Murder in a Very Small Town Read online

  Nonsense and another reason to isolate that glowing idiot box. What she wanted to hear were the details and timing of the storm, minus the panting. When the newscaster started talking numbers, she would turn to the set and watch. Numbers mattered. Humping soap sales didn’t.

  Viv heard a girl introduce yet another expert speculator. She glommed the wad of blue tape onto her hip and started pulling the streamer from the baseboard under the fresh paint. She was at the corner of the far wall when the power went out.

  Standing in the sudden dark and silence, Viv turned to the window. She spoke softly, sweetly, “Fuck.”

  Outages were common, but each and every one upset her more than most people. Didn’t matter if it was day or night, if Beau was home or not.

  ✳ ✳ ✳

  When Wesley Lorenzo had attacked her, four months prior, the power was out and Beau was home. Viv was in town, leaving their Quickee with the day’s receipts and cash. The money and rolled register prints were in the zip bag on the seat beside her when Wesley Lorenzo lit up his blue-and-red lights behind her. She had a dim view of Wesley Lo, as she liked to call him. She muttered in her best Jon Stewart voice welcoming an edgy guest, “And here’s dipstick, Wesley Lo.”

  Viv hit the blinkers, but didn’t pull over right away. In fact, she drove through most of town, very slowly, just to screw with him.

  She parked. Dipstick sat in his cruiser.

  “Chicken Shit rhymes with Dipstick,” she observed, decidedly not looking to the mirrors filled with hot light.

  He got out and told her to do the same.

  She called back, “No. And what do you want?”

  She braved the mirror, squinting. His roof lights and headlights went dark, which was odd. Gonna sit perfectly still; not even remove my seatbelt.

  There was a harsh clack on her window. She turned and saw his gun hit it again.

  She opened her door. Now she was pissed. She climbed out, and Wesley Lo stepped back.

  Taking an angry stride along her Land Rover, she faced him square, stepping into his space. From their high school days, the Dipstick had always creeped her out. Always looking at her, her body, never raising his eyes.

  She stood there in his space, and he took a step back, but as usual, he would not look to her face.

  “There’s been a break in,” he grumbled, studying the Sew What front door.

  “Well I’m certainly the best suspect,” she exhaled sarcastically. She turned to the Sew What, and that was when the power on Main went dark.

  Wesley Lo did the unexpected. Still looking away, he had punched her in the side of the head.

  Viv recoiled off the side of her car; stunned, and then the bad movie started.

  Wesley clenched her hair in his fist and dragged her back to his car. In the dark, he forced her over the hood. His free hand climbed up into her shirt, tearing at her bra. He slammed her head against the hood, knocking the breath from her lungs. Viv stared at the windshield, stunned, too shocked to even scream. His hand was struggling with the belt buckle to her jeans, and his hand in her hair slammed her forehead on the hood again.

  It was the second blow to her head that cleared her mind, and she started fighting back, all elbows and back kicks. She knew she was connecting because he began struggling, panting, and cursing. Her boot heel connected high up between his legs and he grunted. Her scalp was on fire and she could care less, she was gonna take him.

  Viv was striking true with her elbows and her boot. He was still in control, but that was fading. No more hands in her shirt or at her fly.

  Wesley tried vainly to contain the storm in his hands. He pressed his larger weight to contain her, but her heel connected again, that time square to the scrotum. Viv threw a vicious elbow and missed. He slammed her head on the hood a third time. That was when she heard shouting and footsteps.

  It was Tom Sheaan, Dent’s honorary, unpaid mayor. Tom was shouting:

  “Hey, Hey, Hey, Hey!”

  At first that was all Tom Sheaan did: shout; until Viv pivoted around, and she and Wesley tumbled to the sidewalk. When Tom Sheaan saw her disturbed and open blouse, he stopped shouting and the usually befuddled mayor was all over Wesley, throwing fists aimed at his head. He landed strong punches with his beefy fist.

  Wesley screamed, sounding like a kicked cat—high and shrill.

  Viv broke free and scampered out into the street. Touching her burning scalp, she looked back.

  It was a mean fight. The two men fell between the cars. Mayor Tom was holding his own but was taking shots too. She saw the mayor land a good one to Wesley’s belly, and she jogged to the brawl. No more watching and waiting.

  Viv entered the fight with her boots kicking, her fists throwing around the barn blows, and going for his head.

  Wesley screamed again. Mayor Tom worked him over onto his side, pinning one arm and leg. He and Viv pummeled Wesley. Viv’s left boot connected with Wesley’s face, and some of the fight went out of him. Blood spurted from his nose and mouth. Viv cocked her boot back for another kick, even as Wesley went limp.

  Mayor Tom rolled Wesley over face down on the pavement. Viv’s last kick nailed him in the neck. Wesley’s head cracked and bounced off the pavement, and Mayor Tom extended his hand to Viv, palm out. That would be her last strike. Mayor Tom placed his heavy knee in the center of Wesley’s back. He started talking at him. Viv stepped back, her boot tip cocked, ready to fire at the first hint of renewed fight.

  There was no more fight in Wesley. He was garbling and making snotty sounds, not words. Mayor Tom hollered into Wesley’s ear, “What the hell?”

  Wesley replied with a mucous and nasal slur.

  “Viv, you best get home. I got this,” Mayor Tom said to her, his eyes to Wesley’s slack and still shoulders. “Start your gen. Get out a rifle if that’ll help.”

  Viv didn’t move. She did not want the attack to end like this. She wanted the sounds of a helicopter and a SWAT team.

  Mayor Tom told Wesley to put his hands on his back. Wesley did so, and Mayor Tom pressed his knee onto them. He searched the cop’s holster and found handcuffs. When Viv saw fat Wesley scraped up and handcuffed, she decided to take Mayor Tom’s advice. She saw herself against a wall in family room, watching the front door, with Beau’s deer rifle held firmly in both hands. She drove home and spent the rest of the very dark night doing just that.

  ✳ ✳ ✳

  Now the power was out again, and Beau was visiting stores. Because of the storm and the distance, she had not heard the earlier gunfire from across the lake. She also had not seen or heard the explosion and orange fireball on the north shore.

  What concerned her was the certain road closures from the storm. No utility trucks, Beau, or anyone else for that matter were getting to Dent for at least a day or more.

  Since the attack, whether Beau was home or not, Viv responded differently to outages. She didn’t want fight, she wanted flight. She dropped the gob of blue tape, went to her knees, and crawled from the room in the dark.

  Viv climbed down the stairs and crawled as quietly as she could to the home office opposite the foyer. She got the gun safe open quickly and took out a rifle. She ran hunched into the family room and sat on the carpet with a clear view of the front door. The loaded rifle on her raised knee.

  The seven-minute timer went off in the basement, and a single light from the generator came on. She had had Beau set it up for her. The light was not above her, for comfort. It was over the front door, where it would illuminate anyone stupid enough, like Wesley Lo, to open it.

  ✳ ✳ ✳

  Cain stopped the snowmobile fifty yards back from the first of the five big houses. He also killed the headlight. He took his time putting on his snowshoes, holding a flashlight in his mouth aimed at his hands. He only gagged once before he stood and lifted the rifle from the handlebars. He shouldered his father’s leather tool bag. He was tired, but not cold. He was in the focused state his father talked so much about; the tunnel view of
action and movement. There was no emotion. None at all. After another mean kicking and beating, father had convinced Cain that this night had to happen.

  He walked through the snow up the road to Beau and his wife’s place like he was trained to do so. Their place was list item five.

  Getting to the back door of Beau’s house was difficult because the incline was steep and the snow hip-high. He moved steadily down the clearing between Beau’s place and the neighbor’s house.

  Like many lake homes and cottages, the view side of the basement was a wall of windows. Cain worked his snowshoes around to the double glass doors. Placing the flashlight back inside his mouth was distasteful, but he did it—as his father had designed.

  The narrow beam warmed the leather tool bag at his feet. There would be no picking of the lock. No breaking of glass. Father didn’t want that. As explained and memorized, Cain took out the power drill with a half-inch bit and centered it on the lock under the door handle. He powered the drill and pressed on it. “Ream it,” his father had instructed. Cain was told not to worry about the sound—the house was big and they would be asleep.

  The bit slid all the way through, but Cain didn’t pull it out. As instructed, he kept the bit spinning and rotated the drill handle in a circular motion. “Widen the reaming.” The hole expanded, and the metal guts inside were chewed up. When the hole was double in size, he slid the drill out. He eased the flashlight from his mouth and pushed on the door.

  Inside the long deep room, Cain walked slowly around the couches, tables, and chairs. He crossed to the furnace room. The door wasn’t locked. The furnace was larger than the one at home, about the size of two iceboxes. Cain swept the flashlight beam over the metal unit, focusing on its sides, looking for the gas line. He moved to the sides, seeing nothing. He searched up above, no snake of flex tubing. In the leather tool bag, he had crescents, pliers, and a hacksaw—everything he needed to open the line, but he couldn’t open the line until he found it. He searched again, both sides and above. Stepping back, he stared at the furnace.

  This should have been a simple item on the list, but now he was perplexed. Had Father been wrong with this part of the plan? Cain wanted to get on to the next list item—out front with the scope on the front door, in case anyone escaped from the explosion, but he couldn’t get there until he completed this.

  He swept the flashlight beam to the opposite wall. A back-up generator was chugging beside a tool shelf, three five-gallon fuel cans, and a metal worktable.

  He steadied the beam on the generator. An idea formed, but it was off the list. “Should I?” he whispered. Can I? Go off-list?

  The thought was unsettling and uncomfortable. The list was what father called gospel.

  The one thing the list did not provide were alternatives or back-ups.

  “But I’m at a dead end,” he said to himself.

  He slid his back down the wall, lowering onto his haunches. He stared at the furnace. Fear of going off-list was huge within him. The fear took the physical form of his father, towering over him, fist and boots firing.

  When Cain made the decision, it felt like a choice, which was a rare experience. He went right into action, shaking his head and the doubts away. He watched himself go to the first five-gallon fuel drum and open it. He poured it out on the slab floor. He emptied out the second drum and most of the third. Shouldering the tool bag and the rifle and placing the flashlight inside his mouth, he left the room and crossed to the open glass door, leaving a trail of fuel in his steps.

  He dragged one boot through the snow on the patio and poured the last of the fuel in the cleared path. Setting the empty can down, he aimed his mouth and the beam into the tool bag. He searched through the tools before remembering there was not a lighter or matches in there—Father had packed and re-packed the bag carefully and with focus.

  Cain went back inside. He found a box of matches on top of the wood box beside the fireplace, and something happened; he felt his lips forming a grin around the taste of the black flashlight. He was not only off-list, but he was also being creative. He headed out back and walked to the end of the fuel trail.

  Cain saw a mistake but didn’t panic. He got creative again. He went back inside the furnace room, found a hand towel on the metal table, dropped it on the floor, and used his boot heel to sweep it around, soaking up fuel. Back outside, he laid the wet towel at the far end of the trail of fuel. He took the flashlight out of his mouth and put it in the bag, lit a match, stepped back, dropped it, and ran.

  ✳ ✳ ✳

  The explosion was huge, similar to what the open gas line would have caused. Cain was hurled into the snow. He lay for a minute with his hands over his head before hurrying up the hill. On the shoulder of the road, he knelt with the rifle raised and aimed at the front door. He watched and waited. Five minutes passed. The fire climbed to the first floor windows of the big house. When the second story windows were glowing with flames, Cain felt that grin again. Without the flashlight in his mouth, the corner of his lips twisted up. He had gone off-list and been successful.

  Cain counted off to six hundred, fingered the safety on, stood and made his way to the snowmobile parked down the road.

  Jame came in from the sun porch carrying heavy coats and snow pants. Wiki was slowly eating pie at the kitchen table. He laid the clothing across the back of the blue couch. On his next trip, he held a pair of snow boots and two sets of ski poles. Neither of them spoke and he left the room. Wiki turned her attention to her plate and fork. She finished her slice of pie looking out the big windows. She could hear Jame somewhere toward the front of the cottage—the sound of orderly rummaging.

  Wiki reached over, took the towel from the kitchen counter and draped it over the pie pan— there was a single slice left. Jame came back into to the room carrying two sets of snowshoes and a backpack.

  “If you’re finished, we should go,” he told her. She joined him in front of the couch and they pulled snow clothing on over what they were wearing. Jame handed her two pairs of wool socks and explained, “They’ll help the boots fit.”

  “Thank you,” she replied softly. Since the shower, they had not spoken.

  When they were fully dressed, Jame handed Wiki a pair of ski poles.

  “For balance,” he told her. She had opted for her long black coat instead of the offered parka. “Let’s go,” he added.

  Wiki looked to the doorway and paused. Jame was crossing the room toward the view, his snowshoes clacking. He stopped at the back door and turned around. Her head was tilted and questioning.

  “We’re taking a shortcut,” he said.

  She nodded once, lowered her sunglasses and walked to him, her clacking snowshoes making her gait awkward.

  Jame opened the door, stepped out, and waited. When Wiki was beside him, he told her, “It’s probably easier if you follow in my steps.”

  She didn’t reply. He started out, took three steps and stopped. The snow was knee-deep. There was a fresh set of tracks bisecting his intended direction. He looked to his right where the tracks had come from, the side of his cottage. To his left, the tracks moved up to the windows and there was a stirring; whoever it was had stomped and nudged a clearing. It looked like the person either sat down or fell. The tracks moved out again, turning with the cottage to the shower side of the big room.

  Jame hunched his shoulders, indicating a question to Wiki. She either didn’t notice or care—she was looking down the incline of the white lawn. Getting no response, he started in that direction.

  “The shortcut is across the lake?” Wiki asked.

  Away from the cottage, the white wind was fierce and moving chaotically. If Jame replied, she didn’t hear it. When the two of them were twenty yards out on the lake, the blowing snow became a steady stream from the east. They snow shoed leaning forward, their heads lowered, the blowing snow buffeting their backs. As he had suggested, Wiki followed Jame, placing her snowshoes in his tracks.

  For Wiki, the world beca
me pure, cold white. She stopped turning from side to side; there was nothing but the storm to see. She kept her shades aimed at Jame’s moving legs and tracks.

  “Go inside first,” Jame said to Wiki, stepping aside. “You need a break. Need to warm up.”

  She looked up from his working legs for the first time in an hour.

  “Hear that?” he asked. He was facing Dent on the far shore. Wiki neither looked nor responded. She stepped past Jame and entered the yellow door to a small squat hut.

  Jame was looking to town and the direction of the muffled gunshots. My town’s being shot up.Who’s doing it?

  He heard Wiki enter the ice fishing hut and the click release of her snowshoe bindings. There were four other huts set out in no particular pattern around this one, all about fifty yards apart. The huts were all hip deep in show, only part of their structures visible. Unlike this blue and gold hut, the others were black or green. None of the other huts appeared occupied; there were no sleds, snowmobiles, or recent tracks. This hut was different: it was nearly twice the size of the others and there was the pattern of approaching and departing snowshoe tracks, indicating regular visits.

  Jame brushed the snow from his head and shoulders, stomped the snow from his lower legs, and removed his snowshoes before stepping in through the yellow door.

  “What is this?” Wiki asked.

  “Believe this is Abel’s fishing hut. Seen her trudging to it a few times,” he answered, squatting just inside the door. “I’ll light the lights,” he added.

  He had never been in this hut, but he quickly located a propane lamp and a box of wood matches. He lit the gas lamp hanging from a flex line.