“Stay here with the dog. I’ll be right back.” I stood and scanned the room.
The hair on the back of my neck prickled, and my ears buzzed. I moved slowly toward the kitchen, old instincts kicking in. I hadn’t felt this rush of adrenaline and fear since I’d returned to Crystal Haven. I couldn’t say I’d missed it. As I reached back and felt along my waistband, I did miss the gun.
From the kitchen doorway I could see why Tuffy was quivering. Sara was sprawled on the floor: faceup, motionless, legs at an odd angle, eyes staring at the ceiling. The blood had spread underneath her and across her tunic, obliterating the brightly colored flowers.
2
“Is she . . . dead?” said a small voice from behind me.
I turned quickly to see Seth staring with huge eyes at Sara, and Tuffy trying to climb over Seth’s shoulder to get as far away from the kitchen as possible.
Before I knew what was happening, my police training kicked in, and I pushed Seth behind me against the dining room wall. I peeked around into the kitchen and signaled him to be quiet. I was sure Sara had been killed, but I couldn’t be sure the murderer was gone.
I stood for a moment and willed my heart to stop racing. Between the dizziness and the pounding in my ears, I was forced to lean against the doorjamb and take deep, slow breaths. The metallic tang of blood was so strong I could almost taste it. I was trained to deal with violence and death. I tried to remember what I was supposed to do next. My mind flashed back to that warm spring evening in Ann Arbor—the last time I had seen so much blood—but I quickly put a stop to that. I had to stay calm.
I cataloged the area to focus my thoughts. The back door was closed but not locked. A half-full coffee cup sat on the counter by a plate of untouched toast. Sara was wearing bright floral-patterned silk pants and a matching tunic. The pool of blood that had collected underneath her looked thick and dark against the beige tile. I started worrying about how she would ever get her grout clean—obviously, my shocked brain’s attempt to distract.
I heard Seth breathing in my ear, and Tuffy trembled against my back. Otherwise, the house was silent. I signaled to Seth to stay put, and his wide-eyed nod assured me he would. I stepped into the kitchen, took a deep breath, and forced myself to feel for a pulse, knowing I wouldn’t find one. As I touched her neck, I felt a surge of fear and rage and had to close my eyes until it passed. It was harder to ignore the rising nausea. Her skin was cold but still soft. We were too late to help her, but my exposure to death reports in my time with the police told me she hadn’t been dead very long.
Keeping the back door in view, I returned to Seth and Tuffy in the dining room. We made our way quickly back through the living room and out the front door. I wasn’t prepared to check the house without backup and with a thirteen-year-old in tow.
“I wish you hadn’t seen that. I told you to stay where you were. Why don’t you ever listen . . . ?” I began my tirade when we got outside but stopped as I noticed that Seth had transformed from an annoying adolescent to a little boy. He had the same look as the time he found a dead baby robin in the backyard when he was six, his first brush with death. I couldn’t remember the last time I had hugged him: a real hug, not just a quick airport hug. I had never embraced Tuffy, but I found myself holding both of them for a long moment.
“Clyde, I don’t feel so good.” Seth muffled into my shoulder.
I jumped back just in time to miss most of it. It only caught the toe of my shoe, but Tuffy wasn’t as lucky. The dog glared at me from under his poufy ponytail as if it was my fault. The combination of all that blood and remembering Sara’s lifeless body had my own stomach lurching in protest. I took deep breaths and held my hands together to keep them from shaking.
“We have to call the police,” I said. I put my arm around Seth’s shoulder and urged him toward the Jeep.
Baxter barked through the few inches of open window as we approached. We got in, locked the doors, and called 911.
*
We’d decided that being locked in a car with a vomit-covered dog was worse than a run-in with a murderer; even Baxter didn’t put up a fuss when we left him behind again. I was hosing Tuffy off in the front yard while Seth sat on the stoop with his head between his knees when the police cruiser arrived. A young man climbed out of the car, managed to trip over a pebble, and walked to where I was drying off the disgruntled shih tzu.
“Hello, ma’am. I’m Officer Andrews.” He flipped open a small notepad. “Dispatch sent me here to check on a report of a dead body.”