Chapter 3 Roses for Juliet

Chapter 3

Steve headed north on I –5 winding his way out of the city. Morning commuters poured in from the suburbs making half of the interstate packed with half-awake, angry people. His side of the road was busy but still moving. The further out of town he drove, the sparser the traffic became.

"Most people just aren't going my way, " he said out loud to the empty car and snorted a laugh. "Ain't that the damn truth." The road cleared out and Steve's black Lexus was the only vehicle on the road. He was out of the heavily populated areas and through the suburbs heading out into state park territory. Trees, dark pine mostly, began to crop up on the side of the road, replacing the gas stations and mini marts with long dark shadows.

Suddenly the silence was a little too much. It gave him a little too much space to think. Steve didn't want to think. He reacted to the situations he was given; Most of the time the situations he found himself in didn't bear thinking about too closely. Steve looked around and noticed he hadn't brought his CD case out with him that morning and had never gotten around to downloading songs to the I-pod he had in his desk drawer at the office.

"The radio it is, " he said aloud. He flipped through the stations, blazing past used car commercials and info on upcoming concerts. He wasn't in the mood for classical and the country station just made him wince. The smell of the girl in his trunk eased its way into the car.

She hadn't been dead long enough to stink of rot and decay. She still smelled...female. Steve took a deep breath and realized it was her perfume seeping into his car that he smelled. It wasn't a sexy sort of smell. It was a light feminine scent, baby powder and roses.

A girl's scent. It seemed to complement the more masculine scent of the leather interior. It was an alluring combination that stirred old memories in the back of Steve's mind. He swallowed hard and tasted the metallic scent of blood that had mixed with the perfume and leather. Steve rolled down the window, washing the air clean with the scent of the dark pine. He twisted the radio dial, willing a decent station to come in to shift his thoughts.

Finally, he found a station playing a song he could sing along to. He tapped the steering wheel in time to the music and mumbled the lyrics to himself to block out his own thoughts. He drove automatically to Eric's place, his mind registering the turns without much conscious thought.

He hadn't actually made that many trips out here and Eric really wasn't the sort he'd visit on his own time, but each visit had been memorable and he knew the way. Steve shifted his thoughts back into the blank and sang along to the music.

Eric lived in a nice quiet place, one of the few privately owned spaces between the state park and the federal wildlife protection area. It was a remote, isolated spot that suited Eric just fine. Steve pulled into the flat patch of dirt in front of the house and Eric came out of the front door wiping his hands on a spotlessly white dishtowel.

"Just finishing up the dishes, " Eric said with a grin. "You want some coffee? I figured as early as Nancy called me this morning and the long drive out here you probably didn't have time for much." Eric had a disarming grin that despite the gray creeping into his shaggy blonde hair was boyish and filled with innocent fun.

"Sure, " Steve said. He stepped up onto the porch and shook Eric's hand. It was roughly callused and still slightly damp from the dishwashing. The handshake was firm but neither of them tried to crush the other's hand with their grip. There was nothing between them that needed to be proven.

Eric led Steve to the kitchen and Steve took a seat at the kitchen table while Eric fixed two cups of coffee. Without asking Eric stirred two sugar cubes and a dollop of cream into Steve's coffee before handing it to him. It was just the way he liked it. Steve smiled as he took his first sip. Eric always paid attention to details. It was one of the things that made him so good at his job.

As they sipped their coffee they chatted about the weather, sports and the odd news clips they had both seen, staying away from both politics and religion to keep things polite. When the coffee was done and a second cup declined, Steve sat patiently until Eric rinsed out the mugs and set them on the dish rack to dry. It didn't do to rush him. Eric took the world at his own pace.

"To business then?" Eric asked. Steve swallowed a sigh. Finally. He was more than ready to finish this.

"This one is a little different, " he said. He had always been one to jump straight into the pool rather than easing his way into the cold water.

"They are all a little different, " He replied, with a half smile.

"True, " Steve said. "This one comes with a bullet."

"Shot?" Eric raised an eyebrow in surprise. "My, my." Steve explained the wound but gave no names or any other identifiers to the situation. Just the body and the bullet. Eric sighed.

"Well we're gonna have to take a look and see what we see aren't we?"

"I suppose so." The two men left the kitchen and went out to Steve's car. He popped the trunk.

"Nice legs, " Eric said, looking at the corpse.

"Yeah, " Steve replied, looking away as Eric studied the naked corpse. He didn't like to think about this part. It was like getting a flu shot at the doctors, you knew you needed the medicine; you just didn't want to see the needle go in.

Steve turned back to the trunk as he heard a ripping sound. Eric had pulled out his pocketknife and sliced open the trash bag covering the girl's upper body. He stared at the bullet wound a moment, turned the head a little and then straightened. He licked his lips and nodded.

"Yeah I can work with that." He said. Steve sighed with relief. "Standard business, " Eric told him.

"Good. It will be in your account in three days, " Steve replied. Eric gazed down into the trunk.

"She sure is a pretty one." He let his hand gently graze her arm before scooping her out of the trunk. He cradled her in his arms as gently as a virgin bride and carried her into the house. "I'll be right back for the lady's bags, " he called over his shoulder. Steve nodded and swallowed hard. He hated this part.

Steve pushed the thoughts away with action. He pulled the bag containing the girl's clothes out of the trunk and then ripped the bags protecting his trunk out and stuffed them in with the girl's effects. As he pulled the last one he heard a metal clinking on metal sound. It was the girl's necklace. The clasp must have somehow snapped.

Steve bent over peering into the trunk. The scent of the perfume was stronger here and Steve had to clamp his teeth together and force himself to inhale while bending over the trunk. The necklace was wedged into a crevice and he tried to reach it but his fingers just couldn't fit into the little space. He couldn't even get a grip on the chain. Needle nosed pliers might do the trick, but his hands certainly weren't up to the task. Eric came back. He was wearing a dopey grin and kept looking back into the house.

"Well, she's all settled in. Is this her stuff?" Eric gestured to the stuffed garbage sack. Steve stuffed the last of the bags into the filled one, deciding the necklace could wait. Eric no longer wanted him around and he certainly wanted to be anywhere else.

"Yup, that's it."

"Good, " Eric swung the bag over his shoulder like Santa Claus. "Well, have a safe drive back."

"Good to see you again, " Steve said by way of formal parting. Eric waved as he retreated into the house. Steve got into the car and drove away. The house was barely out of sight before he had to pull over. He pulled onto the shoulder and stopped. He closed his eyes and took a couple of deep breaths. He knew that Eric had an incinerator out back and that all of the girl's clothes and the girl herself would be roasted into ash, with the larger bones ground up and spread out. In a few days there would be no trace of her left. It was just the space between her arrival and her cremation that Steve didn't want to think about. Steve let his breath out in a thin, steady stream and opened his eyes.

"It has never been a problem before, " he said aloud. "It's not like she's still in there anyway. She's gone. Beyond pain. Her body is now just an empty shell. Why is this such a problem?" His voice sounded thin. Steve took three deep breaths, holding each for a five count before letting them out. He eased the car back on the road.

"Juliet, " he said. That was why this was such a problem.

"Why the hell did Nick tell me her name?"