Bitter Cold (11 page)

Bobby swallowed hard, loud enough for April to hear over the tow truck’s constant rumble. “No,” his voice sounded rehearsed.

“I don’t believe him,” April crossed her arms, though the stiffness of her frozen jacket made it tough. “He’s full of shit.”

“I gotta go with her on this one,” Jeff nodded. “He just looks guilty.”

Bobby stared at Jeff without blinking. His eyes watered at the icy wind. Then he piped up. “Hey, man. Can I go or what? I’ve got to get to Clatskanie by eleven. My girlfriend’s gettin’ off work, and if I’m not there right on time, she’s gonna freak.”

Jenkins gave him the cop-eye, shining a light into Bobby’s chest and remaining straight-faced.

“Am I under arrest or something,” Bobby looked perplexed. “Are you arresting me?”

“No, no,” Jenkins raised his empty hand and lowered the flashlight. “We’re just having a conversation here. No big deal.”

“If it’s no big deal, then I’d like to go, if you guys don’t mind. Like I said, my girlfriend,” he pointed at his watch.

Jenkins clicked off his light. He worked his tongue over his teeth. Then he cleared his throat and spat. “All right. I guess that’ll be it,” he waved Bobby away. “Just do me a favor and get this thing off the road until there’s an accident or something. You don’t need to be driving around in this shit. I’d hate to have to call a tow truck to pull a tow truck out of the ditch.”

“You don’t have to worry about that,” Bobby beamed. “I can go through anything in this old beast. She’s a tank. There’s no stopping her.”

“Pretty powerful, huh?” April smiled.

Bobby blinked and tilted his head. Then he seemed to accept April’s sudden pleasantness and answered. “Oh, yeah. This thing’s a beast, I tell ya’.”

“Powerful enough to, say, pull a wrecked car up the side of a hill?”

“Of course—HEY!” he narrowed his eyes. “Don’t put words in my mouth, lady. I’m gettin’ the hell outta here. You guys’re all nuts!”

He hurried to his truck, slipping as he rounded the hood to get to the driver’s door.

April glared at Jenkins. “Aren’t you going to do anything? He’s the best witness to the crime we have, and if there’s any evidence, it might be on that truck.”

“I’m still not convinced there
was
a crime,” Jenkins watched Bobby climb into the cab.

April noticed Jenkins’ suspicious look. “But you have a hunch, don’t you? All good cops have hunches. I can tell you’re one of the good ones.”

Jenkins presented half a smile. “Yeah, yeah. Flattery will get you everywhere.”

The tow truck pulled away. Jenkins shook his head at April, then reached into his pocket and produced a notepad. As the truck drove out of sight, he scribbled the license plate number.

“We’ll see what turns up,” he put the pad in his pocket again. “In the meantime, go home and get out of this cold. I don’t know a wit about corporate murder plots or weird black stains in the snow, but I do know about a little thing called pneumonia. And you look like you’re gonna get it if you don’t get inside, and soon.”

April had forgotten about the freezing temperature until that moment. She was shivering again, chattering her teeth. The cold seeped into her, a chill settling in the core of her bones.

Jeff threw his arms around her. “April? What’s wrong? Are you okay?”

She summoned the strength, tightened her stomach, and forced a response. “I’m fine.”

“You’re not fine,” he touched her cheek. His hand felt hot. “You’re freezing. Look at you, you’re trembling. Let’s get back to the truck.”

SIXTEEN

LOGAN LED APRIL into the foyer, through the arched cased opening to a sitting area below the staircase. She looked shaky, head down, eyes on her feet, but stopped and seemed to become aware of her surroundings when she got to the living room. Jeff busied himself with stoking the fire, although it really didn’t need another log quite yet. He’d filled the stove before they left.

“You want to come in and sit down next to the fire?” he poked at a glowing chunk of maple. “I’ll get you something hot to drink. You like cocoa? Or how about some coffee? I think we even have some tea.”

Sniffling, she glanced at him, searched the room, and said, “You know? I think I’d like to just take a nice, hot bath. Is that all right with you?”

“A bath?’ he paused. “Uh…sure.”

A bath!
He popped up, dropping the fire poker on his foot. He didn’t feel it. He had one thing on his mind, and that piece of iron wasn’t it. She wanted to take a bath, and he hadn’t cleaned his tub in about two years.

“Just let me…” he ran past her and up the stairs, using the handrail to vault three steps at a time. “Just give me a second!”

With the help of some pretty strong cleanser, he managed to scrub away the yellow ring on the porcelain and the brown stains behind the shower curtain. He couldn’t do anything about the musty curtain itself, so he pulled it out of the tub and let it dangle over the edge.

After restoring an ivory luster to the old clawfoot, he ran hot water until it started to steam, then closed the drain. He twisted the cold a little and allowed the tub to fill.

Two quick knocks on the door. It creaked open.

“Can I come in?” April peeked in and smiled. “Are you done yet, because I really want to get into the…Oh, that’s
beautiful,
” she stared at the bathtub.

He glanced at it. “Yeah. It’s original to the house. My grandmother loved this thing. Soaked in it every Saturday for eighty-one years. She didn’t even need one of those safety rails, either. Could get in and out better than me.”

“She sounds like an amazing woman,” she stepped in the room, no doubt disgusted by the smell. Why didn’t he clean that toilet?

“She was,” he nodded. “Hey, do you want bubbles?”

“Of course.”

He searched beneath the sink. Years of clutter under there, but he knew he’d find it, a sad remnant of Emma’s existence, one of many scattered throughout the house. This was a wicker basket, filled with soaps and lotions, bath oils and salts. The kind of basket sitting in every pharmacy and gift shop in every mall in America. Emma loved that stuff. He supposed every woman did. Come to think of it, so would he. He just never got around to treating himself.

“Here,” he presented the basket to her. “Take your pick. It’s all yours.”

She frowned. “I…I can’t take this.”

“Why not?”

“You know. It belonged to your wife. It just wouldn’t feel right.”

“Don’t be silly. I don’t think she’d care. She’d like you, in fact.”

“What makes you think she’d like me?”

“Well, for starters, you tried to help save Logan’s life. That goes a long way in my book, and I’m sure it would in hers.”

“You said for starters. What else?” she tilted her head.

He paused, feeling a rush of blood saturating his face. “I just think she’d like you. That’s all.”

She stared at him. He wished to hell he could read her mind. He wanted to pull her close and lock his lips onto hers so tight she’d feel it for days. It had been so long since he’d kissed a woman. He didn’t want to think about how long. His heart raced. It made his head spin, yet he decided it was now or never. He cleared his throat leaned toward her when she sat to look at the little basket.

“It
is
pretty nice. Oh, Chamomile…and clove oil, I love Chamomile and clove oil.”

He went to the door. “You know what? Suddenly I feel like an intruder. You have yourself a nice bath. I’ll be downstairs. Hey, uh, are you hungry? Because I’m fixing something.”

She began to unbutton her blouse and faced him. “Sure. Just make me one of what you’re having.”

He turned before she undressed fully, though it seemed she wanted to show him. He just couldn’t. Inside, he heard Logan’s voice calling him a chicken. He chuckled to himself. He
was
a chicken. “Okay, then. I’ll heat up some pizza for you, then,” he fumbled, his voice cracking a little. “Pepperoni okay?”

She giggled. “That’s fine. Now get out of here!”

WITH FIVE MINUTES left on the oven timer, Jeff jumped from the kitchen barstool and stood fully alert. He’d heard a noise that startled him. Then he heard it again and his feet moved before he could think, taking him straight upstairs where April was supposed to be relaxing.

She didn’t sound relaxed.

She sounded terrified.

“Oh my God! Help me! HELP!”

Her shrieks filled the house. It made Jeff’s hair stand on the back of his neck. Logan met him at the top of the staircase.

“Dad! Is she all right!”

“Jeff! HELP!”

“Go back to your room!” Jeff dashed down the hall. Logan stood motionless. “Go!”

He nearly broke the door off its hinges getting in.

“What! What is it!”

She splashed at the water, kicking the bubbles. Then she tried to pull herself out of the tub, but slipped and dunked under, coming up spitting and coughing. She reached for him. “It’s here! It’s here to get me!”

Without a thought, he yanked her straight out of the water. She landed on her feet in the middle of the bathroom, fully nude and shivering. Jeff looked away. He found a clean towel and gave it to her, handing it over behind his back.

She took the towel and stepped back from tub, out of breath and crying. “That-that thing was in there, I swear! It was in there, in the bubbles!”

“In the bubbles?” Logan peeked in.

“Logan, get your ass in your room, now!”

“Okay, sheesh,” he rolled his eyes and disappeared.

April clung to Jeff when he moved toward the bathtub. “No! No, don’t do it! Don’t go near it!”

He hesitated. Then his protective instincts kicked in.

“No,” he puffed his chest. “If something’s in my bathroom, I want to see what it is.”

“I’m telling you what it is! It’s that thing! That fuckin’ monster! It tried to get me!”

He pried loose, stepped to the tub, and threw aside the flimsy, stained curtain. Nothing. Just bubbles and soapy water.

“What?” he held open the curtain. She didn’t move, huddling in the furthest corner in the room. He reached and splashed in the tepid water and repeated, “What?”

She frowned and lowered her shoulders, then took two tentative steps toward him. “You-you don’t see anything?”

“Just Mister Bubble, or whatever you used. There’s nothing here, April.”

Keeping her hand on the towel around her chest, she inched to the edge of the clawfoot. She looked in and inhaled quickly. He saw her fear wash away, in its place a genuine confusion. He would have thought it a joke if she didn’t look so perplexed.

She reached and slapped at the water. “It was
here
, dammit! I saw it, in the bubbles, just like in the snow, but it was in the bubbles.”

He tried to touch her shoulder. She winced and pulled away. Her refusal didn’t deter him. He tried again, this time she let him. She put her head on his chest.

“I must be having nightmares. I keep seeing it, having dreams about it. I must have woken up and saw the bubbles and thought it was snow and…oh, it was so horrible! That thing,” she looked him in the eye. “You saw it, right? You’re not just saying you did?”

He shook his head. “I was there, remember? I was right there just a few feet away when it took Dexter’s foot.”

“I know you were, I know,” she rubbed her eyes and leaned against the clothes hamper. “I’m sorry. It’s just that…that it was so dark, like a hole into hell. But holes don’t move. What the fuck, Jeff? What the fuck is it?”

“I thought you knew,” he kept his staring at a minimum, though the loose towel made it difficult. It draped over her leg, exposing a smooth thigh. She must not have noticed, or cared.

She looked at her feet and shook her head. “I don’t know anything anymore. I thought I knew. But where’s my car? If I had an accident, if I flipped over that embankment, where’s the car? There was nothing. Just a few tracks. The cop was right. It didn’t prove anything. Well, it did prove one thing. It proved I’m crazy.”

“Listen, if you’re going crazy, then it means I am, too. I mean, what is this? Some sort of mass psychosis? What about the Daniel Applegate story? And what about…” he stopped. No need to go down that dark path. But April insisted on dredging it up.

“Your friend Eddy? He was killed by that thing, wasn’t he?”

Jeff still felt like it had happened yesterday. “I’m certain of it now.”

She nodded solemnly. “It’s strange, but it proves maybe I
am
crazy after all. I’ve been thinking all along that monster in the snow was caused by the radiation leak. But you said your friend was attacked years ago, and the Daniel Applegate incident happened over a century before that. It doesn’t add up. It must have been caused by something else.”

“That may be, but I can tell you this: it can move, now. At one time it was stationary.”

“So,” she reached for her clothes. “Before this winter, that thing existed, but it was immobile? And now, for some inexplicable reason, it’s become mobile?”

He nodded. “And you wanna know something else? It’s getting bigger. It used to be just a few feet across. Now something’s changed. Something’s happened that lets it do things it couldn’t do before.”

“A spent fuel leak from the nuclear plant,” she pulled up her jeans without exposing so much as an inch of skin. “It caused some sort of spontaneous mutation.”

“What, are you some kind of scientist, now?”

“No,” she tossed a towel over her hair. “I’m not. But I’ve been a reporter long enough to learn a thing or two. It might be a rare, lethal algae bloom or something. The radiation from Trojan could have altered its DNA and made it even deadlier. I know it’s happened before. Mutations are common in radiation exposure cases.”

“You think it’s some sort of mutated algae?”

She pulled on her socks. “I don’t know what it is, but I’m almost certain the radiation from those spent fuel rods affected it somehow.”

“I really don’t care how or why. I just know we need to keep everyone outta there.”

She tugged her shirt over her head, then unwrapped the towel. “Sunshine’s the best disinfectant. The boys at NWP don’t want anyone to know about their little fuckup, so much so that they’re willing to commit murder. I’ve got to get this story out. You have internet access, right?”

“Yeah, of course.”

“Good.”

An ear-splitting alarm shattered the calm.
BEEEEP!  BEEEEP!  BEEEEP!

“DAD!” Logan screamed above the shrill noise. “The Pizza!”

“Shit!” Jeff rushed to the door.

She laughed. “You know, you’re not supposed to use smoke alarms as oven timers.”

He gave her a wry smile and made it to the first floor in record time, barely touching the steps. The stench of charred crust filled the kitchen, smoke rising from the oven. The pizza was ruined. He flopped it into the sink and ran the cold water.
FUCK!
He slammed the counter.

In the hall, April yanked open the smoke detector and pulled out the nine-volt. “Don’t worry about it. I wasn’t that hungry, anyway.”

“
I
was,” he snorted.

Logan dredged up some old, freezer-burned fish sticks and fries and they salvaged some kind of meal, though April said she only wanted coffee. She sat with her laptop and her voice recorder the rest of the night, typing and typing. Jeff had never seen anyone type so much so fast. He left her alone after the second time he tried talking to her. He could tell she strained to be polite, but her body language said,
‘Leave me the hell alone!’
So he did.

After watching most of
Lord of the Rings
with Logan, he left the boy snoozing on the couch to find April sleeping in the den. Out of coffee, she’d slumped in the office chair, her fingers still on the keyboard, whining lightly when she exhaled.

Outside, a gust of wind seized the falling flakes and stirred hundreds of them into a tiny tempest. On the windowsill, a small accumulation clung to the corners. It looked so innocent, so unassuming, like a Hallmark card. The very thought of snow made him feel innocent and whimsical. How could something so wonderful harbor such evil?

With some effort getting her out of the chair (the casters kept swinging her sideways), he lifted April and carried her upstairs to his bed. He debated on whether or not to undress her. His better judgment won the argument, and he slid her under the blankets fully clothed. He didn’t want that conversation in the morning.