“Why not? Everyone else on this block does whatever the hell they feel like. The Hollenbachs don’t mow their lawn until it’s four inches high.Four inches!” she repeated like it was a personal affront. “Then there’s the Hummels who leave their garbage cans out for twenty-four hours. What is this? A homeless encampment?” The unhinged laughter was back. “Maybe I’ll just burn down the entire neighborhood!”
Chelsea barreled into Riley, a woman on a mission.
“Gabe!” Riley yelled.
His hulking form appeared respectfully on the doorstep. “May I come in?” he asked politely. Daisy the cow was nowhere to be seen through Chelsea’s open door or front windows.
“Don’t you dare set one sweaty foot across that threshold or I’ll set you on fire too,” Chelsea howled. “You and your bulging muscles and your flawless skin! It’s not normal, I tell you!”
“Can you stop threatening everyone for a minute? I think you’re in danger and—”
“Of course I’m in danger! I live next door to a hippie circus. It’s amazing I’m still alive. Your mother hangs her laundry out to dry in the backyard! Who does that? What kind of monsters raised you?”
Fresh, line-dried sheets were the best to crawl between at night, but Riley didn’t feel like that information was pertinent to the conversation.
“Now, Chelsea,” Riley said, holding up her hands and trying to look non-threatening.
Gabe did the same thing. Except his eyes rolled back in his head, and for a moment, he stood completely still. And then his gigantic body keeled over face-first onto the carpet.
“Don’t you drool on my carpet! I just steam-cleaned it yesterday!” Chelsea shrieked.
But Riley’s attention was on the figure behind Gabe. The figure holding a now-empty syringe in one hand and a gun in the other. He was glaring at Riley.
“You’re ruining everything!” he shouted.
37
11:27 a.m., Tuesday, August 18
Riley stared in shock at Hudson Neudorfer, the affable Channel 50 employee who brought her coffee when she’d gone to the studio with Detective Weber to interview the on-air talent. He was holding a gun.
“Hudson?”
He stepped over Gabe’s legs and into the house.
“Of course it’s me. You’re the psychic. It’s why you keep messing up my plans, isn’t it? You knew all along!”
She really didn’t have it in her to handle two unhinged individuals at the same time.
“I really didn’t. I’m not a very good psychic.”
“Oh, please. I’m supposed to believe that you justhappenedto show up at Channel 50. You justhappento be here when I’m delivering the package. You justhappento live next door to one of the murder scenes.”
“That’swhat that smell is?” Riley yelped. She felt suddenly nauseated.
“Take your shoes off!” Chelsea yelled.
“She just steam-cleaned the carpet,” Riley explained.
Hudson glanced down at his sneakers, then back up at Chelsea. “No,” he said firmly. “And I hope that I’m tracking mud inside.”
She gasped and took an unsteady step back as if he’d struck her. “How dare you,” she hissed.
“How dareme?” Hudson repeated. “How dareyou! You are a horrible human being. Do you know how terrible you have to be in order to make my murder list? Pretty freaking terrible, lady.”
“I think you’re in the wrong house. The terrible people live next door. That’s their cow destroying my yard.”
“Good! I’m glad your yard is being destroyed just like you’ve destroyed the lives of other people.”
