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A Dollhouse to Die For(111)

By:Cate Price


            A broken wine bottle lay on the ground nearby.





Chapter Nineteen





I swallowed hard and gripped Jasper’s leash to hold him back. Chip was still wearing the same workout gear from yesterday, minus his knit cap. His Lycra pants were saturated with dew as if he’d been lying there all night. I closed my eyes briefly against the sickening sight of his blood-streaked face.

            I fumbled for my phone, thanking God that I’d had the foresight to put it in my pocket today. I ripped my gloves off, shoved them in my pocket, and dialed 911.

            After I’d been assured that the police were en route, Jasper and I ran toward the house. My screams and banging on their front door finally roused the Browns, and Sam came stumbling out, with Dottie close behind. A young man also ran over from next door just as sirens sounded in the distance.

            With a strangled cry, Sam charged toward the patch.

            “Stop, Sam! Don’t go any closer, this is a crime scene now,” I called.

            The young neighbor grabbed him and held him back while Sam tried his best to wrestle free. I came up behind them for a better look at the hideous tableau.

            Chip must have fallen on the pumpkin in the final throes of death, perhaps scrambling to get away from his killer, and the weight of his body had ripped the thick vine away from the enormous fruit, depriving Georgia of her life-giving food source.

            All those countless hours, days and weeks of caring for her, lost in an instant.

            “That bastard! Let me at him. I’ll kill him.” Sam was beyond distraught at the devastation, tears streaming down his face.

            “For God’s sake, Sam,” Dottie cried, “he’s already dead.”

            Tears filled my throat, too. Georgia’s swollen skin looked like it was actually weeping from the wound.

            I wondered what kind of awful thing it said about me that I was more upset about the loss of a giant pumpkin than a human being.

            The sun broke its watery way through the haze, lifting the dense fog. The first officers to arrive had already begun marking the area with crime scene tape and asking us to move back when Serrano came roaring up in his Dodge Challenger. He strode over to the body, giving me a “wait right there” signal as he passed.

            I pulled out my phone again and left a frantic message on the machine for Joe.

            Ronnie the psychic ducked under the tape and came hurrying up to me, wearing a silk floral robe and purple pajamas. “I knew it, Daisy! Didn’t I tell you something bad was going to happen? I had one of my funny turns again. I couldn’t sleep a wink last night.”

            Without the orange caked-on makeup, she looked prettier, even in the harsh light of day. Older, but prettier. Her hair was wadded into blond clumps where she’d slept on it.

            Jasper snuck his nose under her robe and breathed deeply.

            “I don’t believe this.” Serrano stalked back and addressed the officer near me who had a roll of tape in his hands. “This is supposed to be a crime scene. Ever hear of securing the area?”

            “Sorry, sir.” He waved his hands helplessly. “But it’s a whole punkin patch.”

            “I can see what the frick it is. Just do it.”

            Eleanor slipped through the space between the two men and stepped into the garden. She wore a white T-shirt, gray yoga pants, and her feet were bare.

            Serrano ran a hand across his head.

            “Oh, well, now it’s a fricking party. Anyone else out there want to come in?” he yelled as he made an exaggerated show of looking up and down the street.