by Lourey, Jess
“Germs,” I said, showing him my jazz hands.
He pretended not to hear me, and so I pretended the elevator came to a screeching stop on the second floor, forcing me to rub my germy elbow against him to keep my balance.
“Sorry,” I said. I’d been hanging out with Mrs. Berns far too long.
Following the signs to room 227, I stood outside the cracked door. It struck me—probably much later than it should have—that I was about to see Gary Wohnt vulnerable. In bed. Possibly wearing little more than a gown.
I took a deep breath, steeling myself, and slipped through the crack in the door.
No part of my imagination could have prepared me for what I saw.
Fifteen
“Miranda Rayn James!”
Gary knew my middle name. And he was alone. The top half of his bed was raised so he could sit comfortably. One leg lay relaxed on the bed and the other was bandaged and suspended from the ceiling in some sort of sling. Both appendages were naked, but that wasn’t what shocked me. It was his expression. He looked as joyful as a child who’d gotten a pony for Christmas, and he was directing all this happiness at me.
I glanced behind me. Had someone else entered, a woman with the same name as me but whom Gary actually liked?
“Come in! I was hoping you’d visit.” His words were slurred and his dark hair tousled, a thick lock of it dangling over an eye. He was wearing a blue hospital gown, and I was thankful to see boxers peeking out from the bottom of it.
“Gary?”
“Have a seat!” He patted the small open spot on the single bed he was occupying. There’s no way I could sit there without our hips touching. This from the man who regularly treated me like I was something he’d accidentally stepped in.
“Have you found God?” I asked.
He visibly pondered the question. While he did that, I checked the tag on his IV drip. Cephalosporin and morphine. Mystery solved.
“I have looked for God, I truly have.”
The corner of my mouth tipped. I reveled in the moment. It had been a crappy couple days. Hell, it’d been a crappy decade. You can let that get you down, or you can find joy in the small moment, like this one. I actually had the upper hand over Gary.
“You are not wearing pants,” I said, both to test his awareness and to divert a possible sermon.
“Pants.” He pronounced the word as if he was tasting it. “Pants.”
“When do you get out?”
“Groundhog’s Day?” he asked, giggling. It was a deep, cheerful sound, but he covered his mouth like a schoolgirl while he did it. “But only if we have six more weeks of winter.”
I pulled up a chair. Gary Wohnt, high and pantsless. This was going to be more fun than a room full of nuns with Tourette’s, to borrow one of Mrs. Berns’s favorite sayings. “What happened to you, anyhow? Who shot you?”
He glanced at his leg, surprised. He fought for focus, and for a moment he looked like Police Chief Wohnt. “White male, twenty-five to thirty, wearing a cap yanked down low. I pulled him over for speeding and driving without a license plate. I approached, he shot.”
My heart clutched. I realized how lucky Gary was that it hadn’t been worse. “What kind of car?”
He turned toward me. “Is that your business?”
Dangit! Had the morphine just worn off? I flicked the IV tube with my finger in case there was blockage. “I want to help.”
“You can help by getting me some water.” He pointed at the table just out of his reach.
I stood and poured him a glass. When I turned, I caught him staring at my butt as though it held the secret of the Sphinx. I cleared my throat.
“Miranda Rayn James! You came to visit me.” He accepted the water, the glassy look back in his eyes. “So many dead bodies you could be finding, and instead you’re here with me.” He giggled again. There was something infectious about it.
“Well, I gotta keep it lively,” I said, winking.
“Yes, you do.” He knit his brows together. “Say, can you help me?”
“You want me to reach something else for you?”
“I want you to gather information on the guys who are bringing the drugs. The gang-bangers. Can you do that for me without getting into trouble?”
“Was Maurice a gang-banger?” I asked, pulling my chair up close.
“Dunno.” He sat back. “Do you know where the remote is?”
“Gary.” I put my hand on his arm. He studied it. “Was Maurice part of a gang from Chicago that is bringing drugs into this area?”
“Dunno. But I do know the gang showed up the same time as the OxyContin patches. Don’t know where the base is. We just know it’s near town.”
“Battle Lake?”
He smiled dreamily. “Battle Lake.”
“What did Maurice die of?”
“Death.” His smile widened. “Have I ever told you how beautiful you are?”
My skin flushed from head to toe. I definitely had not foreseen this conversational turn.
“Kiss me. Kiss me now.”
I stood so fast that I knocked over my chair. This couldn’t only be the morphine talking. He must also be having an allergic reaction to the antibiotics.
“Um, I should be going.”
“Pretty, pretty, pretty. I think you’re as pretty as a peach.” He held his finger to his mouth in a comically exaggerated “sssh.” “Don’t tell Kennie,” he said, in a drunk man’s whisper.
The fun was definitely over. This was not at all what I had planned. “How about we don’t tell anyone? In fact, how about we forget that I even stopped by?”
I was in such a hurry to escape that I dropped a Nut Goodie. I would have gone back for it, except Gary was singing “Unforgettable.” I stress ate the remaining two Goodies before I reached my car.
Sixteen
I’d forgotten the Maurice Jackson print-out at the library, so I had to stop by there on my way home. Once inside the toasty building, the encounter with Gary fading to an unpleasant memory, I decided I might as well finish my research as long as I was there. I flicked on the track of lights over the front desk, turned on the computer so I could cross-reference as needed, sharpened one of the stubby library pencils, and grabbed two manila folders. I labeled one “Operation Offerdahl” in honor of the case I was actually getting paid to research. I tossed around a couple names for the second folder before settling on “Cold Case.” It was dark humor, to be sure, but the name had less to do with the way Maurice had died than the fact that I had few leads and no reason to look for more. I had no tangible stake in finding out who Maurice really was and what had happened to him, no incentive other than curiosity and a feeling like I owed him something.
Once my meager paperwork was organized, I made my first call, to a Maurice Aames Jackson at 1355 West Greenleaf Avenue in Chicago, Illinois. There was no answer. I put a chicken scratch next to his name, shorthand for “tried once.”
The next name on my list was Maurice Carver Jackson, living at 1640 North Orchard Street. He picked up on the second ring. He sounded old, and I hadn’t rehearsed what I was going to say.
“Hello, sir! I’m calling from the Chicago Public Library, and someone has returned a library card with the name of Maurice Jackson. Have you by chance lost your library card?”
“Chicago Public Library?”
“Yessir.”
“Then why does my caller ID say ‘Battle Lake Public Library?’”
Shit. He was going to make detective before me. “All our library calls are routed through one central location.”
“Izzat so? I suppose you have a bridge you want me to buy, one that just so happens to span the Dumbass River?”
I was torn between the urge to hang up and the desire to ask him if he was single so I could set him up with Mrs. Berns. “I’m sorry. I
am calling from the Battle Lake Public Library. It’s in Minnesota. I really did find a Chicago Public Library card with the name of Maurice Jackson on it, and I’m trying to track him down.”
“It ain’t mine, but can I offer you some advice?”
That’s a question that rarely deserves a yes. “Sure.”
“Tell the truth.” Click.
He had a point. Then again, I had so few natural skills—lying being toward the top of the list—that it seemed counterintuitive to limit myself arbitrarily. I tried three more numbers. Two were home, both dead ends. It was a bit demoralizing, particularly since I didn’t even know how old the library card was. Maurice Jackson could have moved out of Chicago months ago. I decided to take a break from calling numbers to do the work I was actually being paid for. Going on Curtis’s tip that Eric Offerdahl had been seen around Swederland and specifically in the vicinity of the new brewery, I dialed their number.
“O’Callaghan’s.” The voice was female and perky.
“Hi. Is the brewery open for tours?”
“Of course! In the winter, we have tours at the top of every hour Tuesdays and Saturdays from noon to eight.”
“Do I need a reservation?”
“Not this time of year.”
“Sounds good. Hey,” I said, hoping I sounded like I just thought of it, “is Eric Offerdahl working this Tuesday?”
“I’m sorry. We can’t give out employee information.”
Was it my imagination, or had her voice gone frosty? “I don’t need any personal info. I’m just wondering if Eric is working there. I haven’t seen him in a while. It’d be great to catch up.”
“I’m afraid I can’t help you with that. Is there anything else I can do for you?”
I recognized a brush-off when I heard it. “No, thank you. I appreciate your time.”
“O’Callaghan’s thanks you for your interest! We hope to see you soon.”
That they will, I thought, as I hung up the phone. Probably this Tuesday, in fact. I was about to shut down the computer when the front door opened. Hadn’t I locked it?
“Sorry,” I said. “We’re not open on Sundays.”
The track of lights above me was illuminated, but I hadn’t bothered to turn on the lights over the front door. The person was definitely a male, his head leaning so far down that the top of his cap was facing me.
“Sir? We’re not open. You can come back tomorrow at ten.”
He stepped into the light at the same time he lifted his head. It was Ray, the mewling, tweaking freak Maurice had saved me from.
Seventeen
Every cell in my body lifted its skirts and ran for high ground. I stepped back involuntarily, one hand fumbling for the phone and the other scrabbling inside my desk for something substantial to whack Ray with. Why had I left the stun gun in my car?
He kept moving toward me, and the closer he came, the clearer the tattoo on his neck grew. The barbed tail of a manta ray licked at his ear, leading to a widening of the body, most of which was tucked into the collar of his thick winter jacket. Stingray. I wondered if the tattoo had given him his name, or vice versa. I also wondered where he’d gotten the warm winter coat and how the helicopter I’d been stupid enough not to lock the door.
“Stop. I have a gun. And I’ve pushed the alarm.”
“Shit, this is a library. What you got that anyone wants to steal?” He stopped, though, and glanced behind him, his hands shoved deep into his pockets.
“That’s close enough. Now, you have exactly two minutes to get out of here before the cops arrive.”
“Two minutes all I need.”
Two minutes?!? Why couldn’t I have said thirty seconds? Our eyes were locked. His pupils were far less jittery than the night we’d met. He also wasn’t making that trapped baby animal noise. In fact, he appeared entirely calm. Still, when he began to draw one hand slowly out of his pocket, I instinctively raised my stapler.
He saw it and started laughing wheezily. “Stop! Don’t collate me.” He held up his empty hands in mock horror.
“That’s a pretty odd verb choice,” I said, still gripping the stapler.
He dropped his hands and shrugged. “I used to work in a copy shop. I got what, a buck thirty seconds now? Here’s the deal. I heard there was a chick detective in town and that I could find her at the library. I got a letter I was supposed to hand over to the police if anything happened to Mo.”
“Mo?”
“Maurice. My friend who was ganked. They found his body in the lake yesterday.”
“Wait,” I said, dropping the stapler by my side, “you didn’t kill him?”
Ray scrunched up his face. “What’s wrong with you, woman? We don’t kill our own. So you want the damn letter or not?”
“I thought you were supposed to give it to the police.”
“I look like I get along with the police?”
Point taken. “Say, speaking of police, I don’t suppose you happened to shoot an officer of the law last night?”
His eyes narrowed dangerously. “I ask you one more time: You want the letter or not?”
I leaned over the desk and held out my hand. He pulled a crumpled sheet of paper from his coat pocket and stepped forward as if he was going to drop it into my hand. At the last second, our hands so close I could feel his body heat, he balled up the paper and tossed it over my head.
“Sorry.” His eyes had gone as flat as a doll’s. “It must’ve slipped.”
He raised an eyebrow and started slowly walking backward to the door. My heart thudded a sick beat against my ribs. I held eye contact. In this brief interaction, I’d made the dangerous mistake of thinking he might be human since he’d done a favor for a friend. He was reminding me what he really was and who held the power in this room.
I let him walk out, neither of us blinking or dropping our gazes. When the door closed behind him, I snapped off the overhead lights and simultaneously flipped on the lights outside the door. The contrast made me feel a tiny bit safer. I watched him slip into a rusty white sedan. When Ray was out of sight, I darted out from behind the desk and locked the door, leaving on the outside lights. Then I scurried back to my desk and fumbled in the drawers until I located a penlight I’d received for free when I’d opened a checking account at Farmers and Merchants County Bank. I flicked it on and was pleased to see that the light was narrow but bright. I quickly located the crumpled paper and then tucked myself behind the tall counter where I could read the letter without anyone seeing me.
Eighteen
I smoothed the paper on the carpeted floor and shone the flashlight beam into the center of it. I discovered it was a grainy photocopy of a handwritten letter:
18 January 1865
Dear Loretta:
I wish I could write with better news. In Minnesota, they do not believe the messages I bring. I do not think I can stay here. I pack my bags to return home tomorrow. Should anything happen to me, look to the tunnel of justice.
With a heart that beats only for you,
Orpheus Jackson
I flipped the letter over. It was blank. I flipped it back and reread it. The letter raised more questions than it answered. Was the date accurate, and was Maurice Jackson a descendant of Orpheus’s? If so, who is the “they” and what were the “messages” referred to in the letter? And more importantly, what in the world did a hundred-and forty-year-old letter have to do with Maurice’s murder? I sighed and rubbed my temples. For all I knew, Ray and Hammer had killed Maurice and dreamed up this letter based on something he’d seen at the copy shop and were using it in a ridiculous attempt to throw the police off their scent.
I wish I’d had time to read the letter before Ray left so I could question him. Then again, I was happy that he was gone. I peeked over the top of the desk and pulled the phone toward me, bringing it down to ground le
vel. I dialed Jed’s number from memory.
One ring.
Two rings.
Three rings.
Click. “Hey, you! Thanks for calling me. You know it’s Jed, right? Well, I’m not here right now, so leave a message with the phone, and I’ll call you back when I get home.” Beep.
“Hey, it’s Mira. Hope you’re well. I’m calling to find out what you know about any recent drug or gang activity in the area.” To anyone else, that message might sound a little offensive; Jed didn’t operate on that level. “Give me a call back.”
I hung up and considered calling Johnny to ask him to walk me to my car. If I did that, though, where would it stop? I’d never be able to go anywhere on my own again. Besides, if Ray had wanted to hurt me, he would have. No way did he buy that I had a gun or an alarm. I just had to be alert from this moment forward.
But not stupid.
I called Gilbert Hullson and told him I’d be over in ten minutes to meet Jiffy and asked him to call the police if I wasn’t. I placed my skimpy research into the appropriate manila folders. Then I set the library door to lock automatically behind me and dashed to the car with such speed that my feet barely kissed the icy ground.
Funny. Running to my car, I’d wished for ol’ Z-Force, the stun gun, more than anything in the world. Now that I’d spent thirty minutes sitting across from Gilbert, who had Jiffy perched on one meaty thigh and a fishing scrapbook on the other, I was glad I didn’t have Z. I would have either zapped Gilbert to shut him up or myself to keep awake. He had struck me as odd during our first meeting in the hardware store, but I’d found myself warming to him by the end of the conversation.
Always trust your first impressions.
The tiny bungalow two miles north of town hadn’t been hard to find, and the neat yard with a shoveled path leading to the house gave no indication that Gilbert was a hoarder. The sheer mountainous concentration of stuff crowding the house’s interior was overwhelming. He’d carved a path inside the house mirroring the one outside, and it weaved through shoulder-high piles of food wrappers, fishing magazines, tackle, old life jackets, decoys, and more. It was as if someone had emptied a gigantic fishing boat into his house at the end of a trip, and it smelled like that trip had ended a decade or two ago.
