Cold Wind

by Paige Shelton

  Gril nodded. “That’s good, too, but some things have come up and we need to talk.”

  “May I change clothes?” he said.

  Gril paused, but then said, “Yes.”

  “I’ll be right back,” he said.

  He walked toward us. Gril and I took a couple of steps backward. The man stepped around us and made his way to the house. Gril followed him, so I followed Gril. The man stopped when he noticed his alarm had been tripped. He investigated the exposed hole and then looked up at the porch. He hesitated as if considering what to say or do, but ultimately, he just kept moving, stepping around the stuff on the porch before he went into the house.

  “You think he’ll come back out?” I asked.

  “I don’t know, Beth,” Gril said. “I hope so. I’d have gone with him, but I didn’t want you to either come, too, or wait out here alone.”

  “I’d be okay.”

  “Not worth the risk.”

  “Do you know him?”

  “Maybe.”

  I looked at him. “What does that mean?”

  “It means maybe.”

  “Who is he, maybe?”

  “I’ll tell you when I know for sure.”

  Nine

  Gril’s truck didn’t have a back seat, just a front bench. We had to crowd together. I sat in the middle. The entire idea bothered Gril to his core. He was not pleased that I was there, but our company didn’t behave in a threatening manner.

  “If you pull forward about a hundred feet, there’s a place where you can turn around,” the man said as Gril started the truck.

  Gril nodded. “What’s your name?”

  “Lane,” he said.

  “That your first or last name?” Gril said.

  “That’s my only name.” Lane kept his eyes forward and then pointed when we came to the spot where Gril could turn the truck around. “There. Pull in there.”

  It was dark now, but the truck’s lights were good. Gril did as instructed, and when the truck was headed in the other direction, he pushed harder on the accelerator than he had when we’d traveled in.

  The light from the dashboard radio illuminated us all with an unforgiving starkness, but I was able to see more of what Lane looked like. He was probably in his forties, but his icy blue eyes seemed older than that, probably because they were pinched with what I could only guess was concern about being asked to talk to the police. His skin was dark, and I guessed he was Tlingit, but he would be the first I’d met who had blue eyes. His messy brown hair was cut with almost the same amount of skill I’d displayed when I cut mine in that hospital bathroom.

  “This is an old logging road,” Lane said. “I didn’t clear it. Loggers did a long time ago. A mudslide covered it years ago, and a recent one exposed it.”

  He was answering questions he hadn’t been asked yet. Gril hadn’t arrested him, though. I was silent, as I was crammed in between the two big men.

  “How long have you been out here?” Gril asked.

  “Awhile.”

  “Why the trap in the front yard? You get a lot of company?”

  “Used to, years ago. Old habits die hard, I guess. Any company is too much.”

  Gril didn’t comment further.

  Lane sat up in the seat as we came close to the curve that would take us by the storage shed. Gril didn’t say anything, but I was sure he noticed Lane’s attention was directed out the window, perhaps in anticipation.

  Unfortunately, after the turn around the curve, the shed and the people still investigating it shone in Gril’s truck’s lights and stirred up a whole new set of turmoil.

  As the truck kept moving, Lane reached for the door handle. “What’s going on there?”

  With lightning speed, Gril reached over me and grabbed Lane’s arm. “Stay in the vehicle.”

  Gril’s grip must have been viselike; the bigger, younger, probably stronger man couldn’t seem to wrest his arm away.

  “What’s going on?” Lane said.

  “That your shed?”

  “Yes.”

  “I’ll tell you what’s going on when we get to the police station.”

  “What? No!”

  I was elbowed in the stomach hard enough to take my breath away as Lane pried himself free. Gril had slowed the truck. Lane got the door open and propelled himself out. He started running toward the shed.

  “Shit.” Gril threw the truck into park and hurried out, too.

  I couldn’t quite catch my breath enough to follow right away, but I managed to a few seconds later, just as Gril finally made good on the promise of drawing his gun.

  “I will shoot, Lane. Stop!” he yelled, his gun leveled at the man.

  The scene played out in the light from the truck and a battery-powered lantern that had been placed next to the shed. I hadn’t noticed that Donner didn’t have his gun today, but I did now. Unarmed, he stepped in front of Christine, Ben, and Jimmy as if to shield them. Christine didn’t like that, so she stepped around Donner. She put her thumbs into her waistband and sent Lane a tight glare from under her steely gray eyebrows.

  “I need to know what’s going on here.” Lane, smarter than he might have seemed when he jumped out of the truck, stopped and raised his hands as he spoke back over his shoulder to Gril.

  “This your shed? Your property?” Gril asked.

  Lane didn’t answer for the longest moment. “Yes. I already told you.”

  “Donner, handcuff him,” Gril said, keeping his gun aimed.

  “I’m under arrest?” Lane said.

  “Yes,” Gril said.

  “For what?”

  Gril looked at me as I approached. He glanced to where I had placed my hand, the spot I’d been elbowed. He might have had a few things he could charge Lane with, but he didn’t have answers on many of them yet. “Assault,” he finally said.

  Once Donner had Lane handcuffed and in the truck, Gril turned to me. “You okay?” he asked as he holstered the gun.

  “I’m fine,” I said.

  “Want Powder to look at you?”

  “No, I’m fine,” I repeated.

  “You’ll be going back with them,” Gril said. He nodded at Christine.

  “I figured,” I said. “Hope I didn’t mess things up.”

  Gril looked at me and I could see him work to look less policelike. “Not at all. You being here gave me a good reason to arrest him. I’ll get the rest of his story.”

  “Okay. Be careful,” I said.

  “Except when I said you could come out here today, I always am.”

  I nodded, and we all watched them drive away.

  “Who the hell was that?” Christine said as we watched Gril’s truck bump over the road.

  “Said his name was Lane,” I said. “There’s a house out there, too.”

  “Goodness, this is getting more and more interesting by the minute,” Christine said.

  Donner took off right away in one of the vehicles from the airport to meet Gril back at the station. Christine told everyone else what to do—I was instructed to stay back as the boys loaded the van, and then I hopped in the van with them.

  And the body.

  It had been bagged and put in the back, still frozen. Christine drove; per another one of her instructions, I got in the only other seat, the front passenger seat, and Ben and Jimmy sat right behind us, closer to the bagged body than I thought would be comfortable. They weren’t fazed.

  “Did you determine the cause of death?” I asked Christine.

  “I need to confirm a little more in the lab, but I think she was strangled.”

  “I couldn’t tell for sure how old she was. Could you when you rolled her over?”

  “I think she was somewhere in her forties, probably late,” Christine said, after giving me a quick frown.

  “How long has she been … frozen?” I asked.

  “Not sure about that yet, either. She has a tattoo on the inside of her wrist, two intertwined hearts. Sound familiar?”

  I sh
ook my head. “I’ve only lived here a few months.”

  “What brought you here? Wait! No, don’t tell me. Let me guess. You wanted to get away from it all?”

  “That’s right.”

  “I’ve heard that story a time or two. I was in Homer and moved to Juneau. I guess I wanted to be around it all.”

  “Donner told me you were the Homer medical examiner as well as a fishing boat captain.”

  Christine laughed. “That’s right.” She paused. “It was because a previous medical examiner screwed up a Benedict case that I’m here. Benedict sees more action than I would have predicted.”

  I nodded, but didn’t add that “action” seemed to be following me lately. Besides, that would only have made me sound paranoid.

  “You know your police chief well?” Christine asked.

  “He’s been very helpful.”

  “Your scar. What happened?”

  “I fell off a horse and had to have a subdural hematoma removed.”

  “Brain surgery from falling off a horse? Must have been some fall,” Christine said.

  “It was.”

  “You know Chief Samuels came from Chicago?”

  “I do.”

  “He and his wife. I heard she died.”

  “I heard that, too, but I don’t know the details. I didn’t know her.” I looked at Christine. Her profile was lit by the van’s dashboard radio’s blue light—a more forgiving light than in Gril’s truck. The radio was on, the volume turned down. There was no signal out here.

  She nodded and bit her lip like she wanted to say something more.

  “What?” I said.

  “His wife died of cancer?” she asked.

  “I think that’s what I heard,” I said.

  “Okay.” She looked in the rearview mirror at Jimmy and Ben.

  I looked back at them, too. They hadn’t said much of anything.

  “What’s going on?” I asked everyone.

  “Nothing,” Christine said just as we passed the Petition building.

  Had Donner told her about the two girls? As we passed by my shed, it seemed like eons instead of hours ago that the girls had knocked on my door.

  I was glad when Christine continued.

  “I just like to get the lay of the land of the folks I’ll be working with. If all goes as planned, and if Benedict needs another ME, I’ll probably be the one to do the job. That’s all,” she said.

  I looked back at Ben and Jimmy again. They both nodded in confirmation.

  “I see,” I said.

  “Where am I dropping you?” Christine asked. We’ve got a plane waiting for us, and I’ll leave the van at the airport.”

  “Just downtown.”

  “Can do.”

  Christine let me out in front of the Benedict House, and I watched her steer the van back out to the road that would take her to the airport. The sky was thick with clouds, but it was neither raining nor snowing. A cold wind bit at my nose, but it calmed quickly. My headache was all but gone, the pain in my side lessening, too.

  I looked around. The only sound was some leftover ringing in my ear next to the scar. I’d become accustomed to the ringing, but it was a little louder today. I turned and made my way into the Benedict House.

  “Hello?” I said as I peered down the hallway toward Viola’s room.

  There was no answer, but that wasn’t a surprise. I didn’t usually call down the hallway or feel required to check in with Viola, but today was different.

  I walked to her room and knocked on her door, but there was no answer. I continued to the end of the hallway and glanced up the stairway. I didn’t hear anything there, either, and I didn’t walk up to check on Ellen. I wondered where everyone was, most particularly the girls, and how they were doing.

  I could use the phone in Viola’s office to try to call someone, but I’d never entered the room on my own. I didn’t really know who to call, either. I didn’t want to bother Gril or Donner.

  I was tired; that much I knew. Maybe I could get some writing done in my room, at least some notes for the book I’d been working on, but I’d have to get my equipment from the Petition.

  Since being in Benedict, I’d learned how to enjoy my own quiet. I’d used some of that quiet to work on meditation, relaxation, and self-improvement, but today I determined I was too tired to do much of anything.

  Maybe I’ll lie down, I thought, rest my eyes a little.

  Ten

  The next morning began with the duo of a ringing phone and someone pounding on my door. I sat up in bed and tried to get my bearings.

  “Beth, open up!” Viola said from the hallway.

  I grabbed the burner phone I’d hidden under my pillow. “Be there in a sec, Viola.” I unfolded the phone. “Hello?”

  “It’s me, Beth,” Detective Majors from St. Louis said. “I have news.”

  “Shoot. There’s someone at my door. Can I call you back in a bit?”

  “Yes, as soon as possible.”

  “Will do.” I folded the phone and jumped out of bed.

  I opened the door just after Viola knocked again. “Sorry, what’s up? What time is it?”

  “It’s early, but your presence is requested.”

  “Where?”

  “Community center. Let’s go.”

  “I need a minute to get dressed.”

  “I’ll wait for you in the lobby. Just slip some stuff on. No time for prissy.”

  I was never prissy. “I’ll be right there.”

  I closed the door and gathered the phone again. I tried to ring back Detective Majors, but my burner couldn’t find a signal—I tried holding it under the pillow, but it couldn’t even find that small signal Detective Majors had called in on. Frustration zipped through me.

  Primitive is what I wanted, I silently reminded myself.

  I glanced at the clock on my nightstand. It was only five a.m. I was frequently up early, but not quite this early. It was later in St. Louis, but Detective Majors knew how early she’d called; she must have something good.

  I was going to have to accept that I wasn’t going to learn her news right away.

  I threw on some clothes, pulled the moose hat I’d purchased from the mercantile over my unruly hair, and brushed my teeth. I hoped someone had coffee somewhere as I exited and locked my room.

  “Here,” Viola said as she handed me a cup.

  “You read my mind.”

  “I don’t have anything to eat, so we’ll have to have breakfast later. Let’s go.”

  She already had her mud boots on. I slipped into mine and hurried to follow her out to her truck.

  “What’s going on?” I asked as she started the engine. It was cold outside, and I could see my breath again.

  “The girls still aren’t talking. One of them drew a picture that looks like you, so I’ve been commanded to bring you to the community center. That’s where we set them up. I was there late, but Maper stayed with them overnight.”

  “Did it look like they were hurt after they were cleaned up?”

  Viola shook her head. “It doesn’t appear so. Dr. Powder examined them again, and he said they look skinny, but not too, and not malnourished. They seem about the same age—maybe eight or nine—but there’s no resemblance between them. They still aren’t talking.”

  I nodded. “Either they can’t, or there’s a reason they’re silent.”

  Viola shook her head. “I hope it’s not a bad reason, but I can’t imagine there’s any other.”

  “Does Dr. Powder think they can talk?”

  “He says they have the equipment.”

  “Psychological reason.”

  “Best guess. We’re not experts here, Beth, and the girls are going to have to go to Juneau. Social services will have to step in. Gril would really like to find out what he can about them before they’re carted away, though.”

  I nodded. “What about the man Gril arrested yesterday?”

  “I don’t know anything about the man Gri
l arrested yesterday. Tell me more.”

  I told her the entire story, from beginning to end. We had to sit out in front of the community center for a few minutes so she could hear all the details.

  “Goddamn, a body? That’s … terrible. Do we know of a missing woman?”

  “I don’t know. I didn’t see the body when it was turned over, but the ME said there was a tattoo on the inside of her wrist. Linking hearts. Gril didn’t mention knowing about any missing women, but he said lots of people go missing in Alaska.”

  “Any tie to the body from a few months ago?”

  “Crossed my mind, too. Not that I know. I wanted to ask Gril if it had been identified yet, but there wasn’t a good moment.”

  “It hasn’t been identified. I would know.” Viola paused. “Linking-hearts tattoo, huh?”

  “It sounds like a common tattoo, but I can’t remember seeing one on anyone.”

  “Me either. No wonder Gril wants the girls to talk. He probably thinks everything is connected,” Viola said.

  “I think that’s possible.”

  I followed her inside the community center. It served the exact purpose it was named for; many meetings, gatherings, and classes were conducted inside. I’d joined a knitting class a few times, and the Petition had recently published a notice about an upcoming potluck honoring the late Bobby Reardon, the man who’d originally begun the Petition. But today, the center was set up as a bedroom. I didn’t know where the two twin beds had come from; they were headboard to headboard in the center of the big main shared space. Tables held piles of folded clothes and snack foods and drinks. There was a small kitchenette in the back of the center, and I smelled a lingering scent that made me think bacon had been cooked recently.

  “Hello, Beth, Viola,” Gril said as he greeted us inside the door. The two girls and Maper sat on one of the beds. She was reading to them from what looked like a children’s book, something I would think would be too young for them, but their attention was rapt. I couldn’t get a good look at them, just that one had light hair, the other dark. Gril stood in front of me, seeming to want to block my view.

  “Hey,” I said.

  He lowered his voice. “One of the girls drew a picture of you about an hour ago. They woke up really early. Maper called me right away, saying they made their beds as if it was something they did every morning. She fixed them some breakfast, and then Annie took a piece of paper and a pencil and drew this.” He held up the picture.