Traveling Town Mystery Boxset

by Ami Diane

  The fact alone that Flo had managed to set a tree on fire given the weather was remarkable and only something she could’ve achieved.

  From back at the table, Ella and Wink went from stunned silence to doubled over in peals of laughter.

  Flo kicked snow like a toddler as she stomped back to the table. “Stupid thing.”

  “It worked,” Ella said, resting an encouraging hand on her friend’s top layer of jackets. “Aside from the barbecued tree, I saw a bird fly away over there. You were going for a deterrent of small creatures, right? Granted, it might have flown away on its own accord, but one can never know. I’d chock that in the win column. But maybe next time warn me so I can bring marshmallows, okay?”

  Shaking off Ella’s hand, Flo grumbled under her breath about having lousy friends.

  Once Ella and Wink had finished wiping tears from their eyes, it was back to business. They were nearing the end of the line of weapons.

  Ella picked up a long-barreled, lever-action repeating rifle—or so Flo told her. Something about it tickled a part of her brain, a memory trying to break free.

  After pumping the lever, she squeezed the trigger. The end of the barrel flashed as she absorbed the recoil. The now-familiar scent of gunpowder filled her nose. A hole appeared in the side of the fruit, but the watermelon remained intact.

  Her breath hitched, and she glanced sideways at the other two. “That’s promising.”

  No one spoke as all three approached. The sound of their boots crunching in the snow seemed to echo through the clearing.

  Carefully, Ella rolled the melon aside. Its smooth, striated-colored surface continued all the way around until she was staring at the entry hole again.

  “That’s it,” Ella said, her voice soft. “That’s the weapon that killed Erik.”

  She straightened, and they stood staring at the melon. It wasn’t scientific, she knew. Heck, it probably wouldn’t hold up in any court. But this was Keystone, and things were done differently. At the very least, it narrowed down the probable murder weapons.

  “So,” Wink said, drawing out the word. “Which one was it, Flo?”

  It was a long while before the crazy woman answered, and when she did, her voice sounded small and far away. “Applesauce.”

  Wink’s eyes rolled up. “Quit pretending you’re young. Nobody our age says ‘applesauce’.”

  But Flo wasn’t listening. “It’s my Winchester 73. Been around since 1873. Very popular. It’s known as ‘The Gun that Won the West’. Edwin borrowed the rifle Thursday, the day before we found Erik.”

  And that’s when it clicked. Ella knew she’d seen that gun another time, before seeing it at the inn.

  No, she’d seen it in a small cabin in the woods. A cabin not too far from where they now stood.

  CHAPTER 18

  WINK STARED AT Flo. “Edwin borrowed it? You sure?”

  Ella didn’t hear nor notice Flo’s reply, their voices sounding far away as if she heard them underwater. Her chest constricted and her breathing became labored.

  She’d been wrong about Leif. All of the evidence pointed to him, but she’d thought it too easy, too neat. And she’d allowed herself to be taken in by his emotional reaction, taken in by a traveler out of time like herself.

  She seized both of her friends’ sleeves so suddenly they stopped mid-argument.

  “Ella?” Wink asked. “What’s wrong?”

  “We have to get out of here. Right now.”

  “What? Why?” Wink looked to Flo who seemed just as bewildered.

  Ella prodded them over to the parked snowmobile. “Get on Blade Runner—“

  “Betsy.”

  “Get on Betsy. Hurry!”

  “If you think I’m leaving any of this,” Flo said, sweeping her hand over the arsenal nearby, “you’re nuttier than circus peanuts.”

  Ella slid to a stop.

  She turned.

  G.I. Jane, she was not and she wasn’t in some Hollywood movie, but, if they were in danger like she suspected, it might be the only thing to ward off the Viking.

  “You’re right. Pack up what you can.” Ella started to turn then stopped. “Also, peanuts are a legume. Not a nut.”

  With that, she picked up a .22 handgun she knew next to nothing about, but she did know where the trigger and business end were. When she realized that neither of the older women was moving, she clapped her hands to shake them from their stupor. “Don’t just stand there. Wink, warm up Betsy. Hurry!”

  Ella shoved the pistol in her jacket pocket and instructed Flo to load up a rifle. Then they frantically packed up the rest of the gear. Seeing as how they hadn’t ridden over with the armament, she wasn’t sure how it would all fit on the ride back to town.

  As they frantically piled duffle bag on top of duffle bag and strapped them to the small platform Ella had ridden on, Flo said between gasps of air, “I wish you’d explain why we’re running about like this. I swear, my heart’s about to pop.”

  “Because you need more exercise,” Wink hollered over the roar of the ancient snowmobile, “like I keep telling you, woman,”

  Ella hefted the last bag on top and strapped it in. “Because I think Leif’s the one who killed Erik, and he’ll have heard us shooting.”

  She climbed onto the ski blades. They were wider apart than was comfortable, forcing her to do the partial splits like a gymnast.

  Wink and Flo hopped on, this time with Flo at the driver’s seat.

  Ella gripped Wink’s shoulders. “Wait—why’s she driving? She can’t see!”

  Wink jumped, and Ella could tell the thought hadn’t occurred to her. As the diner owner reached forward to stop her, Flo revved the vehicle, and it shot out across the snow.

  Ella nearly flew off the skis, and only managed to stay on because she was creating bruises in Wink’s shoulders. Wind whipped past her, stinging her eyes and any other area of exposed skin. Her cheeks flapped, and her eyes were sucked to the back of her head as the vehicle careened over a drift, barely missing a tree, the bark brushing Ella’s jacket.

  As a general rule, she reserved screaming for rollercoasters and the occasional large spider, but she felt the moment warranted one of her loudest, longest screeches known to date.

  Her panic rose to new heights when she heard Wink yell, “We’re going to die!”

  If the woman who hang glided on a regular basis, suspended several hundred feet above the ground in nothing but thin material and a metal frame, was terrified for her life, then death was imminent.

  A large ponderosa pine rose directly in front of them.

  Ella yelled, “Left!” at the same time Wink screamed, “Right!”

  “Which one is it?” Flo said over her shoulder.

  “Just pick one!” The words had barely left Ella’s mouth, swallowed by the wind before Flo careened left.

  Turning too sharply, the snowmobile tipped onto one blade, threatened to spill its occupants, then jostled back into a horizontal position the way the manufacturers had intended it.

  Ella’s fear crossed over into hysteria. Rather than her life flashing before her eyes, she experienced disjointed thoughts and regrets, some of which she voiced.

  “I don’t want to die. Not without reading the rest of Game of Thrones.” Her thoughts flitted, reaching into her childhood. “I wish I had kissed Devon in the third grade. I wonder what he’s doing now.”

  “Stop this instant!” Wink screeched.

  “Why?”

  “Because you’re blind as a bat, and you’re going to kill us!”

  “I never got to try lobster,” Ella said as they hit another drift and went airborne for a full four Mississippis. “I bet it tastes like crab—”

  “You hear that?” Wink shouted at Flo.

  “—or shrimp.”

  “You broke Ella!”

  “—really, all seafood tastes the same.”

  “Now turn this damn thing off!”

  Flo let out a growl that became one with the gutt
ural, smoker’s cough of the motor. “Fine, you babies.”

  To Ella’s relief, the vehicle slowed, and she no longer felt her stomach hugging her spine. Something—probably yesterday’s lunch—crawled up her esophagus and threatened a reappearance.

  Muttering curses, Flo let up on the throttle even more until they chugged to a stop. At the last moment, the front of the vehicle came to a rest, kissing the bark on a fir tree before she cut the engine.

  “Unbelievable.” Wink jumped off the death trap and shoved Flo back on the seat so she could take the wheel.

  “I agree,” Ella said, coming down from her adrenaline high, regaining lucidity. “Dale Earnhardt Jr. there missed all of those trees going Mach seven but managed to hit one while practically parked.”

  Flo did her best to twist her stiff neck around, gave up, and flipped Ella the bird. “I resent that.”

  “You have no idea who Dale Earnhardt Jr. is.”

  A noise in the forest drew Ella’s attention to her left. Snow sloughed off a bough, causing it to spring back into place.

  Up front, Wink struggled to get the vehicle to back up. It complied an inch at a time. “Can’t get it in gear. Ella hop off.”

  “Why?”

  “Cause I think your weight’s making it stall.”

  “Excuse me? My weight?” She gave a pointed look at Flo’s generous back, a jab that was lost on both older women since they had their backs to her.

  “You’re on the blades.”

  “But you just said you couldn’t get it in gear. I don’t think that’s related to my weight on the skis.”

  “Just try, dear, will you?” Wink said in barely concealed frustration.

  With her own annoyed, heavy breathing, Ella complied. After watching Wink continue to struggle with the stuck Betsy, Ella suggested putting it in neutral and pushing it out, much like a car.

  It took bribing Flo with the promise of an entire cheesecake for her to climb off, as well, and help. Since they couldn’t get an angle on the front because it was resting against a tree, they pulled from the back and sides.

  Bending to grip the seat with her gloved hands, Ella felt something hard digging into her side. She’d forgotten she had one of Flo’s guns tucked into her pocket, a precaution that now felt like an overreaction.

  Breathing out in puffs, she heaved each time Wink counted to three. Between breaths, she said, “Probably would be a lot lighter without all of these guns on here.” It had been a lot of work strapping them on, so she wasn’t about to suggest unpacking them. She just thought it worth mentioning. “Also, I wouldn’t have thought this rust bucket capable of traveling that fast.” She gave the vehicle an almost appreciative look.

  “Yes, well….” Wink focused on her grip and counted to three again.

  Inch by inch they made progress.

  “Well, what?” Ella prodded. A line formed between Wink’s eyebrows in concentration.

  “Wink?”

  Ella let go of the seat as Wink called out, “three,” causing the two women to jolt and groan. Ella could swear she heard something in Flo’s back break.

  They both cursed and turned on Ella who crossed her arms. “You had Lou soup this up, didn’t you? No vehicle on God’s green earth that’s not a race car should be capable of going that fast. He rejiggered the motor or some such nonsense, didn’t he?”

  Wink pressed her lips together but held Ella’s gaze.

  “Rejiggered the motor?” Flo repeated. “Really? Remind me not to let you near any vehicle.”

  “Never mind that—” Ella held up her hand and made a motion for them to be quiet.

  “Why should I be quiet? You’re the one talking.”

  Ella kicked snow at Flo and motioned again for her to button her lips, this time more emphatically and throwing in wild eyes and lots of pointing for good measure.

  She indicated a spot off to her left, incidentally the same spot she’d heard a noise earlier.

  The two older women crept around Betsy and joined Ella with a minimal amount of noise considering their usual fanfare.

  When they were within whispering range, Ella hissed out, “I heard something over there. Something big.”

  “Could be a bear,” Wink suggested.

  Flo’s eyes lit up, and she began to dig through the top duffle bag for a weapon.

  “What about the rifle I asked you to load?” Ella asked.

  “Won’t do no good if it’s a big bear. Just make him angrier. No, I need something that packs a punch.”

  Ella wanted to point out that the whole point of today was to test out low caliber, low trajectory rounds, and weapons. Also, Flo wouldn’t be able to hit the side of a barn a foot away without her glasses. But she chose to voice neither of those things, mostly because something else was pulling her focus and filling her with dread.

  “Oh, crap.” She gripped Wink’s arm. “Is that smoke over there? I think that Flo crashed us just outside Leif’s cabin.”

  “Hey, I didn’t crash.” Flo pulled out a different rifle, shook her head, and exchanged it for another.

  “Fine. Parked it inconveniently against a tree. Better?”

  “Yep.”

  Wink hobbled to the vehicle and leaned against it as if her strength alone would inch it away enough that they could drive forward. “Pipe down, you two. Let’s just get out of here before he finds us.”

  Something massive and covered in fur pelts crashed through the trees behind them. Ella spun on her heel while Flo pumped her rifle and took aim. Leif lumbered towards them like a bear—a bear with a sharp ax and sword on his belt.

  “Too late!” Ella hollered.

  CHAPTER 19

  “RUN!” WINK YELLED.

  Ella wasn’t so sure they could outrun him. “Wink, get the snowmobile going! Flo—”

  “I’m on it.” The crazy woman snapped her rifle to her shoulder and leveled it at the charging Viking. Meanwhile, Ella and Wink scrambled to inch the vehicle just a little farther back. Another couple of inches and they could turn and clear the tree.

  Her heels slid as she strained and threw all her weight behind pulling the snowmobile back. She found the looming Norseman a great motivator and discovered a new font of strength of which she didn’t know she possessed.

  “That’s it!” Wink hopped on and fired up the motor. It sputtered in protest before settling into a throaty hum.

  Ella chanced a glance over her shoulder at the Viking. He no longer lumbered towards them but had been stopped in his tracks on account of Flo’s firearm.

  His body was rigid, set in a fighter’s stance, fingers dancing over his sword.

  “I wouldn’t.” Flo continued to point the rifle, only several inches to his left.

  Ella reached out.

  She nudged the gun so it aimed at him.

  “Almost… yep, there we go.” She left Flo to cover their backs, hopping onto the skis. “Flo, let’s go!”

  The old woman shuffled backward, knocked into Ella, and dropped the gun. Before Leif could charge, Ella scooped it up from the snow and directed it at him.

  “Would you just get on? I got him.”

  She managed to grapple and aim the weapon with one hand, freeing up the other to grip onto Flo. Wink revved the engine, and the snowmobile lurched, nearly throwing Ella to the ground. After a tense moment of turning and scraping against the tree, they cleared the obstacle and took off.

  The Viking shrank into the distance. With the immediate threat gone and the assurance of safety, she began to come down from her adrenaline rush, and with that, full functioning of her faculties returned. She thought back to Leif’s expression. He hadn’t been angry or murderous but full of bewilderment.

  She puzzled over the realization a moment, wondering what it meant, before resting the gun on the bag in front of her. Despite the fact that there was no looming danger, Wink kept Betsy at an eye-watering pace—not break-neck Flo speed—but fast enough that Ella created divots in Flo’s shoulders with both hands.
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  By the time they flew through the park and reached the south end of town, Ella’s heart had returned to a normal rhythm and no longer felt like it was going to burst out of her chest Aliens style.

  Another snowstorm had moved in, flakes marching down from the gray clouds like a brigade, forcing Wink to have to slow to a crawl.

  Ella tapped Flo’s shoulder and had her relay a message to Wink, asking her to take her directly to the Sheriff’s station. With the sky falling the way it was, she didn’t want to have to go back out, especially since encroaching darkness limned the mountains with its shadows.

  A minute later, Wink slowed the ancient snowmobile to a stop. Ella guessed they were in front of Chapman’s office but could barely make out the tops of buildings over the berm and through the thick flakes. With cold, stiff limbs, she hopped off the skis and started to climb the mountain of snow.

  “You think Chapman will be in?”

  “Chapman?” Flo looked at Wink. “What do you wanna see him for?”

  “What? Are you serious? Because we need to tell him about the gun.”

  “Oh, you said ‘sheriff’s office’.”

  “What did you think I said?” Ella was now high enough up the bank to glimpse the buildings on the other side. “Wait, did you drop me off at the bar?”

  “I thought you wanted a drink before going home. Why do you think I stayed on instead of having Twinkle Toes here drop me off at the inn when we passed it?” Flo climbed back onto the snowmobile and jutted out her lip. “I can’t go to the sheriff’s. He’ll take these.” She tipped her extra tall beanie at the mound of bags strapped to the back.

  Wink tutted at Flo. “I thought it was strange, Ella asking to be dropped off at the bar, but it made sense after nearly getting attacked by a Viking.”

  “That’s just it,” Ella said. “He didn’t attack.”

  “‘Cause I had him at gunpoint.” Flo’s voice rose in pride as she attempted to mold her hat-covered beehive into shape.

  “Yes, he really seemed scared. I think there was a higher probability of you shooting yourself.”