Dead Lift by Rachel Brady Read Free Book Online

Jeannie liked to read, as well as a collection of fitness magazines, photo albums, and a dog-eared copy of
How to Move On—After He Moves Out
, which struck me as odd since Claire had initiated her divorce.
    My cell phone rang. It was Jeannie.
    “Just turned onto her street,” she said. “Brought you a latte.”
    “Right after the laundry service van.” I started up the custom curved staircase. “The back door’s unlocked. I’m going upstairs.”
    Over my shoulder, I watched through an ornamental foyer window as Jeannie’s rental car rolled up the drive. She headed toward the back of the house, where I’d parked my old Taurus. I continued up the steps, headed for the master bedroom. Soon, the back door swung open, then shut, and Jeannie hollered out, “Helloooo?”
    I leaned over the balcony. “Nice digs, huh?”
    “Hell yeah.”
    “Come on up.”
    “In a minute. I’m starving.”
    I wondered what that had to do with coming upstairs. “You’re
not
going to eat her food.”
    “
She’s
not gonna.”
    Suction broke as she yanked open a refrigerator door and I turned away from the banister. Arguing was futile.
    Then, Jeannie screamed and there was a crash. She screamed again and I raced down the stairs.

Chapter Seven
    In the kitchen, I found Jeannie backed up against Claire’s granite island countertop, two spilled coffees and a broken dish at her feet. She stared, wide-eyed, into an open freezer and pointed.
    I rounded the corner, stepping around puddles and glass. Jeannie curled her lips into a disgusted snarl and pulled her eyes off whatever she’d found. “This lady’s a freak.”
    Fog whirled in front of us and I gazed, disbelieving, into the freezer. Nestled on a shelf of its own was a set of vacuum-sealed rats. Individually bagged, they’d been positioned in alternate directions so that each set of heads was separated by the long, naked tail of a neighbor.
    Too nauseated to speak, I turned away and pulled a long series of paper towels off a dispenser.
    She flung the door closed. “Right next to the Lean Cuisines and frozen spinach.”
    Together, we cleaned up the mess. Claire’s microwave clock showed that the time was nearing eleven.
    “We only have a half hour,” I said.
    She nodded. “What are we looking for?”
    “I’m not sure. Mainly I want to get a sense of her. But I’d also like to know if she had a history with Platt.”
    “Anything so far?”
    I shook my head. “Let’s look upstairs.”
    Four bedrooms opened off the second floor hall. Jeannie took the master suite and I turned the other direction and stepped into a gloomy room that obviously belonged to one of Claire’s boys. Navy blue walls sucked all the light from the space, but his twin bed was neatly made and even his desk was orderly. Again, I noticed that a computer was missing.
    The room’s centerpiece was what I estimated to be a two-hundred gallon aquarium tank set up to accommodate a fat brown snake. Coiled and still, it lay pressed into a corner of the glass and didn’t acknowledge me. A copy of
Your New Burmese Python
rested open, pages down, on the enclosure’s mesh lid and I was relieved to at least have an explanation for the frozen rats.
    Larger and brighter, the room next door belonged to the other son. Framed prints of airborne skateboarders, some in black-and-white, others in color, hung on the walls. I went from one to another and didn’t realize until the fourth image that the same boy was in all of them. A shelf with a dozen or so skateboarding trophies was mounted above a custom desk, fashioned to fit one corner of the room. Once again, there was no computer, but all the ancillary accessories were in place.
    Jeannie’s voice startled me. “What do you think?”
    I turned. She’d posed in the doorway holding a red silk evening gown on a hanger in front of her.
    “Unless that dress has a card attached that says ‘Love, Wendell’ I’m not impressed.”
    She frowned. “But—”
    “The woman