The Alpine Yeoman (8 page)

“Ha! I wasn’t asked, and I wouldn’t go if she
had
invited me,” Mary Lou asserted. “Vida’s daughter Amy is a spineless creature, and her husband, Ted, is a mere cipher. Count yourself lucky that you weren’t included in the Hibbert family celebration. It’s the little boy I feel sorry for. He’s an innocent
child being raised by a passel of fools. All I can say is I hope he doesn’t turn out like Roger. I volunteer at RestHaven and observed that lazy obnoxious lout lolling around instead of pitching in like the rest of us do. Outside smoking half the time and inside tagging along after that Sigurdson girl. Mark my words, her parents will quash that romance before it’s too late. Good night, Emma.” Mary Lou started to turn away, then stopped. “Oh! I haven’t offered congratulations on your marriage. I’m relieved that you and the sheriff made yourselves legal. You’re both old enough to know better than to set a poor example for young people. Have a pleasant evening.” She swerved on her own pair of chunky heels and clomped off down the street.

At least Mary Lou was one step ahead of Vida with good wishes. I would, of course, have preferred it to be the other way around.

After buying a blackberry pie and a half dozen French rolls, I headed home. Driving my Honda into the carport, I could see a pile of logs out in the backyard. I grimaced, wondering if my cozy little cabin would feel chilly. The fitful April showers had ceased, though clouds still hung low over the mountains, drifting slowly to the west.

I’d been inside just long enough to turn on the oven and put the game hens in the microwave to defrost when the phone rang. Dashing out into the living room, I snatched up the phone from the end table.

“Scratch Tanya for dinner,” Milo said. “She’s going out to eat with an old pal, Deanna … I forget her married name. She’ll be back around seven, seven-thirty. I’m in touch with the Yakima County sheriff’s office, so I might not get home until six or so.”

“Okay,” I said—and realized that the sheriff had already disconnected. Maybe he thought he was talking to my voice mail.

I wondered if I should hold off cooking one of the game hens, but given Milo’s prodigious appetite, I put both in the oven. If there was anything left over, I could take it to work for lunch. By the time I’d prepared a mixture of white, wild, and brown rice out of a box and readied the asparagus for steaming, I considered making a drink but decided to wait for Milo. I sat down on the sofa, opened my laptop, and started an email to Adam. He’d returned to St. Mary’s Igloo Sunday night after attending a conference in Fairbanks. I’d received a brief message from him saying he’d arrived safely—details to follow. I hadn’t heard anything further, so I assumed he was busy with his villagers. As ever, I wished he’d be assigned somewhere that wasn’t so isolated and remote. Like Ben, he had to go where he was sent.

I told him how the remodel was progressing and that I’d decided to keep my old double bed in the expanded spare room. “I’ve moved all of your stored belongings to the so-called den, between the living room and your old room. As you may recall, that area was so small that there wasn’t enough space for a kid’s school desk. Scott Melville suggested we also rip out that wall to double the bedroom’s size.”

I paused. For all I knew, the church and rectory where Adam lived wasn’t as big as my little log cabin was now. I wondered if he thought his mother was bragging. Or cajoling. Or …

I gave a start when I heard the kitchen door open and bang shut. “Milo?” I called, closing the laptop and hurrying into the kitchen.

“It’s not Mother Nature,” my husband growled, taking off his hat and tossing it on top of the dishwasher. “All I can get out of Yakima is the drought that’s predicted over there. The fruit crop’s heading for disaster and the governor is already
worried about forest fires. Worst water shortage in the state’s history.”

“We’ve had some rain here,” I said in an unnaturally meek voice.

Milo shrugged out of his regulation jacket. “Not enough. Besides, we’re on the so-called wet side of the Cascades, in case you forgot.” He grabbed his hat and stalked out of the kitchen.

“Hey,” I yipped, chasing after him as he hung up his hat and jacket on a peg by the front door. “How many times do I have to remind you I’m your damned wife?”

“Oh … hell.” Milo’s broad shoulders sagged before he took me in his arms and kissed me. “Damnit, Emma,” he said, resting his chin on top of my head, “I don’t deserve you. I told you that before we got engaged.”

I rested my cheek against his chest. “Hey, big guy, I knew what I was getting into. You deserve something better than a bitchy homecoming.” I managed to pull away to look up at him. “What’s wrong?”

“Wait until we sit.” He glanced over at the end table. “You don’t have a drink?”

“No. Now that we’re married, I don’t like drinking alone.”

He leaned down to kiss my nose. “I’ll make the drinks. I can change later. How soon is dinner?”

I followed him out to the kitchen to check the game hens. “You’re a little earlier than I thought you’d be, so at least twenty minutes.”
More like half an hour
, I thought, but maybe Milo wouldn’t check his watch. The game hens were only now starting to brown.

He didn’t speak while he fixed my Canadian and his Scotch. I turned the heat on low under the rice. He handed me my glass, his hazel eyes troubled. I touched his cheek before leading the way back to the living room.

Milo sighed in relief as he sat down in the easy chair before taking out his cigarettes. “You want one?”

“You know I’ve been trying to quit. Again,” I said, but decided maybe I should go ahead and smoke anyway. “What the hell.” I got up and let him light a cigarette for me.

“Something’s not right,” he stated after I’d sat back down on the sofa and he’d taken a sip of Scotch. “I had to listen to all the dire predictions about drought and the eastern half of the state burning up this summer.” He paused to take a drag of his cigarette and another sip of Scotch. “Hell, I’m not unsympathetic. I worked with the Yakima crew back in December. They’re good people. My counterpart wasn’t in, so I talked to a senior deputy. He didn’t exactly stonewall me, but he was evasive. In fact, he sounded downright uncomfortable.”

After a couple of puffs on the cigarette, I felt a bit lightheaded. “Uh … about tracking down a guy with a common Hispanic name?”

Milo leaned forward to peer at me. “You sure you didn’t start drinking before I got home? You look kind of goofy.”

I laughed and shook my head. “I don’t think I’ve smoked in almost a month. I feel woozy.”

“Oh. I’ve cut down, too, at least around Tanya.” He sat back in the chair. “The deputy’s first reaction was that there had to be a ton of Fernandezes in the county. Then I prodded him a bit, asking if they had any missing persons reports. They did, but no one by that name. That answer came too fast. It’s a relatively big and fairly mobile population. I figured he was putting me off. But why? It makes me think they know damned well who the stiff is.”

I gave Milo a curious look. “Are you sure you’re supposed to be telling me this, Sheriff? Do I need to remind you I’m the press?”

Milo waved the hand that wasn’t holding the cigarette. “I’d
tell Vida if she were here. Of course, she isn’t speaking to me. But this is one of those quirky things that you women are good at. Besides, by the time I finished the Yakima call, Jack Mullins was the only one left in the office. You know what kind of smart-ass remark he’d make. Not helpful.” Milo took another sip of his drink. “You can’t use this in the paper anyway.”

I agreed. “Unless, of course, it escalates.”

“It better not. I’ll raise hell if it does.”

“Do you think the dead man might be one of their own?”

“It crossed my mind,” Milo replied slowly, “but there was nothing on the guy to indicate he was with the sheriff’s department.” He paused, stroking his long chin. “It could go one of two ways, though. Either he
is
some kind of law enforcement type—or he’s on the wrong side of the law and they want to do some checking before they say anything.”

The phone on the end table next to me rang. Kip was on the line. “Hey,” he said, “do we have anything new on the guy who got thrown from the sports car? Mitch didn’t update me before he left.”

“Let me ask the sheriff.” I put my hand over the receiver. “Sports car guy—dead or alive?”

Milo shrugged. “Don’t ask me. They took him to Valley General hospital, in Monroe.”

I spoke again into the phone, relaying what Milo had told me. “Mitch may have forgotten. Brenda was ailing this morning, so he was probably preoccupied. Have him call Monroe. Doobles, or whatever his name is, isn’t local, but we should at least find out if he’s dead.”

“Will do. Otherwise, we’re good to go.” Kip paused. “I take it you don’t have ID on the corpse in the river?”

“No. It’s aggravating, but there’s nothing we can do about that.”

“Isn’t that sort of weird?” Kip asked.

“Yes.”

“Okay. I think I get it. The sheriff’s not talking.”

“Right. If that happens, I’ll let you know.” I rang off.

Milo was grinning. “You talking in code?”

I got off the sofa. “My staff—and Spence—have a problem figuring out why you don’t unload about your job when you come home.”

“I just did.”

“But it’s not news. Venting doesn’t count.” I went into the kitchen to peek at the chickens. They still weren’t quite done. “Five minutes,” I called to Milo as I turned on the asparagus.

“Good. I missed lunch.”

As the days ahead would prove, there was a lot more missing in Alpine than the sheriff’s lunch.

M
ILO ATE AN ENTIRE GAME HEN BY HIMSELF
. T
HAT WAS
no surprise. Despite his expressed displeasure over being forced to eat rice instead of potatoes, he was placated by the blackberry pie. Or almost.

“No ice cream?” he asked, looking disappointed.

“If you want ice cream, why don’t you tag along with Bill Blatt when Vida treats her nephew so she can inveigle information about your latest investigation?”

“And have her
not
speak to me? That’d be a relief, I suppose. I’m surprised she doesn’t make Bill sit in a booster seat.”

“Maybe that’s because he’s almost six feet tall.”

“Five-ten,” Milo said, loading his fork with pie. “That’s what it says in his personnel file.”

I glanced at my watch. “It’s going on eight. Kip hasn’t called with any more problems, so the paper must be almost set to print.”

“I don’t know why,” Milo said after eating another mouthful of pie, “if you print the paper tonight, you can’t get it on the street in the morning instead of the afternoon.”

“Because it takes a while to print,” I replied. “I can’t afford to hire drivers or carriers to deliver a morning paper. That’s why. Marius Vandeventer had to send the paper to a printer in
Monroe, and so did I before we started our own back shop operation. That’s also why we have a five o’clock deadline. Unless, of course, there’s breaking news before the paper is ready to go to press.”

Milo reached out to brush at my lower lip. “Crust crumb. Makes sense. Maybe I should try to remember that about your deadlines.”

“You won’t.”

He shrugged. “Probably not.”

I narrowed my eyes. “Why do I suspect you
do
know about our deadlines?”

Milo’s expression was innocent as he devoured more pie. “No clue.”

I didn’t believe him, but I decided not to argue. I concentrated on my pie, then suddenly remembered Janie Engelman’s visit. “She thought Fred might like earning extra money as your handyman,” I explained. “You told me he did a decent job when he used to spend the weekends in jail.”

“He was okay,” Milo said without enthusiasm. “Frankly, Fred’s kind of an alarmist. He sees problems that don’t exist.”

Before I could respond, the doorbell sounded. “I’ll get it,” I volunteered. “It must be Tanya.” I took a last bite of pie and hurried out to the living room.

I was right. Tanya stood on the porch with a young woman I didn’t recognize. “Hi, Emma,” my recently acquired stepdaughter said. “Dad’s here, right? I saw his Yukon in the driveway.”

“Yes,” I said. “We’re late with dinner tonight.”

Tanya beckoned for her companion to follow her. “This is Deanna Engstrom. We went to school together when I lived here.”

Deanna put out a plump, freckled hand. “Hi, Mrs.… Dodge.”

“Hi, Deanna.” Her grasp felt very soft and tentative.

Milo came into the living room, saluting Tanya. “Hi, kid,” he said before looking at Deanna. “I think I remember you.” His big hand swallowed up her much smaller one. “You married a guy from … Startup?”

“Gold Bar,” Deanna said, trying not to wince as Milo shook her hand. The first and about the only time he’d shaken my hand I’d thought all my fingers would break.

Tanya was taking off her tan suede jacket. “Deanna needs to talk to you, Dad. Is that okay?”

“Sure.” He frowned slightly, darting a glance at me. “Is it anything I need to hear in private?”

“Ah …” Tanya looked at me, then at Deanna, who simply stared back with wide blue eyes. “I guess not.” She turned again to her friend. “My stepmom owns the newspaper. She finds out everything anyway.”

I accepted that oversimplification without comment. “Make yourselves comfortable,” I said. “Can I get anything for you two?”

“I’ll grab us both some bottled water,” Tanya responded, her plain, yet mobile face showing compassion for her companion. “Go ahead, Dee. Take a seat.”

Deanna hesitated before sitting down at the far end of the sofa. She was wearing a thick navy sweater over what looked like a mock turtleneck of the same color. Milo settled into the easy chair, while I assumed my usual place at the other end of the sofa.

Over the years, I’d had some opportunities to see how Milo dealt with witnesses and suspects. He had a knack for reading people. The sheriff could bulldoze, intimidate, befriend, or—his favorite ploy—play the small-town hick lawman out of his depth. That last guise had actually fooled me until I got to know him better.

“My son, Bran, likes to white-water-raft out of Gold Bar,” he said as his opening gambit. “He goes with an old pal from Alpine.”