“What time is Dorothy coming over?” Scarpetta forced herself to ask.
“She was supposed to be here fifteen minutes ago,” her mother answered, rattling the paper loudly.
Her breathing was labored from a life of smoking that had eventually hospitalized her with emphysema.
“Mother, would you like me to get your oxygen?” Scarpetta asked.
Sinbad languidly strolled into the kitchen. He stopped and gave the chef a crooked stare. His tail twitched. Scarpetta began heating the skillet. She opened the refrigerator and found a Buckler she poured into a glass.
“Well, dinner will be ready in ten minutes,” she said. “Take it or leave it. If we waited for Dorothy every time she was supposed to show up, we’d turn into skeletons.”
Her mother sighed. Sinbad squeezed himself between Scarpetta’s feet as she turned on the burner to heat the water.
“How about boiled cat over pasta,” Scarpetta said, booting Sinbad out of the way yet one more time in life.
“YUCK!” Mrs. Scarpetta protested with disgust. “How can you say such a thing?”
Scarpetta began crushing cloves of garlic and sautéing them with the vegetables.
She stripped fresh basil from its stems and sprinkled it in, adding salt and ground pepper.
“This is going to be light and healthy,” Scarpetta said, knowing full well how her mother would react to this.
Momentarily, Scarpetta felt no guilt about not pleasing her mother, who did not believe in healthy food and was offended by it and took it personally., Scarpetta had learned long ago to take care of herself, to alleviate pain, and not be victimized. With her family, she would take but so much. She had been down here for almost a week. Frankly, she’d had enough, her disk was full, her nerves overloaded, she could take no more.
“What about meatballs?” her mother complained. “I can’t believe you aren’t serving sausage, prosciutto, or something.”
“Not tonight,” Scarpetta said.
Chapter 5
In Richmond, at the precise moment Scarpetta was placing pasta in boiling water many miles south, Pete Marino was looking out at the weather. He was grateful his Dodge Ram Quad Cab pickup truck was safely under the aluminum carport. Otherwise it would, by now be covered with at least three inches of snow-the soft, wet sort that he hated most. It inspired the neighborhood brats to fashion snowballs and hurl them in the direction of his small house in its quiet neighborhood south of the James River, just off Midlothian Turnpike.
These assaults inevitably occurred at night, resuking in soft thuds against windows, doors, and aluminum siding. By the time Marino was out on the porch, the suspects had fled, vanishing in the deep shadows of trees and to various residences along his street. He was an experienced officer of the law, and following footprints in snow was about as easy as arresting a rapist who leaves his wallet on the floor of the crime scene, or the thief who records his driver’s license information on the back of the stolen check he’s cashing. Oh yes, this had happened more times than well-behaved citizens would believe, but tracking children through the dark, frigid night, slipping and sliding, was a different matter altogether.
Marino lit a Marlboro and opened another can of Budweiser as he waited, ready in coat and boots, the television turned down low, an ear to the front of his house, as big flakes fell thickly. When he was growing up in New Jersey, he had committed far worse offenses than throwing snowballs at people. But in his case, violence was always justified and appropriate, for there were bullies and vandals in the blue-collar community of his youth. He had beaten the hell out of others only when he was picked on first or was protecting someone weaker. Marino was certain he had done nothing in this instance to justify the rude and thoughtless acts perpetrated by his small neighbors.
He had not factored in the many times he had chased them away from his aboveground swimming pool, or scattered them when they had dared to play football in his yard without asking. The occasions he had yelled and smacked a newspaper at the SPCA puppy that belonged one block away had not gone over very well, either, nor had the occasion when he had stopped his unmarked car and ordered Jimmy Simpson, who was ten, to pick up the candy wrapper he had just tossed on the street.