The Doomsday Girl Read online

  “That doesn’t sound very scientific,” she said.

  “Go hire a scientist if that’s what you want,” I replied, and walked out the front door. I was halfway to my truck before I heard Walter huffing behind me. “I’m sorry, there, hold on, please, just allow me a moment.”

  “Yes?”

  He had lost his breath during the short trot to catch up with me. “Bear with me, please.” He bent at the waist and put his hands on his knees and gulped air until he straightened and said, “It’s my heart, you know.”

  “Are you okay?”

  “Yes, I think so. I’m just not a young man anymore.” He smiled bravely, then said, “I want to apologize for Lillian. This situation has been incredibly hard on her. And on me, too. But she’s handling it differently than I am. She’s become, well, more difficult. Please understand.”

  “What is it you want from me, Walter?”

  “Come back and finish with Lillian. She’ll be cordial, I assure you.”

  I sighed and looked past him at the darkening skies above the lake. The temperature had dropped, and it was no more than twenty degrees outside. Walter wrapped his arms around himself and stepped in place, like a child who needed to urinate.

  “All right,” I said. I wanted the job, and in the back of my mind I was already chiding myself for my impatience. Sure, the woman was caustic, but I could typically handle much more than she’d doled out.

  We walked quickly back to the condo and went inside. Lillian was waiting in her seat at the kitchen table. She looked at me, her jaw clenched and her lips parted, showing a chipped front tooth.

  “I’m told you’ve killed many men,” she said.

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “You heard me. The crimes against my family were committed by parties I wouldn’t consider human. I need to hire someone who is ready, willing, and able to deal with their kind. That’s why I called you.”

  “Do you intend to hire me, or not?”

  “I have just one more question, Mr. Reno. Can you find who murdered my son-in-law, and find my granddaughter?”

  I looked down and considered the different ways I might answer that. Then I met her stare and said, “No problemo.”

  CHAPTER 2

  After a brief discussion concerning my rates, which Lillian frowned at before conceding they would pay whatever it took, I asked where their daughter was.

  “The doctors only released her from the hospital two weeks ago,” Walter said. “She was in a coma for four weeks after the attack.”

  “She’s recovering,” Lillian said flatly. “There doesn’t seem to be any permanent damage.”

  “When can I speak with her?” I asked.

  “I’ll go see if she’s up to it,” Walter said, and walked to a hallway leading to bedrooms.

  “Wait a minute,” I said. “She’s here?”

  “Where else do you think she’d be?” Lillian replied.

  I didn’t answer, and a minute later a young woman in purple sweatpants and a long-sleeved pastel blue shirt followed Walter into the kitchen. She had long brown hair parted on the side and a curvy, full-bodied figure. Her face was pretty, her nose freckled and her lips full. She could be considered either sexy or wholesome, depending on one’s inclinations.

  “This is our daughter, Melanie,” Walter said.

  “Hello,” I said, standing. “I’m Dan Reno.”

  “Hi,” she said. Her large brown eyes met mine briefly before she looked toward her mother.

  “Melanie, we’ve decided to hire Mr. Reno, to find Mia and to find out who murdered Jeffrey,” Lillian said.

  “Sit here, honey,” Walter said, pulling back a chair at the head of the table.

  We were all silent for a moment, until Lillian said, “Please proceed.”

  “Your parents tell me you were in a coma,” I said. “Do you remember anything of what happened?”

  “Yes, I remember most of it, I think.”

  “Can you describe the intruders who came into your home?”

  “It was two men,” she said, her hands in her lap. “One was black, one white. They wore masks, so I couldn’t see their faces.”

  “Can you tell me what they said?”

  She glanced up at me, and her eyes flickered with uncertainty. “They pointed guns at us and demanded to know where the gold was. When my husband Jeff didn’t answer, they tied us up. We were sitting there, tied to our dining room chairs.” She closed her eyes and put her fingertips to her forehead.

  I looked over at Lillian’s expressionless face. “Please continue, Melanie,” she said.

  “They kept asking Jeff where the gold was, and Jeff kept saying he had none. The white guy did most of the talking. But then the black man had a knife and told Jeff he had one last chance.” She blew out her breath.

  “And then?” I said.

  “Jeff was screaming and the black man was cutting him. And then I was unconscious, and that’s all I remember.”

  I leaned forward in my chair. “Do you have any suspicions who these men were, or why they targeted you and your husband?”

  She shook her head. “No. The gold thing made no sense. I mean, Jeff said eventually gold would be our safe haven, but we needed all our money to run the business. It was all in the bank.”

  I looked around the table. Walter’s eyes were wide behind his spectacles, and he stared at me eagerly, as if hoping I’d say something reassuring. Lillian was still as a statue, her thoughts hidden for the moment. Melanie sat in her chair and moved her hair back from her forehead with a ringed finger.

  “My daughter is gone too,” she said, her voice breaking. “And I want to go home.”

  ******

  An hour later it was full dark, and the lake was as black as the moonless sky. Tree trunks and frozen boughs flashed in my headlights as I drove back to South Lake Tahoe. On the seat next to me were two pages of handwritten notes Melanie had compiled over the last two weeks, since regaining consciousness. The blow to her head had fractured her skull and ruptured an eardrum. Her four-week coma had been managed by a medical team in Las Vegas, as they worked to reduce swelling in her cranial cavity. The doctors considered it a minor miracle that she’d recovered with no detectable permanent damage. She had been airlifted by helicopter to Las Vegas after a UPS employee arrived to make a delivery, and then called police when he found their front door wide open and saw the house had been ransacked. This house, where Melanie had lived with her late husband and missing daughter, was in Cedar City, Utah. It was a small town about 170 miles northeast of Las Vegas.

  When I got home, Candi was sitting on the couch, her legs tucked beneath her, our fuzz-ball gray cat on her lap.

  “Hi, doll. Hi, Smokes,” I said.

  “Hey, you, I made a salad and put a pizza in the oven.” She lifted Smoky and set him aside, then took her ceramic Sherlock Holmes pipe from the ashtray on the coffee table. “What have you been up to?” she asked, placing a small bud of marijuana in the pipe bowl.

  “I just got hired for a new case.”

  “Really? What kind?” She lit up and walked to a partially opened window and exhaled out the screen. Her feet were bare, and she wore tight jeans molded to her hips. I walked up behind her.

  “I’ll probably be gone most of next week.” I put my hands on her waist and kissed her neck.

  She leaned into me, pushing her shapely rear into my crotch. “No, I don’t think that’s acceptable,” she murmured.

  “A man’s got to make a living,” I said, cupping her breasts.

  “The pizza’s gonna burn,” she said.

  I followed her into the kitchen and checked the oven. “Where are you going?” she asked.

  “Cedar City, Utah. It’s about an eight-hour drive, as long as it doesn’t snow.”

  “Is that near Salt Lake?”

  “No, it’s in southern Utah, down toward the Nevada-Arizona border.”

  “What’s going on out there?”

  I paused. I was alway
s hesitant to share sordid details with Candi. Even though she rarely protested the nature of my work, I saw no reason to burden her. But I didn’t want to appear evasive, or worse, outright lie.

  “A man was murdered by robbers, supposedly. His wife survived, but their ten-year-old daughter vanished, presumed kidnapped.”

  “Yikes. Why do you always get these kinds of cases?”

  “I don’t always. They said I was recommended.”

  “By whom?”

  “I don’t know.” I began chopping a cucumber and tossing the slices into the salad bowl on the counter. When she didn’t say anything, I put down the knife and turned toward her. “I don’t always get to be choosy about my jobs. I don’t feel right when I don’t work.”

  She opened the oven and set the pizza on a woodblock next to the stove. Then she came close and grasped my hands.

  “That’s what makes you the man you are,” she said. “And you never have to apologize to me for that.” She began leading me to our bedroom.

  “The pizza will get cold,” I said.

  “We’ll heat it up.”

  *******

  Afterward, I lay on the bed and watched Candi walk naked to the closet. She had dark brown hair, but her nipples were pink. Her stomach swelled gently before it flattened above her light pubic hair, and her ass was heart-shaped below her thin waist. Standing on her tiptoes to reach something in the closet, her thighs and calves looked sleek and perfectly proportioned. Then she bent to pick up her panties from the floor, and I said, “Too much.”

  “Excuse me?” she said.

  “Nothing. Just talking to myself.”

  “Were you checking me out?”

  “Maybe.”

  “Hmm,” she said. “We’ll have to see if we can cure that.” She climbed back on the bed and straddled me.

  “I guess I deserve this,” I said.

  “You sure do.”

  ******

  After we finally dressed and finished dinner, I was packing my clothes and loading my truck when my cell rang.

  “Dan Reno,” I answered.

  “Mr. Reno, it’s Lillian McDermott. What time are you leaving tomorrow?”

  “First thing in the morning.”

  “Good. I’d like you to stop by here first and pick up Melanie.”

  “What for?”

  “She’s become adamant about returning home tomorrow. We looked into flights to Las Vegas, but driving would be quicker, all things considered.”

  “You want me to drive her to Cedar City?”

  “No, I don’t want you to drive her. She wants you to. She’s insistent upon it.”

  “It’s an unusual request.”

  “You are under my employ, correct, Mr. Reno?”

  “You’ve hired me to investigate the murder of your daughter’s husband and the disappearance of your granddaughter. I wasn’t aware that included taxi service.”

  “Are you saying you won’t drive her?”

  I took a moment before answering. “No, it’s okay. Tell her I’ll be there at eight-thirty tomorrow morning.”

  “Good. She’ll be ready.”

  ******

  When I woke the next morning, the house was cold. I rekindled and stoked the stove, then made coffee. While it brewed I stepped out onto my back porch. Blowing puffs of vapor into the frigid air, I surveyed the sky. A roil of dark clouds loomed to the west, but it was still clear over the mountaintops. I suspected it would snow later in the day, but by then I’d be beyond the brunt of the storm, heading southeast across Nevada’s Great Basin Desert.

  I had breakfast and watched the fire dance behind the stove glass. The flames cast a shimmering pattern against the furniture in my living room. When Candi moved in a year and a half ago, she’d replaced my old couch with a leather sectional, added a modern easy chair that we rarely used, and covered the walls with various art, including her own paintings. In short order she’d transformed the interior of my three-bedroom-two-bath A-frame home from nondescript into something eclectic and inviting. In quiet moments, I still found myself marveling at the living room, as if the décor was an extension of what she meant to my life.

  By the time I’d dressed and was ready to hit the road, Candi had risen and was sitting at the kitchen table drinking coffee. Smoky sat by her feet, his long gray fur impeccably groomed. Candi would not allow him outdoors because of the coyotes.

  “I should know better, but how long do you think you’ll be gone?” she asked.

  “Around a week. Hopefully not longer.”

  She stood and gave me a brief hug. “Be safe and call me,” she said.

  “Of course, babe.” I gave her a final squeeze and a quick peck on the cheek, then went to the garage and backed out my truck. I’d bungee corded my suitcase to the bed, and my gear bag was stowed in the locked steel box welded behind the cab.

  As I drove out of town and around the lake, I wondered what it would be like sharing the long drive with Melanie. Would she be quiet and shy, or perhaps energized and chatty? I’d prefer the latter, because I was sure there was more she could tell me. Her two pages of notes had posed more questions than answers. But I didn’t know if her injury had left her memory fully intact. I guessed I’d find out soon enough.

  I pulled into the lakeside condo parking lot right on time and knocked on the McDermotts’ door. Melanie opened the door as if she’d been waiting there. To her side were two large suitcases. She looked at me expectedly. Lillian McDermott appeared behind her, followed by Walter.

  “Good morning,” I said. “Ready to go?”

  “I’d like to have a word with you first, Mr. Reno,” Lillian said. “In private.”

  “All right.” I went into the house and followed Lillian to a room where a sliding glass door faced the lake. The waters were gray and the tiny white caps looked fringed with ice.

  “Melanie has been through a lot, as you know,” Lillian said. “Walter and I originally planned to accompany her back to Cedar City. Unfortunately, we have pressing business that will keep us here at least another forty-eight hours. We pleaded with Melanie to wait for us, and allow herself more time to heal. But she insists she’s fine, and is unwilling to delay her return.”

  We stood side by side, looking out at the beach. After a moment, Lillian turned toward me. “My daughter’s life has been invaded by unspeakable evil, and we don’t know if any danger still exists. But she is ready to reclaim her life, as she must.”

  I started to respond, but Lillian stopped me with her piercing, steely blue eyes. “These men who killed her husband, and maybe her daughter—they must be found. If my granddaughter is still alive, she must be found, and returned to Melanie. The police force in Cedar City, if they can truly be called a police force, has proven woefully inadequate. I don’t know exactly what they’ve done, but I can tell you it’s not much.”

  “I understand.”

  “As for Melanie, know this: she is my only child, and she must be protected, above all else. Again, I don’t know what threat may lurk in Cedar City, but I’m not at all comfortable with her returning so soon.”

  “It is her home,” I said.

  “Yes, and she needs to live there, or try to sell that… property.” Lillian shook her head and her lips turned downward.

  “Is there anything else?” I asked.

  “I suppose not.” She turned toward the door.

  “Mrs. McDermott, you said I came recommended. By whom?”

  “An investigator we spoke to in San Jose. A massive bear of a man. Cody Gibbons, if I remember his name correctly. He said he was too busy, but this case would be right up your alley. Those were his exact words.”

  I stared at her silently for a moment. “You know him, I take it?” she said.

  “Yes,” I replied. “I know him.”

  We walked out to the main room. Melanie wore blue jeans, pink trail shoes, and she’d put on a thick jacket with a fur collar. She opened the front door and pulled one of her suitcases down the st
ep. I grabbed her second bag, but Walter stopped me.

  “Please,” he said. “We’re counting on you.”

  I shook his hand and squeezed a little harder than I meant. Then I patted him on the shoulder and walked out the door.

  CHAPTER 3

  Sitting quietly in my passenger seat, Melanie didn’t seem eager to chat. In fact, within a minute of taking off, I saw her eyes were closed, and I heard her deep, rhythmic breathing. I let her doze as we wound around the lake, then into South Lake Tahoe. It was only after we’d crested Kingsbury Grade and dropped out of the mountains that she stirred.

  “I’m sorry, I guess I’m really tired. I didn’t sleep much last night,” she said. She wore a white ski beanie over her auburn hair.

  “You’ve been asleep for an hour.”

  “The doctors said I might take more naps than usual. Where are we?”

  “West of Gardnerville.” We were on a long, straight section of road traversing pastures that stretched as far as I could see. To either side, cattle grazed on the sparse vegetation that rose through the snow. Behind us a series of granite peaks loomed, the ridges jagged and streaked with white.

  She removed her shoes and tucked one leg beneath her. “So much empty land,” she said.

  “There’s a lot more of that to come.”

  “It’s kind of pretty, I guess.”

  “I figure we’ll stop for lunch in Tonopah. It’s about the halfway point.”

  “What’s in Tonopah?”

  “Not much. It’s an old mining town in the middle of Nevada.”

  “Oh,” she said.

  We drove in silence for a while before she spoke again. “Did you read my notes?” she asked.

  “Yes.”

  “Don’t you have any questions?”

  “Yeah,” I said, but her two pages seemed little more than a smattering of disjointed thoughts, and I wasn’t sure where to start.

  “Maybe it’d be easier if you just tell me about your life with your husband and daughter.”

  “Well, okay,” she said, and for the first time I saw a modest smile on her face. She had white, even teeth, and her brown eyes had a certain sparkle. She was quite pretty, I decided.