Dead is the New Black Read online

  “Hi,” I said, offering a cordial smile. “I’m Stephanie Scott. Lucy said that Dr. Van Graf—”

  “I be the cook. You’re a troll.” She thrust a pudgy little hand at me. As with just about everyone else I’d met in the house, she had a heavy accent. Hers seemed to be Scandinavian…ish.

  Unsure I’d heard her words correctly, I shook her hand, which turned out to be damp and a little sticky, and said, “I didn’t quite get that. Did you say I’m a…troll?”

  “Nej. She’s my sister. I’m a goon.”

  “Oh? You’re a goon?” I blinked, hoping it would help clear up my sudden-onset hearing disorder. “But I thought you said you’re a troll.”

  “Ja.”

  “Uh. Okay. Is your sister a troll or a goon?”

  “She was troll like me, ’til she married dat goon fella.”

  “Okay. Your sister’s a goon.”

  “Ja. I’m a goon.”

  “But I thought you said you’re a troll.”

  “Ja,” she shouted. “You’re a troll!”

  Apparently, what we had here was a failure to communicate, so I decided to cut to the chase. “Dr. Van Graf asked me to meet him in the study. Is he—?”

  “Nej.”

  My ears rang. My brain hurt. I wanted to weep in frustration. I glanced around, desperate to locate an interpreter. Just where was Dr. Van Graf? Perhaps this was some kind of welcoming prank and any minute, Van Graf would jump out from behind the door and he and this cook person would regale me with laughter.

  Or perhaps this was a test to measure how well I could cope with an alien life-form.

  “Well,” I said finally. “In any case, I’m pleased to meet you.”

  I think.

  The Scandihoovian woman-cum-cook-cum-troll-cum-goon opened the door to allow me inside the study. Like an angry drill sergeant, she pointed straight-armed at one of several chairs by the fireplace.

  “Sit,” she ordered. “Wait here. The doctor was called to der phone. He to be with you directly.” With a sharp nod apparently intended to indicate her departure, she stormed out of the study, slamming the door behind her.

  By comparison, the silence she left in her wake was deafening.

  As directed, I sat and waited for my employer to make his appearance, hoping it would be sooner rather than later. I wanted to get back up to my room and make sure Mom was okay. And I still needed to call my kids.

  I’m a troll. No, you’re a troll. I’m a goon and you’re a troll. I’m a troll and you’re a troll and I’m a goon and you’re a—

  Oh. I sat straight up. That’s it. Names. Those were names. Ura Troll was the cook and her sister was Ima Goon.

  Sisters.

  Very, very weird sisters.

  In fact, everyone I’d crossed paths with since arriving that morning—with the sort-of exception of Dr. Van Graf—was weird. None had threatened me or made me feel in danger, it was my own idea of who they were and what they were that gnawed at my fears.

  I sat back into the deep cushions of the chair and tried to relax as I let my gaze wander.

  The study was enormous, classically appointed in mahogany paneling and gilt-framed oil paintings. Two walls were lined floor-to-ceiling with shelves containing thousands of leather-bound volumes. Additional bookcases filled the middle of the room creating alcoves and aisles, much like an enormous public library. Five multipaned windows along the south wall would beautifully illuminate the room during the day, but with the night and the storm, they appeared more like shiny black etchings, each one uniquely designed by frost and wind and wandering snowflakes.

  Brass and leaded glass lamps cast the room in muted light, adding to the coziness, while several brocade-covered wingchairs stood gathered in a semicircle in front of the blazing fire.

  What a room. I loved it.

  I settled down into my chair—the one closest to the fire —wondering how long I would have to wait for my new employer to arrive. For a moment, I thought to seek out La Troll, but then remembered Wolf’s warning not to wander through the house. I had no idea what the layout of the place was, but given its size, I would surely get myself lost. So I’d simply bide my time and—

  What was that?

  I bolted out of the chair and turned toward the bookcases.

  There it was again. A noise. A sort of groan?

  Holding my breath, I waited, listened, but all was silent—except for the sound of my heart slamming against my eardrums. The fire popped, and I jumped. A log fell into the ashes creating a hissing sound, like the warning of a startled snake.

  So, had I heard a noise? I wasn’t sure I had now, but, no, well, yes, I really had heard something. It hadn’t been my imagination. Maybe a book fell over on a shelf.

  “H-hello?” I ventured. Silence. “Is someone there?” Nothing.

  Shit. I was going to have to go look. See for myself whether it was just a fallen book or some kind of brain fart and I hadn’t really heard anything at all.

  Slow-w-w-ly I turned…

  Step by step…

  Inch by inch…

  I crept toward where I thought the sound had come from. Peeking around the last bookcase, my “Anybody there?” clogged in my throat.

  My blood froze.

  I could not move.

  Barely able to speak, all I could manage was a whispery, “Help? Somebody? Help?”

  Chapter 6

  I didn’t scream. I don’t have a pretty scream. Mine’s more like a raspy choke. Not musical in the least, nor high and girly. More like a quarterback calling an audible before the ball’s snapped.

  I shut my mouth and stepped cautiously toward the man who lay sprawled between two bookcases. His face was turned away so I couldn’t see his features clearly.

  What I did see…was blood. Lots of blood.

  Bright red blood covered half his face—the half that had obviously taken quite a blow.

  Was he really dead? He sure looked dead.

  Had that Troll person killed him and left me behind to take the blame?

  Kneeling, I was able to see him better. It was not Dr. Van Graf.

  I surprised myself by giving an involuntary sigh of relief, thankful it had not been my handsome new employer.

  It wasn’t Wolf or Igor or anybody I’d ever seen before.

  Okay. Okay, Steph. The ball’s in your court. What would Debby Destiny do?

  Body on floor. Blood. Signs of violence.

  Look for signs of life.

  I was sure no Debby Destiny, but Debby was fiction and I was human and I was here. It was up to me to do something for this guy, if I could.

  I sucked in a deep breath and placed two shaky fingers on the victim’s carotid artery. Nothing. I checked his wrist. No matter what I did, I could not find a heartbeat.

  He was dead.

  Placing my open hand on his chest, I could feel he was still warm, so he couldn’t have been dead for long. Was that noise I’d heard his last gasp before dying? If I’d found him even minutes earlier, might I have saved his life?

  My head felt light, as if my brains had grown wings and fluttered away leaving me with an empty skull. My muscles deserted me, too, weakening me so my butt plopped down on the floor next to the dead man. I rested my back against the bookcase for fear I’d faint and keel over.

  As I worked hard to normalize my breathing, I let my gaze evaluate the victim.

  Dead guy was around thirty or so. Good looking, a male model type. Except for the dent in the side of his head and the blood on the carpet, he might just as well have been sleeping.

  “Stephanie?”

  I just about jumped out of my skin, jerking my attention to the end of the row where Dr. Van Graf stood glaring down at me.

  When had he come into the study?

  Had he been here all along?

  Had he killed this man while I’d waited in front of the fire?

  Dr. Van Graf’s expression was unreadable as he stepped forward, taking my arm and helping me to m
y feet. I was in shock, or I probably wouldn’t have let him anywhere near me, but his touch was gentle, his hand strong. Standing so near him, I could feel the heat from his body and wanted to curl into it for shelter and reassurance.

  But he could be a murderer. If so, would he kill me now?

  I started to pull away from him, but he tightened his grip on my arm. He didn’t hurt me, but it was clear he was not going to let me go.

  “Are you okay, Stephanie?” Dr. Van Graf’s blue eyes narrowed as he studied me, surely looking for signs of impending hysteria.

  Not only am I not a screamer, I’m not given to hysterics, either, so I slowly nodded, assuring him without words that I was all right. But to be fair, I’d never before discovered the body of a murder victim, so when I did try to speak, my throat was so dry, all I could get out was a high-pitched, “He-he-he-he-he.” I sounded like a hyena on helium. Swallowing, I tried again and managed to choke, “He’s dead.”

  Thank you, Mrs. Obvious.

  Releasing my arm, Van Graf knelt and put his fingers to the guy’s neck. His jaw clenched, he bit out, “Dammit.”

  I stammered, “Who-who-who?”

  Thank you, woodsy owl.

  Van Graf rose and turned to face me. “His name’s Percy Usher. He’s an actor. I’m sorry you had to be the one to find him, Stephanie.” His brows lowered. “This must be quite a shock. Are you sure you’re all right?”

  It was then I noticed something was not quite right about the doctor’s sweater. At first, I thought the bulky knit might have picked up a bit of lint, but on closer scrutiny, I could see it wasn’t lint at all.

  The specks were red. Blood red.

  Without thinking, I raised my hand, touched one of them. It smeared. Holding my hand in front of my face, I studied it, unwilling to accept what it was.

  A small spray of blood had splattered on Van Graf’s shoulder.

  Fresh blood.

  I lowered my hand and took a step back, away from my employer.

  His eyes focused on my finger. Slowly, he lifted his gaze to meet mine.

  “Dr. Van Graf?”

  He said nothing.

  “You have s-something on your sweater.”

  He remained silent, just staring at my hand.

  On a teensy, tiny breath, I squeaked, “You didn’t kill this guy, did you?”

  I wanted to run, but there was nowhere to go. Van Graf was bigger than I, faster, stronger. If I’d spotted him at a party or some kind of social function, all those attributes would have made him really hot, but as things were, he was a vampire with spots of blood on his sweater and a dead man sprawled on the floor of his study.

  “Stephanie?”

  I took another step away from the doctor, but had to stop when my behind met the bookshelf behind me.

  “Stephanie,” he repeated. “Please look at me.”

  I raised my gaze, met his, felt my cheeks heat. If I were quick, I could make a run for the door, flinging hefty volumes at him as I went to slow him down.

  Now, if I had written this little scenario for a couple of Debby Destiny’s clients, my readers would know that Dr. Van Graf was not a killer, because he was the hero and I was the heroine, and we were meant to fall in love and live HEA. The murderer would most likely be some superfluous character like Igor or Wolf, and the presence of those spots of blood on my hero’s sweater would have a logical explanation having nothing to do with murder most foul.

  Besides, if he’d just committed murder, wouldn’t there be a lot more blood on his sweater than a few droplets? Well, wouldn’t there?

  “I didn’t do this, Steph,” my erstwhile hero said. “But I’ll need your help to find out who did.”

  My help?

  “My help?” With slow deliberation, I slid my right hand behind my butt and grabbed the biggest tome my fingers touched, praying it was Stephen King’s The Stand, which clocked in at a hefty 1153 pages. If Van Graf made a move toward me, I would at least have a fighting chance, slamming his face with a pound or two of hardcover fiction, stunning him long enough to escape.

  He tilted his head slightly. “It won’t work.”

  I swallowed, tightened my grip on the book. “What won’t work, Doctor?”

  “Call me Jon, Stephanie.”

  “What won’t work, Jon Stephanie?”

  He chuckled. “Hitting me with that book you’ve got hold of. Even if you managed to get it off the shelf without dropping it, I’m pretty quick and—”

  Yanking the book free, I swung my arm, smacking the volume into his shoulder. Thwaak. It was like hitting a concrete wall with a sponge.

  “Oh, wow. Ouch.” There was laughter in his blue eyes and an infuriatingly sarcastic tone in his voice. “Put that damn book down before somebody gets hurt.”

  “Like you, you mean?” I challenged. “Move aside or I’ll hit you again, Jon.”

  I don’t know how it happened, but one moment the book was in my hand and the next it was in his. Turning the volume, he read the title aloud. “The Collected Works of Stephenie Meyer. Hey, thanks. I’ve been looking all over for this.”

  His brow furrowed as he looked at the book, then back at me.

  “Your name’s Stephanie. Is this one of yours?”

  “Mm-hm,” I mumbled. “Sure is.”

  He reached for me and curled his long fingers around my wrist. I started to pull away when he said, “I’m not going to hurt you. Look at me. Trust me.”

  Call me an idiot…

  You’re an idiot!

  Thank you. But I wanted to trust him. Hoped I could. Needed to.

  “Let’s sit down,” he urged. “This is a crime scene. We don’t want to disturb it more than we already have.”

  As he tugged me along the aisle and out into the main part of the study, I said, “Are you going to call the police?”

  “Eventually.”

  The fire crackled and popped in greeting as we took our seats. “Why wait?” I asked. “If you didn’t kill Percy—”

  “I told you,” he interrupted. “I did not kill anyone. Hell, I didn’t even know Usher. Only met him briefly yesterday. What possible motive would I have? Besides…” He paused and seemed to search for words. “I have an alibi.”

  I straightened in my chair and eyed him. “An alibi? What kind of alibi?”

  “I was with someone.” He cleared his throat and said softly, “A lady.”

  Narrowing my gaze on him, I said, “Well, since you were with someone, why did you send Lucy to get me? Why was the cook waiting for me here instead of you? And why does she yell everything?”

  He shifted in his chair and with a small shake of his head, said, “I can’t elaborate on your first two questions, but I can tell you that Miss Troll is nearly deaf. She resists getting a hearing aid because she thinks it will make her look old, and since English is her second language, she yells because she’s afraid she might be misunderstood.”

  I flattened my mouth. “She called me a troll.” I shrugged. “At least, I thought she did. At first.”

  He appeared more amused than surprised. But just as quickly, his expression turned serious again.

  “I do have an alibi, Stephanie, but it would be awkward for the lady in question to come forward. You must trust me or we’ll never get past your assumption that I killed Usher and find out who did.”

  So what then? His lover was married? He was having an affair with a married woman? I was being asked to trust a man who was lying and cheating with a married woman?

  I felt my blood pressure start to rise. I was experiencing a reaction to Jon’s explanation that caught me by surprise. For some reason, I felt a tiny cramp in my heart. I was disappointed in him. Despite his being a vampire and a possible murderer, someplace deep inside, I’d wanted him to be a good guy. But he wasn’t a good guy. He was a user, just like my ex-husband.

  “Well, if you didn’t do it,” I snapped, “and if you have an alibi, why aren’t you going to call the police?”

  “
For one thing,” he said, leaning back into his chair. “With this storm, they won’t even be able to get here until it stops snowing and the roads are cleared. By the time that happens, whoever did kill Usher could be long gone.”

  “And for another thing?”

  He arched his brows. “I’m a Vampire, Stephanie. The local yokel cops will automatically assume I did it, and stop looking for the real killer. And since we don’t know why Usher was killed, the murderer could have another murder planned. We have to figure out who it is, gather evidence, identify and isolate the murderer, and then call the authorities.”

  I studied him for a moment. “Okay. Let’s say, just for the sake of argument, that you didn’t do it. Who had a motive to kill him? What was he doing in the study? Was he here to get a book or was he lured here for the express purpose of killing him? Was it an argument with someone that turned violent, or—”

  “Hang on,” he interrupted. “The first thing we have to do is get everyone in the house together and tell them what happened. Watch their reactions to the news. Since we don’t know exactly what time Usher was attacked, the best we can do for now is find out who saw him alive last and nail down that time.”

  I considered this. “He might have been attacked hours ago and just lay there, dying. Actually, I think…I think…he may even still have been alive when I came into the study. As I was waiting for you, I heard a sound. I thought it was my imagination or that a book had toppled from a shelf or something, and when I went to check, there he was. I’d hate to think he was still alive, and that I might have been able to do something to help him.”

  No question about it, I was still in shock. I know I felt uncertain and confused. In my wildest dreams, I never would have believed I’d be involved in a real murder, or working for a man I wanted to trust, wanted to believe, but couldn’t simply take it for granted that he was innocent.

  “I’m sorry, Stephanie. Truly. For your sake, I’m so sorry this happened.”

  “Well,” I muttered, crossing my arms, “I imagine Percy Usher feels a little more regret than you do.”

  He stood. “I’m going to have Leech assemble everyone in the parlor in fifteen minutes. I want you there.”