Free Sweetheart by Chelsea Cain Page B

write a real book. A smart, compelling, illuminating book. Was that so terrible?
    “I didn’t mean to—” she started to say.
    Henry held up his hand. “Stop,” he said.
    A porch light came on, splashing yellow light into the darkness. The front door opened and an elderly woman appeared. She wore her gray hair loose and was wearing a wool button-down shirt decorated with Indian totems.
    “Yes?” she said.
    Henry stepped forward and showed her his badge. “Hello, ma’am. I’m Detective Sobol. I was hoping to ask you a couple of questions.” He smiled amiably. “Do you live here?”
    “Yes, son,” she said, her pale blue eyes alert and amused. “For fifty-four years now.”
    “Have you noticed anything strange lately?” Henry asked. He ran a hand over his bald head. “Activity in the woods?”
    The folds in her face deepened. “Is this connected to the senator’s death?”
    “No, ma’am,” he said. “We’ve found some remains in the woods.”
    “What sort of remains?” she asked.
    Henry cleared his throat. “Human.”
    The old woman turned and craned her head back toward the park. Then she looked over at Susan. Susan tried to smile amiably, too. “Is this your wife?” the woman asked Henry.
    Susan laughed out loud.
    “No, ma’am,” Henry said. “She’s a reporter.”
    Susan held up her notebook and wiggled her other hand in hello.
    Henry continued, shifting his weight uncomfortably. “Notice anything out of the ordinary? Hear anything? Smell anything?”
    Missing any relatives, Susan thought but didn’t say.
    The woman considered Henry’s questions. “Bill has been acting strange lately.”
    “Is that your husband?” Henry asked.
    “My standard poodle,” she said.
    Susan saw the corners of Henry’s mouth twitch up for an instant. “Strange, how?” Henry asked.
    The woman frowned. “He just stands in front of his doghouse. Barks some. Won’t let me near it.”
    “Do you let him run loose in the woods?” Henry asked.
    “He jumps the fence sometimes,” she said. “Always comes back, though.”
    “Where is Bill now?” Henry asked.
    She motioned for them to follow, and then led them around down an old brick path that ran along the side of the house. She was wearing sheepskin boots, and Susan noticed Henry move close in behind her, in case the old woman slipped on the uneven wet bricks. The path was lit with solar yard lights that cast a pale blue glow, but did little to provide illumination. However, the woman was steady on her feet and didn’t miss a step.
    They came to a gate in the cedar fence that boxed in the backyard and the woman opened it, and the gate swung in with a rusty sigh. There weren’t any lights back there and it was dark. Henry snapped his flashlight back on as the woman disappeared into the blackness.
    “Ma’am?” Henry said.
    A floodlight turned on, revealing an ivy-clotted backyard, and the woman appeared on her back stoop.
    “Bill,” she said to the backyard, “I’ve brought a friend to meet you.”
    Susan searched the yard for the poodle. The ivy from the park had crawled over the fence and snaked halfway across the yard. It was like some sort of intractable green tide. You could chop it back, sure, but it would just keep creeping forward, an inch a day, until it covered everything again. Susan heard a dog bark and she realized that the doghouse was half-covered with ivy, too. A large black poodle stood in the doghouse’s open doorway. The dog had been recently groomed and his coat had been trimmed into a series of lumps and balls, a weird living topiary.
    Susan saw Henry wince. “Is Bill friendly?” he asked.
    “As a lamb,” the woman said.
    Henry shook his head, set his shoulders, and walked toward the doghouse.
    Bill growled.
    Henry stopped. “As a lamb?” he asked.
    “Don’t let him intimidate you, son,” the woman said. “You don’t have a cat, do you?”
    “I have three cats,” Henry said.
    The woman clucked. “Bill doesn’t