Блейз Клемент - Duplicity Dogged Тhe Dachshund

Leo said, “I’m not asking your permission, boy.”

Gabe’s lower lip crept forward. “I ain’t your boy.”

Denton said, “That’s enough, both of you!”

I said, “Guess what, Gabe. Leo raped Priscilla before he gave her to you. The baby might even be his.”

A dark painful flush spread up Gabe’s neck. Denton laughed, and Gabe looked quickly at him.

I said, “They think you’re funny, Gabe. They think it’s funny to use your woman, your baby, anything they want. And when they’re through with you, they’ll think it’s funny when they kill you.”

“Shut up, cunt. Ain’t nobody killing me.”

“They’ll have to. You know too much. You think they’re going to let you go around knowing what you know?”

Gabe was dumb, but he wasn’t so dumb he didn’t know I could be telling the truth. His brow furrowed and he cut his eyes toward Leo and Denton.

Leo said, “Kid, she’s fucking with your mind. Now shut up and do as you’re told. I want the woman in the house.”

Denton said, “Leo, let it go.”

Over him, Gabe said, “What the hell you mean, do as I’m told?”

Gabe’s face looked like a four-year-old’s about to cry or throw a tantrum, and his hand holding the dart gun looked twitchy. He swung angrily toward Denton.

“You was there both times, and if you think I won’t tell the cops you was, you better think again.”

Denton scowled at him. “Gabe, this isn’t the time—”

Reggie slammed himself against the door of the shed with such determined force that it cracked and rattled against the wooden latch. The men all shot a quick look toward the shed, and my hand began to inch toward my shorts pocket where my .38 was making a hard statement on my thigh. As if the words were wrenched from him, Gabe pulled himself taller and sputtered, “Mr. Brossi, is what she said true? Did you rape Priscilla?”

Leo Brossi grinned and made a lewd jerking motion with his pelvis, looking in his shiny silk like a banty rooster posturing under a bull.

“Wasn’t rape, boy. She liked it. Probably never had nothing but boys before.”

Denton said, “Leo, that’s enough!”

Stung, a small man between two large men, Leo pivoted toward Denton to make himself feel bigger.

“Speak for yourself, Denton. You have your plans, I have mine.”

Behind him, Gabe made a strangled sound and whipped the dart gun up to point it at Leo Brossi. Brossi made a quick instinctive movement to the back of his waist, and in the next instant a shimmering knife blade sliced through the air and pierced the side of Gabe’s neck.

For a second, time seemed to freeze. Gabe remained standing for what seemed an eternity, staring at Leo with incredulous shock, his face traced by inarticulate runnels of private agony. The geyser of dark blood arching from his neck seemed to move in imperceptible increments. My hand seemed to take eons to creep into my shorts pocket and come out with my .38.

At the same time, Denton shouted “Fool!” and ran to stand behind Gabe and chop his fist down on Gabe’s thick forearm holding the gun still pointed toward Leo Brossi.

Perhaps it was the blow that caused Gabe’s trigger finger to squeeze instinctively, or perhaps Gabe’s final movement was deliberate. The dart left the gun with a sharp phifftt and caught Leo square in the shoulder. Leo’s other hand swung toward the point of impact as if to pull the dart out, but the drug was faster than his hand. His eyelids fluttered, his face quivered, and he crumpled to the ground and lay motionless, only the horror in his eyes evidence that he was conscious.

Only then did Gabe fall into the pool of his own blood, his sturdy young legs in their tight denim already flaccid in death.

I held my gun extended with both hands, waiting for the moment when I had a clear target. Inside the shed, Reggie was hysterical, banging himself against the shed door so hard it seemed as if the door must surely split from the impact.

As Gabe fell, Denton crouched low and scrambled through the river of blood to grab Gabe’s backup dart gun from its leather holster. I gripped my gun and sighted his head, my finger ready on the trigger.

Denton’s fear was palpable. Things hadn’t gone the way he’d planned. A lifetime of bullying people weaker than himself hadn’t prepared him for the moment when one of his thugs lay bleeding out on the sandy ground, another was turning blue from asphyxiation, and a woman he’d planned to feed to the alligators had him in her gunsight.

The shed door slammed open with a loud crack, and Reggie charged out in snarling fury, graceful flanks smoothly churning, wide chest heaving, no confusion in his mind anymore about whether it was right to attack a man who had been welcome in his master’s home. Even muzzled, he was a ferocious sight.

Denton jerked to his feet, swerved his eyes once toward Reggie, and aimed the dart gun at me.

I emptied my .38 into Denton’s cesspool heart.

29

At the memorial service for Conrad and Stevie, swirling dust motes shimmered like sequins above a large photograph of them at their wedding. In the photo, Stevie was radiant in a traditional bridal gown and veil; Conrad wore a splendid morning coat, a pleated white shirt, modestly patterned skorts, and his signature ear bobs. They looked so vital, so alive, that it was hard to believe they were dead.

Inside the chapel, an organist played softly while the audience sat in silence, still stunned at the ugly violence that had lived among them. Outside, the media slavered over a breaking scandal that involved some of Florida’s most prestigious politicians and businessmen. A grand jury had decided that Leo Brossi had killed and been killed by Gabe Marks, and that I had shot Denton Ferrelli in self-defense. Once again, my name had become front-page news. I had actually been turned into something of a heroine, which shows that people who write about killing don’t have a clue what it means to do it.

I sat with Josephine and her husband. Josephine kept an arm tight around my shoulders as if she were afraid I might bolt and run. I might have too, if I hadn’t known reporters would love to see it.

A moment of quiet fell, and then the organist swung into a loud rendition of “Stars and Stripes Forever,” the signal circus bands use to alert performers that a major disaster has struck. At the cue, a line of clowns wearing red noses and big silly shoes stepped through the side door and took seats in the front two rows. Pete followed them, also dressed in full clown, and stepped to the dais to deliver the eulogy. Now that Denton was no longer a threat to Conrad’s plan for a retirement home for circus performers, I knew there was joy mixed with Pete’s sadness.

I looked over my shoulder and saw Guidry a few rows back and across the aisle. Ethan Crane was almost directly behind him, and both of them were watching me. Their eyes held identical questions that I couldn’t decipher. Or maybe I just didn’t want to.

I can barely answer my own questions, how could I answer theirs?

Acknowledgments

As always, many thanks to The Thursday Group—Greg Jorgensen, Kate Holmes, Clark Lauren, and Janet McLaughlin—who heard a lot of this book as fastscribbled scenes written during our weekly Improv Writing Class. For their support, information, and friendship, I am blessed.

Thanks to Barry DeChant, aka the famous “Bonzo,” for letting me join one of his classes for future clowns, many of whom will work in hospices and children’s hospitals. The world is enriched by their wise humor and generosity of heart, as it is by clowns all over the country. For general crime-scene information, a big thank-you to Sarasota County Sheriff’s Department Crime Scene Technician Lora Garrett; to Dr. Reinhard W. Motte, Miami-Dade County Associate Medical Examiner; and to Homicide Detective Chris Ioreo of the Sarasota County Sheriff’s Department.