Free Bodies Are Where You Find Them by Brett Halliday

eyes were avid, and her lips brazenly invited his kiss.
    Shayne bent his head and touched his sore lips lightly to hers, tightening his arms about her. “I’m not in very good shape for kissing,” he warned her, “but otherwise I’m as good as any man.”
    “And better than ninety per cent, I’ll bet.” She pulled his head lower and pressed her moist lips against his bruised cheek, cooing, “Was some bad mans mean to you?”
    “Sort of.” Shayne turned toward the hibiscus hedge, keeping his arm around her waist. “Wouldn’t we be safer to get away from here?”
    “Not too far.” She went across the driveway with him, giggling excitedly. “Old Briggs’d have a conniption fit if she knew I’d slipped out. I’ll have to run if she starts calling for me.”
    There were informal flower beds beyond the hedge with garden seats scattered about beneath low, spreading coco palms. Shayne led the girl to a seat in the heavy shadows.
    She leaned against him when they sat down. “You’re a detective, aren’t you? I bet you’re just pretending to like me to find out things.”
    “Don’t be silly. You know you could make any man forget business.” Shayne pressed his cheek lightly against her hair. “You been working here long?”
    “Ever since they moved in. We all have.”
    “And I suppose you’re pretty much isolated here on the island,” Shayne said sympathetically. “But you get a day off now and then, don’t you?”
    “I’ll say we don’t. Old Briggs is a slave driver. She’s so ugly herself she’s jealous of any of the rest of us having a good time. All we get around here is work from morning till night. That’s the reason I went sort of all loose inside when you looked at me in there and I knew you liked a good time, too.” She turned against him and raised her face hungrily.
    Shayne touched his swollen lips to hers again. She caught his face between her palms and held it, gently touching the tip of her tongue to his bruised mouth. She drew away, laughing shakily. “Does that hurt?”
    “Soft as an angel’s wings,” Shayne told her throatily. “Couldn’t you slip away tonight—after they’ve all gone to bed?”
    “I might get away with it. Would you meet me, redhead?”
    “On the other side of the bridge—at midnight?”
    “Better make it later. Two o’clock. Briggs is always up till midnight. She gives Mrs. Stallings her medicine then.”
    “Is Mrs. Stallings really very ill?”
    “I guess she is, all right. She never comes out of her room. Mrs. Briggs is a trained nurse and she does everything for her. You know what I think? I think she’s a hop-head.”
    “Mrs. Briggs?”
    “No; Mrs. Stallings. I’ve seen Briggs sterilizing a hypodermic two or three times.”
    “Lots of nurses give their patients shots.”
    “But there’s something funny about it,” Lucile insisted. “Briggs tries to keep it a secret from the rest of us. Sometimes I think maybe it’s the girl uses it. She acts dopey enough, if you ask me.”
    “Helen?”
    “Yes. There’s something funny about her, all right. Boy, the things I could tell you if I was to cut loose.”
    “Go ahead,” Shayne encouraged her.
    “Damn you, you’re just working me for information. I ought to have known.” She jerked herself away from him.
    Shayne drew her back gently. “You’re crazy,” he said in a soft, indulgent voice. “You know the reason I’m not loving you to death. That’ll have to wait until later. We can keep our minds off of what we’re missing by talking about something else. Helen, for instance. She’s dopey, huh?”
    “Sort of nuts,” she answered, snuggling against him. “I don’t get her at all. And the way I’ve seen the old man looking at her— well!”
    “Stallings?”
    “The old goat.” Lucile pursed her lips resentfully. “If he gave me the eye like that—”
    “You’d give it right back to him, I’ll bet,” Shayne told her cheerfully. “You can’t blame Stallings so much.