Serpent's Tooth. Michael R. Collings

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      When we hit the paved road on the other side of the bridge, we officially entered the town of Fox Creek.

      It’s a small place, really, especially to anyone used to the ‘big city’ as I was, but I was surprised how long it took us to pass through four of its five intersections. Luckily, the lights were green. As far as I could see, there was no other traffic.

      At the city limits, the state road turns into Main Street and continues under that name to the far side of the town, then it resumes its original moniker.

      We didn’t get that far.

      “Turn here,” Victoria instructed as we approached the fifth stop light. In “town talk,” that would be Avenue C, but again, once we passed the edge of town, it would continue as County Road 5A.

      “Ellises live along here, about three miles farther on.”

      We drove in silence. The county road was in better condition than the gravel track leading up to Victoria’s house, so there were fewer rattles and bumps. We didn’t see any more snakes, but I noticed a covey of redwing blackbirds perched on the cattails that grow in wild profusion between the roadbed and the nearest fields. The ground here would be swampy, damp even in August.

      Once a quail darted into the middle of the road, hesitated for an instant when it realized we were there, then, instead of dashing ahead and getting across in plenty of time for us to miss it, it suddenly decided to go back the way it had come. It spun around so fast—its low-slung, plump body on those ridiculously frail-looking stick legs—that it nearly toppled over.

      My front tires missed it by no more than a yard.

      Foolish bird.

      Victoria seemed not to have noticed the moment of comic by-play. Her hand was gripping the flap on her handbag again, and she was staring out the passenger window as if there were something of life-or-death seriousness happening in the passing fields.

      “It’s not much further,” Victoria said a few moments later. She pointed with one hand, finally releasing her grasp on her handbag. “Turn in at the first place. Down there.”

      Up ahead I could see two houses—traditional clapboard farmhouses, two stories high, with deeply set wrap-around porches, huge maples shading the front yards and gravel driveways leading to side doors. The two houses were perhaps two hundred yards apart. They might belong to different families—and from what little I could glean from Victoria’s few remarks, they did—but they were alike as twins.

      Form follows function, probably. Both were at least half a century old, perhaps older.

      We turned in at the first drive.

      Someone was waiting for us at the end.

      I must admit that my heart thumped a bit faster for an instant when I recognized Carver Ellis.

      Not that there is anything between us...romantically, I mean. Even if I were in the market for a boyfriend—much less a “significant other” (how I hate that phrase)—there would be nothing between us. Chronologically, he’s still pretty much just a kid, nearly a decade younger than my own twenty-nine years, but at times he seems even younger than that. I think there may be something developmentally not-quite-right. He’s not slow mentally, nothing like that, but occasionally there is the sense about him that he’s not as mature, not as adaptable to change or challenges, not as..., well, not as adult as his years would suggest.

      He’s often more child-like than I expect, frequently surprising me.

      Not childish. Just child-like. Innocent.

      Well, I suppose that innocent is not exactly the right word. But perhaps you know what I mean.

      Still, my heart flipped over one or two beats when I saw him standing there, waiting for us.

      Because Carver Ellis is beautiful.

      I know I shouldn’t use that word for a young man, but it is the only one that truly fits. Muscular in the all the right ways, the ways that suggest hard work, and lots of it, rather than narcissistic afternoon visits to a gym. Add to that a perfectly chiseled face. Startlingly blue eyes. Blond hair bleached almost white by daily exposure to the sun. Deep, even tan—I knew what his torso looked like because I had seen him once or twice shirtless as he worked around Victoria’s place, but I strongly suspected that not too far south of his waistline the tan would suddenly vanish.

      Not that I ever expected, or in fact wanted, to actually verify that by personal observation, but I knew that he supported his widowed mother and that there were more than enough calls for his skill as a handyman to keep him too busy to lounge around in the sun working on a tan.

      Yes, the boy was beautiful, but as I drove closer I noted something else.

      This morning, underneath his tan, his skin was almost deathly pallid. His face seemed drawn and his hair was disheveled, as if he had jumped out of bed and finger-combed it on his way out rather than spending any time in front of a mirror.

      And, closer yet, I could see that his hands were trembling.

      “Victoria,” I said, keeping my eyes on Carver’s distraught face, “what’s wrong.”

      “I don’t know for sure. Carver can be...well, scattered when he’s worried. And right now, I think he’s plenty worried.”

      She was out of the car before I turned the engine off, standing next to Carver with her hand on his shoulder...a bit of a reach, actually, since he was a good head taller than she was.

      I didn’t hear what she asked him, but by the time he answered I was almost even with Victoria and I heard him.

      I heard him just fine.

      “It’s Rick Johansson. From next door.

      “He’s dead.”

1. Devil’s Plague: A Mystery Novel, by Michael R. Collings / Driving Hell’s Highway: A Crime Novel, by Gary Lovisi (Borgo Press, 2011); Devil’s Plague: A Mystery Novel (Borgo Press, 2011, ebook).

      CHAPTER TWO

      “Dead! Oh, Carver, no.” Victoria’s voice sounded as distressed as I felt.

      She might have added, “Not again!” but she didn’t.

      I didn’t know anything about Rick Johansson, had never even heard his name until that moment, so news of his death, while sad, didn’t touch me very deeply. But I knew Carver, and I knew from first-hand experience how he responded to death.

      I even knew how he reacted when he was charged with causing a death.

      I had seen him accused of murder.

      He didn’t deserve to go through that again.

      “Are you sure?” Victoria was asking.

      Carver simply nodded, his eyes wide with...with what? Sorrow? Loss? Fear? Dread?

      I couldn’t read him.

      “Where СКАЧАТЬ