I rang the counter bell.
“Hey, Rose, you around? It’s Shelby.”
The back door of the small house was cracked open, letting in a few flies that buzzed around us. I heard a muffled reply, and not long after, Rose appeared in the doorway, carrying half a dozen clay flower pots planted with daisies and African violets. She wore a camouflage tank top and jean shorts underneath. Rose had always carried a couple more pounds than she liked, and her exposed stomach had the tiniest roll. Her skin was moist with sweat and dirty with paint and potting soil. Her reddish-brown hair was tucked under a beret.
“Hey, Shelby,” she said. “Hey, Adam. Have you been here long?”
“Just got here.”
“Oh, good. Sorry I’m such a mess. I was out in the garden, and I’ve been touching up paint on the doors half the day.” She dropped into the office chair and swatted away a fly with one of her motel brochures. “What’s up? You guys find Jeremiah yet?”
I shook my head. “No.”
“Damn, that’s so awful. He’s such a great kid. I can’t believe this. I just saw him yesterday.”
“Where was this?”
“Right here at the motel. Jeremiah and Adrian both help me out sometimes during the summer.”
“Doing what?”
“Oh, Adrian moves furniture and other heavy stuff. Jeremiah helps me unload boxes. Soap, shampoo bottles, new towels, that kind of thing. Ellen likes to make sure the kids have plenty of summer chores, and there’s never a shortage of things to do around here. Plus, Jeremiah’s a little chatterbox, and I like that. He hangs out around the office with me.”
Adam and I exchanged a glance.
“Does he meet a lot of your guests?” I asked.
“Some, sure.”
“And you said he was over here yesterday?”
“For a couple of hours in the morning.”
“Did he seem okay?”
“Oh, yeah, he was fine.”
“Did anything unusual happen?”
“Unusual? No, just the same old, same old. Guests check in, guests check out, guests always need something. It’s go-go-go all day long.”
“Do you remember Jeremiah talking with any of your guests yesterday?”
“I suppose he did, but I don’t remember anyone specifically. People assume he’s my kid, so they talk to him.”
“What was he doing while he was here?”
“Not much. I was too busy to put him to work, so he was batting around a shuttlecock outside for a while, until he lost it in the trees. Then he was working on a jigsaw puzzle in the corner.”
“Did he mention having problems with anybody?”
“Problems? You mean, like with one of my guests? No, he didn’t say anything like that.”
“Mrs. N says she had a Peeping Tom outside her window last night. She thinks it was someone from the motel. Did she talk to you about that?”
Rose rolled her eyes. “Oh, yeah, of course, she did. Every week it’s something different with her. Complaining is what keeps Mrs. N alive.”
“Do you have any idea who this man was?”
“Not a clue.”
“She said he breathed really loud. Does that remind you of anybody staying here? Like a guest with allergies or something like that?”
“A loud breather? Seriously? You think I pay attention to that? The only problem I have is with people who are too loud at other things. Moms don’t like it when the walls start shaking right next to their kids’ heads.”
“What about men staying here on their own?” Adam asked. “Do you have anybody in a room by themselves? No wife or girlfriend tagging along?”
“I don’t get it, why are you guys so on about this? Jeremiah’s missing, and you’re worried about somebody peeping Mrs. N?” Rose cocked her head, trying to figure us out. Then a flush of horror spread across her face. “Oh, man, you don’t think—? One of my people?”
“My father asked us to cover all the bases,” I explained. “The thing is, if Jeremiah was hanging out here yesterday, maybe he met somebody …”
Rose swore. She took off her beret, wiped her forehead, and put it back on. “This sucks. I can’t believe it.”
“Single men, Rose,” Adam repeated. “Anybody around here fit the bill?”
“Yeah, one guy.”
“Who is he?”
“I don’t know. Nondescript. Thirties, I think, tall and skinny, buzz cut. He said his name was Bob. Bob Evans, like the restaurant. He paid cash for three nights upfront, and he said he didn’t want maid service.”
“That didn’t raise red flags with you?” I asked.
“This is the Rest in Peace, Shelby. Around here, anything less than an active smell of decaying flesh doesn’t worry me much.”
Adam peered through the office window at the motel parking lot. “Is his car here? What does he drive?”
“A big gray Cadillac, I think.” Rose stood up and eyed the lineup of vehicles. “Yeah, the car’s here. He’s in room 106.”
Adam didn’t wait for me or discuss what we should do next. He banged through the screen door and took long, determined cop steps down the row of motel rooms. If there was a chance to be a hero, Adam was always right there. By the time I caught up with him, he was thumping his fist on the door of room 106. I went over to the gray Cadillac and squinted through the windows to see if I could spot anything inside.
I did.
The floors were thick with dirt and pine needles. Bob Evans had been in the woods. I also saw a large water canteen and a plastic bag tipped over on the back seat, spilling out a head of romaine lettuce and a small container of dried fruit chips. I recognized the logo on the bag. It came from Ellen Sloan’s mini-mart.
I spun back to the motel room door. No one had answered.
“He’s in there,” Adam told me. “He’s trying to ignore us, but I hear somebody moving around.”
“This could be our guy, Adam. Be careful. The boy could be inside.”
“Mr. Evans,” Adam shouted, banging louder on the door. “Police.”
The motel room door opened two inches. A chain lock dangled across the space. I saw one nervous brown eye and a round face that dripped sweat. I also noticed a noxious smell busting out of the shut-up space.
“What do you want?”
“I want you to open the door, Mr. Evans,” Adam told him.
“Why? What for? I haven’t done anything.”
“Then you won’t mind if we take a look inside.”
“Well, I do mind. I paid for the room, it’s mine, you have no right to come in here.”
He was right. We didn’t. But in the midst of the standoff between them, I heard the thump of something inside the motel room, like the sound that someone would make who was trapped behind a locked door.
“Adam, he’s got somebody in there!”
Adam heard the noise, too. As Mr. Evans shouted in protest, Adam slammed a shoulder against the motel room door and ripped the chain lock away from the frame. He piled through the doorway and tackled Mr. Evans to the ground. I leaped over the two of them like a steeplechase runner and landed in the middle of the worn, stained gray carpet. The only other door in the room was the bathroom door, which was closed. I heard the same heavy thud from the other side that I’d heard before.
“Jeremiah! Jeremiah, is that you? It’s Shelby Lake, everything’s okay.”
I ran to the bathroom door and yanked it open. The instant I did, something erupted from inside, collided with my legs, and knocked me flat on my back. A snuffling, grunting noise filled my ears, and something huge and black began licking my face with a slobbering tongue. I shoved the thing away in horror and scrambled to my feet.
Adam had a knee shoved into the back of Bob Evans and already had cuffs around the man’s wrists.
“Let him
go!” I screamed.
Adam hadn’t caught up to what was going on. “What? Why?”
“Let him go! It’s a pig! It’s a pig!”
I said it several times, and I may have added an adjective in front of “pig” that began with the letter f.
The victim who’d been trapped inside the motel bathroom was a miniature pig, all black, probably at least a hundred pounds, looking like a beer-bellied drinker at the local bar. The animal snorted its way over to Bob Evans, who was still trapped under Adam, and shoved its flat nose into the man’s face.
“Snuffle Man!” Adam exploded. “This is what Mrs. N heard? The guy was chasing after his pig?”
“Looks that way.”
Adam flipped the man over and grabbed his collar. “I don’t believe this. Why were you hiding it, buddy? You could have gotten yourself killed.”
“The motel doesn’t allow pets,” Bob Evans gasped from the floor. “The penalty’s like a hundred bucks if you bring one in the room.”
Adam shook his head in disgust and freed the man. The two of us were breathing heavily as the shot of adrenaline drained from our systems. When I glanced at Adam’s belt, I saw that he’d gone so far as to unsnap the holster clip on his gun. We were all lucky. This could have gone south very fast.
A pig. A pet pig.
Not a child.
I got out my phone to call my father and give him an update. The Rest in Peace was a dead end. We were no closer to finding Jeremiah.
Chapter Ten
After we left the motel, Adam and I drove the short distance down the highway to the Sloan house. Trina Helvik answered the door, and I could see a crowd of people behind her. It looked to me as if half the town was waiting for news with Ellen and Dennis. Adam and I needed to search Jeremiah’s bedroom for clues, but I asked him to start without me. I wanted to talk to Trina first.
She grabbed a sweater and followed me down the steps. We made our way along the fringe of an elaborate garden, where the flowers had shut themselves up against the cool night. The house lights threw our shadows across the grass.
“How is Ellen doing?” I asked Trina.
“Oh, she’s in rough shape as you’d expect. Ellen isn’t the kind of person who can just sit there and do nothing. She likes to be in control of the world, and this is something she can’t control.”
Trina always had good insights into what made people tick. That was what made her a successful coach. Control was how Ellen Sloan lived her life, with everything in its proper place. The garden at her house was like that, manicured in neat, colorful rows and free of weeds, with decorative fencing to keep out the rabbits. Her mini-mart was the same way, with every box of cereal or can of soup in perfect alignment with the one next to it.
“Have you discovered anything at all about where Jeremiah might be?” Trina asked.
“No. Nothing yet.”
“That’s so sad. That poor boy. I hope he’s okay.”
“I know. Me, too.”
Trina’s face was stoic like a good Scandinavian, but she was also a parent with a daughter the same age as Jeremiah. I knew what Trina was thinking, that it could just as easily have been her child who disappeared.
“Did you get my message? I found Anna hanging out in the cemetery this afternoon.”
“I did. Thank you for bringing her home, Shelby. Sometimes that girl is so headstrong.” She added with a smile, “She reminds me of a certain high school volleyball player I used to coach.”
“A little bit,” I agreed.
“Did Anna say what she was doing there?”
“She was looking for Jeremiah. She’s very upset about him.”
“Aren’t we all.”
The two of us kept walking through the Sloans’ large, sloping backyard. The forest loomed at the end of the grass. If you hiked into those woods, eventually you would find yourself on Keith Whalen’s land a mile away. The trails led past Black Lake, where the Striker girls used to swim on Saturday afternoons. Trina would join us there sometimes, bonding with her players. It was during those lazy days, laughing together and telling stories, that I began to see her as a friend even more than a coach.
Trina was six inches taller than me, statuesque and athletic, like a blond model out of a Dale of Norway ad. She had a natural beauty that could make you self-conscious about your own flaws. Pale blue eyes, sharp little nose, a face so symmetrical that each side looked like a mirror of the other. At forty years old, she’d given almost nothing back to time, except for the faint lines that bent around her lips when she smiled.
However, to me, she’d been at her most beautiful five years earlier, when she was completely bald and hugging her daughter as Anna cried into her shoulder in a hospital bed. I was crying, too. So was her husband, Karl. The one who should have been crying was Trina, but instead, she held all of us together with an inner strength that I envied. She had every reason in the world to be bitter, but I never saw one ounce of anger or self-pity from her throughout the entire experience.
“Anna told me that she and Jeremiah aren’t friends anymore,” I said. “Did you know about that?”
“Yes, it was pretty obvious. They haven’t spent time together in months.”
“Did you ask her why?”
“I did, a couple of times, but she wouldn’t open up to me about it. I didn’t want to push her. I figured she would talk about it when she was ready.”
“Well, if you can get her to tell you anything more, that would be helpful.”
Trina cocked her head in surprise. “Why?”
“Just in case it’s related to something going on in Jeremiah’s life that led to his disappearance. At this point we have to consider everything.”
“I suppose so. That’s an unpleasant thought.”
We stood in silence for a while. Where the trees began, I saw a young doe feeding on the leaves, its body barely kept upright by spindly legs. Looking at my best friend, I debated whether to ask her what was wrong. If she was keeping a secret from me, she had her reasons, and like Anna, she would talk about it when she was ready. Except Trina rarely opened up to me. She was happy to let me lean on her, but she resisted being vulnerable herself. For a while, I’d assumed it was because she still saw me as a teenage girl and that she was more open with her other friends. Then I realized that I was wrong. Trina had acquaintances, coworkers, and neighbors, but in many ways, I was her only real friend.
“Anna thinks something is going on with you,” I murmured.
Trina was staring at the doe. “She said that?”
“Yes. She said the two of you have been crying.”
“Karl. Not me. I don’t cry.”
It always puzzled me that she was so proud of that. “So what’s going on?”
“Now isn’t the time, Shelby. You have other things to think about.”
That was classic Trina. She was always pretending that she was protecting me when she was really protecting herself. It was a defense mechanism, a way to keep emotions at arm’s length. I could have let the subject drop, but I’d learned long ago that I needed to keep knocking on the door until she answered.
“Is it you and Karl? Are the two of you having problems?”
“Oh, no. Karl is wonderful.”
“Then what?”
Trina swayed slightly on her feet. She would do that beside the volleyball court, too, when she’d seen us making a mistake and was gathering her words for how to tell us. She never spoke off the cuff. She thought about everything so that she wouldn’t have to regret it later. I was still struggling to learn that lesson myself.
“It’s back,” she said.
That was all she told me, but she didn’t need to say anything more. There were not two words that could have frozen my soul more than those. It gets cold around here in the winters, but never as cold as that moment on July 17.
<
br /> “Trina, I—”
That was all I managed before my throat closed up. I had so many things to say, but I didn’t say any of them. I took two steps to close the distance between us and wrapped my arms around her. I held on for a long time. She reacted stiffly, as if embarrassed by our closeness. Physical displays of affection made Trina uncomfortable, but I didn’t care.
When I found my voice, I said, “What do you need? How can I help?”
“There’s nothing you can do right now, Shelby. But thank you.”
“I’m here. Day or night.”
“I know that.”
“Any time you want to talk, we can talk. Or not talk. If you want to sit there and say nothing, that’s fine, too.”
Trina put a hand on my shoulder, as if she wanted to comfort me. Then she pointed at the back porch of the Sloan house. “You’re sweet, but we’ll have to do this later.”
“What? Why?”
“Ellen’s here.”
I turned around and was jolted back to my other reality.
Ellen stood on the house’s redwood deck with a cigarette in her hand. I hadn’t even realized that she smoked. In the porch light, her face was all bone and shadow, like a skeleton’s. She stared at the sky, as if she needed God to give her answers. Eighteen months ago, she’d lost her mother, and then two weeks ago, her father. And now her youngest son was missing. It would test anyone’s faith.
She saw the two of us on her lawn. She saw me on her lawn. I knew this wouldn’t be good, and it wasn’t. She crushed her cigarette into a flower pot. She stormed down the steps and stalked toward me. With every step, she fell to pieces. By the time she was in my face, tears flooded down her cheeks, and her skin was beet red with fury, and her whole body quivered. She screamed at me in the darkness from six inches away.
“How dare you even show your face here? Where’s my son? Where’s my son? Your father promised me he would find him. Why isn’t Jeremiah back here with his family? I told you! I told you, and none of you listened! I told you I wanted roadblocks and helicopters, and all Tom Ginn could do was stand there and tell me everything was going to be all right. It’s not all right! Jeremiah is gone! He could be anywhere!”
The Deep, Deep Snow Page 6
