Chapter 9
Chapter Nine
My phone was in my hand before I consciously decided to pull it out. My fingers moved on autopilot, pulling up my address book.
I knew the number by heart, but I didn’t trust myself to get the details right right now. It took everything I had just to scroll to it and push the phone icon.
It rang twice before Mendoza picked up.
“Mrs. Kelly?”
There were faint noises in the background, like he was outside somewhere. Whistles blowing and loud noises.
“Yes. I’m sorry,” I said shakily. “I know I shouldn’t be calling you, but—”
My voice sounded strange, distant. Like I was inside a fishbowl, or maybe outside of it, listening to someone talk through glass.
His voice sharpened. “Where are you? What’s wrong?”
“Bellevue,” I managed. “Nick’s house.”
“Nick? You’re in Dominic Costanza’s house?”
I nodded. And remembered, a second later, that he couldn’t see me. “Yes.”
“Get out of there,” Mendoza said.
“What?”
He spoke slowly and clearly, as if he thought I was slow. At the moment I probably was. “Don’t touch anything, and get out of the house.”
“Too late,” I said. “I already touched the doorknob, and the light switch, and the—”
When I didn’t finish, he did. “—body?”
“What? No, I didn’t touch that. Are you crazy?”
A beat passed, and then I added, “Wait a minute. How do you know there’s a body?”
Was this already common knowledge? Had Mendoza killed him? Or did he know who had?
“I assumed,” Mendoza said. “You’re acting like someone who’s seen a dead body. Have you left yet?”
I hadn’t, so I gave Nick a last look before I turned on my heel and stumbled toward the door. “Come on, cat.”
“Cat?” Mendoza inquired.
“There’s a cat in here. One of the neighbor’s, probably. She has a lot of cats.”
“The neighbor saw you.”
It sounded much more like a statement than a question, but I nodded. Then I realized, again— “Yes. She came out when I was knocking on the door.”
He muttered something under his breath. Probably an expletive. It sounded like one. I decided not to make him repeat it, just made my way across the small kitchen to the door I had left open when I walked in. The door the tortoiseshell had entered through.
“Cat!” I called again. “We’re leaving! Come on!”
“I said,” Mendoza repeated patiently, “that if someone has seen you, there’s no way you can close the door and pretend you weren’t there.”
“No. And I can’t believe you’d suggest something like that. Aren’t you a cop?”
“You know I am. Are you outside yet?”
The morning sunlight seemed too bright after the darkness of the bedroom, and I had to squint as I stepped out onto the stoop. “Yes. I’m outside.”
“What about the cat?”
I glanced down as the tortoiseshell darted across the threshold, past my feet, and down. It didn’t bother with the stairs, just shot directly off the edge of the stoop onto the dead grass and headed for the front yard at a good clip.
“That, too.”
“Good,” Mendoza said. “Now sit down and wait for me. Don’t let anyone else go inside. Not even another cat. Do you understand?”
I nodded. “Yes.”
“Breathe, Mrs. Kelly. I’ll be there in fifteen minutes.”
He hung up, and I collapsed into a heap on the stoop, next to the kitchen door I’d left open, and tried not to think about Nick Costanza lying dead in his bed with a bullet hole between his eyes.
It was more than fifteen minutes later, but not quite twenty, when Mendoza’s car—a silver Jeep this time, not the small gray sedan he uses on the job, nor the dark pickup truck I’d seen before—came around the corner and down the road where it pulled up behind the Lexus with a squeal of tires.
He was out of the driver’s seat before the engine had fully died, and around the front of the car before the slam of the door had finished reverberating.
Gone was the easy-going waiter from last night, with his dimple and melting chocolate-brown eyes.
This was Detective Mendoza, grim-faced and hard-eyed, and he looked every inch the part despite the civilian clothes.
“Are you all right?” He stopped in front of the stoop, looking down at me.
I nodded.
“Did you touch anything else? Besides what you already told me?”
I shook my head.
“Good.” He climbed the two steps and peered into the kitchen before flicking me a look. “Stay here. Don’t follow me in.”
“No problem.” There was no part of me that wanted another look at Nick. “To the left once you’re inside.”
Mendoza disappeared through the doorway, and I heard his sneakers squeak against the vinyl as he moved through the kitchen.
It was silent after that, as he presumably entered the minuscule hallway and the bedroom.
I stayed where I was, trying not to think about what he was looking at, and doing my best not to remember what Nick had looked like, lying there with that neat hole in his forehead.
I should probably call Zachary and Rachel, to let them know what was happening. They needed to know. But what good would it do to tell them anything right now? There was nothing they could do to help, and I certainly didn’t need Rachel to leave Daniel just to come hold my hand.
And as for Zach, he’d probably feel guilty.
He’d been here last night, and had scampered off to McDonald’s as quickly as he could.
He’d probably worry that whoever had shot Nick had been here when he arrived, and that if he’d stayed longer, there was something he could have done to stop it.
I didn’t think there was, but I could understand why someone would think that.
No. Better to wait until I knew more.
A flash of orange and white caught my eye, and I looked up to see the tortoiseshell come trotting around the corner of the duplex again. Behind it came the elderly neighbor from earlier.
“Patches!” she called. “Come here, you naughty girl!”
The cat ignored her and continued toward me, weaving through my legs before sitting down at the base of the stoop to wash its face.
The cat’s owner came to a stop a few feet away, looking from me to the open door and back again. “That don’t look good.”
I shook my head. No, it wasn’t.
“I suppose you can’t tell me what happened, can you?”
I probably shouldn’t. Better to let Mendoza deal with it—and her.
“I’m Mrs. Miller,” she continued when I just shook my head again. “Coco Miller. I own this duplex. Nick’s been my tenant for, oh, five years now? Such a nice boy. Handsome, too.”
Yes, he was. Or had been.
“I’m Gina Beaufort Kelly,” I said. “I’m a private investigator.”
Her eyebrows shot up. “A private investigator? No kidding? Is Nick in some kind of trouble?”
Not any longer. But before I could blurt that out—or anything else—Mendoza emerged in the doorway. I shut my mouth again.
“Ma’am.” He nodded at Mrs. Miller. (Much as I tried, even in my head I couldn’t call her Coco.) “I’m Detective Jaime Mendoza with the Nashville PD.”
He’s Hispanic, of course, and I’ve seen his name written, so I know it’s spelled the Spanish way, with the I before the M. He pronounces it like the English, though. Jay-me.
Mrs. Miller’s hand flew to her throat. “Police? Oh, my goodness. What’s happened? Is it Nick?”
Of course it was Nick.
And then I chastised myself (silently) for cynicism, when it was clear that she was very upset.
Mendoza’s expression was professional, carefully neutral. “I’m afraid so. Mr. Costanza passed away last night. I’m very sorry for your loss.”
“Passed away?” Mrs. Miller’s voice shook. “But—but I just saw him last night! He came home around eleven-thirty. I heard his truck.”
“You heard him come home?” Mendoza pulled out a small notebook. “Did you see him? Or hear anything else?”
“I saw his headlights through my window,” Mrs. Miller said. She was still clutching her cardigan closed, her knuckles white. “I was watching the Late Show, like I told the lady.”
She looked at me. “I heard the truck pull up, heard his door slam. That’s all.”
Mendoza glanced at me, too. “Was he alone?”
“I— yes, I think so. I didn’t hear anyone else. Just Nick.” Her eyes filled with tears. “What happened to him? Was it his heart? He was so young, but you never know these days—”
“We’re still determining the cause of death,” Mendoza said, which was a big, fat lie. “Mrs. Miller, I need to ask you a few more questions, if you don’t mind. Did you hear or see anything unusual last night or this morning?”
She shook her head. “It was quiet. Usually I can hear Nick moving around through the wall—you know how these old places are—but I didn’t hear anything after he came home.
Or after he went to bed, I guess. He was banging around a little bit—I heard the water running—and then nothing after that. And nothing this morning.”
“Anyone outside? Coming or going?”
“There was another car,” Mrs. Miller said, “just after Nick went inside. I remember the lights coming through my front window. It rode a little rough, sounded like.”
I winced, and Mendoza shot me a look, although he didn’t comment. Not then.
“Did you get a look at it?” he wanted to know instead.
But Mrs. Miller hadn’t. “I just heard it go by. It backfired a little bit.”
“Are you sure it was a backfire,” Mendoza asked delicately, “and not something else?”
She thought about it. “It sounded like a backfire, but I guess it might have been something else. It wasn’t a blown tire, though. It drove away fast, and didn’t stop.”
Mendoza nodded. I made a mental note to tell him about Zachary and the McNugget binge as soon as I could, hopefully before he got the wrong idea.
“What about other visitors?” he wanted to know. “Not last night, but in the last few days or weeks?”
Mrs. Miller thought for a moment. “There’s his girlfriend. Pretty girl, dark hair, but a bit stuck up if you ask me. Drives a zippy little VW Beetle with eyelashes on the headlights. Can you imagine? Eyelashes on a car.”
I could imagine. I had seen that car, and had the same reaction to it, a few months back.
“Anyone else?” Mendoza had probably placed the Beetle’s owner, too.