by Judy M. Kerr
The new day had dawned. Her first day without Barb. Yet the previous day had a hold on her, and she felt it wouldn’t let her go any time soon.
MC dug in the desk drawer for paper and pen. She scrawled the phone number Sharpe had given her before she forgot it. She considered the bottle of vodka and opted for a shower and clean clothes instead.
By eight, dressed in jeans, her tactical boots, and a white T-shirt under a gray thermal crew neck, MC decided food was a necessity.
She donned her coat, grabbed her wallet and keys and headed for the door. Hand on the deadbolt, she stopped and returned to the desk where her messenger bag drooped on the floor next to the chair. She found her notebook and pen and pocketed the items.
Fifteen minutes later she occupied a tiny back corner booth of a greasy spoon diner halfway between the hotel and her home. The place was fairly crowded. Saturday morning tended to be big go-out-for-breakfast time, and she hoped like hell she didn’t run into anyone she knew.
While she ate, she ran through her notes on the Stennard case. If she couldn’t broker any info on Barb, she decided she’d focus her energy on Arty. Ferndale and Andrews seemed open to MC’s input, but still focused on Len Klein as the killer.
She was doubtful of Klein’s involvement mostly due to the fact that she and Cam had seen him with the two questionable characters the night of the meeting. Klein seemed more the type to have someone else do the dirty work, keeping his hands squeaky clean. Despite those factors, she had a nagging feeling that he could somehow be the killer. She made a note to question Klein, then remembered she wouldn’t be at work for a while. Maybe Cam would pay Klein a visit. Or she would do it without telling anyone.
She forked eggs into her mouth and crunched a slice of bacon while she contemplated how long she should take off work.
A week? Two? She had a lot to do. For a moment, her mind went blank, and she couldn’t recall what she’d just been thinking. A baby started crying from somewhere near the back of the café, and the sound made her head throb.
What was I thinking? Oh, yeah. Things to do. Arrange Barb’s memorial. Hire a crew to clean the house. Pack up the place and put it on the market. No way could she live in the house ever again.
She’d need to find a storage facility. Maybe move to the cabin? The cabin was their haven. Maybe that’s where she needed to be.
Couldn’t someone shut that baby up? Her head was pounding, and suddenly, the food tasted like cardboard. She left the remaining half-slice of bacon on the plate and watched the congealed yellow mass of yolk running into the wall of toast. She pushed the half-eaten breakfast aside. How could she have just had all these thoughts, so clinical, so matter-of-fact? What was wrong with her?
Maybe there was nothing wrong. Didn’t she have the right to compartmentalize?
The server approached and asked, “Everything okay?”
“I’m not very hungry.” MC rubbed her temples.
The waitress picked up the plate. “No problem. Can I get you anything else?”
“A refill on the coffee and the check, please.”
The waitress filled her cup and left the check on the corner of the table. MC sipped her coffee. She felt antsy. Needed to do something. She pulled her phone from her coat pocket and called Cam.
“Hello.” Squeals of laughter sounded in the background.
MC smiled. “Sounds like the kids are having a good time.”
Cam groaned. “They wear me out. How are you doing? Hold on a sec.” The background sounds muffled and disappeared. “Sorry. I diverted the munchkins toward Jane, and now I can hear.”
“Things could be worse, Cam. Enjoy the kids.”
“I do. Every moment I can. So? How are you?” His voice dropped a notch.
MC filled him in on the latest and told him she’d let him know the date and time for the memorial as soon as she’d set it all up.
Then she dumped her thoughts about Arty.
As soon as she finished, Cam said, “You need to focus on you. Forget about work.”
“I swear if I don’t do something to occupy my mind I’ll curl up in a corner and become a blathering babbling idiot. And then what?”
Cam sighed. “I get it. You’ve got a point about Klein. He’s dirty, but he doesn’t do the dirty work. I can talk to him. I’ll check in with Oldfield.”
“You know what else is stuck in my craw? Thomson and Stennard.”
“How so?”
“What do we know about Gavin Thomson? I haven’t heard Ferndale or Andrews mention anything about him. Seems he’s low on the totem pole as a person of interest, but I have a funny feeling. He’s shifty. And Stennard seems wild. Drugs? They both need to be checked out.”
“We’ll handle them. You have other things to worry about right now. This case shouldn’t be your priority.”
“What should be my priority?” She gulped a mouthful of cooling coffee to wash away the ashen taste of grief. “I need to do something. SPPD won’t tell me anything about Barb. I get it, but at the same time I want to scream at them to let me help.”
“It’s rough. I’m here for you. Whatever you need. You need to take time, though. Grieve. Grieving is a healthy step in getting through this.”
“I will. But keeping up on the Stennard thing will help me through. I’ll probably request two weeks’ leave. Should be enough time for me to get my life back in some semblance of order. But two weeks is a long time to be away. You’ll be my eyes and ears, right?” She felt tears threatening and swallowed hard. “Don’t shut me out, Cam.”
“I won’t but only two weeks? I’m sure Crapper would let you take more time. For god’s sake. Barb was murdered. Take some time off. Recover.”
“Actually, Jamie told me he would be my contact, so I don’t have to deal with Crapper. The best thing for me is to stay busy. I need to move forward. And, no, this is not shock talking. It’s how I’m wired.”
“You have to promise me you’ll let me know how we can help you, in your personal life. Jane and I—we love you guys like family. We still haven’t told the kids Auntie Barb is gone.” His voice cracked. “Going to be a tough talk. They loved her so much.”
MC smiled. “And she adored them. Tell them she’s gone, but she loved them and she’ll be watching over them from heaven. I don’t believe in the whole heaven and watching over deal, but I think it might be the easiest for the kids.”
“I’m with you.”
“I gotta go, but we’ll talk soon. And let me know—email or call—after you talk to Klein. Okay?”
“Yep. Take care.”
She disconnected, left enough cash to cover the check and a hefty tip, and exited the diner.
The day was brilliant. Bright. Sunny. Mild. The high was expected to be near forty. Yesterday’s snow was destined to diminish considerably by day’s end, probably changing sidewalks and streets into slushy rivers.
MC checked the time on her phone. It was creeping up on ten already.
She decided to hit up a local bookstore. She needed to buy a new Moleskine notebook. A special one, for a special investigation. Sharpe be damned. She’d figure out who the fuck killed Barb herself.
She drove out to Roseville, a northern suburb of Saint Paul, where she was certain she wouldn’t run into anyone she knew. She found the Moleskine display and knew the minute she laid eyes on the perfect notebook to chronicle Barb’s case: a five-by-eight-inch Oxide Green hardbound leather notebook with ruled pages. She quickly made her purchase.
MC started up the Subaru and NPR’s Saturday lineup filled the inside of the car. She tore the wrapper off the new notebook and cracked the cover. Pen in hand, she recorded the details she knew about the previous day’s events, including her own schedule and timeline and Barb’s intended plans. She narrowed down the time Barb was killed to between six and seven yesterday morning.
Her calculations were more than she’d gotten out of Sharpe. She tapped the tip of the pen against the steering wheel as she stewed. Her phone rang, jolting her ou
t of her reverie. Dara’s name appeared on the screen.
She answered, “Hi, Dara.”
“We’re home. Where are you?”
“Parking lot of Barnes and Noble in Roseville.”
“Okay. Do you want to come over?”
“Yes. I need to run some things by you and Meg.” She blew out a breath. “God. Is this real? I feel like I’m in a dream.”
“More like a nightmare. Come over. Coffee’s on.”
“On my way.” MC set the phone on the passenger seat and noticed a sheet of paper between the seat and the center console.
She slipped it out and was greeted by a child-sized outline of a hand decorated to be a Thanksgiving turkey. Emmy Carson was printed at a downward slant in the upper right corner. It must’ve fallen out of Barb’s bag earlier in the week.
Her heart shattered like an icicle dropping to the pavement from a gutter. Barb’s students would be devastated. She made a mental note to go through Barb’s bag and bring any papers to the school. Whoever they got to replace Barb should have the kids’ work. She traced the fingers, a rainbow of colors representing the turkey’s feathers.
Tears dripped from her chin, and a splash of water stained the bottom corner of the sheet. The thought of the kids not seeing Barb again was enough to shove her off the edge. She couldn’t control her sobbing.
Two teen-aged girls scampered past her car and gawped at her before tripping each other and moving on in a fit of giggles.
“Real nice. You’ve never seen a grown woman cry?” She tossed the paper on the seat, planted her phone on top to hold it in place. She found a napkin in the glove box and blew her nose. MC picked up the green notebook and on the page that read, “In Case of loss, please return to:” she wrote Black Friday instead of her name.
Then she pointed her car in the direction of the only family she had left.
At her friends’ house, MC picked up Dara, and they returned to the Best Western to grab her belongings. She checked out and settled the bill while Dara loaded the suitcases into the car.
Dara and Meg’s peach-colored clapboard house was located in the Grand-Dale neighborhood of Saint Paul. White rails ran along the front porch, and teal trim offset the peach nicely. They had replaced the sidewalk with gray hexagon-shaped paving stones, which gave great curb appeal but were hell to shovel in the winter.
Meg came out to help haul MC’s luggage in and up to the second-floor guest room at the back of the house overlooking the yard and the alley.
MC peered out the window. “Slushy mess out there.”
Meg opened the closet and pushed aside some old coats. “I really should donate these. We don’t wear them anymore.”
“I’ve been telling you to do that for two years.” Dara heaved one of MC’s suitcases on the bed.
“Oh, you,” Meg said. “Blah blah blah.”
MC listened to her two best friends bicker. Her shoulders were hunched, coat still on, and she leaned her head against the windowpane, barely registering the burn of the frigid glass against her skin. What she wouldn’t give to be having a similar exchange with Barb. Tears filled her eyes, and drops lazily snaked down her cheeks.
Meg came up behind MC and drew her into a hug. “I’m so sorry. I want to say it’ll be all right.”
“I don’t know if things will ever be all right.” She hiccupped. “Tell me how I go on without her, Meg. Please, tell me.”
“You’ll be the strong woman you’ve always been. You go on living. She’d want all of us to do the same. Cherish and gain strength from the memories.”
Dara joined in the hug. “Yeah, what my better half said.” She smiled through her own tears. “We’ll get through this together. We’re family.”
“Family.” MC broke their circle and sat heavily on the edge of the chenille-covered double bed. The bright dandelion-colored walls belied the mood in the room.
Meg swiped at her own face with both hands. “You settle in. I’ll go downstairs and make some lunch. Use the closet and the chest of drawers. If you need extra blankets or pillows you know where they are.” She rattled on about towels and such in the linen closet, and MC tuned out her well-meaning friend.
Over lunch, the three friends put their heads together and came up with a list of tasks, which they divided up.
MC took on the arrangements for Barb’s cremation and memorial service to be handled by Sunset Cremation Society in Highland Park. Sunset’s chapel would hold at least one hundred people. A few years before, MC and Barb had set up and paid for their funerals, so all MC had to do was confirm the following Saturday afternoon from one to three would work, and the rest was taken care of, including an obituary notice in the Saint Paul Pioneer Press newspaper. Then she got hold of the ME’s office to let them know someone from Sunset would be there to take Barb to her final resting place.
Meg contacted a local caterer and placed an order for sandwiches, salads, and cookies to be delivered to Flannel where MC wanted to have their few close friends and family gather after the memorial service.
Dara researched accredited crime scene cleanup companies in Saint Paul. She found three to propose to MC, and they settled on a company called In the Midnight Hour, Inc., because the name seemed discreet, and they had immediate availability for crime and trauma scene decontamination.
When MC gave her the go-ahead, Dara scheduled the crew for that evening. MC hoped having them show up after dark would lessen the chance of gawkers.
Dara asked, “Do you want to be there when they arrive or would you like me to go?”
MC considered the list on the table in front of her. She sipped from a cup of lukewarm coffee and then rubbed her temples. “I didn’t even think about having to be there, but I suppose someone needs to let them in and lock up afterwards.”
“I can do it,” Dara said. “You don’t need to put yourself through that.”
MC glanced from Dara to Meg and back. “You guys are the best.” She bit back a sob. “Would you mind, Dara? I know it’s a lot to ask. The scene isn’t pretty.”
“Don’t worry about me.” The pool of tears gathering in Dara’s eyes contradicted her bold words.
“Promise me if it’s too hard, you’ll call and I’ll come right away.”
“You got it. I’ve still got time before I head over there, so what can I do next?”
MC reviewed the list in front of her. “Nothing else right now. I’ve got to get to the post office and rent a post office box. I don’t want mail delivered to the house.”
Because I don’t ever want to go back there again is what she didn’t add.
Chapter Twelve
November 29 – December 7
The next few days were a blur. November bled into December.
MC finalized details for Barb’s memorial and managed to coordinate everything with Barb’s parents and brothers.
They’d put together an amazing photo array and each of the family members, along with MC, Dara, and Meg, were getting up to speak. Some folks might refer to their comments as eulogies, but MC preferred to think of them as Barb’s life stories and the sharing of the legacy she left behind.
Dara and Meg closed Flannel at noon on Saturday, December sixth, for Barb’s memorial. Barb’s family and MC and Barb’s closest friends and co-workers were invited to attend the luncheon. Meg set up photo collections and piped all Barb’s favorite music through the café’s speakers.
MC somehow made it through the day. She reminisced with friends and cried with Barb’s mother.
She laughed with Cam and Jane as they watched their two beautiful, vibrant children, Ben and Hailey, chase Dara around the tables and chairs. Her heart broke and swelled at the same time with all the love this group shared for a woman who’d been the brightest star in the darkest of nights.
H
Mid-morning on the Sunday after Barb’s memorial, Dara, Meg, and MC piled into Dara’s blue Jeep Grand Cherokee and made the two-and-a-half-hour drive north to MC’s cabin.
; She sat in the back seat cradling Barb’s bronze urn. Dara had NPR on the radio, and they were silent as the inside of a church during the ride.
With only one stop in Hinckley for gas and a restroom break, they made excellent time. The day was mild, near forty degrees, and lemony-light colored a pallid blue sky overhead.
MC fought the demon inside screaming for a drink. She’d not touched vodka since her bender in the hotel over a week earlier, but the evil tempter pecked at her brain daily. The thought of the fine French vodka, created from winter wheat instead of Russian potatoes, made her toes tingle. Of course her wallet tingled too. Grey Goose was expensive.
Determined not to think about alcohol, she listened to the replay of the weekly radio show, A Prairie Home Companion, and absorbed the steady thrum of the tires on the road.
At noon Dara drove through the virgin snow covering the driveway to the two-car garage fronting MC’s cabin north of Two Harbors.
The crunching sound set MC’s teeth on edge. “Sounds like fingernails on a chalkboard.”
“I agree.” Meg opened her door, dangling her short legs before dropping to the snow-covered driveway. “Snow’s almost up to the tops of my boots.
“I’ll shovel us a path to the house.” Dara regarded MC in the rearview mirror. “Toss me your keys and I’ll get the shovel from the garage.”
In short order, Dara had cleared the snow from the garage to the house and trudged around to the lake-facing side and made a trail from the cabin’s sliding glass doors to the steps leading down to the lake.
MC didn’t own a boat, so instead of a dock she had a patio with a bench near the shoreline on Lake Superior. The gales of November had given way to the squalls of December, carrying the steely taste of ice and snow. The threesome huddled on the patio and watched the whitecaps soar and recede, the sharp tips sparkling like diamonds.
Meg linked her arm through MC’s. “I know it’s hard to let go, but she’ll always be with us.” She dabbed her eyes with a gloved finger.
“Yes.” MC lifted the heavy round top off the container. “And she wanted to be here, where we both found so much peace.” MC slipped as close to the water’s edge as she could and tipped the urn and dumped about half the contents. A gust of wind wound up and the waves crashed, grabbed Barb’s ashes and rolled away.