Cry For Help

by Wendy Dranfield

  Nate fills a bowl with water for Brody, and then pours himself a glass. He knows he needs to give her some alone time. They’ve been in each other’s pocket since they left California.

  He walks back to the living room and closes the door on Stephanie’s blood. Seeing the crime scene like that makes him more determined to find out what’s going on in Lost Creek. Whoever framed Madison for murder must be responsible for Stephanie’s death too. The guys who were hassling her a week ago were here to ask about Madison’s location; they know that for a fact. So it’s all linked somehow.

  As he passes the front door, he sees something that makes him want to flee. Brody barks in excitement and runs to the door, trying to peer through a glass panel.

  There are blue and red flashing lights right outside the house.

  13

  Madison is trying to relax, but being here doesn’t feel right. It’s not just seeing Steph’s blood all over the living room—although that’s bad enough, because now she knows the killer showed her no mercy—but she has a bad feeling building in her chest in a way she can’t ignore. Like that moment when you figure out you can’t trust someone close to you, but it’s too late because you already have.

  She looks at her reflection in the bathroom mirror and isn’t surprised to see dark circles under her eyes and scaly skin around her nose. She hasn’t bothered with makeup during their journey, as they’ve been on the road for practically all of it, but it’s more than that. They haven’t been eating well, relying on fried food from drive-throughs, and she’s got to give up the cigarettes.

  She sighs. All she wants is a hot bath and a comfortable bed, but not here. Not where the ghosts of her past are waiting for her. She needs to listen to her instincts, which are telling her to leave immediately and find somewhere else to stay. At least until the police have a crime-scene clean team clear up the living room and she’s spoken to Mike Bowers in person to get some idea of what happened here.

  “Goddam asshole,” she mutters. Mike should have prepared her for that mess. He knew she was due to arrive today. Is this the department’s way of letting her know they’re holding a grudge? Washing her hands, she hears Brody bark downstairs. When he doesn’t stop, she turns the faucet off and listens.

  “Madison?” shouts Nate. “We have a situation.”

  She hears fear in his voice. Her blood runs cold and she immediately knows she made the wrong decision in coming here. She feels for the cheap Glock handgun she bought after her release, but it’s not under her shirt. She left it in the car. “Shit.” She flings open the bathroom door and slowly walks down the stairs. “What is it?”

  Before Nate can answer, she notices the flashing lights through the door behind him. Clutching the handrail, she stops halfway down the stairs and looks at him.

  “Want to leave through the back?” he asks. “We might just make it.”

  She notices that the blood has left his face. He’s as scared as she is. She feels guilty for putting him in this situation, but that quickly turns to anger. “I’m not running. We haven’t done anything wrong.” She walks to the bottom of the stairs and pulls back the shade on the front door.

  When she sees who is standing there staring at her, she takes a step back.

  “You know him?” asks Nate.

  She nods. Her mouth has gone dry. “He was the arresting officer,” she whispers. Her body trembles as she realizes how stupid she’s been. She shouldn’t have come back here and put herself in the same situation as the one she only recently got out of.

  Nate takes charge. He moves in front of her and opens the door, with Brody at his side. Brody appears happy to see cops in front of him. Is he expecting his dead police handler to reappear? Nate has to hold him back by his collar.

  “What can I do for you?” he asks.

  Detective Douglas looks past him, straight at Madison. “I’m here to speak to Ms. Harper.” Apart from more lines around his eyes, he looks exactly the same.

  “In relation to what?” asks Nate.

  “That’s between me and her.”

  Nate blocks his view of her, forcing Douglas to look at him instead. “Well I’m sorry, but it’s late and we’ve only just arrived in town after a long journey. She’d be happy to stop by the station tomorrow afternoon with her lawyer.”

  Madison leans in to see Douglas’s reaction. He actually smirks at Nate. Then he pushes by him into the house, making Madison take another step back. Douglas has her by the arm before she can get away. “Madison Harper, I’m arresting you for the murder of Stephanie Garcia.”

  She looks at Nate, who’s yelling something at him. She watches two officers she doesn’t recognize rush into her house, pushing Nate against the wall and away from her. Brody’s jumping up at one of them and she silently prays he doesn’t bite anyone. He’ll be shot on the spot.

  Everyone looks angry. They’re all shouting. But she can’t hear a word they’re saying. All sounds are muffled, as if she’s drowning.

  How can this be happening again?

  14

  Mike makes it to Gold Rock in time to see Wyatt and Angie McCoy buttering up the drunk locals. He smirks. They’re not stupid; they know a drunk person is more likely to throw caution to the wind and donate more to the fundraiser than they would sober.

  Angie spots him first. She’s bouncing someone’s toddler over her shoulder; a little boy who looks like he’s half asleep. “Detective Bowers. Glad you could join us. You missed the journalist, so you won’t make it into tomorrow’s paper.” She winks at him, knowing full well that’s the only reason Chief Sullivan sends him to their events.

  “Good to see you.” He looks around. It’s getting dark fast, but there are still a lot of folks here enjoying themselves. The small Main Street has been lit up with party lights, and people are sitting outside on the picnic benches that have been spread around. The local stores appear to be busy with customers. It said on the tickets that a percentage of every ticket sale and of the sales from each shop and stall will go toward the charitable cause. “Looks like you’ve had a good event.”

  Wyatt McCoy claps him on the back. “Wish you could’ve been here sooner. I could’ve had you blind drunk by now.” He laughs heartily.

  “Do you think you’ve made enough money to restore the old Silver Saloon?”

  Angie says, “Hopefully. But we’ll have to wait until I do the books to find out.” She smiles at him. “We’ve been waiting on you in the hope you’d announce the winner of the craziest moustache competition.”

  “Sorry, but I can’t stay. I just wanted to show my face and pass on Chief Sullivan’s message that the police department appreciates your efforts in the community, as always.”

  He registers Angie’s disappointment.

  “Perhaps if we didn’t have that incident over at the amusement park I could’ve been here longer. My apologies for that.”

  Wyatt nods. “We understand. You’ve got a difficult job, Detective Bowers, and we appreciate you turning up. Here.” He hands Mike something warm wrapped in silver foil. “Some hog roast for your dinner. That should see you through a long night.”

  Mike smiles. “I appreciate it. Have a good evening.”

  His stomach rumbles loudly as he walks back to his car.

  At Fantasy World, Mike watches the officers as they search the amusement park for the missing knife. The park’s owner, Trevor Sanders, approaches him after switching on all the lights to make their job easier. The sun has set completely now.

  “I was hoping to reopen tomorrow,” he says. “I’m guessing that’s not going to happen now.”

  Mike looks at him. “Depends. If we find the knife tonight, we shouldn’t need to come back. I’m pretty sure our forensics guy has everything else he needs.”

  “Good. This is already going to be bad for business, so the sooner I can open, the better.” He must notice the look on Mike’s face, because he tries to appease him. “I know it sounds harsh when a girl has died, but times are hard
, man. There’s nothing I can do for Nikki now.”

  He’s right, but it’s still callous. “Have you tracked down your maintenance guy yet?”

  “No. I doubt I’ll see him again, which means I have the added hassle of hiring a replacement.”

  Ricky Gregor is high on Mike’s list of people to interview. “He ever act weird around young girls?”

  “No weirder than anyone else. He’d stare at a hot woman, but no one ever complained about him. Not to me, anyway.” Trevor shakes his head. “It looked like a suicide to me; I can’t get my head around the thought that someone might have killed her.”

  “Well, we don’t know that yet. Do you know who she was dating?”

  Trevor looks uncomfortable. “Who knows? The kids who work here are all screwing each other, so I can’t keep track. If you need me, I’ll be over in the office.” He walks away.

  Mike sighs. He watches Officer Jim Greenburg lying flat on his stomach with a flashlight in one hand, trying to see into the machinery under the Ferris wheel. That would be the most logical place for the knife to have fallen if Nikki dropped it herself after cutting her wrists. But Jim’s been staring down there a while now and not found anything.

  Mike turns to see Alex approaching him. “Will my services be needed tonight, Detective?”

  “It’s not looking that way.” He tries to think. “Is there any way to tell for sure whether Nikki made the cuts to her wrists herself? I mean, it must’ve been difficult to cut the second wrist once she’d cut the first.”

  Alex considers it. “It would certainly have been uncomfortable, but not impossible. It’s likely she took an overdose of painkillers in anticipation, but we won’t know that until the results of Lena’s toxicology tests are in.”

  “If she took an overdose, why slash her wrists too? Why not just wait for the OD to kick in?”

  Alex looks at him incredulously. “You obviously don’t know how painful an overdose can be, Detective. Your organs shut down one at a time. And it’s not a quick process. Depending on the drugs used, the victim can suffer seizures, chest pains, bleeding from all orifices, breathing difficulties—”

  “Okay, okay, I get it.” Mike tries to think.

  Jim gets up from the ground and dusts his black uniform off as he approaches them. “There’s nothing down there.”

  Shelley joins them. “We’ve searched everywhere, Detective. The knife isn’t here. My bet would be that if someone did kill her, they’ve either thrown it in the lake or taken it with them.”

  Mike agrees. “Okay, guys. That’ll do for tonight.”

  He walks away to his car and checks his cell phone. He has a missed call from Nikki’s mother. He decides to pay her a visit before heading home. He needs to update them both on the knife situation.

  “Why are we finding out what’s happening via the goddam TV instead of through you?” shouts Mr. Jackson before Mike’s even through their door.

  Mike lets him shout, for now. “I thought you didn’t watch the news?”

  “Don’t get smart with me!”

  He knows he needs to calm the guy down, not get him more wound up. “Look, I didn’t know someone had leaked it to the press. I came here to tell you myself.”

  “So what’s going on?” asks Mrs. Jackson with tears in her eyes. “You told us she killed herself.”

  He softens his voice. “The knife Nikki used to cut herself wasn’t with her when she was found this morning. That could just mean that the guy who discovered her took it, or it could mean there was someone with her when she died.”

  Mrs. Jackson sits down on the couch. “Do you mean someone else killed her?”

  “I don’t know. It doesn’t look that way to me, but it’s a possible theory.”

  “Theory?” says Mr. Jackson. “I want more than theories!”

  Mike’s losing his patience. If the guy wasn’t downing shots from a cheap bottle of whisky, he’d have more sympathy. “As part of the investigation, I need a clearer understanding of what happened leading up to Nikki’s death.” He turns to Mrs. Jackson. “Did you hear from her at all after she left for work yesterday?”

  She nods. “She called after the park closed to say she could earn some extra money by working late, but only if her dad would be able to pick her up after.”

  Mike looks at the father, surprised. “So you went to the park last night?”

  “No.” Mr. Jackson doesn’t offer any explanation.

  “No? Why didn’t you pick her up?”

  He has the decency to look ashamed at least. “I’d had a few drinks. It wouldn’t have been safe to drive.” He turns away from them.

  Mike’s gut tells him this guy could be lying. Was he the last person to see Nikki alive? He turns to the mother. “Did he go to the park?”

  Her husband spins around and they exchange a look.

  Mrs. Jackson is unable to conceal her contempt. “No, he blacked out on the couch. I was already in bed asleep at the time he was supposed to leave, so I didn’t know to text Nikki and tell her she’d need to find another ride home. I found him out here in the morning.”

  “Can’t you drive?” he asks her.

  “No.”

  “But you can dial a cab, right? You have a phone.”

  He sees guilt in her eyes and she looks away, sniffing back tears.

  Mike is incredulous that these people wouldn’t be concerned about how their daughter would get home after working a late shift. He can’t help but shake his head in disgust. It’s wrong of him but he does it anyway.

  This angers Mr. Jackson. “You can stop judging us. Just because I fell asleep doesn’t mean I wanted my daughter to die.”

  “But weren’t you worried when she hadn’t returned home? You must have noticed she wasn’t here when you got up this morning.”

  He looks defiant. “Like I told you earlier, we thought she was with some boy.”

  “But you told me and my partner that she didn’t have a boyfriend.” Mike’s pushing them because he wants one of them to snap. That’s the quickest way of finding out whether they’re hiding something.

  Mrs. Jackson speaks. “We didn’t know for sure. We just assumed that if she was starting to stay out later, she must have met someone. Plus, she seemed happy lately.”

  “For a change,” says Mr. Jackson.

  Mike doesn’t tell them about the rumors that their daughter did have a boyfriend. They clearly have no idea about that, or who he is. He looks at his notepad, but all he’s really learned from this visit is that Nikki was waiting for a ride that never showed up. Was that enough to drive her to suicide? Maybe. If she thought her parents cared so little about her that they couldn’t even be bothered to make sure she got home safe. It could have been the last in a long line of rejections.

  He looks at the father. Or maybe he did go to pick her up. Maybe they fought and she killed herself to spite him. He could’ve brought the knife home with him so the police would never know he was there. There’s an easy way to rule him out as a suspect. “I’d like to search this place.”

  “What?” says Nikki’s dad. “For the knife?”

  “Yes.”

  Mrs. Jackson starts sobbing.

  Mr. Jackson walks up to Mike, who stands his ground. “If you want to search my home, you’re going to need a warrant. Until then, you can get the hell out of here.” He points to the door.

  Mike turns away from him, determined to obtain that warrant.

  15

  Independence Day

  It’s early afternoon and Nikki’s turn at garbage duty, which she hates doing. Not only because people stare at her like she’s worthless, but also because it gives her too much time to think. She already spends way too much time in her head. Is it normal to overthink things this much? She has no idea.

  She watches Mason carrying a young boy on his shoulders as they look for the boy’s parents. Kids are always getting lost here, but Mason’s great with them. She still can’t believe he’s her boyfriend. How did
she get someone like him to be with her? A terrible thought crosses her mind. What if he’s just pretending to like her? Setting her up for some kind of prank? She’s never been able to tell the difference between paranoia and reality. Is her anxiety tricking her? She sighs, exhausted with all the thinking.

  “Here you go.” A guy drops a popcorn carton on the ground in front of her feet instead of placing it in the garbage bag she’s holding. He smiles as if he’s doing her a favor. She mumbles a thank-you and curses herself for not saying something else.

  As she walks past the Brain Drain and Mind Eraser rides, she checks out the groups of teens from her school. Everyone comes here in summer break; the goths, the geeks and even the jocks with their bimbo girlfriends. It’s not like there’s anything else to do around Lost Creek. The only group she fits into doesn’t have enough money to spend at a place like this. Growing up in a trailer park has always set her apart from most of her peers, because she can never afford to do anything with anyone. It costs money even just to hang out somewhere; for drinks, food or weed. Nikki had almost nothing until she started working here last summer. And even now she has to give most of her earnings to her parents for food and bills. Maybe if her mom and dad went out to work, she wouldn’t have to support them, but that’s never going to happen.

  She’s suddenly overwhelmed with a feeling of hopelessness. Is she ever going to get out of this shitty town? Thoughts of what happened the other evening flood back and threaten to engulf her. If she could leave town now, she would.

  She picks up some empty soda cans and spots Taylor and Mandi from school. They’re approaching her with bitchy grins across their faces. She turns away, intending to avoid them, but she hears them call her name. They rush to catch up with her.

  “Are you deaf as well as stupid?” says Taylor. She has pink extensions in her long blonde hair that match her false nails. As usual, her makeup looks Insta-ready, and she’s dressed in a short skirt and tight tank top. She’s everything Nikki hates about girls her age, and Mandi is practically her clone.