by Tonya Kappes
“I don’t think it’s a good idea to go looking now.” Abby’s knee bounced up and down. “I’d just really like to get back so I can go home.”
“I need to find the motorhome,” I told her and pulled the car off to the side of the road. “I don’t have video cameras at the campground. If I don’t find that motorhome, I’ll have to file bankruptcy because my insurance will go up and I can’t afford that right now.”
It was humiliating having to tell her that, and my soul felt defeated. It was hard for me to accept any sort of failure, but she needed to know exactly the reason for my drive to find it.
“I thought the campground was doing great.” Abby looked at me for an explanation.
“It’s doing well. I have been pouring any extra money into continuing to build it up. I figured I’d have some time before something disastrous happened.” I gnawed on the edge of my lip. “Obviously, I was wrong.”
It was true. I had used any extra money from the camper rentals, lot rentals, and prepaid future guests to continually make improvements to the campground. It wasn’t cheap getting more laundry machines, fixing up the recreation building, keeping the lake clean with the new aeration system, updating the campers to today’s standards, etc.
“Mae, you’ve got to be kidding me? All the social media work I’ve been doing for free is going to go down the tubes?” Abby gave me a blank look.
“Not necessarily. I’m sure someone will buy the campground.” A week didn’t go by without someone contacting me to buy the place and take it off my hands.
“Yeah, people who want to make Normal a mini-Gatlinburg,” she groaned, melting her body into the seat. “We don’t need all that traffic.” She was talking about the tourist city in Tennessee that used to be a hiking trail through the Great Smoky Mountains that was now littered with places like Ripley’s Believe It or Not, The Cheesecake Factory, pancake houses, and outlet malls. “Go on.” She pointed back to the road.
“Thank you,” I said with a grateful heart. “We might not find it there, but I’m going to try really hard to find it.”
“What does it look like?” she asked, taking out her phone.
“It’s base color is cream. There are several brown and orange stripes along the side. It’s a motorhome, so there’s a driving part up front and a sleeping part on top with windows.” I did my best to describe it from memory.
“Hashtag motorhome stolen in hashtag Normal,” Abby recited everything I had described, adding a hashtag before every word and only stopping when she gestured that I needed to turn. “Is there a reward?” she asked.
“I’ve not thought about it.” It did seem like a good idea.
“How much money do you have?” she asked, pointing for me to turn down a narrow gravel road.
“It doesn’t matter.” I slammed the brakes, bringing the car to a sudden halt.
Both of us stared out the front windshield at the big cream motorhome.
“Is that it?” Abby asked, looking for confirmation.
“Yes.” I jerked the gear shift into park and opened the door.
“Oh, no.” Abby sat straight up. “This time we are calling Hank first.”
“No, we aren’t.” I slammed the door.
“Yes, we are!” Abby jumped out of the car and fumbled with her phone. “Greaser might have an accomplice that could be in there. Dying today wasn’t on my To Do list.”
“It’s fine.” I waved her to follow me.
“It’s not fine.” She kicked an empty beer can. “Do you think Greaser drank all this beer by himself?”
There were six cases of empty beer cans thrown all over the ground in front of the motorhome.
“I’m going in.” I have no idea where my confidence came from, but adrenaline was pumping through my veins, making me make decisions that probably weren’t in my best interest. Before I even thought about what I was doing, I curled my hand around the motorhome door handle and opened the door.
“Hello? Police. I’ve got a gun!” I yelled into the motorhome. A big lie, but they didn’t know that. “Is anyone in here?” I peeked inside and saw legs on the floor, coming out from under the kitchen table.
“Well?” Abby was as close to me as she could be without being piggyback.
“I see feet,” I whispered and watched to see if there was any movement. “I hope they aren’t dead.”
“Let me see,” Abby shoved me out of the way and walked right up the steps into the motorhome. “Davey Bass! Is that you?” I heard her say once she was inside. “Your mama and daddy would be ashamed.”
From her tone, I knew it wasn’t a dangerous situation, so I went inside, delighted to see there didn’t appear to be any damage, although I hadn’t seen what it looked like before. I did see the computer area Barbara had talked about and it looked just fine.
“Davey Bass, you get up from there!” Abby continued to yell at the boy.
He groaned and rolled a few times, expelling a smell that should never come from a human.
“Are you drunk?” Abby continued to badger the poor kid. “How did you get this motorhome?”
“Stole it,” he grumbled and belched before mumbling a few more words.
“You stole it?” Abby asked him. “You better sit up right now.”
We took a few steps back as his body began to wiggle about. When he finally did come from out underneath the kitchen table, he looked an awful mess. His hair was sticking up all over the place. There was what appeared to be vomit on the high school letter jacket with his name and archery badges.
“Did you interact with Greaser?” Abby asked, trying to understand how the Bass boy got in the motorhome with Greaser.
“Who?” His head swayed side to side, his eyes closed.
“Who did you get this motorhome from?” She asked again.
Once again, he said, “Stole it from campground.”
I bent down. My toes curled from the stink rolling off of the kid.
“Hi, I’m the owner of the campground and I need to know if you and Greaser stole this motorhome.” I tried to talk to him as calmly and clear as I could, but Abby was talking over me about how his parents were good, churchgoing people who were going to be very disappointed.
“My parents were going to battle. . .” he rolled his finger in the air. “Friends. Joy ride.” He smiled. His head did circles before his eyes bolted open. “I’m going to puke.” He shoved me out of the way. He made it to the door of the motorhome just in time to hang out the door and vomit.
“Kick him out!” I called to Abby as I made my way to the cab of the motorhome where the keys were dangling from the ignition.
“What?” Abby’s face contorted. “I’m not going to do that,” she protested. “I’m going to call his mama and daddy right now. They can come get him.”
“Fine, do that. Then drive my car back to the campground.” I turned the motorhome on. “I’m taking this baby back to where it belongs and not going bankrupt.”
“Mae West, you’ve lost your ever loving mind. Don’t you want to file a report that it was stolen?” she asked a very good question that I did not have the time to consider. “That’s what Hank would want you to do.”
“I’ll worry about that and what Hank would want me to do later.” I put the car in drive. “I’m going now. I’ll see you after you do whatever you need to do with that kid.”
Abby grunted a few groans and muttered something under her breath as she realized I was going to leave with or without her. She gave me one more disappointed look before she left the motorhome and took Davey with her.
Twelve
The motorhome needed a front end alignment, or maybe I was going a little faster than a motorhome should, but I was on a mission to return Frank and Barbara’s home on wheels before any sort of insurance claim was filed and Happy Trails was taken away from me.
I reached over for my cell when I realized I’d left it and my purse in my car back at Kissing Point with Abby and the drunk Bass boy. She was ri
ght in that I probably should’ve called Hank, but it wasn’t in my nature to change tracks to do the right thing when I was on a mission, especially a mission to save my livelihood. Besides, the campground wasn’t far and while Frank and Barbara were checking out their place to make sure it was okay, which it appeared to be, I would call Hank then. After I called Ken, my insurance man, that is.
“What on earth?” The flashing red and white lights from a Daniel Boone National Park’s forest ranger truck caught my eye in the rearview mirror. “Great,” I groaned and veered to the side with a tiny bit of hope he wasn’t pulling me over. “This is the last thing I need.”
That hope crashed and burned when he pulled up behind me.
“Get out of the motorhome with your hands up!” The ranger was screaming over his loud speaker from inside of his truck.
“What?” I twisted around and to look through the motorhome and out the window in the back. “What did he say?” I asked myself as though I was going to answer and shifted my gaze to the side mirror attached to the driver’s side door.
“Get out of the car with your hands up!” This time he’d opened his door and his head was sticking out of the truck between the opened door and the roof. “I said…”
I wasn’t sure what he said after that. All I knew was that he had his gun sticking straight towards the motorhome and I knew I should’ve listened to Abby about calling Hank.
“I’m out!” I yelled with my hands raised above my head. “I know I was speeding, but I need to get this motorhome. . .” I tried to explain.
I couldn’t even get out the rest of my sentence.
“Stop talking!” He yelled from the truck. “Is anyone else in the vehicle?”
“No.” I shook my head and started to lower my arms.
“Keep your arms up in the air!” he yelled, making me jerk my arms up.
“Okay. Fine!” I yelled, but he didn’t seem to care. He kept his gun on me while he talked into his phone. He was too far back for me to hear what he was saying, but I did hear the sirens. “Thank goodness,” I sighed, knowing Hank was on the way.
When several other ranger trucks pulled up, I became increasingly worried. Hank’s big black car was nowhere to be seen.
“Lay on the ground!” one of them ordered me with his gun trained on me. “Lay on the ground with your nose touching the pavement now!”
I gulped and did exactly what he said.
I grimaced as four of them swooped in on me, grabbing my wrists and flinging my hands behind my back. In nanoseconds, they hoisted me up by the cuffs and dragged me to one of their trucks while reading me my rights.
“You are under arrest for stealing this motorhome. . .” was all I heard.
“I can explain,” I continued to say over and over.
“Save it!” screamed one ranger.
“I’m Hank Sharp’s girlfriend,” I said, right before he shoved me in the back of one of the Jeeps.
He hesitated when he heard that.
“I’m Hank’s girlfriend and I own the Happy Trails Campground where the motorhome was stolen from…” I started to say, but he slammed the door shut on my explanation.
He got in the front seat and picked up a clipboard. He wrote a few things down and then peered into the rearview mirror.
“Hank Sharp doesn’t have a girlfriend.” His shoulders jiggled as he laughed.
“Yes, he does.” What did he mean by that? “Did he tell you that?” I was now more concerned about Hank not telling anyone about me. “We’re together. You’ll see.”
I huffed and sat back into the seat. Once they took me to the station, I knew I could prove this guy wrong.
He threw the police Jeep in gear, did a U-Turn in the middle of the road, and headed back towards the station, which was on the other side of town. I wasn’t sure what I was madder about, the fact this guy thought I stole the motorhome or the fact that Hank hadn’t told anyone about us.
Granted, Hank was now full time at the sheriff’s department in Normal and his life as a ranger was over. So maybe these guys didn’t know. But their offices were in the same building. On the other hand, some of the rangers did just hang around the Daniel Boone National Park offices.
No matter, I was still devastated that Hank hadn’t ever mentioned me. Ever.
“Don’t try any funny business,” he warned when he opened the back door of the Jeep once we’d pulled into the Normal Police Station.
“Don’t worry.” I swung my legs out and let him guide the rest of me out of the Jeep with his grip on my cuffs.
“Mae, is that you?” Agnes Swift asked through the sliding glass window of the police station. Her saggy jowls frowned.
“Hi, Agnes,” I snorted and shrugged. “I think I’m in a little bit of trouble or at least this guy thinks I am.”
The ranger didn’t even look at me. He stood at the window and filled out some paperwork before even acknowledging Hank’s Granny.
“She needs to be placed in the tank until she can be questioned about the motorhome she stole. We’ve already read her her rights, so she should call her lawyer.” He handed the paperwork to Agnes through the window opening.
“She doesn’t need a lawyer.” Agnes shoved her pen in her short gray hair and jumped off her stool that was butted up to the window.
The door between the entrance of the station and the inside of the station flung open. Agnes might’ve been in her eighties, but she was full of spunk and spice that made me jealous.
“Bring her in here and get those off her.” She waved me and the ranger in.
“Ma’am, this is official business and you need to realize this is the woman who helped Greaser escape.” He was dead serious.
“Greaser is dead,” Agnes said with a flat voice. “She didn’t steal no motorhome, the Bass boy did. He’s in the drunk tank. Someone has already brought him in.”
“Abby?” I asked and looked around. She wasn’t there, but I saw Julip sitting in one of the chairs along the back wall where they sit you before they interview you. She was leaning over the empty chair next to her talking to someone in a police uniform two seats away.
“Your little librarian friend.” Agnes nodded. She smacked the ranger’s hand. “Get them off her.”
“I’m gonna need some reassurance from Hank.” His tone was a bit shaky, like he wasn’t sure if he should be disrespecting Agnes.
I had to give him credit because she wasn’t backing down.
“Fine.” She grabbed the keys from his belt, snapping them off. “I’ll do it.”
“Ma’am, give me back my keys!” He raised his hands in the air, letting go of me.
While he and Agnes did a little dance, with my hands still cuffed behind my back, I headed over to the empty chair between Julip and the other person, who I thought was a woman, but I wasn’t sure.
“What on earth have you done?” Julip asked.
“Not a thing. I found that motorhome at the Kissing Point. It’s all because of you telling me people hide out there that I won’t go bankrupt. I owe you.” I went on to tell her how I’d gotten stopped by the police since they’d set up road blocks all over the national park and how they thought I was helping out Greaser. “You know, the serial killer.”
“I don’t know him, but I’m here because they’re interviewing everyone involved with the reenactment.” She tapped her feet on the ground nervously. “I’ve never been in a police station before. That’s Blanche Davis,” she whispered and gestured to the person next to me.
A woman.
“Who is that?” I whispered.
“She’s the security guard that the serial killer knocked down.” Julip’s brows wiggled.
“I thought she was a cop with her uniform.” I leaned back and glanced at Blanche with my peripheral vision. I wanted to jerk my head around and look at her, but I figured that would be impolite. I wanted to see her bruised up hand from trying to get the Billy club back from Greaser.
She didn’t have a single femini
ne way about her whatsoever. Her hair was almost as short as a buzz cut.
“Afternoon,” said Blanche with pinched lips and a solid head nod when she me looking at her.
I guess I wasn’t as smooth as I thought I was.
“Hi there,” I said with a sweet smile. “I hear you’re the guard Greaser knocked down,” my mouth blurted out, my eyes looking down at her hands.
I’m not sure if it was because she had beefy hands or if enough time had passed, but she sure didn’t appear to have any bruises or scratches on her hands. Well, at least I couldn’t see any from where I was sitting.
“Mmmhmm, I guess I’ll never live that down.” She rolled her eyes. “But I’m glad he’s dead,” she said in a low voice, looking over me at Julip and then around the room. “Of course, I can’t say that too loud.”
I wiggled in my seat hoping I’d be getting these cuffs off soon since the park ranger was walking over with keys in his hand and Agnes on his heels.
“You are going to stay here in her custody until all of this gets straightened out. You understand?” he asked with furrowed brows.
I nodded, keeping my mouth shut for once so I wouldn’t get myself into any more trouble than he already thought I was in.
I scooted up on the edge of the chair, giving him space to unlock the cuffs. Once my hands were free, I rotated my fists and rubbed out the indentations the metal had left in my skin. My arms ached from being up in the air while they searched the motorhome to make sure there were no more criminals in there. Now I wished I had been going to Jazzercise with Queenie. My arms probably wouldn’t be aching as much.
“Mae don’t be going and stealing anything in here,” Agnes snickered and turned around. “I’ll let Hank know you’re here.”
“Hank Sharp?” Julip asked.
“Yes. He’s my boyfriend.” I smiled with pride and looked over at Blanche to see if she’d heard my conversation, but she was too busy fiddling with her cell phone.
“Really?” There was a look of surprise on Julip’s face. “I had no idea he had a girlfriend.”
“Seriously?” I questioned and made a mental note that Hank and I needed to be seen a lot more in public. “We’ve been dating a few months now.”