Stone Cold Dead

by Catherine Dilts

  “Your brother has a sadness that saps him of joy.”

  If Kendall was sad about anything, Morgan knew it was because he and Allie had not been able to have children. But that had not diminished his joy of living.

  “I’m afraid you don’t know my brother very well.”

  “It is my gift to know a person’s inmost emotions. I am an empath.” Piers narrowed his eyes and seemed to look through Morgan. “I can see that you have sustained a heavy blow.”

  Morgan supposed that was an easy call. She had just told Piers she was a widow. Unless news of her finding a body had already circulated around town.

  “Come by the shop,” he said. “I can realign your chakras.”

  Morgan watched Bernie return with relief.

  “Here’s your bread,” Bernie said.

  Piers stood, pressed his hands together, and bobbed a little bow. “Many thanks.”

  He took the loaf from Bernie and held it in a careful embrace. The brown bread was mottled with dark bumps.

  “I didn’t see that in the display case,” Morgan said.

  “It’s a special order,” Bernie said. “Extra high fiber whole grain and flax seed bread.”

  “My own recipe,” Piers said. “It’s impossible to find decent bread in Golden Springs. Even our little health food store doesn’t stock bread with adequate fiber.”

  “You’re a vegetarian, Piers,” Bernie said, resting one hand on her well-padded hip. “Everything you eat has fiber.”

  “It’s important to maintain a healthy colon,” he said.

  Bernie pressed her lips together, but her eyes betrayed repressed laughter.

  “I must open my shop,” Piers said. “Please add this purchase to my tab, Miss Belmont.”

  “It was nice meeting you.” Morgan extended her hand. “I hope we can chat another time.”

  Piers clutched the bread to his chest. “I never shake hands. As a healer, I could contaminate myself with negative energy, and pass it on to my clients.”

  Morgan was not sure how to react to being equated with a contaminant.

  Piers glanced toward the door as the bell tinkled. His jaw tightened.

  “I must go.”

  He passed Lucy as she entered the bakery. Apparently she was a source of contaminants, too. Piers went to great effort to step around her and the two children she had in tow. He avoided looking at Lucy, which was good, because Morgan thought Lucy had a rather nasty scowl on her face. Her expression softened to a smile as she turned to her children.

  “Pick out one pastry each,” Lucy told them, handing the girl a twenty, “and get Daddy a bear claw, and Mommy a cinnamon twist.” Lucy sat at the table. Her buckskin skirt hit her long legs mid-calf, and a plain beige sweater displayed her turquoise necklace nicely. “Good morning.”

  Bernie leaned forward on her chair. “Piers offered to realign Morgan’s chakra.” She giggled.

  “That has to be a record,” Lucy said.

  “That’s his profession,” Morgan said. “I’m sure he didn’t mean anything by it.”

  “Don’t be taken in by his good looks.” Lucy flipped her long, black braid over her shoulder. “So how are you doing, Morgan? After yesterday and all.”

  Bernie leaned forward. “I knew it. You’re the one who found the body, aren’t you?”

  News did travel fast.

  “Yes,” Morgan said with resignation. “And lost it.”

  Lucy saved Morgan yet another retelling by giving her own condensed version of Morgan’s story.

  “Wow,” Bernie said. “Instead of a cup of coffee, I should have offered you a shot of Jack Daniel’s.”

  “Mommy, we’re done.” A kindergarten-aged girl with Lucy’s long, straight hair stood by the table. A smaller boy with a dark, round face clutched the pastry bag with his fist.

  “Okay, honey.” Lucy stood. “Paul’s waiting in the truck,” Lucy told Bernie and Morgan, “so I can’t stay and visit, but I wanted to remind you both about the new running club Tuesday night. We’ll meet in downtown Granite Junction, run a five K,” Lucy pumped her arms, “then hang out at the pub.”

  “What’s a five K?” Bernie asked.

  “It’s only three point one miles,” Lucy said. “Paul’s walking with Kimmie and pushing Danny in the stroller.”

  “I can walk,” Danny declared. “I not a baby.”

  Kimmie rolled her eyes. “You have it easy, Danny. I have to walk and walk and walk.”

  “There’ll be other walkers,” Lucy said. “You don’t have to run. Come on, ladies. It’ll be fun.”

  “I’m not doing anything Tuesday night,” Morgan said.

  Bernie bit her lower lip.

  “Morgan, work on Bernie.”

  Lucy hustled her kids out the door. Morgan watched through the bakery window as she loaded Kimmie and Danny into the full rear passenger seat of a huge truck. Her husband sat in the driver’s seat, a serious expression creasing his face. A worn felt cowboy hat sat on his raven black hair. Even seated in a truck, Morgan could tell he was tall and broad-shouldered.

  Bernie set her elbow on the small table and rested her chin in the palm of her hand. “I made the mistake of telling Lucy I needed to start walking, and now she won’t leave me alone.”

  “I’m definitely a walker,” Morgan said, “not a runner. I need to get in shape, too. Maybe we should try it.”

  “I can’t possibly keep up with Lucy,” Bernie said, “but if you promise not to leave me behind, I might consider going.”

  “Leave you behind?” Morgan exclaimed. “I couldn’t run three miles to save my life.”

  Or someone else’s, she thought.

  Cleaning the barn was more time-consuming and strenuous than Morgan expected, even with Del doing the lion’s share of the labor. The barn hadn’t received proper attention in the weeks before Kendall and Allie left, Del assured her. It would be easier to clean from now on.

  Morgan hoped he was right. When the alarm woke her Monday morning, she groaned as every overworked muscle made its presence known. Soaking in a tub full of Epsom salts and hot water would have been the preferred method to begin the day. Instead, she prepared to spend her time in the shop, hoping she’d learn something that would help her make the right decision about the rock shop’s future.

  Her business clothes from her days as an executive administrative assistant for a Sioux Falls engineering firm hardly seemed appropriate. She didn’t have the western fashions so many folks in Golden Springs seemed to favor. She pulled on a pair of comfortable blue jeans and a Washington Warriors sweatshirt.

  After starting a pot of coffee, Morgan unlocked the door connecting the living quarters to the shop. Whether she kept or sold the place, it needed a cleaning. The office seemed a good place to start. She opened the door and hit the light switch.

  Her aching shoulders slumped.

  Stacks of dust-coated papers tottered in disorderly piles on every horizontal surface. Morgan pulled open the top drawer of the ancient metal filing cabinet. The drawer was empty. Everything that should have been filed was strewn around the small office, including on top of the cabinet.

  Kendall had told her there was a computer, but she couldn’t reach it. Her brother never emailed. Was it because the computer was broken, Morgan wondered, or had he abandoned it because he couldn’t find it in the clutter?

  Deciding that the place to begin was organizing the piles of papers, Morgan pulled open the middle filing cabinet drawer. No file folders. But there was a stack of papers. They must have been important if Kendall and Allie had actually put them inside the cabinet. Morgan thumbed through vaguely legal-looking documents. They had something to do with zoning. She would have to wait to read them until she had the top of the desk cleared. So far, Morgan had only managed to make a bigger mess and let her coffee go cold.

  She took a break, nuked the coffee, and toasted a slice of Bernie’s bread.

  As she sipped coffee in a stoneware mug, she wondered when her employees
would make it in. She didn’t want to barge in and establish a bunch of rules, but the place was in serious need of organizing. A work schedule had to go on the list.

  Morgan finished her toast and grabbed a clipboard and pen. She started with the office.

  “File folders,” she said aloud, scribbling on the pad of paper. “File folder labels.”

  A trip to an office supply store went on her agenda, but she couldn’t leave the shop unattended. She would have to wait for one of her employees to arrive, and hope that would be today. In the meantime, she could take a closer look at the rock shop.

  She flipped on the shop lights, a series of fluorescent lights in rectangular metal casings suspended from the low ceiling on short chains. She shook her head slowly.

  “Kendall, how have you been spending your time?” Morgan placed her hands on her hips and released a tired sigh.

  Now that she could really examine the shop with no distractions, it was apparent that it was in worse condition than the barn. Someone had planned to do spring cleaning once upon a time, if the broom, dustpan, mop, and liquid cleaners hidden away in a small utility closet were any indication.

  Morgan hunted down a step stool. She found the rusty relic behind a cabinet crammed with dinosaur bones, plaster castings of footprints, and fossilized dinosaur excrement with the unlikely name “coprolite.”

  She settled the step stool in front of one of the large windows. Three shelves nested flush to the window frame. The bottom shelf extended from the windowsill. The next two divided the window in thirds. Morgan emptied the shelves, piling the rocks and curios on the display table across the aisle. Each item had a price-tag sticker or tag on a string, handwritten.

  She tackled the shelves, armed with a bucket of warm sudsy water. They reluctantly relinquished grime to her scrub brush. The aching in her muscles eased as she worked, but every movement reminded her that she was out of shape.

  Next, she attacked the filmy window inside and out with a spray bottle of glass cleaner and wadded up newspapers. The transformation was startling. The weak winter sun shone through the window, making the dingy little shop seem almost cheerful.

  Finally, she dusted the rocks. Each was a marvel, some featureless, some glittering with crystals, others streaked with surprisingly vibrant colors. Morgan resisted the impulse to study the rocks as she placed them back on the clean shelves.

  The bottom shelf had held rusty farm implements. A long-handled nipper for trimming horses’ hooves, well-worn pliers, a hammer with a splintered wooden handle, assorted bits of wire, nuts and bolts, and items Morgan could not identify.

  It would be a shame to place the dirty items back on her clean shelves. There had to be rust remover in the shop.

  Morgan headed for the utility closet when the cowbell clanged.

  “Mornin’!” Del called.

  “I wondered when someone would get here,” Morgan said. “Or if. I couldn’t find a work schedule.”

  Del clomped across the pine floor in his cowboy boots. “It’s pretty much verbal,” he said. “Cindy works Tuesday and Thursday afternoons, and Friday mornings, except when her kids are sick or have some event planned. I’m around most of the time, but Kendall pays me for full days Monday, Wednesday, and Saturday. My trailer is just up above the shop.” He pointed vaguely northeast. “So when things are slow at my place, I drop by to help out.”

  “I’ll need to write down the schedule.” Morgan grabbed her shopping list and jotted down “dry erase board.”

  “Sure,” Del said. “Kendall kept me and Cindy on a pretty loose rein. We can adjust if you need to switch things around some.”

  “It’s not that,” Morgan said. “I didn’t know this morning whether anyone was coming in, or if I’d be able to leave the shop to run errands.”

  Del stepped behind the counter and picked up the glass carafe from the coffeemaker. “In cases like that, you just use the be-back-in sign.”

  “The what?”

  Del walked to the front door, carrying the empty carafe. “This.” He flipped around a sign with a clock face. “Set the hands to when you’ll be back.”

  “Oh.”

  “And I’ll be back after I get some water.” Del carried the carafe into the one-seater restroom.

  Morgan slouched on the aspen bench in front of the checkout counter. Del strolled back, water sloshing in the carafe, and busied himself preparing a pot of coffee.

  Her job in Sioux Falls had required punctuality. Often, her phone was ringing before she hung up her coat in the morning. Running the rock shop was going to take some adjusting.

  Switching mental gears, she asked, “Do we have any rust cleaner?”

  “Why do you want to clean rust?” Del asked, a smile quirking his mustache up on one side.

  “You know what I mean,” Morgan said. “Rust remover.”

  The coffeemaker gurgled and sputtered.

  “Maybe out in the barn? What do you need it for?”

  Morgan pushed herself up off the bench and walked to the display table. She brought back the hoof nippers.

  Del seemed to notice the clean window for the first time. “You’ve been busy.”

  “And there’s so much more to do,” Morgan said. “I want to clean up this stuff before I put it back on the shelf.”

  “And ruin the resale value?” Del appeared genuinely alarmed.

  She turned the nippers in her hand. The blades were worn to rounded nubs. “They’re useless.”

  “That’s the way our customers want them.” Del took the nippers from Morgan’s hand and placed them back on the shelf. “When somebody cleans out their barn or workshed, and brings us a pile of rusty old tools, it’s like finding a treasure chest.”

  “People buy this stuff?”

  “Sure. They decorate their houses or vacation cabins. Old West charm, I guess.”

  Morgan sat on the bench as Del poured coffee into a chipped ceramic mug.

  “There can’t be much money in selling other people’s trash,” Morgan said. “And who buys rocks and bones?”

  “You’d be surprised.” Del slurped the steaming coffee. He pulled a blue and white bandana from the back pocket of his jeans and pressed it against his mustache.

  “Kendall and Allie actually made a living at this?” Morgan waved a hand in the air.

  Del shrugged. “I never pry into my bosses’ financial situation, as long as I get paid.”

  Morgan and Kendall had inherited the rock shop and the seventy-five acres it sat on from their great-uncle Caleb. Morgan had been happy to let Kendall manage the property back when she had a life of her own in Sioux Falls. If Kendall had tried to take out a loan against the land, he would have needed her signature. He had never asked.

  “I’ve got a lot to do.” Cleaning the window had only made the rest of the shop more dismal in comparison. Morgan sighed. “I’d better get back to work.”

  Del set his mug on the counter. “I’m not opposed to cleaning. Just so long as we don’t damage the merchandise in the process.”

  Morgan stood. “Whatever the future holds for the Rock of Ages, we’ve got to clean this place up.”

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Washing the rest of the windows and shelves took all morning.

  “We can tackle the display case next,” Morgan said. “You can’t even see what’s inside.”

  She opened the cash register drawer and fished out the display case key. The lock opened, but the sliding glass door hadn’t been budged in a while. Del helped Morgan work it open.

  They gently removed dozens of petrified bone and eggshell fragments, and a glorious mound of dinosaur dung. Coprolite, Morgan reminded herself. Each had a price attached. Some of the dinosaur dung was more expensive than dinosaur teeth.

  Morgan grabbed what looked like a large horn carved out of rock. It was heavier than she expected. The two-foot object, tapering on one end to a point, nearly slipped from her hands.

  Del’s mouth fell open. He jumped forward and sna
tched the horn from Morgan, cradling it against his chest.

  “This is the showpiece of the Rock of Ages.” Del rested it gently on top of the display case. “Possibly the most expensive fossil in the entire shop.”

  “Not the T. Rex skull?”

  “That’s a replica.”

  “I don’t see a price tag.” Morgan peered at the object from all angles.

  “Our better fossils have their pertinent info typed up on cards.” Del poked around inside the display case. “Here it is.”

  He handed the yellowed file card to Morgan.

  “‘Species: Triceratops horridus,’” she read. “‘This Triceratops brow horn is from the Cretaceous Period, approximately 70–66 million years ago.’ Oh, no. You have to be kidding me.” Morgan squinted as she read the price. “Would someone really pay over three thousand dollars for this?”

  “No one has yet,” Del said, “but that is a fair price.”

  Morgan turned her attention back to the display case. She and Del had not accomplished much but stirring up dust. She sneezed three times in rapid succession.

  “I’m going to get clean water,” she sniffled.

  While Morgan filled the bucket with clean water and soap, the cowbell above the door clanged. The college-aged man who entered seemed to know exactly what he wanted. He browsed the shelves and specimen tables quickly, stopping at a coprolite display.

  “My roommate’s turning twenty-one,” he said, turning the coprolite over in his hands. “This will make the best gag gift.”

  Del winced. “Gag gift? That’s authentic coprolite. A scientific treasure.” Del took his dinosaur dung seriously.

  “Oh, he’ll treasure it,” the young man said. “He’s a geology major.”

  Del bagged the coprolite and accepted the young man’s twenty.

  “As long as it’s going to a good home,” Del said.

  “I had a hard time finding your shop.” The young man accepted his change from Del. “You guys need a sign.”

  “We have a sign,” Del said. “The big green dinosaur. Can’t miss it.”

  “No, I mean downtown. At the turnoff.”