I pocketed the key, closed the window to within an inch of the sill, slipped out the door and stuck the key in the Glicks' lock. Bingo. The door clicked open.
The first thing I noticed was the wash of cool air. It had to be forty degrees in Betty Glick's kitchen. It was like walking into a refrigerator. The no-?wax linoleum floor was spotless. The appliances were new. The countertops were Formica butcher block. The theme was country kitchen. Wooden hearts painted barn red and Newport blue, inscribed with homey messages, were hung on the walls. A small pine turned-?leg table had been positioned under the back window. The toaster snuggled under a crafts fair toaster cover. Pot holders and dish towels sported rooster designs, and in a colorful, hand-?painted bowl was the essential orange-?scented potpourri.
Only problem was that the potpourri did nothing to disguise the fact that Betty Glick's kitchen smelled bad. Betty needed some baking soda down her sink drain. Or maybe Betty needed to empty the garbage. I did a quick look through the cupboards and drawers. Nothing unusual there. Also no dead rats or rotting chicken carcasses. The waste container was scrubbed clean and lined with a plastic bag. So what was that smell? There was a kitchen telephone, but no answering machine to snoop on. The sticky pad beside the telephone was blank, waiting for an important message. I looked in the refrigerator and the broom closet, which had been converted into a small pantry.
The smell was stronger on the broom closet side of the room, and suddenly I knew what I was smelling. Uh oh, I thought, take me out of here, feet! But my feet weren't listening. My feet were creeping closer to the source of the smell. My feet were heading for the cellar door next to the broom closet.
My cell phone was in my shoulder bag, and my shoulder bag was hung on my shoulder. I looked inside the bag to make sure the LED was lit. Yep. The phone was working.
I opened the cellar door and flipped the light switch. “Hel-?lo-?o,” I called. If I'd have gotten an answer, I'd have fainted.
I crept halfway down the stairs and saw the body. I'd expected it would be Eddie or maybe Maxine. This body was neither. It was a man in a suit. Late fifties, early sixties, maybe. Very dead. He'd been placed on a tarp. No blood anywhere. I wasn't a forensics expert, but from the way this guy's eyes were bulging and his tongue was sticking out I'd say he hadn't died of natural causes.
So what the hell did this mean? Why would Betty have a corpse in her basement? I know it sounds crazy, but it struck me as especially odd since Betty was such a tidy housekeeper. The basement had been finished off with tile flooring and an acoustical ceiling. Laundry area to one side. Storage to the other, including some large equipment under another tarp. An average basement . . . except for the dead guy.
I stumbled back up the stairs and popped into the kitchen just as Betty and Leo came through the front door.
“What the hell?” Leo said. “What the hell is this?”
I didn't know what was going on, but it didn't feel healthy to hang around in Betty's kitchen. So I bolted for the back door.
BANG! A bullet sailed past my ear and embedded itself in the doorjamb.
“Stop!” Leo shouted. “Stop right where you are.”
He'd dropped the box he'd been carrying, and he was aiming a semiautomatic at me. And he was looking much more professional with a gun in his hand than Sugar had looked.
“You touch that back door, and I'll shoot you,” Leo said. “And before you die I'll chop your fingers off.”
I stared at him bug-?eyed and open-?mouthed.
Betty rolled her eyes. “You and those fingers,” she said to Leo.
“Hey, it's my trademark, okay?”
“I think it's silly. And beside, they did it in that movie about that short person. Everyone will think you're a copycat.”
“Well, they're wrong. I did it first. I was clipping fingers years ago in Detroit.”
Betty retrieved the box Leo had dropped, carted it into the kitchen and set it on the counter. I read the printing on the side. It was a new chain saw. Black and Decker, 120 horsepower, portable.
Eek.
“You're not going to believe this,” I said, “but there's a dead guy in your cellar. Probably you should call the police.”
“You know when things start to go wrong, it all turns to crapola,” Leo said. “You ever notice that?”
“Who is he?” I asked. “The man down there.”
“Nathan Russo. Not that it matters to you. He was my partner, and he got nervous. I had to settle his nerves.”
My phone rang inside my shoulder bag.
“Christ,” Leo said, “what is that? One of those cellular phones?”
“Yeah. I should probably answer it. It might be my mother.”
“Put your bag on the counter.”