[To Die For 01] - A View to Die For (2012) (8 page)

Megan and Fred were on the deck when I finished. Fred had his head in her lap getting an ear massage while Meg talked on her phone. She had it on speaker mode – evidently so her hands would be free to work on Fred. “Okay. I’ll see you later then,” she said, then reached over and pushed the off button.

“Was that Kevin?” I asked.

“No. Just an old girlfriend. Kevin never came home last night,” she answered without making eye contact. Her tone sounded worried.

“Is something wrong? Is he okay?”

She quit giving Fred his massage and looked up at me. “Yeah. He’s okay. He left me a text saying he spent the night at Taylor’s house.”

“My damn luck,” I said and sat down. “I was hoping you would give us a ride to Sedalia.”

She sort of tilted her head when she looked at me. Then she must have seen why I was upset. “Oh. You thought we’d have to take the Tempo. Kevin can be considerate you know. They came back to get Taylor’s truck and left my Jeep.”

Twenty minutes later, we were stuck in a traffic jam. At first she hesitated on taking Fred, but relented after he laid down in front of her and given her his sad puppy look. “I haven’t seen traffic like this since they redid I-25,” I said.

“It’s either an accident, or they must be blasting today. I’ll be so glad when they finish with the road work. It seems like it’s been going… What the hell!” She stopped in mid-sentence when we saw the roadblock up ahead and a sign that read ‘Drug Check’.

We were waved on when we approached the checkpoint. We must not have fit the profile of world class drug smugglers. Either that or my fierce guard dog scared them off when he started barking at the drug sniffing German Shepherd one of the cops had tethered to a leash.

It was past noon when we finally go to the rental lot. Having skipped breakfast, I was famished. I could see mine and Fred’s favorite fast-food restaurant across the street. I swear he knew that those golden arches meant lunch; he barked in their direction when I let him out of the Jeep. “Are you hungry, Meg? How about some lunch first? I can get the rental anytime. I’ll buy.”

“Can I have a rain check? I’m meeting an old friend, and we’re going over to Big Lots and then check out the clothes at Goody’s. You know - girl stuff.” She didn’t wait for me to answer and took off going east on Broadway.

“Now, I wonder why your Aunt lied to us, Freddie?” I asked. I didn’t need the eyesight of a canine to see Penny’s a block down the street in the other direction. McDonalds would have to wait. Fred wouldn’t pass as a seeing-eye dog, so I needed a vehicle before I bought us lunch.

The rental agent had no recollection of the thirty-five dollars a day he had quoted me. Maybe he had changed his mind because of Fred. But once I agreed to pay a non-refundable pet deposit and accept an ‘older’ car, his Alzheimer’s vanished, and Fred and I were headed for lunch in a car that would have made Kevin proud. But at least the air conditioner worked.

As it turned out, we didn’t need the air once we left the rental lot. A storm front had come in while we were negotiating with the rental agent, and the temperature had dropped considerably. I drove across the street to McDonald’s and parked under a giant-oak tree, then let Fred out to water it. That’s when I realized I needed to go as well. After putting Fred back into the car with all the windows down, I headed into McDonald’s and straight to the men’s room. I figured it was better than reliving myself at the oak tree, considering someone might object.

I was on my way back to the car with a bag of McDoubles when I passed by a large screen television and happened to catch the tail end of the newscast. I froze in place. The announcer was talking about the recent drug busts around Lake of the Ozarks. A film crew out of Kansas City was reporting on the drug check Meg and I had seen earlier. I sat down at the nearest table to watch.

“If you ask me,” said the old man next to me, “it’s the Mexicans.”

“What did they find?” I asked, regretting it almost before the words were out of my mouth. Experience dictated one should never get started in a conversation with old men unless one had nothing but time on his hands.

“Found a whole bunch of prescription drugs hidden in the door panels of a truck. I done seen this special on CNN where they are smuggling counterfeit drugs now because it’s more profitable than marijuana. You can’t even…”

He was interrupted by a woman who had lipstick on her teeth. “Raymond. Let the man eat in peace. I’m sure he don’t want to hear your right-wing views.” By the tone she used on him, I guessed the woman was his wife.

“I’m sorry,” I said to her and quickly got up to leave. “I must be in your seat.”

“I can’t leave him alone for five minutes while I go to the little girls’ room,” she said. “I hope he didn’t offend you with his views.”

“It was a pleasure talking to him, Mam,” I said and made my escape, but not before looking back at the old man. “You take care now, Raymond.”

Megan’s lie about meeting her girlfriend was still bothering me. I needed time to think, so I took the long way and drove around the lake. The road to Bagnel dam wasn’t bad; however, I had expected to see the lake, but it didn’t materialize until I got to the dam. It was a pretty drive, just the same, and it gave me time to reflect on my life and the events of the last week.

I was getting nowhere as an over-the-hill programmer back in Colorado, and the pittance I made writing and doing handyman work was getting me there fast; maybe, I needed a new career. My degree in math and computer science had been little help in a state with one of the highest percentages of college graduates. Maybe I would have a better chance where the competition wasn’t so fierce. I could always teach, couldn’t I? Then I thought of my nephew and his friends, before washing that thought from my mind. I’d rather drive a septic truck than babysit kids like that.

Then there was my love life – or lack of one - that reminded me of the nurse back at the hospital. Was it really possible to fall in love at first sight or had it been the anesthesia? She was beautiful. Her dark hair and violet eyes reminded me of Allison’s mother. I was a sucker for the Cleopatra look played by Elizabeth Taylor in the movie. But Amy already had her Julius Caesar. Although some people told me I wasn’t bad looking, I knew I was no Marc Anthony.

“How about that sexy waitress at the restaurant?” I asked Fred. “What was her name? Linda? Forget about love. That one was more like lust at first sight.” Fred didn’t bother to answer. But now that he was awake, I had his undivided attention.

Once I passed the dam, I could finally see the water and was brought back to the present. This end of the lake was huge. And unlike sleepy Truman, it was quite crowded. There were large expensive houses and condos everywhere, and the boats weren’t the little fishing boats and pontoons of Truman – they were yachts. Just one of those monsters must have cost more than I’d make in a lifetime. “What did these people do to make that kind of money, Fred?”

There were outlet malls, every major fast-food restaurant on almost every corner, and several high-class restaurants that would cost me a week’s wages for a meal. There were shopping centers, banks, and even a couple small theme parks. But what was most impressive were the boat dealers. I never saw so many expensive boats in one place in my entire life. I drove through Osage Beach and Camdenton traffic jams, then headed west on Highway Seven, thinking my sister was one lucky gal to live at the other end of the lake. I would have traded this entire part of the lake for the solitude of her backwoods retreat.

If the road to Truman had been a roller coaster, this part of Highway Seven was a bob sled on steroids. When I pulled into her driveway some four hours after I had left her in Sedalia, my sister’s house was a welcome sight. I got there just in time to see her crying, and Kevin leaving in the back of a sheriff’s car. Almost as surprising, Taylor’s mother, my nurse from the hospital, was standing next to Megan. I could tell she had been crying too. She wasn’t surprised to see me, so I guessed someone had told her by now who I was.

Fred went straight to Megan and seemed to smile at her as he gently put a paw on her thigh. She reached down to pet him, but before I could ask what was going on, a black Mercedes SUV pulled up behind my rental. It was Amy’s husband, Hal.

“What’s so important that I had to leave the clinic before seeing Dr. Arnold?” His question was directed toward Amy. Fred’s smile turned into a growl. I guess he didn’t like the tone of Hal’s voice.

“I thought your son might be more important than trying to make another sale,” she answered with a look of disdain. “They arrested Taylor on some bullshit drug charge.”

We all went into the house to sort things out. I had to put Fred on the deck; even though Fred was no longer growling, it was obvious Hal was uncomfortable around the big dog. In the meantime, Meg had opened a bottle of her favorite Merlot. I settled for a Keystone Light. It was the closest I was going to get to Colorado for some time.

“Now can someone tell me what happened?” I asked.

Amy gave Hal a sour look then turned toward me. She was wearing her nurse’s uniform, so I reasoned she must have been on her way to work when she got the call. “The boys were on their way back from Sedalia when they saw that drug check. Taylor did a quick U-turn, but the cops saw him and gave chase. He stopped at a turn in the road where the cops couldn’t see the truck until they came around the corner. By that time, Kevin had bolted and was hiding in the bushes. Can you finish, Meg? I need another glass.”

Amy got up to leave, then turned toward me. “Can I get you another beer, Jake?”

I hesitated before answering. I had never known anyone so beautiful. “Sure,” I answered once I woke from my trance. “How about you, Hal? Do you need anything?” I asked.

“He can get his own,” she answered and left the room.

My sister took over where Amy had left off. “Taylor acted like he never saw the road block, but they didn’t buy his story and brought in the dog who found drugs in the door panels.”

“Then Kevin made it back to the house,” I said. It was more of a statement than a question. “Didn’t he think this would be the first place they would look?”

“He didn’t think they were looking for him,” Megan answered. “He said the cops thought Taylor was alone because they never got a good look at who was in the truck when it first turned around.”

“Taylor turned him in?” I asked.

Amy had returned to the room and handed me my beer. “Taylor wouldn’t do that,” she said adamantly.

“I think I need a refill,” Hal said, reaching for the bottle of Merlot.

“And I need to get rid of some of this beer. It seems to go right through me lately.” I headed toward the bathroom. “Wait ‘till I get back before you finish, will you?”

When I returned, they were all watching the six o’clock news on a big flat screen television. There was one of those annoying banners at the bottom of the screen that read, ‘Ozark Drug Bust’. The room was quiet as the news anchor was talking.

“One suspect had been arrested at the scene, and the other was apprehended several hours later at his home at Lake of the Ozarks,” he said. “An alert pawn broker led to the arrest of the second suspect. The suspects had tried to sell an old twenty-dollar gold coin at his shop in Sedalia only an hour earlier.”

Megan spilled some of her wine on the table then nervously wiped it up with a doily. No one else seemed to notice. They were glued to the television.

The scene shifted to an interview with the pawnbroker. “I recognized the piece of junk they were driving when I saw the twelve o’clock news. That’s when I called the police to let them know about the other boy. They both looked like something from a vampire movie. I hope they put those two creeps away before they hurt someone.”

Hal shifted his body so he was facing his wife. It was the kind of movement only an obese man could make. A thinner person would have just turned his head. “I told you that damn bastard took it. I’ll be lucky if I ever get that coin back from those cops. Do you have any idea how much it was worth?”

Amy stared at her husband with a look that could turn Medusa to stone. “You’re the bastard! Always cutting him down just because he’s not your son!”

“Not now, Amy. You can tell me later what a bad step-father I’ve been. I’m sure our neighbors don’t want to hear us fight in their house.”

“If you cared the least bit for him, he wouldn’t act the way he does. He only does it to get your attention, you bastard.” She stood up and ran out of the house.

We heard Amy’s car start up and peel out of the driveway. Hal didn’t follow her. “You have anything stronger than this, Jake?” He asked as he held up his wine glass.

“The liquor is in the cabinet next to the wine cooler, Jake,” Megan said when I stood up. “Mike had some cheap stuff in there somewhere.”

I poured Hal a tall glass then returned to the great room. Megan had left to join Fred on the deck.

Hal downed the drink faster than a bum at a free wine tasting party. “Maybe it was this scotch that killed Mike,” he said.

Megan had returned with an empty glass in her hand. It was just in time to hear Hal’s remark. She gave him a dirty look and snatched her bottle of Merlot off the coffee table.

Hal didn’t miss a beat, “I guess it doesn’t matter much now that she let the cat out of the bag, so to speak,” he said. “Amy was already pregnant when we met. I was crazy about her, and I thought I was the luckiest guy alive to reel in a catch like that – pregnant or not. I mean look at me. I’m not exactly George Clooney.”

More like George Costanza with a fat suit
, I was thinking as he went on.

“I was lucky to get any woman, but a gal like her? It was like winning the lottery. Anyway, it was over before all this happened,” he said, pointing to the television screen.

I wanted to ask if he meant the boys being arrested or Amy leaving in a huff, but I let him continue.

“I’ve known for some time she’s been screwing around on me. Never marry a good looking younger woman, Jake. They will break your heart.”