A stereo played softly in someone else’s room, but that wasn’t what kept her up. The traffic on the nearby freeway had softened to a slow dribble. That hadn’t kept her awake either. Nor did the occasional passing car, or the screaming match next door that had just ended. Max could sleep through anything.
Anything except Bethany Spring. Bethany had been a night owl. She’d stayed in bed until one in the afternoon, heavy drapes pulled across the bedroom windows to keep out the bright light. She didn’t start to feel alive until her phone began to ring at midnight. Midnight, when Bethany Spring turned into Cinderella.
The Cinderella in the prurient fantasies of lonely, desperate, hungry, horny men.
Then again, Max’s insomnia could have been caused by the three jelly donuts she’d wolfed down. They writhed in her stomach like maggots. Bad thought, it almost made her barf. She needed to barf. She’d probably feel one hell of a lot better if she did. She could stick her fingers down her throat and get rid of the squiggling donut mass ...
Damn. Bethany again. She’d obviously been bulimic at one time or another.
“Right, and like you never were,” Cameron scoffed out of the darkness. Apparently ghosts didn’t need sleep.
“I was a teenager. All teenagers half-starve themselves and stick their fingers down their throats when they’ve eaten too much. I did not have an eating disorder, if that’s what you’re implying. Making yourself throw up is part of being a teenager.”
“Was it? Did all your friends do it?”
She didn’t recall having many friends. “Sure. We all did. I’m trying to get some sleep here, do you mind?”
Sleep wouldn’t come even without Cameron’s voice.
Max turned to look at the clock. Ten forty-six. About the time Bethany started thinking about running her bath, where she soaked in fragrant bubbles, then powdered, petted, and prepared herself. The time when Bethany blossomed.
What would her callers think when she didn’t answer at midnight? Would there be one of them who never called at all, one who knew she wouldn’t answer?
Max bolted up in bed, covers falling to her waist. Buzzard mewled and stared up at her, bleary eyed.
Jesus. Someone should be monitoring those calls. As of right now, the police most likely didn’t have one single clue as to Bethany’s nocturnal activities. They wouldn’t even think about the phone sex angle or that maybe one of her clients had broken into her home and whacked her. Witt certainly couldn’t tell them. By the time the cops hit on that slant, they would be too late to catch the killer. If indeed the killer had found Bethany through her sexual proclivities.
“What are you thinking, Max?” Cameron’s eyes glowed in the corner of the room like a fire-breathing dragon. The excitement was unmistakable, vibrating in his voice the way the arrival of a new case in the D.A.’s office had kept him up all night when he was alive.
“I’m thinking of going for a drive,” she whispered.
“You’re going to break the seal on Bethany’s front door.”
“Back door. I don’t want to be seen.”
“And then?”
“Then I’m thinking that I’d recognize his voice—”
“Achilles?”
“Of course. If he calls tonight, that’s a good indication he wasn’t the one who killed her.” She spread her hands and shrugged. “Otherwise, why call, right?”
“If he doesn’t call?”
“Then he’s my number one suspect.”
Chapter Eight
Max climbed from bed, dragged on an old pair of black jeans, a maroon, paint-covered sweatshirt she wore for cleaning, and her black suede boots. She loved suede whether the heels were four inches or flat. These were flat, which made running easier.
Half an hour later, Max cruised Garden Street. The lights were out in Ladybird’s house except for one on the front porch. Witt’s department-issue sedan was gone, the street empty and quiet, fall leaves whirling across the macadam in front of her car. She rolled down her window and listened to the night. San Carlos was a small, tightly packed suburb, allowing the distant sound of cars to drift in from the El Camino.
Lights blazed in every window on the opposite side of Bethany Spring’s duplex, the side occupied by her mother and sister. A gray Camry station wagon had joined the Civic in the driveway.
Damn, damn, and triple damn. “I might be able to sneak into the house, but I sure don’t like the new odds with everyone awake next door.” Eleven-thirty. People would only have just settled down after the eleven o’clock news.
“I doubt they’ve even been thinking about watching the news,” Cameron scoffed.
“It’s still risky.”
“Chicken.”
She glanced in the rearview mirror and narrowed her eyes as if she could see Cameron somewhere in the reflection. “Why don’t you see if she gets any calls? They’re always saying ghosts can use the telephone.”
“I’d hate to take away all your fun. I know how you love doing a little B&E.”
He was referring to her late-night sojourn through a murder suspect’s house less than two weeks ago. Bad experience, that. She didn’t want a repeat.