Blood Dahlia - A Thriller (Sarah King Mysteries) (4 page)

The sheriff down
ed some more beer. Giovanni looked at Rosen, who wasn’t even blinking. He seemed much more interested in this than Giovanni thought he would be. Most grizzled federal agents abandoned all superstition, including religion. The things they saw tended to preclude, in their minds, an all-loving, merciful God, or the supernatural.

“She told me,” the sheriff continued, “that
the wife needed to look in a locker he’d rented at the gym for a month. Locker 114. That the locker was in the women’s locker room under her name. I didn’t think anything of it, and I didn’t even deliver the message. I thought it was ridiculous.” He drifted off a moment. “There was a news report a little bit after that, maybe five weeks. The gym had a policy to stick everything from abandoned lockers in the lost and found. When they emptied locker 114, they found a gym bag full of money with a, like, Post-it note. It just said, ‘I’m sorry, Grace.’ Grace was the wife’s name. The name the locker was under.” He shook his head. “Was a hundred grand in there. Grace got it eventually, with a call from me. Damnedest thing I ever seen… Until I took her to see one of Nate’s bodies.”

7

It was evening by the time Sarah exhausted herself on the treadmill. A straight hour and a half of jogging. The muscles in her legs were weak, like Jell-O. Each step was an exercise in concentration so she wouldn’t just collapse on the gym floor.

When she was done, she got on the exercise bike and cooled off. The
cool-off was an important step, like a gateway back into the real world. She needed that time to brace herself.

The gym showers were strong
, and the water bounced off her flesh as it massaged her aching muscles. She closed her eyes and pretended she was sitting under a waterfall as the warm water rushed over her, calming and soothing her. No one else around. Just her and nature.

When she was through, she changed into jeans and
a tight black T-shirt. As she was changing, she heard two women speaking close to her. They were discussing one of their husbands and whether he had a wandering eye. Without asking for it, an image flooded her mind. A man with dark hair and dimples, a tattoo of a sun with rays coming off of it on his left shoulder. He removed his wedding ring before getting into a bed with a woman who was nude.

Sarah finished quickly and left the locker room, trying to focus on something, anything, else. The woman deserved to know, but everyone deserved to know the secrets all the people in their life kept from them. And Sarah, without wishing it, knew them. She wouldn’t be able to explain them to everyone. That’s what she told herself when that twinge of guilt stung her, reminding her that she could
help the woman with a sentence. But then again, no one ever believed her anyway. They just believed what they wanted to believe.

Sarah stopped just outside the locker room. She stood still for a long time, though she wasn’t sure how long. Turning around, she saw the two women stepping out, talking about something else.

“Excuse me,” she said. “Your husband has a tattoo of a sun on his shoulder, doesn’t he?”

The woman
looked at her friend and then back to Sarah. “Yeah? How did you know that?”

“He’s cheating on you
with a blond woman. Blond and dark eyes. It’s happening in hotel rooms, so you can probably see it on his credit card statements.”

Without waiting for a response, Sarah immediately turned and marched away. The woman said something behind her
, but Sarah didn’t hear it. She just quickened her pace and was out of the gym before the women could catch up to her.

Sarah jumped into her car and sped out of the parking lot. Her work wasn’t too far from here
, and she thought she would get there early and maybe have a few drinks before starting her shift.

Pink’s was as upscale as bars went, and the theme—the color pink—was on prominent display everywhere. From the neon sign out front
, to the suit coats the bouncers had to wear, to the name tags the bartenders displayed on their chests. At first, the place seemed glitzy to her, something like an old Hollywood Playboy party or something. But night after night of Pink’s wore on Sarah, and she realized how sensitive she was to her environment. She had been trying for the past year, unsuccessfully, to land a job that involved less interaction with other people but paid relatively the same. The problem was that bartenders could clear two hundred fifty bucks a night for five hours of work. No other jobs she could get without an education offered anywhere near that.

The bouncer, a large black man with tattoos on his neck, smiled when he saw her. “How are ya, Sarah?”

“Good, Catcher. How you been?”

“Can’t complain.” He stepped aside, letting her enter. “Bit early, ain’t it?”

“Thought I’d catch up on some side work.”

“I bet.”

Sarah knew they called him Catcher because he’d played for the Mets as a relief catcher nearly a decade ago. Though he said he hated the nickname, she knew he secretly liked it. His career had ended because of an injury, not because it’d run its course, and he always regretted not being able to play longer. She knew all this about him in a fraction of a second the first time she met him.

Though evening had fallen, it wasn’t yet dark
, and the dimming sunlight coming through the bar’s windows gave her an eerie feeling. Something about being in bars in the middle of the day didn’t sit well with her.

“Hey,” she said, coming behind the bar. The woman back there, Jeannie, was stocking the liquor bottles in front of a large mirror.

“Hey yourself. What’re you doing here so early?”

“Oh, just bored. Didn’t have anything else to do.”

Sarah lifted a bottle of Jose Cuervo and poured herself a shot, filling the glass to the brim. She swallowed it, enjoying the warmth of the liquid down her throat and into her belly. She poured another shot and took it with her eyes closed. When she opened them, Jeannie was staring.

“What?” Sarah said.

“You know what. Your shift hasn’t even started.”

Sarah took one more shot and then slapped her hands together and hooted like a frat boy. She grabbed Jeannie’s hands and spun her around. “Don’t be such a grump. Our job is to party.”

Jeannie kept a stern face for only a few moments and then began dancing with her behind the bar. Sarah spun her and dipped, their faces nearly touching, before she pulled her back up and began helping her stock.

The night wore on
, and the bar grew packed. The music was so loud sometimes she’d have to wear earplugs, but not tonight. Tonight, she wanted to feel it right down to her bones.

The drinks were poured quickly.
Despite the fact that she’d probably had six or seven shots in the past four hours, Sarah was really good at her job. At least she thought so.

A party of four guys was at the end of the bar
, and with each round they bought they gave her a twenty-dollar tip. One of the men was handsome, his muscles bulging underneath a gray V-neck shirt. His hair was styled, and his eyes glimmered when the roving strobe lights hit them in just the right way. He’d been smiling at Sarah the entire night.

“Hi,” he shouted over the music as she poured them another round.

“Can I touch your hair?” she shouted back.

He nodded. She tapped it. It was hard, almost immobile from all the product he had in it.

“You’d look better with dry hair. Watch.”

She ran her hands through his hair, mussing it up. The wet look faded
, and his hair wasn’t up as high. It looked naturally styled now rather than plastered in place. She reached down and washed her hands in a sink underneath the bar.

“How is it?” he said.

“Look for yourself,” she said, stepping to the side so he could see himself in the mirror behind the bar. The man evaluated his hair from all angles and nodded.

“Not bad. You a stylist?”

“No, just an observer of culture, I guess.”

“What time do you get off?”

“Two.”

“You wanna grab a drink afterward?”

“Why would I leave a bar to grab a drink?”

The man thought a second. “How about something to eat?”

“How about coffee?”

He tapped his hand against the bar. “Coffee is perfect. I shoulda thought
of that.”

“
You can make it up to me later.”

Sarah poured two shots, one for him and one for herself. She lifted her shot glass
, and they tapped them against each other as the man said, “Salud.”

The shift lasted another two hours. Toward the end, Sarah was thoroughly drunk. By her estimation, she’d had at least ten shots. She gulped down water and Sprite to help flush her system
, but it didn’t seem to be helping much.

She
and Jeannie got to go on break at the same time, and they went out back to smoke. The back alley was quiet, only the dull thump of the bass coming through the walls. On the other side of the alley was a sushi restaurant, and sometimes the garbage stank like fish back here, but most nights it was bearable.

Jeannie lit a cigarette and handed it to Sarah. She didn’t smoke, but whenever she drank enough
, the urge came to her and she’d have a cigarette or two. Odd what alcohol did, she thought, considering that most nights the smell of cigarette smoke in the bar made her gag.

“You goin’ home with that guy?” Jeannie asked.

“Maybe. We’re gonna have coffee and see what happens.”

Jeannie inhaled deeply, the cigarette tip
glowing a bright red. “I’m taking out that one guy. The one that’s been bugging me for like three weeks.”

“The guy with back hair
poking out of his shirt?”

“He doesn’t have back hair. It’s just like… I don’t know
… manly hair.”

She shrugged. “To each her own
, I guess.”

“You don’t think he’s cute?”

“He is. Except he has back hair poking out of his shirt.”

She smirked. “You’re such a bitch.”

Sarah puffed at the cigarette. “What are you guys doing? Maybe we should make it a foursome date?”

“He’s
taking me back to his place. He has this huge hot tub, and we’re just going to hang out and—”

Sarah didn’t hear the rest of the sentence. An intense pain radiated suddenly through her head. So powerful it was blinding, drowning out all sound and sight. Her fingers went up to her head
, and she bent down as though she’d been punched in the gut.

She saw it there. The hot tub. Jeannie was in her underwear
, and they were kissing. The man said he would get drinks for them. He walked into the kitchen and crushed up a white pill and put it in a wine glass. He walked back out and gave it to her.

Sarah saw the entire night
—the torture and penetration with inanimate objects, like a lamp and pliers. He needed them passed out for that. They would never consent to the pain otherwise.

In the morning, they would wake up in the park or at the front of a hospital if the injuries were severe. Then he would never go to that bar again.

“You okay, hon?” Jeannie said.

“I’m fine. I just need a sec,” she said through gritted teeth.

“It’s that tequila. I keep telling you to—”

“You can’t go with him, Jeannie.”

“What?”

“He’s going to drug you in the hot tub. He needs you drugged. You can’t go with him. Promise me you won’t go with him. Promise, Jeannie.”

“I’ve already gone on a date with him, Sarah. He was a perfect gentleman.”

“No, no
, you have to promise me you won’t go with him. Please. Please!”

Jeannie was stunned into silence a moment before she said, “How do you even know?”

“I know. I know… please, you can’t go with him.” She grabbed Jeannie by the arms. “Listen to me. He is going to rape you. You can’t go with him.”

Jeannie tossed her cigarette and looked Sarah in the eyes. “You okay, babe?”

The pain was fading into the background. Like some horrific memory that was slowly subsiding into the unconscious to be brought out again at another time. “I’m fine.”

“Sweetie, I know there
are things in the world that are weird, but that’s too much.”

“Jeannie, listen to me, as a friend. Please do me a favor and do not go to that man’s house.”

Jeannie held her gaze awhile and said, “Okay, as a friend, I won’t go.”

“Thank you.”

She checked the clock on her phone. “Why don’t you take off? I’ll cover the rest of your shift.”

“No, I should finish.”

“No, no. You go with your guy and get some coffee.”

“Thanks, Jeannie.”

She began walking back inside when she realized she had nothing in there and their hours were kept on the honor system. She stopped and began walking out of the alley toward her car. It felt like she was in a haze, as though pushing through a thin soup. Everything appeared blurry, and her movements were slow. Her body seemed detached from her, as though she were another person watching everything happening to her.

“You sure you’re all right?” Jeannie yelled out behind her.

“Fine. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

Sarah got to her car and leaned against it. The images came like a powerful current, overwhelming all her senses. Usually, through years of effort, she had come to control them. But when she drank or when she was off guard and relaxed, they could push themselves into her consciousness with a force she
could never prepare for.

The last thing she felt like doing right now was getting coffee. She inserted the key into the lock and heard someone
behind her. She jumped and gasped, startling the cute guy from the bar.

“Sorry,” he said. “I’m really sorry.”

“No,” she said, her hand to her chest, as though that would calm her racing heart down, “no, it’s my fault. I’m just jumpy.”