Storm Front

by Robert Conroy

  Ten years ago, Sheridan was little more than a dot on a map to Mike. One of many towns he had never really seen, although he’d driven through it a forgettable number of times. That the city had a past was something he’d never really thought much about.

  “Mike, ten years ago, the city got a federal grant to renovate MacArthur Boulevard and the old, sleazy properties along it. They even closed down a porno video store that me and the missus really liked. It really turned her on but then we got divorced. Ah well. About that time, a little company called Carter Siding and Home Improvement became Carter-Sheridan Construction with a lot of money to bid on contracts. They got more than their share and now Calvin Carter’s both rich and mayor of the town he helped rebuild. The Feds are looking into where and how he got the initial money to go big all of a sudden, and where all the grant money went. There are rumors of queer accounting practices and offshore banking accounts. The Feds love that kind of shit.”

  “Son of a bitch,” Mike said. “Does Carter know this?”

  “Possibly not for certain, although I’m sure he suspects. I only hear rumors and leaks from friends of mine, but I’m reasonably certain it’s true.”

  “But what has that have to do with us and the price of snow?”

  “Y’know, Mikey, that’s the damndest thing. I don’t really know, but I’ll bet there’s something going to come up that we don’t suspect.”

  Mike laughed. “Yeah, like a blizzard.”

  * * *

  Traci Lawford was napping in her upstairs bedroom when she heard the noise. She was exhausted, but she’d accomplished what she’d feared all day was impossible: She’d actually made it home from work. Of course, she’d only had a couple of miles to come and her car was abandoned in the street about a half mile away, but she was home after bulling her way through the drifts. Wet, cold, and exhausted, but home. And safe.

  Traci was quietly thankful that she was in excellent physical shape. Many her age, she was thirty-four, were in crummy shape. Her husband was one and, although she loved him dearly, she despaired of getting him to eat right and exercise.

  Small and slender to the point of being thin, she exercised daily and was working her way up to running her first marathon. She wondered just how people who weren’t in shape, like her husband, managed to get around in days like this. Maybe she wouldn’t live forever, but it wouldn’t be for lack of doing the right thing. Well, at least most of the time.

  Alternatively dazzled by the beauty of the snow and fearful of its implications, she’d watched both it and the weather reports. It was obvious that her husband would not be home this evening from his business trip to Indianapolis, where it was also snowing, but not nearly as bad, and that she would be alone for the night. She changed into sweats and decided to make the best of a bad situation. A shower, a microwaved dinner and a couple of glasses of inexpensive wine and she was ready for bed. She stripped off the sweats and was half asleep when she heard something.

  At first, she was confused as to the sound’s meaning. She and her husband Tony had only been living on Beckett Street in Sheridan for a year even though it had been in Tony’s family for generations. It came to them as an inheritance when his grandmother passed away. The house was far too large for their needs and tastes, and it didn’t look like it would be filled with a ton of kids. If they had any, it would be one or two. Sometimes she wondered if they had sacrificed their chances for a family on the altar of career. Traci was an accountant and Tony was a lawyer.

  The sound grew closer and she recognized it as a snowmobile. She’d been on them a couple of times and couldn’t see the thrill it gave some people. Freezing and getting snow in the face was not her idea of fun. She felt the same about riding motorcycles in the summer and spitting out bugs.

  Perhaps it was Tony, she thought hopefully. Maybe he’d figured a way to get home. She hopped out of bed and looked out the second-floor window just in time to see the snowmobile pausing under the utility wires. Through the falling snow, she watched as a man in the back reached up and sliced a wire. Stunned, Traci ran to the phone. It was dead and she realized that the people on the snowmobile were a danger to her.

  She had been napping in her bra and panties. She quickly threw on her sweat suit and slippers. Where was her cell phone? Downstairs in her purse. Where was Tony’s shotgun? All locked up in the basement for safety’s sake. Besides, she thought ruefully, she didn’t know how to shoot the damn thing anyhow.

  A noise downstairs told her the strangers had forced their way into her house. This is my home, she wanted to scream, but reason held her tongue. Would her screams scare them off or excite them? She would be prudent and try not to draw attention to herself. They had talked about getting an alarm system, but hadn’t convinced themselves of the need. Sheridan was a safe community, wasn’t it? Or maybe there was no place safe anymore.

  Where to hide? The attic crawlspace was a good choice, but then she remembered that a wall of old clothes was backed up against the closet ceiling hatch that led to it. Along with taking forever to clear, the noise would attract too much attention.

  She heard more noises downstairs. She willed herself to be silent. Where would they search, and what were they looking for? Valuables, of course, and the most likely spot was the master bedroom, and she was in the master bedroom. After mentally racing through a number of bad alternatives, she took the best one available and crawled under the bed. It was so silly, she thought. Only in bad movies did anyone hide under a bed.

  She heard footsteps on the stairs. Traci willed herself not to breathe, not to make a noise. They were in the hallway, and then the other rooms. She heard their voices, male voices. She was too terrified to make words out of the sounds—she only knew that they were as menacing as a tiger’s growl. She felt utterly helpless.

  They were in her room. Strange, but they hadn’t turned on any lights. No one looked under a bed, she told herself. No one was even looking for her. They didn’t even know she was home. She’d cleaned up the kitchen, hadn’t she?

  She screamed when a hand closed around her ankle and began pulling her out from under the bed.

  * * *

  As he pulled up on his snowmobile, Petkowski realized he had been to this place before. It was one of a number of nice, expensive detached condos on small lots. Affluent couples lived there, and, if he recalled correctly, association bylaws prohibited children. He thought the only way to really prevent children was to prevent screwing, but that was none of his business. He liked kids and hoped someday to have a handful.

  These particular people were real winners, or whiners, he thought as he pushed his way through the almost waist-deep snow to the door. The woman seemed nice enough, petite and cute, although who knew what she was like when she was alone with her husband. Maybe she was a real viper who dared him to belt her and then she’d call the cops when he did. Regardless, that didn’t give her gonzo of a husband the right to slap her around. Mr. Happy Homeowner was a big guy, which suddenly gave Petkowski pause. He was all alone and he’d better not forget that. Backup was nonexistent.

  He pounded on the door. Someone had cleared a space on the small porch so he could stand. Their names were Fred and Cindy Baumann and they were about thirty. The condo was expensive and maybe they had money problems. Probably cost more than they could afford. Thanks to the housing collapse, they probably owed more on it than it was worth and were trapped in a place they could neither sell nor afford to keep.

  Or maybe their problems were more traditional. Maybe one was doing some extracurricular screwing. Hey, maybe both. Cindy Baumann was pretty good looking. Too bad she was married to such an asshole.

  Petkowski pounded on the door a second time. It opened and Mrs. Baumann stood there. Her face was red and there was a welt forming under right eye. She looked physically and emotionally defeated and very much like a candidate for a personal protection order. Petkowski wondered if he should suggest it to her.

  “Police,” he said and showe
d a badge. Otherwise he looked like anybody in a snowmobile suit. If the situation wasn’t so serious, it would’ve been funny.

  “I’m sorry, officer, but the call was a mistake, a misunderstanding.”

  “I’ll judge that,” he said. “When a call like this comes in, I am required to check it out.”

  It wasn’t quite true. Sheridan Police operating procedures gave him considerable latitude and discretion in such matters. They just didn’t allow him to be wrong. He would be safe rather than sorry.

  Mrs. Baumann didn’t resist as he pushed the door open and stepped inside. Mr. Big Bully Baumann got out of a reclining chair and approached Petkowski. His face was also flushed, although there was no bruising. Petkowski assumed he’d been drinking. One whiff of his breath confirmed that.

  “Like my wife says, Officer, we don’t need you no more. Didn’t need you in the first place,” he corrected himself.

  “And like I told her, sir, I’ll be the judge of that.” He turned to Mrs. Baumann. “Are you all right here? Do you want to come with me and press charges?”

  She smiled quickly and he liked the change. “Come with you? Just how the heck would we accomplish that in this weather?” Her expression changed and she was again sad. “No, I’m not pressing charges. There’s nothing to press. It was a misunderstanding.”

  “How’d you get the bruise?” Petkowski asked. “Did he hit you? That’s a criminal offense if he did.”

  “She fell, if it’s any of your fucking business,” Fred Baumann said. He positioned himself so that he towered over the shorter Petkowski, who was beginning to really wonder why on earth he’d taken the run alone. “So why don’t you go back to ticketing speeders and get out of my house?” Baumann snarled. “What me and the lady do is my business, not yours.”

  Petkowski shrugged and smiled broadly. “Hey, you’re right, Mr. Baumann. She’s yours and you can do whatever you want with her. Tell you what, I’ll run along. Why not walk me to the door?”

  Fred Baumann laughed and walked a pace behind Petkowski. When they reached the doorway, Petkowski stepped out into the whirling snow, and Baumann followed. Petkowski turned quickly and snarled at him. “You are an asshole, Baumann, and a fucking coward for hitting a woman.”

  Enraged, Baumann grabbed for Petkowski’s shoulder. Petkowski wheeled, grabbed Baumann’s wrist and launched the larger man headfirst into a snowdrift. When Baumann got up, sputtering and confused, Petkowski planted his right knee in Baumann’s gut. Baumann doubled over and puked at least two cans of beer into the otherwise pristine white snow. A second knee to the face straightened him up and bloodied his nose.

  Baumann was dazed and vulnerable. Petkowski slapped and punched him a half dozen times. “I’m not going to give you a ticket, dickhead. It wouldn’t fly because you’ve scared your wife into silence. This time you get off with a warning. Did you like my warning? You made me come all the way out here in this miserable fucking weather for nothing. That does not make me happy.”

  “You’re not allowed to hit me. I’ll sue,” Baumann said as he spat out blood and tried to keep from retching.

  “See any witnesses? Hey, I don’t even see Frosty the Snowman.” Petkowski slapped him a couple of more times and Baumann began to whimper. Despite his size, Fred Baumann was not a fighter, and for that Petkowski was thankful.

  “Besides, you started it by grabbing me and taking a swing at me. You’re so much bigger than me, so who’ll believe anything else? Hey, you want me to stop?”

  “Yes,” he whimpered.

  “Then leave your wife alone. I’ll check back and if I see any new bruises, I’ll find you and kick your ass right up between your ears. You understand?”

  “Yes.”

  “Yes what?”

  “Yes sir. Yes sir, Officer.”

  At that moment, Cindy Baumann opened the door and looked at her bloody and dazed husband. She did not appear upset. “What happened?”

  “He fell,” Petkowski said and held his breath. He shouldn’t have done what he’d done. He shouldn’t have pounded on her jerk of a husband, regardless of the provocation. He’d let the built-up rage and frustration of the day get to him. People were hungry, hurting, and dying out there, and these idiots couldn’t get along with each other for one night in a house full of expensive middle-class comforts. If Cindy Baumann still had feelings for the jerk, and so many abused women inexplicably did for their abusers, his career as a cop was over and he might just spend time in jail. He’d let his frustrations overwhelm him and now he might be in big trouble.

  Cindy Baumann nodded solemnly and again permitted a trace of a smile. “He fell? I believe it. There’s a lot of that going around, especially if you’ve been drinking like a fish. He’s so sloshed he won’t remember much of anything tomorrow.”

  * * *

  “Would you believe the snow is actually tapering off?” Wally Wellman said.

  Mort Cristman, the young anchor, smiled wanly. He was staring at a window that was covered with snow two thirds of its height. It was almost like being underwater, except that you could see better underwater. “I would no longer believe anything you told me. You are a weatherman and that makes you a congenital liar. Or is it genital liar?”

  “No,” Wally answered, “lawyers are genital liars because they’re such pricks. Hey, I didn’t say it was stopping. Like I just said on the phone to the governor—who, by the way, called me and not you—and told her the rate of snowfall has slowed down. It is now no longer a deluge, merely a rotten heavy snowfall. It’s like a man who was drowning in fourteen feet of water being told that the water’s only twelve feet deep.”

  Cristman stretched and yawned. They were seated in Wally’s cubicle. “Does that mean I can go home now? My mommy gets worried when I’m out after dark and it’s almost midnight.”

  Wally laughed. The kid was beginning to grow on him. “I’ll bet you didn’t even bring a change of underwear, did you? How about a toothbrush or a razor?”

  “Hell no. I had no idea I’d be camping here with you and all the other Scouts. Don’t tell me you bought a change?”

  “I always keep fresh clothes in my file cabinet,” Wally said. “Emergencies are always unexpected. That’s why they call them emergencies. Tomorrow I will look fresh and bright, while you will look like road kill.”

  “At least there’s a shower in the men’s room,” Cristman grumbled. “I won’t stink all that badly. Of course, who’d know?”

  “I would,” said Wally. “By the way, there’s a couple of extra toothbrushes in my closet and, if you’re real nice, you can have one. A new one.”

  Cristman yawned again. “Gracias, amigo. So tell me, is it true that you and the governor were once an item?”

  Wally sighed. “Once upon a time when the earth was young, I thought that Lauren Landsman and I would spend eternity together. Then she found someone else and the rest is history. Eternity was a lot shorter than I expected.”

  “And you found someone else, too, Wally. I know about your loss and you know I’m sorry. My mom died when I was eleven and I felt all alone and lost for so long. It took a lot of time to get over it.”

  “To the extent that you ever do,” Wally added softly. “And thanks for the thought. Now I won’t charge you for the toothbrush. However, the toothpaste is extra.”

  Strange, though, his conversations with Lauren had begun friendly enough and quickly achieved a level of comfortable intimacy that surprised him. During the last days of her life, he and Ellen had discussed his future. She hadn’t wanted him to mourn, or go into a shell and feel sorry for himself, which is exactly what he’d done. He’d known it was a betrayal of his promise to her that he would continue to live life to the fullest, but he simply couldn’t shake the depression until recently.

  His conversations with old flame Lauren Landsman had been a surprising tonic. Better, he knew that Ellen would not complain one bit. He smiled inwardly. Who says a blizzard doesn’t have a silver lining? Now if he could
only get Cristman a clean change of underwear before no one wanted to sit next to him.

  CHAPTER 11

  The teachers and other adults marooned in Patton Elementary had started a routine of four hours on duty with the kids and four hours off. The number of children had declined only a little as the parents who were going to be able to pick up their children had done so, and it looked as if they were stuck with themselves and the remainder for the duration, whatever that meant. The teachers made jokes that some parents who could pick up their kids had decided to let the schools provide free babysitting. Even if every student somehow disappeared, and there were those who thought that would be a good idea, there was no way for the teachers to depart. No one’s car would be able to navigate through the snow and they’d all heard about the roads blocked by thousands of unmoving cars.

  “We’re going to be here until spring,” Maddy said in mock despair. “At which time someone will find our mummified corpses and we’ll make the national news or a National Geographic special. Our fifteen minutes of fame. I hope we get a nice memorial service. I just don’t want a school named after me.”

  “I just hope we get some more toilet paper,” sniffed Donna Harris. “The little assholes are using too much.” She giggled at her own bad joke.

  Of course, the brandy helped loosen them both up. They were in the principal’s office and each had downed a couple of shots in plastic cups. Neither was close to legally drunk, but the brandy, combined with fatigue and stress, had made them a little giddy. It was the first chance they’d had to relax and they were going to seize the moment.

  Many of the kids were on their cell phones and talking to family and friends. It looked like the school’s prohibition on them had been a waste of time and effort. There were hundreds of the devices along with a smaller number of laptops with webcams throughout the building. Accepting the inevitable, the kids had been told to keep them all charged in case the power went out. Modern batteries had long lives, but would not last forever, especially if the owner was hell bent on talking to everyone he or she had ever known.