by Hannah Reed
“Johnny Jay assaulted me is what happened to me.” Then I stopped and considered. Hunter was a cop and in theory on the other side. “I’m sorry, but I shouldn’t tell you any more than that. I need an attorney.”
“For what? You haven’t been charged with anything.”
“WHAT?” I practically screamed. “I was handcuffed and locked in a cell for hours. I thought you’d figured out how to bail me out.”
“You weren’t charged. You beat Johnny again.”
“This isn’t a competition between the two of us. It’s more like a free-for-all. He threw me on the ground, cuffed me, and arrested me for burglary.”
“He’s about to pay dearly for that,” Hunter said. What a guy! I thought. He’s going after the rogue police chief. I still couldn’t believe I was actually free and clear. “So I’m not in trouble?”
Hunter smiled. “Johnny Jay worked it from every angle but Norm Cross stood firm. I can’t believe you broke into his house.”
“I didn’t exactly break in.” I didn’t feel too bad about saying that, since technically Patti broke in.
“Anyway, Norm refused to press charges against you.”
“Really? That’s great news!” Then I thought of Norm’s dog, Dinky, and it took me a minute to remember that I’d left her at the store with Carrie Ann and Holly. They would take good care of her until I got back.
“So tell me about your little escapade at Norm’s,” Hunter said.
It didn’t take long, since I left out plenty, like how Patti started it and how I ran away. “That poster has me thinking,” I said at the end. “The captions are handwritten and they didn’t look masculine to me. What if Hetty made the poster?”
“Unlikely,” Hunter said, “that she and Norm would have pulled off Lantern Man together.”
“Just food for thought,” I said. “Whoever called the news media must have it in for me. It must’ve been Lori. She stood right there and watched Johnny Jay tackle me and didn’t lift a finger to help. In fact, she threatened my life.”
Hunter had an amused grin on his face when he shook his head. “Lori Spandle didn’t have anything to do with tipping off the news media. You’re going to love it. But wait. Something else happened next. After Norm refused to press charges against you, he came forward and finally admitted that he was Lantern Man.”
“Really? Wow.”
“I’d done some research into those records we talked about,” Hunter said, pouring coffee for me, fixing it just the way I liked it with cream and honey from a jar I’d left at his house. Last time he tried to get me to drink it with sugar. Yuck.
Hunter continued after handing me the cup. “I couldn’t find anything to substantiate whether or not he had been home during the camper attack or the night we were in The Lost Mile. We didn’t have a thing on him, but he confessed anyway.” He looked puzzled. “Sort of strange he chose now to step forward.”
“What will happen to him?”
“Not much. His only crime was destruction of personal property way back when he shredded those campers’ belongings. Statute of limitation ran out on that offense years ago. And he’s admitted he went overboard and has offered to pay the families involved for damaged property.”
“But he terrorized The Lost Mile.”
Hunter chuckled. “Not a crime.”
“Did he say why he did it?” That handwriting still bothered me.
“Only that he wanted to discourage kids from hanging out and drinking there. He thought he was doing a good thing.”
“We wouldn’t have been in The Lost Mile in the first place if Lantern Man hadn’t been scaring kids. We wouldn’t have had a dare to accept. Lauren might not have driven drunk. Johnny Jay’s dad might still be alive.”
“On the other hand, if we weren’t all afraid of Lantern Man, maybe we would have partied there all the time. But I still wonder why he decided to reveal his identity now.”
“I brought up Lantern Man to him,” I said, “which really made him mad. And you searched his house, so he knows you saw the poster and lanterns. It was only a matter of time before somebody caught on anyway.”
“There’s dirt all over your face,” Hunter said. “We better get you cleaned up.”
Hunter washed my face and applied an antibiotic cream. His touch felt nice. I was feeling better and better all the time. Except for my arms, which ached from being cuffed behind my back, and my legs weren’t used to running like I had, so they screamed out in pain. To top it off, my favorite shirt had grass stains all over the front and everybody knows they don’t wash out.
I rubbed a shoulder. “Something’s really wrong with Johnny Jay,” I said. “He’s been acting more aggressive and hostile than ever. It’s like he’s snapped.”
“That’s the real reason for the news crews. Patti Dwyre sent a video over the Internet to all the Milwaukee newsrooms, showing Johnny Jay beating up on you.”
“Nothing like police brutality to fire up the masses.”
“Apparently,” Hunter said, shaking his head in amazement. “But you seem to have survived the incident without too much internal or external damage.”
“I told you I was a big girl and could take care of myself,” I said, showing off.
“I could tell that was absolutely, indisputably true when I viewed the video. You really took care of him, the way you had him on the ground on top of you. Lots of technique in that trick.”
Hunter didn’t have to look quite so amused. After all, I’d been through a lot in spite of my boasting.
“Are you going to pursue charges against him?” Hunter asked. “You do have the upper hand.”
“Charges? Sure, right, and have Johnny Jay stalking me for the rest of my life?” Although it dawned on me I was already living that life.
“This is your big chance.”
“I have to think about it,” I said. Since I was into mixed emotions these days, I was happy and upset at the same time, relieved the world was about to see the real Johnny Jay, traumatized that my exploits were going to be on display for every nightly news watcher in our coverage area.
Friends, customers, family members.
I tried to remember all the details after Johnny Jay came around the corner of my house and tackled me, but things had happened so fast. Mostly I recalled eating dirt.
It felt really good to be sitting at Hunter’s kitchen table sharing coffee and conversation.
“What if Norm is covering up for his wife?” I asked, focused again on the poster.
“Why would he do that? If anything, wouldn’t he blame her for the whole thing? She’s dead and can’t defend herself against any charges he made.”
“That would be cold.”
“I agree.”
“But if Hetty was Lantern Man, well, I suppose that would make her Lantern Woman, wouldn’t it? That might explain why she was out in the woods at the same time as Lauren. That might help determine if someone was really after Lauren when Hetty heard voices out there and got in the way.”
“Story, Norm confessed.”
“I better think about getting back to The Wild Clover,” I said, giving up on that particular line of thought.
Ben deserved several liver treats for bravery beyond the call of duty, so I made sure he got them and finished another cup of coffee. “Do you think the store is safe from reporters?”
“No.”
“I have to get back.”
“That’s a really bad idea.”
“Let’s go,” I said, ready for anything.
Twenty
Hunter was right, not that I would ever admit that to him. A Channel 4 news van crawled past The Wild Clover and was backing into a parallel parking space just as I bolted through the front door of my store.
“Jeez,” I thought I said to myself, very quietly, but instead I must’ve blurted it out pretty loud. All eyeballs shifted my way. “In a hurry,” I said, not stopping to chitchat.
Staff and customers stood gaping, their mouths fl
opping open when I ran past the checkout counter where Carrie Ann and my sister were standing (Did I look that bad?), then skidded down aisle six heading for the back storage room. I locked myself inside much to the delight of Dinky, who jumped down from the office chair where she’d been sleeping and clawed her way into my arms.
From safety behind the closed door, I called my sister’s cell phone.
“A news truck is outside,” I said. “Don’t let them in the store.”
“This is a public building. How am I supposed to stop them?”
“Good point. Okay. At least tell them I’m not here.”
“’K.”
“I’ll hide out back here until you call me back and say the coast is clear.”
“’K.”
Even before we hung up, I heard a sharp rap on the door. “Who’s at the door?” I said into the phone. “Make them go away.”
“It’s Ali Schmidt.”
“I don’t care if it’s the First Lady. Tell her to go away.”
“She knows you’re in there. She saw you run by.”
“Oh.”
“Besides, she’s applying for a job.”
“Really? Cool!” Music to my ears.
I unlocked the door, pulled Ali in, and relocked.
“What’s happening?” she wanted to know.
“Reporters. Stalking me. No big deal. Holly said you want to work here?”
“Yes, I do.” And Ali dove into a sales pitch that would have dazzled the manager of any national grocery line. She had a voice I was jealous of—husky and sexy. My cousin Carrie Ann had a husky voice, too, but hers was more gravelly, rough from years of smoking cigarettes. Ali’s voice . . . well . . . I always wished mine sounded like that.
Ali, it turned out, was qualified for my position, if I could believe everything she told me, which right now, didn’t matter in the least. Two arms and half a brain would have been all the qualifications she needed.
Her dental office organization skills gave her a giant step up to the head of my employment list. Not that anyone else was on the list at the moment. As it turned out, Ali didn’t need money as much as she needed to get out of the house and the dental office.
“I love T. J. to death,” she said after laying out her professional history. “But I need some breathing room and going to work someplace else, like here, will give me that. It’s not the easiest thing for a family to live and work together.”
Tell me about it, I could have said. Working with family members took either nerves of steel and incredible bravery or total stupidity and desperation.
“But you’re his receptionist,” I said, ready to sign her on no matter what she said next. “What will he do? How will he replace you?”
“I’ll still do scheduling for him and paperwork in the mornings. I just want to work here two or three afternoons every week. And I can work Friday nights, since T. J. has rotary club meetings.”
I couldn’t believe my good luck. Between Carrie Ann, Holly, and me, we could handle mornings and early afternoons. That would give me wiggle room later in the afternoons with Ali and the twins. Things were definitely looking up.
And the biggest bonus of all? A reliable employee like Ali would keep my mother out of the loop.
“I can stay at the store and help right now,” my new best friend, Ali, said. “I heard about what happened with Johnny Jay. Why don’t you slip out the back door and take the afternoon to regroup? Go ahead, we can handle the store.” Ali shooed me with her hands.
A few minutes later, I was slinking down back alleys with one mangy mutt under my arm and two happy carefree feet. I cut through Patti’s yard and made it into my house undetected. After showering, changing into clean clothes, and munching on a peanut butter, banana, and honey sandwich, I sank onto the sofa for a nice long rest.
My cell rang. Holly.
“You can come out now,” she said.
I’d forgotten to let Holly know I’d made my escape from the store. She still thought I was in the backroom.
“I hired Ali Schmidt,” I remembered to tell her, a bit late.
“So that’s why she’s hanging around asking questions.” Holly’s tone was a bit frosty, like maybe I should have passed that news by her already. Or first, before making the decision. I ignored her tone. No way was that ever going to happen. Once I let her in on management decisions, I’d lose my reign. Or reins.
“Show her around and put her on the schedule starting immediately,” I said as authoritatively as possible.
“ATM (At The Moment) I am training her. Until now I was fielding reporters’ questions. But I’ll get to the schedule ASAP.”
“You’re not saying anything to the press, are you? Please don’t talk to them.”
“I’m not.”
“And don’t give them my home address.”
“Gotcha.”
We hung up, and my thoughts turned to Patti’s recent overtures of friendship and the way she’d stuck up for me, even though I knew her motives were a bit self-centered.
When I was married, I let the part of my life go that included female friends, sad as that was to admit. I opened the store and worked such long hours, I didn’t have any extra energy for friendships. But for the last few years I’ve craved more female interaction. I wanted to have a best girlfriend, or as Holly would say a “BF.”
Then a flash of insight came to me while I lounged around with Dinky, hiding from the world.
Best friends aren’t something we pick out ahead of time, like a prime cut of beef. People traipse randomly through our lives, starting out as basic acquaintances. Sometimes they move up to a new category, sometimes they sink down.
Like Lori Spandle, who’d slept with my husband and would never be one of my friends. She lacked the basic requirements of friendship—loyalty, commitment, and a whole lot of acceptance of me just the way I came.
But others? One day, out of nowhere, some of those acquaintances and casual friends become something more.
In my life, for example, I suppose I have to count my sister as my best friend. Even though we rag on each other, we still love each other to death. Then there’s Carrie Ann, my cousin, who I’ve known my whole life, and can count on in a crisis.
Holly, Carrie Ann, and I have shared experiences, memories, secrets, and we know one another’s faults and failures like they are our own.
What about Patti Dwyre? As much as I didn’t want to accept it, P. P. Patti had managed to pass through the acquaintance stage, although she was branching into something as yet totally undefined and a bit frightening. We had a ways to go before I’d consider her a true friend—if ever.
“So to sum up my current circle of friends accurately,” I said to Dinky, “they consist of a chronic text-speaker, an alcoholic, and the town snoop.”
Dinky’s ears perked up and she barked back at me like she was actually responding.
To be perfectly honest with myself, I must have an equally flawed character to fit in so well with them, although I couldn’t think of exactly what was weird about me at the moment.
Psychoanalysis wasn’t my strong suit, especially when it came to my own personality and motives, so I stood up from the sofa, shook off the heavy thoughts, and decided my next step.
I peeked out into the street. No reporters lurking. So I took Dinky out into the backyard to check on my bees.
Spring is a busy time of year for beekeepers, but most of the hard work had been done earlier in the season. I still inspected the hives on a regular basis, hunting for mite invasions and making sure the queens’ egg productions were right on schedule, a sure sign that they were healthy and the hive was thriving.
To prevent more swarms (that last one making me feel like a sorry sort of rookie who needed to pay more attention to detail), I added additional honey supers to most of the hives. “Adding honey supers” is beekeeping lingo for adding an extra box for honeybees to store more honey. It’s like putting an addition on a family’s house, only on a mu
ch smaller scale.
Aurora stopped by to say hi. “Heard what happened,” she said. “There’s something about you that has started attracting negative karma.”
“Like I’m being punished?” To tell the truth, I didn’t know exactly what karma was, but Aurora was about to give me her interpretation.
“No, no, it isn’t punishment. You create karma with every single one of your actions. Even through your thoughts.”
“So I’m thinking myself into problems?”
“Nothing happens by chance. You’re in the process of learning a lesson.”
“Have you been talking to my mother?”
Aurora, usually serious about everything, chuckled. “No, I haven’t seen her. This experience is between you and Johnny Jay. The outcome depends completely on what you do next.”
I watched her walk away, heading for Moraine Gardens across the street. She’d left me feeling way too responsible for things I couldn’t control. Or could I?
By the time the evening news came on, I was back in the house, perched in front of the television set next to Holly, with Dinky in the middle, chewing on a miniature rawhide bone. The newswoman started with the feature story, what she termed a chilling event that had taken place in the small community of Moraine.
And our police chief was the star of the show.
Unfortunately, so was I.
Holly and I watched, glued to the TV, while Johnny Jay and I were shown in my backyard. The footage was slightly shaky, since Patty had been excited at the time. And she’d been hanging out her upstairs window, so a tripod was out of the question.
In those few seconds between spotting Johnny and getting bowled over, I hadn’t had time to think too much about the confrontation between bully-boy Johnny and me, other than that he had no right and I preferred not to eat dandelions, grass, and rainy muck.
And really, he hadn’t actually hurt me much. I guess it was all that childhood conflict between him and me that had me accepting his abusive behavior as perfectly normal, considering the source.
Witnessing the scene as a playback was not only surreal, but Johnny Jay looked and acted like a man who had lost his mind as well as control of his actions. I should have been scared to death.
