Killing Her Softly (15 page)

Simon rapped his fist on the panels and waited. If Leslie was upstairs, it would take her a few minutes to come down.

No one came. Come to think of it, he would have expected her to be outside in the garden by now. He didn't hear a sound from the house. Had she gone out? He walked around the house. No, Jason's little car stood there.

"Could she have gone to the beach?” he asked the cat.

The car yowled and batted at his ankles before going back to the door. He crouched, lifting his front paws. He dragged them down, leaving long scratches in the paint.

"What's wrong, cat?” Simon asked him. “I've a good mind—"

He broke off, the hair rising on his skin. Somewhere in the house, a woman was screaming.

Her scream echoed around the attic. Leslie felt as if her eyes were bulging from her head as she stared at the open trunk in front of her. The sweet musty odor she'd noticed before stole her breath.

They say she drowned, but they never found a body.
The words echoed through her head as nausea swam in her stomach. She swallowed the bile in her throat.

The body was found.

Definitely a woman. She wore a flowered dress, and her long blonde hair mercifully covered her face. She lay on her side, her knees drawn up slightly to accommodate the short length of the trunk. The hand that rested on her thigh was wrinkled and dry; the fingers looked like leafless twigs.

With a shudder of revulsion, Leslie scrambled back. She stood up, scarcely feeling the pain when she cracked her head on the low ceiling. She ran to the door and pounded her fists on it, yelling, “Help! Please help me."

Not that anyone was likely to hear.

She coughed and swallowed, her mouth parched. She shivered, cold and hot at the same time. She was no longer sweating, and goose bumps feathered her skin.

Her hands began to ache from beating on the door, and her throat felt as if she'd swallowed ground glass. She sank down on the floor, her cheek against the door. Red and black dots floated behind her closed eyelids.

She forced them open, concentrating on settling her roiling stomach. She couldn't faint, she couldn't give up.

She refused to end up like that poor woman in the trunk.

Her ear, pressed to the door panel, registered a vibration deep inside the house. She sat up. Was that a shout she heard? The vibration was someone pounding on an outside door, two or three thuds, silence, more thuds.

The kitchen door. Hope surged through her. She got clumsily to her feet, shaking her head to clear it. She had to be quick, before they went away.

Her gaze skittered around the room, finding the chair. Fighting dizziness, she slammed it against the window she guessed overlooked the kitchen door. The glass broke with a satisfying crash, the pieces clinking as they rained down on the patio below.

The window was smaller than the others, barely allowing her to poke her head out. “Help!” Her voice came out as a hoarse croak. Would anyone hear? She coughed and tried again. “Is anyone there? Help!"

"Leslie? Where are you?"

She nearly fainted in relief as she recognized Simon's voice and saw his dark head below her. “I'm here, above you. In the attic. Break a window or something. Just get me out of here.” Her voice broke in a racking cough.

"Right away."

She heard glass shatter, and headed back to the door. The room tilted under her feet. She swayed dizzily, her tongue sticking to the roof of her mouth. Next to the door, she huddled on the floor, counting the seconds. One thousand and one, one thousand and two, one thousand and three ... Dark shadows swirled in her brain, and she concentrated on the numbers. She couldn't pass out. She couldn't.

Only half conscious, she barely moved when an odor prickled her nostrils. She coughed painfully and ran her tongue around her teeth, trying to dredge up a little saliva.

Suddenly it didn't seem to matter any more. The heat was gone, and cold shivers enveloped her. Chest heaving, she coughed miserably, clutching her aching stomach.

Smoke. Letting out a hoarse croak, she put her face against the bottom of the door. She smelled smoke, and this time it was in the house.

Where was Simon? Horrible doubts began to penetrate her mind, sluggishly coalescing into certainty. Simon wasn't coming. He, too, wanted her dead.

She lay down on the floor, uncaring that it was dirty and hard and rough with splinters. She told her mind to stop fighting. At least if she passed out, she wouldn't feel the pain when she burned to death.

She sank into a black void where nothing mattered.

Simon hoisted himself up on the window sill. His shoulders barely fit through the frame. He cursed as a shard of glass in one corner ripped his shirt and laid a long, burning scrape on his shoulder.

He curled himself into a forward roll and pushed himself through, painfully bruising the other shoulder when he landed. The cat jumped in after him, dropping gracefully on four silent paws. It ran to the kitchen door, then stopped, letting out an ear-splitting yowl.

Then Simon noticed it. The smell of something burning. He crossed the kitchen. Near the door, his foot slipped. He grabbed the corner of the table, scrambling to keep his feet under him.

Shards of pottery from a broken vase lay smashed on the quarry tile floor. Around it, his yellow roses were scattered in a litter of crushed petals and broken stems. He forgot the smoke for a moment as he focused on the table.

Another vase stood there, filled with red roses.

"Damn,” he muttered, coughing.

The pungent smell of smoke was stronger, gray tendrils floating around the room, dissipating out the open window. The cat howled again.

Simon ran into the front hall. More smoke. There, in the living room. The fire burned on the hearth, but he realized that the chimney must be plugged because the smoke blew back into the room.

An embroidered runner on the mantel hung down low enough that the edges were beginning to scorch. Simon ran back to the kitchen, and yanked the roses out of the vase on the table.

Coughing, he crossed the living room and dumped the water on the fire. It hissed and subsided. Just to be sure, he refilled the heavy glass vase and soaked the fire again, using the poker to scatter the soggy ashes.

Poker in hand, he dashed up the stairs, his mind racing as fast as his feet and his heartbeat. Who would set a fire on such a hot day? And what was Leslie doing in the attic on that same hot day? It must be an oven up there. Didn't she know about heat stroke, and how fast it could kill?

At the top of the attic staircase, he found the cat waiting for him, clawing at the door. The padlock hung from its hasp, neatly closed. Simon's blood turned to ice, despite the suffocating heat.

No accident, then. This was outright murder. Leslie dead of heat stroke, the house burned down, and no one the wiser.

He clenched his fist around the poker, the metal handle digging into his palm. If he caught the person who'd done this—

"Leslie, are you there?"

No answer. He inserted the end of the poker between the hasp and the lock, frantically calling to her again. “Leslie!"

With a high-pitched groan, the hasp came out of the frame. Simon shoved open the door and lunged inside, nearly tripping over Leslie's prone body on the floor.

His heart stopped as he saw her. Her face was as white as paper, and she wasn't breathing.

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The cat meowed plaintively and patted Leslie's face with a gentle paw. Her chest heaved, and she coughed harshly. Simon groaned with relief, pushing the cat aside. He gathered Leslie into his arms. She felt alarmingly light and fragile, her skin hot and dry.

He had to get her out of here.

Wisps of smoke still lingered in the hall as he carried her down the two flights of stairs and outside. His own lungs felt parched, oxygen-starved. He gulped in fresh air, laying Leslie down on the mossy stones near the water tap.

Stripping off his T-shirt, he soaked it with water and bathed her face. He let the hose spray her shirt, to cool her off, closing his mind resolutely to the sight of her nipples pebbling under the thin cotton.

He had to get water inside her, as well.

Running quickly to the kitchen, he grabbed a glass and took it out to her. To his surprise, Leslie was struggling to sit up, hindered somewhat by the anxious ministrations of the cat as he licked her face. “Stay down,” Simon said. “You have to rest."

Her gaze skittered around the garden, her eyes dark and wild. “How'd I get here?” she asked hoarsely, the words slurring together.

"You're safe now,” he murmured reassuringly, filling the glass and holding it to her lips. She grabbed it with one hand and gulped greedily. Simon pulled it back. “Slowly. You have to drink it a little at a time or you'll be sick."

She lay back, her eyes falling closed. He could see the thin blue veins on her eyelids, the dark lashes against the pallid white of her cheeks. What else could he do? Her breathing was rapid and shallow, her skin still hot when he picked up her wrist to check her pulse.

Suddenly she cried out, her fingers gripping Simon's arm. The cat leaped away as she sat up. “Simon, there was a woman.” Her voice broke in a racking cough, and Simon allowed her another mouthful of water.

"A woman?” he asked, wondering if she was hallucinating. “Where was this woman?"

Her body jerked. Color flooded her cheeks, and she clawed at his arm. Her nails left sharp, stinging scratches on his skin. “In the attic.” She shuddered, her feet sliding on the wet moss as she struggled to get up. “I have to call Jimmy."

"We'll call Jimmy,” he said soothingly. “As soon as you're feeling better.

She sagged in his arms, like a doll that had lost its stuffing. “He locked me in, didn't he?"

"He?"

She shook her head impatiently, her eyes desperate. Simon frowned. Something had scared her, something more than the danger of being locked in. “Yes, he wanted me dead.” Her voice became clearer, insistent. “Just like the woman was dead."

Simon gathered her up in his arms and sat her in one of the chairs next to the patio table. He refilled the water glass and put it in front of her. “Half now, half in five minutes."

Good thing she hadn't been up in the suffocating heat of the attic longer. Heat exhaustion could be deadly, he knew, but if caught in time, it was relatively quick to reverse. She already showed signs of recovery, and he didn't think she'd need a doctor.

What bothered him more was her mental state.

"Where was this dead woman?” he asked in a calm voice, willing her to settle down rather than perch on the edge of the chair as if about to take flight.

"In the attic. She was in the attic.” Leslie gave a whimpering cry and covered her face with her hands. “She had blonde hair. Like me."

"What?” A cold fist seemed to squeeze his heart. He stared at her. Had she been having a nightmare? Dehydration could do odd things to the mind.

"There is a dead woman in the attic.” Eyes closed, Leslie spoke with the exaggerated patience of one explaining something to a child. “In a trunk, under the eaves. She's been dead a long time."

A shudder lifted goose bumps on her skin. “She looked like a mummy. Call Jimmy.” She braced her hands on the arms of the chair, pushing herself up.

Simon gently pressed her down. “Sit. I'll have a look.” He hesitated, placing his palms on her cheeks and tilting her face up. Some color had returned to her skin and her eyes no longer had that sunken look. “Will you be okay here?"

She picked up the water glass and sipped from it. Her hand shook, the glass clicking against her teeth. Jerkily, she nodded. “I'll be okay."

Simon ran up the stairs, taking them two at a time. Dust motes shimmered in the light from the dusty windows in the attic. The heat, dense and heavy, drove the breath from his throat. His stomach rolled. If she had been up here any longer...

He raised the lid of a nearby trunk. Folded clothes and the smell of mothballs. He looked around. There it was, the space under the eaves. He picked up one of the loose boards, his heart clenching. She'd torn them off, looking for a way out.

Cautiously he crawled into the space. Another trunk stood open. With a feeling of dread, he looked inside. And recoiled. A sweet, musty smell enveloped him, along with the ghost of cedar.

Simon swallowed down nausea as he gazed at the dried twig fingers. He knew that dress, small multi-colored flowers on a cream background. He'd seen her wear it a number of times that summer two years ago.

Driven by an urge he couldn't control, he lifted the strands of hair that covered her face. The skin had shrunken on her bones and pulled back from her teeth. Yes, it was Melanie. He recognized the slight overbite, the faint crookedness of one front tooth.

For an instant, impotent anger swamped him. He'd been accused of her murder, at least unofficially, and all the time, she'd been here. Dead, but not at his hands.

Shame overwhelmed his anger. And guilt. She had been murdered. The realization slapped him in the face. Someone had shut her up in the attic to die. Or, at best, had hidden her body. Her death could not have been a natural one; she'd been in perfect, robust, angry good health the last time he'd seen her. She's screamed insults at him as he walked out of this very house that night.

Leslie had almost died here, too. His anger returned, burning through every other emotion. Whoever had killed Melanie must be behind the attempts to drive Leslie from the house. He's probably feared she would discover the body.

Simon had to find him before he killed again.

Simon ran down the stairs and into the kitchen. Leslie still sat on the patio, the cat in her lap. Her eyes were blank, her face pale, as she stared out at nothing.

Simon's heart twisted in pain at her stillness, and he almost went to her. No, this had to be reported. And resolved.

Turning, he went into the living room, where smoke and the smell of wet ashes hung in the still heat. Picking up the phone, he dialed the police station.