Chapter 16

 

YOGA CLASS WENT surprisingly well, and I wasn’t nearly as sore this time as I had been the first. When Tina showed me how to use a strap to prevent me from straining my back while practicing the asanas, the exercises went much easier than I thought they would. By the end of class, I actually felt like I’d had a massage. Woohoo! I told her I’d be back the next week and raced home, where I jumped in the shower and changed just in time to drive us out to Perry Field, where Miranda’s astronomy club was meeting to watch the Perseids.

The Chiqetaw Stargazers Society was primarily composed of a handful of older men and women in their retirement years, three or four earnest young nerds in their twenties, and two members under eighteen—Randa and her friend Lori. All of the older members looked out for the two girls, especially Naomi French, who made sure that the talk remained PG-rated at the most, and that the two girls didn’t get overlooked in the discussions. Twice a year, they drove over to Bellingham to meet with another group of amateur astronomers, and I allowed Randa to go as long as Naomi went.

The group welcomed us with a hearty hail of greetings. I had stopped on the way at the QVC to pick up a box of doughnuts and now offered them around. Randa beamed at me. Even at her age, she knew that the quickest way to win favor was by placating the sweet tooth. Several of the members came up to tell me what a polite and intelligent girl my daughter was. She blushed, but looked pleased. I unfurled our blanket and we settled down to await the celestial light show. Kip, trying desperately to hold onto his tiff, planted himself a few yards away, on a makeshift bench that had been created out of a fallen log. After a few minutes of his self-imposed isolation, he crept back to join us on the blanket.

Randa sat up her telescope and tested it out. “Okay, it’s ready. Have you got the binoculars?”

I held up the pair that were hanging around my neck. “Check!”

She nodded, a satisfied look on her face. “Good. We’ll start watching in about half an hour. The club needs to go through the minutes from the last meeting and stuff like that. If you want to wait here, you can.”

“Sounds like a plan to me,” I said. She joined the others who were gathered around a picnic table while Kip and I sat on the blanket.

Set on the outskirts of town, Perry Field was six blocks away from Lincoln Elementary, the school Kip attended. The land—a good five-acre plot—had been deeded to the city by Wilber Perry, an old eccentric who had frightened all the kids with his threats to keep the baseballs they hit into his yard, and to call the cops whenever they ran through his vegetable garden. He’d died the year before we arrived in Chiqetaw, and the city had found itself the proud owner of the five-acre parcel. It hadn’t taken much to turn Wilber’s house into a meeting hall that could be rented out for weddings and other events, and the land itself was primed and ready for turning into a park. Outfitted with jungle gyms, swing sets, and picnic tables, Perry Field had become the perfect place for birthday parties and impromptu meetings.

A number of other meteor-watchers had decided that the park would be prime sky-watching territory; blankets and figures shaded by the dusk lay scattered across the field. The city had acquiesced to the Chiqetaw Stargazers Society’s request and doused the streetlights scattered throughout the park for the next two evenings to give us prime viewing.

I leaned back on my elbows, staring at the sky. In Seattle this would have been impossible; there was too much light pollution. But here, the velvet dark surrounded us, the stars spread in a glittering panorama over our heads. I took a deep breath and let it out slowly, relaxing for the first time in a while. Monsters, murders, these were thoughts for the day, not this evening.

Kip must have been feeling the same way I was, because he scooted closer and stretched out on his back, his hands cradling his head. “Mom, I’m sorry about what happened with Sly. I really didn’t mean to steal anybody’s money.”

I reached down and patted his shoulder. “I know you didn’t, bud. You just have to start using that brain of yours a little more. Try to think about the ramifications of your actions—ask yourself what might happen because of what you choose to do. We talked about this in December, remember?”

“Oh boy, do I ever.” He nodded fervently, then, out of nowhere, asked. “Mom? Are you and Joe in love?”

Whoa. I hadn’t been prepared for that one. How to answer? What with Roy and Tyra having a new baby, the kids felt left out enough as it was. Would my saying “yes” make them feel pushed away even more?

“Well, I think we might be.” I looked down at my son. “Does that bother you?”

He popped up then, like a jack-in-the-box, and stared at me intently. “Bother me? Heck no! I like Joe. Hey, if you guys get married, will you have another baby like Dad is? I wouldn’t mind having another brother… or sister.”

Heavens! Now Kip had us married and pregnant. “Slow down, kiddo! Joe and I’ve never talked about marriage, and I certainly think that if we do get married, we’ll have to wait a while to make a decision about another child. After all, you and Randa are my children, and I would never do anything to make you feel left out.”

Kip picked at his shoe. “Dad really doesn’t love us, does he?” He sounded so sad that I wanted to scoop him up in my arms, to cover him with kisses and hugs, to wipe away any loneliness or pain he was feeling.

How could I answer his question? How could I, in good conscience, tell my children the truth: Their father didn’t care about them. He didn’t care about anybody but himself. And when he and Tyra had their new baby, he would lose interest in that child, too. I didn’t hold out much hope for his marriage, the odds were just stacked too high, and Roy wasn’t a good gambler. Someday he’d start finding fault with Tyra, just the way he had with me.

I searched for the right words. “We’ve talked about this before, Kip. Your dad isn’t cut out to be a father, but he loves you dearly.”

“I don’t think he does.” Kip set his lips in a thin line. “You don’t have to lie to me. Randa and I know, we talked about it the other day. That’s why I’ve decided I don’t wanna go see him. He never bothers to call us, or to come visit.”

I pulled my knees to my chest and rested my chin on them. What now? He was right, he and Randa knew the score as much as I’d tried to shelter them from it. I finally looked over at my son who was waiting for an answer. “Kip, your father has a lot of emotional problems. He mainly cares about himself. It’s not your fault, it’s not Randa’s. It’s not mine. Roy never learned how to care about others. However, he is your father, and by law, he has a right to see you. I know you don’t want to go, but please, give him another chance. Maybe he’s trying to reach out—you never know.”

Kip bit his lip, then shrugged. “Yeah, guess so.”

Just then, Randa showed up. She sat down on the blanket and accepted the soda I offered her. “We’re about ready to begin our official count. Every time I see one, I’ll mark it down.” She sat back on the blanket, scorecard in hand.

I forced back a sigh. She was so analytical that sometimes it almost broke my heart. I wanted her to enjoy the wonder of her passions, not just to probe and prod data into order. “Do you want our counts, too?”

She thought for a moment, then shook her head. “No, you’re not actually members so we couldn’t really use them in our tally.”

“Where do we look?” Kip asked. At first he’d balked at the excursion, but now he seemed to be getting into the spirit.

“It doesn’t matter where you look—they’ll be all over the sky.” As she launched into an explanation of what meteors were, and what they weren’t, I tipped my head up and stared at the canopy of diamonds that stretched from horizon to horizon. The night had grown darker and all of a sudden, a brilliant sparkle of light streaked across the heavens, leaving a glistening trail behind it. Despite myself, I gasped and pointed.

“There’s one!”

Randa and Kip swung their faces skyward, just in time to catch a second that went zinging overhead. “Yay!” Kip yelled, clapping his hands. “I’m gonna make a wish.”

As he shut his eyes and wished, I caught sight of yet a third, and we were off and running. Dusk drifted toward midnight as the cares of the day vanished amid our shouting and cheers each time we saw another shooting star. The entire field was filled with victory cries, and we lost track of the meteors that went streaking overhead.

At one point, I looked over at Randa. The scorecard that she’d been holding so diligently had dropped to the ground, forgotten, as she watched with a look of sheer delight plastered across her face. I needn’t have worried. This was her passion, and all the statistics in the world couldn’t keep down her love for the stars. I settled back and we sat there late into the night, watching in wonder as the skies came tumbling down around our shoulders.

 

 

I WAS UP at six, still sleepy but feeling extraordinarily relaxed. At least, I was feeling relaxed until I remembered that I had to go cave-hopping with the reporter from hell.

I dug through my closet and came up with an old pair of jeans and a grungy tank top. I’d been meaning to toss them, but they’d be perfect for spelunking; caves were notoriously dirty, and I didn’t relish getting covered in whatever cave-goo our expedition might encounter. I tied my sneakers, pulled my hair back into a braid and tucked a bandana around my head. Eschewing makeup, I opted for sunscreen instead.

A hooded fleece jacket would complete the outfit; caves could be icy cold even in the middle of summer. I’d rather lug the jacket along with me than end up shivering all the way through the morning. In the kitchen, I filled a backpack with a couple of water bottles, three peanut butter sandwiches, an apple, and a handful of cookies. On second thought, I added a roll of toilet paper and a thin nylon rope. I also made sure my cell phone battery was fully charged.

Speaking of phones, I punched in Jimbo’s number. When we got home from the field last night, I found that he’d left a message, agreeing to go along. At least I wasn’t facing a day alone with Ms. Sutton. I caught him mid-breakfast. The static-laced drone of the TV in the background filtered through his mumbled “A-OK.”

“I’ll meet you where we found Clyde’s body,” he said. “I’ll be there at around seven-thirty.”

As I was brewing a quick espresso fix, the kids came running in from out back, their mouths covered with a bright purple stain. “Let me guess, you’ve been picking berries?” I gave them a quizzical look. “You’re up early.”

“We thought we’d get busy before it gets too hot,” Randa said. The lot next door was overflowing with brambles. I had the feeling they’d be covered head-to-toe with blackberry juice by the time they finished harvesting the fruit.

“That’s a good idea. Pick enough and I’ll do my best to make us a pie. But be sure to rinse them off when you bring them home. I don’t want a lot of bugs crawling around in my kitchen.” I gulped down my mocha, swallowed the last bite of my Pop-Tart, and then grabbed a slice of cold pizza. That should hold me until lunch time.

“We’ll clean ’em,” Kip promised. “Mom, can we have hamburgers for breakfast? Randa said she’ll make them for us.”

I peeked in the fridge. Sure enough, we had ground beef and buns there. I shrugged. “Why not? Sounds nutritious to me.” I pulled out the beef and handed it to Randa, along with the nonstick skillet and a plastic spatula. “Use this to cook them in, honey, so they don’t stick.”

“Thanks Mom,” she said, forming patties and sliding them into the pan. I had the suspicion that she’d actually started to enjoy cooking, even though she still professed to hate it.

“Listen, while I’m gone today, I want you to hang out with Horvald. He said he’ll take you out for lunch if I’m not back by then, but I don’t expect to be gone longer than noon. I’ll take my cell phone, though, so you can get in touch with me if you need to.”

Randa smiled “He’s nice. I wish he and Mrs. Trask would get married.”

“Yuck! Mush.” Kip screwed up his face. “Besides, whose house would they live in? They can’t get married anyway, they’re too old.”

Randa watched the burgers sizzle. She buttered the buns and popped them in the toaster oven to brown. “Can too! They’d make a great couple. Feed the cats, stupid, while I fix our breakfast.”

“Who you callin’ stupid?” Kip stuck his tongue out at her. He dished out breakfast for the cats, who were milling about underfoot. “Why do you want them to get married, anyway?”

“’Cuz they both seem lonely.” Randa transferred the hamburger patties to the buns and set them on the table as I emptied the dishwasher. After they finished eating, I herded them across the street, to where Horvald was already hard at work in his dahlia bed.

They waved as I hopped in the car and took off up the road.

Come seven o’clock, I was sitting in my Mountaineer in front of my shop, a triple-shot grandé iced mocha in hand, waiting for Cathy to show up. Six shots and counting so far.

I patted the dashboard. “It’s okay, Tenzing. She doesn’t bite. If she does, we’ll kick her ass.” And maybe I could. After yoga class, I’d expected to wake up feeling stiff and achy, but I was actually feeling pretty good. It occurred to me that I should stretch before bed every night. Just to hurry results along.

A glance out the window showed the usual Sunday morning lack of traffic. Chiqetaw was deader than a fence post. The only shops that opened early along Main Street were a couple of restaurants, Starbucks, and the Barnes & Noble bookstore a few blocks away.

A knock on the passenger door startled me out of my thoughts. Cathy was standing there, dressed in a pair of black jeans and a designer T-shirt. I unlocked the door for her and she hopped in, breathless. I noticed she was wearing a pair of black suede loafers, and if I wasn’t mistaken, they were Ralph Lauren.

I pointed to her feet. “Are you sure you want to be wearing those when we go mucking around a cave? It’s probably filled with slime and mold.”

She glanced at her shoes and shrugged. “They’ll be fine. I don’t think we’re going to find anything that nasty, and if we do, I’ll just buy another pair.”

Just buy another pair. I’d like to have money like that to throw away. “Fine, whatever. Let’s get this show on the road. It’s almost seven-thirty.”

She clicked her seatbelt shut. “I’m sorry I’m late. I couldn’t get my car started.” As I eased out of the parking space, she asked, “Where are your friends?”

I shrugged. “Murray and Joe had to work. Jimbo will meet us there.”

She shuddered. “I don’t like him very much. He’s crude.”

I glanced at her as I turned onto the road leading out to Klickavail Valley. “Crude or not, he helped me save my son. Sometimes the cover really doesn’t reflect the book.”

“Well, he hasn’t got any manners, that’s all I have to say about him.”

Manners? Jimbo? Not for someone like Cathy Sutton. He’d told her just where she could stick her microphone a few months earlier and I had the feeling she was still holding a grudge. Time to change the subject.

“So, do you like your job? You always seem so cheerful on TV.”

She snorted. “I’m paid to be cheerful. I’d love to work at a station over in New York or down in L.A., but it’s impossible to find a good agent when you live in a dump this size.” She studied her nails as we lapsed into an uneasy silence.

So Ms. Sutton was a big city girl stuck in a small town. Considering her attitude and disregard for people, she probably would fare better in a large, anonymous city. Then again, I had the feeling she was blaming her lack of promotion and new offers on Bellingham’s size, rather than on her own shortcomings.

“So…” she said. “Why did you decide to open a china shop?”

I flicked on my right-hand blinker. Not far to go, thank God. “I’ve always loved china and teapots, so when I left my ex, and decided to go into business, it seemed natural to draw on my passion for inspiration.”

“How long were you married?”

I gave her a long glance. Ten to one, Cathy couldn’t hold a normal conversation without digging for gossip. “Too long. I was married too long. And you? Have you ever been married?”

She turned to stare out the window. “Yes, actually, I was. When I was twenty.”

Well, that was a shock. I couldn’t imagine what kind of man could put up with her. “Divorced?”

“He died.” She shrugged. “He was twenty-four. One day he went skiing with a friend and they were caught in an avalanche.”

Oh jeez! I caught my breath and let it out slowly, feeling terrible for all the uncharitable things I’d been thinking about her. “I’m sorry. I can’t imagine how hard that must have been to cope with.”

“It wasn’t easy. His family didn’t think I was good enough for him to begin with.” She shrugged. “Anyway, after Tom died, I sued the resort, and used the settlement to go back to school. I graduated with a degree in broadcasting, got hired at KLIK-TV, and thirteen years later, here I still am, in a dead-end job, with a dead-end résumé.”

Not sure of what to say, I kept my mouth shut and concentrated on the road. After a few more minutes, we pulled into Klickavail Valley and I idled the motor. None of the bikers paid much attention to us—they were used to seeing people coming and going through here by now. “Before we get this show going, I’m going to tell you something and you need to remember it.”

She looked at me, expectantly.

“There are some freaky things out here, including spirits that don’t like people screwing around in their territory. You do what I say, when I say. Got it?” Chances were good I was wasting my breath, but I might as well try.

She grunted and I took that for a “yes.” We eased through the shaded foliage at a snail’s pace, then abruptly shot out into the area where Clyde had lost his life. I shivered. There was something wild and untamed out here, a feeling that the forest could close in and swallow us whole. I looked around, but Jimbo was nowhere in sight. He was running late, as usual.

“Where’s this shack you were talking about?”

Cathy stared at the terrain, sucking on her lip. After a moment, she pointed left, past the outcropping of brambles and bushes that blocked our view. “On the phone, George told me it’s over that way, beyond a huge patch of briars and brambles, a little ways beyond Turtle Rock.”

Hmm. Past the area where we’d found Clyde’s body. I pulled to a stop and we got out of the car and started walking. “That’s where we found Clyde and George.” I pointed out the murder scene. Signs of the investigation still littered the ground. A crumpled cigarette pack, a forgotten latex glove, dark splotches of dried blood. Monuments to unexpected death.

Cathy stared at the patch, somber. “I’ve never seen a dead body.”

“I’ve seen more than I ever wanted to.” It seemed like the past year had been steeped in blood. I’d managed to stumble over several murder scenes and by now, I had realized that the memories and images weren’t going to fade away. “So, where is this shack?”

She pointed to a place where Klickavail Mountain jutted into the strip of meadow, a tiny bump in the manner of mountains, but large enough to obscure our view. In fact, it looked as if the meadow ended there; the forest crowded in around the base of the slope. “There. It should be in the forest over there.”

Hmm. Jimbo wasn’t here yet, but I didn’t want to drag this out. Maybe if I left a message for him on my windshield, telling him where we were going, then Cathy and I could at least take a look at the shack while we waited for him. I told her to come with me and hurried back to the Mountaineer, where I dug around in the back and hauled out my pack, slipping the straps over my arm. “I suppose you didn’t bring so much as a bottle of water for yourself, or even a flashlight?”

She blanched. “Oh. I thought you were bringing those things.”

Good God, either the woman really did believe I could read minds or she expected to be waited on hand and foot. I plastered a huge note on the windshield, and then took another gander at the road, hoping to see Jimbo’s truck. No such luck. “All right, show me this shack. We should be safe for now.”

We trekked back past Turtle Rock and rounded the curve, trudging through the verdant foliage that girded the gigantic boulder. Once we reached the tree line, it only took a few moments to locate the cabin. Weathered and worn, it couldn’t possibly be inhabited.

“The cave is back in the woods, beyond the shack,” Cathy said. “George told me that he marked the path with torn pieces of a canvas sheet. That’s when he said he was going back to explore further,” she added glumly.

I headed over toward the building. The outer walls were gray with age, and if it had been painted, the paint had long since flaked away. I fingered the wood. Rough, splintered. Nope, this didn’t look like a house, even for someone roughing it. Shack was the only word that fit.

“Whose place is this? Do you know?”

She shrugged. “I have no idea, but it looks abandoned, doesn’t it?”

I cautiously ascended the three sagging stairs that led to an even more precarious porch, and sidled up to the door. There was no sign of anyone around, in fact, no sign that anybody had lived here for a long time. If there had ever been glass in the windows, it was so much dust by now. The floor listed under my feet, and I held my breath as I pushed open the door.

Light streamed in from the cracks in the walls and the windows. The cabin was bare-bones, with a rusty old cot pressed against one wall and a rickety table in middle of the room. A couple of stools were drawn up to the table, and there was a dilapidated dresser pushed up against the opposite wall. The drawers were open, and empty, save for the remnants of the canvas that George had found. All of the furniture looked makeshift. The nail heads were rusting, and it was obvious that the mildew had eaten through a good share of the wood. Nothing indicated that this cabin might play home for anybody except the bugs.

“Well, this is a dead end.” I turned to Cathy.

She huddled near the doorway. “This place gives me the creeps. Let’s go look at the cave.”

“No way, not without Jimbo.”

“Oh come on,” she wheedled. “Leave him another note. Tell him to follow the path George left—the canvas ribbons will show up easy enough for him to see. I promise, I won’t ask you to go into the cave until he gets there. Or…” she said, eyeing me speculatively, “we can sit here and play twenty questions until he shows up.”

That was enough to get me moving. Talking to Cathy in the car had been agony enough. I followed her back into the sunlight. Jimbo would show up soon and he could easily catch up to us. If anybody knew these woods, he did. But any way you sliced it, I didn’t like this. However, I didn’t have all day to waste, so I maneuvered around till I found a signal for my cell phone and punched in his number. His answering machine beeped, but he didn’t pick up.

“He must be on his way; I can’t get him at home.” I hesitated another minute, then decided that we might as well start back through the woods. The Warriors of the Mountain seemed to only come out near dark, and it was far from evening. If we waited by the entrance of the cave, we’d be safe enough. I dashed off another note and stuck it prominently on the door of the shack.

“He’ll show by the time we’re there. Let’s head out.” We swung around back of the shack and sure enough, there in the bushes glimmered a moldy white ribbon. Maybe this wouldn’t be so hard after all, I thought as I plunged into the bushes, Cathy close on my heels.