Double Black Diamond (Mercy Watts Mysteries) (40 page)

“Have you been talking to them?”
 

“A bit.”
 

Dad peppered me with questions from how the members of DBD looked to the state of Nina’s health.
 

“I gotta go, Dad. I’m on a lift.”
 

“Okay. Okay. Have you heard anything about a reunion?” he asked.
 

“I think it’s a done deal,” I said.
 

Dad whooted into the phone.
 

“Bye, Dad.”
 

“Wait. Wait. What do you know about the new album?” he asked, breathless.
 

“Not much. Just that it’s a memorial album for Cliff,” I said.
 

“What’s it going to be called?”

“It’s just Cliff’s initials. I have to go. We’re getting to the end of the line.”
 

“JDS. Good name. I like it.”
 

Pete pushed up the safety rail.
 

“What did you say?” I asked.
 

“JDS. Jacob David Silverstein. That’s Cliff’s initials,” said Dad.
 

“Where did Cliff come from?”
 

“He loved skiing out of bounds. Going off cliffs.”
 

“Oh.” I hung up and tucked my phone away as I lifted my tips.
 

“What’s wrong?” asked Pete.
 

“JDS.”
 

“What’s that?”
 

“Mickey’s brother’s initials. JDS. Does that sound familiar?” I asked.
 

He didn’t have a chance to answer. Our skis hit the berm and we were flying down the little hill. I turned to the right and just caught a glimpse of Mickey and Wade joshing each other and then going over the lip to Bittersweet.
 

JDS. So familiar. Why?

“JDS. Isn’t familiar to you?” I asked Pete.
 

“I feel sick,” he said.
 

“What’s wrong, honey?” asked Nancy coming up beside us.
 

“Not feeling good.”
 

A snowboarder blasted past us, icing our legs and causing Calvin to shake his fist at the guy. I stared off after Mickey and Wade. Those initials were so freaking familiar. The snowboarder that had iced us got to the lip and did a sharp turn, flashing the black and blood red pattern of the bottom of his board. I froze. The guy bent over to adjust a buckle on his boot and his jacket slid up in the back, revealing a red and black tattoo. JDS.
 

“Oh shit!”
 

“Mercy!” said Nancy.
 

The snowboarder jumped up and over the lip, out of sight. I poled frantically after her. Jessie. Wade’s arm candy. She was the one. “Call 911!” I yelled over my shoulder at Pete.

“What?” he yelled back.
 

“It’s the snowboarder! Jessie! Call Carey!” I pushed past several skiers to the lip.
 

“Mercy! Mercy!”
 

I glanced back. It was Fergus frantically waving something at me. He drew his arm back and launched it. I dropped my poles and snatched it out of the air. My taser. I went over the lip with no poles. I didn’t think. I had to catch her. Mickey was up ahead. Wade, Jimmy, and Darren. She was going to stop that reunion. It would be a bloody ending.

I went down the fall line. Straight down. No turns. Building speed. More speed. There she was carving and heading for Mickey and Wade. They were skiing in tandem. She was gaining. Closer. Closer. Mickey waved to Wade and cut to the left toward Leap Frog, a green run. Wade continued on Bittersweet. I held my breath. Which way would she go? Straight after Wade. No hesitation. He was her target.
 

“Wade! Wade!” I screamed into the wind. But he couldn’t hear me. I tucked and built more speed. I was directly behind her, matching her speed. She glanced back when she heard me get close. Her lips were in a tight line and then they formed an O. She lost her concentration, caught an edge and tumbled ass over teakettle across Bittersweet. Wade kept going and was gone in a blink. Jessie flipped off the trail over the edge. Out of sight. I did a hard stop, shooting up a wave of snow and fell on my bruised hip. I gasped and struggled to my feet. Without poles it’s a lot harder. Taking a couple deep breaths, I jumped my tips downhill again and took off across Bittersweet.
 

I found Jessie in deep powder struggling to get up.
 

“Stop!”
 

She didn’t stop. Isn’t that always the way? She struggled harder. There was no point in skiing into that powder. I wouldn’t get anywhere. I squatted and forced down my releases, popping out my boots. Then I tumbled headlong into the powder and dove at Jessie. She screeched and flailed at her boots, trying to release them.
 

“Where is it?” I screamed at her.
 

She picked up a broken branch and swung it at me. I was too slow and she caught me on the side of the head. I
 
lurched sideways, but managed to charge the taser.
 

“Get away from me!” she screamed.
 

“Tell me where it is!”
 

“You’re crazy!”
 

Damn straight.
 

She released her boots and dove away from me. I couldn’t let her go. Sure. I knew her identity and Detective Carey would nab her sooner or later. But Keegan couldn’t afford later. I had to get that oil before the cops got it. I dove after her. She struggled in the four-foot drifts between trees and reached up to grab a branch exposing her tattoo. I lunged and zapped her, right on the D. She screamed so high-pitched only dogs could hear it and then started flopping. Spit was going every which way. Kind of reminded me of Wallace when she shook.
 

I jumped on top of Jessie and yanked her over. “You bitch!” she slurred out.
 

“Yeah. I’m the bitch.” I smacked her in the mouth. I’m not exactly proud of hitting someone when they’re down, but in all honesty, I’d do it again. The girl did try to concave my head with a microwave. “Where’s Rory’s bag?”
 

“No!”
 

“Tell me!”

“He can’t have that stuff. Wade will kill him if they get the band back together.”
 

That took me back and she used that second to punch me in the face, splitting my lip. Luckily, she was still juiced and it wasn’t hard enough to daze me. I smacked her again.
 

“Wade didn’t kill Cliff. I need that bag!”
 

“No!”

I stuck the taser in her face. “I need that oil. You tell me where it is or I’m going to zap you into a coma.”

“No!” she spat in my face. She actually spat at me. Infuriating, but she also put a protective hand on one of her jacket pockets. I wiped the spittle off my cheek and gave her a low-voltage zap to the side of the face. She went limp and I ripped open the pocket. It only contained a well-worn business card of a private investigator, Reuben Scott. On the back of the card two numbers. 115 and 4242. Must be where she put the bag. Why two numbers? Couldn’t be a condo. She couldn’t be sure someone wouldn’t find it.
 

“A locker,” I said. “She put it in a locker.”

I put the taser in my pocket and rolled off of Jessie. She began to moan and I fought the urge to spit on her before I wallowed out of that hole.
 

“Mercy!” Fergus stood at the edge of the trees. “You got her!”
 

By the time I climbed out of the powder, I was sweating like I was Uncle Morty staring at Nina. “You…stay…with…her.”
 

“Did you use your taser on her?” he asked, looking at the now moving Jessie.
 

“Yes…call…patrol,” I gasped. “Going down.”
 

He grabbed me by the waist. “I’ve got a hold of you.”
 

I pointed down the hill. “Down.” I shakily clipped into my skis.
 

“Are you sure you can make it?” asked Fergus. He looked doubtful and I felt it. My legs were shaking so bad, I wasn’t certain I could stay on them, but the oil was down there. I had to try.
 

I patted Fergus on the shoulder and pushed off. This time I went slow, carving as much as possible down to the lift. I must’ve looked terrible because about twelve people asked me if I was okay. I lied. That was probably pretty evident when I came down the hill, went for the racks, but didn’t have enough strength to stop and ran into one. I lay on the hard-packed snow and rolled side-to-side like a turtle on its back.
 

“Mercy!” Lisle skied up and grabbed my flailing hand. “Are you okay?”

I leaned on the rack and caught my breath. “Just exhausted.”

“What happened to your poles?”
 

“Lost them on Bittersweet. Can I borrow one of yours?” I asked.
 

Lisle gave me a pole and I popped my releases and stuck my skis in the rack. “I have to go. Thanks.”
 

She waved with her pink pom-pomed mitten. I went into the village past the fire cauldron and went to Copper One’s ski shop. I clomped between racks of padded pants and wished I could ditch my boots, but when Detective Carey showed up it would look suspicious if I was in such a hurry. Boots were expensive. If Carey was any kind of detective he’d wonder why Rory’s bag was worth a pair of five-hundred-dollar boots to me. He was already questioning my involvement with Rory. I couldn’t afford for him to start thinking.
 

I brushed past a school group of screeching fifth graders and went into the day-tripper locker room, which was filled with more students. There was an elderly locker room attendant hollering over the din, but the kids ignored him.
 

“When you are finished dressing move outside with your teacher!” he yelled.
 

Kids were saying their boots were stuck. Their boots hurt. They were hungry. They were tired. So-and-so said they looked fat in their ski pants. There wasn’t a clear path, so I barged in, pushing my way through. Kids may have gone down in my wake. I really didn’t stop to look. They were all yelling anyway, so that was no indication. I passed a pair of teachers, who looked ready for a stiff drink.
 

“They don’t pay us enough for this,” said the blond, who had dark rings under her eyes.
 

The other teacher replied, “I almost called in sick.”
 

“I would’ve killed you.”
 

He laughed. “I know.”
 

I squeezed past them and finally got to the locker access panel, read the directions on blue screen, and punched 115. It asked me for my PIN number. I held my breath and typed in 4242. Accepted. The locker was open. I pushed my way through a clique of girls talking about how stupid a boy named Andrew was and found 115. I was almost afraid to open it. If Keegan’s oil wasn’t in there, I would lose my damn mind. I was out of ideas and out of time, just like Keegan.
 

I opened the locker and nearly burst into tears. A small black nylon case sat on the bottom. I knelt and blocked the view in case someone else was looking. I opened the flap and found two compartments, each had six bottles with black and white labels. I pulled one out. It looked like a bottle of cough syrup and was labeled Mickey with the dosage, strength, etc… I put it back and pulled a bottle out of the other compartment. That bottle was labeled Keegan. A tear escaped my eye and rolled down onto my lips. Keegan. There it was. The one thing in the world that could save him. I tucked the bottle and its companions into my jacket’s inside pockets. Bulky, but they were well-concealed underneath the puffy down. I zipped up and waded back to the access panel. Locker 263 wasn’t in use, so I swiped my credit card and input Jessie’s pin 4242. I was never going to forget that one. 263 opened and I squeezed past two boys who were smacking the crap out of each other, while their exasperated teacher begged them to stop.
 

Hello, woman. You’re going to have to physically do something.
 

She didn’t. Apparently begging was her thing. I made a mental note never to beg a kid, especially my kid, to do anything. It appeared to egg the little nutcases on. I opened the locker, put Keegan’s oil in a back corner, and quickly closed the door. I lurched to the side, light-headed.
 

Breathe. Breathing is important.
 

I turned around to the smacking boys, grabbed one, and handed him to the teacher, whose mouth dropped open in surprise. “Don’t hit people. It’s annoying,” I told the ruffian.
 

“You can’t do that,” said the beggar.
 

“Just did it. Begging your students is just sad,” I said as I called Detective Carey, returned to Jessie’s locker, and put three of Mickey’s bottles on Keegan’s side of the bag, so it wouldn’t look like anything was missing.
 

“Miss Watts,” Detective Carey said, breathlessly.
 

“Yes. Where are you?” I asked.
 

“Covered bridge.”
 

“I’ve got Mickey’s oil,” I said.

“How? Where?”
 

“Copper One’s daily locker room.”
 

Five minutes later Detective Carey was wading through children with an extremely irritated look on his face. I wouldn’t have been surprised if he wanted to whack them with his big cowboy hat. I did.
 

“Did you touch it?” he asked.
 

I stepped aside. “Of course. I had to make sure it was really in there.”
 

He squatted in front of the locker and pulled the bag to him. He took out the same bottle of Mickey’s oil that I had and read the label. “I’m surprised she didn’t destroy it.”
 

“You’ll have to ask her why she didn’t,” I said and I started sweating. Jessie would tell him about Keegan’s oil. I could deny taking it, but how far would that get me?