by Sandra Balzo
'That's different. The Lux is mountain, as are the other private rentals. Discriminating guests, if they wanted to lodge on the lake itself, had to come here.'
'Except those who stayed at the White Tail Lodge, back in the day.'
'I said "discriminating".' Sheree growled. 'Now there are condos — one and two bedrooms, with kitchens — right in Hart's Landing. "Where the mountains meet the lake and the finest in shopping, dining and entertainment are right outside your door."'
Sheree said the last as if she was parroting a booming-voiced television announcer. Or Dickens Hart. AnnaLise had to see this place for herself. It sounded... well, it sounded wonderful.
She felt like a traitor for even having the thought. If the new development was all it was trumpeted to be, Hart's Landing could well sound the death knell for not only Sheree's Inn, but all of Main Street.
Including Torch and Mama Philomena's. 'What kind of rest―'
But Sheree was preoccupied with the housing. 'Dr. Stanton's already bought three of the condos. He's living in one, Tucker in another, and I understand he's renting the third to that Ichiro guy.'
'Bobby Bradenham's business partner?' As if there could be more than one 'Ichiro' in a town the size of Sutherton.
'Yeah.' Sheree slowed down. A good man could do that to a woman. 'You've met him?'
'Bobby introduced us this morning. Nice guy.'
'Handsome guy. Those eyes are to kill for.' A thought seemed to strike Sheree. 'Hey, speaking of which, did you hear that bastard Rance Smoaks finally got what he deserved?'
'Speaking of killing, you mean?'
'Well, yeah.' Sheree slowed down another notch. A dead man can do that to you, too. 'Though it sounds kind of harsh when you put it that way.'
AnnaLise didn't point out that she hadn't put it any way. 'It should. There's a difference between wanting someone dead and doing it.'
'Yeah. Courage.'
At a loss for what to say to that sociopathic revelation, AnnaLise settled for, 'What's he been doing since he lost his position as police chief?'
'Drinking.' Sheree said. 'Honestly, I don't know how Kathleen and he have managed to keep their place on the lake this long. It must be mortgaged up the ying-yang.'
'Certainly is a lot of house.'
Sheree shrugged. 'Familiar small-town tradition. Rance was a Smoaks and so the "good ole boys" down at the bank let him borrow more than he could afford.'
'I never understood the Smoaks' mystique,' AnnaLise said. 'Rance's nephew River was in our class, remember? Girls were always ga-ga over him.'
'For one thing, he was the only eighth-grader old enough to have a driver's license.'
'And need a razor.'
'Even without being held back three times, he'd have been shaving. The male Smoaks practically come out of the womb with dark beards.'
'And the females, big boobs,' AnnaLise agreed.
'Maybe that's the allure,' Sheree said. 'The whole family is hyper-sexual. They exude pheromones.'
Luring the unwitting. 'Poor Kathleen.'
'Actually, lucky Kathleen. Believe it or not, Rance's father might have been a Smoaks, but his mother was Nanney Estill.'
'Estill? Like the road?' Estill Trail was a major route on the other side of the interstate.
'Like the trail. And the mall. Even the golf course,' Sheree said. 'The Estills, my girl, have real money.'
Smarts, too — at least enough to divorce Rance's father. Though, admittedly, Nanney Estill had married Roy in the first place.
'Are you saying some of the Estill estate came to Rance?' That might explain why Kathleen and Rance seemed to feel they could live beyond their means. 'I didn't realize Rance and his mother were close.'
'You kidding? Nanney wanted nothing to do with her husband Roy after the divorce. Or Rance.'
'Her own son?'
'We are talking about Rance Smoaks, remember?'
True. 'But―'
'Anyway,' Sheree continued, 'Nanney married against her family's wishes and apparently it didn't take long for her to see the error of her ways.'
'Meaning her family disowned her.'
'I couldn't say.'
Which meant Sheree could, but wouldn't. A rare show of restraint. AnnaLise tried to pick up the threads of the story.
'So Nanney divorced Roy and functionally abandoned little Rance,' — who'd once set the middle school on fire — 'yet left him money when she died?'
'Not on purpose, silly.' Sheree was preoccupied with a rough fingernail. 'Apparently, there was this insurance policy she'd forgotten.'
'With her son being her nearest relation and therefore her beneficiary, unless she stipulated otherwise.'
'Bingo,' Sheree said. 'And now it all goes to his widow. I understand it's a bundle.'
'Lucky' Kathleen, indeed. A little too lucky? 'Are you sure she lacks... "courage", as you put it?'
'Oh, yeah. Kathleen didn't kill him.' Sheree gave up on the nail. 'Apparently he was out shooting with a friend.'
'Smoaks had a friend?'
'Of sorts. Joe Palooka.'
'You're kidding.' But AnnaLise knew that while Joe Palooka was a joke, he was a sad one. Born with the distinguished name of Stewart Chapel, going overboard on alcohol and food had turned the man into a caricature — an overinflated, misshapen punching bag that had gone way too many rounds. But a man who, like the old balloon that was his nick-namesake, kept popping back up for more punishment. Especially from fair-weather friends like Rance Smoaks. Fair-weather, meaning anytime there was no one else available.
'Where were they shooting?'
'At Rance's lake house. Trying to hit liquor bottles at twenty feet.'
'Let me guess, Rance was drinking straight from one such.'
'No, but close. The way I heard it, he'd set up a row of empties on the dock so they could shoot toward the lake and not hurt anyone.'
'Safety first. I'm impressed.'
'Yeah, except one bottle wasn't quite empty. Rance leaned over the line of them to remedy the situation and...'
'Joe didn't see him?' Lovely. Drunken target-shooting.
A shrug. 'It was dark.'
Night-time drunken target-shooting? Doubly lovely. 'And Rance just toppled into the lake?'
'Seems so. Joe's not absolutely clear on the sequence of events.'
Poor, pathetic Joe Palooka. With friends like Rance...
But speaking of friends, AnnaLise checked her wristwatch. 'Gotta go. I'll catch you tonight at Sal's.'
'You still wear a watch? I use my cellphone to tell time.'
AnnaLise was standing. 'I use a watch to tell time and a cell to make calls. So sue me.'
Sheree was tsk-tsking as she followed her to the door. 'And I suppose you still have a camera, too.'
'With actual film inside, believe it or not.' AnnaLise turned. 'Call me old-fashioned, but what's wrong with that? Look at Mama's: the clunky cash register, the cushioned booths, the comfort food. That's why we love it.'
'Maybe that's why you love it. I love the view.'
'The view?'
'Sure. The lake, the beach and the bodies.' Sheree Pepper held open the door and shrugged. 'You know what they say: "eventually, every body comes home to Mama's."'
Chapter Six
Sheree and her 'Pepperisms'. Though prone to the sweeping overstatement and occasional outright lie, she'd been accurate this time.
Things did come home to roost on Main Street. Or, more specifically, on the public beach across from Mama's, where the constant Lake Sutherton currents deposited everything from wayward flip-flops to sodden advertising flyers blown off the mailboat.
Bodies, at least the human variety, were still infrequent. In fact, AnnaLise had long maintained that Sutherton's widespread reputation for bizarre accidents and untimely deaths was greatly exaggerated.
However, she did concede her having trouble convincing people of that in the future, given Daisy's recent phlebotomy flub and Rance Smoaks's even more recent actual
demise.
Passing the cinched waist of Lake Sutherton's figure-8, AnnaLise slowed her Mitsubishi Spyder convertible so as not to miss the turn-off for White Tail Island. Especially since Daisy, in the passenger's seat, was hanging her head out past the windshield, eyes closed, but otherwise enjoying the breeze like a cooped-up collie.
Good thing the top wasn't down or Mother Griggs would be standing up like a beauty queen in the homecoming parade. Not that AnnaLise would mind. She'd been both delighted and relieved when Daisy agreed to make the short trip with her.
Approaching by water, the fifty-acre island dominated Lake Sutherton's smaller northern loop, but from the road, it never seemed that obvious. AnnaLise needn't have worried about overshooting her mark, though. Always low-key and increasingly overgrown since the lodge had closed, entry to the island was now boldly announced by massive brick pillars, anchoring an overhead wrought-iron banner reading 'Hart's Landing'.
As AnnaLise made the turn, a large 'Phase One' sign appeared, 'Fully Occupied!' slashed across it. The next placard read, 'Phase Two — Coming Soon!' And the third, 'Pre-construction Prices — Better Act Now!'
'Burma-Shave,' Daisy piped up, eyes now wide open. 'You know, this little car makes an awful racket for its size.'
'There's a hole in the muffler, which I'll have fixed when I get back to Wisconsin. But what did you say about Burma?'
'Burma-Shave. The cream became famous because of an advertising campaign that I think started all the way back in the 1920s and ran into the Sixties. The company used a series of roadside signs that sort of interconnected. I don't remember everything clearly, but your Grandma Kuchenbacher would recite them whenever we went on a driving vacation.'
'Signs? Like billboards, you mean?' AnnaLise glanced over at her mother, who was smiling nostalgically.
'No, smaller. Only a couple of words on each sign and then the last one would always read 'Burma-Shave'. Grandma's favorite chant was "Does your husband Misbehave? Grunt and grumble Rant and rave? Shoot the brute some / Burma-Shave."'
'I love it!' AnnaLise was giggling. 'Tell me more.'
'I wish I could,' Daisy said. 'I should have written them all down back then. Now, I've forgotten most of what your Grandma told me and when I'm gone...' She shrugged and left it there.
'Maybe you should keep journals, like I do,' said AnnaLise. Then, more sternly, 'That way, when you're gone in another thirty or forty years, I'll be able to pass the family lore on to my kids.'
'Best find a husband first.'
'Well, that's not very forward-thinking of you,' AnnaLise said, glancing over. 'I don't need a husband to—'
'Speaking of forward-thinking,' Daisy interrupted, 'watch where you're going. Here's the bridge.'
The car bumped onto the wooden span, which to AnnaLise's surprise hadn't been updated like the entry. Luckily the distance from shore to island wasn't more than twenty feet. If you looked back as you reached the other side, you could just catch a glimpse of the Bradenham house through the trees.
'And soon,' said Daisy.
'Soon what?'
'The husband and children. Have to regale them with our family stories before you forget what you remember of what I remember. Though God knows that's not much anymore.'
AnnaLise threw her mother a startled look. Was Daisy aware of her memory blips? 'Everyone forgets things.'
It was a backhanded way to approach the subject, and AnnaLise was rewarded by an equally vague answer. 'Perhaps.'
Then her mother seemed to think for a moment. 'You mentioned journaling. I've been mulling this blogging thing on the Internet. Seems that way I'd have a record of what I did, of what happened to me. And you would, too.'
Was Daisy considering a blog as a tool to train her memory? Or to remind herself when it failed?
Or... both?
'Sure, but remember blogging is for public consumption. Journaling, you can keep private.' Before AnnaLise could follow-up further, they wheeled into Hart's Landing. It was a little like that scene in The Wizard of Oz, when Dorothy steps out of the cyclone-blown house.
'We're not in Sutherton anymore, Toto,' AnnaLise said out loud.
'More like New England.' Daisy was trying to peer three-sixty out of the convertible's windows as they turned into a parking space. 'Federalist, maybe?'
'Maybe.' AnnaLise turned off the engine and climbed out to look around. 'Red brick, white trim, blue-gray shutters. It's pretty, but not exactly High Country North Carolina.'
Daisy joined her. 'Though I'm not sure what even that is anymore. Sutherton's getting to be like any other town. People come from all over and they bring their influences.'
'Change,' said AnnaLise, disapproval audible even to her own ear. 'Bah humbug,' she threw in for good measure.
'AnnaLise Marie Griggs. You sound more like eighty-two than twenty-eight.'
'Just because I want things to stay the way I remember them?'
'They can't. And even if they did, your memories would change.' Daisy was staring south across the lake, toward Main Street. 'Take it from me.'
'The hell I will!'
The words hadn't come from AnnaLise, but from around the corner. The voice sounded like Joy Tamarack's and it was joined by others, also raised. Thinking her friend might be in trouble. AnnaLise signaled Daisy to stay where she was.
Hart's Landing consisted of three, long four-story buildings forming a squared horseshoe, the opening facing the mountains. As AnnaLise traced the sidewalk from the parking lot, the center of the landing came into view — a town square, of sorts, complete with gazebo bandstand. Though mostly still empty, the first floors appeared designated for retail, with residential apartments above.
Three people were standing on the sidewalk, arguing. A lot of noise for such a small group. As AnnaLise got closer, she recognized Dickens Hart. He stood only about five foot nine and had to be in his late sixties, but he still had the looks and bearing that had attracted Joy and countless others. Dark hair, now salt-and-pepper. Deep brown eyes.
Sort of a pocket Sean Connery.
Joy was standing toe-to-toe with him, obviously angry, though AnnaLise couldn't yet make out individual words. The third person, staying to the side and seeming to listen intently, was the father of the family AnnaLise had seen leaving Mama's restaurant that morning. Presumably David Santino — the developer Bobby had mentioned.
AnnaLise was about to retreat to save everyone embarrassment, when an apartment window quietly slid closed above the trio. It might as well have sounded like a thunderclap for the reaction it elicited. The three people sprang apart as Daisy rounded the corner, too, joining AnnaLise.
Dickens Hart was the first to catch sight of mother and daughter.
Since it now would be more rude to turn tail and run, they walked up to the group.
'AnnaLise,' said Hart. 'It's been a long time. Can I hope you're moving back to town? Maybe looking for a nice place to live?' He swept his hand toward the buildings. 'It's a prime time to buy in.'
'Unless you're me, of course.' This from Joy. Somehow, without AnnaLise noticing, Sabatino had disappeared.
Like James Duende, entering the Sutherton Inn as a silent shadow.
'I said buy in,' Hart snapped. Then he apologetically addressed Daisy. 'I'm sorry. Family squabble. You know how it is.'
'Ex-family,' Joy snarled.
'Family stays family. Forever.'
A life sentence. The way Hart said it made AnnaLise very glad she wasn't related to him. And, despite Daisy and Mama's gossiping, she dearly hoped Bobby Bradenham wasn't either.
AnnaLise had been very young when she first heard the term 'womanizer'. Her father had been talking about Dickens Hart, and though AnnaLise hadn't known what the word meant, she knew it wasn't a good thing to be. Growing up, AnnaLise had always kept her distance.
'The subject of family reminds me,' Hart continued, turning to AnnaLise. 'I was going to email you on your newspaper's website.'
'You were?' Granted, AnnaLi
se was a reporter, but on an urban daily newspaper nearly eight hundred miles away. What possible good could she do Hart? 'Why?'
'I'd like to publish my memoirs. I've been piecing together notes and journal entries. I'm looking for someone to help me with the project.'
'In what way?'
He looked puzzled. 'To collaborate. You know, in the writing of it.'
'You want me to collaborate on your autobiography? I'm a journalist not a... a book author.' God help her, she'd almost said 'novelist'. But in truth, what better way to blur the line between fact and fiction than for a journalist to help an egomaniac twist his memoirs?
'I've read your work,' Hart persisted, looking her straight in the eye. 'And while I've interviewed a couple of highly-recommended ghostwriters, I really need someone who knows both the High Country and Sutherton's place in it. To make things simpler.'
And probably cheaper for him. Which meant that the best way to say 'no' would be to quote a fee so high Hart would have to be an idiot to agree. Like a bluff bet in poker.
'Well, thank you for thinking of me,' AnnaLise said, glancing over at Daisy. 'I'm afraid, though, that I'm very busy right now and I couldn't possibly take on something of this magnitude for less than a hundred thousand, upfront, whether we're the only ones who ever read it or not.'
Hart's mouth opened.
Better up the ante. 'And I'd want fifty-percent of any advances and royalties from the publisher if the book is accepted, of course.'
'Umm...'
'Before agent commissions and my out-of-pocket expenses.'
'Uh...'
Raise him again. 'Plus, I'll work only on my own timetable. From Wisconsin.'
'But—'
Now call his bluff. 'And I'm not ghosting this, Dickens. I demand full collaborator's credit on the jacket cover.'
'Done,' said Hart.
Shit, girl. You've negotiated yourself one hell of a deal. Or... the deal from hell.
Chapter Seven
'Whatever were you thinking?' mother asked daughter as they stood with Joy, watching Dickens Hart walk away.