Theresa Monsour (7 page)

HE'D DECIDED NOT to weave any lies because he feared he'd lose track of them. Instead, he left out the bits of his life that were unsuitable for a savior. He didn't tell them he lived in a trailer park or that his father was his roommate or that he was considered a loser in high school or that he'd never gone to college. No one questioned the missing details; all the reporters wanted to concentrate on was his previous hero experience.

He met one last newspaper reporter for an interview over lunch Monday. She said she was doing a feature on him for the next day's paper. He ordered a burger and fries and she bought herself a Diet Coke. He was grateful for the food; it gave him something to fiddle with. He kept stumbling over what to call her because her last name sounded like a first name—Jill or Jane or Jan—and her first name was a fella's name. Terry or Tommy. He gave up and called her “ma'am.” His pa had taught him to fall back on “ma'am.” She was barely five feet tall and couldn't have weighed ninety pounds. Cute. Smelled good. Lilacs. He tried to imagine himself in bed with her and decided they'd
look ridiculous. He was clumsy at sex no matter who he was with, but it was the most awkward with the short ones. He was having trouble concentrating on the interview itself. Exhausted after the weekend, he'd hit a wall and needed to pop another pill. The body in back of the truck was another distraction. Minnesota Octobers were unpredictable; any day the cold snap could give way to a warm spell. He had to get rid of the bridesmaid.

An hour into the lunch interview he was staring at his plate and repeatedly dipping the last fry into a spot of ketchup. “What p . . . paper you with again?”

“
Duluth News Tribune
.” She sounded irritated. She closed her notebook, clicked her pen and shoved both in her purse. “I got everything I need. Why don't you get some sleep? You're wiped out.” She slid out of the booth and threw enough cash on the table for her drink. Trip watched her leave and tiredly ran his fingers through his hair. A few strands fell into his plate.

His cell phone rang. He'd shut it off Friday night and had turned it on again that morning. He pulled it out of his jacket and flipped it open.

Wade Murray, his regional sales manager: “Hey, big shot. Why the hell haven't you been picking up?”

Trip: “Busy.”

“Yeah. I noticed. Why didn't you give the company a plug?”

“B . . . b . . . been wearing the shirts on TV.”

“So what? Who knows where they came from? Next time they shove a camera in your mug, the first words outta your mouth are
Pinecone Clothing Distributors
.”

“Sure.”

“How'd you do up there?”

Trip: “Great.”

A pause. Murray knew Trip was lying; he never did great. “When you heading back to the Twin Cities?”

“A couple d . . . days. Thought I'd d . . . do some cold-calling south of Duluth.”

“We got a sales meeting early Thursday. I want you here for it.” He hung up.

Trip closed the phone, shoved it back in his pocket. He threw some bills on the table and slid out of the booth. Went out the door. On his way back to the car he heard sirens. He stopped in the middle of the sidewalk and scanned both ends of the block. His heart raced; three squads were coming down the street. His eyes went to the truck and back to the squads. Were they on to him? How? They zoomed past him. He wobbled as he walked the rest of the way to the Ford. He wondered where they were going; wherever it was, he wanted to steer clear of them. He pulled his keys out of his jacket and dropped them in the street while opening the door; his hands were shaking. He picked them up, opened the door, slid into the driver's seat. As soon as he shut the door his cell phone rang again. Should have left the thing off, he thought. Probably Murray again. He pulled it out and flipped it open.

“Yeah.”

“Son?”

“Pa.”

“When you coming home?”

“Soon. How you f . . . feeling?”

“Horseshit.”

“How's your blood sugar?”

“Too damn high.”

“How high? Nurses b . . . been there yet?”

“Come and gone. Bitches. Especially that fat blond one you favor.”

They
were
bitches, but he and his pa couldn't pick and choose. The free homecare service was contracted by the county. The fat blonde, Keri Ingmar, was a longtime neighbor in the trailer park who'd enrolled them in the program. She was ten years older than Trip. Stupid as a rock. She'd been supplying him with his drugs since he was in high school. She'd been sleeping with him since then, too. It used to be the drugs were separate from the sex. Over the
years, as Keri grew older and Trip grew less willing, the sex became part of the payment for the drugs.

“Hang in there, P . . . Pa. I'll try to cut it short.” He felt guilty for being gone and at the same time was glad he wasn't there. His pa wasn't a well-behaved diabetic. He ate what he wanted. Didn't keep up with his insulin shots. Ignored the sores on his feet until he had to have a big toe amputated. The nurses fought with the old man to get his socks off during their visits. His pa didn't want them to check his feet because he was sure a leg would be the next to go, and he was probably right. His eyesight was failing—another side effect of his refusal to cooperate with medical treatment—and the old man wouldn't admit it. Pretended he could see perfectly well. All the while he kept pissing in the bathroom wastebasket instead of the toilet.

“Sweet.”

“Yeah?”

“You look real sharp on TV.”

“Thanks.” Trip was amazed his old man had taken a break from his western channel to catch the news.

“They pay you anything for that?”

“No.”

“Don't worry about me. Take your time up there. Sell some shirts. Make some money. Do something worthwhile.”

“Later, P . . . Pa.” He closed the cell phone and tried to put home out of his mind. The whole scene in their trailer was getting too depressing. The fat blond nurse was getting to be the highlight of Trip's week, and that in itself was pathetic. He wished she didn't live so close; sometimes he felt trapped by her. His pa knew Trip was sleeping with her; he'd asked Trip to keep the bedroom door open so he could listen. The old man said it was the only action he'd get for the rest of his life, but Trip knew that was a lie. His pa was sleeping with her, too. That's why his old man told him to take his time. Trip didn't care. He couldn't leave Moose Lake yet anyway; he had work to do that night.

Trip went back to the motel room after lunch and
relaxed on the bed with some magazines and a six-pack. He popped open a can, took a gulp and paged through a couple of knife catalogues to see if there was anything new. The bowie knife with a running stag etched on the six-inch blade was nice, but the handle was imitation antler and he wanted the real thing. The gladiator swords didn't interest him; he already had a whole rack of those. He wondered if his pa could use the cane; the carved cobra head pulled out to reveal a sword. He pictured his old man tooling around the trailer park with a sword cane and laughed.

The motel room was chilly. He cranked up the thermostat, peeled off his clothes and stepped into the shower. Good and hot. He ducked his head under. He massaged his scalp with his fingertips; his pa told him he needed to get the blood circulating in his head. When the stream turned lukewarm, he turned off the water. Trip saw black strands in his palms and tangled around his fingers. More hair on the shower floor. He'd been losing hair since he graduated from high school. It depressed him; he figured he'd be bald by the time he hit fifty. Just like his old man. Didn't seem fair.

The room was warmer by the time he toweled off and collapsed into bed. His feet hung off the edge of the mattress. He tried to turn on the television with the remote. The screen stayed black. Batteries were dead. He got up and turned it on manually and fell back against the pillows. He was surprised and happy to see what was leading the six-o'clock news. Bunny Pederson's ex-husband had been picked up for questioning in her disappearance and suspected murder. Trip never imagined someone else would get blamed, and so quickly. He figured they'd eventually find the body—she'd be a collection of bones. There'd be weeks of investigation while they followed tips and leads that led nowhere. Then they'd give up. Beaten. They'd never say the word.
Beaten
. But that's what they'd be. That's how it had worked before. This was even better. “Perfect,” he said. He popped open a second can and took a long drink. He studied the man on the screen. Handsome.
Well built. Probably a jock in high school. Captain of the football team or some such shit. Chad was his name, according to the television reporter.

“I didn't do anything,” he said into a microphone, and he slid into the backseat of a sheriff's car. In the background, the cops were loading a bunch of shotguns and a barking dog into a van. A deputy was holding a couple of crying boys by the hands. Trip figured they were the Pederson kids.

He thought:
Things are looking up for Sweet Justice
. He wondered if he should dump the body where the cops could find it and really seal the jock's fate. No. They took the jock's guns; they thought he shot her. If they found the body and figured out she'd been run over, that might somehow exclude the ex-husband as a suspect. The cops would probably figure out that it was a truck that did it and maybe this Chad didn't have a truck. No. Better play it safe. He'd bury her that night while the cops were focusing their attention on the jock. He took another sip of beer and popped the top off his pill bottle. Fished around with his finger until he found what he needed. His favorite. The Adderall. Full of energy. He'd need energy tonight. He chewed the pill and washed it down with another sip of beer. He was hungry. Knew he'd better eat before the amphetamines did their thing and took his appetite away. He decided to go back into town for dinner. Load up on some food. More energy for tonight. He'd try that bar where the wedding reception was held. Where Bunny Pederson was last seen alive.

PUBLIC PRETENDER'S OFFICE my ass. Stupid jerk.” She drove home from the station Monday night muttering to herself while making a mental list of who she needed to call before leaving and what she needed to pack for Moose Lake. She pulled into the parking lot and saw a sapphire Jaguar convertible. Erik Mason's car. “Not what I need,” she said to herself as she shut off the Jeep and pulled her key out of the ignition. She slid out of the car with her purse and slammed the driver's door hard. As she ran to her boat she heard Tripod, her neighbor's three-legged dog, barking like crazy. He was the yacht club's fail-safe alarm; he went off whenever there was a stranger on the dock. She thumped down the dock and saw Erik standing by her boat. She would have recognized his figure from across the river: tall, athletic, short walnut brown hair. Jack was a rower and had a muscular upper body. Erik, a runner, was a bit trimmer—and more preoccupied with his own looks. He spent a lot of time in the gym. He was also more interested in money. Spent too much time at the track. Murphy figured the horses paid for the Jag. She liked that
dangerous edge to Erik, and his looks matched his personality. She thought he resembled an older James Dean. Her husband—safer and more playful than Erik—looked like a younger James Caan.

“Horseshit timing,” she said, and rushed past him to open her door. He followed her into the galley; his arms were filled with flowers. “What if Jack was here?” she snapped. “You can't just show up. Jesus Christ.” She threw her keys and purse on the kitchen table and turned to glare at him.

“I checked first. No silver Beemer in the lot. Got a vase?”

She pointed to a cupboard and ran upstairs. “I've got to go out of town for work,” she yelled from her bedroom. “I appreciate the thought, but they're going to be wasted. And what if Jack sees them?”

“Tell him they're from your mother.” Erik set the flowers on the table and followed her upstairs. She was stuffing a tangle of bras and panties and socks into a duffel bag that was sitting on her unmade bed. “When are you going to tell him what happened over the summer? You should. Get it all out in the open.”

“No,” she said flatly. She went into her closet and pulled a jean skirt off a hanger. Some running gear—stocking cap, sweats, shoes—were in a heap on the closet floor. She picked them up. Maybe she could squeeze in a workout; Moose Lake had some great trails.

“That's it? No? Didn't it mean anything?” Erik was on her heels and she almost knocked him over when she turned around. “Answer me.”

She stepped around him and tossed the clothes on the bed. “I don't have time for this.” She yanked open a dresser drawer and pulled out three sweaters and two pairs of jeans and tossed them on the pile. She went into the bathroom, scooped a handful of toiletries out of the medicine cabinet and went back to the bed with them. Her cell phone rang. “Dammit!” She dumped the toiletries in the bag and rifled
around the sheets for the phone. She found it under a pillow and picked it up: “Murphy.”

Jack: “Babe. Want to meet for dinner at that Italian joint on St. Peter Street?”

Murphy frowned at Erik while she talked to her husband. “I can't. They're sending me up north. Moose Lake.”

Jack: “Why?”

“Long story,” said Murphy, cradling the phone on her shoulder while shoving clothes into the bag. “Call my folks. They're expecting us for dinner tomorrow night.”

“You won't be back by then?”

“I don't know. Maybe not.” She tried to close the bag; the zipper was caught on a bra strap. “Gotta go. I'll call you.”

Jack: “Love you.”

She paused. Erik was staring at her; he knew who was on the other end of the phone. “Me too,” she said. She hung up and threw the phone on the nightstand.

“Want some company for the ride up?” Erik asked. “I've got a couple of days off.”

“No,” she snapped. She disengaged the bra strap and finished zipping the bag shut.

Erik sat down on the bed. “Stop moving and talk to me.” He put his hand on the bag to keep her from leaving. “What about us?”

She hated that pleading tone in his voice and the hungry look in his eyes; she thought he might as well wrap his arms around her ankles. “I don't know. I told you a couple of weeks ago I don't know. I'm no closer to figuring this thing out. Jack and I are still married, you know. I still have feelings for him.”

“You have feelings for me.” He grabbed her wrist and pulled her next to him on the bed. She opened her mouth to argue and he planted his mouth hard over hers. His left hand cradled the back of her head and his right moved down to her left breast.

“Damn you,” she breathed, trying to push him away with both hands. “Don't tie me in a knot right before I have
to leave town.” He released her and she stood up. The smile on his face. Smug. Self-satisfied. He knew how to stir her up.

“Admit it,” he said. The smile disappeared. “You care about me.”

From manipulator to wounded puppy; Murphy didn't know which made her angrier. “Give me some time. Breathing room. Space.” She pulled the bag off the bed.

Erik stood up and shoved his hands in his pants pockets. “That's the line I usually use.”

Murphy ran downstairs and took her keys and purse off the kitchen table. She opened the fridge and took two bottles of spring water for the road.

Head lowered and hands still in his pockets, Erik walked downstairs. “I'll leave the flowers in some water. They'll last. Call when you get back.”

“Fine,” she said. Suddenly, leaving town for a few days seemed a wonderful idea. She opened the door to leave and turned to toss him her spare key. “Lock the place up behind you.” He caught it and grinned. “Don't get any ideas,” she said. “I want that back.”

As she walked to the parking lot, she wondered what was going on with Erik. They'd known each other for years. She was familiar with the sly, dangerous side of him; it was what first attracted her to him. The timing had been good for them, too. They'd both been assigned to the prostitute's murder—she as the lead detective and Erik as an investigator for the ME's office. Erik supported her through the tough case and believed her when she first raised the surgeon as the main suspect. Jack, who hated her job anyway, thought she was nuts. He went out of town for a medical conference in the middle of things. Part of her was still angry with Jack for that. Erik stuck by her, too, in the internal affairs investigation that followed the surgeon's suicide. The doctor had killed himself with her gun. But this clingy, needy stuff with Erik was new and unsettling. If that was her lover's flip side, she didn't want any part of it. What did they have in common anyway? Good sex.
They'd trained for the Twin Cities Marathon together. They both enjoyed cooking. Sex and running and food. Not enough for a long-lasting pairing. Sometimes she feared all she and Jack had in common was sex.

She opened the back of the Jeep, tossed the bag inside, slammed it shut hard. Sliding behind the wheel, she took a deep breath and told herself to relax. She went through downtown and turned onto Interstate 35E heading north. She'd missed rush hour; traffic was light. Moose Lake, a town of two thousand on the way to Duluth, would be well under a two-hour drive. She slipped a compact disc into the CD player. Billie Holiday's “Night and Day” filled the interior of the car with smooth horns. She took a long drink of water and felt better. Time to forget about Erik and Jack and her leaky showerhead.

As soon as she got out of the metro area, the drive took on a north woods feel. She passed a few red barns and white farmhouses, but mostly the highway was lined with hardwoods and pines. The interstate sliced through lakes and rivers and towns with names that conjured up the forest: Pine City. Snake River. Willow River. Sturgeon Lake. Moose Lake would be coming up after all those. What did she know about Moose Lake? She'd passed it a hundred times while headed to the North Shore. She'd taken the exit into the town on a few occasions. Once to interview an inmate at the state prison. Another time she ran a 10K there. A weekend in May. Moose Run, it was called. Rock hound Jack dragged her there one July weekend for Agate Days. The town dumped 150 pounds of agates and $100 in quarters in the street mixed with gravel; with the blast of a siren, everyone dove in to dig for rocks and money. The silliness of the event charmed her. She'd been in enough small towns to know she'd never work in rural Minnesota. The odd missing bridesmaid case aside, there wasn't enough murder and mayhem to keep a cop busy. If she had to pick a place to retire to, however, Moose Lake would top the list. It was one of those places that had at least one of everything. Flower shop. Pet store. Dentist's office.
Doctor's office. Funeral home. Drugstore. JCPenney catalogue store. Hardware store. Grocery. Hospital. Movie theater. The community was nestled in an area checkered with lakes, streams, rivers and forests. She couldn't see what else a person needed.

She was south of Moose Lake when her work cell phone rang. She looked over at her purse sitting on the passenger's seat. Let it ring, she thought. She didn't want to talk to Erik or Jack. Maybe it was her mother. It might be the cop shop. She reached over, fished it out and answered. “Murphy.”

Duncan: “Don't sound so excited.”

After the scene she'd left behind on her houseboat, talking to Duncan didn't seem so bad. “Actually, I'm looking forward to this little trip,” she said.

“Know where you're staying?”

“Not yet.” She planned on scoping it out when she got to town.

“I do. I already made reservations for you at the AmericInn right off the freeway. Got you a room with a Jacuzzi.”

“I'm afraid to ask why.”

“My way of trying to apologize. Plus they had a weekday special. Okay?”

Odd but well-meaning gesture, she thought. Yo-Yo wasn't such a jerk after all. “Okay.”

“Sorry about that crack about your head. Actually, that scar gives you an air of mystery.”

“Cut the crap, Duncan. Should have quit while you were ahead.”

He laughed. “My life story.”

 

SHE took the Moose Lake exit. The hotel was part of a growing tourist development right off the highway. A gas station and sub shop shared the intersection. She parked the Jeep, took her bag out of the back and walked in. A
blaze crackled in the lobby fireplace. The clerk at the front—a skinny blond woman with hair pulled back into a ponytail—slid the key card across the desk to Murphy. “Breakfast in the morning. Served right here in the lobby. Coffee. Juice. Cereal. Toast. Fruit. Waffles. Danish. The whole nine yards. Comes with the room.”

“Thanks.” Murphy took the card and grabbed a trail map from the counter. A quick run at dawn would be good.

“You can get on one of the trails right off the parking lot,” said the clerk.

Murphy pointed toward the moose head mounted over the fireplace. “That real?”

“Who knows? I hate it regardless. Scares me at night. His eyes follow you.”

“Which way to the pool?” Murphy asked, and the woman sent her down the hall. Murphy poked her head into the room. Hot and humid. High, wood-beamed ceiling. Through the sauna window she saw two fat men sweating it out. Two fat women sat in the hot tub; probably the fat guys' wives. The pool was unoccupied. She'd have to go for a swim later. She walked to the edge of the pool and peered into the water. At the bottom of the pool, written in tile:
MOOSE LAKE
. She went to her room, slipped the key card into the lock and pushed open the door. She turned on the light and gasped. A two-room suite with a whirlpool and a fireplace. “Shit,” she muttered. She threw her bag and purse on the bed, a four-poster. The setting gave her an idea.
Why not?
She pulled the cell phone out of her purse and punched in his phone number. “Hey, babe,” Murphy said into the phone. “Are you up for a one-night vacation?”

Murphy pulled down the bedsheets, turned on the gas fireplace, filled the ice bucket and set it next to the tub. She called the front desk. “A tall, handsome guy is meeting me here.”

The woman laughed. “Does he have a brother?”

“His name is Jack Ramier. If he gets here before I get back from dinner, give him a key card.”

“Gotcha.”

Murphy checked her watch. It would take nearly two hours for Jack to drive up. He'd already eaten and she was hungry. She grabbed her jacket and purse. Remembered a bar off the main drag that served dinner.