“Maybe you should get yourself some of your own mud boots first.”
“Not a bad idea.”
She nodded and pursed her lips as she looked around the small space, this time with a deeper curiosity. She was looking for something.
“What?” I asked.
Her wandering eyes stopped on me. “Nothing, just getting a feel. I like to see what people do with their places around them. It’s a curious thing, you know, how people decorate places. Tells you—well, me, tells me a lot.”
“All I’m doing right now is straightening up and filing. It’s a losing battle, so far.”
“See, that’s exactly what I mean. Are you filing, say like a person who tells other people the best ways to file things, or are you a willy-nilly sort of girl who doesn’t, in fact, tell other people how to file things at all? Because, I gotta tell you, that was one of the worst lies I’ve ever heard.” She made a quick, incredulous noise that was peppered with a little anger. “And I hear more than my fair share of lies.”
The gun was holstered at her waist and I was suddenly surprised that she didn’t look like a cartoon character. My mom had a gun but she never wore it on her hip; usually it was in a holster at her ankle, well hidden by her jeans. The old hat on Viola’s head might have its own stories to tell, but even that didn’t seem inauthentic. She was real, three-dimensional, and not just in my fictional frame of mind. I wouldn’t say I felt threatened by her. I didn’t sense that she was about to draw and fire if I didn’t tell her the truth. I did sense that she was a person I wanted on my side though.
“I found a bottle of whiskey in a bottom drawer. Can I interest you in a drink over some conversation?” It worked in the Ozarks; perhaps it was a universal way to begin a friendship.
“Yes ma’am. Would be impolite to turn down such an offer. You can save the chicken soup for later.”
I cleared off two chairs and grabbed two shot glasses and the bottle. I placed them on the desk that now held only one of the typewriters. I’d moved one to the other desk. The motions of hospitality gave me time to work on formulating a story, something I could tell Viola that would sound closer to the truth than my earlier lies.
And, I came up with nothing.
“Any special toasts around here?” I poured the amber liquid into the two shot glasses. There was no date on the dusty bottle and I’d never heard of the brand, but the smell that wafted up to my nostrils left me confident and hopeful, if trying hard not to cough. I watched Viola as I finished pouring; her eyes told me she enjoyed whiskey.
She took the glass I handed her. “Today, we’re going to toast to truth. It sets you free, you know.”
“I used to think that.” I lifted my shot glass and we clinked.
The whiskey burned going down, but landed softly. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d had a shot of whiskey. “And to Bobby Reardon.” I glanced upward. “I hope to fill his mud boots at least partway, and I thank him for the drink.”
“Right. To Bobby,” Viola said sadly.
“He was a friend?”
“Sure. We’re all friends around here, even if we don’t like you. We have to be. Small place. Rough weather. Mean weather. We have to take care of each other, so even if we don’t like you, we have to know we can at least trust you. For example, Gril seems to think you’re a good egg. I’m not saying you’re a bad one, but your story doesn’t jibe. I wouldn’t care, mind you, if you were just visiting. I wouldn’t even care if you were one of my girls—they lie all the time—because I’m in control of them, even if they don’t rightly recognize it. Here’s the deal, you don’t have to tell me your truth, but I gotta hear something so’s I know I can trust you. Tell me something good.”
I looked at her a long time. She looked back, and neither of us seemed in a hurry.
“My name really is Beth Rivers. I’m running away from something and I need to hide for a while, hopefully not for a long time, but I don’t know. I don’t want to tell you any more than that because I’m afraid. I’m not dangerous, but I don’t know how to prove to you that I’m not out to harm anyone here.”
Viola nodded and poured herself another shot. I shook my head when she held the bottle my direction. “Could you take off your cap?”
I did. If Hank had told everyone, it seemed silly to hide it anyway.
Viola sucked in air through clenched teeth. “That’s ugly.”
“Yes.”
“Does it hurt?”
“No. I’m okay.”
She nodded and downed the shot. She licked her lips and I could envision her drinking with Bobby, though as faceless in my mind as Levi Brooks was, I could imagine a friendly guy welcoming all visitors. Did the Petition see a lot of company? Would I need to restock when this bottle was done? Was I going to have to keep the door unlocked?
“You should wear a cap that doesn’t look like you purchased it in an airport gift shop on the way here,” Viola said.
I smiled. “How about one like yours?”
“This?” She thumbed the brim. “No ma’am, this is one of a kind, and I’m the only one who gets to wear it.”
“That’s the answer I expected.”
She sighed big. “Thing is, I know you, Beth Rivers. I don’t know why or how, but I do. You’re familiar.”
My cheeks burned. Short of plastic surgery, there wasn’t much more I could do to disguise myself. I didn’t recognize any of the versions of me. I didn’t think I looked a thing like Elizabeth Fairchild. Maybe I looked like someone else Viola knew. What were the chances she, or someone else, could figure it out? I previously had no distinguishing feature—no mole, no dimples. I was of average height, currently a little thinner than normal because of everything, but not even close to skeletal. My features were rather ordinary, except for the scar and the shock of white hair. I looked good in my author picture, but that was more about makeup, lighting, and a little help from Photoshop. I opened my mouth to say something, maybe protest, but nothing came out.
“Right,” Viola said. “I appreciate why you don’t want to tell me, but if you really are in hiding, you might not be hiding as well as you think. Tell you what, if I figure out who you are, you have to tell me I’m right, okay? I’m eons smarter than pretty much everyone, so no one will figure it out before I do. When I do, you’ll have some time to figure something else out, maybe another place to run to before whoever you’re running from figures it out too, but you have to agree to tell me honestly if I pinpoint it. ’Kay?”
I nodded, still searching for words. She had a good point. If she could recognize me, how far behind her were all the mere mortals? I didn’t think I was recognizable though.
A jolt of pain suddenly seared through my right temple, making even the side of my nose hurt. I tried not to show the pain, but my eyes closed reflexively as tears squeezed out and slid down my cheek.
“Beth?” Viola said, from some faraway place.
In a disjointed way, I felt her touch my arm and, through the pain, I wondered if she had come around the desk or reached over it. But I couldn’t open my eyes to get the answer.
I gurgled a watery noise, and then, just when I thought I might pass out, the pain subsided, like it rolled out with a quick tide. Relief blossomed as I was able to open my eyes.
“I’m okay. It passed quickly,” I said.
She’d come around the desk and was crouching beside me. Concern pulled at her eyes under the brim of the hat. “What passed quickly? Are you sure you’re okay?”
“Yes.”
She squinted at me just long enough to be impolite and then stood and went back to the chair on the other side. The chair squeaked as she sat. “Darlin’, whatever that was, it wasn’t good, and it might need to be looked at.”
I shook my head lightly, careful to see if the movement brought another nail to my brain. It didn’t. “I’m okay. My doctor said this would happen.”
Sort of. Dr. Genero had said that I might experience some headaches, but she’d never dis
cussed the level of pain or any sort of sudden onset. I was fine now, but if I had many more of those, I would agree with Viola and plan a trip to Juneau or Anchorage for a CT scan. The random memories were better than the headaches. For now, I didn’t want Viola to know the episode had bothered me.
I might have thought I was looking at Indiana Jones’s mother. The eyes she now gave me under the brim of the old hat reminded me so much of those movies that I felt an involuntary smile tug at the corner of my mouth.
“All right,” she said. “Well, I hope you let your doctor know about it. I watched for one side of your face to sag or something but I didn’t see that at all.”
“That’s good news.”
Viola scowled. “Look, you escaped from something, I get that, but you might have taken off out of wherever too soon. And you chose this place to hide, I get that too, but maybe you should spend some time in a bigger city, closer to real medical care. A few weeks.”
I shook my head, again slowly. I would be looking over my shoulder enough. Here, when I did, figuratively and literally, mostly I would see woods and maybe glacier. In a city, any city, I was sure I’d sense Levi everywhere, hear his voice rise above crowds. I’d rather have the headaches and the memories.
I needed a change of subject. “I put something on the front counter this morning. A toy. A tiger. Hopefully it made it to its owner.”
“Yeah? I didn’t see it. After breakfast?”
“No, right before.”
Viola’s eyebrows came together. “I didn’t see it. I don’t know who it belongs to, but maybe one of the girls claimed it, or swiped it.”
“It didn’t seem worth much of anything.”
“Well, they like to take things, no matter the value sometimes. Where did you find it?”
“On the floor. I kicked it accidentally.”
“Why didn’t you bring it into the dining room?”
I shrugged. “Not sure. Just seemed like putting it on the counter was appropriate.”
“Hmm. Well, I don’t know.”
“Probably no big deal.”
“Probably.”
Viola fell into thought. I’d only brought up the toy to change the subject, but something about what I’d said had given her pause. Maybe she had her own set of alarm bells.
“What are you thinking about?” I asked.
“Nothing.” She poured herself another shot.
“Hey, Viola, what can you tell me about Linda Rafferty and her husband, George?” I asked.
“What? Why?”
“Have you heard what happened?”
“Of course I have. Linda Rafferty might have killed herself. Why are you curious about them?”
“Gril wonders if it wasn’t suicide, if it was murder.”
“I’m not surprised.” Viola chewed on her bottom lip as she fell into thought.
“Why aren’t you surprised?”
“I don’t know … It’s just that Linda didn’t seem like … Well, I know it’s hard to always know, but Linda didn’t ever seem like she’d kill, or hurt, herself.”
“She was happy, content?”
Viola had fallen back into thought.
“Viola?” I said.
Her attention swung back to me. “No, I didn’t know.” She stood. “I need to go.” She put her hand on the gun as she turned to make her way to the door.
“What’s up? What did I say?”
“I gotta go, that’s all.”
“Can I go with you?” I stood too. The pain was still there, though muted and a good wavery distance away. I hoped it wouldn’t come back full force as I tried to keep my face normal.
“Hell no.” Viola pointed at me. “You stay here, Missy. Eat that soup. You hear?”
“Sure.” I’d wait until a better time to remind her that I wasn’t one of her felons.
Her eyes pinched as her tone softened. “Just … I’m sorry, I have to go.”
“See you at dinner?”
“Yeah, see you then. Eat that soup, I mean it. It will make you feel better. It cures all ails.”
Viola left. The door shut with such force that my eyes went up to the ceiling. Should I brace myself for the building coming down around me?
The walls remained upright, and I sat back onto the chair. My head was clear with only a small promise of returning pain, but new anxiety rattled me. Was I going to have to deal with flash headaches and flash memories? Is that what Dr. Genero meant?
Also, what had set Viola off? What did it mean to Linda Rafferty’s death?
“I didn’t even know Linda Rafferty,” I mumbled to myself.
But even posthumously, there was a way to get to know people.
As I swiveled the chair so I could reach for a computer keyboard, I realized there wasn’t one there. Even if I could grab some of the library’s Internet, I had no way to access it. I hadn’t brought either my laptop or my satellite phone. With my research thwarted, I decided to use the burner phone. It wouldn’t hurt to talk to Dr. Genero about the headache.
I pulled it out of my pocket and powered it on. Gril had been correct, the bars were all lit. I didn’t have this good of reception in my St. Louis home office. A red light was also blinking, as if to tell me I had a message. I didn’t remember giving the number of any of the burner phones to anyone, but maybe I had.
I hit the call button and was immediately connected to a computerized voice.
“You have one new message. To hear the message, press 1.”
I did as instructed.
“Hey, hey, hey,” was all the message said.
In a male voice. A voice tinged with an Ozark-like accent. A voice that sounded a lot like Levi Brooks’s.
At once, my hands iced and shook, my breath caught, and my stomach plummeted. I listened to the phone’s instructions and played the message again, focusing extra hard, paying attention to the fact that if I didn’t do everything correctly, I would accidentally erase it, erase something that might be evidence, erase it so I would wonder if I’d really heard it at all.
“No! Not possible!” I said as I played it again, and again.
Finally, I flipped the phone closed and threw it onto the desk.
“No!”
Eight
“Beth?” Detective Majors said, her voice a high point amid surrounding chaos.
I didn’t know if the background noises were because of where she was or because my heartbeat was still booming in my ears.
“Yes, it’s me. Can you talk?”
“One second.”
The noises disappeared after what sounded like the shutting of a door. I couldn’t envision the room Detective Majors had moved into. I’d only met with her at the hospital. I imagined a typical police precinct interview room.
“Beth, where are you? Are you … there?” she asked.
“I’m there. Listen, did I give you this number? Did you give anyone else this number?”
“No, you didn’t give it to me. I would never have shared it if you had. What’s going on?” Her voice was tight and charged, like an electrical wire.
“Something … happened.”
“Are you hurt? Are you okay?”
“I’m fine.” I took a deep breath and tried to calm down. It didn’t work.
“Go on.”
“I got a call … a message. It was … it might have been Levi. I can’t be sure, but it sounded like him. I think.”
“What? On a burner phone?”
“Yes.”
“That doesn’t sound like something that could happen, Beth. I mean, there’s no way it could have been Levi. No way.”
We both knew that it was improbable, but not impossible. Nothing was impossible. Not anymore.
“Is there anything you can do? Can you trace the call, or check on it? The number it came from is marked private,” I said.
“I’ll try.”
I imagined her reaching into the pocket on her shirt for the small notebook and the pen she carried. When I’d first met h
er, I’d commented on how short she was. It had been a thoughtless remark, impolite, immature even. The comment hadn’t bothered her. It hadn’t bothered me at the time, but it had later, along with other thoughtless things I’d said. When I’d mentioned my concerns about my impulsive words to Dr. Genero, she’d told me that head injuries could cause personality changes, though for me they were probably temporary. Since I’d later regretted the remarks, I hoped the changes were resolving.
Detective Majors was also young, particularly for a detective. She was maybe almost thirty, but I hadn’t asked. She wore her dark hair pulled back in a short, tight ponytail, and she never smiled. Even when she was being friendly or sympathetic, her mouth remained in a straight, grim line. She was smart, and I did trust her—to investigate the crimes done against me, not to protect me. I didn’t trust anyone but myself to do that.
“All right,” she said. “Tell me all about the phone. I might need more than the number.”
I gave her the details, the brand, even the serial number, but I could hear doubt in her voice. Nothing was completely secure, but burner phones were named as such because of their somewhat off-the-grid nature; use and burn them up, so to speak. It was getting harder and harder to be off the grid though. I knew that. I sensed that her tracing the call was a long shot, but she would exhaust her options.
“Have you talked to the local police chief? I let him know you were coming. I felt it necessary,” she said after I gave her the phone details. “But I didn’t think about it until after I’d dropped you off. There was no way to let you know. Sorry.”
“It’s okay. I have met him. He’s … being helpful.”
“Good.”
I felt the back of my neck bristle. I turned to look behind me, but I was alone in the tin building and no one was looking in through the window. “Detective Majors, do you have anything new?”
She sighed. “No, not really, Beth.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means I’m looking at every little thing that might have something to do with Levi Brooks. I’m hitting lots of dead ends, but that’s not a surprise. I won’t stop looking. I won’t give up. You should know that by now. I—”
Thin Ice Page 7
