by Jason Deas
Chapter One
Cameron Caldwell swore he would never work for a police department again. He wouldn’t have to worry about that as none would hire him after the DUI. And it wasn’t your ordinary, everyday, ‘oops I had one too many.’ Cam fell out of the car when the police opened the door. He punched a cop when he stumbled back to his feet. Taking it one step further, he ripped his shirt off and pounded his chest before being pinned and cuffed. It was all on video.
Cam moved across state after the inquisition. He got a sweetheart deal to disappear. He moved from south Georgia to north and leased an empty space in a virtually vacant shopping center. The agent who leased the place said a Piggly Wiggly moved out a year earlier and all the other businesses followed. The rent was cheap. A sole sandwich shop remained.
Cam stood on a blue stepladder and applied large gold and black letters to the front window. The arch of letters advertised his newly founded private detective agency.
“Welcome to the ghost town,” a voice said behind him.
He turned to find a petite brunette. The first word that came to his mind was mousey.
“Thanks,” Cam said, stepping down from the ladder. “My name is Cam.” He offered his hand.
“I figured as much,” she said pointing to the lettering he’d just finished, which read “Cameron Investigations.”
“Does it look straight?”
“Are you drunk?” she kidded.
The comment took Cam by surprise and his eyes bulged.
“Your arch is perfect.” She noticed his discomfort. “It shouldn’t be straight.”
“Oh, right,” Cam said recovering quickly. “I didn’t get your name.”
“Daphne.”
“Like the girl on Scooby Doo?” Cam asked before his brain told his tongue to stop.
“Yeah. I have the pretty girl’s name, but look like Velma.”
Changing the subject, Cam asked, “What are you doing here?”
“I own the sandwich shop. You hungry?”
“Yeah.”
“The first one’s on me. After that you’ll be hooked and you can pay for the pleasure.”
“Is that why you’re the only business still here?”
“Yep. My sandwiches will kick your butt and leave welts.”
“Kick it,” Cam said, laughing for the first time in weeks.
The sandwich shop echoed that of a classic diner with a modern twist. A counter ran the length of the restaurant accompanied by silver barstools and red cushion tops. The seats didn’t rest on straight silver supports, but curves, swirls, and spirals—all of them different. The usual black and white checkered floor had been created with circles instead of squares. Red booths lined the front window. Each table top had a different mosaic or art piece under glass. Original paintings filled the walls.
“Wow,” was all Cam could say as he took in the room.
“I’ll take that as a compliment,” Daphne said, as she steered him to a barstool and walked behind the counter.
“Who made these barstools?”
“My brother. He did the table tops as well.”
“Did he do the paintings?”
“Yep.”
Cam looked around the restaurant and seemed to notice for the first time that he was the only customer.
“How do you stay in business without any customers?”
“I do great business.”
“Then where is everybody?”
“I’m closed. I only serve breakfast and lunch. I close at three o’clock. It’s almost four.” Daphne handed him a menu. “It can be overwhelming if you’ve never been here before.”
“I’ll say,” Cam said, looking at the selections.
“Can I make a suggestion?”
“Sure.”
“Number twenty-two is a favorite.”
“OK. Sounds delicious.”
Daphne slid him a crisp dollar bill and pointed to a jukebox.
“Pick some tunes while I get your sandwich ready. And what do you want to drink?”
“Ice tea would be great.”
“I don’t serve alcohol, but I’ve got a six pack of Buds in the cooler if you’d prefer one of those instead.”
Cam’s eyes shot open again as they did the first time she’d mentioned alcohol.
“That’d be great,” he said.
Daphne made note of his strange reaction. She walked toward the back as Cam made his way to the jukebox.
The jukebox had an eclectic mix of all musical varieties. Cam slid the dollar bill into the machine and was granted five selections. The jukebox was the old school sort with all of its contents listed on a single board. It wasn’t the type where you could flip through a collection of compact discs. He picked two songs by Willie Nelson, and one by The Doors, Bob Segar, and Joan Jett and the Blackhearts.
When he returned to his barstool a Budweiser waited for him and Willie Nelson’s song, Bloody Mary Morning filled the diner. Cam took the bottle and pulled it to his lips. He drank until his eyes watered. He shook his head as the alcohol ran through his body. He wished there was another way. Although alcohol was the visible reason that brought him to Miner’s Bluff, the real culprit was a deeper problem. A problem Cam was dying to share with someone.
“You a Willie Nelson fan?” Daphne asked, as she set a plate holding a mammoth sandwich in front of him.
“I am. And the song seems to fit my life.” Cam picked up the sandwich and tried to find a place to sink his teeth. He found one and bit. Cam began chewing and stopped with his mouth full to say, “My God!”
“Told ya.” Daphne picked up his bottle and shook it. The bottle was almost empty. “I’ll get you one more.”
When she came back with the new bottle of beer he was chewing with his eyes closed. The second Willie Nelson song began.
“Do you need a moment?”
Cam opened his eyes. “I’m good,” he said, with a smile.
“I know we just met, but if you need a ride home, I don’t mind. I can even pick you up tomorrow morning or send my brother Claude to get you.”
“Your brother’s name is Claude? Like the artist?”
“Which one?” Daphne asked with a wry grin.
“Monet of course.”
“He prefers Manet.”
“Who?”
“Claude Manet. He thinks, and I agree, that Manet was better than Monet.”
“Never heard of him, but that’s beside the point. Is your family from here?”
“Yes.”
“Then how does a kid from Miner’s Bluff, Georgia get the name Claude?”
“Promise not to tell? Even if he ever decides to tell you?”
“Sure.”
“His real name is Clyde.”
“You’ve got to be kidding me!”
“Nope. He was six years old when he decided he was going to be a famous artist. My parents found him some cheap coffee table books at a thrift store. The books were full of beautiful glossy prints. He noticed some of the painters had a name similar to his and changed his name.”
“What do you mean he changed it,” Cam said licking his fingers.
“I have napkins.” Daphne handed him one. “He started spelling his name Claude on all his school papers and he wouldn’t respond if you called him Clyde. He was adamant about it and it didn’t take long before everybody called him Claude. Clyde was a distant memory.”
“Interesting. I’ll have to check out Manet on the Internet when I get home.”
“And where would that be?”
“I’m renting a little A-frame up on Nettles Mountain Road.”
“That’s a curvy road. I’d sleep better to
night if you’d let me drive you home.”
“One condition.”
“Shoot.”
“I need to stop by a liquor store. I can’t get enough of those little sausages they sell at the checkout counter.”
“Deal. Those are tasty.”
Chapter Two
Daphne dropped Cam off and headed back toward town. Before he got out of the car, she pulled her square framed glasses off her face to wipe a smudge. As she concentrated on her glasses he studied her. Cam thought her hair was cut a little too short and somehow accentuated her petite stature. With her glasses off he noticed her smooth skin and tried without success to find a flaw. He thought her high cheekbones were cute. When she noticed him staring and looked up, her brown eyes spooked him and he quickly exited the car.
“Call me when you’re ready to come back to town,” she called out the window.
Cam stumbled across the threshold into the A-frame. Boxes filled the room. He hadn’t unpacked any of them. He walked to the first one he saw and ripped the tape holding the cardboard together. Reaching inside, he pulled out a picture frame. It was his first picture from the police department, fifteen years earlier. He still looked basically the same—black fashionably cut hair, angular face, blue eyes, unintentional five o’clock shadow, and the distant look. Always the distant look. No eye contact. It was a practiced look.
He shoved the frame back in the box and pulled the bottle from the brown paper bag. He knew he didn’t need any more to be safe, but it also helped him stop the conversation in his head. He drank. The conversation quickened and eventually stopped. Somehow during the evening the conversation ordered pizza.
Cam woke up on the floor. Before he opened his eyes his nose told him he had company. He opened his eyes to find an unopened pizza box next to his face. He sniffed again. It smelled delicious and although he didn’t remember ordering pizza or paying for it, his right thumb found the tab on the front of the box and lifted. He thought he might still be asleep and dreaming when he saw the contents of the box. One of the most beautifully crafted pizzas he had ever seen lay inside. It wasn’t too thin, too thick, or too anything but perfect. His stomach lurched as he pulled a slice from the pie. Pulling it to his mouth, his eyes found the empty liquor bottle on the floor. He wasn’t surprised.
His stomach allowed him half a piece before protesting. A bottle of Pepto-Bismol rested on the counter next to a supersize container of Tylenol. He popped three pills in his mouth and washed them down with the Pepto.
In the shower, Cam decided not to drink the entire day so he could get a real feel for the town. He hoped for the best.
As Cam dressed he wondered how he would get to town. Daphne had not given him her number and he’d been too buzzed to remember the name of her diner. Looking it up on the Internet would be useless. Cam’s ears perked as he heard an engine roar into the drive.
He peeked out the front window to find an ancient green Dodge pickup stopped in his gravel driveway. He thought it looked as though the driver was singing at the top of his lungs. The man threw the driver’s side door open and jumped out of the vehicle. He tossed his hands into the air dramatically and fluttered his hands back toward his face.
“Mountain air!” he bellowed. “Yummy.”
Cam opened a kitchen cabinet and grabbed his Glock 9mm handgun. He wasn’t sure what kind of crazy was walking up to his front porch.
The doorknob turned without a knock and the stranger walked in, unannounced. Cam planted a foot back and raised his arms, pointing the firearm directly at the intruder’s chest.
“Freeze!” he screamed.
The intruder smiled and shrugged his shoulders as he walked toward Cam.
“That is so cute.”
He walked across the room and wrapped his arms around Cam, giving him a bear hug. “She said you were intense. And she was right. She always is, Cam.”
The stranger let him go. Cam dropped his arms and put the gun on the counter next to him.
“You must be Claude?”
“I see my reputation precedes me.”
“Not really. Consider it a lucky guess.”
“Excuse me for being direct, but this place is dreadful. If you’re going for the Frat house look you’re almost there. Another pizza box or two and a few dozen beer cans might just do it. Maybe a poster or three.”
“I just moved in,” Cam tried.
“Excuse me for being direct again, but have you ever heard of eye contact? It lets the person you’re talking to know that you’re listening and engaged.”
Cam took a deep breath and looked him in the eyes.
It only took a second before time stopped.
Cam’s head jerked violently to the side before it jerked back to connect his eyes. Once connected he saw the darkness. The worst thing Claude had ever done. As simple as that—every time he met someone new, he got a glimpse into the person’s most evil act.
Cam saw Claude as a younger man taking a painting off a wall. The vision flashed and Claude was burning the canvas in hiding. He had destroyed a friend’s work in jealousy. Cam’s head jerked again sending him back to the present.
“That’s better,” Claude said. “You have pretty eyes. Can we go now? I don’t have all day to wait around on a gun toting aggressive male.”
Cam threw his hands up in the air, completely flummoxed with Claude and said, “Let’s go.”
As Cam was about to shut the door, Claude said, “Leave it unlocked and I’ll come back while you’re at work to see what I can do with the place.”
Cam had not been in his office for a full five minutes when a young man walked through the door. Cam’s hand instinctively patted his pant’s pocket for his flask. Coming up empty he looked the bearded fellow in the eyes and wished him a good morning. The kid was clean besides stealing a sleeve of communion wafers from his church as a child and eating every single one of them in his tree fort.
“You owe me $16.50 plus tip,” the young man said, without introduction.
It took Cam a second before he remembered the pizza. He blushed.
“Ah, Jesus. I’m sorry you had to see me like that.” Cam reached into his pocket and pulled out two twenties. “Here. Keep the change for your trouble.”
The young man didn’t quibble with Cam and pocketed the money.
“You want a menu?” Cam shook his head. “Name’s Turner by the way.” Turner pulled a menu out of his back pocket and handed it to Cam. “If I may make a suggestion, next time you order, don’t call the guy who answers an ass hat. You really shouldn’t offend the people who are making your food.”
“I didn’t even know that word was in my vocabulary.”
“Luckily it was me that answered the phone. You may have a much more colorful vocabulary than you realize. You told me if I looked you in the eyes that you would punch my ass through my throat. I’m not exactly sure how you were planning on doing that, but I thought it was pretty creative and it made me laugh. Somebody else answers and you say stuff like that, you may not be so lucky.”
I need to tell somebody before I tell a complete stranger, Cam thought.
“Can we change the subject? I don’t want to hear anymore. Again, I’m sorry.”
“Sure, plus, there’s no more to tell. When I got to your house you were asleep on the floor.”
Cam looked at the menu. “Pizza Chalet, huh?”
“World’s best pizza. Did you try it yet?”
“I was able to stomach a few bites this morning. Pretty damn good.”
“It’s better fresh out of the oven.” Turner looked around the office.
Cam had set up a metal desk accompanied by a rolling chair. He also had two folding chairs and a telephone.
As Turner took the incredibly short visual tour of the room, Cam checked him out. Cam guessed twenty-something. He had the kind of beard that looked as if he shaved once a week and it was creeping toward the end of the seven days. The thin, rusted red beard matched his wispy hair. Cam thought he
looked at ease with himself and the vibe Turner sent out said the same.
“This place blows. How do you expect to get any business with this setup? Do you expect people to trust you to find answers for them when you can’t even find respectable office furniture?”
I need a drink. “Point taken.”
“What if I shake up some business for you? Will you give me a cut?”
“Yeah, ten percent. I charge five hundred a day, so that means fifty bucks a day for you on the jobs you send my way.”
“You’ll have your first job tomorrow or later today. Is that ten percent a promise?”
“Yeah. I’m a man of my word.”
“If you cut me out, I’ll post the video I shot of you last night on the Internet.”
“You took video of me passed out on my living room floor?”
“Maybe I did,” Turner said, raising a hand and walking out the door.
Cam paced the room after Turner drove away. As he walked back and forth he wanted to go to the liquor store and as he strolled a bit more he talked himself out of it. Back and forth. Back and forth. His stomach finally told him he needed to go get something to eat.
Cam hated crowded places. It increased the probability of making eye contact with people. He had a hard time letting evil hide. Once at a busy shopping mall he made the mistake of looking a man in the eyes who’d been stealing his mother’s social security checks. He sucker punched him in the gut and while pretending to help him whispered in his ear that he was watching him. He went on to tell the man if he ever stole from his flesh and blood again he would cut off a very important part of his body.
Cam opened the door to the diner and walked inside. The place was packed, but he was still able to find an empty booth at the back. He watched his feet shuffle as he headed that way.
I need a drink, he thought. I need a drink.
“Your hand is trembling,” Daphne said, as she set a menu in front of him.
Cam looked up, surprised by her quick arrival. He looked over her shoulder and back down to the table.
“I don’t like crowded places.”
“I’ll get you a drink and be right back.”
Cam thought it was strange that she didn’t ask what kind of drink he wanted. He stared into the menu without reading. He let the letters and numbers dance in front of his eyes. A moment later a glass of what looked like ice tea appeared in front of him.
