Sing Sweetly to Me Read online

  SING SWEETLY TO ME

  By Barbara Pronin

  A Gordian Knot Production

  Gordian Knot is an imprint of Crossroad Press

  Digital Edition published by Crossroad Press

  Smashwords edition published at Smashwords by Crossroad Press

  Crossroad Press digital edition 2021

  Copyright © 1991 Barbara Pronin

  Original publication by Dell—September 1991

  LICENSE NOTES

  This eBook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This eBook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person you share it with. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then you should return to the vendor of your choice and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  Meet the Author

  Raised in Brooklyn, New York but a long-time Californian, Barbara Pronin is the author of six globally acclaimed mysteries, including three as Barbara Nickolae. An award-winning journalist and a would-be pianist, she adores dark chocolate, the L.A. Dodgers, and her five amazing grandchildren. Find her on Insta @writerbobbi and at BarbaraPronin.com.

  BIBLIOGRAPHY

  As Barbara Pronin

  Syndrome

  Sing Sweetly to Me

  Thicker Than Water

  As Barbara Nickolae

  Finders Keepers

  Kiss Mommy Goodnight

  Ties That Bind

  DISCOVER CROSSROAD PRESS

  Visit the Crossroad site for information about all available products and its authors

  Check out our blog

  Subscribe to our Newsletter for information about new releases, promotions, and to receive a free eBook

  Find and follow us on Facebook and Twitter

  We hope you enjoy this eBook and will seek out other books published by Crossroad Press. We strive to make our eBooks as free of errors as possible, but on occasion some make it into the final product. If you spot any problems, please contact us at [email protected] and notify us of what you found. We’ll make the necessary corrections and republish the book. We’ll also ensure you get the updated version of the eBook.

  If you have a moment, the author would appreciate you taking the time to leave a review for this book at the retailer’s site where you purchased it.

  Thank you for your assistance and your support of the authors published by Crossroad Press.

  For Joe

  For their kindness in sharing knowledge and expertise with me, I am grateful to Rob Welborn, Dr. Gil Martin, and, most especially, to Reneau Kennedy, whose love of her work was truly the start of the story.

  Table of Contents

  Prologue

  1

  2

  3

  4

  5

  6

  7

  8

  9

  10

  11

  12

  13

  14

  15

  16

  17

  18

  19

  20

  21

  22

  23

  24

  25

  26

  27

  28

  29

  30

  31

  Prologue

  Vejar State Hospital

  Santa Barbara, California

  September 23

  It was stuffy in the doctor’s office and Denny wanted out, but he forced himself to focus his attention on the man who would make the decision.

  The doctor was puffing on an unlit pipe, tapping his fingers on a stack of folders to no rhythm Denny recognized. He was fat, balding, and pasty-faced, but Denny knew he must listen to him carefully and be prepared to answer questions.

  “From a medical standpoint,” the doctor said at last, “there seems to be no reason to keep you, Mr.”—he looked again at the file—“Kiefer, is it?”

  “Kiefer, yes, sir, Denny Kiefer. I have to tell you, I feel great, Dr. Landesmann, I really feel just fine.”

  “Mmm,” the doctor said, not seeming to hear as he consulted the topmost folder. “Dizziness, nausea, vomiting gone, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera. Well, it seems, Mr. Kiefer, that whatever you ingested is successfully out of your system.”

  “Yes, sir, absolutely.” Denny nodded. “I surely do feel fine. And I have to get out of here, Dr. Landesmann. There’s this job—in Coos Bay, Oregon?”

  “Mmm…”

  Denny patted the pocket of his windbreaker and looked earnestly at the doctor. “See, I have this letter here from my cousin. There’s a job waiting for me at the lumber mill.”

  The doctor looked directly at Denny; his puffy eyes narrowed. “I don’t know where you came from, Mr. Kiefer, and I don’t know where you’re going. But there are some on this staff who are recommending that discharging you would be precipitous. They are suggesting you might benefit from a period of psychiatric observation.”

  Denny willed the prickling of sweat to leave his upper lip. “Dr. Landesmann,” he said, looking straight at the doctor, “I deeply regret that—outburst. I never intended to lose my temper with Nurse Whiting the other day. I have apologized to her, sir. I—hoped she understood. I hope you do as well. And, sir, it is very important to me that I get on up to Coos Bay.”

  The doctor looked away, frowning slightly as he perused the chart once more.

  Denny could feel the tension building in that place behind his eyes. Steady, he told himself. You’re almost there. He could feel the doctor wavering.

  “Oregon, eh? That’s a long way. How do you plan to get there?”

  Denny was prepared. “My cousin,” he said, patting his jacket pocket. “He’s sending me money for bus fare. He mailed it to me, in fact, care of General Delivery, here in Santa Barbara. It’s probably waiting for me now at the Post Office. I just have to pick it up.”

  “Mmm.” The doctor peered at him again, drumming his fingers on the desk. The phone rang. “Dr. Landesmann here. Yes, yes, I’ll be right there.”

  The doctor scribbled something on the chart and laid it aside on the desk. Then, taking a card from his desk drawer, he scrawled something on the back. Heaving his bulk up from the leather chair, he handed the card to Denny.

  “Your discharge order will be waiting downstairs. Sign out at the desk. If you need a bed or whatever before you get out of town, here’s the address of a shelter.”

  Denny was on his feet. “Dr. Landesmann, thank you. I’ll send you a card from Oregon.”

  But the doctor was distracted, opening the door, motioning the patient out. Denny needed no second invitation. He heard the door close behind him.

  In a moment, listening to the satisfying squish of his sneakers on the polished floor, he was at the elevator, pushing the button, moving into the car.

  He shared the ride down with two student nurses, pretty, but he didn’t care. He bolted from the elevator, strode across the lobby and out into the open air.

  The sea breeze bit through his windbreaker and caused him to shiver some. He moved purposefully away from the entrance to the seaward side of the building.

  He found himself on a deserted greenbelt that stretched out toward the ocean. Trust the state, he thought, to build the hospital ass backwards to the view. Filling his lungs with damp air, he considered what to do next.

  Thirty feet away against the hospital wall a gardener was hunched over a flower bed, tossing weeds back over his shoulder with a steady, noiseless rhythm. Denny looked up. There were no windows on the lower floors of the building. It would be i
mpossible for anyone looking out to see directly below.

  Slowly he edged his way along the wall toward a wheelbarrow filled with tools. Lifting a sturdy, earth-covered shovel, he moved quickly toward the gardener until he was near enough to raise his arms and deliver a skull-crushing blow.

  With a single cry the gardener pitched forward, then sprawled across the ground, a thin trickle of blood running down behind his ear to mingle with the red adobe soil.

  Poised to run, Denny glanced once around. He tossed aside the shovel. Convinced it was safe, he leaned across the dead man and plucked his wallet from his pocket.

  A green card inside identified the gardener as Ramon Jose Garcia. He was 24 years old, the same age as Denny, birthplace Sonora, Mexico. Folded behind the card were three crumpled fives and six one-dollar bills.

  Denny stuffed the bills into the pocket of his jeans. He thought about keeping the green card, but then he realized that with his blond hair and blue eyes, it was unlikely he could ever pass as a registered alien named Garcia.

  Instead, he tugged at a thin chain that hung from the gardener’s neck and deposited it, tarnished silver cross and all, in his jacket pocket. Tossing the wallet into the flower bed, he moved casually past the hospital entrance. Then he picked up speed, sprinted across the parking lot, and turned left on Coast Highway.

  He was careful to keep his arms at that peculiar angle runners seemed to favor. No one would remember a young guy jogging less than a mile from the campus. By the time he reached the university, he knew what he was going to do.

  In the library he blended easily among the students browsing in the stacks. It didn’t take long to spot what he wanted—an unattended book bag. Hoisting it over his left shoulder, he made a beeline for the door.

  Someone was yelling from the library steps. Denny picked up his pace, gliding through clutches of milling students in a serpentine path across the campus.

  It was only when he reached the Coast Highway that he turned to look behind him. No one had followed. He was perfectly safe. He paused to catch his breath, then held the book bag aloft, the university logo facing traffic. The fifth driver heading south slowed and braked to a stop.

  Denny slung the book bag over his shoulder and jogged over to the gray Cutlass, whose driver peered at him as an automatic window slid down.

  “Say there, preppie, where ya headed?”

  “L.A., sir—if you’re going that far. I really have to get home.”

  “You do, eh? What’s your hurry? Seems like school just started.”

  “Yes, sir. It’s my dad. He’s had a heart attack. My mother called. I have to get home.”

  “I see.” The driver was silent a moment, as if he were sizing Denny up. Then he hit a button. The passenger door lock popped up. “Get in. We’ll have you home in no time.”

  Grinning, Denny slipped off his windbreaker and stuffed it in a compartment of the book bag. He threw the bag in the back seat and climbed into the Cutlass. “Thank you, sir.” He extended a hand. “I appreciate this. God bless you…

  1

  Santa Clarita Valley

  Northwest of Los Angeles

  September 28

  It had been a pleasant evening, Margie admitted, slipping into her nightgown. Chet had promised a nice quiet dinner, and that was what they’d shared, along with a glass of wine, a joke or two, and good conversation.

  There was no mistaking the look in his eyes as they’d said good night at her door, though Chet had not pressed her when Margie made it clear that she wasn’t ready for more.

  Pinning her dark curls back with a barrette, she dipped a cotton pad into a jar of cold cream and began to remove her makeup. Then she stopped, staring dolefully at the somber face in the mirror.

  It seemed to Margie that her hazel eyes had darkened to an austere brown, and tiny lines had begun to form in the middle part of her brow. She was only 28, but the lines were there, and she found it disconcerting.

  Tilting her face, she forced a smile and peered out from under thick lashes. It gave her face a playful look and made her look years younger. That was the Margie she remembered best, the Margie she could be again. She might not be ready for another romance, but she would make an effort to smile.

  She found the simple promise cheering and smiled again at her reflection. Then she brushed her teeth, turned out the lights, and slipped between the sheets.

  She woke with a start, her heart pounding. Had she heard someone scream? Or was it the nightmare, back to haunt her, her own cries echoing in her head?

  Margie sat up in bed, her eyes wide, seeing nothing in the darkness. She listened, but there was no sound except the wind in the trees outside her window.

  Aware that she was holding her breath, she let it out slowly and sank back on one elbow to look at her bedside clock. Twelve twenty. She’d not been asleep long. It must have been the dream that woke her…but it had seemed so real. She flung off the blanket and rose unsteadily to her feet.

  Pulling on a robe, she moved slowly toward the door and leaned against it, listening. Then she unlocked it and opened it as far as the chain and bolt would allow. Surely, if she had heard a scream, others would have heard it, too. But the corridor was empty as far as she could see, the doors across the hallway closed.

  Bolder now, she undid the chain and opened her door wide, padding barefoot to the open stairwell to peer over the banister. There was no one there. It must have been a nightmare. She straightened up to go back in.

  She was halfway inside when a sudden impulse made her turn her head and look up. She stared for a moment into the empty upper landing until the feeling passed.

  Inside, she locked and bolted the door and wavered for a minute by the phone, debating whether to call the police or admit she had simply had a nightmare.

  Unsure, she went to her bedroom window and pulled aside the curtain—which, she realized, she should have done in the first place instead of prowling around in the hall. She looked down through the trees into the brick-lined square below, the common courtyard to the complex of apartment buildings she’d found not far from the state hospital.

  The courtyard was lighted by a double row of gas lamps that extended to the parking garage. But as far as Margie could see, there was no one out there, nothing moving at all, except a few swirls of liquid amber leaves caught in the gusting drafts.

  It was September and warm, the season for Santa Anas—hot, dry winds that blow up from Mexico and howl through the streets of Southern California as though they were still open plains. Margie was new to the Santa Clarita Valley, and the four distinct seasons that characterized upper Connecticut were still fresh in her memory. But already she recognized these desert-like winds that seemed to hold winter at bay.

  She glanced up, searching rows of windows, thinking she might see someone else at the curtains who had been wakened by the noise she thought she’d heard. But the windows were either dark or muted patches of light, revealing nothing of the neighbors she did not know, though she’d lived here for nearly six months.

  Finally, she looked beyond the apartments toward the lights of Santa Clarita State Hospital. Perhaps it was the wail of a siren she’d heard. Yes, that could have been it….

  Sighing, Margie dropped the curtain in place and turned back to her bed. But she was wide awake, too much so to sleep. Maybe a cup of tea would help.

  She could see quite clearly in the darkness by now, but she turned on the kitchen light anyway. She put water on to boil and got down her favorite mug, the heavy blue one Trisha had made for her last Christmas, before—when they had all been together.

  Determined not to upset herself even more, Margie concentrated on her sister-in-law. Pretty Trisha. How she wished she could see her now. How happy she must be with the baby. She was picturing that when the telephone rang, a sharp shrill that sent her blood pressure soaring for the second time in an hour.

  “Hello—”

  “Marg? It’s me, Rob.”

  “Oh, Rob, you
scared me to death! I was just thinking of Trisha and the baby—” Margie stopped herself. It was nearly four in the morning in Connecticut. “Rob, is someth—what’s wrong?”

  Her brother sighed. “It’s Trisha. She’s gone. She took the baby and left. I probably woke you. I’m sorry, Marg. I didn’t know what else to do.”

  Margie frowned. “Where are you, Rob? When did Trisha leave?”

  “I’m home. I just got here and found a note. I guess she left sometime tonight.”

  Margie did not ask him why he’d only just come home in the wee hours of the morning. “Did you argue or something? I mean, a person doesn’t leave without any warning at all.”

  Rob paused. “No, we didn’t argue. Not recently, anyway. I—well, okay, she’s threatened once or twice…”

  “Threatened what? To leave?”

  “Yes. I didn’t think she’d do it, though. God, Margie, she knows I love her. Anyway, I doubt she’s gone far. I just—I thought maybe she’d called you.”

  “No, Rob. I haven’t heard from her.”

  “Will you call me if you do?”

  “Of course. I’m sure she’d want you to know that she and the baby are all right. Meanwhile, in the morning, check with her friends. You’re probably right, she hasn’t gone far….” Margie hesitated. This was not the time to ask what the two of them had argued about. “And listen, Rob, you call me back the minute you know they’re okay.”

  “I will.”

  “Okay. I love you, Rob.”

  “I love you, too. ’Night, Marg.”

  The water had boiled down to a scant mugful by the time Margie got back to it. She poured the tea and took it to the window, scanning the landscape again. A lone jogger on the outer perimeter of the complex headed toward the highway. A hospital orderly on the graveyard shift, she supposed, or someone unwinding before bedtime. That was another thing Margie had noticed. Everybody in California jogged.

  She sipped the tea, relishing its fragrance, knowing she should go back to bed. She was seeing the Walters boy tomorrow and she would want to be fresh and alert. But if the scream—or the nightmare—hadn’t wakened her, Rob’s phone call would have. Either way, she was fully awake, and now there was Trisha to worry about.