Two Lethal Lies

by Annie Solomon

  Neesy glanced over at Loritta, who raised her brows again.

  Julia sighed, set down the glass, and crossed her arms over her small chest. “So… is someone going to tell me how my dad got that bruise on his face?”

  Finally, Mitch spoke up. “That’s enough, Junebug. Finish your milk and start your homework.”

  “But how long can it take to tell me what happened?”

  “Too long,” Mitch said. “It’s been a tough day, and the women have work to do.”

  “Oh, we can work in here.” Neesy had no intention of missing a second of whatever was going to happen now. She winked at Loritta, who took the hint, and in a flash the two of them had disappeared behind the swinging doors and returned with an armful of ketchup bottles and salt shakers.

  “See?” Julia said to Mitch.

  “I see plenty,” Mitch said. “And don’t think you’re getting away with anything.”

  Despite the words, he wasn’t really angry. Neesy was coming to appreciate the easy camaraderie between father and daughter—something she thought existed only in books. Or dreams. She wanted to step in, be a part of it.

  “Like to help?” Neesy asked Julia.

  “Can I?”

  “Sure,” Loritta said. “Many hands make fast work.”

  Julia climbed back on the stool at the counter, where Neesy was setting out the bottles. She showed Julia how to fill the shakers from the big box of salt.

  “So when we’re done, you’ll tell me?”

  “Oh, we can talk while we work,” Neesy said. And despite the grumblings from the direction of the grill, she told Julia all about her dad sticking up for Mary Nell.

  “So, you see, he saved the day,” Loritta summed up.

  Mitch shook his head. “I just did what anyone—”

  “Well,” Neesy interrupted, “he did have some help. Don’t know what would have happened if the dog hadn’t jumped in.”

  Julia’s eyes widened. “Dog?”

  “Now you’ve done it,” Mitch said.

  Neesy filled Julia in about the stray in the alley. If the girl had been interested before, she was totally energized by the mention of the animal.

  She leaped off her stool. “Is he still out there?”

  “No,” Mitch said.

  “Maybe,” Neesy said at the same time. She flashed Mitch a smile. Now that he was back in her good graces, she could enjoy making him squirm. “Why don’t we take a look,” Neesy added.

  “No,” Mitch groaned. “Not a good idea. Please—”

  But they ignored him and trooped outside. What could Mitch do but follow?

  It was sheer pleasure to watch him watch Julia and that stray. He protested every step of the way, deflected all her “why can’t we bring him home?” and “why can’t we get a puppy?” requests. He made a face when the dog licked Julia’s, but despite his protests, there was a secret joy in his eyes.

  He loved that kid.

  Better yet, the kid loved him.

  The insight squeezed something inside Neesy, making her happy and sad at the same time. It was only later that she understood why: seeing Julia with her daddy made Neesy realize everything she’d missed growing up.

  By week’s end, Mitch’s routine was set. He brought Julia to precare at school, then headed for Crick’s. Morning setup included teasing Mary Nell and Loritta—who blushed and ignored him, respectively—and avoiding, not always successfully, flirting with Neesy. Then he fried his brain to a crisp on bacon, eggs, and pancakes. At lunch it was patty melts and fries with the occasional chef salad. On Wednesday, he introduced Big Apple dogs—he added grilled onions and kraut to the hot dogs—and on Friday he made egg creams. Both were a hit, and along with his cinnamon French toast, so, it seemed, was he.

  At two-thirty, he left the shop, picked up Julia at school, and brought her back to Crick’s while he finished cleaning up.

  The first thing Julia did when she got to Crick’s was go out back and feed the dog. She named him Huck, because she was engrossed in Mark Twain at the moment, and despite the billions of times he told her not to pet him, he usually caught her on the ground with the dog in her lap.

  Which led to the inevitable—a trip to the vet and a bath. Mitch felt better about letting Julia hover over the animal after the dog had been shot up with hundreds of dollars’ worth of vaccines and smelled like a greenhouse, but he still didn’t want the responsibility of taking him home. They had to stay lean and light in case they had to leave quickly.

  “Dogs make me sneeze,” he told her in the truck on the way back from the vet.

  “You haven’t sneezed once,” she rushed to point out.

  “I will. We keep a dog around and I’ll be sneezing like it’s an eleventh plague.”

  “You’re just making that up.”

  He shot her a glance. She was scowling out the windshield, her arms crossed stubbornly. He tried a different tack.

  “Look, Junebug, I know the dog means a lot—”

  “Stop calling him ‘the dog.’ He has a name.”

  He bit down on the angry response that came all too quickly—yeah, and I told you not to name him—and said instead, “Okay, okay. I know ‘Huck’ means a lot to you, but dogs cost money, and it’s not like we have a lot of that floating around.”

  “He doesn’t eat much. We can still feed him scraps from Crick’s.”

  “Do you know how much he cost today? A couple of weeks’ worth of paychecks. I had to arrange an installment plan to pay it off.”

  “What’s an installment plan?”

  He explained it to her.

  “Oh,” she said when he finished. She was quiet for a while, then, “I could get a job.”

  “You’re eleven. There are laws against that.”

  “There is not.”

  “Google it if you don’t believe me.”

  “On what?”

  “There are no computers at school?”

  “If it’s true, it’s a stupid law.”

  “You can still see him every day at the restaurant.” She didn’t reply. “Okay?”

  She pursed her mouth but her shoulders sagged, and he knew he’d made his point, though he wasn’t very happy about it.

  “I guess,” she conceded, then turned on him. “But no more yelling at me for petting him.”

  He lifted a hand off the steering wheel like he was swearing to it. “Vet says he’s clean.” At least for now.

  It was hard taking Huck back to the alley, but Jules soldiered through it. The next day was Saturday, which meant she’d be at Crick’s all day, so she knew she’d be seeing him a lot. Mitch suspected that helped.

  To ease her over the hump, he offered to take her to Barrington, where there was a McDonald’s and a movie theater, two of her favorite places.

  “No, thanks,” she said, surprising him. “We have to pay off the installment plan, remember?”

  A twinge of guilt bit him. “We can afford a crappy burger and a movie.”

  She sniffed and raised her chin in the air like a little martyr. “Then I’d rather take the money and buy something for Huck.”

  He sighed. There was no winning with this one.

  7

  Special Agent Roger Carrick stood at the window of the FBI’s Quad Cities resident agency, the satellite office for eastern Iowa. It was just after five, but outside it was dark enough to be midnight, except where the streetlamp stood guard over the parking lot. Snow fell through its narrow swath of light, then disappeared into the black.

  Barely November and already the snow was falling. Not that Roger was surprised. After ten years here, he’d come to expect anything, especially winter. He had a fleeting thought for the farmers who might not have all their corn in yet. Funny, him thinking about farmers. He had grown up in Miami; farming was the last thing he ever expected to be worried about. But you couldn’t live in Iowa without thinking about the key cash crop. Five minutes out of Moline and it was all around you. Green, gray, plowed under, or reaching fo
r the sky. Corn was everywhere.

  A knock on the door had him turning. The office manager held up a handful of envelopes.

  “I’m taking off.” She laid the mail on his desk. “See you Monday.”

  He said good-bye and scuffled over to the desk. The mail had landed on a stack of memos and reports, mostly about the Nebraska-Iowa Joint Terrorism Task Force. The JTTF was part of a huge revamping of the FBI since 9/11. Now over 40 percent of resources were devoted to counterterrorism. Unfortunately, Roger wasn’t one of them. Someone else had handled the anthrax hoax and the series of pipe bombs planted in mailboxes outside Des Moines. The closest he’d gotten to counterterrorism were field exercises.

  Wasn’t much different with other major crimes. Eastern Iowa was as much a breeding ground for drug trafficking, child pornography, and armed robbery as anywhere in the country, but the special agent in charge in Omaha always had something else in mind for Roger when the big cases broke.

  Nine times out of ten, he ended up chasing shadows. A drum of radioactive chemicals that could be used to manufacture WMDs goes missing? Give it to Carrick. Let him spend three days, over thirty man-hours, and who knows how many miles in a Bucar running that one down—only to find it had been inventoried incorrectly and had been sitting in the warehouse in Moline all along.

  Was he bitter?

  He laughed to himself as he sorted through the envelopes. Hell, yes, he was bitter.

  Corn country had stolen his wife and kids—who were back in Miami—not to mention his career.

  He paused in the act of slitting open one of the envelopes. Be fair, now. Can’t blame the Midwest for everything. Some of it was his own undiplomatic fault.

  He took out the letter and unfolded it. What he saw rooted him instantly.

  A photocopy of a newspaper article, complete with picture. A picture he thought he recognized.

  He rose and went to a cabinet against the wall, where he riffled through the files to the one he wanted and plucked it out. Inside were ten identical pages. On the top of each one, heavy black font spelled out HAVE YOU SEEN THIS MAN? and below that was a photograph.

  Carrick compared the two. The one from the file was clean-shaven and carefree, the hair expertly trimmed, the smile jaunty, a bow tie from a tuxedo showing at the neck.

  The one he’d just received was the face of a working man, stubbled and lined. The hair was shaggy, the expression sober—even a little annoyed—and the collar at the neck looked like plaid flannel.

  He squinted. Looked at them both through a magnifying glass he kept in his desk. Were they the same? More than a decade separated the two photos. Did that account for the changes? Or were the men in these pictures only look-alikes?

  He went back to the newspaper article. Read the story. Some guy who’d saved a kid when she fell into the river. He picked up a pen and circled the name of the local hero. Too similar to be coincidence?

  He checked the date line. Two weeks ago. Checked the paper’s name. Crossroads Sentinel. Never heard of it.

  He did a computer search. There was no Web site for a Crossroads Sentinel, but there were several towns called Crossroads. One in Pennsylvania, one in Maine, and one in Tennessee.

  He glanced at his watch. Five forty-five on the first Friday night in November. An hour later in Pennsylvania and Maine. Office hours were over, but the phones were always manned.

  He drummed on his mouse.

  Abruptly he rose, shut down the computer, and walked away from the desk.

  He wasn’t jumping on anything. The hotshot hot-rodder he used to be had been slowed considerably by his exile in corn country. He’d wised up. Learned how to think before acting. The weekend was coming up. He’d take the time to mull it over.

  He put the article and its envelope in the manila file with the pages he’d received every year on the same day for the last ten years. Put the folder in his briefcase and snapped it shut. Then he grabbed his coat, his rubber boots, his scarf, his hat, and his gloves. As he headed out the door, he glanced at the window. The snow was coming down thick and heavy in the beam of the streetlight.

  He hoped to hell his car would start.

  8

  Mitch’s second week at Crick’s ended on Saturday, the slowest day of the week for the restaurant. Mary Nell didn’t work weekends, so it was just Loritta, Neesy, and himself. And Julia.

  She wanted to go over to the Blunts’, but he wasn’t comfortable leaving her alone yet. So far, Crossroads had been quiet and friendly, the Blunts especially so, but Mitch had spent years looking over his shoulder, and he wasn’t going to stop now. So he brought her to Crick’s, thankful she was still young enough to enjoy filling salt shakers and ketchup bottles. After that, there was homework, and her latest book, so she had plenty to keep her occupied.

  He made a batch of French toast, and Julia wolfed down two pieces plus extra bacon. He gave it to her even though he suspected that some of it would go out the back alley for Huck.

  She thought she was pulling one over on him when she snuck past him, but he was wise to her shenanigans. He let her go, though, because Neesy stepped through the kitchen door and placed another order of fried eggs.

  “Push the toast,” he told her. “I’ve got a ton of it waiting.”

  “Don’t know where everyone is this morning.” She leaned against the inside of the swinging kitchen door. The position set off her breasts, and she seemed to know it. He could feel her watching him. Waiting. Looking for some hint of appreciation. “Must be the weather. Everyone’s out in the yard.” She shrugged, the little gesture moving that cleavage up and down.

  He gritted his teeth, returned his gaze to the grill, and kept it there.

  “You got plans after work?” Somehow, she’d snuck up behind him. “Because I was thinking.” Her chest brushed against his elbow, and the egg he was cracking burst in his hands.

  “Oh, geez.” She ran for a towel and was mopping up his hand before he could protest.

  “I’m fine.” He pulled away, and when he trusted himself to look at her again, he found her smiling. The little… She knew exactly what she was doing.

  But she did have a glorious smile. Her green eyes crinkled up, and a little dimple made mischief of her right cheek.

  God, she was trouble.

  “You’re in my way,” he said, easing around her to pop some bread in the toaster.

  “Am I?” She looked around. “Well, I guess I am. Sorry.” But she clearly wasn’t, because she followed him to the toaster and back to the grill. “So, how about it?”

  He was almost afraid to ask. “How about what?”

  “A beer. You know, after work.”

  “Can’t,” he said automatically.

  “Why not? You got a thing about dating in the workplace?” She leaned over to mock whisper, “I don’t think old Crick would mind.”

  “It’s not Crick; it’s Julia.”

  “She’ll be fine for an hour or two. Loritta’ll watch her.”

  “I wouldn’t wish that on Loritta.”

  She gave him a look he couldn’t fathom. Part curious, part mystified, part determined. It made him nervous.

  “You like girls, don’t you?”

  “Not in the morning when I’m trying to get my orders straight.”

  She balanced the plates on her arm, pursed her lips, and thought about it. “Another time, then?” She let loose that smile, leaned in, and spoke low, “I like a good challenge.”

  Despite his uneasiness, he almost enjoyed her resolve.

  Until a high, piercing child’s cry ripped through the screen door from the alley.

  The scream startled Neesy so much, she jumped. The row of plates precariously balanced on her arm tumbled and smashed against the hard kitchen floor. The clatter coincided with the slam of the screen door as Mitch hurtled through it.

  He’d moved so fast that Neesy was left standing there in a puddle of broken yokes and smashed crockery. She knew why, too.

  His kid was out t
here.

  Neesy had conveniently forgotten about Julia when she’d strolled in looking for a date. Of course she had. Can’t be thinking about the kid when you’re interested in the daddy. The pure selfishness of it embarrassed her. What the hell was wrong with her?

  But she knew the answer. Much to her chagrin, she was doing what she always did, what she’d promised herself not to do. And without even realizing it, she’d gone ahead and broken that vow. She was chasing a man again.

  Damn, she thought she’d learned that lesson.

  Evidently not.

  But this was different. Mitch was different. He was strong; he was decent—he loved his kid, for God’s sake!

  No wonder she just couldn’t help herself.

  Hell, maybe that was why he seemed less than fascinated by her. She didn’t know what it was that attracted only the deadbeats, but the good men never seemed interested in her. An acute wave of shame ran through her, like she deserved what she got.

  Quick as it came, though, she shook it off. She was done thinking badly about herself. Besides, how could she be worrying about her pathetic love life when there was clearly something wrong outside? Kicking herself, she stepped over the mess on the floor, bolted out the back door, and stopped short when she saw what was going on.

  At the alley’s far end, Mitch had swept up his child, whose face was buried in his shoulder. Neesy gasped when she saw why.

  Against the alley’s dead end was a bloody mess of flesh and bone. Its eyes were black sockets; its insides open fodder for the crows and vultures picking at it. It took Neesy a minute to realize the gore had once been the stray dog.

  A spasm of revulsion twisted her stomach, and she had to force herself not to throw up.

  Julia’s shriek soon attracted a small crowd, most of them from Crick’s. She heard gasps of shock like her own and expressions of sympathy as Mitch pushed through the crowd with Julia. Someone tried shooing the birds away, but they came back soon enough. The inevitable “who would do such a thing?” was carried through the crowd, and a few minutes after the door slammed behind father and daughter, a siren burped.

  Someone had called the police.