I pressed my back against the wood siding of the adjacent wall. With my right arm extended, I slowly pushed open the door a few inches, careful to keep clear of the gap and the door itself, where a shooter was likely to fire if his intention was to stop me from coming in. The hinges were well-oiled. They didn’t squeak. Nobody shot at me.
Had I still been with Alpha, serving as the point man in a standard, five-man entry team stacked up outside the door, I would’ve waited for the last guy in the stack to squeeze the shoulder of the guy ahead of him, indicating he was ready for action. That “ready” signal would have been passed up the train until the guy behind me squeezed my shoulder, telling me we were all good to go. Then we would’ve gone. With my submachine gun or short-barrel shotgun raised to my shoulder and ready to fire, I would’ve moved to my left, sweeping the room and my field of fire from left to right. The man directly behind me would’ve entered, shifted to my right, and scanned from right to left. We would’ve stayed a foot away from any walls because bullets tend to ricochet within six to eight inches of walls. And we would’ve put multiple hollow-point rounds into the vital organs and skulls of anyone remotely threatening. But, like I said, it was just me, and I was without the comforts of a good gun.
I waited a few seconds, exhaled slowly, and walked in.
The bed had been made. Things tidied up. Nothing looked amiss. Nobody was there. That’s what I thought initially. Then, from inside the bathroom, I heard a male voice mutter, “Mmmm. Oh, yeah.” I moved quietly and peaked around the corner:
Preston Kavitch, the son of our B&B hosts, Johnny and Gwen, was standing at the pedestal sink, in front of the antique, gilt-framed mirror. He was stroking his crotch with his right hand and caressing his left cheek with a pair of Savannah’s black lace panties.
“Hey there, sport.”
Startled, he stumbled backward and fell into the claw-footed tub.
“I was just—”
“—Just what? Doing your best Pee Wee Herman imitation?”
“Actually, I was…” Preston cleared his throat. His eyes darted in every direction but mine. “I was changing the light bulb over the sink. It went out. Your lady told my mother it was out before she left to go wherever. I’m in charge of maintenance. It’s what I do. Only I couldn’t find a sixty watt, so I had to get a seventy-five watt, which’ll be bright, but that’s OK. Not that big a difference between sixty and seventy-five. Uses more energy, but whatever.”
His nervous eye movement and his manic elaboration of insignificant, irrelevant details, instead of sticking to the topic at hand — namely, him being a pervert — more than confirmed my suspicions that Preston Kavitch was exactly that.
“Please don’t tell my parents, OK?”
“Why wouldn’t I tell them?”
Preston had to think about that one for a second. “Because I’m really a nice guy?”
“Nice guys don’t go round sniffing their guests’ underwear, Preston.”
“I wasn’t sniffing. I was… appreciating.”
“Hand ’em over, Preston.”
He handed me the panties. Then he started crying.
“They’ll kick me out of the house if you tell ’em,” he said, crocodile tears flowing, still sitting in the tub with his legs hanging awkwardly over the edge. “I got nowhere else to go. Please, it won’t happen again. I swear it.”
There was a time when I would’ve ignored his begging and made a point to teach him a proverbial lesson he’d never forget, one that might’ve involved the spilling of blood and a broken bone or two. Back then, I didn’t feel sorry for many people, including those who got down on their knees and begged me for their lives. I steeled myself against their pleas; they got what was coming to them. But then I started getting older, and maybe, more or less, a little wiser.
“Get up, Preston.”
He gripped my outstretched hand and I hauled him out of the tub, just as Savannah came walking into the bungalow.
“Logan?”
“In here.” I stuffed her panties in the back pocket of my jeans.
“Please,” Preston whispered, “you can’t tell her.”
Savannah entered. “What’s going on?”
“Preston had to change a light bulb.”
“That’s right,” Preston said. He fished the old bulb out of the antique wire trash basket and made a point to show it to her. “Burned out. Just like you said.”
“Thanks for getting to it so quickly,” Savannah said. “It would’ve been hard to see in here tonight otherwise.”
He gave me a furtive glance, lowered his head and walked out of the bathroom. I waited until I heard the door close and latch.
“You told his mother about the light bulb?” I asked Savannah.
“Yeah. Why?”
“Nothing.”
I’d been wrong about Preston Kavitch. He hadn’t lied to me. He may have been a disgusting pervert, but he was, at least in this instance, an honest one.
“You’ve got that look on your face,” Savannah said.
“What look would that be?”
“The ‘weight of the world’ look. I’ve seen it before, Logan. Innumerable times. And I learned a long time ago that it’s pointless, me asking you, ‘What’s wrong?’ Because you’ll never tell me, anyway. Now, why don’t you slowly undress me and take me to bed?”
I was sorely tempted. I was also plain sore, not to mention exhausted. I couldn’t decide which hurt more, my scraped elbow or twisted knee. Both of my feet were blistered. My shoulders felt like they’d been stomped on by contestants from “The Biggest Loser.”
“Would you be offended,” I said, “if I took a hot bath instead, alone?”
“No, I wouldn’t be offended.” She tilted her head subtly and her eyes smiled. “I just wish I’d had the presence of mind to bring along your Mr. Bubble.”
“I’ll survive.”
She held my face in her hands and kissed me softly, one cheek, then the other.
“Go take a bath, Logan. Let me know if you need anybody to wash your back.”
I assured her I would.
SIX
My phone rang at 0512 the next morning. I was dreaming I was in bed with Savannah. She was curled in the crook of my arm. I could smell the sweet, musky fragrance of her perfume. Her breath warmed my neck. Only it wasn’t a dream.
“Logan,” I said, still groggy enough that it was a challenge merely remembering my name.
“Matt Streeter, El Dorado County Sheriff’s Department. Hope I didn’t wake you up.”
“No, I’m always up this early. The milkman and me.”
“Wondered if I could buy you breakfast.”
“I’m staying in a B&B, Detective. The second “B” typically implies breakfast is included with the bed.”
“OK, coffee, then. It’s important, Mr. Logan. I wouldn’t have called this early if it wasn’t.”
Gone was his recalcitrance from the day before. There was something almost needy in his tone. I asked him where he wanted to meet. He gave me the name of a café and the address. He said it was less than five minutes from where I was staying. I said I’d be there.
Savannah cracked an eye. “What time is it?”