by Dakota Kahn
“I am in the zone!” Miguela shouted, louder than even the Universe of Fitness speakers that pounded the air with the most obnoxious Euro-beaty techno music in existence. Still excited, Miguela pointed to the display on her elliptical. “The fat burning zone! I can feel it!”
“Can you talk while burning fat?” I said.
Her entire expression changed, and she pulled out her earbuds with a violent gesture. She looked me straight in the eye.
“You just say I’m fat?” she said.
“No, I just… fat burning zone, you said.”
“I am a big woman. Every curve of me is more woman than most men can handle, huh? Fat, bah!” She reached down for her ear buds.
“Is Gerry Sparks man enough for your curves?” I said.
Pumping her thick legs on the machine that, however thick and industrial might not be enough for this woman, Miguela stared at me. She started to breathe heavily, then gave up her split attention, and shut off the machine.
She got off of it, and looked at me again. I seriously thought for a moment she was contemplating picking me up and throwing me through the plate glass that looked outside to the parking lot, where that little blonde instructor was leading a set of very tired, very unhappy looking people through what are called “burpies” but looked like elaborate self torture.
“Come on,” Miguela said, whispering right in my ear. I jumped - I hadn’t noticed her get that close.
Then she had me by one big, strong hand and was pulling me, none too gently, toward the bar at the center of the Universe of Fitness. Unfortunately, it was a juice bar, not the good kind, and I was about to have my second smoothie of the day.
“You cannot tell another soul about that,” Miguela said, staring ahead at the mirrored back of the bar, capturing sweat from her forehead and flicking it away from her. “If anyone knew…”
“That you were getting friendly with the opposition?” I said, filling my voice with as much dirty innuendo as it could carry.
“Ai, it’s not like that. It’s just… I’m not crazy against development, but the thought of a piece of Whispering Pines heritage going up in smoke, poof, to some outsider? Sepulvedas were in Crestgold when it started. I’ve got roots in California longer than any gringo,” she said, piling on an accent that I knew was completely unnatural to her. Miguela was completely of Spanish blood, 100% European stock. I’d even bet her brown eyes were from contacts, not nature, but I would never pry.
But she was also telling the truth. There were a number of founding families in Crestgold, and only a few of them stuck around to help found the new Whispering Pines on the ashes (or, rather, rubble) of the old. The Sepulvedas were one of them.
“Yes, I understand, believe it or not, being from a family with a history. And I definitely understand going out on your own, doing your own darn thing regardless of what anyone thinks. Even something as silly and potentially damaging to your future reputation as changing your name to Chica Sands and being an underwear model,” I said, getting through the words quickly enough that she didn’t punch me midway through.
Miguela stopped her sweat flicking and her pouty face and stared, open-mouthed, at me through the reflection. I couldn’t quite tell what was going on in the brain behind those eyes, and was afraid she was, yet again, figuring out whether or not she could throw me through glass.
“I’ve been talking to Sparks,” I said.
“He knew,” Miguela said, her voice very quiet. “So he came to me pretending to like me only to blackmail me later. And he’s using you to do it.”
Venom came into her voice, and I could feel those thoughts of quick violence against Kate deepening into something darker and more possible. Real revenge. I had to put a stop to this but quick.
“No, you’re reading this all wrong. First, I’m not a blackmailer. That’s gross. Second… I don’t think Sparks is, either.”
I didn’t add that I think he’s a creep who didn’t care about Miguela until he saw her underwear pictures, but that’s the sort of thing probably best discovered in the fullness of a relationship. And hell, for all I know Miguela might like a creep.
“Hmm,” she said, her eyes still lowered.
“Those were the pictures you took from that private eye. Spark’s private eye, at least at one time. But there was something else there, I caught a glimpse of it. A flier. And I want you to tell me what it said.”
“And why would I do that, girl? I don’t owe you a thing, and I don’t need any more of your nosing—”
“So that I don’t think you killed James Wendover. Because right now I believe that’s a possibility.”
“What?” she practically shrieked.
It wasn’t the subtle approach, but I was running out of time, patience, and, perhaps most important, confidence. I knew that I did not know, like definitively, who was responsible for Wendover’s death. So I had to start kicking hornet’s nests and poking sleeping bears and doing all kinds of stupid things, because I was on a deadline.
“You were with Sparks at that awful cafe on Forest, when you saw Wendover drive by, at midnight, heading toward the job site. You know Crestgold as well as anybody, you could have known a way to get to the ghost town secretly, and did James Wendover in to make sure your beloved Crestgold didn’t get turned into… a place more fit for Chica Sands than Miguela Sepulveda.”
Miguela was laughing, incredulously, I think, and shaking her head.
“What goes on in that mind of yours, girl? I saw him drive by, true, and I went right home and started making phone calls, organizing a protest for early in the morning. Which… didn’t go too well because everybody was asleep and nobody cares about this as much as I do. At least not at midnight,” she said, looking a little sheepish. “And that’s when I made up the flier and printed out a bunch of them. Then I heard what happened and I burnt them, but I missed one that the PI stole.”
I shook my head, not quite following. “Why would you burn the fliers?”
“Because… I’m not so bad with photoshop. And I had a picture of the gallows. And a picture of James Wendover. And I…” She put her hands together. I closed my eyes, shook my head.
Miguela wasn’t planning a murder and hiding the evidence. She was exemplifying extraordinarily bad taste, and trying to cover it up.
“Well, how was I to know that my picture would become what happened? It was a bad joke. No, not a joke. A solemn protest against a bad guy, with bad ideas. That gallows was so tasteless, so… ugly and stupid. But having those all over town right after he got hanged? Not the right image for the Society for Bettering Whispering Pines. And now I’ve got girl attorneys coming in here accusing me of murder just for… being enthusiastic.”
She rolled her eyes. I wanted to come back at her with something, save a bit of face, but I couldn’t come up with anything. This was the wrong tree for barking. And now… I was going to have to shamefacedly ask her for a ride into town, because otherwise I would be stuck here.
Chapter 17
I actually couldn’t work up the courage to ask Miguela for a ride (besides, she had to shower and somehow get that lycra off of her before going, and I’m on a deadline) but luck was, for the first time in what felt like many many moons, with me. Blake was heading out of the parking lot just as I was walking past it, and he honked at me.
“Need a lift, pilgrim?” he said.
“I’m not a pilgrim,” I said. “I’m an intrepid investigator out to right many wrongs, and yeah, I need a lift. But aren’t you under house arrest or on desk duty or whatever they do to cops who are out of line? Didn’t you have to turn in your badge and gun and go it alone as a vigilante on the streets, doing whatever it takes to catch your man?”
I slid into the passenger seat, and grinned at Blake. My grin faded in the face of his stony silence. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing, I’m just tired. And I’m not suspended or anything like that, but… it’s not fun getting a talking-to from your boss. The fact that noth
ing’s happening to me now doesn’t mean I’m off the hook. More like he’s biding his time. I’m taking you home,” he said, as if he’d just realized that himself.
Boy, Blake looked and sounded tired. He needed sleep, probably a snuggle, all kinds of fiancee attention I could not give at the moment. I was on my quest.
“You’re not going back out to the ghost town, are you?” I said, thinking about him out there, staring bleary eyed into the ravines. Even in the daylight it was dangerous.
“Yeah. There are teams hunting in the ravines, and they’re all manned up, I’m just going to back up Woody at the entrance, in case Rip doubles back. I wouldn’t want them to have to face each other mano y mano again. Woody might feel he had something to prove.”
I didn’t buy it. There was action and Blake didn’t like not being at the center of it. Even if he was half-dead on his feet. But I didn’t let my skepticism taint him. Besides, I had plenty of Kate stuff to worry about without getting Blake problems on my plate.
He could, I know, take care of himself. And if I wanted him to respect the notion that I could, too, there had to be some give and take there.
Even if he was wrong, wrong, wrong and should take a long nap to be ready for me tonight when I revealed the murderer to the whole town. Whoever the murderer was.
And that was my next job. Feather the psychic could wait, and Mr. Sparks would almost certainly not see me again today… I needed to go back to where my instincts were telling me I was needed.
“I need to go to the Whispering Pines Inn,” I told Blake.
He yawned.
What would have made sense was for Blake to drive me home, me get my car, and we go our separate ways to meet up later, all autonomous and fresh and ready to face the world on our own terms. But Blake was too tired to think straight, and I was busy trying to think of some new approach for Greene.
There was no real reason he should want to see me… but I had that little in now with his wife. Not much of an in, having seen her face on a workout video but it was something. And more of a something than I would let on with anyone else in the room.
“Um…” the receptionist said, with her hand over the receiver of the phone, looking at me with unmasked skepticism. Where the heck does Whispering Pines get these useless, condescending front desk people?
“They do not want to be disturbed this morning, except for an emergency.”
“Oh, this is an emergency,” I said, trying to look completely emergent. “Big one.”
“Who should I say is calling?”
It was like a scene in a movie, where a person was trying to get in the club, the bouncer saying, “Not on the list” without even checking.
“Tell her Kate Becker. We met yesterday, and I had some questions. About her workout,” I said, feeling very sly and smart.
“Workout,” the receptionist said, looking very skeptical.
Well, I don’t care, receptionist lady. I barge into people’s private affairs and uncover mysteries. You talk to people on the phone and look skeptical at pretty young attorneys. We both have our jobs to do, now do yours.
“Uh, okay.” She dialed, her expression already saying, “Sorry, no, go away” to me before the phone answered. “Hi, Mrs. Greene, I have a Kate Becker here asking about you. Says she met you yesterday. And then she said something about a workout.”
The receptionist held the phone away from her ear while Mrs. Greene apparently cackled loudly into her receiver. A few seconds later, she listened, nodding, looking very upset.
“Yeah, she’ll see you,” the receptionist (whose name tag I studiously did not read, and whose name I shall never learn) said, looking like she was very disappointed that she could help.
Two minutes later, I had barely knocked on the door before Mrs. Greene opened it and was pulling me in.
“You had the look,” she said, her demeanor almost completely changed from the day before. Then, sitting across from Mr. Mean Greene, she was demur and quiet. Now she had the twinkle in her eye (and the uncovered, impressive bicep) of a woman used to shouting at a crowd of sweaty people that they weren’t trying hard enough, and there were just 5 more, and you can do it.
“Well, it’s just that you don’t think you’re going to meet somebody you’ve seen on TV so many times. But, gosh, it wasn’t until this morning that it popped into my head just who you were. But you… your workout was super important to me. Through a bad patch.”
If you would prefer I were lying, just believe that and skip down to where we start talking again. For anyone who won’t think less of me by knowing the truth…
When I was 23 and alone in San Francisco I had a whirlwind relationship with a slightly older man, details about which go with me to the grave. But when it ended, and it ended badly, I felt awful. I felt old (which was stupid) ugly, (stupider) and fat (which… I’ve lost 10 pounds since then, which isn’t a lot. I was just sad, okay?) And I thought no-one would ever want to look at me again, particularly when I wasn’t covered up like an Eskimo. Or Inuit.
Maybe I found Mrs. Greene’s video. Maybe I bought it and watched it 6 dozen times and danced around to her (I know now) rather suspect workout routines. Did they make me look good in my underwear? Well, put a ring on my finger and maybe you’ll find out.
Did it make me feel better? Let Mrs. Greene tell it:
“So many women have told me even if they couldn’t get as fit as their body’s complete potential, they just felt so much better after working through it. And you look like you did better than most,” she said grabbing me and giving me a twirl. One that I couldn’t resist if I wanted to. Mrs. Greene was strong.
“But your name wasn’t Greene then.”
“Oh, no, it was before Claire introduced me to Lawrence. I was Xena Matrov. It says Matrovsky on my birth certificate, but I didn’t want it to sound so Russian. Oh, we had fun in those times,” she said, tilting her head back and laughing. I guess I was with her back then, and remembered the fun because I laughed too. Who knows, maybe all the twirling me around was making me a bit manic.
“Claire?”
“Claire. Wendover. She’s a Matrovsky, too, though we’re only cousins. Close cousins, I like to think. She married James and introduced me to Lawrence and we all came together and made Wendover Amusements. I don’t do any of the business stuff, though. My baby’s enough business to handle,” she said.
“The thing is, I was dying to come and say hi to you while you’re in town,” I said. “Remembering who you are and all.”
“I don’t look so different, do I? I haven’t gotten that much older?” she said, and winced a little, but it was a playful wince. With a playful tone, not nearly as self-absorbed as the words might sound. She didn’t seem to mind getting older one bit. “I’ve been thinking about making a new video, ‘How to Look Good in Maternity Clothes’” she said, grinning, and just on cue her little girl stumbled into the room, fell flat on her face, and burst into tears.
Xena (I did not realize that was her name - what an odd thing to not remember) made one of those noises that comes with motherhood, where she managed to laugh at her kid falling and make a soothing cooing “mama’s here” sound all at once. She grabbed the suddenly screaming toddler and lifted her up off the floor.
She had just started her second round of truly piercing screaming when another, louder sound bellowed from further inside the hotel suite.
“Will you keep her quiet? I’m trying to rest!”
Lawrence Greene’s voice didn’t quite shake the windows, but it shook me to the point I was afraid to make a peep.
Xena gave me an apology smile.
“He’s not been well. None of us have, of course. It’s been terrible. This whole ordeal…” She cooed a bit more at her child, then smiled at me. “Have they caught that guy—”
“Rip? Not as far as I’ve heard. I was just at the sheriff station, and they looked hard at work.”
“But you don’t think he did it?” she said, her tone gett
ing a little distant, like she was trying to put some space between me and what I might say.
“I don’t know what to think,” I said, being truthful (if not truthfully answering her question.) “And what I think isn’t all that important to anyone anymore. I mean, in an official capacity.”
Xena sat down at the nearby table with the kid, Maybell, I remember her being called in the restaurant, who was still crying but putting less of an effort into it. It was more of a cry for show than in anything earnest. I sat down next to Xena, and looked Maybell in the face, trying to raise a smile. She was snotty, and her forehead was a little red where she bumped it, but she had all her parts and none of them were spurting blood.
“I thought you were a lawyer,” Xena said, carefully. The girl fussed in her hands, looking over her shoulder for something, studiously not looking at me.
“Yes, very much so. Just whose lawyer is in dispute at the moment. Um, but I’m still interested in what happens for the town. And what happens tonight. Do you have any inside scoop on what’s going down?” I tried to sound conversational, not at all like I was fishing for anything.
“No, no. I don’t put any of my head into that business. Sign a few checks, and watch James and Larry spin it into gold,” she said trying to get a pacifier into her child.
Nothing doing, Maybell was reaching for something that wasn’t there, and she couldn’t understand why it wasn’t there.
“Monkey,” she said.
“Oh, you lost your monkey,” Xena said.
“I don’t understand,” I said.
“A toy monkey. Well, like a little figure, really. I don’t know where she got it from.”
“No, what you said. You sign the checks?” I said.
“Oh… well… I don’t know if I’m supposed to talk about that. Trade secrets and everything,” she said, and smiled again with a look that said, sorry, toots. Not getting anything out of me.
“I’m sorry Larry sounds under the weather,” I said, still trying to sound natural but not making a good job of it. I think I’d put the lady on her guard now, because all she wanted to do was look for a monkey.