Death at a Fixer-Upper by Sarah T. Hobart

reaching into her purse and pulling out a camera.
    I parked in the gravel pullout again, looking for my client. No signs of life. Maybe he’d decided to wait for me out back.
    Gail snapped pictures while I started down the brick path, keys in hand. A gleam of white registered in my peripheral vision. I slowed my steps and saw it was a piece of paper caught in the brambles. I extended a hand toward it, but a capricious gust of wind sent it airborne, skidding along the path just out of reach. I blinked. There was another sheet of paper in the grass. As I stood in place, the wind brought a third one, tumbling it end over end and finally depositing it at my feet. I bent to retrieve it, then went rigid. It was spattered with red.
    My heart began to rattle in my chest. I straightened up slowly, looking around. Not ten feet away, a pair of brown leather shoes protruded from a clump of tangled foliage. I edged a little closer. The shoes were connected to brown socks, which, in turn, were attached to rumpled trousers. My eyes traveled up the length of the pants to a nylon jacket and pale blue shirtfront.
    “No,” I said. “Please.”
    Right on cue, Gail came skidding around the corner, camera in hand. Her mouth dropped open.
    “Fucsh,” she said. “Fusch, fusch, fusch.” Then she opened her mouth so wide I could see a wad of gauze wedged between her molars and cheek, and began screaming.
    The earsplitting din jolted me into action. I grabbed Gail’s shoulders and shook her. “Stop it!”
    She swallowed a second scream building up in her throat and hiccupped.
    Trembling a little, I edged toward the figure in the vines. He lay on his back, his arms outflung as if about to embrace me. One look at his head was enough. I didn’t look again. His body lay in a bower of crushed roses. Blood dripped from the leaves; he hadn’t been dead long. Chunks of cement were scattered among the vines. I pieced together the fragments like a puzzle and realized I was seeing the remains of a figurine. Automatically I looked up and, sure enough, one gargoyle was missing from its perch.
    My stomach roiled and I was considering finding a quiet spot to throw up when I caught sight of Gail’s face, her complexion pale as milk. Visions of Biddie’s collapse danced through my head.
    “Oh, jeez. You’d better sit down.” I pushed her over to a grassy spot about twenty feet from the body and she sat down hard, her legs limp as two strands of spaghetti. “Maybe you should put your head on your knees or something.”
    She waved me off. Another sheet of paper floated by, and she snatched it out of the air.
    “Ith a purthase conthract,” she said. “Wh-wh-who—?”
    I took the page from her and saw my name along the bottom margin. With a clunk I felt all the way down to my heels, the other shoe fell.
    “He’s my two o’clock,” I said.

Chapter 7
    I called 911. Then we waited. The unsettling thought occurred to me that Merrit and her daughter might come home unexpectedly. I didn’t want a kid to see this.
    “Will you be okay for a minute?” I asked Gail.
    She nodded. I took off around the house, fumbling with the key at the back door until it opened. Where had I seen…? My brain seemed to have turned to oatmeal. I smacked the side of my head and things cleared. Linen closet. Second floor.
    I raced through the lower level and up the stairs. The closet was down the hall, at the foot of the second set of stairs. I yanked open the door and in my haste grabbed a full stack of moth-eaten wool blankets, exposing a square of mustard-yellow wall and releasing a cloud of dust that reeked of mouse.
    Something checked my hand as I closed the door. Loretta had looked in the closet an hour ago, with me hanging over her shoulder. Square marks in the dust told me the odd assortment of luggage had been moved about since then. I stood rooted to the spot for a moment. What would be the point of that?
    I shook my head and hurried back down to where Gail was