“Do you know a place where there is no discrimination?” Jace asked.
“The Cities,” I said.
Tapia and the young woman looked at each other like they had simultaneously discovered I was a raving lunatic.
“I’m not saying you won’t find any bigotry up there,” I said. “You will. Of course you will. You’ll find it everywhere you go. Only you’ll find less of it. In a big city, a white woman dating a Hispanic, a Hispanic married to an African American, an African American dating an Asian, an Asian spending time with a Jew, a Jew with a Muslim, a Muslim shacking up with a conservative Republican—we see it all the time, and most people don’t even notice, much less care.”
“This is my home,” Tapia said.
“Mine, too,” said Jace.
Good for them.
I changed the subject. Pointing at the front of her letterman’s jacket, I said, “Interesting name.”
“It’s short for J.C.,” she said. “People called me J.C. when I was a kid but now everyone just calls me Jace. Sometimes they say Jacey with a long e. But I like Jace.”
When she was a kid? my inner voice asked.
“J.C. and R.T.,” I said. “Sounds like a match.”
“We’re just friends,” said Tapia.
Who was he kidding? I wondered. Not the punks out on the sidewalk.
The young woman’s eyes widened at the lie, but she said nothing.
“Listen, kids, there’s something you should know. The earth spins on its axis at about a thousand miles an hour. You can’t slow it down and you sure as hell can’t stop it.”
“What is that supposed to mean?” Tapia asked.
“It means, kiss the girl while you have the chance.”
A few moments later I was standing outside. I zipped my jacket to my throat and looked up at the dirty gray sky. The weather geek on the radio had predicted snow and I figured that sooner or later he’d be right.
I walked to my Audi without once looking over my shoulder through the large windows of Fit to Print. It would have cheered me to see the kids making out like bandits on the counter, but I didn’t think there was much chance of that happening.
What a shitty town.
Whatever was in the water that Suzi Shimek and Coach Testen were drinking, Lynn Matousek was having none of it. Her hair was thin and black with plenty of gray at the roots; she had a heavy, square body and a shiny face. She was only pushing fifty years old, yet could easily pass for sixty.
I introduced myself at the door and said, “May I ask you a few questions?”
“Are you a cop?” she asked.
“No.”
“Are you a private investigator?”
“Something like that.” It’s illegal to pass yourself off as a law enforcement officer, but hell, anyone can be a PI.
“Which one of the assholes hired you?”
I was confused and probably looked it.
“My ex-husbands,” she said. “Which one hired you?”
“How many are there?”
“Three. I got three ex-husbands.”
“None of them hired me.”
“I’m supposed to believe that?”
“Lady—”
“What’re you doin’ here? Lookin’ for more shit t’ use against me in court?”
“I want to ask some questions.”
“You said that. ’Bout what?”
“Elizabeth Rogers.”
That slowed her down. “Beth? Why? After all these years why would you ask about Beth?”
“I’m trying to find out what happened to her.”
“Why? Why now? Is this for one of those TV documentaries or something? Is this for—Are you working for the governor? Is this for that shithead Barrett? If it is, you can just get your ass outta here.”
I saw the opening and took it.
“It’s time the people of Minnesota learned just what kind of man they elected to office,” I told her. “I don’t know what party you’re affiliated with—”
“I ain’t affiliated with no party.”
“But I work for people who want to bring honor and integrity back to the governor’s office.”
“What people?”
“Real Minnesotans who want to take back their state.”
Lynn’s eyes grew wide. “Are you going to stick it to Barrett, that bastard?”
“This isn’t about Governor Barrett. This is about the truth.”
“C’mon in.”
I followed Lynn into her home, dodging debris as I went. Apparently she kept house the way some college kids kept house.
“Want a drink?” she called over her shoulder.
“If it’s not too much trouble.”
“If it’s not too much trouble,” she mumbled. “Have a seat.”
I found one behind a coffee table stacked with newspapers and the remains of Chinese takeout—beef lo mein, I guessed. A moment later, Lynn returned carrying a bottle of Phillips and two glasses. She set them on the table in front of me, poured a generous amount of vodka into one glass and took it across the room, leaving me to serve myself.
“You wanna know who killed Elizabeth Rogers?” she asked.
“Yes.”
“It’s ’bout time somebody did something about Beth. That bastard ain’t never paid. You wanna know who killed Beth? I’ll tell you. Jack fucking Barrett killed Beth. Jack Barrett killed Beth and everyone in town knows it. Only no one in the fucking town cares. They didn’t care at the time cuz he was a fucking sports hero and they don’t care now cuz he’s the governor and they didn’t care in between cuz . . . who the fuck knows? Cuz they let him get away with murder which makes ’em what? Accomplices? Ah, it don’t matter. No one cares.”
“I care,” I said.
“Are you gonna get him? Are you gonna get him cuz of what he did to Beth?”
I smiled my most conspiratorial smile and said, “Tell me what you know.”
Lynn brushed the debris from a chair next to mine, sat down, and leaned forward, holding her vodka between her hands.
“People say there’s no proof that Jack killed Beth. But there is proof. What you call irrefutable proof.”
“Tell me.”
“The locket. The locket Beth always wore. What was missing when they found her body.”
“What locket?”
“The one he gave her. Beth wore a little silver locket in the shape of a heart. You open it up and there’s this tiny picture of Jack on one side and a tiny picture of Beth on the other side. Jack gave it to Beth when they were juniors and Beth never, ever took it off. Even when she took a shower she wore it. She was wearing it at the party. I saw it. Only it was gone when they found her.”
“There could be a lot of reasons for that.”
Lynn shook her head vigorously.
“Jack took it,” she said. “He killed her and took the locket. The fucking governor of the state of Minnesota. He did it.”
“Why? What motive did he have?”
“Because, because . . . Just because. Look, the night of the party Beth had a fight with Jack Barrett.”
“Do you know what it was about?”
“Jack was cheating on her.”
“He was?”
“Yeppers.”
“With who?”
“Beth didn’t know. That’s what the fight was about.”
“If she didn’t know who he was cheating with, how could she be sure?”
“You think we’re stupid? I always knew when my husbands were cheating on me. They always knew when I was cheating on them. You don’t need to be no rocket scientist.”
“Did you ever learn who it was?”
“Nah. No one said nothing afterward. I wouldn’t have said nothing, either.”
“Someone at the party?”
“Fuck if I know.”
“When Elizabeth left the party, she left alone,” I said.
“She left alone,” Lynn repeated and drained her glass of vodka. “Whew,” she exhal
ed. “That was good.” Good enough that she poured herself another hefty drink. She drank some more vodka and said, “Look. Jack did it. Everyone knows that. The whole fuckin’ town knows that. So what are you gonna do ’bout it?”
Good question.
“When Beth left the party, where was she going? Do you know?”
Lynn shook her head.
“She didn’t confide in you?”
“We were—We came together and we should have left together, but . . .”
“But what?”
Lynn drained her glass a second time.
“I haven’t told but a half dozen people this, but if it’ll help you get the governor . . .”
“What haven’t you told?”
“The reason Beth left the party alone. We were going to leave together. I should have been with her. I wasn’t. Know why? You wanna know why? I’ll tell you why? Because I was on my fucking knees in the upstairs bathroom giving the mayor a blow job when Beth decided to go home, that’s why. Seventeen years old and this man married with two kids in my school and he, and he tells me—Fuck. I believed every word he said. Fuck. That’s why Beth left the party alone. Men can be such bastards.”
I watched as Lynn poured herself another straight vodka.
“That’s why I drink,” she said. “That’s the secret to my success. One of the secrets, anyway.”
She drank some more.
“Worst thing that ever happened in this town was that fucking basketball tournament.”
Nothing Lynn Peyer Whatever Whatever Matousek had told me proved that Jack Barrett had murdered Elizabeth. I could see why she believed it, why she wanted to believe it. Others in Victoria probably believed it, too. Yet the question remained: Who sent the e-mail? I didn’t think it was Lynn. She didn’t strike me as the e-mail type. If she had decided to threaten Governor Barrett, she would have done so far less subtly and at a much greater volume. Besides, how could she have possibly learned Lindsey Bauer’s private e-mail address? I crossed her name off my list of likely suspects, but lightly, and in pencil.
I was idling at the intersection waiting on the light, debating which way to turn next. The traffic had an anxious feel to it, like all the drivers were afraid they were missing appointments. A black Mercedes pulled next to me, the engine revved impatiently. It was a new SLK 320 convertible with the top up, costing about the same as my car. I had taken a look at one a few months back before buying the Audi.
I recognized the driver immediately. Coach Testen. We glanced at each other and I nodded my head in greeting. He looked away. Was the snub intentional or did he simply not notice me?
The light changed and he was off in a hurry. I watched the Mercedes disappear around a corner.
A few minutes later I was on a county road heading out of town toward the South Dakota border. Both Lynn Matousek and Mrs. Rogers had asked why I cared about what had happened to Elizabeth. I wasn’t sure myself. She wasn’t the reason I had come to Victoria, although I was beginning to think she was the reason I was sent here. At the same time, it felt as if her eyes were watching me from on high as I drove Victoria’s back roads. Perhaps she had been searching for someone to speak for her after all these years and finally found a man who might manage it. It was an incredibly arrogant thing for me to think, I know. Yet the idea pleased me just the same. It made me feel important.
At the same time, I recalled what Mrs. Rogers had said earlier. “Perhaps you were sent by God.”
“Yeah, right. Me and God.” I crossed my fingers. “We’re like this.”
I still had the map of the greater Victoria area that I had purchased at the convenience store and was now following it to the Hugoson farm. It was only 4:30 P.M., but dusk was already gathering. By five the sun would set. I had hoped to arrive at my destination before then. As it turned out, I drove past the farm and was nearly two miles down the road before I realized my mistake and doubled back.
I couldn’t estimate the size of the Hugoson farm. It seemed huge, its snow-covered fields stretching toward the setting sun. The farm’s driveway, however, was about two hundred yards long and plowed to the dirt. It started at the county blacktop and rose up a slight incline to a white two-story house with blue shutters that were badly in need of paint. There were two large pole barns flanking the house, both made of sheet metal. The driveway ended in a kind of courtyard framed by the three structures. I parked in the center, turned off the engine, and slid out of the Audi. The huge door to the nearest pull barn was open and I moved toward it. A hard crust had formed on the snow. It made each step sound like I had dropped my car keys.
Just inside the door, I could see the back end of a dark blue pickup. I called out and a man dressed for a tedious day’s work in the hard cold stepped around the truck and into the courtyard.
I recognized him instantly. I had been trained by experience to recognize him by the way he restricted his movements, not turning his head or gesturing with his hands, relying on peripheral vision instead of normal eye movement. I recognized the way he controlled the muscles that gave his face expression and spoke in a restrained conversational range, neither low nor loud, excited nor dull. He was an ex-con, someone who had done the kind of time measured by many wall calendars.
“Mr. Hugoson?” I asked.
“Whatever you’re sellin’ I ain’t interested in buyin’ and by the looks of that car of yours, I doubt I could afford it, anyway.”
“My name’s McKenzie. I’d like to talk to you about—”
“I know what you want to talk about and I ain’t havin’ none of it. Get off my property.”
“Mr. Hugoson—”
“You don’t hear real good, do you, boy?”
He stepped nearer. Somehow he seemed to expand, becoming larger, straighter, harder, with eyes that held all the warmth of an ice pick. He stared at me without blinking so I would know that he was a dangerous man and certainly not squeamish about assaulting a trespasser. It was unnecessary. I already knew he was a dangerous man. I took a step backward as my right hand moved slowly to the spot on my hip where I would have holstered my gun if I hadn’t been so careless as to leave it in my glove compartment.
“News travels fast in a small town,” I said.
“Bad news does.”
I turned to my right, but he was quicker, moving so that the setting sun was at his back and shining directly into my eyes.
“Why are you afraid to talk to me?”
Hugoson strung together a half dozen altogether filthy obscenities that suggested he wasn’t afraid of anything, much less a big city punk of dubious sexual orientation.
“Does your mother know you talk like that?” I asked. It was a horribly lame retort, I know; it was the best I could come up with at the moment.
In response, Hugoson turned his back on me and stepped inside the barn. A moment later an unseen motor hummed and the huge door shuddered, shook, and rolled shut. I cursed out loud. I wasn’t used to having doors slammed in my face, especially such big ones.
Brian Reif had a worn, weary expression that reminded me of a retired civil servant, someone who had been beaten down by ignorance and indifference and ingratitude. I found him inside A-1 Auto across the street from Nick’s Family Restaurant and recognized immediately that he wouldn’t talk to me. At least not civilly.
He was alone, wearing the same dungarees he had on at the Rainbow Cafe, and was working on a nearly new SUV. He came into the office when I arrived, looked at me for about two seconds, turned around, and walked back into the garage. Without an audience, he had no use for a confrontation.
I followed him.
“How did the meeting go after I left?” I asked him. “Sign up any new members?”
He answered by taking an air wrench to the lug nuts of the SUV. The car didn’t need tires, but then he wasn’t changing them, just loosening and tightening the nuts with the air wrench, making noise.
“Mr. Reif . . .”
The noise was so loud I heard it in the s
oles of my feet.
“Mr. Reif . . .”
I decided I might as well be talking to a microwave oven. I was angry enough to consider whacking Reif on the side of his knee with the heel of my boot, except there was nothing to gain by it. Still, I might have done it anyway if I hadn’t been distracted by the opening bars of “Don’t Fence Me In” played on my cell in between blasts of the air wrench. I recognized the phone number on my display. I returned to the office and answered it.
“Hi, Nina,” I said.
“McKenzie. Tell me you’re not still angry.”
“I’m not angry. I never was.”
“Yes, you were.”
“Was not.”
“Was too.”
“Nuh-uh.”
“Then why don’t you come over. I’ll buy you dinner.”
“I’d love to . . .”
“Prudence Johnson is singing tonight, one of your favorites.”
“I can’t.”
“You are still angry.”
“I’m not.”
“Then why . . . ?”
“I’m not in the Cities.”
“Where are you?”
“A couple hundred miles southwest, in Victoria, Minnesota,” I explained.
“You rich jet-setters. The world’s your playground.”
“I really appreciate the invitation, though.”
“What are you doing in Victoria and what is that god-awful noise?”
Reif was still working the air wrench while he watched me, obviously wishing I’d go away.
“Nina, I can’t talk right now.”
“Okay, well . . .”
“I’ll call you later tonight.”
“Promise?”
“I promise.”
“I love you,” she said.
I deactivated the cell without replying. I closed the phone and slipped it into my jacket pocket. I gave an enthusiastic wave that Reif pretended not to see and stepped out of the office into the auto shop’s parking lot. It was only about 5:30 but night was already a dark reality. Across the street the bright red neon sign of Nick’s Family Restaurant beckoned to me.
8
I opened the door to Nick’s, stepped inside, and let the door close itself. It was a big, heavy wooden door that could easily withstand a battering ram. It seemed to fit perfectly with the rest of the restaurant’s decor—scarlet carpet, white stucco walls, false timber beams across the ceiling, and small, high windows built to discourage patrons from throwing one another through them. The bar was shaped like a horseshoe and surrounded by stools with black cushions. There were square tables with four chairs each arranged in the center of the room and a dozen high-back booths along the walls. The lights were dim except for the neon signs behind the bar and mounted on the walls that advertised various brands of beer and tequila, and the air reeked of cigarette smoke and perfume sold for seven bucks a bottle. In the corner, a young woman stood in front of the jukebox, biting her nails as she studied the selections. Her companion at the nearest table watched her intently, as if he were afraid that the next button she pushed would end all life as he knew it.
Pretty Girl Gone Page 13
