The Dead Room Read Online Free PDF Page A

Most of the furniture were antiques, and the room had a feeling of warmth and comfort. He noticed a painting above the mantel and crossed the room for a closer look. It was an N.C. Wyeth. Not a copy, but an original. Teddy knew the painting was worth a fortune. He turned, taking the room in with his back to the fireplace. On the opposite wall he noticed three more paintings which he recognized. Seurat, Gauguin, and Cezanne. He looked at the chairs again and realized one had been turned to face these magnificent works of art. No doubt the owner of these paintings spent a lot of time sitting in that chair staring at them. Clearly, robbery wasn’t the motive in Darlene Lewis’s horrible death.
    It was beginning to get dark outside. Teddy checked the doors in the room, expecting a powder room but finding closets instead. To the left of the fireplace was an entryway to a library—a long, narrow room with books lining all four walls from floor to ceiling. Beyond the library was another sitting room, smaller than the first with a desk and computer, then a laundry room, a breakfast room and back to the kitchen.
    Teddy returned to the foyer, eyeing it closely. A door was cracked open in the wall beneath the stairs he’d missed the first time around. Swinging it out of the way, he found just what he expected. The toilet had been lifted from the floor. When he opened the cabinets beneath the sink, the pipes were missing here as well.
    He backed out into the hall, glancing at the living room as he climbed the stairs. No one was sitting around any longer, the waiting over. The crime scene techs had opened their cases and were rigging fluorescent light fixtures on stands and carrying them into the dining room. A man with a video camera was opening a fresh tape.
    Teddy continued up the stairs and down the hall, passing the master bedroom until he found a common bath. He hurried inside, switching the lights on. The plumbing had been ripped apart here as well. The detectives had combed through the house for most of the day. The job had been thorough because they thought Oscar Holmes, the friendly neighborhood mailman, wanted to get rid of something. It seemed obvious that whatever that something was had everything to do with making the circumstances unusual as well.
    Teddy stepped into the hall, looking for the girl’s bedroom. It was the third door down, and he stopped to take it in before entering. It was a teenager’s room. A room in transition furnished with hopes and dreams and the lingering mementoes of a childhood about to be left behind. The sadness was overwhelming because the evolution from girl to young woman had been destroyed.
    His eyes came to rest on an old oak chest against the wall by the window. Spotting a series of photographs, he flipped the light switch and crossed the room. The pictures had been dusted for fingerprints, along with the brass handles on the drawers. One photo stood out, and Teddy picked the frame up by its edges, trying to avoid the dark gray powder that ADA Powell had warned him about. It was a family shot, taken while on vacation and probably recent. It could have been Rome, but Teddy suspected it was Paris. He looked at the faces, the smiles, guessing the eldest daughter had to be Darlene. She was pretty, even beautiful. By the way her father was holding onto her, Teddy could tell he thought so, too. Teddy’s eyes moved back to Darlene in the picture and he studied her face. She was more worldly than he expected, almost too sophisticated to live in this room.
    He set down the picture and looked around. He noticed her clothes on the chair, a pair of jeans and a T-shirt. Then he crossed the room to the closet, reviewing her clothing. He spotted a pair of panties rolled into a ball on the floor and picked them up. As he opened them and examined them in the light, someone tapped on the bedroom door.
    It was ADA Carolyn Powell, staring at him with a lazy smile and those blue gray eyes of hers.
    “Are