Dead In Red Read Free Page A

eyes, but the overall effect
was not detrimental. Dressed in a denim skirt and peasant blouse,
she was the epitome of Southwest fashion from her
silver-and-turquoise squash-blossom necklace to her tooled leather
boots.
    “Just looking around,” I said lamely, and
staggered back up the hillock, with Richard following me.
    “This is not public property. I’m the owner,
and unless you’re a mill customer, I’ll have to ask you to
leave.”
    “Cyn Taggert—is that you?” Richard
asked.
    The blonde squinted at him. “I’m sorry. Do I
know you?”
    “Richard Alpert. We were friends when you
were at Nardin and I was at Canisus High.”
    The anger dissolved from her features and a
mix of astonishment and delight lit her face. “Richard?” She
lurched forward, capturing him in an awkward embrace.
    I got another flash—so fast it almost
didn’t register: Hands. Blood.
    She pulled back, the movement startling me,
and examined Richard’s face. “How many years has it been?”
    He laughed. “Too many.”
    The two of them stood there, staring at one
another, oblivious of what I’d just experienced. Then the woman
gave a nervous laugh. “I’m Cynthia Lennox now. I was married for
twenty years to Dennis. He passed away last fall.”
    “I’m so sorry,” Richard murmured.
    Her smile was wistful. “So am I.”
    I looked away, realizing my fingers were
clenched so tight they’d gone white. Flexing them, I noticed
half-moon indentations in my palm. That latest burst of insight had
affected me more than the sparkling red shoe or the vision of Walt
Kaplan’s body.
    The woman took Richard’s hand. “What
happened to you? Last I heard you were in medical school.”
    “A lot of years ago,” Richard admitted,
smiling. “I got my MD and moved to California for eighteen years.
I’m back now.”
    I waited for him to say something like,
“about to get married to the most marvelous woman in the universe,”
but he kept looking at this stranger with a vacant, sappy grin.
Ex-girlfriend, I mused? So what. Why not tell her about Brenda?
    I cleared my throat.
    Richard seemed to surface from the past.
“Cyn, this is my brother, Jeff Resnick.”
    “Brother?” she asked, puzzled.
    Richard hadn’t even known about me when he
was in high school. “It’s kind of a long story.”
    She didn’t look interested in learning it. I
was too far away to shake hands—not that I wanted to—so I nodded at
her. She did likewise. No love lost there.
    “Well, come on in,” Cyn told Richard,
gesturing toward the mill. “We’ve got the best coffee in
Williamsville, and a wonderful apple strudel.” She looked at him
with eyes half focused on the past. I wondered if I should just
slink back to the car and disappear. Then again, it had been
someone from the mill who’d found Walt Kaplan, and I wanted to know
about it. Uninvited, I trotted along behind them.
    We followed Cyn up the stairs and into the
mill’s side entrance, stepping into the dim interior of what looked
to be a storage barn. Crates and more pallets of grain and flour
were stacked so that there was only a narrow path between this and
a larger room with bright lights to the left: the bakery and
storefront.
    Cyn stopped dead ahead of us and like two of
the Three Stooges, Richard and I bumped into one another. Richard’s
at least six inches taller than me, so it was difficult to see
around him.
    “Tigger,” Cyn chided. A fat tabby leaped
onto the stack of crates, giving a lusty yowl and looking
self-satisfied. “Stay there,” Cyn told us. “I’ll take care of
it.”
    Richard stared down at his shoes—no, just
beyond them, at a gray, furry lump. Either a very large mouse or a
small rat.
    Cyn returned with a worn and stained
gardener’s glove on her right hand. She picked up the limp creature
and inspected it. “Good work, Tigger.” Cyn started off again,
paused to take aim at a trash barrel with a black plastic bag
folded over its rim, and tossed the body in. Two