Curt brought her water. “What can I do for you? Business good?”
Mabel sipped the water, ice cold, which she approved of as any good waitress would. “The mine is bringing in a lot of crews to the diner. My motel is booked solid for the next six months at least, and I’m starting to think I need to hire more.”
Curt nodded. “Me too. I’m bringing a couple of new girls in to maybe do another show. You know Lacey is my main waitress,” Curt said, referring to his new wife. “But Candy’s a server too now and not a pole girl no more.”
Mabel turned around to glance at Candy, who was taking an order nearby. “She’s pregnant again, right?”
“Yep, second child.”
“Same boyfriend?”
“Nope. New one. Works at the mine. And now that she’s working tables, she gets benefits too — I cover that,” he said proudly. “Candy’s Nana babysits while she works, and will watch the next one once she pops.”
“Nice to see her settle down a bit. I hope the guy treats her right.”
“Seems so. Actually, he’s more of an office type, a scrawny one-hundred-pound thing that wears these wire-rimmed, coke-bottle glasses and seems kind of respectable. A nice, polite guy. Guess he also asked for her hand in marriage, but she told him no, not yet, not just ’cause of a baby on the way.” He shrugged and took a drag on the cigarette. “Candy’s a tough girl. She’ll figure it out.”
Mabel raised her eyebrows and said nothing more. Candy was twenty-three years old.
“Got a question for you,” Mabel said, ending the small talk. “It’s about the night Karen Thompson was murdered.” That got Curt’s attention quick. “I heard a few of the sawmill crew ended up here, and I’m wondering if you recall who.” Mabel didn’t say her suspects’ names right off, hoping Curt would mention them natural like.
Curt turned serious and glanced around before he whispered, “I can’t be talking about any of the Larson boys.”
“So some of Larson’s men were here that night?”
“When are they ain’t? But you know as well as I, most of Larson’s boys these days are staffing the sawmill shifts now because he wants them to have respectable jobs for their probation officers.”
Mabel had heard the same rumor that Larson owned most of the sawmill. While Consuela hadn’t confirmed it, she said her manager didn’t seem to be the boss anymore and that some of the long-standing workers, especially those of color, had been losing their jobs to Larson’s white men.
“I really do need this information.”
Curt leaned on the bar casually for appearances but still whispered, “What for? You got trouble with Larson now?”
“Someone does. I can’t say who in particular. I promise I won’t mention where I got the information from.”
Curt stubbed out his cigarette and nodded. “You know I like you. But folks asking questions don’t go over well in this town. Be careful what you’re doing. It’s—”
A waitress came by, and Curt stopped talking.
“Hiya, Mabel!”
“Hi, Candy!”
“What are you doing here? I haven’t seen you show up before. What’s up?”
Curt spoke up for Mabel. “She’s doing us a courtesy.”
Mabel smiled and nodded. “Congrats on the little one. Are you four or five months along?”
Candy smiled and patted her stomach. “Twenty weeks in and sick as a dog. This one is a handful, so I suspect a girl.”
“Why don’t you and your Nana swing by my house for a dinner one night?” Mabel asked. “My treat. I’d love to see you both again, plus your little one, Sam — such a sweet thing.”
Candy put her arm around Mabel’s shoulders. “Thanks, babe. Sam’s growing like a weed, nearly two years old.”
“Heard you have a new boyfriend too.”
Candy blushed. “Yeah, Kelvin. He’s an accountant at the mine. Sweet man.”
“Would he come too? He’s welcome for dinner.”
Candy hesitated then beamed. “He’d like that. Thank you.”
Curt interrupted. “Maybe you two can talk waitressing at that dinner too, and Mabel’ll give you some tips. You’re messing up your orders some.”
Candy gave him a fierce look before she squeezed Mabel’s shoulder. “We’ll talk,” she said and left.
Mabel watched her go before turning back. “I always liked her — good in school.”
Curt picked up a new cigarette and a lighter. “Smart girl. Hard life. That’s the Blue River way, I guess.”
“Speaking of hard lives, was Petar here that night?”
Curt held the cigarette to the flame for a few seconds, thinking, before he crisped its end and took a puff. “Petar? Yeah, sure. Came in with the manager and a few boys, I think, after a trip to Edmonston and back. Stayed for a few, left at closing.”
“You don’t mind answering about him.”
“He ain’t a Larson boy.”
“Like Don Sigmundson?”
Curt squinted before he took another puff of the cigarette. He blew out the smoke, reached over, and turned up the stereo on the bar to drown out his whisper. “He’s someone I can’t talk about.”
Mabel felt the tension and followed Curt’s gaze to the other men in the bar. Most were still staring at the pole girl doing her thing. Candy was at a table near the stage, serving a group of men. But as Mabel turned back to Curt, she felt the hairs rise on her neck like they were being watched, and so she leaned in and whispered, “Was he here that night?”
Curt frowned in response. “Briefly. Came early and left early with another. He had a few beers and then bought some off-sales for later. He was a little rowdy.”
“He got into a fight here?” Mabel recalled what Kerry had said about cuts and bruises on Don’s hands.
“Nope. Not here. If he had got into a fight, it wasn’t on my property. Is that what this is about? He beat up someone you know?”
“Someone did. That’s why I’m asking.”
Curt frowned. “Larson’s getting tougher now. I’m hearing stories.”
“Is he coming after your place?”
“No. Not yet. But I don’t want that to change.”
Mabel nodded, feeling bad for Curt. Since most of his regular business was from Larson’s men, he needed to comply. Like Sarah had said before, she, at least, had the construction workers, truckers, and tourists, and none of Larson’s men bothered to visit her diner, being more of a family place and all.
Mabel got up and said, “Thanks for this. I better get going.”
Curt reached over to stop her. “Be careful, Mabel. I hear things. Larson is asking about you. Don’t make yourself a target. Whatever you’re doing, don’t stir things up.”
Although his eyes were showing concern, it was still a kind of threat. It meant her business was at stake. But she wouldn’t budge, not for this. “A girl was murdered, Curt. And I’m not the one who broke the peace here.”
CHAPTER 29
With Don Sigmundson moving up to suspect number one, Mabel drove back to the diner and worked the rest of the morning shift with Sally. Then she went home to clean her messy pantry, which she had been putting off for months. An hour in, she found a full bottle of whiskey at the bottom. It stopped her cold, bringing her back to the dark days when Bill stashed bottles throughout the house. It was a while since she’d found one, as she’d done a hard clean after kicking Bill out. She set the bottle aside, a little depressed. Then Consuela phoned, with more bad news. She couldn’t get a DNA sample from the lunchroom as Don was off for two weeks. With Winston’s trial coming up fast, Mabel needed another way. Looking at the whiskey bottle gave her an idea.
A few semi-trucks swept past before she pulled out on the highway, reminding her of all the truck drivers she’d served over the years. She always made a point of asking them to watch their speed around the towns, not just for their sakes, but for the kids’ as well. Accidents on these highways were rare but almost always fatal — at least according
to Dan. He saw most of the grisly ones. It had hardened him up some, so when even he had trouble describing Karen Thompson’s murder, it reinforced to Mabel how cruel the killer must be. “I don’t know how you do it,” she’d told Dan one night. “Seeing all those accident victims, let alone the murder.” Fortunately for Blue River, murder was rare, with Karen being the only one in recent memory — if you didn’t count Larson’s men getting killed in some drug shoot-out in another county. None of those drugs battles had occurred in Blue River proper just yet, but times were changing.
Mabel followed Lisa’s directions and made her way to Parker’s Ridge and the farm where Don lived, with its collection of trailers and camper vans parked in a gravel lot on the edge of a forested slope. A small community of Larson’s men lived out here, tending to one of several farms in the area. She pulled up to find a dozen or so empty, weathered lawn chairs around a big firepit. Only two guys were hanging out beside it, smoking and drinking beer. As Mabel watched, unimpressed, one of the skinheads drained a can and crumpled it against his forehead before tossing it into the cold firepit with the rest of the trash.
Mabel got out and made her way over. The men’s glances at her waitress uniform and her canvas shoulder bag made her feel decidedly out of place on a marijuana farm run by skinheads.
“Either of you, Don Sigmundson?” she asked.
The two men glanced at each other and smirked but didn’t reply. She focused on the younger one who’d been poking the ashes with a stick — he didn’t look so angry.
“I’m looking for him.”
They returned to their conversation, ignoring her.
“Excuse me,” Mabel said. “That was rude, young man. I asked you a question.”
The young guy finally turned to her. “Don ain’t here.”
“Where is he then?”
The older, angrier skinhead whispered something crude, and both laughed. The young guy then pointed his stick to a field through the woods. “Out back,” he said to Mabel.
“I’d like to talk to him.”
The young guy glanced at the older one for more direction, but the older man just belched loudly and grabbed another beer.
The young guy shrugged. “Sure. I’ll get him.” And then left.
The remaining skinhead belched loudly again, which Mabel took as a sign of disrespect. She glared at him.
The skinhead glared right back at her. “You got a problem?”
“I got a problem with trash who don’t sit up for a woman and show her some respect.”
The older skinhead downed his second beer before he tossed it into the ash pit with the others. Then he lifted the side of his shirt, making sure she could see the hidden pistol underneath.
Mabel rolled her eyes but then looked elsewhere, decidedly more nervous now. She was almost glad to see the young guy returning with a second fellow she assumed was Don Sigmundson.
The new man said, “Hey, lady. You looking for some weed?”
The men snickered. Mabel didn’t. As per her plan, she put on a mock cheery tone, but it didn’t quite come out that way with the way things were going. “I’m with the July fourth organizing committee, and we wanted to give you your unclaimed prize.”
“That was months ago. I don’t remember no prize.”
“I know,” she said, pressing on with her ruse. “But if you don’t come to get the prize, we deliver it. We’re honest folk around here.”
“Honest folk, huh?” Don chuckled with the boys. “Okay, Mabel, is it? What’s the prize?”
Mabel was shocked they knew her name until she remembered she’d foolishly kept her nametag on. Get it together, she warned herself. She pulled out a slate with a carbon paper credit slip and pieces of paper clipped to it. “You just need to sign here,” she said and handed him the carbon slip and a pen and observed to see where he put his fingertips. He got some of the dry ink on his hand and tried to wipe it off on the paper, just like she wanted. She stopped herself from smiling that her plan was working. Once he signed it, he handed it back, and she was careful not to mar his prints with her own.
“So? What’s the prize?” he asked.
“I need to see some ID too.”
All three men found this funny. “ID?” Don said, laughing. “For a county fair prize?”
Mabel nodded, trying to look sincere.
Don made a funny face to the skinhead by the fire, and they both chuckled. “Okay,” he said with mock respect. “My ID is in my trailer. Let’s go get it then, ma’am.” The other two chuckled in a way that made Mabel even more nervous, but she was determined to see this through.
She followed him to one of the trailers, outside of which were two chairs and a small side table that had a used cigarette tin, a few empty beer cans, and a plastic flower in a vase on it. The last touch was likely his girlfriend, Barbara’s. As Don went into the trailer, Mabel hung back, took a tissue, and used it to grab a beer can and a cigarette butt carefully and put them in her bag. Next, she took out an envelope with one hundred dollars in it, and unsheathed the bottle of whiskey that she’d brought. When Don came back, he exchanged his ID for the whiskey and envelope. She wrote down his driver’s license information and then gave it back to him while he hollered out to his friends, holding the bottle as the real prize.
“You should’ve told me it was whiskey and a Benjamin note,” he said to her, happy now. “I’d have got my girl come and get it sooner. But then again, a good-looking woman like yourself, maybe you should come by more often.”
Mabel resisted rolling her eyes, wanting to get out of here as quickly as she could. The other two men strolled up, and Don handed over the whiskey and said, “I’ll get a couple of glasses.”
The older, angrier-looking skinhead edged closer to Mabel, giving her a more appreciative once over. “If I’d known you’re bringing some booze, I might have been nicer.”
His unwashed smell repelled her, and she covered her nose in disgust.
The skinhead took offense and turned mean again. “Don’t be a bitch about it.”
His coarseness made her feel even more vulnerable, and she wanted to get away as fast as she could from these dangerous men.
She turned to go, and the skinhead called out from behind. “Maybe we’ll stop by your diner tonight, Mabel. I’d like a spicy dish like you. Maybe you can serve it up to me, nice and fine. Just the way I like it, uh?” He laughed coarsely, but his voice had an undertone that made the threat real.
Mabel did not look back, mad and scared as she was, and then the men laughed again, likely at some joke at her expense. As she drove away, she resisted stepping on the gas, not wanting to look like she was running away, but her breathing came out in gasps, and her hands shook terribly.
CHAPTER 30
After the kids had finished their homework, they broke out the cards, and all four of them started playing at the kitchen table.
“Go fish,” Mabel said to Fred, who groaned and then picked up a card. He jumped up excited and showed everyone a nine and then smacked down another nine. “Match!”
Hector grimaced. “No fair. You always get the cards.”
Fred continued his turn by examining the backs of everyone’s raised cards like he had X-ray vision and took his time to decide like he always did.
“Hurry it up,” Hector grumbled as Kerry turned to Mabel and asked, “How did it go today?”
Mabel answered, cryptically, sensitive to the boys, “You mean with the farm?”
Kerry nodded, equally cagey.
“Oh, fine. Got what I needed.”
“The, uh…” Kerry said, knowingly.
Mabel nodded.
“What are you talking about?” Hector said. “Is it about that dead girl in town?”
“Hector! Your brother!” Mabel said.
Fred turned pale. “There’s a dead girl here!?”
“No!” Both Kerry and Mabel spoke together.
“No,” Mabel repeated. “Hector’s just talking about a girl that…
” Mabel struggled to answer.
“Passed away,” said Kerry, and Mabel nodded like that was the right way to say it.
“Was murdered,” Hector said, scaring Fred even further.
“Hector!” Mabel said. “Watch it.”
“He’s taking forever,” Hector pleaded. “We’re going to be here all night.”
“Is she a ghost now?”
“No, Fred,” Kerry said, touching his hand. “There are no ghosts.”
“Can you sleep with me tonight? For protection?” Fred asked Kerry, and she nodded while Hector just rolled his eyes.
Mabel stifled an “aw,” putting her hand to her own heart, touched that her family was starting to get along, until Hector punched his brother and pleaded, with as much exasperation as he could muster, “Please, pick a card! It’s taking forev—”
A loud bang and a shattering sound of glass frightened all of them.
Kerry and Mabel stood up in surprise.
The boys rushed to the den to find a web of cracks around a small round hole in their front windowpane.
Fred ran to touch it—
Mabel screamed, “Fred! No!”
She reached to pull him back and then clawed at Hector and Kerry to get down.
Another bang, more glass breaking.
Another bullet slammed into the far wall. The kids screamed. Mabel pushed them back into the kitchen and down onto the floor. She knocked the phone off its holder, scooped it off the floor, and immediately dialed the Sheriff.
It took several rings before Sheriff Dan came on the line. Mabel pleaded. “Dan! Hurry! There are gunshots. People are firing at us!” Mabel shared the details in a rush and then hung up, and with Dan on his way, Mabel crawled back to the den to peek out the broken window.
A car engine revved loudly, the tires spinning a donut loop into the gravel driveway, its blinding high-beams shining into the living room while the men in the car laughed and whooped it up. Mabel violently motioned Kerry and the terrified boys back. Then a series of lights went on in the motel, and several guests emerged from their rooms. The car tore off onto the highway with the men inside still laughing and hollering as it disappeared around the dark bend.
Heart of a Runaway Girl Page 14