Lake Country

by Sean Doolittle

He’d climbed into the cab when his jacket pocket chirped. Mike dug out his phone and saw a text message from Tanya Ellerbe:

  Where r u??

  Nobody he knew sent him text messages, including Tanya. Mike hated trying to string together an answer one character at a time, and by the time he finished he could have called the person. Hell, they were already using phones.

  He fiddled with the buttons, looking for the command that let you automatically dial back the incoming number. While he was doing that, the phone chirped again.

  Cops @ yr house rite now. 4 Darryl.

  Mike had to read the words twice. He sat behind the wheel of Hal’s truck in the fading daylight, staring into the bright glow of the phone’s small display screen, thinking, Shit.

  Chirp.

  4 U 2!

  Double shit.

  Now what? Mike tried to think.

  Chirp.

  ! ! !

  “All right, cripes, gimme a second,” he said to the phone. He looked around, as though anyone else might have reason to be back here on this weedy patch of asphalt. But there wasn’t anybody else. He was alone.

  Mike cobbled a reply as quickly as he could tap out the letters with this thumbs:

  copy—call me soon as u can talk ok?

  He hit send. In a few seconds, the screen told him the message had gone where it was supposed to go.

  Mike couldn’t think of anything else to do after that but sit there and wait, so he tossed the phone onto the seat beside him and started the truck. It took him two or three tries. He hoped those guys from the garage had finished their dart game.

  8

  Dobry Automotive opened at 6:00 a.m. and closed at 6:00 p.m. every day but Sunday, according to the sign out front. Apparently, exceptions could be made.

  The guys were waiting for Mike when he arrived. Their names were Ray and Wayne, he learned. One of them rolled up the door to the service bay while the other brought him in with hand signals, stopping him with a show of his palms. When they were set, Mike cut the engine, got out, and said, “Guys, you’re really helping me out here.”

  “Don’t sweat it,” Wayne told him. Or maybe it was Ray. One was taller, but they didn’t have names on their coveralls, and they both had beards. Being distracted, Mike had already lost track. He felt bad meeting them this way; he’d seen them maybe three or four hundred times at the Elbow, always in the same corner after they got off work, and he’d never once bothered to exchange much more than a nod with either one of them. They didn’t seem concerned about it.

  “Take a load off,” Wayne or Ray said, leading him through a door to a customer waiting area. “Parts are in stock, shouldn’t be long.”

  “Thanks,” Mike said, genuinely meaning it, but WayneRay had already left him. Mike caught the broadside of his back as he lumbered out into the shop, where RayWayne had his head under the hood of the Dodge.

  Mike took a seat in the deserted lounge, which had a few chairs, a few issues of Field & Stream magazine, and a lonely, after-hours vibe. A cold, forgotten inch of complimentary coffee sat in the pot on the counter. A girl in a bikini smiled at him from the muscle car calendar on the wall. He could hear a faint electric buzz coming from the ancient yellowed Drink Dr Pepper! clock hanging over the coffeepot. The clock said it was 7:36.

  At 7:53, the door to the service bay opened again. WayneRay leaned in, held out Mike’s phone between two thick, grime-stained fingers, and said, “This rang a couple times.”

  Crap, Mike thought, only then realizing he’d left the phone behind in the truck. He had to get his head screwed on straight. He went over to the door, took the phone. “Sorry about that.”

  “Don’t sweat it,” WayneRay said. Back to work.

  Mike flipped the phone open. Tanya had tried him three times in the past three minutes, according to the caller-ID log. Mike wasn’t sure whether to call her back or wait, but the phone rang in his hand while he was standing there wondering.

  “Hey,” he answered. “I’m here.”

  “Mike, good grief,” Tanya said. “Where are you?”

  “Not far,” he said. “What’s going on?”

  “You tell me,” she said. The way she paused, it sounded to Mike as if she was smoking a cigarette. Last he knew, she’d quit a while ago. “The house is totally crawling with cops.”

  “Yeah, I got your message. You went by there?”

  “They called me,” she said. “To come open the place up.”

  “The cops called you?”

  “An hour ago. I’m at the curb out front right now, watching them go in and out. So are all the neighbors.”

  “Jesus, Tanya. I’m sorry.” Mike tried to run through possibilities. There seemed like a lot of them all of a sudden. “Did they show you a warrant?”

  “Oh, they showed me a warrant.” Puff. Exhale. “They showed me a warrant, all right.”

  “What does it say?”

  “It says your name, Mike. On the first page.” Puff. “Want to know what else it says?”

  “Tell me.”

  Tanya was quiet a moment. “You already know,” she said. “Don’t you? I can hear it in your voice.”

  The house is totally crawling, she’d said. Not exactly a standard police response for a guy wanted in connection with sticking up a steakhouse. His heart sank. “I have a guess.”

  “Jesus God,” she said softly.

  “I don’t think he’s involved,” Mike said, believing it less now than when he’d said the same thing to Hal. But then the logic in what Tanya was telling him fell apart. “Wait, back up a minute. Before you told me they were looking for Darryl.”

  “They are now,” Tanya said. “I told them why you called me this afternoon. They asked me all kinds of questions about you, and I haven’t said much, Mike, but I’m not liking this. I’m not liking this at all.”

  “Why are they looking for me?”

  “Because they found your car.”

  “The Skylark?”

  “No, the Rolls.”

  Mike felt something click in his throat. “Where?”

  “I don’t know, but they found it somewhere. Does it really matter?”

  No, Mike thought. He supposed it probably didn’t. Wherever they’d found his car, he was forced to accept the obvious: The police had tied the Skylark to Juliet Benson somehow. Which pretty much blew his hopes of a coincidence out of the water once and for all.

  “Your address is on the registration,” Tanya said. “I guess they checked the county records, found out who owned the house. Woo-hoo, here I am.” Puff. Exhale. “I’m sorry, I don’t mean to be a bitch, but this is … I don’t even know what this is. They asked me what I knew about the girl too. Juliet?”

  “Yeah,” Mike said.

  “Mike, what have you gotten yourself into?”

  I haven’t done anything, he wanted to say, but that seemed beside the point.

  “The place was already a wreck when I got here, by the way,” Tanya said. “It looked like somebody had come in and turned everything upside down.”

  Mike spoke by rote, mind elsewhere. “We had to let the maid go.”

  “I’m glad you think this is so funny.”

  “I’m sorry,” he said. “It’s not funny.”

  “No, it isn’t. At all.” Tanya dropped her voice again. “Did you find Darryl or not?”

  “Not,” he said. It was technically the truth, and he was starting to get paranoid, talking on the phone. “I’ll make all this up to you, Tanya. I promise. Thanks for the heads-up.”

  “Hey, you wait a minute,” Tanya said. “You’re on your way over here, right? You’re going to tell these guys Darryl took your car hours ago, and you haven’t talked to him, and you have no idea where he is. Right?”

  Mike was quiet too long.

  “Because if you don’t,” Tanya said, “then I’m washing my hands. Are you listening? I’m not covering for anybody on this. Not for Mr. You-Know-Who. And not for you either, Mike. Not for this.”
/>   “Tanya—”

  “Look, I know there’s something you’re not telling me, but I’m not going to be in this position. Okay? And you shouldn’t be either.”

  “Tanya, I’m not asking you to cover for anyone,” Mike told her. “Not for me or Mr. Anybody.”

  “Good, because I won’t.”

  “I’m just sort of tied up right now.”

  “Bullshit. Who is this girl they’re trying to find?”

  “I don’t know her.”

  “Bullshit. Where are you?”

  “I really am sorry, Tanya. Thanks for the info. I’ll sort this thing out.”

  “Mike—”

  “Just cooperate and tell them whatever you can tell them. Okay? I’ll take care of it.”

  “Goddammit, you’d better not hang up on me.”

  “Gotta go,” he said, and hung up on her.

  Mike pinched the bridge of his nose until his eyes watered. He felt like an asshole, but more talk wasn’t going to get anybody anywhere; if anything, the longer he kept Tanya on the phone, sucking down cigarettes and stealing glances over her shoulder, the worse it would look for her to any cop who happened to be watching.

  What had they found in the house? What had he overlooked? How long before these cops found their way over to Hal’s place?

  What the hell was happening at Rockhaven?

  Tanya was right. The thing to do—the only thing he should even be thinking about doing—was to get back to the house, find whoever was in charge over there, and spill all he could. Starting with Darryl at the bar last night, and ending with the directions to Hal’s cabin. He should stop by the Elbow first, long enough to bring Hal up to speed. The man had trusted him against his better judgment; if he’d known the new score, he’d never have gone along.

  Mike knew all these things in his gut, the same way he knew to back off from a growling dog. The way he knew right from wrong.

  The same way he knew you didn’t leave a buddy in the soup. The way Darryl had known the same thing, in another life, on the other side of the world. Known it without standing around thinking about it. Like breathing.

  Christ, what a mess.

  Mike turned off the phone. As an afterthought, he removed the battery too. In case of what, he didn’t know, but he’d heard tales about what the cops could do about locating cell phones. He didn’t really know what was true and what was bullshit, but there was no sense taking any chances.

  He checked the Dr Pepper clock—8:13.

  Behind him there came the muffled sound of an engine turning over, followed by the steady grumble of a big old V8. He went over to the door and looked out the window into the service bay. WayneRay sat behind the wheel of the Dodge, one leg hanging out the open door. RayWayne stood by the front bumper, wiping his hands on a greasy rag. When he held his thumb up, WayneRay cut the motor.

  Mike pulled open the door and went out. “You guys are fast,” he said.

  RayWayne nodded. “Cheap too.”

  “Don’t fill out the customer-satisfaction card or anything,” WayneRay said, climbing out of the cab. “Boss don’t normally give out free starters.”

  “I can pay for the parts,” Mike said. He thought of the five-dollar bill in his wallet. Then he thought of his bank account. He said, “You know, next time I see you.”

  RayWayne took down the prop arm and let the hood drop. The sound of the slam echoed tightly in the space. WayneRay waved a hand. “Don’t sweat it,” he said. “Boss is a dick anyway.”

  Toby Lunden didn’t know who made him more nervous: the guy he’d been looking for all day, or the guy his uncle had sent to help find him.

  Bryce sat in the passenger seat of the Navigator, watching Potter’s place through a pair of compact field binoculars. “You know what?” he said. “I sorta can’t wait to meet this fuckhead.”

  “Maybe we should just, you know. Get out of here,” Toby said.

  Bryce smirked beneath the binocs. “Don’t want your money anymore, huh?”

  They were parked curbside at the far end of the block, around the corner, off the radar. At least Toby hoped they were off the radar. He was starting to feel sick to his stomach.

  Since this afternoon, cops had descended on Potter and Barlowe’s place like ants on a candy bar; from where they sat, Toby could see uniforms talking to the neighbors, eyeballing the street. There were squad units parked around, from the county and St. Paul PD both, plus an unmarked in the driveway, poking out from the carport. A couple of the squads still had their flashers going, strobing the neighborhood red and blue. Toby didn’t like any of it. He was a numbers guy.

  “I can’t believe he called the cops,” he said. “What an asshole.”

  “Who?”

  “Nathaniel.”

  “Who?”

  Toby said, “What do you mean, who? My guy.”

  “Your guy.”

  “From the restaurant. The whole reason we’re out here?”

  Bryce didn’t lower the binoculars. “This is something different.”

  “What else could it be?”

  “There’s a question,” Bryce said. “By the way, kid? Piece of advice?”

  “What?”

  Bryce looked at him. “Mind your tone when you speak to me.”

  Toby felt his scalp tingle. His mouth went dry. Bryce said it sort of casual, but, Jesus, something about this guy’s eyes. Toby dropped his own automatically. “Yeah, man, sure. Sorry.”

  Silence. Toby sat still. He felt the car getting smaller.

  “Apology accepted,” Bryce said, and raised the binocs again.

  They’d been there maybe another ten minutes, watching the action down the street, when Toby’s mobile went off. He jumped so hard at the sudden ring in the quiet of the car that his seat belt locked, holding him in place. Jesus, he was on edge.

  Bryce chuckled. The phone kept ringing. Bryce said, “You thinking about getting that?”

  Toby took a breath, grabbed the phone out of its cradle. He saw who was calling and answered, “Hey, Uncle Buck.”

  “How’s the hunting?” his uncle said.

  Toby wasn’t quite sure what to tell him. “Um … it sort of got kind of weird.”

  “Oh?”

  “Kind of.”

  For some reason Uncle Buck didn’t sound surprised. “I just got a tip from a state patrol buddy of mine,” he said. “Tell me again, what’s the name of this nut you’re lookin’ for?”

  “Darryl,” Toby said.

  “There a last name goes with that?”

  “Potter. Darryl Potter.”

  “Huh,” Uncle Buck said. “That’s what I thought you told me.”

  Toby didn’t understand. “You got a what from who?”

  “A tip,” Uncle Buck repeated. “From a buddy of mine. With the state patrol.”

  “A tip about Darryl?”

  “That’s the name I got here, yeah.”

  “Why?”

  “For the show,” Uncle Buck said.

  “Oh,” Toby said. “Wait. What?”

  “One thing at a time, champ. Where are you now?”

  “St. Paul,” Toby said. “North End, where Potter lives. There’s cops all over his house.”

  “I expect there would be.” Uncle Buck seemed inexplicably pleased to be hearing this. “Bryce still with you?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Good. Put him on a sec.”

  Toby wanted to ask what was going on, but he knew Uncle Buck. It was better if you didn’t make him ask twice for things. He handed the phone to Bryce and said, “It’s my uncle.”

  “So I gathered,” Bryce said, still watching the house through the binoculars.

  “He wants to talk to you.”

  Bryce took the phone with one hand, kept the binoculars in place with the other. He put the phone to his ear and said, “I’m here.”

  Toby tried to make out the conversation by listening to Bryce’s end of it, but Bryce didn’t give him anything to go on besides an occasi
onal yeah or an uh-huh and one sort of vague-sounding no shit.

  After a minute he finally said, “Got it,” and handed the phone back to Toby. Toby put the phone to his ear, but the line had already gone dead.

  He looked at Bryce. “What did he say?”

  Bryce smirked under the binoculars. “He said he’d keep in touch.”

  “Come on, man,” Toby said. “Seriously. What about Darryl?”

  “Yep,” Bryce said. “Still the question.”

  Mike killed twenty minutes at the Go Shop on the corner. He gassed up the Dodge, then hit the ATM inside and withdrew as much cash as he could without tripping the twenty-dollar minimum on the account. He used some of the cash to buy a bottle of ibuprofen, a thermal travel mug full of coffee, a fistful of energy shots, and a Minnesota state road map.

  At the last minute, on his way to the counter, he veered and added two more items: an adjustable Twins cap from the general-goods aisle and a pair of sunglasses from the revolving rack inside the door.

  Don’t even think about it, said a reasonable voice in his head. Just go.

  Mike ignored the voice and climbed into the truck. After tearing into the ibuprofen and chasing a few caplets with one of the energy shots, he bit the tags off the hat and glasses. He put the glasses on, pulled the ball cap down low on his head, and checked himself in the rearview mirror.

  He looked like a jackass. A regular master of disguise. Sure.

  Forget it, the reasonable voice said. Get on the road.

  But his leg had a different opinion, Mike reasoned back. With the drive he had ahead of him, stuck in the same position for two hours, ibuprofen wasn’t going to cut the mustard. Not when it got like this, with the throb in his knee already climbing up through his thigh bone, all the way into his hip.

  Mike told himself that he had to be able to focus. To do that, he was going to need what was left of his Vicodin prescription, back at the house.

  At that point his leg and the reasonable voice seemed to join. Each thump felt like a warning: Don’t be an idiot. Don’t be an idiot. Don’t be an idiot.

  Anyway, it had been at least forty minutes since he’d spoken to Tanya. Who knew? Maybe by now the coast was clear.

  It wasn’t.

  A full block before he rolled past the north end of his street, Mike saw the steady pulse of flashers strobing the bare tree limbs in the dusky light. He slowed down as much as he dared, tried to glimpse as much as he could from a distance.