Frozen Stiff (23 page)

Chapter 35

S
ometime later we’re headed toward Milwaukee on back highways and Hurley gives me the go-ahead. I turn the cell phone on and start to dial Izzy’s number when it hits me that I don’t know what it is. The number was plugged into my phone’s memory by Izzy himself and all I ever had to do to call him was hit two buttons.

“You don’t happen to know Izzy’s number, do you?” I ask Hurley.

“Not from memory,” he says. “Don’t you know it?”

“Nope. It was programmed into my phone as one of my speed numbers so I’ve never had to dial it.”

Hurley thinks a minute and then says, “I suppose we could call information.”

“It won’t help. Izzy’s cell phone is an unlisted number.”

“Wait, didn’t you say Izzy wanted you to meet him at the office when he called? Do you know that number?”

I shake my head. “I do, but I doubt he’s still there. Even if he is, he doesn’t usually answer the main office phone. He lets it flip over to voice mail.”

Hurley white-knuckles the steering wheel and scowls. Then his face lights up. “You said the throwaway phone was in your purse, right?”

“Yes.”

“That number we have. Call it.”

“But if it’s in my purse—” I see where he’s going then and smile. “Ah, very smart, Hurley. You’re thinking they might have found my car by now.”

He nods. “Izzy knew you were at the gym when you were attacked, right?”

“Yes, I think so. I thought it was Richmond calling and since he was supposed to meet me there, I started cursing him as soon as I answered. Richmond should remember our gym appointment and figure out that that’s where I was. Plus I left a message on Richmond’s cell phone.”

“And judging from the way things will look when they find your car, I’m sure they’ll be treating it as a crime scene. They’ll have your purse with that throwaway cell in it, and when it rings, they’ll answer it.”

“Yeah, but
who
will answer it?”

“Doesn’t matter,” Hurley says. “Just insist on talking to Izzy.”

“Assuming he’s there. What if he isn’t?”

“I consider myself a pretty good judge of character and I’m willing to bet Izzy will be there.”

I pull up the number of my cell—the only one stored in Hurley’s phone—and dial it. It rings several times on the other end and just when I’m about to tell Hurley no one is answering, someone does.

“Hello?” I recognize the voice as Bob Richmond’s.

“Bob? It’s Mattie Winston.”

“Mattie! Where the hell are you? Are you all right?”

“I’m fine, but things got a bit dicey earlier. Are you at the gym?”

“I am. I’m by your car. What the hell happened?”

“It’s a long story.”

“Give me the abbreviated version.”

“Someone tried to kidnap me.”

“Kidnap you? Who?”

“I don’t know who it was. I take it you didn’t find anyone with my car?”

“No, all we found was your purse lying on the ground, along with your keys and your broken cell phone. What’s with this other phone? Where are you?”

“I’m okay.”

“That’s not what I asked. You need to come back here.”

“That’s not going to happen, Bob, at least not yet. Is Izzy with you by any chance?”

“He is.”

“Can I talk to him please?”

I hear Richmond mutter a curse and then some muffled sounds that make me suspect he has his hand over the phone so he can talk without me hearing him. A moment later, Izzy comes on the line.

“Mattie, what the hell is going on? Are you okay?”

“I’m fine, Izzy. I had a white knight ride in at the last minute to save me.” I see Hurley shoot me an amused look.

There’s a moment of silence on the phone and then Izzy says, “Hold on a sec.”

I wait, wondering what he’s doing. Is he helping Richmond trace the call?

“Okay,” Izzy says finally. “I wanted to step away from everyone else so I can talk to you without being overheard. Are you with Hurley?”

I hesitate, knowing the answer might seal my fate with regard to my job. “I am,” I admit. “But he didn’t do these killings, Izzy. There’s someone else involved and that someone tried to kidnap me. Hurley said the guy has been following me the past couple of days. He thinks they did it to get to him, to try to flush him out.”

“Why would they think that would work?”

“Because I’m the closest thing to family Hurley has.”

There is another pause and I hear Izzy sigh on the other end. “Okay,” he says finally. “I’m not totally convinced Hurley isn’t involved, but I did find something that points toward someone else being Callie Dunkirk’s killer.”

“What?”

“Well, when I looked at the X-rays again, I realized that the angle of the knife ran from left to right and more or less straight in, perpendicular to the body. So did the track for the other wound. That suggests both a left-handed killer and someone who is close to the victim in height, which is around five-foot-six. And if I remember correctly, Hurley is right-handed and about six-foot-four.”

“Yes, he is. That’s great news, Izzy.” The excited tone in my voice makes Hurley look over at me with a questioning expression. “Did you share that information with Richmond?”

“I did, but he isn’t completely swayed. He thinks the knife angle might have been affected by the positions of the people involved, or that Hurley could have hired someone to do the killings. He’s going to look into Hurley’s financial affairs next to see if there is any suspect activity. But I think the knife angles, along with that little speech you gave earlier, are enough to make both him and me want to dig a little deeper.”

“Good. At least he’s willing to give Hurley the benefit of a doubt.”

“What are you and Hurley going to do?”

“I don’t know. Hide out for now. Try to come up with something.”

“He needs to come in, Mattie. If he’s innocent, we’ll find a way to prove it.”

“But if he’s in jail he won’t be able to investigate things on his own. And whoever’s behind this seems to have a pretty extensive reach.”

Izzy sighs again. “Okay, but promise me you won’t do anything stupid.”

“Based on your earlier reaction, I think I already have.”

“Yeah, about that . . . we’ll talk some more. If it turns out Hurley has nothing to do with this, I’ll find a way for you to keep your job.”

“Thank you, Izzy. I owe you big.”

“Yes, you do.”

“So I guess it’s rather presumptuous of me to ask you for one more favor?”

“What now?”

“I need someone to take care of Hoover and Rubbish for me until I can get back.”

Izzy chuckles. “No problem. Just know that if Dom spends too much time with Hoover you might not get him back.”

I hang up the phone, and while I’m turning it off I tell Hurley what Izzy told me about the angles of the knife wound and Richmond’s plan to look into Hurley’s finances. “It sounds like Richmond is at least keeping an open mind,” I conclude.

“It’s a start,” Hurley says, turning the car around and heading back the way we came. “But if I don’t come up with something else pretty soon, you and I may both end up behind bars.”

Chapter 36

T
he remainder of our drive is done by the light of a full moon, a good thing because after stopping at a twenty-four-hour gas mart to pick up some staples, Hurley drives us deep into the woods along a rutted, dirt road. I’m feeling like Hansel and Gretel when we arrive at our little hidey-hole, which turns out to be more a shack than a cabin. The scary thing is I suspect it looks better now than it really is and once daylight arrives, all its flaws will be clearly visible—assuming we survive the night. It’s basically a one-room, wooden structure with a front porch that’s falling off and a roof that looks like it’s sagging in the center and ready to cave in any moment.

“Is this place safe?” I ask Hurley, getting out of the car. The night air has turned bitterly cold and I wrap my arms around myself in an effort to get warm. I’m only feeling the cold because it’s so early in the season. Eventually we Wisconsinites adjust to the frigid temps of winter and by February, when any normal person would think Hell is frozen over, we might open our schools an hour or two late. “And does it have heat?”

“It’s a little rough,” Hurley admits, eyeing the place. “I haven’t been here for a while but it will have to do for now. Come on, where’s your camping spirit?”

“Camping spirit? You got the wrong girl. My idea of roughing it is a hotel without room service.”

Hurley grabs a flashlight from the car and uses it to examine some rocks beside the stairs. A moment later he lifts one of the rocks, produces a key, and unlocks the door.

From what I can see in the beam of the flashlight, the inside of the cabin isn’t much better than the outside. The place is primarily furnished with cobwebs and the few pieces of human furniture look like something I might see at the estate sale of someone’s great-grandmother. The air smells musty and damp, and I hear something scurrying about off in one corner.

“I think I should have let Parking Lot Guy grab me,” I say. “I’m betting his accommodations would have been better.”

“Assuming he let you live long enough to enjoy them,” Hurley fired back.

Well, yeah, there is that.

“I need to go outside and start up the generator.” He turns to leave, taking the only light source with him.

“I’m going with you,” I say, falling into step behind him.

I’m relieved to discover that the generator, which is at the back of the house beside a huge pile of chopped wood, has a large fuel tank attached to it. Hurley checks the gauge and says, “Good, there’s plenty.” As soon as he gets the generator started, he loads us both up with wood from the pile and we head back inside.

A short while later we have lights, our packages have been hauled in, and Hurley is stacking wood in the fireplace, which fortunately comes equipped with matches and a basket filled with packets of firelighter stuff.

“This should help brighten the place up,” Hurley says when he strikes a match and puts it to the firelighter. A few minutes later the kindling catches and the wood starts to crackle.

The fire is warm and reassuring, but a more pressing need comes to light. I turn around to look at the rest of the place and that’s when it hits me. “Hurley, where are the facilities?”

“Facilities?”

“You know, the bathroom?”

He picks up the flashlight and hands it to me. “Outside and around to the left,” he says.

I stare at him, dumbfounded. “You’re kidding, right?”

“Afraid not. There’s toilet paper on the shelf by the door over there. Want me to go with you and hold your hand?”

“No. But I wish you’d told me about this before I ordered a caffeinated drink with dinner.” I take the flashlight, grab the toilet paper, and head back outside in the direction he mentioned. There, on the other side of the cabin in all its smelly, ramshackle glory, is the outhouse.

I walk over and open the door, shining the flashlight inside. “Great,” I mutter as I look at the bench with two holes cut into it side by side. “A high-class outhouse.” I step inside and shine the light down into one of the holes. Just a few inches below the seat is a tower of spiderwebs with a half dozen little spiders in it and one gigantic one that I swear is as big as the burger I ate for dinner. I shine the light into the second hole, relieved to see that this one doesn’t have an arachnid condo built inside.

I don’t think I’ve ever peed so fast in my entire life, and when I’m done, I use the flashlight to examine my crotch and the inside of my pants before I pull them back up, just to make sure nothing has tried to move in and homestead either spot.

Back inside, I’m delighted to see that the fire is now a roaring, crackling source of heat and reassurance. I return the toilet paper to the shelf and walk over to the fireplace, turning my back to it to warm up.

“Glad to see you didn’t fall in,” Hurley says.

“Or become some giant spider’s bitch,” I toss back. “Have you looked down those holes out there? It’s the New York City of Spidervilles. And I’m pretty sure I saw a red hourglass on the belly of one of the residents.” I shudder at the memory and edge a little closer to the fire.

“I use them for target practice,” Hurley says with a grin.

With nature’s call out of the way, my mind takes in the rest of the room. There’s a couch facing the fireplace, a card table with two folding chairs, a utility sink in what I’m guessing is supposed to be the kitchen—though I notice it has no faucets—and a number of built-in shelves and cabinets.

After taking note of what is here, I then notice what isn’t: a bed.

“Where are we going to sleep?” I ask Hurley, who is loading logs into a woodstove beside the sink.

“The couch is a sleeper sofa. This place isn’t designed for winter living so we’ll have to tend to the fire through the night if we want to stay warm. Want to go fetch some more wood?”

Not particularly, but I suppose I need to pull my weight. Reluctantly I grab the wood carrier and the flashlight, and leave the warmth of the fire to head outside. When I get to the woodpile I lay the carrier out on the ground and start stacking logs into it one at a time while I contemplate the night’s sleeping arrangements. Two people, one bed . . . it doesn’t take a genius to do the math. Normally I’d be excited over the prospect of sharing a bed with Hurley, but with Izzy’s revelations about the new working arrangements and the whole no fraternizing rule, things have gotten much more complicated. I wonder if Hurley has heard about the budget cuts and the proposed changes, and if he has, what he thinks about it.

A few logs later, I hear movement in the trees off to my left. I freeze, listening, and hear it again . . . footsteps crunching on the carpet of dead and fallen leaves. I shine the flashlight in the general direction of the noise but the woods are so thick all I can see is an endless expanse of tree trunks.

I consider hollering out and asking who’s there, but it seems too much like those scenes you see in a horror movie just before the next horrendous murder. Then I realize that the flashlight marks my location like a bull’s-eye. Quickly I turn it off and stand there, still holding a log and hoping it’s enough of a weapon, waiting for my eyes to adjust to the moonlit darkness.

For a moment everything is quiet, but then I hear the footsteps again, moving even closer. As my eyes adapt to the nighttime light, I abandon my post and do a fast gimp back toward the cabin’s entrance.

“Hurley, there’s someone out there,” I say, trying to swallow down my panic. “I heard footsteps in the woods and they were coming this way.”

Hurley drops the log he was positioning in the woodstove, takes the flashlight from me, and then heads outside, taking his gun from his holster. I hover just inside the doorway, unsure if I should go out there with him. My instinct is to stay inside behind the security of the walls, but I feel an obligation to keep an eye on Hurley. Realizing I’ll be about as useful as teats on a bull, I wield my log like a one-handed batter anyway, hoping Hurley will shoot whoever’s out there before I have to use it.

He disappears behind the cabin and I wait, listening for any sounds of a skirmish, or for a shot to ring out. Instead, I hear Hurley call out my name.