If Wishes Were Horses Read online

  “Cause of death?”

  “We won't know until coroner gets here, but we're thinking exposure. She froze to

  death.”

  Sarah stopped, looked back at him. “You're joking.”

  “Do I look in a joking mood?” he snapped.

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  She let that pass. She'd nursed too many rookies through their first murder scene not to recognize the signs of stress. “What makes you think she froze to death on a night when the temperature didn’t fall below sixty?”

  “Frost. She's got fucking frost on her.”

  She noted multiple cop-type shoe prints around the body, indicating the Marion force hadn’t been as careful to follow procedure as they should have been, but they had done better than she would have expected.

  Even though Wassler had warned her, the effect was startling. A frost-like substance rimmed the victim's blue lips and embossed the point of an angular shoulder, the tip of her bare breast, the insides of her thighs. Sarah touched the shoulder in one small spot, felt the cold. She brought the white powdery substance to her lips. Ice.

  “Son of a bitch,” she murmured. “This woman was a hard user.” Sarah drew Eric's attention to the needle tracks on the arm. “I'm willing to bet the coroner will find the same on the backs of her knees.”

  The bumpy column of her sternum was visible between small breasts, which might have been larger if she had eaten occasionally, rather than living on whatever she had shot into her veins. Sarah knew the signs. This woman would have been an ER ODstatistic within another few months.

  She raised her gaze to the woman’s face. Her emaciated, drawn countenance didn't match her glorious, healthy fall of brunette curls.

  Sarah fished out her pen. She passed the covered tip over the woman's forehead near the hairline, and inserted it between the scalp and a tight netting.

  “Good quality wig,” she commented. “Expensive. Either it belonged to the perp, or she stole it. She wouldn't have wasted good drug money on something that cost this much.”

  “Could it have been an overdose instead of murder?”

  “Maybe.” Sarah pointed with the pen to the area between the woman's spread legs. “That looks like knee prints to me. She had company. Maybe he ran when she OD'd, or maybe he shot the poison into her deliberately. It's hard to say. Coroner's report will tell us a lot more. Do you have any occult activity around here, Chief?”

  “Not really. There's a Wiccan coven in Lilesville, which you may already know about. Justin Herne's linked up with it. He carries a lot of new age stuff in that shop of his, and he hosts a festival on his property each year.”

  “Could Justin Herne be involved in this?” She made herself say it, though the words felt like jagged glass in her throat.

  Eric’s reaction was not what Sarah expected. The man looked shocked to his foundations. “Sarah, he's been part of our community for a few years. His family has been in Lilesville for three generations.”

  “The man runs a sex shop, Eric,” she pointed out, “and while Wicca is a lovely faith in its pure form, it does attract its share of crazies.”

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  “It's not a sex shop, Sarah, not like an adult store with glory holes in the bathrooms. Heck, my wife loves to go there.”

  Now it was her turn to be startled. He lifted a shoulder. “Justin came to town four years ago and moved in with his aunt. Beatrice Smartley, a good woman. He took care of her until she passed away, then opened his shop just outside the corporate line in one of the old two-story shingle farmhouses. He renovated the place, had it re-landscaped. I think he's going to open a bed and breakfast. Nope. Instead he opens his store. It's called ‘For Her’. He starts with high class lingerie like Victoria's Secret, only European hand-tailored stuff. Meditation candles, perfumed soaps, all those things women like. A few vibrators,” he cleared his throat, looked away, “tucked away in the back. I think yeah, women will like this place, but it won't last, there's not enough of a market around here.”

  He shifted, his attention going pointedly to the body, like he thought perhaps they might move the conversation elsewhere, but Sarah stayed where she was. “So what happened?” she prodded.

  “He starts holding events related to his inventory. He hosts lingerie parties forbirthdays and bachelorette shindigs, brings in instructors to teach sensual massage for couples. Then,” a ghost of a smile crossed his face, as much as he could manage with murder so close to them, “he draws in our senior citizens with requests for theirhomemade herbal soaps and things like that to go with his aromatherapy perfumes and such. He asks them to make up some of their sweets, and now he has a little serve-yourself coffee area in his sunroom to give shoppers a place to relax. Donates all the proceeds from the refreshments to the local senior citizen center.”

  “So why is it classified as an adult business? Sounds more like a fancy lingerie store.”

  “Well, over time, he started bringing in more elaborate sex toys, role playing costumes, adult books and videotapes, erotic artwork and photography. But not your typical Deep Throat cheesy stuff. Herne caters strictly to couples and women.”

  “I still think that would be a little over the top for the folks of Marion and Lilesville.”

  “Some of it is,” Eric admitted, “but contrary to popular opinion, people in small towns aren't any more narrow-minded than people in the city. They just don't like someone shoving stuff in their face, making them change faster than it suits them. Herne seems to have a talent for getting people to look at things differently, while respecting the way things are. By the time he added that stuff, he was pretty well integrated into the community around here, and there was barely a murmur of protest. I hear more concerns about the non-Christian new age stuff than the sexual aids, and even that’s been low level complaints.”

  “Sounds like he would have gotten more business if he set up in one of the bigger

  cities. Why'd he stay after his aunt died?”

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  “I've asked him that. He says he likes it here, and big cities are overrated. Doesn't matter anyway. Guy has set up a unique operation. We've got people who drive as far as from Miami to visit his place. It's almost a damn tourist attraction.”

  “Hmm.” Sarah sat back on her heels, digested that. She'd be the first to admit that her radar this morning was shot to shit. Still, she wasn’t going to ignore the tingling in her gut. Something didn’t ring true.

  “I'd like to bring him out here, let him see this,” she decided. “Use him as an informal expert witness. He might be able to tell us what some of the things used to perform this ritual mean. I can also see how he reacts to the situation. He might not have had anything to do with this, but if he’s involved in occult activity in the area, he may have an idea who our knee-print person is. Would you mind if I go get him, bring him out here to see what I get out of him before the coroner takes over?”

  “Not as long as I'm here when you do,” Wassler said. “But I’m telling you, I’ve read up on Wicca. You know, when they first started practicing in the area, just to make sure they were on the up and up. A lot of it sounds pretty crunchy granola, like a spiritual movement stranded in the sixties.”

  Sarah straightened and gave the chief a level look, not without sympathy. “I get that you know Herne and like him. But you asked me here for my experience, so I need to tell you that this kind of perp, if there is one, is more often than not someone who ispart of the community. It's almost never the drifter or the guy with the biker tattoo and bad attitude. Murderers don't go around with a big 'M' on their chests.”

  “And here I thought they carried business cards. Murderers, Local Chapter 106,” hesaid dryly.

  “Damn unions are everywhere.” She smiled. “You're learning the knack, Chief.”

  “Let's hope I don't have to get used to it.” Eric frowned. “We're a small community, and a close one. Don't you th
ink a tendency toward homicide would show up in othertypes of behavior, some kind of warning?”

  “Not always. But I’ve met Herne recently, and the last thing I get from him is ‘flower child’. How about you?”

  Chief Wassler looked down at the body. An uncomfortable expression crossed his face, as if Sarah's question and the corpse were joining forces to rile his stomach. “No, I don't get that from him, either. But there's something about Herne. He’s protective by nature, particularly toward women. If I had to say anything about him, I'd say he'dhave made a good cop. Or a priest, odd as that sounds.”

  “Well, let's give him his chance to play cop. Let's bring him here and see what hesays.”

  “I could dispatch a car.”

  “No

  , Dexter should be here with mine by now. I'd like to see his place, and I want

  to see his face when I tell him what we need from him.”

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  Plus, they needed to clear the air between them. With the stench of death in her nostrils, accomplishing that was going to take an aircraft wind tunnel. “I'd like to see the backpack before I go.”

  She joined Eric outside the cordoned area around the body and waited for one of his men to bring it to him.

  “So what was the other favor you needed?”

  “Hunh?” He pulled his attention from the body.

  “The second favor,” she prodded gently, shifting so she was in his line of sight. “You asked me for two.”

  “Oh. Shit, yeah. Safety presentation at one of the county middle schools Friday, the usual ten to fifteen minutes on drugs. Would you mind?”

  “Not a problem, if you can give my man a ride back to the station while I go see Herne.”

  “Done deal.”

  The uniform brought the backpack and Eric passed it to Sarah. She pawed through the contents and immediately found a small stash of cocaine inside a makeup compact that hadn't carried face enhancements in a long time. There was no billfold, nothing to ID the body. There was only one thing other than the clothes and the drugs.

  “Look at this.” Sarah withdrew the palm-sized book, the type that card shops sold in a basket next to the cash register. “Best-Loved Poems.” She cracked it open and in the center was a photo, just slightly bigger than a postage stamp, of a newborn infant. The poem on the page was from 1 Corinthians 13, Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians.

  Love is not selfish…

  Sarah turned her gaze from the passage that had been read at her wedding and focused on the picture.

  “Looks like a hospital photo, the kind they take the day the baby's born and staple

  to the file,” Eric observed. “Odd. It's the only thing really personal in the pack.”

  “Not so odd. An addict will trade everything for the next hit. This wouldn't have

  had value to anyone but her.”

  Sarah sat back on her heels. They all started as infants, as fresh and unmade as the photo in her hand, but for some it ended the way it had for the woman behind her. The ache in her gut intensified, the telltale burn of her ulcer. It was a signal, a part of her

  intuition, and she didn’t welcome it. The woman in the circle had not overdosed. She

  and Eric Wassler had a murder case. She’d bet on it.

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  Chapter 4

  Sarah didn't avoid what scared her or pissed her off. Herne had done both and shewas going to confront him, on several different levels. He'd picked the wrong day tohave himself associated with a murder.

  Even so, she made herself roll Wassler's words over in her mind because she didn't know how much her distrust and animosity toward Herne had to do with what had happened last night. He’d thrown off her instincts. Damn him. Why did the man have to be potentially connected to a murder? It was as though he were determined to make her crazy.

  She had imagined Herne's store as the typical aged brick or clapboard storefront commercial structure, with no windows and an asphalt parking lot and cheesy sign asthe sum total of the store’s exterior embellishment.

  Though Wassler had prepared her for something a bit different, she was surprised to turn down a drive shaded with large water oaks hung with Spanish moss. A solidwood sign painted silver gray with a white border marked the entranceway off the rural highway. The carved rose in a deep red hue underscored the sandblasted navy blue lettering of “For Her”.

  The house was attractively landscaped with beds of spring tulips and lush weeping cherry trees around the gravel parking area. They framed the old rambling farmhousewith its wide porches and white columns. Candlelight glowed behind jewel-toned stained glass in the front first level windows. Bright green acres of marsh stretched out behind the property, and Sarah watched a heron take flight out of the tall grasses.

  She pulled into a parking space. As she got out and walked toward the front door,she passed a side courtyard which could be accessed from the parking area through a trellis of wisteria. It was cobbled in stone, and had a wishing pond and a fountain as the centerpiece. The water poured over a bronze sculpture of a long-haired mermaid and a winged man, an angel. They clasped one another in an intimate embrace. One of the angel’s wings was wrapped around the mermaid's bare back, his other hand cupping her breast. Her fingers tangled in his shoulder length hair.

  The courtyard was enclosed in the trappings of an English garden. There were a couple of discreetly placed benches, purple phlox tumbling over artfully placed piles ofsmooth large rocks, white lilies coming up from the cracks. The branches of an old liveoak formed a shaded canopy over the back of the courtyard.

  He had wanted to create a mood before his clients ever crossed the threshold of his

  store, and Sarah felt it as much as saw it. She turned to look back the way she had come, and saw how carefully he had transitioned from the reality of the highway. The atmosphere gently pried open the senses to other possibilities, other adventures.

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  That surprised her again, but it paled next to her shock when one of Lilesville’s well-respected octogenarians stepped out onto the porch. Mrs. Jenkins carried a warm smile and a brown bag with an artful arrangement of straw poking out the top. The handles of the bag were tied with a ribbon and a fresh gardenia bloom to screen the contents.

  She came through a door propped open with a gargoyle statue bearing a big grin and a penis so long Sarah thought it was a tripping hazard. Along with the statue, there was a cluster of spring flowers in a tin bucket and a bird feeder, a Goddess figure offering the winged creatures sustenance out of her generous lap, just under herpendulous breasts.

  Mrs. Jenkins neatly avoided the statue's overendowed genitalia in her sturdy black heels.

  “Hello, Chief Sarah,” she said. “It's good to see you this morning. Doing some shopping?”

  “A…a gift for a friend,” Sarah said, deciding she didn't want anyone to know she was here on police business. The murder would be TV and radio news by dinnertime, and she didn’t want speculation to run rampant.

  Mrs. Jenkins nodded, a twinkle in her eyes “Y. ou come by my house sometime soon and I'll hem that dress you wore to church last Sunday. It's coming down in the back. You young women have such busy careers, you don’t have time to attend to these things anymore.” She pressed Sarah's hand with a bony hand covered in soft flesh and went on down the steps, humming to herself.

  Sarah watched her go, mildly mortified that Mrs. Jenkins had the impression the police chief was shopping for sex toys or lingerie for herself and too embarrassed to admit it. The lady who did alterations to supplement her Social Security check carried her gloves and wore her hat as if she'd planned to stop at a church meeting. Her delicate blue-veined legs rose above her shiny black shoes. The hem of her blue dress was trim and neat.

  Would she ever be a Mrs. Jenkins, face lined and content, her soul quietly wise and

  accepting of past mistake
s? Weariness settled on Sarah’s shoulders. The stress of what had happened with Herne and another murder to solve weighed her down. She straightened her spine, chastising herself for the moment of weakness, and turned on her heel.

  Justin Herne was framed in the doorway.

  In daylight, she had expected him to be different, the spell broken, just a handsome man who by some trick of moonlight and a primitive ritual had worked magic on her

  senses.

  Her heart caught in her throat. He was different in daylight. He was more magnetic,because the reality of him was more immediate and stark, those harsh, pale planes ofhis face, straight nose and thin lips more potent in their full detail. He wore a black, close fitting T-shirt tucked into fitted black slacks. A small silver pendant of a stag's

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  head fused to a pentagram hung on a slender silver chain around his neck. His dark hair was swept off his forehead and tied back as it had been before, but it did not give him the veneer of civility such a style should have suggested.

  The short sleeves of his shirt revealed what she had felt last night. There was little

  softness to him, his muscles corded and lean, giving his body a tensile appearance. Strangely that made her heart hurt, as if she could stroke those arms, take away some of the tension and give him peace.

  Where the hell had that come from? She was not a soft woman. The man broke into her house and she was here to scope him out as a possible murder suspect. Yet there

  was something here, just like last night, something more she could not begin to define.