Bingo Barge Murder (17 page)

Dawg and I arrived
at the cabin without further interruption. Coop was sound asleep on the couch, his arm over his eyes and one leg resting on the floor, an old blanket half covering him. I gently tucked it up under his chin.

After a quick trip to the facilities for both Dawg and me and some ibuprofen for my head, I crashed on the bed in my room. Dawg nudged his way into the blankets. Then he groaned and heaved himself onto his side, curled one monster front paw against me, and plopped the other across my chest. His big head took up half my pillow, but I was too tired to care.

Sleep slammed into me. I didn’t know how long I’d been floating in blissful nothingness when an obnoxious ringing startled me into semi-consciousness. I nearly fell off the bed groping for the source of the sound. Dawg had wiggled even closer to me, and I occupied about a foot of mattress at the edge of the bed.

The objects in the room were no more than dim outlines in the weak light that seeped around the edges of the drawn blinds. Finding the familiar shape of my cell phone, I grabbed it and squinted at the front readout. It was a number I didn’t recognize.

I flipped the phone open as Coop popped into the doorway, sleepy and panicked at the same time.

“Hello?” My voice was husky from sleep, or lack thereof.

“Is this Shag O’Hanlon?” A woman’s cultured voice sounded vaguely familiar, but I couldn’t place it through the sleep-fog in my brain.

“Shay, yes.”

“You have something of ours. Actually two somethings. We want them back, you lying little Minnesota Storage Facility Inspector’s Office bitch.” The voice faded from cultured to gritty in a breath. Rita Lazar.

“Ah,” I choked out.

Ignoring my gurgle, Rita continued, “I don’t know what the hell you’re up to, but we want that truck you heisted last night, and Buzz wants that ugly dog of his back, too. Don’t ask me why. It’s a disgusting, slobbering thing.”

“Ah,” I tried again. “But—”

“There’s no buts here, you conniving thief. We get what we want, and we’ll give you this in return.” A moment of silence was broken by scuffing sounds in the background. A distant voice said something in a very unfriendly tone, and then, “Shay O’Hanlon? Shay O’Hanlon, Ms. Rita’s fallen off her rocker. Help me, Shay O—” The voice was abruptly cut off and Rita came back on the line.

“Yes, Shay O’Hanlon,” she mimicked. “You have to help widdle Rocky.”

Any remaining vestiges of sleepiness vanished the moment I heard Rocky’s voice, and fury instantly replaced confusion. My body began to vibrate with anger. “Don’t you—don’t you dare hurt him, Rita,” I shouted into the receiver. “He’s done nothing to you.”

No way could there be two kidnappings in my mundane life. It wasn’t possible. Then Rita cackled in my ear, assuring me I wasn’t in the grip of some incomprehensible dream. She sounded more convincing than the Wicked Witch of the West ever did.

“The nuts—” she began but was interrupted by someone, probably Buzz. Then she continued with an exasperated breath, “and that disgusting dog will buy freedom for our
dear friend Rocky.” Her voice dripped with sarcasm. “You have the nuts and the dog at the Grizzly terminal at—” she was again interrupted by Buzz. “Four this afternoon. Not a moment later. Got that?” Without waiting for a reply, she hung up on me. I sat a full minute staring disbelievingly at the phone in my hand, and then slowly flipped it shut.

“Now what?” Coop asked.

Still staring at the phone, wondering how things could have gone from dire to insane, I murmured, “I can’t believe it. Rita and Buzz snatched Rocky and they’ll trade him for the truck and Dawg.” I blinked slowly. “How on earth did we get involved in not one, but two kidnappings? Oh, excuse me,” my voice started to raise, barely held back hysteria about to let loose. “I meant two kidnappings, a dognapping, a stolen truck, and a dead body. Oh, and I got pulled over for drunk driving on the way up here.” I shook my head, attempting to pull myself back from the brink. “Makes lying to the cops about
your
whereabouts pretty minor, doesn’t it?”

Coop peered at me with a mixture of fear and concern. Even Dawg was awake now, his eyes wide, his forehead wrinkled as if he understood the tension and emotion in the air. He huffed at me, then leaned forward and gently licked my forearm.

“I’m so confused. Are Rita and our mobsters in cahoots? Oh lord,” I flopped back onto the pillow.

“Who the hell knows. Doesn’t seem like it, but I suppose they could be.”

The display on my cell read 7:10 am. We were supposed to call Vincent at one o’clock for further instructions. Now this. Oh Eddy. I swallowed back a sob that came out like a hiccup.

Coop sighed deeply. “Shay, everything’s going to be okay. Let’s just think this through. Two sets of crazies want this godforsaken truck with its stupid nuts and we need to figure out a way to make them both happy. And they may or may not be working together.”

“If they’re not, how did Rita and Buzz figure out what we were up to?” My voice was muffled beneath the hand I’d thrown over my face.

“I suppose they know Rocky hangs with me sometimes, and they got your name from your visit to Rita. They may have asked Kate how to get a hold of you. Or maybe Rocky knew the number.” We both cringed, knowing how hard it was for us to pry information out of Rocky. For Buzz and Rita to have gotten anything out of him, they would have had to use some seriously persuasive and probably painful techniques.

“And Buzz and his pal saw you and me at his junkyard,” Coop continued.

I moaned, and Dawg whined.

“Come on, be quick and make me some breakfast.” Coop ducked out of the way of the pillow I threw at his head and dragged me to my feet.

_____

The cabin was a cozy affair with two bedrooms, a rustically decorated living room complete with a fireplace and mantle, and a cheery kitchen painted canary yellow with rust trim. As much as Dad and I loved our bucolic setting, he appreciated his creature comforts. Both bedrooms and the living room had TVs and DVD/VCR combos to help pass cold winter evenings, and the cabin was wired with high-speed Internet, which Dad hated and I loved. I rarely had free time at home, so the setup was a bit of a guilty pleasure for me.

Exposed log beams made up the walls throughout the structure and I ran a hand over the glossy blond wood. As I stood in the doorway between the kitchen and living room, the immediate situation faded as usually repressed memories washed over me in nostalgic monsoon.

The property had been in the family longer than I’d been around, and in my mind’s eye, I could still smell the suntan lotion my mother slathered on me before I splashed a hot summer’s day away in the lake. I could still feel her soft hands as they slid across my skin, making sure to cover every exposed inch. The memories I had of her and this place were filled with unconditional love. God, I missed her.

The cabin was a refuge. When I was lost, hurting, and lonely, when life’s pressures overwhelmed me, this was where I hid until I regained my equilibrium. This was the place where memories of a happier time always swept over me, where I could still feel the pull of my mother. These walls meant safety and love, security and peace. But this time, I realized as I dragged myself out of my reverie, this cabin was an honest-to-goodness escape.

Coop and I quickly scrounged up some breakfast and bounced ideas off of each other as we ate. Neither of us came up with any miraculous solutions. I finished off my bowl of instant oatmeal, the apple and cinnamon flavor stuck in the back of my throat, and crossed the kitchen to the sink. I scooped up the bowl we’d given to Dawg, and it turned out he liked instant oatmeal as much as Subway sandwiches and pizza. I wondered if he’d even entertain the idea of regular dog food after this. He lay quietly in the corner, his lips draped on either side of the paws his head rested on. His shiny eyes continually flicked from Coop to me and back.

Coop grabbed a towel and dried our few dishes. “Shay, it’s time to call JT. I know I suggested this before, but this time I really think we should. She did tell you to call her if you were in trouble, and you are—
we
are—in some deep-ass shit.” He carefully dried the spoons and tucked them in the silverware drawer. “Long ago this stopped being about me,” he added. “I can see that now.”

“What if Vincent finds out we went to the cops?” I asked.

“We have to hope he doesn’t.”

“This sucks.”

“I’ve got it!” A devilish expression appeared on Coop’s face. “How about we steal another truck with a rusty container, deliver it to the junkyard, and hope Buzz doesn’t open it up before we get out of there with Rocky. Then we go Eddy hunting.”

I swallowed a snort. “And where do you propose we find a truck that would fit the bill? Go back to Grizzly and swipe another one? I can see it now. ‘Oh, George, we need to borrow another truck for a few hours. We promise we’ll give it back.’ ” I rolled my eyes. “He’d probably have us arrested on sight. My dad’s going to kill us when George tells him what we did.”

The humorous expression on his face faded. “God, Shay, I hope Eddy’s okay.”

I nodded somberly. “Me too.”

We finished the dishes and returned to the table. Reluctantly, I pulled out JT’s card and punched her number into my cell. By the fourth ring, I was almost hopeful she wasn’t going to answer. I was about to hang up when I heard a click and then a cold, hard voice uttered, “Bordeaux.”

Words caught in my throat, and for a second I couldn’t get anything out.

“Hello?”

“JT—it’s Shay. Shay O’Hanlon.”

The voice warmed instantly. “Shay, it’s good to hear from you. You weren’t at the Hole this morning.”

So she’d stopped by again. I wondered if it was because she was after me, if she was simply in love with Kate’s drink-making abilities, or if she was still sniffing around for Coop. Maybe it was all of the above.

I took a deep breath and exhaled fast. “JT, okay, there’s something I need to talk to you about.” I caught Coop’s eyes and he nodded, silently encouraging me. “Is there any way you can meet up with me this morning? It’s kind of an emergency.”

Stillness reigned on the other end of the line and seconds felt like minutes. Then, “Of course. Where?”

Why did I not think things through beforehand? Where? Here? No. My mind raced. “There’s a Denny’s right off 35 in North Branch. Can you meet me there in an hour?”

More silence, then JT said, “No problem. I’ll be there. Should I come alone?”

“Yeah. Alone would be good.”

“I’ll be there,” JT repeated. Then she quietly asked, “Are you okay?”

The kindness in her voice nearly made me lose what tenuous self-control I still possessed. With effort I swallowed the ball of emotion that blossomed in my throat. “Yeah,” I whispered, and hung up before I completely lost it.

_____

At a quarter to nine, we made a quick trip to the North Branch post office to mail a copy of Kinky’s video that we’d made to the address on JT’s business card. We didn’t want the bad guys getting away in the—don’t even think it, Shay!—event things didn’t work out like they were supposed to.

Coop and Dawg waited in an adjacent business’ parking lot as I sat in a booth at Denny’s. The building was a Fifties-styled diner, complete with sparkly red-vinyl seats, lots of chrome, and a jukebox in the corner. I thanked the waiter when he handed me a Cherry Coke, impatiently thrumming my fingers on the retro tabletop. The aroma of coffee and French toast made my stomach rumble.

Coop and I had decided I’d meet JT alone to drop the bomb on her. Actually, multiple bombs. I had visions that alternated between JT arresting me on the spot and her hightailing it out of the diner without a backward glance.

The door swung open and JT strode inside. She paused long enough to slip the sunglasses from her eyes to their usual spot on top of her head. She squinted, scanning the narrow room. Glossy hair hung in loose waves at her shoulders, unleashed in all its glory from the ponytail in which it was usually bound.

“What’s the emergency?” JT asked as she slid into the booth, her dark eyes narrowed on me, her face unreadable. I resisted the urge to squirm. Now or never.

“Okay, here’s the—” As I was about to spew the sordid tale, my cell rang. I gave JT an apologetic look and palmed it. A phone number I didn’t recognize was displayed on the readout. A sharp moment of wariness poked me in the gut, and I momentarily considered not answering. However, the stakes of the game were way too high not to.