Suspicion of Innocence (13 page)

"Okay." He nodded toward the door. "Go ahead and open it up."

There were two locks on the door, one in the brass doorknob, the other on a deadbolt. Gail pushed the door open and stood back. Thomas and Wooten entered first, each carrying a satchel. Britton gestured for her to go in.

One of the technicians flipped a switch, and light from recessed fixtures fell in pools in the dim entrance hall. Mexican tile led straight ahead to a living area, kitchen through a door to the right, two bedrooms upstairs. A stagnant odor came from somewhere. The air was heavy and still. Gail shivered, even in the heat.

The blond officer—Wooten—said, "Let's get that AC going." He went to find the thermostat. The other man glanced up the stairs. He was chewing a piece of gum between his front teeth, the muscle in his jaw moving.

Britton said, "Why don't you guys take the kitchen first?"

Their motions were smooth and precise, not wasting any time. Gail imagined they wanted to finish up and go have a beer. She followed Britton further inside.

A glass-topped table and six chairs marked the dining area. At the other end of the room a white L-shaped sofa faced an entertainment center, its oak shelves crammed with electronic equipment and a color TV. A pink neon telephone glowed on an end table. Renee had tacked up unframed travel posters—the Rockies, Paris, Jamaica.

Gail lifted the hair off the back of her neck. A breeze was blowing from the vent. She set her briefcase on the dining table. "How long do you think this will take?"

"Not too long." Britton hung his jacket over the back of a chair. Gail had expected to see a gun in a holster, but there was only a tan striped shirt and brown belt. He pulled out a chair for her. "Have a seat. You can tell me about your sister while you're waiting."

Gail pulled a pen and legal pad out of her briefcase and began to jot down a list of the contents of the room, as Ben had instructed her to do. She said to Britton, "I don't know how much help I can be to you. Renee and I hadn't seen each other regularly for years."

Britton crossed to the entertainment center and began opening drawers. "How come? You and Renee didn't get along, or what?"

"I suppose you could say that." When he glanced at her, she gave a little shrug. "It happens."

He pulled out the drawer under the television. Compact discs, tossed carelessly inside. Videotapes. Gail could read the tides of a few of them. Foreign erotica. Oddly, she felt embarrassed, as if Britton were poking through Renee's lingerie.

Britton closed the drawer and opened another one. "Do you know any of her friends?"

"No, I'm sorry, I don't. She worked at a title company. Vista, I think it was called, in Coral Gables. Someone there might help you."

As she scanned the room, Gail looked for the deer mask Jimmy Panther had described. It wasn't in here. Under the coffee table she noticed a pair of shoes that lay where they had been kicked off, turquoise leather flats with bows. Renee's feet had been small, white, and high-arched. Gail remembered Renee sitting in the backyard by the seawall in her bikini, painting her toenails, cotton balls holding her toes apart.

Britton was walking slowly from one end of the shelves to the other, tilting his head to read the titles of a few popular novels. The light filtering through the vertical blinds reflected off his glasses.

"Your mother said she didn't think Renee was particularly depressed." Britton glanced at Gail.

"My mother has a hard time accepting what happened, Sergeant. That's why she asked you to do this." Gail put her pen into her jacket pocket and sat down, crossing her legs.

Britton moved aside a parched fern, then slid it back into place. Gail made a note to herself to put the plants out on the patio before she left so they could get the rain.

He said, "I can understand how she feels. Losing a child in that way. She's a fine woman, your mother. I'm sorry either of you had to go through this."

"Thank you," Gail said, wondering how he maintained such innocent blue eyes in his line of work. She smiled at him.

Britton lifted an open, upside-down issue of
Cosmopolitan
on the coffee table. "I spoke to her this morning, as a matter of fact. She called me, said never mind going through Renee's place, sorry for the bother. She says you asked her to call."

"Well, not directly, but I did suggest it."

"How come?"

"Because all this is so useless." "Well, let me worry about that." He smiled back at her.

Gail said, "I don't mean to sound unappreciative. I know you have to do your job."

From the kitchen she heard the low rumble of male voices. A laugh. A scrap of conversation about the NBA playoffs. Drawers opened and closed.

She stood up. "Sergeant Britton. As long as I'm here, I need to make a list of Renee's possessions and pick up her financial records."

Britton looked around.

She said, "I'm the personal representative of her estate."

"I thought you said your mom was the PR."

"Did I? Well, we thought it would be better if I handled it." Gail picked up her briefcase from the table. "I'll just be upstairs."

"I'd rather you stay down here, if you don't mind."

"Actually, I do mind." Gail checked her watch. "I have a daughter waiting for me at home."

"Ms. Connor." Something in his tone made her turn around. He said, "Stay here. Please."

"I certainly won't take anything without giving you an opportunity to review it first."

He nodded. "Yes, ma'am. I intend to do that."

After a few seconds, she put her briefcase back on the table.

Britton walked to the kitchen door and leaned in, holding on to the frame. "Y'all about done in there?"

Gail could see the black officer hold up a plastic bag with a short glass inside. "We're going to print a few of these at the lab. We dusted the counter and appliances. Nothing in the garbage."

"All right."

The two technicians came out with their satchels, then moved quickly up the stairs. Gail followed Britton into the kitchen. He opened the refrigerator.

"Sergeant, if we could go over the records now, then I could leave. You can keep the keys and lock the door when you finish."

He turned around. "I know you're a busy lady, but you're going to have to bear with us." He gestured toward a small table under the window.

Gail sat down. A cup half full of soup, now obscured by mold, had been left on a plate with a few scraps of potato chips. She pushed it aside. Footsteps thumped overhead, muffled voices. Britton pulled open one drawer after another, the utensils inside rattling. The cabinets were light gray Formica, smudged around the handles. Gail wondered at the traces of black powder, then realized they marked where Thomas and Wooten had lifted fingerprints.

She wrote down on her legal pad: kitchen table, four chairs, various appliances, a clock radio, pots and pans, etc.

When Britton opened the refrigerator, Gail could see inside it. The usual bottles and jars of condiments in the door. On the shelves, Chinese food cartons, several bottles of opened wine, leftovers in plastic bags, a box of granola. He picked up a clear-wrapped package with two thick steaks inside and tilted it toward the light.

"You could have them, but they're probably spoiled," Gail said.

Britton laughed. "No, I was checking the expiration date." He showed her the sticker. "The tenth. Figure back a few days, she could have bought them the seventh."

"Is that important?"

"Not really." He tossed the package back inside and shut the door.

Gail said, "I suppose you want to know why Renee would spend over twelve dollars for filet mignons the same day she decided to kill herself." When Britton glanced around, she continued, "Renee was impetuous. She rarely thought ahead."

Britton regarded Gail closely, then said, "She bought two. Filets don't keep and she was no bigger than a minute. Do you know who the other one was for?"

Why yes, Gail thought, perhaps she was planning to have my husband in for lunch on Monday. She said, "I have no idea."
 

"You don't know who her boyfriend was? According to the autopsy, she was at least a couple months pregnant."

Britton's delivery was so flat Gail thought he might be probing to see whether this was news to her.

"So I heard," she said. "I really don't know who she was dating."

"Was Renee the type to keep a diary?"

"She never did as a teenager."

Britton didn't say anything for a moment, just continued to lean against the kitchen counter, arms spread out on either side of him, the light making miniature windows in his glasses.

There was an odd pattern in the grease spattered above the stove, and Gail realized she had seen it before. She had, after all, come into this kitchen on her way to get a dress for Renee, her curiosity roused by the stale odor of garbage and the sound of rap music coming softly from the radio on the counter. She had glanced around, finding a perverse satisfaction in the mess, then had turned off the radio.

Gail stood up. "May I look under the cabinets? There's a piece of Indian pottery I have to find while I'm here. A friend of hers lent it to her and he'd like to have it back."

"Sure, go ahead." Britton moved aside while Gail opened the doors. "I thought you didn't know any of her friends."

"This one contacted me." Gail bent to look under the sink. "His name is Jimmy Panther. A Miccosukee Indian." She checked the other cabinets. Nothing remotely resembling a deer mask.

"How well did he know her?" Britton asked.

"You'd have to ask him that. In fact, you probably have his name in your reports somewhere. He's the one who found her body."
 

"Is that right?" Britton gestured toward the kitchen door. "You want to take a look for those records now?"

She preceded him up the stairs. Nearing the top she heard voices coming from Renee's bedroom. Her steps slowed. She felt like a trespasser. She walked further down the hall and stood at the open door.

Gail had come at night the last—the only—time before, not seeing much but her way to the walk-in closet. Fleeting impressions, unwillingly registered. A lace bra and panties on the floor. A satin teddy thrown over a chair. Mirrors. Unmade bed, too many pillows. Pink and black. The smell of perfume. Irises in a tall, cut-glass vase.

She could see now that the water in the vase had turned green and cloudy. A dank odor filled the room. Thomas was bending over Renee's dresser with a soft brush, whisking away powder.

His back to the door, Wooten had made a little pile of things on the bed, pulling them out of the open drawer of a nightstand. He wore latex gloves. A length of black silk rope coiled across the sheets patterned with pink and purple orchids. Jars and tubes lay among the flowers. An open book of photographs—the color of flesh.

Wooten opened the next drawer. Gail couldn't see what he took out, then heard him laugh. "Hey, look at the size of this thing. Girl knew how to have a good time."

Thomas looked around, then toward the door, his grin fading. Wooten turned and saw Gail standing there. He moved the plastic phallus out of her sight, embarrassed.

"Sorry," he said.

Gail lowered her eyes and backed out of the door.

Britton spoke quietly. "Never mind those guys. They don't mean anything."

"I'm not offended," Gail said, following him toward the other room. "Nothing you find here would surprise me.
 

She regretted her response. In the same instant she had attempted both to assure him that she was no prude and to disassociate herself from Renee—a combination of cowardice and disloyalty. Then Gail wondered why she cared what he thought.

They entered a smaller bedroom with a daybed and odd bits of furniture. Gail recognized a chintz-covered armchair that had been their grandmother's. A desk and chair were by the window, a bookcase opposite. She made a note of all these on her legal pad. Britton turned on the desk lamp and started going through the drawers.

Gail crossed the room to the closet. Inside she found clothes jammed on the rod, shoe boxes underneath. On the shelf overhead, a cardboard box about a foot square. She set it on one corner of the daybed and noticed a shipping label. A novelty company in California had sent the box to Trail Indian Gifts, at a post office box in Miami. Gail pulled back the plastic bubble wrap inside and lifted out the face of a deer.

"What'd you find?" Britton was behind her when she turned around with it. "Funny-looking thing," he said. "Is this what that Indian wanted you to look for?"

"I imagine so." Gail showed him the long, triangular mask. Large ears—one of them was chipped—flared outward. The gently slanting eyes were outlined with delicate curving lines. A bas-relief crescent decorated the forehead. The remnants of paint—perhaps once it had been red—flaked from the surface.

Gail said, "I'd like to take it with me, if you have no objection."

"I can't think of any."

While she put it back into the box, Britton returned to the desk, opening and closing drawers. "Lot of stuff here," he said. "Tell you what. You jot down the information you need. Banks, charge account numbers, whatever. That would save some time. I'll go through all this at headquarters and deliver it when I'm done, how's that?"