clamp of the clipboard. “I’m not sure there’s any reason to bother Dobbs about this.”

“What, it doesn’t matter that he threatened to kill Pollock?”

“We already have a suspect in this.”

“The nurse,” Vicki said.

“What makes you think she’s the one who killed him?”

“Physical evidence at the scene.”

“Such as?”

“I’m not at liberty to reveal the details of our investigation.”

“Bug-squat.”

“I will say that we found a dress in Pollock’s apartment. The name tag identified it as belonging to the suspect.”

“So did she leave starkers?”

Joey shook his head.

“Couldn’t her dress have been planted to mislead you?” Vicki asked.

“By Melvin, for instance,” Ace said.

“We have some indications that the perpetrator was a female. And we should be able to confirm, today, that it was actually Patricia Gordon who inflicted the wounds. Once we’ve checked her dental charts…” He stopped abruptly and looked annoyed.

“She bite him?”

“I didn’t say that.”

“Of course you didn’t.”

“Damn it.”

“We won’t say anything,” Vicki told him.

“I would appreciate that.”

“If this nurse disappeared Thursday,” she asked, “how did she end up in Pollock’s apartment?”

“We have no idea.”

“He hadn’t been…keeping her?”

“It occurred to us. But we found nothing to indicate that she’d been there for any period of time.”

“The earlier theory was that she’d been abducted?”

“That’s what we’d assumed. It followed the pattern of the other disappearances, at least until she turned up last night and killed him.”

“Don’t you think that’s pretty strange?” Ace asked.

“Everything about this is strange.”

“But you’re pretty sure,” Vicki said, “that Pollock isn’t the one who abducted her, and maybe kept her tied up or something, and she killed him to escape?”

“We didn’t find any ropes in the apartment. His handcuffs were in their case on his utility belt. We didn’t find anything that looked as if it might’ve been used as a gag. There weren’t any drugs in his apartment that he might’ve used to render her unconscious. So it certainly doesn’t appear that he was keeping the woman against her will. From the latent prints we found, it doesn’t even look as if anyone had been in the apartment except Pollock.”