Corpse Suzette

bucks.”
    “You women are nuts.”
     
    As Dirk maneuvered the
Buick around the dark road with its sharp curves, Savannah couldn’t help
thinking that the way home seemed a lot longer than the way to Devon’s house.
    Deep, heavy, depression of
the soul could cause that.
    “We’ve got nothing,” she
said. “Not a blamed thing.”
    “So? I’ve barely started on
the case,” he replied. “It’s too soon.”
    “ You’ve barely
started. I’ve been working on it for thirty-six hours, and I’ve got squat, zip,
nada. You know as well as I do that if you don’t solve a homicide in the first
forty-eight hours, your chances are cut in half.”
    “That’s just because most
murders are obvious. You arrive at the house, you see the body on the floor and
the body’s brother standing over it with a bloody steak knife. You ask the
other relatives what happened, and they tell you the two of them were drunk and
fighting over who got the biggest steak. Case solved. The other kind take longer.”
    “Which kind?”
    “The kind where it ain’t so
obvious.”
    Savannah sighed. “That’s
probably wise and profound, but I’m way too tired to appreciate your sapience
right now. I just want to go home and go to bed.”
    “Did you just call me a
sap?”
    “No.”
    “Good. Then I’ll offer to
take you home and even tuck you into bed myself. Maybe I’ll throw in a little
backrub, a little all-over, hot oil, body massage. What do you say?”
    “Eh, bite me.”
    “Okay. Never mind.”

Chapter

10
     
     
     
    Y ears ago, Savannah had
promised herself that, someday, she would treat herself to one homicide. Just
one.
    She intended to murder
Officer Kenny Bates. And she was sure that if there was even one woman on the
jury, she’d get away with it.
    Kenny served the fine
citizens of San Carmelita by guarding the front desk in the medical examiner’s
complex. You had to get by him to see Dr. Liu or any of her assistants.
    Getting past him wasn’t
difficult. He was a worthless guard. But signing in without being highly
offended and grossly insulted was impossible. Kenny was living proof that not
all pigs had snouts. Some of them just had body odor, bad breath, and manners
to match.
    “Savannah! Hey, babe!” His
ugly face split with a smile the moment she walked through the doors. “Long
time no see!”
    “Long time no bathe,” she
replied as she approached his desk and tried to breathe through her ears.
Experience had taught her that breathing was a bad idea within an eight-foot
radius of Kenny Bates.
    Dirk walked through the
door behind her and growled under his breath. “Back off, Bates and slide that
clipboard over here.” Bates pushed the board with its attached pen toward
Savannah and leaned over the counter as far as he could, straining to see down
the front of her blouse.
    She caught a whiff of
something that smelled like egg salad and nacho cheese chips as he said, “I was
wondering when you were going to come see me. I’ve been meaning to tell you...
after you solved that last big case, I saw your picture in the paper. I cut it
out and taped it to my ceiling, right over my bed, next to Miss December.”
    “Hey!” Dirk barked. “Watch
your mouth or you’ll be eating your teeth, jackass!”
    Savannah held up one hand.
“That’s okay, Dirk. Bates and I have an understanding. He stays on that side of
the counter, and I don’t give him a karate kick in the groin.”
    She grabbed the sign-in
board and scribbled a name on it— P.H. Cue. Then she pushed it back at him and
said in a low, menacing voice, “Get that picture off your ceiling, Bates. I
mean it. If you don’t, I’ll find out. I’ll wait for you in a dark alley. And
I’ll blow your brains out. You won’t even see me coming. You’ll just be hanging
around one minute and the next, you’re in pervert hell. Got it?”
    He snickered, but looked
uncomfortable.
    She leaned closer. “Look
into my eyes, Bates, and see if I don’t mean it.”
    Kenny squirmed under the
blue lasers like a worm on a hot sidewalk. “All right. I’ll take it down.”
    “And tear it into little
pieces and throw it away. I’m a private investigator. I’m going to check in
twenty-four hours. I’ll know whether you did or not.”
    “Yeah, okay.”
    As she and Dirk left the
counter and walked down the hallway, she could see Dirk grinning from the
corner of her eye.
    “OF Kenny actually believed
you,” he said. “Like you would know what was on his bedroom