A Clean Kill Read Online Free PDF

into my eyes as though she was trying to see through them. Her irises were so dark that the pupils were indistinguishable from the surrounding color. “No, thank you. Sheri and I really need to get going.” And without taking her eyes from mine, Bobbi said, “Sheri, are you ready?”
    “Sure.”
    I held up my hand. “Sorry, Sheri. Just one more thing. Who was with your mother that Saturday? Did anyone stay with her?”
    I was looking at Sheri, but I could see Bobbi tryingto hold my eyes with hers. Sheri said, “I was there. Most of the time, anyway. Dad called around two Saturday afternoon to tell me they were headed for the emergency room. I got to the hospital around three-thirty and stayed until dinnertime. Mom was getting better when I left.”
    “Was your father there the whole time?”
    Sheri looked bored, like maybe she was losing her buzz. “I think so.”
    “Was he there when you left?”
    Bobbi cut in. “She said he was. Look, Sheri, we need to get …”
    I interrupted, but tried my best to sound pleasant. “Bobbi, your friend’s paying me a lot of money to ask these questions.”
    Bobbi’s hard black eyes narrowed, and she walked out onto the porch. I turned to Sheri. “Well, was your father with your mother
in her hospital room
when you got there
and
when you left?”
    Sheri was growing blurrier by the second, but wasn’t the least bit irritated by my cutting off her friend. “Yeah, Dad was there when I got there. And he was still around when I left.”
    “Still around the hospital or
in
your mother’s room?”
    “Oh. Uh, he went to the cafeteria.”
    “Did you see him come back?”
    “Unh-uh. He was still gone when I left.”
    I put my hand on the small of Sheri’s back. “You need to get your shoes.” Sheri walked into the living room and slipped painted toenails into her sandals. As we walked back toward the open front door, I said,“Okay, thanks, Sheri. I’ll call you tomorrow after I talk with Dr. Adderson.”
    Just inside the door, she turned to face me. “I’m a little bit drunk.”
    “I figured that out.”
    Tears pooled in her blurry brown eyes. “I’m sorry, Tom. I really am serious about this, and I appreciate what you’re doing. It’s just … it’s funny how awful it is to lose your mother, even if, you know, you’re a grown-up.”
    I glanced through the open door and met Bobbi’s black-eyed glare. She and Sheri were both in their twenties, but I wasn’t sure I was in the presence of any actual grown-ups.
    Sheri stepped gingerly toward the open door and closed it between us and her friend. “Tom, can I tell you something about my mother?”
    “Anything you want.”
    She leaned against the door and rocked the back of her head against the painted wood. “I was in the fifth grade—I guess about ten years old—and I’d seen a Bela Lugosi movie or something ’cause I decided I wanted to be a vampire for Halloween.” Sheri squeezed her eyelids shut and tears rolled down her cheeks. She swallowed hard. “So anyway, I tell Mom that that’s what I wanna be. And I’ve got a pretty unrealistic picture in mind of the costume I want. I want a cape like Dracula’s. You know, black with red satin lining. One of those things cut in a half circle so it would hang in folds and I could hold it in front of my face and give people the evil eye.
    “Anyway, I’m rambling on about all this, and Mom just listens. Later, when she couldn’t find a costume likeI wanted, she went to the fabric store and bought black and red satin. She was still working with my father then—working as hard as he did—and she stayed up every night for a week after he went to bed. Mom designed and sewed a cape and a vest to go with some black pants and a shirt I’d picked out. She even went out and bought a three-dollar wig and cut it into a widow’s peak like Bela Lugosi had because I didn’t wanna run around acting like a demon in a little blonde pageboy.
    “Do you understand what I’m