Corpse Suzette

picked up on it, too.
    He cleared his throat and
took on an even more officious tone. “Is Dr. Du Bois in the habit of missing
work?”
    “Never. Never, never. She
was a workaholic and she knew more than anybody how important it was for her to
show up today to start this new Emerge campaign.”
    Again with the past tense.
    Savannah decided something
then and there. For all of his high-falutin’ name, Brioni suit, and Tutima
watch, Sergio D’Alessandro wasn’t that sharp. Obviously, he knew or strongly
suspected his former wife was dead, and he was too dumb to realize he was
exposing that fact.
    And while most people might
fear that possibility if an otherwise responsible, predictable person went
missing for twenty-four hours, experience had taught her that most innocent
folks continued to speak of their loved ones in the present tense, even after
they were confirmed dead. It was only natural.
    “All right,” Dirk said,
flipping his notebook closed. “I’m gonna have a look around. You can get back
to whatever you were doing before you drove over here.”
    Sergio shifted from one
Bruno Magli to the other. “Don’t you want me to stay... in case you need
something or . .
    “Nope. You let me into the
house. That’s all I need or want from you right now,” Dirk replied with his
usual lack of charm. “Don’t call me. I’ll call you. And stay in town. Don’t go
takin’ no unscheduled vacations to Tijuana or Vancouver, if you know what I
mean.”
    He turned and walked away,
leaving D’Alessandro standing there with an aggravated look on his face.
    When Dirk was out of
earshot, Savannah sidled up to him. “There’s something you should know,” she
said. “Sergeant Coulter’s bite is a lot worse than his bark.”
    “Huh? Don’t you mean...?”
    “Nope. I meant what I said.
You should probably leave now.”
    The next thing she saw was
the back of Sergio D’Alessandro’s fancy suit, walking briskly out the door. She
couldn’t help but think that the atmosphere improved with his absence. There
was something about the man she didn’t like... beyond his basic smarminess. And
her instincts seldom led her astray in that regard.
    Yes, if anything had
actually happened to Dr. Suzette Du Bois, she would give ol’ Sergio a second
look. Maybe a third and a fourth.
    She found Dirk in the
kitchen, listening to the messages on an answering machine on the counter.
    “Anything good?” she asked.
    “Just the usual crap,” he
replied. “A couple of calls from somebody named Myrna, wanting to know why she
wasn’t at work this morning.”
    “I think Myrna is the
secretary or receptionist at Emerge. She’s called at my house and talked to
Abigail a couple of times to schedule things with her.”
    Savannah glanced around the
room, noting that, although it was a gorgeous, modern kitchen with lots of
architectural accents like beveled glass inserts in the cupboards, an ornate
wrought iron pot rack, a brick oven, and marble countertops, it was a mess.
    Dirty dishes sat in the
sink in a bath of scummy, greasy water. Pans half-filled with dried food
littered the stove top. With one finger Savannah opened the dishwasher and it,
too, was full of crusty dishes.
    “It’s a little hard to tell
if she ate here last night or this morning,” she said. “Most of these dishes
look pretty old.”
    “Eh, she’s a pig. She may
have a fancy joint here, but my trailer is cleaner than this mess.”
    While Savannah wouldn’t
label the woman quite so quickly or harshly, she had to agree that, even though
Dirk lived in an old, rusty mobile home in a trailer park on the bad side of
town and decorated it with plastic milk crates and rickety TV trays, his place
was basically sanitary at all times. And she, herself, had been raised by
Granny Reid to believe that a “filthy kitchen” was one where the dishcloth
hadn’t been thoroughly rinsed and neatly hung on the rack to dry.
    “There’s no excuse for
bein’ nasty,” Gran always said in her soft, Georgian drawl. “Maybe a body can’t
help being poor, but everybody can afford a bar of soap. There’s just no reason
for dirtiness, not a-tall.”
    “I’m going to go look for
her purse,” Savannah said.
    He nodded. “I’ll check out
the bedrooms.”
    Savannah found the
pocketbook quickly. It was on an accent table in the living room, next to the
door that led into the foyer. And beside the Louis Vuitton bag was a set of
keys and a cell phone.
    The living room