by P. J. Tracy
Magozzi's cell phone started playing AC/DC, and he excused himself and picked up. 'Grace.' He listened for a few moments, then pulled a notebook and pen out of his pocket and started scrawling.
'What is it?' Gino asked when he hung up, not at all liking the expression his partner was wearing.
'Monkeewrench just found a ninth pre-post. "City of Big Cheese, pink polyester, near steer," and they think Wisconsin's a possibility. They want us to call Sheriff Halloran over there and see if he can't help pinpoint a location, because they're running out of time to maybe prevent the murder.'
The judge dropped his glass and it shattered on the floor, spilling amber liquid over white marble. 'I used to have a cabin in Door County,' he said, his voice and expression numb. 'Interstate 94 to Wisconsin Highway 10. There's a diner just before that turnoff called the Litde Steer, and thirty miles north of that is the glass semi-trailer that holds what was then the largest block of cheese in the world, exhibited at the World's Fair.'
* * *
Chapter Nineteen
Harley was pacing the office like a manic gorilla, pounding a beefy fist into his palm, boots banging the wooden floor. 'Okay. City of Big Cheese. That's in Wisconsin for sure, right?'
'Absolutely positively,' Annie agreed.
Agent John Smith had his elbows braced on the table, his hands pushing through his nowhere FBI haircut. 'California produces more cheese per year than Wisconsin.'
Annie dismissed that silly notion with a fluff of her black bob. 'That is not true. I have been to Wisconsin, that place is practically made of cheese, and they produce more than any other state. I read that on a placemat in a diner over there.'
Smith shrugged. 'Point of pride for the Dairyland. California passed them in tonnage some time ago, but they're still in denial.'
'Crap,' Roadrunner grumbled from his station. 'I have almost three million sites on the search for Big Cheese. Give me some more parameters.'
'Add California and Wisconsin,' Harley said. 'Otherwise all we've got in the post is "pink polyester" and "near steer."
Annie snapped her fingers. 'What did I tell you, Agent Smith? Near steer. Who has more cows than Wisconsin?'
'California. And Texas. And probably Oklahoma.'
'That is an out-and-out lie.'
'It might be.'
Annie raised her brows. That had sounded suspiciously like a tease, which stunned her. In her experience, teasing a woman was directly related to testosterone, but Agent Smith looked like someone had wrung every bit of that out of him long ago. She opened her mouth to tell him the further edification that in the one Wisconsin diner she'd been in, the waitresses had worn pink-polyester ugly suits, but the phone rang before she could utter a syllable.
'Yes?' Grace snatched her receiver, listened, said, 'Got it,' and hung up. She looked over at Annie. 'Magozzi has a possible location. Interstate 94 and Wisconsin Highway 10, a diner called the Litde Steer.'
'Shit!' Harley bellowed. 'What county is that? Who's the sheriff?'
'I'm on it!' Roadrunner shouted back.
Agent John Smith put his elbows on the table and his head in his hands. They were going to lose another one.
Lisa Timmersman didn't believe there was a hope on God's green earth of growing up thin on a Wisconsin farm. She had been a ten-pound baby born with her hand out for a cookie, to hear her father tell it, and for a while, looking at the rest of her hefty family, she actually believed she had just been a genetic fat bomb waiting to blow up.
It never occurred to her that growing up eating pure lard on homemade bread, and gravy on everything else, had anything to do with it. It was all she knew, and barely worth thinking about, since all the farm kids in her little country school looked pretty much the way she did.
And then skinny little Cassandra Michels transferred into her second-grade class from Milwaukee, told Lisa she was the fattest girl she ever saw in her life and that what she needed was an eating disorder. At that age, Lisa didn't have the slightest idea what an eating disorder was, or where she could get one. But that single remark from that single person taught her a very important lesson: that the people outside the small circle of her childhood weren't going to like her, not one little bit, all because she'd been born fat into a fat family and didn't have a prayer of changing that.
So, you carry a little extra baggage. Honey, that ain't such a bad thing. Makes for a softer place for a man to fall, and some day that's going to be a good thing.
Lisa had been eight at the time and didn't understand much of what her daddy was telling her, but for years she had nightmares about some gray area in her future where really fat hairy men would fall on her and squash her flat.
It wasn't her daddy's fault, who raised the food she ate, or her mother's, who put it on the table. All they'd ever done was let her know how much they loved her, and that she was pretty and smart and could be just about anything she wanted to be. They meant well, but they didn't have Cassandra Michels' perspective, and that was what she listened to.
When she was thirteen, her daddy put up a satellite dish and Lisa found the Food Network, where the people who cooked wore snappy white coats and clogs to work, which was totally cool. A lot of them were pretty fat, too, and no one made fun of them, which sealed the deal for her. Lisa was going to be a famous chef. She'd go to the culinary school in Chicago, or maybe Minneapolis, and then she'd buy a new front door for the house that fit so tight her mother wouldn't have to tuck blankets into the crack at the bottom to block the winter winds. And maybe one of those new shiny steel steam cleaners so her dad didn't have to kill himself scrubbing the milkhouse with a hose and a brush twice a day.
She got an after-school job at the Litde Steer Diner out near the freeway, started out bussing and waiting tables and saving every dime she made. The soybean prices had hit rock bottom, and if she wanted to end up anywhere more glamorous than the high school cafeteria where they still wore those hairnets that fit halfway down your forehead, she was going to have to earn her own tuition. By the time she'd graduated from high school she owned half the menu and managed the place, and was precisely two months from the amount she needed to pay her tuition at the Minneapolis School of Culinary Arts. Her parents were so proud they kept saying how they were near busting, and that made Lisa shine.
She felt sorry for the other women three times her age who wore support stockings and shuffled from table to table taking orders, whose only dream was to make the monthly mortgage payment. Alma Heberson was having a particularly bad time this year. She'd lost her eldest son to a corn picker last year, and her husband had been knee-deep in the bottle and mean as a copperhead ever since. She'd been dead on her feet tonight and fighting a nasty cold, and Lisa offered to finish up her tables so she could go home early and get some rest. It wasn't a small thing, since Lisa had to be back at the diner before dawn to bake the pastry and make the soup of the day, recipe courtesy of one of the Food Network's newcomers, who Lisa thought would go far.
It was twenty minutes to closing when the last customer paid his bill and headed out. Maybe she could lock up a little early and get home in time to get a full five hours of sleep.
She hadn't finished closing the register drawer when the last straggling customer pushed open the door and let in the steamy night heat from the parking lot. Too early to turn him away, especially if the order was easy. It had been a pretty slow day, and the till was hurting. Besides, the customer was attractive and young with one of those pleasant, hopeful faces that made you think a little homemade meatloaf might just change his life.
'Can I help you?' Lisa smiled and ran her bleach cloth over a section of the Formica counter.
Deputy Frank Goebel was cruising north on one of those tar two-lanes that doubled as a section line between farm fields, which meant there were no lights other than his own, and the asphalt brandished the ever-present mud trails of whatever tractors had taken the same route during the day. Damn things were invisible at night, impossible to avoid, an
d the ride home was one long series of bumps. His tires danced and jittered over a thick tread line of mud that the day's heat had hardened into cement and the patrol skidded onto the right shoulder. He eased it back onto the road and sighed, bringing his speed down to thirty.
Not that he was all that anxious to get home anyway. He'd lived solo in the little boxy rambler since his wife had left last Christmas, and small as it was, the house echoed every move he made, reminding him he was alone.
Couldn't save his kid, couldn't save his marriage, and lately he'd been wondering if he could save himself, or if it would even be worth the effort.
He winced at the buzz and click from the radio that announced a call from dispatch, and waited without emotion for Mary to go through the by-the-book introductory identifiers. He'd watched an old movie once where a cop on patrol got a call on the radio, and the dispatcher said, 'Hey, Bill, this is Dispatch and we've got a break-in at the bank.' Now how hard was that? What brainiac decided that Dispatch should have a number, every car should have a number, and every crime should have a number? So damn many numbers to remember that these days talking on the radio was like taking a math test. Hell, he could hardly remember his own car's call numbers at the end of a long shift, and he sure as hell wouldn't be able to guess the kind of call she was going to send him on because she'd never say it flat-out in English. Whatever it was, it wouldn't be good; not this late. Car accident, drunk driver, teenagers having a noisy kegger somewhere, driving the early-to-bed farmers nuts.
'Frank, are you there?'
That got his attention. No rigamarole, and a little panic in her voice.
'Jeez, Mary, you broke protocol. Was there a terrorist attack on the Tom Thumb, or what? Spew out some numbers for me or I'll think you're an imposter.'
'Shut up, Frank, and listen.'
Wow. Her voice was actually shaking.
'I've got a crowd of people from Minneapolis yammering at me over the speakerphone, including an FBI agent, and there's no number in the book for what they say is happening'
Frank flipped on the roof lights and pulled over onto the shoulder. 'Okay, calm down, Mary, I'm listening.' He heard her take a deep breath.
'They said someone's going to kill one of the girls at the Litde Steer tonight unless we can stop it.'
'What? How the hell do they-?'
'Don't ask questions, Frank, just take it as gospel and get the hell over there. We don't have much time.'
He turned on the siren, cranked the wheel and stood on the accelerator. Shoulder gravel rooster-tailed into the ditch and then the front tires caught tar and the back tires laid twin lines of rubber. 'Jesus, Mary, I'm twenty miles away!' he yelled into the radio. 'Isn't there someone closer?'
'No! There isn't! So just step on it! And leave your radio open.'
'You got it.'
Frank didn't do much talking after that, because he was doing sixty now on the road, trying to dodge the worst of the mud ridges the tractor tires had left, getting thrown from side to side, jerking the wheel, trying to keep the car upright. His palms were sweating, greasy on the wheel, and his heart was hammering.
Nothing you can do, Frank, nothing you can do, just get there in one piece, and who the hell would want to kill one of the girls at the Little Steer, and why, for Chrissakes? Who's on tonight? Alma for sure, she worked every night shift; and Lisa, natch, because she damn near lived at the place, and oh God, no, not Lisa.
She was a great cook, a great person, his daughter's best friend, a frequent visitor to the house when there had been a family living there, and two plump arms at the funeral wrapping around his waist, squeezing the breath out of him while she tried to hold his heart together, her tears soaking the one and only tie he'd ever owned.
Look at you, Frank, you can handle sixty on these goddamned mud ridges, and that means maybe you can handle seventy, just ease it up slow, pay attention, breathe, goddamnit, breathe…
A green mile marker flashed by the right side of the car. Fifteen miles to the freeway.
There were times Grace could remember her heart actually hurting, as if some giant fist had it in its hand, squeezing down harder and harder until she thought it would surely be crushed. Those times all had names - people horribly murdered because of her - kept sacred in her memory like jewels in some Pandora's box that only opened when another name was about to slip inside. Kathy and Daniella, her roommates in college; Marian Amburson and Johnny Bricker, foolish enough to want to be close to her; Libbie Herold, sent to save her, her lifeblood flowing on the other side of a closet door, where Grace cowered, helpless.
Helpless then, helpless now, huddled with the rest of them around the speakerphone at the big table, listening to what was going on in Wisconsin as if it were a horrible radio play.
Frank, where are you?
Coming up on the ten-mile marker. You got backup coming?
The call's out to everyone. Tommy's up at the northern end of the county, but I got Brad out of bed, he was the closest. Should make it to the diner in about forty. Three counties and WHP are sending cars, but they're all farther away.
Shit, Mary.
No answer at the diner. Maybe they all went home early.
Pray to God.
Agent John Smith leaned over the speakerphone. Agent Smith here, Mary. Give us the owner's name. We'll call from here and get mobile and home numbers for whoever was working tonight.'
They could hear Mary breathing hard, clicking on a keyboard. Then: 'Ted Kaufman in Woodville. And thanks. I've got my hands full here…' the shrill ring of another call coming through on her end interrupted her.
Roadrunner was covering ground to his computer station, long fingers moving even before he hit the chair. Precious seconds seemed to fly by. 'I have Kaufman on line two, John, pick up and do your thing'
John took the call on Annie's desk because it was closest, and so he wouldn't interrupt the transmissions they were still getting over the speakerphone on line one. It was turning into a nightmare of noise now; the siren in Frank's squad wailing whenever he keyed in, Mary on Dispatch talking nonstop to the highway patrol and other deputies who were calling in.
John talked fast, too fast, and probably sounded crazed. 'Mr. Kaufman, this is Special Agent John Smith of the
FBI and I need the home and mobile numbers of anyone working at the Litde Steer tonight.'
'Who did you say this was? Goddamnit, George, is that you? If I've told you once I've told you a thousand times…'
John dragged his fingers down his face so hard they left angry red rake marks on his cheek. 'Please shut up, Mr. Kaufman. I'm an FBI agent and we have a killer either in your diner now, or on his way to kill one of your employees. Now give me their phone numbers right now.'
Silence for a moment, then John heard, 'I gotta get my book. Hang on a second.'
John rolled his eyes upward to see Annie standing next to him. 'Jesus Christ,' he muttered. 'This is a fucking nightmare.'
Annie covered his hand with hers, and then he had to snatch it away because Ted Kaufman was spitting out phone numbers like a slot machine hitting the jackpot. He wrote them all down, then ripped off the tablet sheet and handed it to Annie. 'Split 'em up, call them all.'
'Except Lisa,' Ted Kaufman said through the receiver. 'It's just ten o'clock. That's closing, and she's there cleaning up for an hour after, regular as clockwork, every night.'
'We've been calling the restaurant, the phone rolls over to voice mail.'
'Huh,' Kaufman said. 'That's weird. Lisa always answers. Her mom's been sick.'
Smith closed his eyes.
Lisa had her arms braced on the Formica counter while she watched the young man eat her meatloaf sandwich. He was almost dainty, using a fork, chewing each bite for a long time, eyes closed and lips curled in the slightest smile.
'Unbelievable,' he said between bites, careful to make sure his mouth was empty. 'Sage, for sure, and what is that? A little thyme?'
Lisa beamed. 'That's right.'
'And shallots, not onions. You caramelized them first, didn't you?' 'I did.'
He took a last bite, and pushed the plate away with one finger. 'You ever watch the Food Network?'
Lisa slapped an open hand to her ample bosom. 'Omigod. Are you kidding? I never miss any of the shows.'
'That guy who does the show on great food at diners, what is it called?'
'Omigod again. That's Guy What's-his-name. Diners, Drive- Ins and Dives. He's so amazingly totally super.'
'You belong on that show.'
He had really blue eyes, or maybe they were green, but oh, Lisa felt them look into her and see what was really there. 'How do you feel about going on camera?' he asked.
Lisa felt her heart flutter. 'Excuse me?'
There was absolutely nothing Grace could do. Listen to Mary fielding calls to Dispatch in Wisconsin; listen to John shouting into the phone at Annie's desk, and then to Annie and Harley and Roadrunner frantically calling people who were on shift at the Little Steer, and now home, safe. All except Lisa, whoever she was.
She heard Charlie whine and looked to her right. He was on the chair next to her, eyes worried while her right hand twisted the hair on the top of his head. 'Oh, Charlie,' she murmured into his forehead, 'I'm sorry.' His tongue accepted her apology just as Mary asked Deputy Frank Goebel where he was and how much longer.
Five miles, Mary. Three minutes if I don't crash first. This road is shit.
It's Lisa, Frank. She's there alone. The Minneapolis people called the rest of them, and they're all home. I've got no help for you for at least another fifteen minutes. You're the man.
Frank saw the lights a full mile away. The clouds were low tonight, and the sodium vapors bounced from cloud back to earth, marking the place the Litde Steer claimed for its own near the freeway.