A Cold Christmas Read online

  “I don’t know. Some stuff about this guy being dangerous and you should be careful and not let in any strangers.”

  Back upstairs, in the kitchen, Caley flipped through pages. Furnaces, furnaces. “What was Ettie talking about?”

  “I don’t know. You know how she is.” Her ex-husband’s mother was a mixed blessing, great in some ways, but given a topic she was a nonstop talker.

  “Where’s that flyer that came in the mail?”

  Zach put his finger on a flyer tacked to the corkboard over the phone. “When it came I put it here just in case.” Shanky’s Furnace and Air Conditioning.

  Caley rubbed her eyes, then punched numbers and explained her problem.

  A sympathetic female voice said someone would be out within the next two hours. It would cost seventy-five dollars for him to take a look at it. Seventy-five dollars?

  “We could build a fire,” Zach suggested.

  She put her arms around him, pulled him close, and kissed the top of his head, probably smearing germs all over him. What would she do without this child? This calm sensible child, too adult for twelve. Keep yourself under control and don’t panic so much, she said silently. It wasn’t fair to him.

  He brought in wood, arranged it in the fireplace, crumpled newspapers, and within minutes had a fire going. Even Bonnie perked up a bit with logs cheerily crackling away.

  Two hours and twenty minutes later, rescue arrived. He was thin inside a bulky black jacket, thin face with a comma-shaped scar like the letter C on his left cheek, high forehead, blondish hair, and blank deep-set hazel eyes, “Tim” stitched on his shirt pocket.

  As she started down the basement stairs, Bonnie scrambled over and flung small arms around her waist. “Mommy, don’t.”

  “I’m just going to show him where the furnace is.”

  “Don’t go!”

  “Bonnie…”

  “Nooo!” Tears trickled down Bonnie’s round cheeks. “Please, Mommy. You won’t ever come back. Like the witch in Hansel and Gretel. You’ll be burned up.”

  “That was an oven,” Adam said scornfully.

  “He’s gonna hurt you.”

  “Of course he won’t, darling. He’s here to fix the furnace so we can get warm.”

  “He has funny eyes,” Bonnie mumbled, sticking to her guns.

  He did, Caley thought. Goat’s eyes. Hazel, intelligent, knowing, and taking in everything. When she was a child, she’d owned a book about a troll who lived under a bridge. The evil troll had eyes just like the man she was about to take into her basement.

  She gathered up her daughter, kissed the flushed face, and brushed light hair from her forehead. “You sit here. I’ll be right back.”

  She turned on the basement light and stepped back to let him go first, not wanting him behind her.

  A flicker of malice stirred in his eyes before he turned and trotted down the steps.

  She pointed out the furnace, against the wall under the dirty narrow window. He placed his toolbox on the cement floor, removed a furnace panel, and crouched to shine a flashlight at its innards.

  She huddled on the bottom step, hugging the banister. Never before had the dim lighting down here bothered her. There were only two bare ceiling bulbs sending fingers of light into the darkness spreading under the entire house. Junk was piled everywhere: boxes, old furniture, a rusted bicycle, broken toys, a doll buggy, a crib, a desk—maybe that could be cleaned up for Zach—file cabinets, chairs, a dining table. A good place to hide something, she thought. Like a body.

  Tim banged away, said it needed two new pieces, and banged some more.

  “Mommy!”

  The edge of panic in Bonnie’s voice had her racing up the stairs. In the kitchen, the little girl stood in the center of spilled orange juice that soaked the front of her clothes, dripped off the table, and puddled in a widening circle around the dropped jug.

  “Go change your clothes,” Caley snapped.

  Bonnie’s bottom lip trembled and tears filled her eyes.

  Oh, God. “I’m sorry, love. It’s all right.” She gave the child a one-armed hug, kissed her, and patted her on the fanny. “Get something dry on. It’s all right.”

  Nothing was all right. She’d just yelled at her baby, she had orange juice all over the kitchen, and she had a weird guy in the basement. Tears prickled at her eyes.

  “I’ll take care of it, Mom,” Zach said.

  “Zach—” Hang on, don’t snivel. “You are a great kid. Thanks.”

  She found Bonnie in the bedroom, shivering so hard she couldn’t manage the buttons on her shirt. Caley peeled off the wet clothes, slipped a dry sweatshirt over the little girl’s head, gathering pale hair loose from the neckline, and pulled on a pair of sweatpants. She carried Bonnie into the living room, sat on one end of the couch, and wrapped a quilt around both of them. She hummed softly. Adam, still mesmerized by television, sat on the other end.

  Horses galloped across the television and guns blazed. Struggle as she might, she still dozed.

  Gradually muscles, tensed to protect her from the cold, began to relax as warmth crept in like soft spring air.

  She dreamed.

  God, with a mass of fuzzy white hair and the repairman’s eyes, put her in an elevator and pressed a button labeled HELL. The elevator descended. When it reached bottom, the doors opened to gigantic, roaring, leaping flames. Hands grabbed her arms and legs, swung her back, and pitched her in.

  “Mom! Mom, wake up!” Zach shook her shoulder. “We got a problem!”

  “Adam?” She shot up. “Bonnie?”

  “They’re fine. In the bedroom. Mom, the furnace won’t turn off.”

  “Turn it down.” She slumped back against the lumpy couch.

  “It is down. It doesn’t matter. It keeps roaring.”

  She untangled herself from the quilts and got to her feet. Hot hot. The room swayed. It had gotten dark while she dozed. Somebody had turned on all the lights. Adam, maybe; he didn’t like the dark. She headed for the basement.

  “Mom, he’s gone.”

  “Gone,” she repeated stupidly.

  “Wake up, Mom. We have to do something.”

  She shook her head, then wished she hadn’t.

  “Call them.” Zach handed her a bill. She owed six hundred and eighty-five dollars.

  “Call. I’ll open windows.”

  She punched in the number on the invoice and, rather shrilly, explained the situation to the male voice on the other end of the line.

  “It’s the blower,” he said, superior male to ditzy female. “Takes several minutes before it shuts off.”

  “It’s been several hours and nothing has shut off.”

  “I’ll send someone out first thing in the morning.” Bored unworried voice.

  “No,” Caley said. “Right now. He just left. Get him back here.”

  Pause. “I’ll try his pager.”

  She slammed down the receiver, used ticking seconds to track down a number, then called Kansas Power and Light.

  After she explained a second time, a female voice promised someone would be there within an hour.

  “Hour? We’ll be on the way to mummified in an hour.”

  “I’ll put a rush on it.”

  Caley disconnected and called another number, relieved when the phone was answered. “Ettie, would you take the children for a while? The furnace isn’t working.”

  “Of course. I’ll be right there.”

  Caley had the Littles and Zach, their breaths steaming in the cold air, waiting on the kitchen porch when their grandmother drove up. She bundled them into the car and waved as they drove away.

  Feverish, shaking, coughing, aching in every joint, she switched on the outside light over the garage door and waited in her car for KP and L—or for the house to blow up, whichever came first.

  Before either of those things happened, headlights poked up the driveway, a van parked in the circle of light outside the garage, and the repairman got out.
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  She scooted from the car and went to meet him. Shaking in the cold, she ran up the porch steps, opened the kitchen door, and let him in.

  He smiled a creepy little smile that froze her hand as she reached to close the door behind them.

  2

  Time ticked by on long seconds. His blank eyes watched her, knowing her fear, amused by it. The kitchen seemed too bright, the ceiling light shined down on bowls of soggy cereal in puddles of milk, a loaf of bread spilling out slices, and a jar of peanut butter with a knife stuck in it. Blobs of red splattered the tablecloth. Clumps of strawberry jam, she assumed, not a foreshadowing of gory smears from her body after he hacked her up with a carving knife.

  Distant music and singing: “She cut off their tails with a carving knife.”

  “Ms. James?”

  She squeezed her eyes shut, blinked.

  “You all right?”

  “Fine.” She calculated how fast she could get to the door before he grabbed her.

  “You seem a little upset. Would you like me to leave?”

  Leave? With the furnace roaring away burning expensive gas, and the house like Hades even with the windows open?

  “I’ll call a doctor,” he said, voice bland, nothing in his eyes.

  “No. No, I’m fine.”

  “You sure? You look a little frail.”

  “Sure. Yes.”

  “Well—” He waited a moment. “I’ll go take care of the furnace, then.”

  “Yes.” She was losing it. As bad as Bonnie with her fairy-tale imagination. Caley slumped in a chair, put her elbows on the table, and propped her head in her hands.

  She could hear banging, followed by ominous silences. Her head throbbed like a jungle drum, and she envisioned him dancing, half-naked, skin glistening, around the furnace. Oh, Lord. She tracked down the Advil, tried to shake two capsules into her palm, and half the bottle came out. She dumped the handful on the table, isolated two, and gulped them down with somebody’s leftover orange juice. She grimaced at the bitter taste.

  When the doorbell rang, she jumped, sloshing juice over her hand. “Damn.” Get a grip. She rinsed her hand in the sink, ripped off a paper towel, and headed for the living room.

  Pulling aside the disintegrating lace curtain over the half-moon of window in the door, she saw her ex-husband on the porch, the light shining on his curly hair. Tall, blond, and handsome, looking like he’d just come in from the range in his fleece-lined suede jacket, ankle boots, and tight-fitting jeans. He didn’t look any different than he had three months ago when she’d thrown him out, taking on this derelict house herself with three kids and no money.

  She jerked open the door.

  “Hi, Cal.” Big smile. He stepped forward to come in. She blocked his way.

  His smile turned to hurt. “Aren’t you glad to see me?”

  “I can’t even remember when I was last glad to see you. What do you want?”

  “I’d like to come in.”

  “No.”

  “Come on, Cal. It’s freezing out here.”

  She closed the door.

  “Caley?” He knocked, then leaned on the doorbell.

  She opened the door a few inches.

  “It’s really cold.” He looked charming and sexy.

  Her manner softened. “Would you like a cup of coffee?”

  “That’d be great,” he said with relief.

  “There’s a convenience store six blocks that way and two blocks right. If you jog you’ll stay warmer.”

  “I have to talk to you.”

  “We are talking. Similar to the last time. How long ago was that? Three weeks? Eight weeks?”

  “Couldn’t we go in where it’s warm?”

  “It’s not warm in here, it’s the Sahara. The furnace stuck. You want to pay the repair bill?”

  “Of course. I’ll write a check. How much do you need?”

  She knew what his checks were worth. “If you have money why didn’t you use some of it to take Adam out on his birthday?”

  “I explained that.”

  “Yeah, well, when you’re eight and your dad says he can’t take you like he promised, you don’t really understand the line ‘Something important came up.’” She crossed her arms. “It never was a very good line anyway.” She shivered and rubbed her arms.

  “Let me in, Caley. I want to see them. They’re my kids too. In fact, Zach is—”

  “They’re not here.”

  “Where are they?”

  She hesitated, then sighed. They loved their father, and in his own way he loved them too. It was just that his way was limited. He made promises he didn’t keep, and it broke their hearts. Zach was beginning to expect it and prepared himself for disappointment. He no longer believed the rosy plans his dad told him about, the ball games, the picnics, the movies, the drives to Kansas City. Zach just kept quiet and waited, but she could see the misery in his eyes when none of the glorious plans materialized. Adam, though not yet burned enough to accept it as the norm, was starting to get the picture. But Bonnie loved her father with no hesitations, got thrilled to bubbling when he laid out some special plan. When he didn’t come through, she was devastated and inconsolable. Caley didn’t want to badmouth their father, but she hated to see them so hurt and had taken to throwing in a few cautionary words. Like, “That’ll be wonderful if…”

  Mat stood there blowing on his hands and shifting his weight from one foot to the other. “Listen, Caley, I have to talk to you. It’s important.”

  “Oh, really. Important to whom?”

  “What?” He was getting a mite impatient with her. “What’s the matter with you? Something has come up—”

  “Come up? Again? You really ought to get some new material.” She closed the door.

  “Caley!” He pounded, then jabbed the doorbell.

  After he got tired of pounding and yelling and stabbing her doorbell, she took her woozy head and her aching bones and clumped down the basement steps.

  Awfully quiet. She peered under the banister. The furnace sat with its outer panels removed and pieces of its insides spread on the floor. Where was Tim the repairman? Took it on the lam through one of the narrow, grimy windows? Hiding? She really did have to get rid of all the junk down here. Ugly old furniture you wouldn’t have in your house, ugly old pictures you wouldn’t have on your walls, boxes and boxes of junk left by the previous owners—and maybe the owners before them and the owners before them, for all she knew.

  “Ms. James?”

  She spun around, heart flying up to her throat, beating so hard she couldn’t breathe.

  Tim had crept up behind her with a live snake, the biggest blackest maddest snake she’d ever seen.

  3

  The scream got tangled in her throat and came out in little uuh uuh uuh uuh sounds.

  He had one hand just behind the snake’s head—its mouth was open, its tongue flickering—and the other hand at the end of the tail. In between it coiled and writhed and twisted itself around his wrist.

  Faster than she could see, it jerked its head loose and sank white fangs into the ball of his thumb.

  Cursing, he grabbed the head and, holding it high, he dashed behind her and fed the snake into a white wicker hamper. He slapped down the lid and propped his butt on it, resting one hand on either side.

  “I’ll call 911.” She was halfway up the stairs.

  “Not necessary.”

  “You’ll die.”

  “Naw.”

  She crept back down the stairs.

  “It’s just a black snake. Harmless. Good to have around, really. They take care of rats.”

  Rats? She looked around the basement.

  He studied the beads of blood on the ball of his thumb, then sucked them.

  She shivered. “Where did it come from?”

  “Hibernating over there.” He nodded toward the hot water heater. “Got a bit irritated at being disturbed. Can’t say I blame it. How do you feel when you get yanked out of deep
sleep?”

  “So far I’ve never bitten anyone.” She eyed him closely, expecting him to drop dead. A great big black snake had been down here since last fall? And the kids hadn’t seen it? They were all over this place. One of them could have been bitten. She’d never seen that hamper before, either. Could he have brought in the snake inside the hamper? Why, for God’s sake, would he do a thing like that? Just because she hadn’t seen the hamper didn’t mean it hadn’t been here. With the jumble of junk down here, half the slithery creatures of Bambi’s forest could be here and she wouldn’t notice. Rats? Maybe it was time to clean this place out.

  “I could use a rope,” he said calmly. “If I get up it’ll get loose.”

  “Rope. Right. Rope.” She peered around blankly.

  “On the wall over there.” He nodded toward the wall behind her.

  Coils of rope of different sizes hung on pegs driven into a board on the wall. He knew more about this basement than she did. She snatched one coil and brought it to him.

  “You might hold the lid while I tie it down.”

  “Yes. Right.” She didn’t like being that close to him, but to her surprise he didn’t smell of fire and brimstone, or even sweat and dirt. He didn’t smell of anything more horrifying than soap.

  He trussed the hamper up like a package about to be mailed.

  “What are you going to do with it?” she asked

  “I’ll take care of it.”

  “Right.” She had a vision of him eating it as a midnight snack. How had he found it? Had he been clambering through junk? Looking for what? Hidden treasure?

  He finished up a knot and plopped the hamper at the foot of the steps, then went to kneel in front of the furnace. Paying some kind of homage to the furnace god? The roar of all that expensive fuel was fierce. He leaned in, did something, then backed away and sat on his heels.

  She heard a click and, much to her relief, the roar dwindled. “Will it go back on when it’s supposed to?” She had visions of going through the whole process again.

  He gave her that scary smile that didn’t reach his eyes. “Yes, ma’am.”

  Go then. Go go. He replaced the panels, packed up his tools, and picked up the white hamper using the rope as a handle. She stood way back and let him climb the stairs. In the kitchen, she opened the door, watched him cross the small porch, go down the five steps, cross the driveway, get into the van, and back out. From a living room window, she watched him drive away. When she was sure he wasn’t going to come creeping back, she called Ettie and said she’d be right over to pick up the kids.