"Van Lustbader, Eric - Dark Homecoming(eng)" - читать интересную книгу автора (Van Lustbader Eric)

"I don't know," Croaker admitted as he carefully examined the carpet. Kneeling by the side of the bed, he plucked a small clump of hairs that had been embedded in the fibers of the carpet as if by a grinding motion. They were the right color and length to be Sonia's. Judging by the roots, they'd been ripped from her head.
He rose and, reaching out with his biomechanical hand, plucked a stainless-steel nail at a place where the pillow was exposed, as if the bed had been hurriedly remade. "Sonia was a neat freak, wasn't she?"
Bennie nodded wordlessly. He seemed fascinated by Croaker's examination.
Using one stainless-steel nail Croaker gingerly lifted the bedspread away from the pillows. The one on his side was slightly askew. He saw lipstick smears over its center.
"What the hell?" Bennie said.
Looking closer, Croaker spotted a couple of eyelashes sticking to the pillowcase. He let the pillow fall back as he looked around the bedroom.
"So where is she?" Bennie whispered.
Croaker pointed to the closet.
Bennie had replaced the lost .38 with a .22. With the gun at the ready, he flipped the door open. Nothing but clothes on racks and shoes neatly lined in rows on the floor.
Croaker looked out the window. "Her car?"
"Still in the carport," Bennie said. "I checked it out."
Croaker, looking down at the small answering machine, hit the Messages button with a stainless-steel fingernail. The tape began to play. Two hang ups, then a male voice said, "Sweetheart, it's Nestor. So looking forward to seeing you in the morning. Love you for it, but you might as well eat the food yourself. This boy isn't feeling any better. But, hey, what the fuck, I've got to make the best of it, right? Love you. 'Bye for now."
"This would be before the power went off," Bennie said.
"Right. Sounds like sometime last night." Croaker looked at Bennie. "Who's Nestor? This was the last call before the power was cut."
"Nestor's a dancer," Bennie said. "Or at least he was until he got AIDS. Now he's dying slowly an' Sonia's made him, like, her pet project."
Noting Bennie's tone, Croaker looked up. "You disapprove?"
"It's, like, the proximity issue." Bennie made a face. "You know, man, it's not a pretty thing."
"No kidding," Croaker said. "Think how Nestor feels." He tapped the top of the answering machine. "You know where this guy lives?"
"Nah, but try Sonia's speed-dialer. He's on there; you can ask him yourself."
Sure enough, Bennie was right. Croaker wrote down Nestor's number, then they retraced their steps through the house. The kitchen was the only room they hadn't been in yet. Croaker stopped in the open doorway, flipped the switch. Cold fluorescent light flickered on, and he stared, wide-eyed. It appeared as if the entire contents of the refrigerator were lined up in neat rows along the countertops. Cartons of milk and orange juice, bottles of jam and ketchup and mustard, plastic containers holding leftovers, a tub of butter. The rows were arranged in ascending height. Every edge was perfectly aligned.
"What the hell is this?" Bennie said.
Croaker was afraid he might already know.
Bennie shook his head. "All this stuff from inside the refrigerator. Why was it taken out? You think Sonia did this?"
For a very long time, Croaker did nothing. He stared at the refrigerator door.
Bennie, seeing where he was looking, said, "Jesus." He passed a hand briefly across his eyes. "Go on, amigo. We've come this far."
It didn't pay to think too much, not at this juncture. Croaker closed his titanium and steel fingers around the old-fashioned handle and pulled.
The door swung open and he saw an interior totally devoid of food. The side walls had been smeared with blood. On one was painted a triangle inside a circle; on the other a dot within a square.
The shelves themselves had been rearranged to make room for the one item which sat inside. An item about the size of a twenty-pound turkey but one not normally found in anyone's refrigerator.
Croaker tried to close his ears to the slow drip-drip-drip of blood. A good size pool had already formed on the bottom shelf.
It came from Sonia's head and neck, which had been very neatly severed from the rest of her, pale hazel eyes opened wide in a fixed expression of full-blown terror.
Back in the bedroom, Croaker walked slowly around until he stood in the open doorway to the bathroom. "Someone standing in that spot in the alcove where the rainwater is, you couldn't see him from here." He walked along the side of the bed as Sonia had done hours earlier. "Not from here, either."
Bennie looked at him. "If that's where the killer stood, he chose the perfect spot to watch her."
Croaker ignored the sudden chill that went through him. "Smart, too. He didn't leave any footprints. He must have left his shoes outside."
He pointed to the pillowcase with Sonia's lipstick smears and eyelashes. "This is how she was killed."
Bennie came over for a closer look. "Smothered, you mean?"
Croaker nodded. "That pillow over her face, pushed down hard. Sonia was no weakling. It had to be someone with a great deal of strength."
"Or more than one someone," Bennie added.
"Right," Croaker said.
He pointed to the spot between them, where he had plucked the clump of Sonia's hairs from the carpet. He could picture her as she lay there, helpless, the back of her head being ground into the carpet, dying. He felt what he always felt at the scene of a murder, as if a vise were squeezing something vital out of his heart.
"She died right here," he said.
Bennie's right hand curled into a fist. Blood seemed to have surged into his neck and cheeks. He gave an inarticulate cry, then lurched out of the bedroom.
"Bennie!"
Croaker caught up with him in the kitchen. Bennie was reaching into the refrigerator.
Croaker's blood ran cold. "Just what the hell d'you think you're doing?"
"I apologize but I have no intention of leaving her head here for strangers to find." Bennie was taking the head out of the refrigerator. As he did so, he averted his gaze. From Sonia's head or the bloody symbols? Croaker wondered. Bennie began to wrap the head with extreme tenderness in the first of the three towels he'd taken from the linen closet in the hall. "I won't allow Sonia to suffer that indignity."
Croaker curled his biomechanical fingers around Bennie's wrist. Bennie's head came around, and he glared at Croaker with eyes suddenly the color of flame. "Escuchame, se?or. Men have perished for that."
"What about friends?"
"Amiga's know better."
"Then you have friends without backbones." Croaker took a step forward. "Tell me, Bennie, is this really about Sonia's dignity?"
"Yes." But Croaker would not back down and he would not be bluffed. Perhaps it was just this toughness that appealed so profoundly to Bennie.