Deep North (A Brenda Contay Novel Of Suspense Book 2)

by Barry Knister

  He jumped down into the Stratos, Marion still talking as he reached for the ignition and saw the keys were gone. He looked on the floor, felt his pockets, looked to the dock. Ross was trying to get the woman up.

  He grabbed her ankle.

  “Let go—” She kicked and he clawed her leg, knowing from the force in her she had the keys, all of them on one ring, the boat, the truck. Pulling her toward him, he saw Marion had her by the parka.

  “You can’t do this!” The woman kicked him. “You’re evil!”

  “Give me the keys, now—”

  “Let her go, Jerry—”

  “Give me the keys!”

  Half on the dock, legs over the side, the woman kicked again but he had a good hold on her, felt her arms windmilling. His cap came loose. Marion lost her grip, and he pulled hard—

  Searing pain—he heard himself scream. Across his forehead, all the ties, the delicate knots of the hairweave broke in her fist, torn, with each knot a pop like a button snap.

  Blood already in his eyes, he wrestled her back down into the boat. The torn-away part of the hairpiece hung and flopped—he felt it off on one side. With a final yank he pulled the woman fully into the boat.

  Only now could he touch himself. It was torn half off. His hand was bloody, the broken knots like pig bristles under his shaking fingers. He leaned over the gunwale and cupped water—cold, freezing. Something fell from his shirt pocket, the phone. He slapped water to his torn scalp, tasting blood.

  In peripheral vision he sensed Ross looking at him, seeing the hair.

  He tried now to put it in place, seeing the cell phone sinking in brown water before he looked to the floor for his cap. He bent and snatched it, straightened. In great pain, he pulled the cap hard, front and back, down over his ruined scalp before stepping over the woman and putting out his hand.

  “Give them to him,” Ross said. “Please, Heather. Now. God, Heather, do it.”

  Sprawled on the floor, the woman reached in her parka pocket and handed them up. He put them in his pants pocket.

  “Get up.”

  “Don’t hurt her.”

  “Get up, Heather.”

  He stood away so she could stand. When she did, he turned to check Ross, and saw himself in the Stratos’s windshield. Blood was coming from under the cap. He took it off, seeing now the full damage. It looked to him like popped rivets. This one was just like Doreen, the quiet ones you couldn’t trust. He touched himself. Any facial movement pulled the wounds. Cool air fell sharp on raw flesh. Wiping blood, he patted his pants for the keys to be sure, then stiff-armed Heather.

  She fell back, sitting down hard on the gunwale.

  He shoved again.

  “Don’t! No!”

  She landed on her back, and began thrashing the water. When she got to it and snatched for the boat, Lomak slapped her hand away. He scooped more water and patted his head. It helped, it was soothing, the woman chattering and yelling at him, pointing now at his head, laughing.

  “Yeah, Heather, I’m funny but you’re fucking hysterical, Heather, that’s what you are, fucking Loony Tunes, that’s funny—”

  He kept talking that way, keeping it going so he couldn’t hear what she said—talking, talking, crazy fucking woman laughing—”Yeah, honey, okay honey, that’s good, you send a postcard where you’re going—”

  The puffy down coat was buoying her up, keeping her high in the water. But she was moving fast now, caught by the current.

  He felt the bow sink behind him, Ross still yelling. He stumbled to the stern and balanced with his hand.

  On the still-hot motor housing.

  He took it away, touching his head delicately. A float cushion sailed out, tied to yellow rope. When he looked to the water, the woman was thrashing to the cushion, grabbing it, but then she lost it, drawn by the current.

  He was laughing now, it was funny. “Really good, Heather, you can take the cushion with you over fucking Kettle Falls, in a barrel, man—” That’s right, the cushion could be like a souvenir for her, in Canada, where she was going with rocks and shit—

  He heard and felt it at the same time. A blow, an audible thud that humped him over the hot motor from behind, sharp and hard, an axe handle. But not. The head pain confused him, but the new thing that had happened quickly overwhelmed what still pulsed on his scalp. His legs tingled, he tried to reach around, hot through his jacket from the motor housing. He tried to push off but couldn’t. Something was stuck to him, in his back. He reached and cried out from the movement. Something was in him. He felt his legs going, something to do with his spine. It was Ross, behind him, in the boat.

  One second, take your eyes off them one second, they would fuck you over every time—

  Lomak reached again, awful pain spreading in all directions. He pushed off the motor, hands burning. The Stratos bobbed under him, sinking his knees. Ross was yelling somewhere different, this time from the dock—Jesus Christ, screaming, loud fucking back-stabbing woman, and he was going down now, dropping, hearing himself suck air. As she shouted, Lomak saw more yellow rope tangled under him, felt it still in him, how she had done it as he was touching the hair weave.

  The drag anchor, fucking aluminum. Stuck in him.

  And for some reason, dropping down now with a grunt on his knees and forearms, facing the gray indoor-outdoor carpet of Schmidt’s boat, what he was thinking—the complete bullshit that came into your mind—was of this guy, some guy that looked like a snake—actually like a real snake, his eyes wrapping round the side of his head. On the news with Jim Lehrer, some expert, this snake guy running his mouth on how you couldn’t blink, you had to stay on message.

  Not a good deal.

  Ross was crying now. The back was bad, but better if he kept the way he was. On his forearms. The sound of the falls muffled her. That was good, a steady drumming. He remembered the one in the water, but it was not cool being like this, down for the count, on the floor.

  “Ross—” He listened for her, hearing himself breathe, the thud of water. “Ross!”

  “You bastard!”

  “Hey counselor—”

  He coughed, in great pain but he wanted her to get it. To start thinking on it right now. “See you in court.”

  No answer. Good, maybe she understood. “How’d she do, Ross? Half gainer with a tuck?”

  He coughed again, but it was all he had to use. “In court you can tell it. Show slides. Marion? Hey, Marion. Lots of good shit for the jury. How you did me twice. Goes on the resume, Marion. Lots on your plate, busy Monday.”

  Too hard. He was out of breath and saw more blood, brownish red. It was coming off his nose, sopping into the indoor/outdoor. Charlie kept a tidy boat, Mr. Clean. Lomak thought of him in the barn, taped on the jet skis. This was not good, but that was fucking humiliating. Or the Ross house. He remembered it, forgotten all day, her house with the fieldstone, the library and antiques, flowerbeds waiting for dozens of flats of annuals. And detonators in the basement.

  Unable to feel his feet or lower legs, but remembering the house and knowing it would blow up today—that was something. You had to think positive. He remembered the plane and listened for it, but knew better. Rohmer was gone. Police and shit, whatever would happen…

  No matter. Ross’s house, that was something.

  Very tired now, he listened to the falls. He reached up painfully and lay the weave in place before resting his head on the carpet.

  He was cold and wished he had taken a jacket before leaving.

  Braking hard on the gravel drive, Schmidt got out and ran up the Nielsons’ front walk. The door was unlocked. He entered and trotted through to the kitchen. On the back landing, coats hung from pegs. He pulled on a plaid wool jacket, stepped out and moved quickly down the grassy slope, toward the covered boat shed.

  He got out the keys. A Lund and a Seabreeze hung suspended. Reaching the dock, he decided on the Lund, moved to the winch, released the pawls, and spun the flywheel. The boat lowered as
he turned, cradled in canvas cinches—slowly, slowly. It touched water, floated free. Schmidt pushed the boat out from under the shed, moved along the dock and hopped down. Seconds later he had it started. He spun the wheel and swung out into the lake.

  The motor whined, the hull rose.

  He had no plan. Nothing. He touched his face, cool air finding places where duct tape had taken skin. The missing eyebrow. If John Nielson had called the landing, someone would soon exit the channel. Gustofson, or Pierson from the Dew Drop. Whatever happened, he’d soon have help.

  Jerry. He saw him seated, tapping his lips for silence, the deer rifle balanced. Of the two, he was the killer. Schmidt looked to shore and back to the channel before sitting. It was a thing people like that had. Playing cowboy. It made him think of Lillie, an adult-ed course she’d taken in Milwaukee, after the kids were gone. Something she said the instructor had quoted—how did it go? Something like, the reason for most of the trouble in the world had to do with people who couldn’t be still in a room by themselves.

  True. Alone in a room. He couldn’t do it for long himself, it didn’t work. Always he was up after a few minutes, feeling antsy. Scratching around, looking for Lillie or one of the kids. Bugging them to go bowling with him, to the movies.

  He was glad for the Lund’s windscreen. Eyes watering and the bare places tingling on his face, he wondered whether Brenda Contay was like that too. Always ready to pick up and go, to do. It was in her face and movements.

  Jesus, he thought. The stuff that came to you at the wrong time.

  Even so, steering but hardly seeing, knowing the channel by heart, Schmidt saw himself getting ready for bed, the room smelling of camphor and wood, seeing her red hair and feeling guilty in front of his wife’s shoes lined up in the closet. But trying to start again, in the old way, with people he knew—it was starting over from the same place. That’s what was wrong with it. To start again, you couldn’t just start over. You had to actually let go. Take a chance.

  He saw an aluminum skiff ahead in the lake. It was empty but running, not drifting. As it came about in a lazy turn, he recognized the dented transom as his own. He looked to the American shore, to his house. The plane still rested at the dock. He aimed for the utility, and now saw the upper body folded forward, then Rohmer’s pink head.

  He throttled back, saw the tiller angled away, the boat circling. He looked again to his house. No movement. At low speed, then in neutral, Schmidt waited for the utility to complete the circle. He floated nearer and grabbed the transom. He managed to kill the ten-horse, and held on until motion stopped. From the entry wound, he knew Rohmer was dead.

  Rizzo. No, Lomak. He had been gone an hour, maybe more. Schmidt pushed the smaller boat forward and away, brought it back, working to reach the rifles. He glanced again at Rohmer, and for a moment wondered what should be done with the plane.

  Someone had put the scope sight back on the Remington. He grabbed the rifle, and shoved the utility clear. He sat again and put the Lund in gear.

  ◆◆◆◆◆

  “I believe him, that’s all,” Tina said. “If he sees us trying to signal, he’ll hurt them.”

  “He won’t see.” Arms loaded with more bedding, Brenda stepped to the catwalk. Sonny was looking up at her, sitting on the heap of blankets and life preservers she had thrown into Brian Reese’s Lund.

  “Move.”

  He barked at her, ready for play.

  “Call him, Tina.”

  “Sonny! Here!”

  The dog jumped to the houseboat and crossed to his mistress.

  “It’s the way he gave orders,” Tina said, wrapped now in her own parka. “’Do what I say, I’m in charge, I’m the boss.’”

  “I met him, I know.”

  Brenda tossed the bedding. She would use gas from the tank in Brian’s boat to soak the blankets, then get down in the water and tow the boat out into the cove. Then set it on fire. Maybe someone would see.

  “Acting like a theater director,” Tina said. “’This is my play, don’t change the script.’ I think setting a fire is dangerous, Brenda. He had it all planned out, rehearsed.”

  “He won’t see it. At night, yes, not now.”

  “What if you’re wrong?”

  “Tina, we can’t just sit here. He throws someone overboard, forces two women to go with him—”

  Determined, she went inside for matches. Brightness filled the lounge, the harsh glare at odds with the cold, gray morning. She stepped to the pantry and opened drawers, looking. She checked the shelf before the houseboat’s controls, the sideboard—then remembered Brian Reese’s matches in her windbreaker.

  She went back out and swung up the ladder. Crossing the deck, Brenda looked out to the channel. Nothing and no one. Just grays and browns, small pine-covered islands. It made her angry. A criminal, a hater of women had taken her friends, but somewhere nearby, locals were making breakfast, fishing, reading bird and geology guidebooks.

  She turned to the land spit. Scanning now, searching the slope for the stand of birches and campsite, she found it. Right there. Their observation point, the empty beer bottles. She imagined Schmidt beaching the Stratos, jumping out and heading up the slope, just as she had done an hour before. To spy. And now the sleek boat was coming toward them to help with Heather’s fish, the man with spooky hair. Then killing the pike, and blaming the fish for his own clumsiness.

  She thought of horses hanging in a barn, saw the rancher—It’s a teaching moment, missy, killing horses this way helps teach my boys it’s a tough world—

  She ran inside to her cabin. Digging in her windbreaker, she remembered Charlie Schmidt and Louis Rohmer looking up as they arrived for dinner. It now seemed staged to her, an act. She got the matches, dropped the jacket, and heard the distant, muffled sound of an outboard.

  Brenda ran out and crossed to the railing. Louder now, it was not the Stratos. She saw nothing and felt defeated. There would not be enough time. Whoever it was would pass within sight of the inlet before she could tow the boat and light the blankets. The sound of the motor would blot out her shouting.

  “Hear it?” Tina called.

  She waited, watching. The motor’s pitch had altered and now seemed aimed for her. The change convinced Brenda it was him. In the next moment the boat appeared, and in seconds it entered the cove. She wasn’t sure, and then she was—his hair and features, driving someone else’s boat. He was alone, and Brenda felt enormously relieved. But quickly she took it back, scolding herself, denying any certainties or loyalties. He corrected several degrees and aimed for the houseboat. He was watching her, keeping track of the boat, looking up.

  She went down quickly. Tina shoved up from her chair, the dog at her side. She believed in him, and she was no fool. But behind the wheelchair, in the narrow span of water between houseboat and land spit, the captain’s chair still floated, tacky underside face up.

  She looked at him, this time in a different boat. He put the engine in neutral and drifted the last few feet. When he again looked at her, there was something different about him. His pant leg was ripped. Propped in the bow was a rifle. He looked now to Tina.

  “You all right?”

  “Yes, someone—”

  “He took Heather and Marion,” Brenda said.

  Charlie looked at her. “Rohmer’s dead.” She said nothing. “I’m just telling you.” He said it defensively, in reply to whatever must be in her face. “I came to check on you. Someone will be here soon, I have to go.”

  “I’m going, too.”

  “There’s no point. I’m looking at random. I don’t know where they are.”

  “He mentioned something about a plane,” Tina said. “Just that, a plane.”

  “Wouldn’t they need a dock?” Brenda asked.

  He looked at her again. “If he was picking someone up, yes. But he wasn’t, that wasn’t the plan. Rohmer never planned to fly out.”

  She looked at Tina. “What did he say?”

  “He s
aid they were going to Kettle Falls. He told Heather to hurry up, he had a plane to catch. He told Marion she should get her gloves, he said she was in the steno pool. Meaning she would be typing something.”

  “Kettle Falls. Okay,” Schmidt said. “That’s it. Lomak went there because they have wireless from the hotel. He thinks Rohmer’s waiting for him at my place.”

  “Somewhere with a dock,” Tina said.

  Charlie nodded. “It makes sense. Louis mentioned going there yesterday afternoon.”

  “They’re my friends,” Brenda told him. “I’m going.”

  “This guy is bad news.”

  “We know.”

  She jumped to the transom. He stared at her, standing in a strange boat, strange himself, holding to the houseboat. His face looked both blanched and red. His left eyebrow was gone. “Don’t argue,” she said. “He’s got Marion and Heather. I can steer if you have to do something.”

  She looked at the rifle, then at Tina. “Is that all right?”

  “I’m fine, you go.”

  Charlie shook his head, but held out his hand. She took it, jumped, and stepped quickly to the passenger seat. He shoved them clear, put the boat in gear and backed away.

  ◆◆◆◆◆

  The smaller Mercury motor sent the Nielsons’ Lund slapping over the lake in heavy lunges. Schmidt was glad the noise made speech impossible. He stood at the console and kept the bow aimed for two islands that concealed Kettle Falls. Brenda sat next to him, right hand gripping the windshield. Her eyes were slits, yellow rain parka flattened to her chest.

  He saw she was looking at the deer rifle in the bow. Maybe she thought he was the one who’d killed Louis. He wanted to tell her no, but concentrated on the islands. What was the point? If she thought it, she thought it.

  Hours before, they had made this same crossing. The light had been fading, Johnson Bay behind them, the falls ahead. That had been long ago. He felt her disappointment next to him, like some kind of laser. It’s not my fault, he thought.

  But whose, then? Who had brought them here? Whose fault?

  ◆◆◆◆◆

  Spray slapped the windshield. Again, and again. Water drizzled off the glass like thread.