Charlaine Harris - Shakespeare’s Trollop

“Why did David pick a fictional job as a prison counselor?”

“Well, he’d know all about it, wouldn’t he? If you’d been able to concentrate on the AMW story, you would’ve heard that David’s been in and out of prison all his life. For that matter, Sherry too.”

“She sure had a lot of nerve, living here as Becca for so long.”

“It took nerve, but it was great cover. And if she could wait it out until David felt it was safe to join her, they stood to make a bunch of money-a combined $140,000 from the sale of Joe C’s lot, plus what they got eventually from the sale of the apartment building. Until the story on television, which broke only days before David was due to arrive. He says she should’ve gotten in touch with him and made him stay away; she says she tried but he wasn’t at the prearranged phone spot. So he came. On the whole, I think they felt pretty safe, pretty anonymous. Sherry’s attempt to burn Joe C’s house was only partly successful, but he ended up dying, and they thought it’d look funny if they left town before the funeral. But then you interfered.”

“I just wanted to know what had happened to Deedra.”

“According to David… do you really want to hear this, Lily? It’s strictly what David says Sherry told him.”

I nodded. I looked down at my hands so I wouldn’t have to watch his face.

“Sherry drew a gun on Deedra that Sunday afternoon, a couple of hours after Deedra came home from church and encountered her on the stairs. Sherry’d done a lot of planning in those two hours, when she saw Deedra wasn’t going to call the police right away. The apartment building was empty, and though she couldn’t be sure someone wouldn’t show up any moment, it was a risk she had to take. She had to get Deedra away from the building; if Deedra died in her apartment, the investigation might focus more on the only person around that afternoon-the landlady. Sherry got Deedra to drive out to the trail off Farm Hill Road, which Sherry knew would put them right out of the city limits, so Marta Schuster would be heading the investigation. That would complicate things real nice, since Marlon had been hanging around Deedra so much lately. Once down the track in the woods, Sherry made her stop the car and get out and strip.”

I could feel my face twisting. “Made her throw her clothes.”

“Yep.” Claude was silent for a long time. I knew Claude was trying, and failing, as I was, to imagine how Deedra must have felt. “Then, Sherry had made Deedra strip, she backed her up against the car, and when Deedra was in place, she struck her. One blow to the solar plexus. With all she had.”

I drew in a long, slow breath. I let it out.

“While Deedra was dying, Sherry forced in the bottle and positioned her in the car. It took a lot of doing, but Sherry’s a martial-arts expert and a right strong woman. As you know.”

I breathed in. I breathed out. “Then what?”

“Then… she walked home.”

After all the talk about switching cars or having an accomplice, it was that simple. She walked home. If she’d stuck to the edge of the woods, she would’ve been all the way in town before she had to show herself. In fact… I tried to look at Shakespeare in my head, from an aerial view. By some careful planning, she could’ve come out in the fields beyond Winthrop Sporting Goods, and then it would be a stroll back to the apartments.

“Thanks to you,” Claude continued after a long pause, “my wife is sitting in the house by herself, wondering when her brand-new husband is going to make it home.”

I managed a smile. “Thanks to me, you’re going to have your fifteen minutes of fame,” I reminded him. “You caught two of ‘America’s Most Wanted.’ ”

“Because I had the trots,” he said, shaking his head ruefully.

“Maybe you could leave that part out.”

“I’d like to figure out a way.”

“Let’s say you were suspicious when we heard footsteps coming up the stairs and you concealed yourself in the bathroom so you could take them by surprise.”

“That sounds better than telling them I ate some bad fish.”

“True.”

“Think that’s the line to take.”

“You got it.”

“Now what, for you, Lily?”

“I have to work tomorrow.” I sighed heavily, and heaved myself out of the extra chair in Claude’s office. “I have to receive food and serve at Joe C’s funeral.”

“No, I mean… longer-term.”

I was surprised. Claude had never asked me a question about my life.

“You know Jack is the one.” I said it plainly and quietly.

“I know. He’s a lucky guy.”

“Well, I just see that going on.”

“Think you two’ll get married?”

“Maybe.”

Claude brightened. “I never would have thought it. I’m glad for you, Lily.”

I wondered briefly why that idea cheered Claude. Well, they say newlyweds want everyone else to get married.

“ ‘Cause my wife”-and he said that phrase so proudly-“called him when she found out you were involved in this showdown, and he’s sitting outside in the waiting room.”

“Carrie… called Jack?”

“She sure did. Just when you think she’s a shy woman, she pulls something like that on you.”

“He’s here,” I said, relieved beyond measure, and happier than I’d been in days.

“If you just open the door,” Claude said astringently, “I wouldn’t have to be telling you, you could see for yourself.”

And I did.

Later that night, when the only light in my house was moonlight, I sat up in bed. Next to me, Jack lay only on his side, his hair tangling around him and his chest moving silently with his breath. His face, asleep, was peaceful and relaxed, but remote. Unknowable. I could only know the man he tried to be when he was awake. Who knew where his dreams took him, how far into his mind and heart? Farther than I could ever penetrate.

I stood, parted my curtains, and looked out the window. The lights in the upstairs apartment that had been Deedra’s were still on; I guess the police had left them that way. It was a strange feeling, seeing those lights on again. On occasions I’d noticed them before, I’d always had a contemptuous reaction; she’s entertaining again, I’d thought, and reviewed once again the host of risks she’d run in her promiscuity.

But it was not her weakness that had caused her death; it was one of her strengths that had killed her.

I wondered what that meant, what lesson could be drawn from Deedra’s death. I considered for a moment, but it was either meaningless, or its moral beyond me. I remembered Deedra as she’d appeared in my dream, the remote control in her hand. Looking at a film of the inside of her coffin.

I let the curtains fall together and turned back to the bed.

CHARLAINE HARRIS is also the author of the acclaimed Aurora Teagarden mystery series, whose most recent installment is A Fool and His Honey. Born in Mississippi, she now lives in Magnolia, Arkansas.