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alvin Hyman peered through the windshield of his cream 2006 Cadillac DeVille. He was looking for the turnoff, but the road
was pitch dark because it was almost midnight. The only part he could see at all was in the V of his headlights, and even
that was weirdly colorless, making it hard to identify anything. Everything else beyond the headlights was lost to the night.
The turnoff was somewhere around here, he knew, but he hadn’t been to the lake in years, and it was so goddamn difficult to—
There! He almost missed it, but he braked hard and swung into the dirt road, the Caddy kicking up gravel. He winced as a rock
dinged off the door. With his luck lately, the door would be scratched. He’d have to check the paint later, maybe take it
into the body shop up in Superior. There was no way he’d let the local idiots in Winosha within ten feet of his Caddy.
Calvin slowed the car to a crawl. The road was rutted, and he didn’t want to lose the muffler on a pothole. He’d told Shannon
that he was at a men’s poker night, but it’d be just like her to examine the car for signs of duplicity. For some reason she
worried about his fidelity, even though he’d never given her cause to doubt him. If she thought he’d lied, she would become
hysterical, which was the last thing he needed right now.
God, the previous couple of days had been hell. First the bank robbery and all the anxiety that had gone along with that.
And then, just when he’d begun to relax, thought the thing had come off and he was home free, no more disastrous audit hanging
over his head—at least for the foreseeable future—he’d watched Turner Hastings rob his safe deposit box. He’d nearly stroked
out right there in the Winosha municipal building. What the hell was she doing? He’d thought—no, he’d
hoped
—it was some kind of fluke. Old-maid librarian going off the deep end and turning to a life of crime. But even on Saturday
night, watching the tape, he’d known it was no fluke.
And that had been before she’d broken into his computer at home.
There was no way to deny it now. The woman was out to get him. After four years, she was coming after him for Russell Turner’s
sake. Because of the sacrifice Calvin’d had to make four years ago. Things had gotten too close back then; the auditors had
been asking questions, and someone had had to take the fall. He was genuinely sorry that it’d had to be Rusty, but who else
would’ve been believable? The embezzling had to have been done by someone high in the bank. And besides, although he loved
Rusty like a brother, no one could deny the man was getting on in years. He was ready to retire anyway.
He’d thought the whole thing had been over four years ago. And now Turner Hastings pops up, bent on some ridiculous revenge
for Rusty, who’d been dead and buried all this time! If holding a grudge that long wasn’t a sign of mental instability, he
didn’t know what was. That was probably why she’d stolen the dog, too. Turner Hastings clearly had a case of mental confusion
at the very least. Too bad he couldn’t just explain that to the sheriff.
She had certainly picked her time, too. The September primary was less than two weeks away. Carter, the retiring state representative,
had assured him that the seat was his. Calvin was
this
close to being a member of the state legislature, for God’s sake.
He felt like shoving that fact into the faces of all those people who had talked behind their hands about him when he was
growing up.
Poor Calvin Hyman, have you heard his father just walked out? Poor Calvin Hyman, his mother was falling down drunk at the
bar last night again. Poor Calvin Hyman, he’s worn the same pair of dungarees for the last two years; the seat’s just about
worn out.
Well, poor Calvin Hyman was the Winosha town mayor now. He was the bank president, a member of the Lutheran church, and on
the school board. Poor Calvin Hyman was the most powerful man in town and soon—so damn soon he could almost taste it—he’d
be the most powerful man in the district. He’d be a state representative. A member of the state legislature. How do you like
them
apples, you small-town gossips?
Soon. If only Turner Hastings didn’t bring all his dreams crashing down at his feet.
The turn leading to the boat ramp loomed in his headlights. He checked the car clock. It was only 11:46, so he was still a
little early. Calvin pulled the Caddy into a grassy area and turned off the engine. The car ticked as it slowly cooled. Outside,
insects buzzed in the surrounding woods. He shifted in the car seat, his rear squeaking against the leather, wishing suddenly
that he’d brought a magazine to read. Of course, he’d run down the car battery if he used the car light reading—
The passenger door opened without any warning and a large, bearded man got in, the overhead light illuminating him briefly.
The light glinted off square black plastic-framed glasses. The man’s bulk was intimidating, taking up more space in the car
than it should. And he smelled. Calvin wrinkled his nose in the dark. The stink was made up of stale body odor, some kind
of bug repellent, and cigarette smoke. The combination was reminiscent of dead skunk.
“You got the money?” Hank asked without inflection. It figured he’d get right down to the part that was in his interest.
“Of course.” Calvin cleared his throat. “But I want to discuss terms first.”
He saw the shadow of the other man’s head turn in the dark interior of the car. “Terms? What terms you talking about? You
want this girl killed, I want the money. What else is there to talk about?”
Calvin winced. God, Hank was crude. Of course, that was why he’d gone to him with this unsavory deal. A more civilized man
wouldn’t be able to pull it off. “I need to have an alibi when you do it.”
“An alibi?” Hank snorted. “Like on TV?”
“Don’t be insulting.” Calvin half turned in the seat. “They might suspect me and—”
“Why?”
“Never you mind. Just make sure you plan it and let me know. I’ve got a dinner tomorrow—”
“No can do.” Hank’s voice was even and dull, almost bored. Like many chronic smokers, he had a pronounced rasp.
“Why not?”
“Look, you told me you don’t know where she is, even. I’m supposed to find her—”
“She’s got to be headed to my cabin.” Calvin frowned, feeling impatient. This couldn’t fall through now. It wasn’t like northern
Wisconsin was crawling with potential hit men. Hank was his only choice.
“And you don’t even know when she’ll show,” Hank grunted. “This is gonna cost a lot.”
“We already agreed. Five thousand dollars. Half now, and—”
“Nope. I want it all now.”
“All?” Calvin heard his voice rise and lowered it, even though they were alone. He hissed, “Do you think I’m an idiot? I give
you the whole thing now and you’ll just take off.”
“No, I wouldn’t.”
“Look.” Calvin sighed. “I’ll give you three thousand before, and after you kill her I’ll give you the remaining two thousand.”
“Three thousand.”
Calvin felt relief flood his chest. “That’s what I said—”
“No.” Hank turned toward him, clothes rustling against the seat. His bulk blocked out the moonlight from the window. “Three
thousand now, three thousand later.”
“That’s . . .” Calvin gasped, at a temporary loss for words. “That’s outrageous!”
“That’s where I stand.” Hank sat back. He pulled a pack of cigarettes out of his shirt pocket and lit one without asking.
The smoke from the cigarette, combined with Hank’s personal stench, seemed to fill Calvin’s throat. He was going to suffocate
if he couldn’t get the other man out of his car soon. “Three thousand now, twenty-five hundred later.”
Hank opened the car door. The overhead light switched on, revealing his straight greasy hair flattened to his scalp. His glasses
were opaque in the glare, so it was near impossible to read his expression. He stood.
“Okay, okay.” Calvin gripped the steering wheel. He wanted to let the other man get out of the car and then maybe run him
over a few times, but that wouldn’t be productive. He needed Hank. “Okay. Three thousand before, three thousand after. Sit
down.”
Hank slowly sank back down and shut the door. “Fine.”
The light winked out again.
Calvin took a thick envelope out of his trousers pocket and handed it over. “I only brought twenty-five hundred because that’s
what we’d agreed on before. I can get you the other five hundred in the morning.”
Without comment, the other man cracked the car door to make the light come on again. He slowly counted the money out, holding
his cigarette between his first and second fingers. Calvin fumed. Christ, didn’t Hank trust him to count the money correctly?
Finally, Hank stuck the wad of money into the front pocket of his jeans and gave the envelope back. He took a pull on the
cigarette and blew more smoke in the car’s interior. “Okay. But remember, I don’t do anything without that five hundred.”
“Fine.”
Hank started to get out of the car.
“Wait! You need her photo.” Calvin fumbled in his pocket.
“Oh, yeah.”
Calvin found the snapshot and held it out. He’d had to really search to locate it. He’d finally discovered it in a stack of
pictures that had been taken at a bank picnic a couple of years ago. Turner’s face wasn’t very big in the photo, but it showed
her round glasses and her hair pulled back. That should be enough to identify her.
Hank took the photo without looking at it and put it in the same place as the money. He heaved himself from the car.
“Don’t forget to let me know in advance,” Calvin yelled after him. “You have my phone number—be sure to call me.”
“Yeah, yeah. Soon as I get the five hundred.” The big man waved a hand over his shoulder. He didn’t turn around. The dark
swallowed him, the glow of his cigarette end the last thing to disappear.
Calvin started the car and reversed to make a Y-turn in the road. This had better work. His future depended on it.
T
urner had just passed the first Spooner exit on Highway 53 when her cell rang Tuesday morning. She glanced at her handbag
on the seat beside her. No one had called her since the bank robbery Saturday, except for a certain FBI agent. She felt her
heart jolt foolishly. On the radio, the Dixie Chicks were gleefully plotting Earl’s murder. She’d been singing along—the Chicks
and she seemed to have a common life philosophy these days—but now she stopped. Squeaky, lying on the seat beside her, opened
one eye. The phone rang again. She really shouldn’t answer it. Talking to John got her nowhere. And it couldn’t be mentally
healthy. He was trying to find her and arrest her, for goodness’ sake.
Up ahead was a green sign for the second Spooner exit. Turner bit her lip and took it. She’d decided this morning to chance
taking 53 south just so she could move faster. Now, of course, she was regretting the decision. She pulled to the top of the
ramp, put the truck in first, and turned off the engine, silencing the Chicks in midyodel. She picked up her phone, still
ringing, only to find that the number wasn’t John’s. In fact, the area code looked like—
“Brad?”
There was an exasperated sigh on the other end. “Took you long enough to answer, Turn.”
She frowned. “Why are you calling?”
She was very visible at the top of the off-ramp. Sooner or later, John was bound to send out police alerts about her. Probably
he already had. In any case, her instinct was to keep moving.
“Oh, that’s nice,” her brother said from the other end of the line. “I haven’t talked to you since, what? Christmas? And the
first thing you want to know is why I’m calling.”
“Brad, why’d you call?”
Squeaky sat up and put one massive paw on the passenger-side windowsill. The poor animal probably needed a pit stop.
“Look,” Brad said. “Some FBI agent with an attitude problem called my office six times yesterday.”
“Six?” Turner blinked, then smiled, imagining John trying to get through Brad’s firewall of employees. Her brother was a corporate
bigwig in Silicon Valley, where nothing mattered but the product deadline and how the company stocks were doing.
“I finally took his call when he threatened to send a local FBI agent to bring me in for questioning. Although,” Brad mused,
“now that I think about it, I’m pretty sure he couldn’t have done that. Not under California law, anyway.”
“What—”
“He told me this ridiculous story about you robbing a bank.” Brian chuckled. “I mean, he has seen you, right? Your biggest
thrill is doing the Sunday crossword puzzle.”
Turner watched the highway. With the Chevy stopped, there was no wind, and the heat was intense. A semi with a huge photo
of a potato chip bag on the side rumbled by. Beside her, Squeaky whined.
“Turn?” Brad had stopped chuckling.
“What?” She got out of the Chevy, slamming the door behind her. The dry heat blew into her face, wicking away any moisture.
“You didn’t rob the bank.”
“You know what happened to Rusty, Brad.” She reached the other side of the Chevy and let out Squeaky. The dog bounded into
the brown grass beside the road and immediately lifted a leg against a brittle shrub. If the plant wasn’t already dead, it
was a goner now.
Brad exhaled on an incredulous laugh. “You’re not talking about . . . Come on, Turn. That happened, what? Five years ago?
You can’t still be angry at him, that’s—”
She hung up on him and crossed her arms. Squeaky ran in wide circles.
“Hey!” she yelled at him.
The dog paused and looked at her, head up, ears erect, the perfect picture of a noble Great Dane. At least he listened to
her.
“Okay,” she called.
Squeaky went back to running in circles.
Her cell rang again.
She punched it. “What?”
“This is insa—”
She hung up.
A silver van with two canoes on the top pulled up to the stop sign where the off-ramp met the road. She watched carefully,
but Squeaky didn’t go near the road. A little boy in the van waved at the dog.
The cell rang.
“What?”
“Don’t hang up, for God’s sake!” Brad sounded frazzled.
“Why not?”
“Because I’m your brother.”
Turner stared at the highway and frowned, trying to keep back tears. “You told me I was insane four years ago at Rusty’s funeral,
and you called me insane just now. You thought he’d done it, that he’d embezzled from the bank he’d worked at all his life.
You just blew me off.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Are you?”
A sigh. “What do you want me to say, Turner? That I’m glad you robbed a bank? Look, I’ve got a friend in the DA’s office.
I can give him a call—”
“Brad—”
“Get him to recommend an attorney where you are—”
“Brad—”
“If you can’t afford it, I’ll cover the cost for now—”
Turner heaved a sigh and waited for her brother to wind down. She whistled to Squeaky. He cocked his head and looked at her.
She whistled again, and he came galloping over.
On the other end of the phone, Brad squawked and sputtered. “What the hell is that? Why are you whistling in my ear?”
“I’m calling my dog.”
“Dog? What dog? You never told me you had a dog.”
“I have a dog.” Squeaky thrust his muzzle into her hand, sliming it with dog spit. “Look, Brad, I don’t need a lawyer. At
least not yet.” She opened the Chevy’s passenger door and the dog leaped in.
“Yes, you do. When you come in—”
“I’m not coming in.”
Silence. Inside the pickup, Squeaky rested his head on the windowsill and looked out at her.
“I don’t understand,” Brad finally said.
“I know.” Turner walked to the driver’s side of the Chevy and opened the door. Squeaky immediately rushed to that side, and
she had to muscle him back so she could get in. “You’ve never understood. Rusty didn’t do it.”
“Didn’t—”
“He didn’t embezzle from the bank.” She got in and shut the door behind her. The seat was hot enough to sear bare skin. Good
thing she’d thrown a T-shirt over it to shield her legs. “He was innocent, Brad.”
“Even if Uncle Rusty was innocent, that was four years ago. He’s dead. What can you hope to do now?”
“Prove his innocence by catching the real embezzler, duh.” She dug under the seat for a bottle of water and poured some into
Squeaky’s red water bowl on the floor.
“Even if you could—”
“Look, this is getting us nowhere, Brad—”
“Don’t hang up!” She could hear her brother taking a deep breath. “Maybe I should’ve listened to you at Rusty’s funeral. I’m
sorry. I didn’t realize his death and the accusations of embezzling had affected you so much.”
“That’s because you weren’t here.” She was surprised at how bitter that sounded. Brad was seven years older than she and had
left home long before Rusty had died. Had she been angry at Brad all this time?
“I said I’m sorry. I can’t apologize for having a life, though. California is where my career is, not the backwoods of Wisconsin.”
“You could’ve listened.” She knew she sounded childish, but she’d been alone a long time. Brad was her only family, as John
had so kindly pointed out. Couldn’t he have supported her just a little?
“I’m listening now, Turn, and I hear that you’ve been planning revenge for over four years. That doesn’t seem very healthy.”
“You think it’s healthier to just forget?”
“Well . . . yes, actually I do.”
“To let everyone think Rusty was a thief and a liar?” She spaced her words deliberately. “To let the man who set him up get
away with it?”
There was a pause at the other end, then Brad said quietly, “What will you do afterward?”
“What?”
“After you get Hyman. It is Hyman you’re talking about, right?”
“Yes.”
“So after you bring him down, make everyone see he set up Rusty, what are you going to do then?”
“I . . .” She took a breath and ran a hand through her short hair. What kind of a question was that? “I don’t know. Does it
really matter?”
“Yeah, I think it does. You’re burning bridges right and left, acting like this is the end of your life.”
“Don’t be—”
“You’re not going to do a Thelma and Louise, are you?”
A laugh burst from her. “What gave you that idea? No, of course not!”
“Then maybe you should start thinking about the future. Your future. What happens afterward.”
“I don’t have time for that right now.”
“Turn, you’re only thirty-two—”
“Thirty-one,” she interrupted. Brad always forgot her age.
“Sorry. Thirty-
one,
then. You’ve got most of your life still in front of you. Rusty wouldn’t have wanted you to throw it—”
“You don’t—”
“Shh. Listen for a moment.” He waited.
“I’m listening.” Turner pressed her lips together impatiently.
“Okay. Rusty loved you. He of all people wouldn’t have wanted you to throw away your life on revenge for his sake.”
“I’m not throwing it away!”
“Have you dated in the last four years?”
Turner winced. “It’s not like there’s an excess of eligible bachelors in Winosha.”
“There’s enough,” he said gently. “If you wanted to date, you could. Is there anyone you can even talk to?”
She thought suddenly of the FBI agent.
Him. I can talk to him,
an idiot part of her brain whispered. “Why—” A sheriff’s car went by on 53. Turner felt a jolt of anxiety. “Look, I need
to keep moving. I have to go.”
“Okay, good.” Brad spoke rapidly as if he were afraid she would hang up on him before he could get out the words. “But think
about what I said.”
“Fine.” She started the Chevy.
“And Turn—?”
“What?” Impatience was making her snap.
“I, um, take care.”
She grinned. What a dork. “You, too, Brad.”
She hung up and put the truck in gear. Squeaky sat up to stick his head out the window and let the breeze flatten his ears,
until she got up to speed on the highway and he had to bring it in again. She wondered what, exactly, John had said to Brad
to get him in such a dither. Her brother could be high-strung, but he didn’t usually notice that much around him, including
other people. He must be really worried to have called her. And the questions he’d asked about her future . . . Turner shrugged.
She didn’t have the mental energy to think about all that right now. She pushed aside the questions and the nagging uncertainty
they produced. After she proved Calvin was a crook, she would deal with them.
For now, she’d concentrate on the job at hand.
