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“What?”
She regarded her top dresser drawer. It was open almost a full three inches. She always closed her drawers, not because she was a neat freak but because she’d gotten a puppy recently and he’d chewed several pieces of her clothing to shreds. On the other hand, the puppy had pretty much grown into a dog at this point.
“Mel?”
She tipped her head to the side. “That drawer was closed when I left this morning.”
Chris followed her gaze. “You think some crook bypassed your video equipment and laptop to poke through your drawers?”
“Not really. I’m sure it’s…” She opened the drawer, froze, closed it. “Nothing.”
“That nothing sounded like a whole lot of something to me.” Chris pulled on the handle, peered inside. Then he looked at her. “You keep roses in with your underwear?”
“One rose,” she corrected. “Long stemmed, white, with a sprig of baby’s breath.” She picked it up and stared. “It’s the fifth one I’ve gotten in the past month.”
“I WHIPPED UP A BIG BATCH of chili and a pot of spaghetti sauce, divided them into servings and labeled the containers.” Eileen Crawford drew air pictures as she spoke. “They’re in the freezer. You can cook pasta, right? Of course you can. There’s fresh milk in the fridge, bread, vegetables and two big packages of cold cuts. Vacuum-sealed, so don’t open the second until the first one’s gone. I’ll be back on Tuesday to tidy up the bathrooms and such. Will you be all right until then?”
Sometimes Johnny swore the woman was beamed from Mars to his doorstep twice a week as a test of earthling patience. Eileen had been cleaning houses for the residents of Blue Lake for twenty years. She was a heavyset woman with a faded Maine accent, curly blond hair and more nerve than anyone Johnny knew. And he knew or had known a great number of nervy people.
But that was in another lifetime, another world, one he didn’t care to visit these days.
He tried to ease the woman politely out the door. “Thanks, Eileen. I appreciate the food and the clean sheets.”
She shifted her handbag to her other shoulder. “You’re just like my Zack when it comes to keeping house. Where clothing lands is where it stays. Has he been around to see you lately?”
Johnny fixed a smile on his face and kept it there as he nudged her forward. “Not for a week or so.”
“Well, Sheriff Frank’s been out of town. He belongs to some order of brethren or other and they convene every year at a big hotel, so Zack’s been pushed a bit more than usual. I think there was some function he had to attend in Woodstock today. It’s all go with you law enforcement types. Constantly busy.”
How busy could one of two deputies be in a town with less than fifteen hundred year-round residents and the tourist traffic down to boaters, backpackers and fifty-five-plus couples?
“I’m sure he’ll get some time off soon.”
“When he does, you two should go bowling, or head over to the grill for a game of pool.” Eileen set a hand on her hip. “You’re so practical, the pair of you. All I want is one grandchild before I retire, and what does Zack do? He dates a tourist for two weeks, then drives her down to O’Hare and says goodbye. Doesn’t get her address, home or e-mail. I bet he never even thought to ask for her phone number.”
“Maybe she wasn’t the right one.” They were almost at the door. “Move, Shannon,” he said to his curious Irish setter. “Eileen wants to leave.”
The big dog barked and began sniffing the woman’s leg. She halted and rolled her eyes. “Doggie treats! I never gave them a thought. I’ll run some out here first thing tomorrow morning.”
“Shannon likes soda crackers. She can snack on those instead.”
“Crackers? My God, Johnny Grand, did you treat your wife like this?”
Now it was Johnny’s turn to stare. “Excuse me?”
She strengthened her grip on her shoulder strap. “I’m sorry. That was out of line. I just can’t help wondering why a couple as lovely as you and Meliana broke apart. Your wife’s a skilled surgeon, and yet she bandaged more knees and treated more stings and bites whenever she came up here than Dr. Fell—rest his soul—did in all his time on the lake. The woman’s an angel.”
Wanna bet? Johnny thought with equal parts humor and regret. “She has her moments,” he agreed.
“How did you meet?”
Oh, no, she was settling in. “It’s a long story, really long. I’ll tell you about it another time. Right now…” The phone rang behind him.
“I’m expecting a call,” he lied. “An important one.”
She patted his arm. “You take it, then, and I’ll let myself out.”
“Walk her to her car,” Johnny ordered Shannon in a low voice. He picked up. “Yeah, Grand here.”
“I know you’re there, Grand, but you should be here.”
Johnny waited until Eileen was out of earshot before turning away. “Julie? Why the hell are you calling me at—” he squinted at the burled wall clock that had come with the house “—eight at night?”
“Your wife got a rose.”
He watched as Eileen’s ’81 Taurus sedan rolled off. “What?”
“Actually, she’s gotten five roses in four weeks. Long stemmed, white, from a—ha-ha—secret admirer. And those weren’t funny ha-ha’s.”
Johnny sat on the arm of the sofa. “What were they?”
“Worried. I take it your good buddy Chris didn’t call?”
“About roses? No.”
“Okay, here’s the deal. Someone tried to break in to your—her town house today around five. We thought the alarm scared the guy off. Everything looked okay inside. But later, after we’d left, Mel found a white rose in her lingerie drawer. It isn’t the first one she’s received. It is the first one that’s really violated her space. The other four didn’t involve a break-in. Also…” She took a breath and Johnny heard the faint shudder beneath it. “Some of her lingerie’s missing. She figures five or six pieces. One of them is that bustier thing she wore under her wedding dress—you know, the strapless bra slash corset slash garter belt number.”
Johnny swore. “Did she call you?”
“Yeah, but only this time. She didn’t mention the other four flowers until today. Blackburn was with her when she opened the drawer, but I figured—and I was right—he’d be as likely to contact you as cut off his foot.”
Johnny searched the low tables for his car keys. “What are you doing about it?”
“There’s not much we can do. We dusted for prints, but you know as well as I do we won’t find anything. We’ll also talk to her neighbors. So far, though, it seems like you bought into a complex where people mind their own business. Are you coming down?”
“Yeah.” He checked under the sofa cushions for the keys. “Don’t tell Mel, okay?”
“You know, I really hate it when people say that to me. She’s my friend, Johnny. She kept me from getting hysterical when I thought my mother was having a heart attack. Then she very calmly ran the tests and removed her gall bladder. I’ll give you two hours before I blab.”
“You’re all heart, Jules.”
He spotted his keys in a ceramic bowl beside the door, grabbed them along with his jacket and whistled for Shannon. “Do me another favor, okay?”
“What is it?”
“Ask Mel if she’s gotten anything else with those roses.”
IT WAS NINE O’CLOCK when Julie reappeared at her door. Meliana greeted her with a canny “You called him, didn’t you?”
Julie reddened just enough for her to see. “You can’t possibly know that.”
“Yeah, right, because I don’t know you at all, do I? We only got arrested together in Mindanao and had to spend ten days in a sinkless hellhole shouting at anyone who’d listen to us that, no, we weren’t soliciting and we certainly hadn’t been using the act as a cover to deal drugs.”
“That’s what you get for carrying white powder in your purse.”
“It was a free sample of Oscar after-bath.”
“Which we couldn’t make them understand, because they didn’t bother to run any tests and we didn’t speak the language—which I thought you said you did.”
“I speak Hawaiian, Julie. That’s a big linguistic step from the Philippines.” Because she really wasn’t annoyed, Meliana let the door swing open. “Is he coming down?”
“Unless he forgets to gas up. Always a possibility.”
“Hey, he’s my husband—I’ll make the nasty cracks.” Linking her fingers loosely behind her back, she watched her friend stride along the short corridor, pause, then glance from side to side. “Chris isn’t here, Julie. I sent him out with patrolman Dick—”
“Dirk.”
Meliana smiled. “They’re talking to Mrs. Feldman. She’s the only bona fide snoop in the area.”
“Everyone I know lives with curtain twitchers. What makes your neighbors so special?”
“Not special, professional. Most of the people around here don’t get home until six or later.”
“No latchkey kids?”
“Busy on their computers. Chris made the rounds, Jules. No one saw a thing.”
“Mmm, well, as I see it, there wasn’t enough time for the guy to have hauled butt up to your bedroom, planted the rose, swiped your lacies and hightailed it back out before we got here. That means he either did the deed while you were home and occupied, in which case he’d have had fairly free access, or he knows your security code.”
“Which he rearmed, then set off on the way out?”
Julie started for the stairs. “He stole your underwear, Mel. You can’t expect rational behavior.” She glanced up. “Is that thunder?”
“There’s a storm on the lake. Perfect backdrop for a murder mystery.”
“You need to date again,” Julie decided.
“I had a blind date lined up for tonight. That’s why I’m not as upset as I probably should be about the break-in.”
“You’re as sick as your underwear thief. Is this the dresser?”
“Top drawer. White rose lying on a folded black slip. Patrolman Dirk bagged it.”
“Was it hothouse?”
“I saw a few spots on the petals. I’d guess garden grown.”
“Thorns?”
“Shaved off.” Which unsettled her and had her rubbing her bare arms. “God, I hope he’s not spying on me.”
“They often do.”
“It’s creepy.” Meliana drew her fingers across her throat and fought a chill. “I don’t want to be a bug under a microscope.”
“It’s a burden, I’ll admit.” Julie sat on the bed and let herself sink back into the padded headboard. “Tell me the truth, Mel—are roses the only thing this guy’s left for you?”
“That I’m sure of, yes.”
“Of course, this could just be the beginning of a more frightening agenda.”
“That’s reassuring.”
“I’m a cop. I deal in facts.”
“So do I, but I don’t tend to approach patients’ families and tell them I’ll be gutting their sons and daughters.” She heard wind howling around the eaves. “Andy McRae says it’s going to be a brisk fall.”
“And he knows that because…?”
“He maintains the lawns and gardens in the complex. Means nothing, Julie. Your mother knows as much about flowers as he does.”
“Whereas you and I know nothing.” A wry expression invaded her features. “I wonder what Johnny knows?”
“More than me and less than your mom.” She heard the door slam open and bang off the wall downstairs. “Ah, good, a looming confrontation. I should have gone ahead with that date.”
Johnny rushed in as if he expected the intruder to still be there. He had his keys in his left hand and a big red dog at his heels.
Delighted, Meliana went to her knees. Shannon barked and jumped on her. “I didn’t think you’d bring her.”
When he realized there were only the two women in the room, Johnny regrouped and shot Julie a dark look. “That was a short two hours.”
“Hey, don’t blame me.” Julie stabbed a finger at Meliana. “She guessed. Count yourself lucky Blackburn didn’t find out. He’d have been a wall in your face before you got up the stairs.”
“He’d have been flat on his ass in the downstairs hallway.”
Meliana ruffled Shannon’s silky ears. “I love it when men do the testosterone thing. Johnny, do you even try putting your clothes together?”
He frowned, glanced down at his jeans, T-shirt and jacket. “What’s wrong with them?”
The brown jacket looked as if he’d slept in it, the red T was torn and frayed at the hem and his jeans were the oldest pair he owned. Meliana hid her amusement. “Nothing, I guess. Kneejerk reaction. I see Shannon swallowed your last hairbrush.”
He moved his lips in a perfunctory smile. “I wasn’t thinking personal aesthetics when I jumped in my truck and raced down here. Is the rose gone?”
“Off to the police lab to be mutilated. Are you limping?”
“Eileen Crawford cleaned today. I tripped over the magazine rack.”
“Which she undoubtedly put back in its proper place. This isn’t a big deal, Johnny.” Meliana was going to repeat that until she believed it. “Some pervert likes roses and underwear. He left one and stole the other. Maybe he just wanted something pretty to wear.”
