Wicked Craving (18 page)

“W
ow, déjà vu all over again,” Savannah said as she and Tammy ducked under the yellow perimeter tape and entered the area the police had cordoned off.

One handsome, young patrolman started toward them, holding his hand up in his best traffic-cop fashion. But when he recognized Savannah, he nodded and smiled.

She gave him a brief wave and a mouthed “thanks,” then turned her attention to the business at hand.

In the center of the protected scene was a new, black Mercedes sedan, and on the ground next to it was a yellow tarp. Savannah would have recognized the shape under the tarp anywhere. It was a body.

“Who do you suppose it is?” Tammy asked. Her voice sounded a little shaky.

For all her bravado and eagerness to be in the middle of the action, Savannah could tell she was nervous.

“I don't know who it is,” Savannah said, although it was running through her mind that she wouldn't be surprised to hear that Roxanne Rosen did a bit of moonlighting as a dancer at Nonnina's.

“There's Dirk over there,” Tammy said, “talking to that cop.”

No sooner had Tammy spoken than Dirk spotted them. He quickly ended his conversation with the officer and walked over to them.

He looked mildly surprised to see Tammy with Savannah, but he didn't mention it.

“What's up?” Savannah asked him. “And who's that?”

Nodding toward the tarp, he said, “Take a look.”

He didn't have to say it twice. Savannah walked over to the car and the body beside it, bracing herself, as always.

Having seen terrible sights when she hadn't prepared herself, she had learned to guard her psyche as best she could. Although she had also learned that there wasn't really any way to protect one's heart and mind from the aftermath of violence.

She pulled a pair of surgical gloves from her purse and slipped them on. Then she knelt on one knee beside the tarp.

But before she raised the corner, she turned to Tammy, who was standing right behind her.

“You okay?” she asked her.

She nodded, looking a little sick, her arms crossed over her chest.

“Why don't you go back and talk to Dirk?” Savannah said. “I'll look first, and then I'll tell you how bad it is.”

“No, that's okay. Let's just do it.”

“All right.” Savannah lowered her voice, “But if you think there's any chance you're going to get sick, run fast and get to the other side of the tape before you…you know…”

“Add my DNA to the crime scene?”

“Exactly.”

Savannah turned back to the body and raised the corner of the tarp. In her peripheral vision she could see several cops who were standing nearby moving closer to get a better look.

It took her mind a few seconds to process what she was seeing, because there was so much blood and the flesh of the face was so badly damaged.

She heard Tammy gasp, and one of the cops said, “Damn! Somebody sure made hamburger out of him.”

As she continued to pull the tarp farther back, she saw that it was, indeed, a male. He was wearing a purple polo shirt.

“He has red hair,” Tammy said. “Do you think it's Wellman?”

“It's Wellman,” Dirk replied. Savannah looked up and saw that he was standing next to Tammy, his hand on her shoulder. “He had his wallet in his pocket. Several pieces of ID and quite a bit of cash, too.”

“Ugly,” Savannah said. “Looks like somebody hit him in the head with something long and hard…and a lot more times than necessary to do the job.”

“A rage killing,” Tammy added. Her pretty, young face, usually lit with a smile, registered her sadness and horror.

“Yeah,” Dirk said. “Somebody sure as hell wanted him dead.”

“And it looks like they enjoyed doing it, too.” Savannah glanced around. On the blacktop about a yard away, near the vehicle's front driver's side tire, was a large screwdriver. Next to it, someone had placed a bright orange, plastic evidence marker. And about two feet from the screwdriver was a hammer, which had its own marker.

The tire was flat, a deep puncture in its side.

“Well, they weren't the least bit subtle about that, huh?” she said. “They give the guy a flat tire and make sure he knows they did it.” She turned to Dirk. “This
is
Wellman's vehicle, right?”

He nodded.

Tammy was standing close to the car, sighting down the side of the front fender. “I think I see blood spatter there near the tire well,” she said. “It's hard to tell on the black paint, but you can see it from here.”

Savannah looked at the area from the angle she had suggested and agreed with her. “Yeah, that's spatter, all right. I'll bet he was leaning over, looking at his flat tire, when he got the first blow.”

Dirk said, “I figure that's why they punched the tire in the first place…to get him into position to get whacked.”

“You poke a hole in my tire and leave the screwdriver and hammer beside it in plain view,” Savannah said, “you'd have my attention. I'd be sure to lean over and investigate.”

“What do you suppose they hit him with?” Tammy said, wincing as she looked at the body's ruined face. “The hammer?”

“I doubt it,” Savannah told her. “Not unless they wiped it down afterward. It looks clean.”

“My best guess…” Dirk said dryly, “…is the bloody crowbar we found laying on the ground halfway down the alley.”

“Ouch,” Savannah said. “That's a nasty, I-mean-business sort of a weapon.”

“We saw Dr. Liu's van arriving when we pulled up out front,” Tammy told him. “Maybe they can lift a print off it.”

“One can hope.” Dirk knelt beside the body and carefully, respectfully replaced the tarp. Then he stood and stepped closer to Savannah.

When he looked at her, she saw a deep sadness in his eyes that touched her heart.

“I blew it, Van,” he whispered, so that no one else could hear. “I watched his house most of the night and tried to warn him, but…”

“You don't know Avantis did this,” Savannah said, as she reached over and put her hand on his shoulder. “And even if he did, you don't know that you could have prevented it.”

He sighed, looking bone-deep weary. “Maybe I could have, maybe I couldn't. But I'll tell you one thing. I'm gonna find that son of a bitch, and if he did do it, I'm gonna nail his ass to the nearest wall.”

“I'll hold him still while you do it.”

 

An hour later, Savannah was in her car, headed for G & K Tot Heaven. On the seat beside her was a picture of Gus Avantis, his Nevada driver's license photo…courtesy of Dirk.

Dirk had gone to the morgue with Dr. Liu and the mortal remains of Robert Wellman aka Bobby Martini. Dirk seemed to think that if he made a nuisance of himself, loitering just outside her autopsy suite, he might get faster results.

Savannah had sent Tammy along with him to referee any fights that might break out between him and the temperamental medical examiner.

“If Karen's going to find out that the father of her unborn child has been murdered,” Savannah had told Dirk at the scene, “I want it to come from me, not the newscaster on channel two.”

So, she was headed to Karen and Gertrude's daycare center to inform her of the tragic truth.

And she wasn't looking forward to it. Informing victims' families was the hardest thing she had been forced to do in a life filled with difficult tasks.

As she parked the Mustang in front of the house, she noticed that many of the decrepit toys were gone from the yard: the broken down swing, the overturned slide, the two-wheeled tricycle. While the place still appeared shabby and depressing, at least the dangerous, damaged equipment was gone.

She doubted that Gertrude and Karen had just suddenly decided, out of the goodness of their hearts, to spiffy up the place. She smiled, self-satisfied that her phone call to Social Services had produced such an immediate effect.

On the curb, waiting for trash pickup, was a heap of long-past-their-prime toys and child-care items.

Yes, somebody at G & K Tot Heaven had been busy…whether they liked it or not.

As she walked up the sidewalk to the front door, she could hear Gertrude Burns's shrill voice, drifting through the open windows.

“Where's the kid's damned teddy bear? The one with the blue ribbon around its neck?”

“I threw it out with everything else,” was the response, screamed from the other end of the house. “They said get rid of the mess…I put it in the trash can.”

“You what? Are you crazy?”

“It's garbage. What's the big deal?”

“The kid won't go to sleep without that stupid bear. But of course, you wouldn't know that because you never take care of your own brats. That bear had better be out there or, by God, I'll…”

The front door swung open, and a fury dressed in black with red glasses came charging out. Gertrude stopped abruptly in the middle of the sidewalk when she saw Savannah.

“What the hell are you doing here again?” she demanded.

“I'm here to see your daughter,” Savannah told her.

“Oh yeah? Well, I think you're here to snoop again. I think you're the one who made that ‘anonymous' phone call to Social Services about
absolutely nothing
! You got us closed down over some old toys…like it's bad for kids to play with toys that aren't spanking new!”

Rather than engage her, Savannah simply tried to walk past her. But Gertrude would have none of it. She reached out and took Savannah by the upper arm, digging her fingers into her flesh.

“It was you,” Gertrude said. “Wasn't it.”

Savannah fixed her with an icy stare and said in a deadly even tone, “You need to take your hand off me this instant. I'm not some poor, helpless child you can manhandle.”

When Gertrude didn't respond immediately, Savannah added,

“This is your last warning before I knock the tar outta you. Your choice.”

Gertrude seemed to understand, because she released her grip on Savannah. But she said, “If I find out it was you who called them, I'm going to—”

“It was me. I made the call. And you'll do nothing about it, except make this place a safer, better environment for the children in your charge.”

Savannah sidestepped her and walked on up to the half-open front door.

In her peripheral vision, she saw Gertrude huff and puff for a moment or two. Then she stomped away in the direction of the overloaded garbage can and pile of discards…no doubt to rescue a teddy bear with a blue ribbon around its neck.

Savannah steeled herself, dreading what was ahead. Then she knocked on the door a couple of times, stuck her head inside, and shouted, “Karen? Karen…it's Savannah Reid. I need to talk to you.”

K
aren Burns took the news even harder than Savannah had feared she would. She sat on the living room sofa, her face in her hands, rocking back and forth and wailing.

“He can't be dead,” she sobbed. “Not murdered! No, no, no!”

“I'm so sorry,” Savannah said as she sat down beside her and patted the woman on the back. “I really am. Please, I know this is awful, but try your best to calm yourself, for your baby's sake. It's not good for it for you to be so upset.”

Gertrude walked into the room and cast a disapproving scowl her daughter's way. She had a baby in her arms. The little toddler, Stevie, was holding on to her leg. “I don't know what you're bawling about,” she snapped. “It's not like he was going to marry you anyway.”

“Gertrude, stop.” Savannah shot her a warning look. “You're not helping.”

“Well, it's true. He wasn't going to do the right thing by her. He was a scumbag, chasing women all the time. Even with his wife out of the picture, he wasn't going to marry her. Did she tell you he told her to have an abortion? I'll bet she didn't mention that little detail.”

“Mom, please,” Karen said through her tears. “I can't take it right now. Just shut up.”

“Do you hear the way she talks to me?” Gertrude shook her head, disgusted.

“And where do you suppose she learned it?” Savannah muttered to herself.

She reached into her purse and produced a handful of tissues for Karen. Then she took Gus Avantis's picture out, as well.

Holding it in front of Karen, she said, “Dry your eyes, sweetie, and take a look at this picture. Try and think really hard…have you ever seen him before?”

Karen did as she was told. After a long look, she said, “No, why?”

“Just asking.” Savannah stuffed the photo back into her purse. “Did you ever hear Dr. Wellman mention the name Gus Avantis?”

“No, why?” Her eyes widened, and she looked as though she were about to be sick. “Is that him? Is that who you think killed my Robert?”

“At this point,” Savannah said, “he's just a person of interest. We have a few questions we'd like to ask him.”

“Who is he?” Gertrude wanted to know. “The husband of some other woman Wellman screwed?”

Savannah rose and walked over to Gertrude, who was still standing on the other side of the room, holding the baby.

“Your daughter just received some horrific news,” Savannah told her. “Now would be a good time for you to look deep, deep inside and see if you can find some kindness in your heart to offer her.”

Gertrude shrugged. “She picks losers. Every damned time, she goes for the scumbags. And this is what happens. It's not my fault she's all brokenhearted again. It's hers.”

“Well…” Savannah sighed. “As long as you dug deep.”

Then she headed out the door.

She desperately needed a breath of fresh air.

 

Savannah met Dirk in the parking lot of the Patty Cake Bakery. But when she left her Mustang and climbed into his Buick, she found him drinking black coffee…and only black coffee. The small pink bag on the dash held one lone pastry. And there were no tell-tale sugar crumbs around his mouth or on the front of his shirt.

“That one's yours,” he said, pointing to the sack. “An apple fritter.”

“Thanks,” she said. “You still dieting?”

“Yeah. I don't know how you gals do this all the time. It's not just the being hungry part; it's feeling weak and cranky and depressed. Dieting sucks.”

“You're darned right it sucks. Been there, done that, lost, and gained it all back, plus some more. That's why this gal don't do it no more. How long do you figure you'll be on this diet of yours?”

He glanced at his watch. “Thirty-four more hours.”

“You've got it figured out down to the
hour
? What kind of diet is that?”

“A stupid one, the last one I'm ever doing.” He rubbed his hand wearily over his eyes. “Boy, sitting out in front of Wellman's house last night instead of sleeping, that really messed me up.”

“No sleep, no food. It'll be the death of you, you don't watch out. You're too old for that sort of abuse. And speaking of young and feisty, where's Tammy?”

“I dropped her back at your house. She's doing some computer work for us, trying to find out who manufactured that hammer and screwdriver and crowbar. Caitlin at the lab said they're all new, hardly a mark on them.”

“So, if somebody bought all three locally at the same time, and we can find out what store carries those brands, we might be able to—”

“That's right. And I really want to find this killer. Dr. Liu said Wellman was hit in the head, hard, at least twelve times.”

“Whoa. That's a lot of anger.”

“Yeah. The guy didn't have a chance. I mean, he wasn't a great human being, but still…”

“No prints on any of those items?”

“Not even a smudged print.”

“So, they were wearing some sort of gloves. You can't wipe the prints off and not the blood, too.”

“Yeah, and the crow bar had blood, skin, and hair on it. Grim.”

She nodded. “And as premeditated as it gets.”

“I put an APB out on Avantis. If he's still in town, somebody's gonna see him.”

Savannah leaned down to set her purse on the floorboard beside her feet, and she saw a bag. It was a white sack with the distinct logo of a fox dressed in a top hat and tails.

“Hey, what's this?” she asked, reaching for it.

But before she could touch it, he snatched the bag off the floor and clutched it to his chest.

“Nothing,” he said. “It's nothing at all.”

“That's from that classy men's boutique downtown. Ryan and John shop there!”

Before she could stop him, he had jumped out of the car, run to the back, opened the trunk, and thrown the bag inside.

When he climbed back into the driver's seat, his face was flushed and he was breathing hard.

“What the dickens is going on around here?” she said. “You went shopping at The Fancy Fox? Since when does that store carry faded Harley-Davidson T-shirts and worn out bomber jackets?”

“I'm not discussing this with you. Subject closed.”

“This subject is so-o-o open! Since when do you shop
anywhere
, let alone
there
? They charge more for one shirt than you've spent on clothes the whole time I've known you.”

“That's not true. I buy myself seven new pairs of underwear and socks every Christmas, and I throw out the old ones.”

“Whoopee! Ralph Lauren, look out!”

“Who's that?”

“Come on. What's with this business of you—”

Her cell phone began to buzz. She knew from the ring it was Tammy, and so did Dirk. He looked extremely relieved for the interruption.

“Better get that,” he said. “She might've found something for us.”

Savannah gave him an evil look but flipped her phone open. “Hi, buttercup. What's shakin'?”

Tammy sounded excited. “I'm still working on that hammer, screwdriver, crowbar thing, but I used that account number that Ryan gave me…the one for Wellman's phone. And I hacked into his records.”

“Oh, yeah? Anything good?”

“You said Wellman got a couple of phone calls in a row when you were talking to him there at the house. And he wouldn't take them in front of you, turned his phone off. Remember?”

“Sure. The first one was at five forty-six.”

“That's right. You told me about that. Well, I checked that call and the one right after it. They were both from Gustav Avantis.”

Savannah raised one eyebrow. “Really? Well, ain't that just mighty interesting?”

“Yeah, I thought Dirk would want to know that. He's really upset about letting Avantis get to Wellman…if he did, that is.”

“I know. He's sitting here beside me. We're getting ready to go…somewhere…He hasn't told me where yet.”

“Oh, you guys having another fight?”

“I don't know. It's hard to say if it's a new one or the continuation of an old one. After a while, they just sorta all run together.”

“Oo-kay. Well, have fun.”

Savannah gave Dirk a sideways glance. His pouty face was firmly in place. “Not likely,” she said, “but thanks anyway.”

 

He didn't tell her where they were going until they were pulling into the parking lot of a decrepit motel on the edge of town.

“Roxanne Rosen's staying here now,” he said as he killed the engine. “She got kicked out of her apartment for not paying her rent. I want to ask her if she knows Avantis.”

“Why would she know him? I doubt that he just walked up to her and introduced himself. ‘Hi, I'm Gus Avantis, your former boss's brother-in-law. I was wondering if you'd tell me where he lives or where he likes to hang out in the evenings, 'cause I'm gonna bash him over the head with a crowbar.'”

“Yeah, I know. But I have to do something. I'll go nuts if I just sit around and wait for somebody out there to nail him on that APB.”

“Yes, ‘wait' is your least favorite word.”

They left the car and walked up to room 106. The peeling paint on the door and the number six that was dangling upside down was in keeping with the rest of the motel's décor. The Geranium Inn had seen better days…back when its guests had arrived on the backs of wooly mammoths.

It took awhile for Roxanne to answer the door, and when she did, she looked almost as bedraggled as her lodgings. Her hair hung down, limp and dirty, and her eyes were brown…no longer that suspicious shade of aqua. Her jeans and tank top looked like she had slept in them.

“Oh, it's you two,” she said with even less enthusiasm than she had shown when greeting them the last time.

“Your roommate told me you'd moved here,” Dirk said.

“She always did have a big mouth.”

“Can we come in?” Savannah asked. “We've got something to tell you.”

“I already heard. I know the bartender at Nonnina's. It was Wellman out there in the alley, right?”

“Yes, it was,” Dirk replied.

“I didn't do anything to him. Just like I didn't do anything to Maria, except whip her ass, which she totally deserved.”

“We don't think you did,” Savannah said. She reached into her purse and pulled out Avantis's picture. She shoved it under Roxanne's nose. “We just want to know if you've seen this guy. Take a good look and think hard.”

“I don't have to think hard. I'd know him anywhere. He bought me a screwdriver last night.”

 

Sitting on the corner of Roxanne's unmade bed, Savannah tried to breathe through her ears. The stench of stale cigarette smoke, mixed with eau de unwashed body, was enough to put a vulture off his food.

On the opposite corner of the bed, Dirk sat, looking equally thrilled with his surroundings.

They both had a thing about motel rooms. Having seen far too many of such rooms, and knowing how much biological evidence was “deposited” on the bedspreads, carpets, walls, and even curtains, neither of them spent any more time in one than was absolutely necessary.

But the information Roxanne was giving them made it worthwhile. She was perched on a flimsy plastic chair, only a foot from them.

The rooms at the Geranium Inn were as spacious as they were spotless.

“I got to Rick's a little early,” she was saying, “before my girlfriends. I was sitting at the bar, and this guy comes up and offers to buy me a drink. We sat there, talking, and the subject of Dr. Wellman came up. He said it was a shame, the doctor's wife getting murdered like that. He seemed to want to talk about it a lot. At one point, I thought he might even be a reporter or something.”

“What sort of things did he ask you?” Dirk wanted to know.

“Oh…what you cops had said to me, whether there were any suspects yet, what sort of evidence you had…stuff like that.” She ran her fingers through her thick hair, as if trying to make a feeble attempt at grooming. It didn't help. “And,” she added, “he asked me out.”

“On a date?” Dirk sounded surprised.

“Yeah, on a date. I didn't look like this at the time,” Roxanne snapped back.

“Did you go out with him?” Dirk said.

“No. He was old enough to be my dad and ugly and kinda creepy, too.”

“So, you told him no, and then what?” Savannah asked.

“He gave me his number and then he left.”

Dirk perked up. “He gave you his phone number?”

“Yes. He scribbled it on a bar napkin, like they all do, and gave it to me, and then he left.”

Savannah felt her own spirits rising. “Do you still have the number?”

“Naw, I threw it out.”

“Oh.”

“Over there in the garbage can, I think.”

Savannah was torn. A garbage can? A possible lead on their prime suspect? A disgusting,
motel
garbage can?

She could see the battle registering on Dirk's face, too.

“You're the one getting paid here, not me,” she told him.

He mumbled some intelligible complaint under his breath, stood, and reached into the inside pocket of his bomber jacket. He pulled out a pair of surgical gloves and put them on.

Squatting by the garbage can, he began to sort through its contents. Savannah felt a surge of sympathy for him when he pulled out a tampon applicator, but he pitched it back in and a moment later came up with a rumpled paper napkin. He handed it to Roxanne.

“Is that it?” he asked.

Roxanne nodded. “That's it.”

Savannah leaned forward and placed her hand on Roxanne's knee.

“We're going to ask you for a favor, Roxie, a really big favor.”

“What's in it for me?”

Savannah gave her a sappy smile. “The deep, abiding satisfaction of knowing that you've cooperated with law enforcement, that you're a good citizen, a valuable member of society.”