rain.
When I finished, and started once more to pull the backpack over my shoulder, I remembered the envelope. I was mildly curious about its contents, but needed to get into the house and cleaned up without Carlo seeing me. Phase five: Carlo. I foolishly thought that this would be the greatest challenge, not to bring a scumbag to justice, but to forever hide from my husband and the world the ghastly thing I had just done. Killing the guy, that was the easy part.
Fourteen
I snuck in the side gate, through the outside door that leads into the garage, and from there inside to the laundry room. I could hear the shower going on the other side of the wall in the master bathroom, thank God. It gave me precious moments to toss my backpack on the claw-foot mahogany foyer table and the cell phone onto the kitchen counter, rip off my clothes, including blouse, hat, shoes, underwear, and gloves, and dump all into the washing machine; throw in half a bottle of bleach; and turn that sucker on. I’d toss it all in the garbage later, but no use providing more evidence than was inescapable.
The Pugs, who must have been having their morning nap in my closet, rushed me. Rather than jumping on my legs the way they always did, they approached cautiously, interested in the new smell I had brought home. I spoke as fiercely as I could while keeping my voice low, “Stop! Stay!” Unaccustomed to sharp tones, they sat back on their haunches and eyed me suspiciously as if concluding I actually was that stranger I smelled like.
Trying to move as fast as I could, before Carlo came out and saw me with most of my body stained where the watered-down blood had seeped through my clothes, I started into the front bathroom, then stopped when I heard Carlo belting an aria in the shower of the master bath.
I don’t know much Italian, but knew that this one went on like that for a while. At any other time the sound of singing would make my skin crawl, but this time it came as a gift. He knew all the verses and the orchestral accompaniment between them and wouldn’t turn off the water until he got to the end of the song.
I went into the guest bathroom at the other side of the house and shut the door. My knees buckled from the shock and dehydration and I wanted to lean up against the sink, but would not take the chance of leaving any trace evidence, so I just stood and swayed a second. To keep from collapsing I stared in the mirror at the little tattoo of a white rose over my heart. Carlo never asked me about that tattoo either.
I thought about what I should have done. I should have left the van as is, come home and cleaned up, and explained everything to Carlo as gently as possible and then called Max. That’s what I should have done.
It took a long time to get clean. I took a bottle of alcohol into the shower with me and poured most of it over my face. Only then did I finally open my mouth under the shower and drink my fill. I washed my hair and the rest of my body, not caring if the soap ran into my eyes. Blood seeping through the gloves had caked in my cuticles and dried on the walk home. It finally melted with my repeating the whole washing process a second time. Even so, when I stood again in front of the mirror, inspecting the reddening bite mark on my upper right arm, I let my fingers soak in a little more alcohol that I poured into the sink. Only then was I ready to leave the bathroom.
I had practiced again using my voice while in the shower so was able to call “Hi, Perfesser. I’m back!” loudly enough and without a tremor to reach him anywhere in the house. Luckily he was still in the shower himself and had moved on to something mournful that sounded like Piangee, Piangee, so did not acknowledge my greeting.
In no hurry for Carlo’s first appearance, I finally allowed the exhaustion to take me, fell into the living room couch to further excite the Pugs, who, happy to have the real me back, threw themselves at my ankles like muscle-bound two-year-olds, making hum-smack noises with their tongues. Then they stopped their playful attack