Stone Cold Dead

by Catherine Dilts

  “Morgan,” Bernie called from her side of the table. “What beer are you drinking? Guinness or Smithwick’s?”

  Morgan looked up from her menu. She stared at the waitress. The young woman had the same chopped off, poorly dyed hair as the girl on the trail. Piercings marred her china-doll skin, and a rash of inartistic tattoos covered her shoulders, bare under the spaghetti straps of a tight tank top. Maybe it was the same girl.

  The waitress boldly returned Morgan’s stare, while working over a wad of moist gum. Morgan turned her attention to the menu, but she couldn’t focus on the drink list.

  “I don’t know,” Morgan said.

  “I suppose beer negates the walking we just did.”

  “A Guinness is actually quite low in carbs,” the waitress said, “for a beer.”

  “Guinness it is,” Bernie said.

  Corny jokes and clean limericks ran around the table several times before the fish and chips arrived.

  Morgan relaxed. It had been a long time since she’d been among people who didn’t tiptoe around her widowhood. She had gotten off to a bad start in Golden Springs, finding a body, and then losing it, being run into a ditch, and chasing donkeys.

  She watched the waitress move between the heavy wooden tables. There was a resemblance, but she didn’t have the winged monster tattoo on her neck. The waitress wasn’t the girl on the trail. Which meant the girl was still missing.

  CHAPTER NINE

  Morgan might have slept in, if her big toe hadn’t started throbbing. She sat up in bed and examined her foot.

  “Blister,” she muttered. “Ugh.”

  Crawling out of bed, Morgan moved in slow motion. Surely one beer couldn’t have given her a hangover.

  “Altitude,” she said aloud. “I’m still adjusting to the altitude.”

  Coffee helped dispel her lethargy. Her muscles loosened up as she went through the morning routine of feeding the donkeys and opening the shop. When she turned around the “open” sign, Morgan felt ready to face whatever adventures the new day chose to present.

  Del arrived, and puttered around fixing dozens of things that needed fixing. He and Cindy seemed determined to maintain the momentum of Morgan’s cleaning frenzy. As she watched Del oiling door hinges, Morgan again wondered at Kendall’s lack of attention to the shop.

  A customer browsed, studying every fossil in the shop, but buying nothing. Another purchased two dozen shark teeth for a Boy Scout project.

  Morgan left Del in charge, and closed herself up in the office. She had no idea whether the shop was making or losing money. She wanted a clear picture of the property’s worth before contacting a real-estate agent. And then there was the IRS. They wouldn’t understand that in his haste to start his Central American cult, little things like the shop financial records had slipped Kendall’s mind.

  Close to noon, Del rapped on the office door.

  “Come on in,” Morgan said.

  “I called Gerda at the auto repair shop,” Del said. “You can take your car in today. She’ll look at it for no charge.”

  “I do need a break.” Morgan saved her file and shut down the dinosaur of a computer.

  “I’ll hold down the fort here,” Del said.

  Morgan tugged on her coat. It was a chilly day, the sky gray and cloudy. She pulled the gate to the driveway closed, making sure it was securely latched, before she drove out of the Rock of Ages parking lot.

  Kruger’s Auto Repair squatted a block off Main Street on the west edge of Golden Springs, between a coin laundry and boarded-up cabins sitting in a lot overrun with weeds. A rack of tires, a chain looped through their centers, marked the division between the laundry parking and Kruger’s. Morgan pulled onto the crowded asphalt lot.

  The two raised bay doors revealed a tidy work area. A thin young man with a crew cut and a heavier man with short gray whiskers wore matching dark-blue jumpsuits. They consulted under the open hood of a passenger car.

  The older man looked up. “Can I help you?”

  “I’m looking for Gerda,” Morgan said.

  The man jerked a thumb toward the office. “She’s in there.”

  The shop windows needed scrubbing. Faded fliers taped to the inside of the glass advertised events dating back three years. The wood framing the scratched glass door badly needed paint. Inside, a cash register sat on a pitted glass display case.

  “Are you Kendall’s sister?” A short, stout woman filled the office doorway, a German accent making her words heavy and terse.

  “Yes,” Morgan said. “Del sent me.”

  “I’m Gerda.”

  Morgan winced as Gerda clasped her hand in a calloused, iron grip. Gerda wore the same dark-blue jumpsuit as the men. It accented her roundness, making Morgan think of an eggplant. A shock of white hair stuck up at odd angles from her round, flushed face.

  “You come in here.” Gerda waddled ahead of Morgan, leading her inside a small office. She sat behind a gray metal desk. “What’s wrong with your car?”

  “I don’t know.” Morgan resisted the urge to tell Gerda that was her job—finding out what was wrong. The frown lines etched deep in Gerda’s face told Morgan the woman might not have a well-developed sense of humor. “It’s been overheating ever since I drove here from South Dakota last week.”

  “I have my boys take a look at it,” Gerda said. “No charge since you’re a friend of Del. Then we decide what to do. Right?”

  How could I disagree? thought Morgan. “That sounds fine,” she said aloud.

  “Good.” Gerda stood. “We’ll take good care of your car.”

  Morgan followed Gerda out of the office. She noticed an empty bourbon bottle in the trash can by the door. Morgan wondered if it was Gerda’s, or one of the mechanic’s.

  “Do you know how long it will take?” Morgan asked. “It’s the only vehicle we have at the rock shop right now.”

  “Maybe tomorrow we’ll know what’s what.”

  Gerda held out her hand. Morgan obediently handed over her keys.

  “You got a ride?” Gerda asked. “I can have one of my boys take you home.”

  “I can walk,” Morgan said, thinking of the liquor bottle.

  Morgan headed to Main Street. The chilly breeze pushed down the neck of her coat. She wished she’d remembered a scarf. The blister on her toe throbbed with every step. Morgan hobbled into the pharmacy and bought blister bandages.

  When she came out, a magpie landed on the hitching post in front of the newspaper office. Snow-white feathers on its underside and the shoulders of its wings contrasted sharply with its iridescent black head, back, and tail. It hopped down the rail, turning its head to watch Morgan as she passed. Morgan shuddered. She wondered if she would forever think of the girl on the trail when she saw magpies.

  As she passed the bakery, the smell of baked goods and soup lured her closer. Morgan resisted the urge to drop in. As long as she was already in town, she might be able to solve one little mystery.

  She hurried to Hill Street, turning at Faerie Tales. Piers stood with his back to the window. Wavy blond hair brushed the shoulders of his green silk tunic.

  Piers had been worked up about the donkeys eating his flowers last summer. Could he have been angry enough to let the donkeys loose, in the hopes of getting them banned from Golden Springs? Angry enough to try to run her down, regardless of the karmic consequences? She needed to see what kind of vehicle he drove.

  A wooden fence enclosed the small parking area behind Piers’s shop. Morgan glanced around to see whether anyone was watching. She stepped down the alley and inside the parking area. A tiny lime-green hybrid car with a sparkly Faerie Tales bumper sticker perched near the back stoop. A late model silver two-door compact sat next to it.

  No black SUV.

  Morgan chided herself. Houdini and Adelaide could have been hit by a truck, or had any of a hundred mishaps. She couldn’t imagine the gentle vegetarian Piers exposing them to harm by letting them out, even if they had eaten his flowe
rs. It was even less believable that he would try to kill a human.

  By the time Morgan walked in the door of the rock shop, she was limping. The blister on her big toe distracted her from further paranoid fantasies.

  Thursday morning Morgan sat at the cash register, writing the work schedule on her new dry erase board. She looked up as a Granite Junction police cruiser pulled into the Rock of Ages parking lot.

  Officer Sanchez walked in, followed by Officer MacKenzie, who had to duck under the low doorway. Their polished shoes and pressed uniform slacks were mud spattered.

  “I don’t suppose you’re here to buy rocks,” Morgan said.

  “A hiker found a body,” Sanchez said. “It was several hundred feet off the trail, but close enough to the spot where you led search and rescue that it could be the same girl.”

  “You said ‘body.’ Does that mean she’s dead?”

  MacKenzie nodded. Morgan felt like someone had knocked the wind out of her.

  Del ducked through the shop door. He yanked the cowboy hat off his head and clomped across the pine floor. He glanced at the police officers, then focused on Morgan. “What’s going on?”

  “Officer Sanchez thinks they might have found the missing girl.”

  “We’d like you to come with us,” Sanchez said.

  “Why?” Del asked.

  “We don’t need you, Mr. Addison,” MacKenzie said.

  “If you’re taking Mrs. Iverson anywhere, I’m going, too.” Del planted his hat back on his head.

  “Look, Mr. Addison,” Sanchez said, “we really don’t need any help here. The more people we have at the scene, the more danger there is that evidence will be compromised.”

  “Evidence?” Morgan’s heart skipped a beat. “Was she murdered?”

  “We don’t know how she died yet,” Sanchez said. “We’d like you to see the scene before we remove the body.”

  “My car is in the shop,” Morgan said.

  “We’ll take you,” Sanchez said.

  Morgan glanced at Del. “I’d really like Del to go with me, if that’s okay.”

  “Only if he promises to stay out of the way,” Officer Sanchez said, frowning at Del.

  Officer MacKenzie parked at the Columbine trailhead. Sanchez got out, pulling on a heavy winter jacket covered with Granite Junction Police Department patches. Another police cruiser, a Pine County Search and Rescue truck and trailer, and two other cars crowded the small parking lot.

  Rolf sat in the driver’s seat of a large ATV. He gripped the steering wheel with leather-gloved hands. A white search and rescue helmet covered his sandy hair.

  “Hello Morgan,” he said. “I guess we weren’t looking in the right spot. Hop on. I’m driving you to the site.”

  The ATV seemed more like a golf cart than the traditional all-terrain vehicles they had at the rock shop. Roll bars encased the two narrow, padded seats. She climbed inside, sitting behind Rolf. Del climbed into the back seat with her, his long legs scrunched up nearly to his chin. His hunter’s green and brown camouflage jacket, covered with pockets, seemed appropriate for the trek through the winter woods. Officer Sanchez squeezed in next to Rolf.

  Morgan gripped the roll bar with one hand. She was glad she’d remembered mittens and a scarf. The wind whipped through the open vehicle as it bounced down the trail.

  The trip was fast in the ATV. Rolf slowed when they reached the spot where Morgan had found the girl. They continued past the cottonwoods and turned into a meadow. Rolf followed muddy tire tracks through the dried grass and scrubby bushes. Morgan watched a magpie fly toward the cottonwood trees. It might have been cawing, but Morgan couldn’t hear it over the ATV’s engine. Rolf stopped where the meadow dropped off at a creek. Officer Sanchez climbed out.

  “We have to walk from here,” she said.

  Del followed Morgan down a steep bank through knee-high brush. She struggled to keep the police officer’s dark-blue jacket in sight. Her blistered toe throbbed.

  The narrow creek etched a curving bed at the base of a pink sandstone cliff mottled with mud dauber nests. Pine trees rose from thick brush at the base of the cliff, their upper branches rising above its flat top. Morgan would not have guessed the low cliff was just yards off the well-traveled trail.

  Unseen things could happen in pockets of Colorado wilderness and never be discovered. Treasures preserved. Secrets hidden.

  Sanchez slowed her march. Morgan stopped beside the police officer. Two search and rescue personnel stood to one side, holding an aluminum-framed stretcher. A skinny police officer who looked too young to be in uniform stared at the ground, looking like he wanted to be anywhere but here. A tall, barrel-chested black man in a suit coat and jeans stood to the other side. In the center of their semicircle, a balding man wearing blue nitrile gloves crouched over a still form.

  Morgan’s stomach clenched at the sight of the familiar black cloak. Del put his hand on her arm.

  The man in the gloves looked up. “Good,” he said in a nasal tone. “You made it.” He stood. “We’re ready to move the body.”

  Quick introductions identified the man in the gloves as the coroner, and the one in the suit coat as a detective. A dark-haired man in cowboy attire, complete with chaps and a shiny sheriff’s-style badge grasped Morgan’s hand and gave it a vigorous shake.

  “Chief Bill Sharp. My job is to serve and protect Golden Springs citizens,” Bill said, emphasis on Golden Springs. “Feel free to call on me.” He jabbed a thumb at his chest.

  Morgan had the distinct feeling that jurisdictional toes had been stepped on. She wanted to explain to Chief Sharp that she wasn’t responsible for the chain of events her call had set in motion, including the Granite Junction police department taking the case as their own. The Columbine Trail wasn’t within either Golden Springs or Granite Junction city limits.

  Detective Roland Parker interrupted before she could speak. “Is this the person you reported seeing Saturday?” His voice was a commanding baritone.

  Morgan walked around the still form, stopping next to the coroner. Del followed, his hand gently holding her arm just below the elbow, as though she might faint at any moment.

  The girl lay in a heap, her limbs twisted at awkward angles. The same pale face Morgan has seen before peeked out from under the black cloak. Morgan recognized the piercings, and the raggedly cut short hair with the bad dye job.

  Morgan clutched Del’s arm and leaned closer. She could see more of the tattoo on the girl’s neck. Bat wings sprouted from the hunched shoulders of a creature that would have been at home perched on a medieval cathedral.

  “Her face wasn’t puffy when I saw her.” Morgan nodded. “But that’s her. I’m sure of it. She was back there.” Morgan pointed in the direction they had come from. “But that’s the same girl.”

  “The weather has been cold,” the coroner said. “There hasn’t been much decomposition.”

  Morgan backed away, bile rising in her throat.

  “So she came down that?” Del pointed to the top of the sandstone cliff.

  “That’s what it looks like,” the coroner said. “At first glance, anyway.”

  “Listen, Mr. Addison,” Officer Sanchez said, “I know you like to be helpful, but I’d really appreciate it if you’d keep what you saw here to yourself. You, too, Mrs. Iverson.”

  Morgan watched the search and rescue team lift the body onto the stretcher, her vision blurry through the tears filling her eyes.

  “If I could have gotten in cell phone range quicker to call for help, or if I’d tried CPR, she might not be here now.” Morgan swallowed hard. “Was she alive when I saw her Saturday?”

  “We won’t know until after the autopsy,” the coroner said.

  CHAPTER TEN

  Officer MacKenzie pulled the police cruiser to the curb in front of the newspaper office. Morgan stared out the window, only half-aware of the streets of Golden Springs. The image of the girl’s pale white face would not fade.

  “Detective Pa
rker’s not a bad guy,” Officer Sanchez said.

  The detective had been unsympathetic to Morgan’s tears, and had insisted on reviewing her report to Pine County Search and Rescue and Officer Sanchez, before allowing Morgan and Del to leave.

  “I know,” Morgan said. “He was just doing his job.”

  “You sure you don’t want a ride back up the hill?” Officer Sanchez asked, half turning in the passenger seat.

  “I need to take care of some business in town,” Del said.

  Morgan nodded her head. “Me, too.”

  “We understand you’ve had a shock,” Sanchez said. “It might be better for us to drive you home, Mrs. Iverson.”

  Maybe Officer Sanchez did understand.

  “Thank you, but I’d rather walk,” Morgan said.

  Del waved at the cruiser as it pulled away from the curb. A gust of wind tumbled a crumpled paper bag across the boardwalk.

  “I’m going to Gerda’s,” Del told Morgan. He zipped up his hunter’s jacket. “See if your car’s been checked yet. Unless you want me to walk with you?”

  Morgan couldn’t face the empty rock shop just yet. She tugged her wool cap down on her wind-whipped curls.

  “I might stay in town a little while.”

  “I’ll call your cell phone when I leave Gerda’s.” Del headed west, his cowboy boots loud on the wooden walkway.

  The detective had asked Del and Morgan to keep what they’d seen to themselves. Surely she could confide the trauma of the experience with her new friend without giving away potential evidence. But a be-back-in sign hung in the bakery window. Morgan checked her watch. Bernie would be gone for another thirty minutes.

  Morgan turned around. As she walked past Faerie Tales, she considered marching in to have a talk with Piers about a sign. There was plenty of room for a rock shop sign on either corner of Hill and Main.

  Seeing the dead girl had taken the fight out of Morgan. What was the point, anyway? If Kendall didn’t come back, she would be selling the property. She’d only been in Golden Springs a few days, and she already had enough bad memories for a lifetime. She took a deep breath and prepared herself for the climb up Hill Street.