Hot on the Trail Mix

by P. D. Workman

  “Of course we’ll look for her. We’ll keep chasing down the leads that we have. But if she’s like your Adrienne and doesn’t have a phone, or has one but only turns it on in case of an emergency, then we can’t use that to track her. And if she has no fixed address and lives out in the bush somewhere, there are too many square miles of land for us to search. Others in the community are probably in touch with her now and then and, hopefully, word will get back to her that we’re looking for her. But whether she’ll want to contact us or not is another story.”

  “Yeah.”

  “She’ll know that either she’s in trouble for something, or we have bad news for her. There isn’t really any other reason that we would be trying to reach her. If she doesn’t want to hear the bad news… she just quietly moves away and never comes back again.”

  “But wouldn’t it be better to know? Wouldn’t you rather know? And especially if she thinks that he’s just taken off on her. Wouldn’t it be better to know that something has happened to him than that he just abandoned her?”

  “For you, maybe. Not everyone’s brain works the same way. Some people would rather not know and be able to make up their own reasons and excuses, and leave open the possibility that one day, maybe he’ll return.”

  “But he won’t.”

  “You and I know that, but if you didn’t know he was dead, you could always believe that he might come back someday.”

  Erin had lived a lot of years fantasizing about her parents returning, even though she had known they were dead. It was sometimes easier to deal with a fantasy world than the stark reality.

  “There aren’t any homeless encampments? Tent cities? Where everyone bands together so that they are more protected?”

  “Not out here. People here are choosing to live somewhere isolated. If they want to live in a large homeless community of some kind, they can find their way to the city. Walk, hitch-hike, get arrested, there are plenty of ways to get to the city, if that’s what they want to do.”

  Erin wasn’t sure what Willie had told Terry about his interactions with Rip Ryder, so she asked her next question carefully.

  “Do you think Rip got into some kind of argument? About land he was squatting on or something someone thought he had stolen or taken that wasn’t his?”

  “He clearly upset someone pretty significantly.”

  “You don’t think it could have been an accident?”

  “It wasn’t an accident, Erin. You can put that out of your head.”

  “There’s no chance?”

  He shook his head. “No.”

  “Has the medical examiner made a determination?”

  “Not yet, but I can tell you that it wasn’t an accident. After seeing the scene, no. It wasn’t an accidental death.”

  “Sometimes an accident can look like homicide.”

  He raised his brows. “You’re telling me?”

  “I just meant… I know you’re the professional, but sometimes… you bring your own biases to the scene. You think there is no way someone could have done this to themselves, either intentionally or accidentally, so you see the scene through that lens.”

  “That can happen,” he agreed. “But you’re going to have to trust me on this one.”

  Erin went into the kitchen to get herself a drink. She sipped the cold water from the fridge dispenser. She was teetering between wanting to know more and being afraid that it would be too much for her and give her nightmares or flashbacks. Things were improving and she didn’t want to set herself back to where she had been a few months back.

  She returned to the living room and set her glass on the coffee table. She moved around the room, tidying up and thinking.

  “Can you tell me a bit more?” she asked finally. “Was it… was the murder weapon at the scene?”

  “Yes.”

  “And… was he shot?” Erin vaguely remembered Vic saying something about the state of the skull. She didn’t think it was a gunshot.

  “No.” Terry looked at her. “You know there isn’t very much I can tell you. You can read what’s in the paper.”

  “If it’s in the paper, then you can tell me. Was he shot?”

  “No. He wasn’t.”

  Erin thought about that. She had seen the brutality of stabbings and bludgeoning. She didn’t really want to picture either one. But if she just followed the idea to its conclusion… if it wasn’t a gunshot, then it was probably a close-quarters killing. Hand to hand. Within reach of each other. If it was something less violent, like poison, Terry probably wouldn’t be as sure about it not being an accident. They wouldn’t have toxicology reports back yet. An allergic reaction could be an accident.

  If the murder weapon was at the scene, then it was something obvious.

  Erin tidied away some papers that she had left scattered when she was reading through Clementine’s papers the previous day. She liked to have everything put neatly away. If she left papers out, they might get damaged or lost, and she wouldn’t be able to put her hands on them when she needed them.

  Eventually, she sat down on the couch next to Terry. He looked away from the TV and at her to see if she wanted to talk, his hand raising the remote.

  Erin shook her head and bent over to take her planner out of her purse. She had a sip of her cold water and put her planner across her knees to look at the week ahead and what was on her task list.

  “You okay?” Terry asked.

  Erin nodded. She turned to her project pages to see what she and Charley and Vic had last discussed about themes, promos, and upcoming events. She had almost forgotten about the next book club meeting at the book store across the street from Auntie Clem’s. Naomi loved it when they made her a themed treat for the book club meeting. Erin wasn’t required to, and sometimes she just sent over a few bites of whatever they had in the display case and freezer. But she liked it when she could match up with a theme. She made a note on her task list.

  “I’m really impressed with how you’ve taken to the planner,” Terry commented. “I didn’t think we were ever going to wean you off your random bits of paper.”

  Erin dropped her gaze to her purse. “It makes it so much easier to find things and keep it all tidy.”

  He nodded. “Of course, if we could get you into the digital world, you could have it all on your phone and you wouldn’t need that bulky book.”

  Erin gripped her planner tightly. They would have to pry it from her cold dead hands.

  Terry laughed. “Nobody is going to take your book away from you. I’m just glad it’s working out for you. Ingrained habits are hard to change.”

  Erin smoothed the corner of the page she was reviewing. “We’ll see how it goes when my life is really disrupted by something. That’s the real test.”

  He made a noise of agreement. “Do you drop it and go back to random papers or neglect your lists altogether? Or do you use it to pull yourself through the crisis?”

  “Yeah. I want to say that I’ll use the planner and keep up my good habits, but I know how disrupting stress can be. Who knows how I’ll react.”

  “What are you working on now?”

  Erin wrote a few headings on a set of fresh, blank pages. “Uh… nothing… just some planning…”

  His eyes were on the TV, and he didn’t persist. He was just being polite. It didn’t really matter what she was working on. He was making conversation.

  Erin wrote down what she knew or had deduced about the murder. She started a column of names, marking them as witnesses, suspects, or persons of interest. She wrote down what she could think of as clues that might point in a particular direction. Of course, she should get the details such as how long Rip had been dead and what the medical examiner had ruled about the cause of death.

  She started a list of questions she would ask if it were her investigation. She doodled in the corners of the page, thinking about it, wondering if she knew more than she had noted. Motives. What she knew about Rip’s background, which was next to nothing.
Was he a native Tennessean? Or had he brought his family there for some reason? Did he have friends and relatives—or enemies—in the area?

  Adrienne said that he was out drinking or gambling, so Erin assumed those were known vices. Willie had fought with him because he figured he could get possession of Willie’s property by squatting on it. Willie said they had argued more than once, and Willie had managed to send him on his way, but who knew where he had gone. They might have crossed paths again.

  Erin shook her head slowly. She was not going to fall into the trap of suspecting Willie. No matter what anyone said, Erin didn’t believe that he could have had anything to do with Rip’s murder.

  Chapter 20

  “What’s all this?” Mary Lou inquired, looking at the new sign on the display case. Her brows came down, and she shook her head. Her short gray hair stayed perfectly coiffed. She smoothed her tunic shirt over her hips. “Families in need? We already take care of the families in Bald Eagle Falls. You know we had that big collection for needy children at Christmas. And there are other programs in place. There’s a hot lunch program at the school for anyone who needs it.”

  “There may be people who can’t access that. And what if the family needs more than children’s lunches? What about breakfast and dinner? What about the adults? And weekends and holidays?”

  “Bald Eagle families are proud and self-sufficient. You don’t want to start giving handouts, people will just come to expect it and get lazy. We don’t want to end up with the same problems as they have in the cities.”

  “Making sure people have enough to eat isn’t spoiling them. I just think that we should take care of our own first. I have been taking my extra baking into the city for the shelters or soup kitchens, but if people here in Bald Eagle Falls need it, I would rather get it to them first.”

  “No one is starving in Bald Eagle Falls.”

  Erin thought about Adrienne’s fussy baby. How her cheeks were narrow instead of round and fat. The children had been happy to get one meal. Had that been from the hot lunch program at school? What was Adrienne eating? She was so thin.

  Nobody was hungry in Bald Eagle Falls?

  “I have food for people who need it,” Erin said. She nodded toward the sign. “Nobody has to show ID or prove their income level, and I won’t be sharing their names with anyone else. If they need food, they can come to me and I will make sure they get what they need.”

  “That’s very generous. But I’m not sure it is well-advised. People need to work for their bread. That’s what God said to Adam in the Garden of Eden. By the sweat of your brow. That’s how he intended things to be in this world.”

  “So if I feed hungry people, I’m breaking God’s law?”

  Mary Lou waffled. “I would not say that. But the people who choose not to work, who just take and take, they are not following God’s plan for mankind.”

  Erin avoided rolling her eyes. “I thought that Jesus was the one who said feed the hungry and love thy neighbor and all of that.”

  “We can still love our neighbor without making them dependent on us. We are supposed to judge wisely, not to just fall for every sob story people give us.”

  “I don’t think anyone is going to ask for free food if they don’t need it pretty badly. Like you said, people in Bald Eagle Falls are proud and independent. But if they are in a hard spot and can’t feed their families, I think someone should be willing to help.”

  Mary Lou gave a shrug and spread her hands apart dramatically. “Of course it is up to you. I would just think that you might ask some of us who have been in Bald Eagle Falls for generations what we think about it before rushing in and trying to change the social order all by yourself.”

  Ignoring the sign, she peered into the display case and pointed out the items she wanted.

  “How is Josh?” Erin asked, as she began to put Mary Lou’s purchases into bags.

  “Well, he’s eating, I’ll say that for him. He’s regained the weight that he lost when he was being held captive. Most of it, anyway. I wonder whether he’s going to stop or if he’s just going to keep eating! But he’s a teenage boy, and you know what their metabolisms are like. They can eat just about anything.”

  “I’m glad he’s getting healthy again. And how about his… outlook? Is he feeling safe? Comfortable with going back out into the world and carrying on with his life?”

  Mary Lou didn’t say anything. Erin passed the bags over to Bella, who was running the till. Bella quickly entered everything and rang up the total.

  “Trust you to ask that question,” Mary Lou said, giving a nod of understanding. “I think… that will take longer. He’s going to take the rest of the semester off of school. Not what I would have recommended, but he’s nearly an adult and I can’t make all of his decisions. I could insist that he stay enrolled, but he wouldn’t go, and then he would fail. I’m hoping that he’ll get bored and feel like he can go back out into the world where it is safe.” She looked at Erin. “Because it is safe. Nothing like that is ever going to happen to him again.”

  “No,” Erin agreed. “That would be really unlikely. But I can understand him feeling afraid.”

  “Certainly. But like the rest of us when we face opposition… he will need to pick himself up, dust himself off, and move forward.”

  Erin hoped that he could. She made a mental note to visit Joshua soon. She couldn’t write it down in her planner right away, so she would have to remember to do it once she was able.

  Chapter 21

  When Erin got home, she found Vic and Terry in the yard talking. From their body language, it wasn’t a casual conversation. She hung back, unsure what to say or do, listening to find out what was going on. The smell of barbecue hung in the air, one of her neighbors obviously cooking.

  “You can’t convict someone based on what family they come from,” Vic snapped.

  “No one is convicting you of anything. But I would be remiss if I didn’t talk to you, considering the fact that you come from the Jackson clan.”

  “I’m not part of the Jackson clan. You know I don’t have anything to do with them anymore. I can’t help the fact that I was born into the family. I never worked for the clan. I left home. You’ve seen my family, you know I’m not welcome there.”

  “Things change. People change their minds. I don’t know if you have reconciled with your family or have contact with anyone else in the clan. You were corresponding with Theresa without anyone knowing about it.”

  “That wasn’t because she was clan. It was because we had a previous relationship. It wasn’t anything to do with criminal enterprises.”

  “But you can’t say that you haven’t had contact with anyone in the clan. And I don’t know how many other people you might have personal relationships with. That’s why I would like to talk about it. Go through the details. Make sure there are no connections.”

  “This wasn’t a clan killing.”

  “It could have been. Ryder may have stepped on some toes. He may have been trying to horn in on someone’s business, the same way he was trying to push his way onto claims that were not his. People don’t always realize when they are in dangerous territory. If he was trying to make a buck selling drugs or doing something else that the clan felt was interfering with their business…”

  “Then you’ll have to talk to someone in the clan about that,” Vic said icily. “I wouldn’t know anything about it, because I’m not in the clan.”

  “You’re refusing an interview?”

  “Yes, I am. And Willie should have too. I don’t know what made him go ahead with it.”

  Terry shook his head, his expression darkening at Willie’s name. “Willie might not have killed him for the Dixon clan, but I can tell you, there are other reasons to suspect that he is still doing work for the clan. He isn’t as pure and innocent as you think.”

  “You don’t know what I think,” Vic snapped. “That’s none of your business. Willie and I found the body, that’s the only in
volvement we had in it. I didn’t kill him. Willie didn’t kill him. We didn’t have business dealings with him. We don’t have any business dealings with either of the clans. Do you think that we could be together if either of us was still part of our clans?”

  “People have been known to defect.”

  “Oh, so now I’m a traitor? Is that it? I didn’t like the Jackson clan and I wanted to date Willie, so I decided to join the Dixon clan instead? That way, we wouldn’t have any trouble with clashing clans.”

  “I didn’t say that.” Terry sighed and rubbed the bridge of his nose. “Look, Vic, I didn’t come over here for a confrontation. I wasn’t trying to start a fight. I was just hoping that the two of us could talk things through like two adults so that I could come to a conclusion about your involvement. So that I could go back to the sheriff and say that I was pretty sure you weren’t involved in any way.”

  “Pretty sure. Well, thanks for that.”

  “I’m not sure how I’m supposed to get to more than pretty sure. Do you have an alibi for the period of time in which Ryder was killed?”

  “Which is?”

  “One to two weeks before you found the body.”

  Vic stared at him. “How could I give you an alibi for a full week? Unless I was in a coma for that entire time, I don’t know how I’m supposed to prove that I never went out to that cave and killed Ryder.”

  “That’s exactly my point. That’s why I could never be one hundred percent sure that you could not have killed him. But I can be pretty sure. If you can convince me.”

  Vic crossed her arms over her chest. “I don’t have to convince you.”

  “No, you don’t. But it complicates my investigation if you won’t. I don’t want to have to spend my time chasing down rabbit trails instead of the actual killer.”

  “Then lay off of me. Because you already have a pretty good idea I didn’t have anything to do with it.”

  “Now you’re saying pretty good.”

  Vic glared and didn’t say anything.