The Taking of Libbie, SD (30 page)

“Not one damn bit,” I said aloud.

“Huh?”

“Evan, you’re getting off easy.” From the look in his eye, I don’t think he believed me. “I don’t know how badly hurt you are, only it could be considerably worse, trust me. At the very least, I could send you to federal prison. At the very least. Do we understand each other?” He nodded. “Fortunately for you, I happen to be in a good mood. I’m in a good mood because in a couple of hours alot of bad things are going to start happening to a lot of bad people. If you speak to anyone, tell anyone I’m back, especially Miller, some of those bad things are going to happen to you. Understand?”

He nodded his head again.

“Say it,” I said.

“I understand,” Evan said.

I turned and started for the exit. Sharren called after me.

“McKenzie, where are you going?”

“To the hospital.”

Nancy Gustafson did everything a doctor would have done. First, she examined my eye, even though it was my ribs that were killing me. Next, she pushed on my chest to determine where I hurt—which hurt like hell, by the way. She watched me breathe and listened to my lungs to make sure air was moving in and out normally. She listened to my heart. She checked my head, neck, spine, and stomach to make sure there weren’t any other injuries. All the while, she said reassuring things like “A blow that’s hard enough to crack a rib is hard enough to injure your lungs, spleen, blood vessels, a lot of other body parts.”

Then there were the inevitable X-rays. She secured mine to a light box and pointed. “Look,” she said.

I followed her finger from my perch on the examination room table. There was a fracture no thicker than a single strand of hair across two of my middle ribs.

“I bet that hurts,” Nancy said.

“It does,” I said. “What can we do about it?”

“Very little, I’m afraid. There’s no cast or splint. The ribs will have to heal on their own. It should take about six weeks. The best we can do is make you as comfortable as possible while you wait.”

“How?”

Nancy cut four long strips of two-inch-wide adhesive tape. She placed two of the strips directly over my damaged ribs, stretching the tape from my sternum to my spine. The other strips were placed on either side of the ribs.

“The tape should help decrease your pain a bit by restricting the movement of the ribs,” she said. “We don’t want to wrap around the entire chest because that’ll restrict breathing. Breathing is important. You want to take deep breaths, and you want to cough every once in a while. It’ll hurt. It’ll also prevent secretions from pooling in the lung; it’ll prevent pneumonia, so man up, okay?”

Man up? How about a little compassion, lady?

“In the meantime, I’ll give you something for the pain.”

“I don’t need any drugs,” I said. To prove it, I winced and groaned as I pulled on my rust-colored polo shirt.

“That’s very heroic of you, McKenzie, except we’re talking ibuprofen, not narcotics.”

“Thank you.”

“You’re welcome. Tell me something? Concussions, broken ribs, black eyes—does this sort of thing happen to you often?”

“I’m just looking for an excuse to spend time with you.”

Nancy smiled at that.

“Since I have you here, may I ask a question?” I said.

“Certainly.”

“Did you prescribe sertraline for Mike Randisi’s agoraphobia?”

“Yes, with the approval of a doctor, why?”

“Mike told me that he couldn’t force himself to come into town to get his prescription filled, and since Spiess Drug Store can no longer fill prescriptions, can no longer deliver drugs to customers like it used to, I was wondering—where did Mike get his meds?”

“He got them from us.”

“How?”

Nancy stepped backward. Suspicion clouded her face.

“You sound like you’re building up to something, McKenzie,” she said.

“Your husband told Sheriff Balk that he was with you when Mike and Tracie Blake were killed. At first, I thought he was using you to give himself an alibi. Now I know that he already had an alibi. He was processing a DUI at the time with plenty of witnesses to back him up. That means he wasn’t protecting himself. He was lying to protect you.”

“He did that?” Nancy said.

“He thought you killed Mike and Tracie. Why would he think that?”

“I don’t know.”

“You delivered Mike’s meds, didn’t you? You drove out to his place and gave them to him.”

“Yes, I did. It’s called being neighborly. You should try it sometime.”

“Were you having an affair with him?”

“McKenzie—”

“He seemed like an awfully nice guy. Didn’t take him long to charm Tracie, that’s for sure.”

“It wasn’t like that. We were friends, we talked, but no, we weren’t having an affair.”

“Friday night, the night he and Tracie were killed, you didn’t go home after your shift, did you?”

“No.”

“Did you go to Mike’s? Did you find Tracie there? Tracie stole your husband, and now she was with your friend. The gun was sitting on the kitchen counter. Did you pick it up?”

“No, no, McKenzie. You’re wrong.”

“That’s not what your husband thinks, or else why would he risk his job and more to give you an alibi?”

“He believes Mike and I were sleeping together, but we weren’t.”

“Then why does he believe it?”

“I wanted him to.”

“You wanted him to believe you and Mike were having an affair?”

“Yes.”

“Even though you weren’t?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

A voice behind me answered.

“It was easier than telling him the truth.”

I twisted on the examination table. Sharren Nuffer stood in the entrance to the suite. Nancy spun to face her, too. She hesitated just for a moment and moved to Sharren’s side. They hugged like two people who had just escaped a horrific traffic accident. When they finished, they both turned to face me, holding hands, standing straight and still like gunfighters, legs apart, weight evenly balanced, a ferocious expression of defiance on their faces.

“Oh,” I said.

“You look disappointed, McKenzie,” Sharren said.

“I am.”

Nancy said, “Who would have thought you’d be another heterosexual male intimidated by—”

“Oh, don’t give me that crap,” I said. “I don’t give a damn about your sexual orientation. You two lied to me. Both of you. I’m starting to feel like Diogenes wandering around with my lantern held high in search of an honest man and finding only—God, I can’t believe you lied to me.”

“What are you talking about?” Nancy said.

“All that nonsense about your husband and Tracie Blake. The noble, long-suffering wife—you played the part well, you know? Tell me, who started cheating first? You or him?”

Sharren said, “McKenzie—”

I cut her off.

“And you. What was it you told me? ‘I was married three times and not once did I cheat on my husband.’ What do you call this?”

“Eric Gustafson is not my husband,” Sharren said.

“Yeah, that makes all the difference in the world.”

“Why are you angry at us?” Nancy said.

“Be honest,” said Sharren. “You weren’t angry at Eric or Tracie or Dawn Neske or Ed Bizek. Why are you mad at us if it isn’t because we’re gay?”

“Because I like you,” I said.

“You like us?” Nancy said.

“Of course I do.”

“Then why did you accuse me of murder?”

“I didn’t accuse you of murder.”

“You said I shot Mike and Tracie.”

“I did not. I already knew who shot Mike and Tracie. I asked those questions to make sure I was right. I had to know why your husband lied. Now I know. Dammit, you guys.”

“Does this mean that we’re not friends anymore?” Sharren said. There was a smirk on her face as if she expected an insult and was all set to reciprocate.

“That night in the lobby of the Pioneer, when you gave me the sandwich,” I said. “You told me that you finally found someone you couldn’t live without. Remember?”

Nancy smiled as if she had just heard the best compliment.

“Why didn’t you tell me about you and Nancy then?”

Sharren looked at Nancy. “It’s a small town,” Nancy said. Sharren nodded as if it were a conclusion they had both reached long ago.

“I don’t care. If you’re in love, you should be together. It’s that simple.”

Yet even as I said the words, I flashed on my relationship with Nina.

It’s never simple
, my inner voice said.

I slipped off the examination table and winced some more. Nancy rushed to my side. I guess she thought I might collapse from the pain. I found myself smiling in spite of myself.

“Libbie, South Dakota,” I said. “Rules, regulations, and respect.”

“I’ve always wondered who came up with that motto,” Sharren said.

“Someone with a sense of irony,” I said.

“Maybe it was just wishful thinking,” Chief Gustafson said.

This time he was the one standing in the entrance to the examination suite. Sharren and Nancy glanced at each other with the same alarmed expression. Like them, I wondered how long the chief had been standing there and how much he had heard. He didn’t offer a clue. Instead, he said, “I heard you were back in town, McKenzie. Do you want to tell me what happened to you?”

I glanced at my watch. Time was starting to slip away.

“I’ll explain on the way,” I said.

I wedged past the chief into the corridor.

“Wait a minute,” the chief said. “Where are we going?”

“I’m going to identify the Imposter. I’m going to show you what happened to him. After all, that’s why I came here. Where’s my Audi?”

“Your Audi? It’s in the lot at headquarters.”

He said “headquarters” like there were police precincts scattered all over the place.

“We’ll take my car,” I said.

“Just so you know, I confiscated all of your guns,” the chief said. “I locked them in the vault in my office.”

“All of those weapons are legally registered—”

“Including the Colt submachine gun with the 40 mm grenade launcher?”

“I have a carry permit, too.”

“In Minnesota you have a carry permit. This is South Dakota.”

I glared at the chief for a couple of beats. He glared right back.

“Fine,” I said. “You drive. Oh, by the way, I need my cell phone.”

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

When we arrived, the bison hanging above the front entrance to Grandma Miller’s bar and grill was committing the sacrilege of singing the old Louis Armstrong standard “What a Wonderful World”—if you call what he was doing to the song singing. If I could have reached, I would have punched it right in the mouth.

We had paused at the cop shop to retrieve my black sports jacket and cell. By the time we reached Grandma Miller’s, most of the lunch crowd had already drifted out, and there were plenty of empty tables and booths inside. The chief and I paused next to a sign that read please seat yourself while I scanned the dining area. Sara Miller was policing a table near the corner. She smiled when she saw us, gave a wave, and gestured at the table near the center of the room.

“Remember,” I said. “You promised.”

“I remember,” the chief said.

We made our way to the table while Sara took the dirty dishes into the kitchen. We were sitting when she returned.

“Hi, McKenzie,” she said. “Chief.”

“How are you doing, Sara?” I said.

She smiled brightly. I think she was still getting used to her new name.

“I’m doing well. I really am. What happened to your eye?”

I flashed on her father.

“It ran into something,” I said.

“Sorry to hear that.” She pulled an order pad from her apron pocket. “What would you gentlemen like?”

“Information,” I said.

“Information?”

I pulled an empty chair away from the table and beckoned her to sit.

“What is it, McKenzie?” She was looking at the chief when she spoke the words.

I gestured again, and reluctantly she sat.

“What is it?” she repeated.

“It’s about Rush,” the chief said.

“Rush?” she said.

I gave the chief a hard look. He read my face and directed his gaze out the window at the highway.

“Listen, sweetie,” I said. “Nothing bad is going to happen to you. Nothing at all. Right, Chief?”

The chief nodded and said, “Yes. I promised.”

“But Sara, I need you to tell us the truth. It’s important.”

Sara nodded her head and folded her hands on top of the table. I think she knew what was coming.

“The night that the Imposter disappeared,” I said. “Tuesday night. You called him, didn’t you? You called his hotel room from your home.”

Sara nodded.

“You told him to meet you at Lake Mataya.”

Sara nodded again. Her hands began to tremble, and tears formed in her eyes.

“Why?” I said.

“I wanted—because of what he did to me, I wanted—I wanted to kill him.”

The chief’s entire body flinched, yet he continued to stare out the window, continued to remain silent.

“You didn’t kill him, though, did you?” I said.

Sara shook her head vigorously. Tears fell and splattered against the tabletop. She gripped her hands more tightly. The chief exhaled as if he had been holding his breath.

“It’s okay,” I said and patted her hands. “No one thought that you did.”

“I was so angry,” Sara said. “After what happened at the hotel; the way he laughed. It was already all over town, and other people were laughing, too. Even my father laughed. And he accused me, my father accused me of, of—you know what he accused me of. He said I damaged his reputation. His. I hated him. Rush. I hated Rush and I wanted—I wanted…”

“It’s okay,” I said again.

“No, it isn’t. Being that way; wanting to kill someone. I still shake when I think of it.”

“Everyone has black and evil thoughts. Everyone knows lust, malice, envy, greed, hate. There is no shame in owning these—these what? Instincts? The shame is giving in to them, giving them dominance. You didn’t.”

“I wanted to. I wanted…”

Sara’s tears flowed more freely, yet I noticed that she had relaxed her hands.

“What happened?” the chief said. His voice was gentle. He didn’t look at either of us.