A Grave Matter

The voice on the telephone had been full throated, husky; the kind that could raise goosepimples the length of a man’s spine.

The moment Johnny Liddell laid eyes on the redhead, he knew the voice belonged. She was sprawled out, her hair a coppery tangle on the beige rug, her arm crooked over her head. The eyes that stared up at him were slightly slanted, half closed; her lips were parted, showing the perfection of her teeth. A loosely tied dressing gown gave ample evidence that the magnificence of her façade had needed no artificial assist.

She was redheaded, she was luscious, she was stacked.

She was also dead.