Stephen White: Warning Signs

Elliot said, "Would you wake Lauren for me, please? I'd very much like to speak with her. Once again, I apologize. I'll hold." He was using a business voice, the kind of tone he might use to an assistant around the office when the boss was around. The tone was polite and respectful, but instantly conveyed the fact that he expected his wishes to be carried out. If I'd been in another mood, I might have humored him and complied.

I eased up the sound on the TV. " … answered a call at about ten-fifteen last night. Apparently, the body was discovered a short time later ."

I placed the house in my mind. It was over on Jay Street, near the foothills. The house I was looking at on the TV belonged to Royal Peterson, the Boulder County district attorney-Lauren's boss. Elliot's boss. I'd been to Royal's home for at least three or four staff parties over the years. Had I been there the previous Christmas? No, his wife, Susan, hadn't been well recently. My last visit must have been the Christmas season before.

What body? My heart jumped. I thought about Susan Peterson. Had she been that sick?

"I'd really rather not wake Lauren, Elliot. She's not been feeling well. What's up?" I thought I sounded as normal as anyone would under the circumstances.

"… been able to learn that there are signs of a struggle inside the house. Neighbors reported hearing some shouting-one man we spoke with said 'screaming'-but there are no reports of gunshots."

Elliot said, "It's about Royal."

"Yes?"

"… Royal Peterson's body was removed by the Boulder County Coroner at around four o'clock this morning."

Instinctively, I reached behind me and found a chair. I tugged it below me and almost fell to the seat.

"He was murdered last night, Alan. In his home."

I tried to say "Royal's dead?" but wasn't sure any sound actually came out of my mouth.

The cameraman pulled his shot back and I saw Elliot Bellhaven standing on the front porch of Royal Peterson's home talking on his cell phone.

He was talking to me.

Elliot was wearing jeans and a T-shirt. The shirt was covered by a tight V-neck sweater. Knowing Elliot, I knew the sweater was cashmere. His left shoulder was to the camera. On the television, the reporter was still talking, but I had stopped listening to her soliloquy.

I inhaled and forced myself to exhale slowly. Royal Peterson murdered? "Jesus, Elliot. What happened?"

"He was beaten to death last night. We think around ten o'clock. We don't know much else."

"How's Susan?"

"An ambulance took her to the hospital. I think she's stable. Haven't heard otherwise." His tone wasn't particularly compassionate. On the TV screen I watched Elliot turn and face the street.

"She's not a sus-"

"Susan? No, no, not at all. I'm sure you know that she's been bedridden lately, not well. So not at this point, no. She was asleep when the police got here and anyway she doesn't have the strength to do what was done to Royal."

Part of me wanted to know what had been done to Royal. Most of me didn't. I knew that Elliot wouldn't tell me the details anyway. But he'd tell Lauren. She'd share them with me in a manner I was more likely to be able to stomach.

I said, "The kids weren't in town?" Royal and Susan had three grown kids. None of them lived in Boulder. I thought one of their two daughters-Amanda? Amelia?-ran a successful decorating business in Durango. She'd been at one of the holiday parties I'd attended, had appeared to worship her father.

"No. No one was here but Roy and Susan. And… whoever it was who killed Roy."

On the screen, I watched as my good friend, Boulder Police Department detective Sam Purdy, poked his head out the front door of Royal's house and said something to Elliot. I could hear what he was saying through the phone line, though the sound wasn't quite in sync with Sam's lips as I watched them move on the TV screen. Sam said, "Need you in here, Bellhaven. Now, if you don't mind."

Elliot and Sam weren't friends. I had theories about the animosity between them, but couldn't be sure that I wasn't missing something. If I invested time in trying to understand why Sam didn't like all the people he didn't like, I'd have precious little time left for almost anything else.

Elliot pressed the phone against his chest and said something back to Sam. Reading lips has never been one of my fortes. I watched Elliot lift the phone back to his ear and waited for the sound of him speaking to me. "I'm at Royal's house right now, Alan, and I need to go. The police want me for something inside. Have Lauren page me when she's awake. Why don't you turn on the news? I'm sure you'll learn something interesting from it. This place is crawling with reporters and microwave trucks."

"Yeah, I'll do that. Thanks for calling, Elliot. Were you catching last night? Is this going to be yours?"

"Don't know. Mitchell's on it, too. So's Nora. As far as politics go, this place is drawing potential candidates like an American Legion hall in New Hampshire in primary season. Have Lauren page me. Bye." He was telling me that the posturing to be Royal Peterson's successor was already heating up. As the spouse of an insider, I was privy to the roster of likely candidates: Elliot; Mitchell Crest, Royal's chief trial deputy; and Nora Doyle, the head of sex crimes prosecution. And now all three were already hovering close to the murdered body of their dead boss.

I watched Elliot fold the tiny phone he was carrying and stuff it into the pocket of his trousers. He paused outside the door of the Peterson home while he pushed his hair back from his forehead and snapped a fresh pair of gloves onto his hands. Lucy Tanner, Sam's partner, held the door open for him. He nodded an acknowledgment to her before he squeezed past her and disappeared inside the house. Lucy stepped outside and squatted beside a plastic case that was resting on the lawn. She held her gloved hands out in front of her like a surgeon who had just scrubbed for the OR.

She was searching the case for something a detective might need to deal with evidence at the scene of a homicide.

My attention was drawn back to the sound emanating from the TV. " … the controversial Boulder DA had been expected to announce that he would not run for reelection. Back to you, Virginia ."

The next shot was Virginia in the anchor chair. I stripped off my Lycra jersey and walked back toward the bedrooms wearing only my padded biking shorts. Grace was just starting to stir. I lifted her from her crib and as I changed her diaper we chatted about her dreams and I told her about the warm morning. The dogs heard us chatting-that was me-and cooing, which was both of us, and trailed after us as I carried my daughter to the kitchen.

I didn't trouble Grace with the news that her mommy's boss had been murdered. She didn't even know Royal Peterson. He had sent a baby gift, though. I reminded her of that.

I didn't have a clue what the gift had been.

The night before,just before bedtime, Lauren had poked a one-and-a-quarter-inch, 23-gauge needle into the meatiest part of her right thigh. She'd then injected one milliliter of interferon solution into the long muscles of her quad.

Why? To tame the lions of the multiple-sclerosis circus.

To keep the brain mud at bay.

This injection of interferon had been her first dose in fifteen months, and she knew, and I knew, that the interferon beta that she plunged into her thigh would make her sick for the next twenty hours or so. She would feel like she had the flu. She would have muscle aches so sharp they brought tears, so deep that she would swear that her bones and her hair hurt. She would have chills. She would have fever.

That's why I was reluctant to wake her when Elliot called. But she woke on her own a few minutes after seven and joined Grace and me in the kitchen. Lauren was wearing a long T-shirt from a Race for the Cure that I knew she hadn't run in. I didn't think I had run in it, either. I embraced her and kissed her on the top of her head.