Die Noon (Goodnight Mysteries--Book 1)

by Elise Sax

  “You want a cup of coffee?” I asked Boone.

  “It’s pretty late for coffee, isn’t it? You won’t get to sleep.”

  “I never sleep.”

  “Never?”

  “I once took a nap on a ferry.”

  “I sleep nine hours a night. Like clockwork,” Boone said, making me want to punch him in the throat.

  “How about chips and onion dip? I’ve got that,” I said.

  “How can I refuse chips and dip?”

  We sat at the kitchen table, scooping potato chips into a bowl of onion dip. I decided to skip the coffee, and we drank water. I was bone tired, and we both had Costello’s blood on us. Boone made himself comfortable, resting his legs on the chair in front of him, crossed at the ankles.

  “Did you get shot at a lot in California?” he asked me, chewing on a chip.

  “This was a first.”

  He seemed to think about that for a moment. “Hmmm…interesting. How about rattlesnakes?”

  “That was a first, too.”

  “So, you move to a Podunk town in the middle of nowhere and then you get into trouble?”

  “I don’t get into trouble. None of it has been my fault. Why do people keep saying I’m trouble?”

  Boone shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe because they’re right?”

  He was chewing on a chip, but he was chewing slowly, while he studied my face, locking onto my eyes. He had a whole smoldering thing happening, but he suddenly gave a half-smile and looked down at his hand.

  “Where were you tonight?” he asked.

  I sat up straight in my chair. “Why? How did you know I was out? Were you spying on me?”

  He arched an eyebrow. “Klee knocked on my door, looking for you. She said you owed her a chicken McNugget.”

  “I emailed it to her,” I said.

  “You emailed her a chicken McNugget?”

  “It’s a long story.”

  “And where were you when you emailed her the McNugget?”

  “I was…” We locked eyes, again, and I couldn’t get myself to tell him that I was at Amos’s fancy ranch. There was bad blood between them and whatever crush I had on Amos had spooked Boone away. I was sure that he had tried to ask me out before he realized there was a spark between the sexy sheriff and me. But now, Boone was careful to keep it all platonic.

  He put his hand up to tell me to stop. “I don’t need to know. I don’t want to know.”

  “You so want to know.”

  “No, I don’t. There’s nothing I want to know less. You might have a fine ass, but your ass has nothing to do with me.”

  “Whoa, that came out of nowhere.”

  He shrugged. “It might have been on my mind. You can’t blame a guy.”

  “I know what else has been on your mind,” I said.

  “I doubt that.”

  “Oh, I know all right. You’ve been wanting to know where I’ve been tonight.”

  “Sorry. No.”

  “You want to know so much you’re ready to explode with it.”

  “That’s the onion dip. It’s backing up on me.”

  “Nope, it’s not the onion dip,” I said. “It’s you. You want to know. It’s killing you. It’s eating at you like a cancer. It’s like flesh-eating bacteria. It’s like Alien, ready to rip your chest apart.”

  Boone crossed his arms in front of him. “I’m curious, but I don’t have Alien ready to rip my chest apart.”

  I held my fingers out about an inch apart. “Little bit,” I said.

  “I don’t have to ask. I know where you were. You were with him.”

  “Say his name.”

  “Asshole.”

  I took another chip and dunked it into the dip. “That’s not his name. You know his name. It rhymes with rich cowboy stud muffin.”

  “I don’t think you understand how rhymes work.”

  “Fine,” I said, moving my hands, like I was erasing the air. “This is getting ugly. I was only there for dinner. He arrested me and fed me steak. Then, I came back here and got shot at.”

  We were quiet a moment, while we ate more chips. Finally, I decided to tell him about the girl. “I saw her again. The vanishing girl.”

  He arched an eyebrow and looked behind him. “You’re seeing her now? Is she here? What’s her name? Should I say hello?”

  I threw a chip at him. “No, not now. Before, in the forest. Right before I was shot at. She told me she was being held prisoner. Hurt. She mentioned a cage and something underground.”

  “Spooky. What was she doing in the forest?”

  “I don’t know. She wouldn’t go with me.”

  “Maybe she’s unbalanced. There’re some folks who live out in the basin who’ve been alone for a long time, and they’re not right up here,” he said, pointing at his temple.

  “You’re probably not wrong. But here’s the thing. She said there are others she wanted me to help. And…she told me to watch myself, like I was in danger, too.”

  Everything seemed to stop, like the earth had ceased revolving and the atoms in the room were rearranging themselves. “And then you were shot at,” Boone said. “Sounds like the two are related, right?”

  “Of course they are. How could they not be?” But I wasn’t sure they were related at all. I had a feeling that I was in danger from multiple forces, and that the girl represented something far bigger and more dangerous, and I might not find out what it was until it was too late.

  Part IV: The Plot Thickens, and Chaos Ensues

  Alien Fans Descend on Town as Rumors of Intergalactic War Grow

  by Jack Goodnight

  Nearly one hundred people have arrived in Goodnight after rumors of an imminent intergalactic war here have grown since a flying saucer fell on Goodnight Gazette reporter Silas Miller. Visitors have come for a front row seat to what they believe will be an onslaught of UFOs from the Vega quadrant, which will incite the Andromedan aliens—who already live in the United States—to defend their territory.

  “It’s going to get real here, real soon,” the Goodnight UFO’s owner, Norton Perkins, explained. “We’ve got all your intergalactic needs here at the store. If you’re team Vega, we have your t-shirt for only $19.99. If you’re team Andromeda, we’ve got your t-shirt, too. It’s a little more expensive because it has multicolored stitching.”

  Intergalactic war fever has spread to Goodnight locals, who are hurrying to tidy up their spare rooms to rent out to Vega and Andromeda supporters. Local businesswoman Mabel Kessler is offering a five-dollar discount off every fish pedicure to mark the event.

  “Do yourself a favor and get a fish pedicure,” she told this reporter. “Have you looked at your heels? They need fish teeth to clean them up. And don’t believe the stories about the toenail issues. That shyster podiatrist doesn’t know his butt from his elbow. Who becomes a foot doctor, anyway? I’ve never heard of such a ridiculous thing.”

  Goodnight was the scene of a town-wide UFO sighting back in the fifties. Since then, Goodnight has been known for everything outer space.

  But some locals feel that any talk of an intergalactic war should be pushed aside to make way for the cleansing of the town’s bad giraffe karma. “Don’t forget about the giraffe parade on Saturday,” local millionaire, entrepreneur, and philanthropist, Rocco Humphrey said. “Spread the word to the world that we love giraffes, despite what our very, very, very distant ancestors did to poor Daisy.”

  Alien visitors suggest Goodnight residents watch out for rattlesnakes, a favorite weapon of the Andromedans against the Vegans.

  Chapter 10

  Faye showed up unannounced at seven in the morning. She walked through the unlocked door without knocking. She was wearing her normal cutoffs and work boots, a tank top and utility belt. She was carrying additional tools in a bucket with her right hand, and over her left shoulder was a bunch of ductwork.

  “I can’t wait to get my hands on your pipes,” she said, tossing her tools onto my kitchen table. “Wha
t happened to your stove?”

  The ancient stove was lying in a heap of parts on the kitchen floor. “I cleaned it last night.”

  “You sure are thorough,” she said. With at least fifty years of grease and grime, I wanted to get every nook and cranny cleaned, and once I started, I couldn’t stop. I began to take it apart to get inside, and one thing led to another and in the end, the stove was lying on the kitchen floor, like it had been violated.

  “I haven’t figured out how to put it back together, yet,” I said.

  “I’ll do it. I love these old girls.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Of course!” She touched one of the burners. “Boy, you really cleaned it.”

  “I like to clean. And I don’t sleep.”

  She studied the stove debris and scratched her head. “You even cleaned the screws. I’ve never seen that before.”

  Insomniacs are weird. We have to do something in the middle of the night, and I didn’t have a television, not that 3 AM TV was any good. “I can still make you coffee. I’ve got six different coffeemakers,” I told Faye.

  “You got any coffee cake to go with it?”

  “I have a package of Oreos.”

  “Deal.”

  We sat at the kitchen table like Boone and I had the night before. I opened the package of cookies and served the coffee.

  “This is nice,” Faye said. “It’s a madhouse over at the shop. Nonstop sales. Norton’s on cloud nine. People are coming in from all over after word got out on Twitter about the coming intergalactic war. We’re housing ten people in our shed.”

  “Ten?”

  Faye nodded and took a sip of her coffee. “That’s nothing. Nora’s stuffed twenty people into her three-bedroom. She’s convinced some of them to sleep under her kids’ beds. She says she’s already made enough money for the next three Christmases, which is saying something since she’s single-handedly repopulating Goodnight.”

  We chatted for another fifteen minutes or so and then she slapped her thighs and got up. “I can’t wait to start with your house. I’ve been wanting to do this since Daddy gave me my first hammer when I was two years old. This old house is special, you know. It’s not just old. It has history.”

  I looked up at the mud ceiling and over to the walls and realized that I was already thinking of it as home. I thanked her again and offered her money, but she explained that Rocco was paying for it. That niggled at my conscience, but I decided to wait to decide how to handle it.

  “I better get into work, if the town is in chaos,” I said. I wondered if Klee would give me a juicy assignment now that the town was going to hell, or if I was doomed to do chicken McNugget and fish pedicure stories forever.

  Abbott and Costello followed me to the Gazette office, pausing a moment to pee just outside the front gate. Costello had already licked off his bandage, but Boone wouldn’t let the vet put a cone around his neck.

  “Let the guy have some dignity. Isn’t it bad enough that he has permanent flatulence?” Boone had said.

  Somehow, Costello knew to leave the stitches alone, however, and faced with eating breakfast and a bone, he completely forgot that he was injured. In fact, there was no sign that he was hurt, and he even walked without a limp.

  “There you are,” Klee said when I walked into the office with the dogs. “I heard you got shot at last night.”

  I told her about it, omitting the part about the girl. She typed while I spoke. “Good,” she said. “Thanks for the quote.”

  “Am I a story?”

  “Everything’s a story.”

  “Do I have an assignment today?” I asked.

  “Not yet. Silas wants to see you. Can you go over there now?”

  I left Abbott and Costello with Klee, and I drove to the hospital to see Silas. On the way, I passed Goodnight UFOs. The flying saucer was still in the street in front of the store. Now, there was an even bigger crowd gathered around it. Norton was out, selling t-shirts to the group, and I waved to him as I drove by.

  The town was buzzing with visitors. I was happy to see Goodnight get some much-needed good attention. Rocco and Mabel had worked hard to revitalize the town, but it turned out that all it needed was a near death experience and a really good conspiracy theory.

  After parking in the hospital parking lot, I walked in and found Silas in his room, yelling at two nurses. The tamale lady was there, too.

  Silas was in his bed with his hand wrapped around a foil-covered burrito, and one of the nurses was tugging at it, trying to get it away from him. “This will block up your bowels, Mr. Miller,” she chastised him.

  “My bowels need this, lady. I’m a journalist! I’m a member of the free press. If you take away my burrito, that’s like Erdogan imprisoning reporters. You’re supposed to be a nurse, not a fascist demigod!”

  “Don’t you curse at me, young man,” the nurse screeched.

  “Who’re you calling ‘young man,’ you old battleax.” They played tug of war until the burrito exploded in a spray of beans, cheese, and shredded beef. Silas crammed his part of the broken burrito that had been left in his hand into his mouth and smiled, even though he couldn’t get his lips together with his mouth full. The nurse threw her hands up in the air, and she and the other nurse stormed out of the room.

  During the dispute, Gloria the tamale lady cowered in the corner of the room. “Hello, Gloria. How are you?” I asked her. “Do you have any more burritos? Or maybe a tamale?”

  “I had four burritos, but Silas ate them. He’s a very good eater.” She beamed at him, but he ignored her, beckoning to me to come over.

  “Come on, boss. Move your butt,” he said. Burrito bits flew out of his mouth when he spoke. I moved to the side of his bed and leaned in. “How’s it going with Wade? I heard you got arrested. I like your moxie, boss. Very Carl Bernstein of you.”

  He punched my arm with his hand, and I wiped cheese off my cheek where he spit at me.

  “I climbed the fence, and they found me and zip-tied me,” I told him. “Sheriff Goodnight took me away, but he let me go after.”

  “He’s a good guy. Fair. Here’s what I found out,” he started.

  “I guess I’ll be on my way,” Gloria said from her corner. She gazed at Silas while she took a tentative step toward the door.

  I elbowed Silas. “What?” he demanded.

  “Gloria’s leaving.”

  “So?”

  Men. Were any of them any good? They either ignored you or tried to kill you.

  “Bye, Gloria,” I said, feeling sorry for her. “You’ll probably get a surge in sales with all the intergalactic people in town.”

  “They’re not tamale people. They want tacos. I don’t make tacos.”

  “Bummer,” I said. “Well,” I continued, trying to think of something to say. “Watch out for rattlesnakes. The Andromedans might drop a whole bunch on the town.”

  “I don’t care about snakes. Not scared of them one bit. I grew up with them around the house. But I don’t like tacos. I like my food completely wrapped, not hanging out for the world to see.”

  “Can we get back to work?” Silas asked as Gloria left the room. “I found out that something’s about to happen over at New Sun Petroleum. I think they infiltrated the water supply. This is dark. This is dark. I can’t do anything from here. You’re going to have to be my legs, again.”

  “What should I do?” I asked him. “I don’t know how to get Wade to talk.” I told Silas about my suspicion about Rocco and Mabel and how they might be involved and maybe that was a direction we could go in to make him confess.

  “Rocco and Mabel have nothing to do with it,” Silas said. “They’re all about making the town grow.”

  “But don’t you see? Your article was going to make waves. It was bad press for the town.”

  “I wanted them to clean it up, get rid of the fracking. Make Goodnight more attractive to families.”

  “That doesn’t matter. That’s the long view. It was
going to be bad press. It would have scared people away in the short term. Rocco and Mabel can’t possibly want that article out.”

  Silas’s eyes grew big. “Look at you, boss. You’re smart. I didn’t know that you were smart.”

  I shrugged, delighted he thought I was smart. “This is my jam. I used to spy on my neighbors, too. One of them got chopped up in pieces.” I bit my lower lip. I didn’t want to tell him that it was my husband who chopped the man up. “I helped with that investigation.”

  “All right. Question Rocco and Mabel. But be careful. Mabel carries a six-shooter in her bra, and I wouldn’t put it past Rocco to have some bodies buried in his backyard.”

  My skin erupted in goosebumps as I thought back to the girl and what she said about the cage and the underground. Could Rocco be her captor?

  As I drove away from the hospital, my stomach growled. Coffee and Oreos were not cutting it for breakfast. I decided to stop at the diner to eat, and now that I had my purse back, I could pay Adele what I owed her.

  I had to park two blocks away and walk. My altitude sickness was getting a little better every day, but it was still difficult to walk that far. There was a line out of the diner, but Adele spotted me and rapped her knuckles against the glass, urging me to push my way in.

  “Sorry. Excuse me. Excuse me. Sorry. Sorry, sorry, sorry,” I said, squeezing my way into the diner.

  Boy, intergalactic war fans were ornery if a woman got between them and their omelets. As I pushed my way to Adele, there was more than a handful of grumblings. “Shut up!” Adele yelled at her customers. “This is my friend. She eats before you. It’s not what you know. It’s who you know.” She stopped in the middle of the diner and looked around, presumably trying to figure out where to put me. “Don’t worry, Matilda. I’ll find you a place. There!”

  I followed her eyeline to a table for two with Boone and Jack already sitting at it. “I’ll be right back,” she told me and went to the kitchen for a minute before she came back holding a step stool and two phone books. “Good enough for government work,” she said and put the stool with the phone books on it down by the table. “Get your butt up, Jack,” she said, giving him a little shove, as he ate his pancakes. “Your boss needs to sit in a real chair.”