| |
“It’s been too long, honey, too long.”
“I know, Mrs. E. I’ve missed you over the years.”
Mrs. E, as I had called her since I was five years old and first allowed to talk to the neighbors, was short for Mrs. Eidenschink. Not a single person referred to her by that mouthful. It was common knowledge that she preferred plain old Mrs. E; the friendly moniker had stuck with everyone up and down the street. We had been across-the-street neighbors until I was sent away, and I hadn’t seen her since. On particularly boring nights at the group homes I’d reminisce about sneaking across the street to accept baked treats from her while she gardened. By gardening I mean placing hundreds of gnomes, birdhouses, angels, and a mishmash of tacky lawn ornaments all over her yard. And I mean not a patch of grass was left untainted by the eyesores as Carli and I would make a game of navigating through them like Indiana Jones to reach our trophy: that day’s freshly baked goodies. While most people found Mrs. E odd and kept their distance, I appreciated the eccentricities that made humanity, in its infinite variety, so colorful.
“How have you been?” I asked, sitting at a kitchen table surrounded by yellowed newspapers on one side and a lampshade on the other.
When I’d decided to visit Mrs. E and she’d invited me inside, I was unprepared for the assault on my senses. First there was the pungent ammonia smell of cat pee, which my eyes and nose followed to an overflowing litter box in the foyer. A scruffy marmalade cat with a corkscrew tail had just finished doing its business (loudly and stinkily) and eyed me with cold feline indifference. I remembered the ranch-style house as being clean and cozy, with a lived-in vibe: an inviting place to visit. Now the foyer was the only hospitable spot in the house—a clearing in the impenetrable jungle of what I instantly perceived as Mrs. E’s late-life hoarding disorder. Piles of boxes, knickknacks, books, old magazines, and motley of junk took up every wall, every corner, practically every inch of space. Out of pure necessity Mrs. E had blazed a narrow path that wended its way throughout the detritus littering the once spacious house. It was this path we followed to the kitchen, where Mrs. E cleared out a small space for me to set down my coffee mug, and then joined me at the table. It was a wonder she could find a clean dish amid the phone books and useless garbage stacked along her counters—if the mug was indeed clean to begin with. It took sheer force of will to take a sip—purely out of politeness—as I considered her offer.
“Been okay. Arthritis acting up as usual,” she replied.
“Keeping the neighborhood kids in check?”
Mrs. E chuckled, her wide lips painted in red lipstick. “Oh, Ari, I can’t keep up with them these days. I feel slap wore out most of the time. What about you—how are you, dear? Got a husband yet?”
The ever-asked question of a barely grown woman in her early twenties. I imagined the questions persisted with age. Married yet? Kids yet? Mortgage yet?
“I’m only twenty-four; got plenty of time.”
“Honey, by age twenty-four I had been married six years!”
“Don’t worry, Mrs. E. I’m not doomed for spinsterhood. I’m actually dating someone special.”
Her black penciled eyebrows rose, only accentuating how crooked they had been drawn on as her hands trembled. The wrinkles didn’t help matters. At least the brows matched half of Mrs. E’s black dye job—the half that hadn’t grown out in a shock of white roots.
“Bring him on by sometime and I’ll whip up some golabki.” I remembered Mrs. E bringing this Polish dish over shortly after Carli’s funeral. The word had reminded my ten-year-old self of glob, which was exactly what it had looked like to me then and still did—cabbage, spicy meat, and rice mixed together in an edible, well, glob.
“Sounds wonderful. I’d love to take you up on that. I know he’d instantly like you.”
“You’re such a doll,” she beamed. It’d probably been ages since she’d spent quality time with someone who wasn’t her cat. “Tell me what’s new with you. I’m low on gossip since Ethel died last year.”
“Well, I’m a private investigator now.” So I stretched the truth like a long string of gum, but Mrs. E wouldn’t care about the particulars.
“Ooh, fascinating! Like Dick Tracy?”
“Uh, sort of, yeah. Which is why I’m here, actually.”
“Let me guess.” She placed a skeletal finger against her gaunt cheek and gazed upward in thought. Mrs. E always had a flair for the dramatic. “It’s about your father, am I right? You know I always keep an eye on things ’round here.”
“I knew you’d come through for me,” I affirmed with a wink. “I’m sure the police have talked to you too, but I was hoping maybe I could find out if there’s something they missed.”
“I’ll tell you what I told the nice officer who stopped by. It was around nine o’clock when I was settling down for the night. Lucy—that’s my cat—started meowing at me to go out, and just as I let her out I saw a person in sunglasses walking at a brisk pace down the street. I thought it odd—sunglasses after dark. Who does that? But that’s all I saw, unfortunately.”
“Do you know anything about what the person looked like? Could you tell if it was a man or a woman? Race? Any facial features or distinguishing marks? A limp? Anything at all?”
“Let’s see.” She tapped her sharp chinbone. “He was wearing a black hoodie, so I couldn’t get a look at his face. Whole body covered in black.”
“You think it was a he?”
“What other kind of criminal is there? It’s always a man.”
I didn’t want to correct her that plenty of women led criminal lives too, so I let her go on.
“I’m 95 percent sure it was a white person. It was dark, so it was hard to tell.”
“What about his body type? Thin, thick?”
“Skinny, I’m pretty sure. It wasn’t a bulky kind of body, and his clothes hung on him loose-like. Very slender. Not real tall, either, I don’t think. Though, I could be wrong. My memory isn’t what it used to be. I wish I could be more help.”
I rested my hand on her knuckles that nearly jutted through skin as thin as tissue paper. “This is definitely helpful. I’ll keep you posted. And we’ll figure out a time to do dinner together, okay?”
She smiled, revealing her coffee-stained dentures.
“Thank you, Ari. Don’t be a stranger, y’hear?”
With a gentle hug—I feared breaking her brittle bones—I left knowing that this narrowed down the suspect list to pretty much ... anyone. Possibly male or female. And maybe white. Slim. Not too tall.
Great.
I slipped into my car and sat in thought. I was convinced that my father’s attacker was the same person who killed Scott Guffrey and Jackson Jones. As Tristan had pointed out, same MO, same knife wound, all connected to my suicide support group in some way. Something trusting about this killer let these victims invite him or her into their homes.
My mother hadn’t heard a peep while my father had gotten stabbed. If the killer was a man who barged his way in, wouldn’t my father have cried out for help? A woman could have manipulated her way inside. But then she’d have to look pretty suspicious wearing a black hoodie when she showed up. After all his dealings with Battan, my father knew better than to invite strangers into his home.
Something about these three victims was connected, but what? I had to find out what linked them to this killer if I was going to stop him from finishing the job with my father. I rummaged through the center console for the pen and tablet I kept in the car for when inspiration struck and began jotting down the things I knew:
All three victims were men.
All three attacked in their homes or in front of home.
Suicide support group pamphlet found at Scott’s house—depressed, contemplating suicide?
Jackson attended group meeting—why?
Killer linked to suicide support group?
Two of the victims were connected to missing girls—Scott and Burt.
Scott’s gf’s daughter, Kat, had gone missing. Did he have something to do with it—cause of depression?
Burt was connected to Battan, who was behind Marla’s murder.
Jackson—who was he? What was he hiding?
Find out Jackson’s secret—the key to how it’s all connected?