Already Dead: A Novel by Charlie Huston

Author:Charlie Huston
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
ISBN: 9780345478245
Published: 2010-06-23T04:00:00+00:00

Joe Pitt 1 - Already Dead

She takes a last look in the mirror, flicks a strand of hair from her forehead, and snaps the compact shut.

--My husband is not a figurehead, Joseph. He is a gifted executive and businessman. He is also a medical doctor and epidemiologist. He did not simply found Horde Bio Tech, he is its chief researcher. He is devoted to his work and rarely at home. Then Whitney started paying us visits. For the last year it has become more and more common for him to work at home or to stop in for an unexpected lunch. I was not shocked by his interest in her, only that he allowed it to be seen by others. Then again, it really isn't all that surprising.

--Why?

--Surely you noticed.

--What?

--The resemblance? To my daughter. I think they even made a game of it when they met strangers, saying they were related.

I remember Missy telling me she thought the Vale and Horde girls were sisters.

--What did your daughter think about Whitney's little act with your husband?

She takes her cell phone from her bag.

--Amanda is a very sophisticated fourteen-year-old, but she is a fourteen-year-old. I'm not certain the threat of Dale's advances is entirely real to her. Or undesired, for that matter. It would not be unusual for her to be sexually curious about her father. In the abstract.

She opens her phone and starts to dial.

--I'm going to call my car.

She makes the call and tells her driver she's ready to be picked up.

--Amanda loved Whitney. I think she thought Whitney's flirting was a joke, a way of making fun of her father, which pleased Amanda no end. Whitney never behaved like that around anyone else. That was the inspiration for Amanda's schoolgirl crush, Whitney was so mature and street-smart. She thought Whitney was having a laugh at Dale's expense, and I suppose she was, but she was also hoping it might pay off.

--Did it?

She gets up and begins straightening her clothes, brushing away lint from my couch, smoothing wrinkles.

---I don't know for certain. But something happened.

--What?

--Perhaps two weeks ago Whitney stopped coming over, and Dale stopped spending so much time at home. And things were somewhat normal.

I don't bother asking if she thinks her husband had anything to do with Vale's death. I don't have to. After all, the killer's hand is holding the cigarette I'm smoking.

Her cell rings once.

--That's my car, Joseph.

I get up.

--Whitney stopped coming over around two weeks ago. So what happened between then and when your daughter took off?

She walks to the door and waits for me there. I come down the hall, open the locks, and we walk to the street door.

--I came home one day and she and Dale were fighting. They stopped when I came in. Amanda ran to her room and Dale retreated to his office.

--What'd you do?

--I went to Amanda's room and asked her if her father had touched her.

--What'd she say?

--She said, Moooom. The next morning she was gone.

--And when you

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