Head in a Haymow

by Chris Seaton

  “What was that about?” Agent Wyatt asked, making himself comfortable.

  “Oh, she just doesn't appreciate one of our more spirited goats, and with me laid up, she's the one who has to milk her.” Bernice watched how easily he was able to stretch his body into the chair. His agility made her jealous. “So, no Margie then?” It was more of an admission than a question.

  “Nope.” His features darkened. “She's probably somewhere in Canada by now.”

  “With two million dollars at her disposal, she could disappear for a long time.” Bernice wanted to touch him. She didn't know if she was allowed to anymore. Something felt like it had changed.

  “You were right about Jessica.” That bit of information seemed to perk him up a little. “We found her under a bush set back from the house. The kicker is that the bush was pruned recently. We're waiting for the lab results, but it looks like a good candidate for the organic source of cyanide that was found in those candies.”

  “Were you able to tell if she was poisoned too?”

  “Tox screen might turn up something, but the body's so decomposed...” Agent Wyatt let the sentence drift off as he fidgeted with his pants cuff.

  Something was definitely eating at him. “Evan?” she questioned.

  He looked up at her and tried to smile it off. “Sorry. Hey, how you holdin' up? Must be pretty swanky sittin' up here, getting out of chores and watching TV.” He glanced over at the new addition to the room and teased, “Wish I had known. I would have brought you Bonbons.”

  “After I got through my saved shows, there wasn't a whole lot left to watch.” Bernice noticed he was still distracted, so she tried a different tactic. “So when do you have to go back?”

  It hit the mark. Agent Wyatt grimaced. “Tomorrow.”

  “Oh.”

  “Yeah, Agent Carlson and I have a meeting with the Attorney General's. It ain't gonna be pretty.”

  “Why, because you didn't get Margie?” Bernice felt like she needed to defend him. “That wasn't your fault.”

  “It's not just that we didn't get Margie,” he corrected her “We wasted lots of money and man hours not getting Margie. The state doesn't look for the reasons. They follow the money.”

  “But you saved my life.” Bernice sat up despite the stabbing pain she received in response. She ignored it. “The video that fireman ran off his phone has been broadcast all over the place. You're a hero. How can they chew you out?”

  “That publicity is the only thing saving my job, Bernice.” Agent Wyatt stood up and away from her then. “And I'm no hero.”

  “Right,”Bernice returned sarcastically. “You were just doing your job, Ma'am. Isn't that right, Officer?”

  She wasn't prepared for the anguish on his face when he confronted her. “You were right, Bernice.” He said it softly, painfully. “I didn't want to believe you, but you turned out to be right about us cops.”

  “Evan,” she tried to comfort him, “you're not like that.”

  “Oh yeah?” he scoffed bitterly. “When I figured out that Margie had your truck, I automatically took you for dead. All I wanted to do was hunt her down and make her feel pain. How's that for blood thirsty?” The venom in his voice gave no quarter.

  She watched him, her face crinkling into confusion. “I don't understand. You found me.”

  “If Darlene and Cameron hadn't come along, I would have been back on the road looking for Margie, and you,” He couldn't finish the sentence. He beat his fist against the wall in his anger. The violence of it left a shallow dent in the plaster.

  Thankfully, no one else was in the house to hear it. The hard thump echoed by itself in the awkward silence of Bernice's bedroom.

  When Agent Wyatt finally looked at Bernice, it almost did him in. Tears fell unfettered down her ravaged face. “No.” The word was ripped from his throat as he threw himself to her bedside. “Please don't cry. God, Bernice, I am so sorry. I don't deserve you. If I could take back that moment...” He carefully held her beaten form and rocked her.

  She clung to him and let all the fear and pain out in his strong willing arms. She buried her face in his chest and wept, finally admitting how close she had been to death. “I've been so stupid,” she wailed. “I should have called you when I figured out it was Margie, but I felt so guilty and unsure. I didn't want to get in the way of your job.”

  “Fuck my stupid job,” he declared, kissing her hair and gently rubbing her back.

  It was still a little too hard. “Ow,” Bernice exclaimed in a small whimper.

  Agent Wyatt stopped and looked down at her. “Is there a single square inch on your poor body that isn't in pain?”

  She snuggled into him, mumbling, “There's a couple of places.”

  He shook his head, letting out a relieved but exasperated breath.

  Cameron walked into the room. “Burgers are ready.” His smile drooped when he realized he had walked into something. “You two need a minute?”

  “We're gonna need more than that,” he whispered into her ear. Lifting his head, he said, “Hey Cameron, you mind packing us a to-go box? I've got a little surprise for Bernice.”

  Cameron was hesitant. “Okay, but Darlene's not gonna be happy about you hauling Bernice out of the house in her condition.”

  “Duly noted,” Agent Wyatt acknowledged. “By the way, you didn't happen to make dessert, did you?”

  Chapter 26

  “Now, I'm really going to miss you.”

  Bernice said this while sitting neck high in hot bubbling water. A very naked Special Agent in Charge from the Wisconsin Department of Criminal Investigation cradled her between his thighs and messaged her temples and her scalp. Jets of bubbles circulated around them, relaxing her muscles, bringing down the swelling, and numbing the scratches and cuts.

  “Mmm,” was Agent Wyatt's throaty response. “I'm going to miss you too.”

  Bernice laughed. “I'll bet.”

  “What?” he argued. “I will.”

  “Let me figure out exactly what you're going to miss. Is it getting violated during a massage or getting your head bashed in or having to constantly rescue me from my own recklessness or me breaking your furniture...”

  “Hey,” he interjected. “I happen to like the way you break my furniture.” His hands moved down to message her neck and shoulders. “As a matter of fact, I have a very pretentious Louis-inspired desk with your name on it at my office. You might want to come by for a visit sometime when you're feeling better.”

  “Hmm.” Bernice liked the way he was thinking. “I might just do that.”

  “And you're right,” Agent Wyatt agreed. “I won't miss any of those other things you mentioned. I definitely won't miss finding dead bodies with you.” His hands evolved to working little circles around her shoulder blades. “But I will miss you, especially like this.”

  “You're kidding right? I look like hell.”

  “That's not what I'm talking about,” he corrected her. “I'm talking about us being alone together, no barriers or boundaries between us. We're just two equally naked people whose only agenda is each other.”

  Whether he was aware of his actions or not, his hands came under her armpits and grazed her breasts. Bernice inhaled at the unexpected intrusion. He immediately moved his hands. “Sorry,” he apologized quickly. “I didn't mean to hurt you.”

  “No.” she said.

  “Yeah, I know. It was a mistake. I really wasn't trying to-”

  She carefully grabbed his retreating hands. “No, I mean don't stop.”

  Agent Wyatt chuckled. “Bernice, you don't have to...”

  She gingerly brought his hands to her breasts. “Touch me.”

  His palms were wrinkled from their extended time in the water. He glided them slowly, rotating around her breasts and grazing her nipples the way he knew she liked it. She settled back against him, letting her wet head lay on his shoulder. He kissed her on her exposed neck, feeling her moan through her throat.

  When
Bernice reached up and kissed him, he held her breasts and squeezed gently, groaning into her mouth. “Are you sure you can do this?”

  She bit his lower lip. “This is making me feel better.” She ran her chapped lips along his rough cheek, trailing her tongue up to his ear. “Skip the ribs and touch me lower.”

  Her carnal request was making him hard. “Yes, Ma'am.” Agent Wyatt drawled and took immense pleasure out of causing her to gasp into his ear when he found the sweet spot. He worked that wonderful connection between her nipple and her clitoris and played it like a tantric instrument. Bernice dug her elbows into his thighs and arched into the sweet manipulations, letting the buoyancy of the deep warm water carry her to a gratifying plateau.

  She hit it with little pulsing sparks, tightening up her butt cheeks against him and moaning, “God, Evan, you are so good to me.” She tentatively tried to put pressure on her hands. She hissed when her wrists decided otherwise. “I just wish that I could return the favor.”

  “You don't need to,” he told her as he nibbled around her jaw. “Can't you feel me behind you?”

  She could, and it made her very happy. It also made her resourceful. “I have an idea.”

  “Oh, dear.”

  Slowly she raised herself up, letting the water help her. She turned. “If I bend over the tub on my knees, and you come up behind?”

  Agent Wyatt shook his head watching her painfully get into position. “Bernice...”

  “Evan, I want you.”

  He knew it wasn't easy for her to say, and it was what he needed to hear. “Just give me a second to suit up.”

  Between the condom under water and the extreme caution not to further bodily harm, it was an experimental and careful coupling, but it was a successful one that built slowly and gained in momentum and confidence. They celebrated being alive and together, leaving their misgivings with their clothes and the separate lives they represented.

  Agent Wyatt bent over Bernice, kissing up the valley of her spinal cord. “You're right, that was a good idea.”

  She smiled, her cheek lying on the cool ceramic tiles that lined the hotel room's hot tub. “Well, every once in a while I get lucky.”

  She felt him pause over her prostrate form. “Like it or not, Bernice... I just want you to know...that I love you.” He placed one more hesitant kiss on her back and then stood up out of the water.

  Bernice's eyes popped open. Her brain whirled like a New Year's noise maker before it settled on the disturbing thought. “Shit,” it proclaimed. “What the hell am I suppose to do with that?”

  “See how many I got?” Michael proudly held up a green plastic container to show off his work. “I'm gonna beat Kevin.”

  Bernice smiled at him and looked over at the opponent in question, who was much more interested in his phone than picking raspberries. “Oh, to be young and stupid,” Bernice thought but went ahead and put her camp counselor voice into play. “Hey Kevin, if Darlene catches you with that phone in your hand, she's libel to try out the new wood chipper.”

  Kevin's supreme look of alarm as he stashed the contraband in his pocket made her wonder if he thought she meant he'd go into the chipper instead of the phone. She shrugged it off. Either way, he was working again.

  She sat on an old holey blanket near the bottom of the patch and contented herself to picking whatever berries were in reach, promptly popping them into her mouth. As far as she was concerned, that was what supervising was all about.

  Her wrists still looked like a botched suicide job but the muscles were finally starting to heal up. Her ankles were being more stubborn. Walking to the bathroom was a long drudging process requiring some advance planning, but it was still better than Darlene treating her like a big baby.

  Being outside and watching spring heat into summer was the best medicine yet. Freshly mowed grass, ripe berries, and quick little breezes to cool the skin against the big bright sunshine; these were all things that made Bernice surmise that life wasn't too bad.

  Her pocket began to buzz. She almost squealed but caught herself. Ever since their last night together in the hot tub, Agent Wyatt had made it his mission not to give up on Bernice, no matter what distance was put between them. He faithfully called every day.

  The conversations were short and a little flirty but very light. “You won't hear the l-word from me again until you're ready to say it too.” That was the last thing he conveyed to her before leaving to go back to Madison two weeks before.

  Bernice still wasn't ready to say it back. It would take time to believe that wretched little word could be trusted to enter her heart and vocabulary again. It was still too soon.

  She popped out her phone, watching Michael's eyes bulge in greed at a particularly huge berry. She chirped out a greeting. “Well hey there, stranger.”

  It wasn't Evan. “Um, hey there yourself.”

  Bernice stared at the LED reading of “UNKNOWN CALLER”. Somewhere in the back of her mind, she scolded herself. That was what caller ID was for.

  “So you're alive,” Margie continued pleasantly.

  Bernice's eyes went buggy. She simply gaped at the phone in her hand and said nothing.

  “I'm glad you're alive.”

  The anger finally kicked in. “Where are you?” Bernice hissed harshly.

  “Oh, I'm around,” was Margie's singsong reply. “Still in transit though. No point having your boyfriend trace the call. I'll be off this tower and long gone by then.”

  “So you're calling to gloat?” Bernice tried to come up with some way to make the call useful. So far, it was only frightening.

  “I saw your rescue on the news and just wanted to make sure you were okay.”

  “No thanks to you, Lady.”

  There was a pause. “I'm sorry things got out of hand the way they did.” The pleasant voice was replaced with the flat one.

  “So you're just going to disappear and leave everyone else to clean up your mess including your father and children?”

  There was the impatient sigh again. “I could have disappeared when things got out of hand five years ago with Herb, but I didn't. My family is old enough to take care of themselves now.”

  “What about that poor man who sold the freezer or your lover in the Bahamas or me? We were just getting in your way?”

  There was another sigh. “When I was Margie, I wasn't given much of a choice about the life I had. As Jessica I was free to find out what life really had to offer, but it came with a price. The person I get to be now has the chance to start all over again and maybe get it right this time.”

  “So you're gone for good? You're never coming back?” Agent Wyatt would never stop looking for her. The case would never go cold for him. Somehow he would find her, and Bernice would help him.

  There was a bizarre little laugh coming from her phone.

  “Oh... ya never do know, do ya?”

  The End

  Coming Soon...

  FEMUR

  in the

  Fieldstone

  Dairyland Murders Book 2

  by Chris Seaton Copyright 2011

  “Leave it to you to waste a perfectly decent day.” Darlene stood and breathed out loud, letting the cool breeze of September honor her with its presence.

  “Well, Lord forbid I actually get to enjoy it with you griping every five minutes,” Bernice returned. She poked the crowbar into the pile and twisted it into a small hole between the stones, working it until a decent sized boulder popped loose. The boulder reluctantly vacated the home it had occupied for decades and rumbled down the short slope onto the grassy ground. “No one held a gun to your head,” she added acidly.

  They looked like an odd couple doing an odd job. In the mid-morning sun two women of a certain age were perched on either side of a haphazard pile of roly-poly rocks. They were on the edge of a tree line that marked the boundary between two neglected fields.

  “Well, considering your track record for getting in trouble, I figured it'd be in my best
interest to make sure you didn't break nothin', messing around out here.” Darlene managed to palm a football sized rock in each hand and walk the short distance to the back of the pickup truck.

  Bernice did her best not to be jealous. After her brush with death a couple months earlier, her body just wasn't healing fast enough for her taste. Walking every day was helping with her ankles, but her back and ribs were being a lot more stubborn about getting with the program.

  “It's not messing around,” Bernice corrected her, grunting and gritting as she slowly pulled a smaller rock up to her chest. “It's taking advantage of an opportunity. Do you know how much these rocks would cost if I had to buy them? Mrs. Beaker is just giving them to us for free.” With a very unladylike, “Huvvv!” she heaved her prize into the protesting truck box.

  “What she's doing is taking advantage of the free labor so she doesn't have to pay someone to haul them off of this property.” Darlene picked up a couple more boulders and dropped them in. “You ask me, you might as well just go into town and get 'sucker' tattooed on your forehead.”

  Bernice stopped and leaned on the truck, frustrated and quickly losing her patience. “Look, I already confiscated every rock on the farm that I could find. It's still not enough hard scape for the new garden.” She held up her hand with a stern face, sensing an old objection. “I'm putting in this garden with or without your help, so put up or shut up.” She stomped back to her place on the pile, grumbling, “I know I'm not going to get both.”

  For quite a while after that, the task of moving the rocks from the pile to the truck was performed in silence. The tall, wheat colored weeds and wild flowers in the surrounding fields filled in the gap with swishing sounds when the wind disturbed them where they stood. They were in the twilight of their lives, tall and tippy, heavy with seed and waiting for their internal clock to tell them it was time.

  The plants were joined by the nuthatches, chickadees, and cedar waxwings that were populating the trees further down the strip from the rock pile. Their chatter and chirping came and went with the wind. They hopped quickly and covertly through the branches, scavenging whatever berries and bugs that could be found.