Copper River

  “I’ve told you, Charlie, it’s too great a risk,” Jewell replied. “If someone sees you, we could have the police here in no time.”

  Charlie gripped her juice with both hands as if she were trying to strangle the glass. “He’s my friend, too.”

  “I understand,” Jewell said. “But you’ll just need to be patient until Ren and I get back. I doubt they’re letting anybody but family see him anyway.”

  Charlie sat back hard and crossed her arms defiantly. “We’re family, Ren and me.”

  “They won’t see it that way, Charlie. You’re not going.”

  Ren said to her, “I’ll call you from the hospital.”

  Charlie stared at the table with stone eyes.

  “Cork,” Jewell said. She gave a nod toward the front door.

  He stepped onto the porch with her. The morning was cool and wet from the night storm. Leaves stripped from the trees littered the ground, and the bare patches of dirt had been turned to black mud. The sky was a promising blue, however, and honey-colored sunlight already dripped over the tops of the Huron Mountains.

  “You’ll need to watch her,” Jewell said. “I’m afraid she might try to get to Marquette on her own.”

  “I’ll put Dina on it. She already ran Charlie down once.” He gave her a reassuring smile. “We’ll feed her breakfast and do our best to keep her mind off things. She’ll be fine until you get back.”

  Jewell looked tired. It had been at least a couple of nights since she’d had an uninterrupted sleep. With all the grief she carried, Cork figured it might have been even longer. Her eyes were dark circled and her black hair needed a good brushing. Yet, there was a strength in her voice, a determined sense about her actions that Cork admired.

  “If what Gary told us yesterday is true, we might get other reporters out here,” she said.

  “We’ll handle them,” Cork replied. “You and Ren do what you have to do.”

  She took a deep breath. “Okay. How’s the leg this morning?”

  “All this activity actually seems to help.”

  “I’ll take a look at it when I come back.”

  “Deal.”

  She turned toward the door and started inside, then hesitated. “Cork, I’m sorry.”

  “What for?”

  “I’ve been hard on you. But I’m glad you’re here.”

  He smiled and shrugged. “Family,” he said.

  23

  Things did not go well.

  From the start, it was clear that Charlie resented being left behind, that in her mind Cork had no authority over her, and that she’d just as soon spit on Dina. She slumped on the sofa with her arms locked across her chest and refused to be coaxed or cajoled into civility.

  “How about some breakfast?” Dina offered cheerfully from behind the kitchen counter. “What do you guys want? Eggs? I make a mean omelet.”

  “I’m fine with cereal and juice,” Cork said.

  “Come on, let me impress you. How about you, Charlie?” She pointed a long-handled wooden spoon at the girl. “I don’t know where you were hiding, but I’m willing to bet it wasn’t a bed-and-breakfast. What’ll you have? I can make almost anything.”

  Charlie kept her back to Dina and addressed the front door. “You wouldn’t have caught me except I slipped in the mud.”

  “That was last night. This is this morning, a whole new day. Let’s start over. What do you say?”

  “I could beat you in a race any day.”

  Cork watched Dina as she assessed the back of Charlie’s head and flipped through the whole registry of possible responses. Her eyes became hard green pellets.

  “You’re fast, Charlie,” she said, “but not as fast as me.”

  “Right. You’re, like, what? A hundred years old?”

  “It doesn’t matter how old I am. You run, I’ll catch you.”

  “Fine,” Charlie snapped. “Race me.”

  Dina left the kitchen, still holding the wooden spoon. She walked purposefully across the floor until she stood directly in Charlie’s dour line of vision. Charlie lifted her eyes, which were full of defiant fire.

  “I’m not going to race you, Charlie. We’ve already been there. The thing that’s important for you to understand now is there’s no reason to run. You’re safe. We’re not going to let anything happen to you.”

  “Safe? Because of you two? Grandma Moses and”—she cast a desultory look at Cork—“the gimp? If I believed that, I’d be so screwed.”

  Dina paused, giving a few moments of weight to the girl’s words, evidence that she’d heard. Then she said, “One of the things I’m sometimes paid to do is protect people. I’m very good at it.”

  “Yeah? Bite me.”

  Dina tossed the spoon toward Cork, who managed a decent catch. “Stand up,” she said to the girl.

  Charlie stayed firmly rooted on the sofa.

  “Stand up and hit me.”

  Surprise replaced the girl’s glare. “What?”

  “You’ve been in fights before?”

  “Sure. Lots.”

  “Ever hit anybody?”

  “Of course.”

  “Then stand up and hit me.”

  “You think I won’t?”

  “I think you can’t.”

  Charlie launched herself from the sofa. She went straight at Dina, who nimbly sidestepped. Charlie spun, her right fist in a fast, angry sweep. Dina caught her arm, twisted, and sent Charlie down. The girl was so fast, she seemed to be back on her feet even before she’d hit the floor. This time she attacked with a kick. Dina danced back and the girl’s foot connected with air. Charlie’s own inertia caused her to lose her balance and she fell squarely on her butt. This time she sat there, breathing hard and staring at the floor.

  “So,” Dina said dryly above her, “how about a little breakfast after that workout?”

  “I’m not hungry.” Charlie picked herself up and stomped toward the guest room at the back of the cabin.

  After he heard the door slam, Cork said, “You didn’t exactly win her heart.”

  Dina grabbed the wooden spoon from him. “All right, maybe it was a little over the top, but she pissed me off, okay. I didn’t like her attitude. The important thing is that if the shit ever hits the fan, she’ll understand I can handle it. By the way, how’s the leg this morning, gimp?”

  “Let’s just hope the shit doesn’t hit the fan. I’d be so screwed.”

  “How about that omelet now?” She headed toward the kitchen.

  “If I said no, would you beat me up?”

  “Don’t test me.”

  He watched her work in the kitchen, such an everyday kind of thing. Chopping mushrooms and onions, grating cheese, beating eggs. By the end whatever irritation she’d felt as a result of Charlie seemed to have vanished and she hummed softly to herself. The omelet she made, with additional hints of garlic and basil, was marvelous.

  “Thanks,” he said as he finished his last bite.

  “For the gourmet meal? You’re welcome.”

  “And for coming.” He wiped his mouth with his napkin. “And for being willing to forgo Jacoby’s money. After all, I’m worth half a million dead, no questions asked.”

  She scooped the final bit of omelet onto her fork. “Don’t think it’s not tempting.”

  “I owe you an apology. In Minnesota, I misjudged you, then I used you.”

  “You had your reasons. Good ones. If I had a family like yours, I’d do whatever it took to keep them safe.” She finished eating and dabbed the napkin to her lips. “More coffee?”

  “No, thanks. Let me do the dishes?”

  “With that leg? Dude, you’d be so screwed. I’ll take care of things. You just sit.”

  “Sitting is all I’ve been doing. But I could sure use a shower.”

  “Go on. I’ll keep an eye on Charlie.”

  Outside, the day felt good. The storm had washed the air clean, and the sunlight and meditative quiet gave the morning a hopeful feel. The groun
d was littered with leaves and small branches torn from the trees. Rainwater filled every depression. Cork made his way toward Cabin 3, the tip of his cane leaving small perfect circles beside his deep shoe prints. As he came to the steps of his cabin, he paused and studied the wet ground. He knelt, moved aside a big russet oak leaf, and saw clearly what had been partially obscured. A paw print, one that had not been there the day before.

  The cougar had returned.

  Cork followed the tracks, easily done because the muddy ground held the impressions well. The animal had circled his cabin. It had also visited the locked trash bin, where scratches indicated the big cat had tried to claw its way in. He picked up the trail again at Thor’s Lodge and followed the tracks to the shed where his car was parked. The hood of the yellow-green Dart was covered with muddy paw prints, as were the windows. The cat had been very interested in the car. Cork wondered if it had smelled the blood that soaked the seat inside.

  One hungry animal, he figured.

  Although the presence of the wild cat was a concern, Cork discovered something else that was far more disturbing: boot prints. They were all around the Dart, particularly deep on the side that was pocked with bullet holes. Cork studied the waffle pattern of the prints, which had been made by boots much too large to belong to anyone at Jewell’s place. Unlike the cougar’s prints, they weren’t filled with rainwater. They’d been made sometime after the rain had stopped. The tracks ended at the edge of the shed, a vantage from which the cabins could be easily observed. They were even deeper there than beside the car. Whoever it was, he’d spent a while standing, sinking into the ground, watching.

  Cork followed the boot prints away from the resort into the trees and found a trail that led south through the woods. Whoever had been interested in the car and the cabins had come and gone along this trail.

  Cork leaned on his cane. His leg throbbed from the effort he’d put into the tracking. A hungry animal he could understand. A man in boots was something else.

  24

  Stash’s family was a mystery to Ren. He’d been to their house a few times but mostly he hung out in his friend’s big bedroom with the blinds drawn, watching tapes or DVDs or playing video games. Stash’s mother was a slender blonde with nails painted a shiny red like drops of blood at the ends of her fingers. She wore a lot of makeup. Whenever Ren visited, she was cordial but a little tense and seemed to watch them both with uncomfortable concern. His father was like a telephone pole in a suit, tall and silent, and he never laughed. He bent and shook Ren’s hand every time they met, his grip strong and purposeful. Stash didn’t talk about his parents much, and when he did it wasn’t with great affection. Stash had an older brother, Martin, who was seventeen and an athlete. He played for the Bobcats and had lettered in a bunch of sports. Stash sometimes called him Jack Armstrong, All-American Boy, a reference that had something to do with an old radio program Ren had never heard of. To Ren, Stash’s family seemed just fine, but he didn’t have to live with them. That always made a difference.

  Stash was in the Intensive Care Unit and not allowed visitors other than his immediate family. There was a waiting room down the hall and Stash’s brother sat there, staring toward the windows that opened onto a vista of Marquette and a sky full of promising morning sunlight. Ren and Jewell were about to step into the room when Stash’s mother emerged from the ICU and came toward them. She looked exhausted.

  “April,” Jewell said, “I’m so sorry.”

  The woman’s eyes were red, and Ren figured she’d been doing a lot of crying.

  “They say he’s stable now,” she said. “All we can do is wait and pray.”

  Tears rimmed her eyelids and Ren’s mother took her in her arms. Ren slipped into the waiting room. Martin looked his way.

  “Hey,” he said to Ren.

  “Hi, Marty.”

  Stash’s brother hadn’t shaved. His face was a drawn landscape of sparse stubble and teenage blemish. The television in the corner was on, tuned to CNN, but the volume was turned to a low, unintelligible drone. Ren stood with his hands in his pockets.

  “What happened?” he asked.

  Marty wore his hair in a buzz cut, like a Marine. He ran his hand over the bristle. “He was on his skateboard, going down Ruby Hill. A car hit him from behind, didn’t stop. He’d probably be dead except some guy was walking his dog and saw it happen. Jesus. That skateboard. I’ve been telling him it’s dangerous. I’ve been trying to get him into a real sport.” He balled his fist, but there was nothing to hit. “Jesus.”

  “Do they know who hit him?”

  “No. A car, that’s all. It was almost dark. He shouldn’t have been skateboarding so late.” He looked across the room again. The light from the early morning sun washed orange over his face. “I’d love to get my hands on the guy behind the wheel, the son of a bitch who didn’t have the guts to stop.”

  Ren glanced at the television, where CNN was running images of damage being done by a tropical storm in Florida: a mobile home with the roof peeling away, a downed power line popping sparks.

  “Have you talked to him?” he asked.

  “He’s still out. Dad’s with him. He hasn’t left the room. God, it’s killing him.”

  “Ren?” his mother called to him from the doorway.

  “Gotta go,” he said to Marty.

  “Yeah.”

  “He’s good,” Ren said, before he left. “He’s really good.”

  Marty looked at him, his tired face blank of understanding.

  “On his skateboard, I mean. He’s awesome to watch. He’s way better than anybody I’ve ever seen.”

  Marty considered this and nodded thoughtfully.

  “When he’s awake, tell him I said hi.” Ren turned to leave.

  “Ren, come back to see him. He doesn’t have a lot of buddies.”

  “Sure.”

  In the hall, Ren’s mother put her arm around his shoulders. Stash’s mother was just vanishing back into the ICU.

  “I can’t see him at all?” Ren said.

  “You can’t go in. But I suppose there wouldn’t be any harm in taking a look from the hallway.”

  They went together and stood outside Intensive Care. In a small room on the far side of the nurses’ station, Ren saw Stash’s parents standing beside a bed, looking down at a lump of linen. All he could see of Stash was a bare arm with an IV tube attached to it. Stash’s father put a hand down, and Ren could tell from the way his arm moved that he was stroking his son’s hair. It was such a gentle gesture from a man Ren had always viewed as being as caring as a chain saw.

  “Let’s go,” he said, and turned away, thinking that if he ever heard Stash dis his father again, he’d let him have it but good.

  25

  “What do you think?” Cork said.

  Dina’s keen green eyes followed the boot prints as they disappeared down the path through the woods.

  “Where does this trail lead?” she asked.

  “Damned if I know. But Charlie might.”

  Inside Thor’s Lodge, Dina knocked on the door to Charlie’s temporary bedroom.

  “What?” came the girl’s surly reply.

  “We need your help,” Dina said.

  “Bite me.”

  Dina opened the door. Charlie lay sprawled on the bed, a comic book in her hands. Her eyes cut into Dina like razor blades.

  “Get out,” she spat.

  “Normally I would, Charlie, but the circumstances aren’t normal right now.”

  “What do you want?”

  “There’s a trail just west of the resort,” Cork said, moving in next to Dina. “Do you know what it is?”

  “The Killbelly Marsh Trail. It’s part of the Copper River Trail system. Hiking, snowmobiling, that kind of thing.”

  “Where does it go?”

  “Loops around the marsh and connects with the main trail along the river.”

  “Is it heavily used?”

  “Heavily?” She rolled her eyes, as if h
aving to think about it was an incredible imposition. “It’s fall. A lot of trolls come up here for the color. The trail’s popular.”

  “‘Trolls’?” Dina asked.

  “People from the lower peninsula,” Cork clarified. “Below the Mackinac Bridge, get it?”

  “‘Trolls,’” Dina said.

  Charlie put down her comic book and sat up. “Why do you want to know this stuff?”

  “Just curious,” Cork told her.

  “So, is that it?”

  “Yes, thanks.”

  He turned to head out, but Dina held back.

  “Hungry yet?” she asked the girl.

  “No.”

  “Suit yourself.”

  Dina joined Cork and closed the door behind her.

  In the kitchen, they spoke quietly. Cork leaned on his cane; Dina crossed her arms and leaned against the counter.

  “A troll?” Cork said. “Just some curious hiker?”

  “It’s possible, I suppose. Someone who stumbled across the cougar tracks and followed them.”

  “Or someone who thought the girl would show up here eventually and dropped by to check it out.”

  “Or,” Dina added, “someone looking for you.”

  Cork shook his head. “He’d have picked me off the moment I stepped out the door. Has Charlie been outside this morning?”

  “Not since we’ve been up.”

  “Let’s keep her in the cabin.”

  Dina nodded. “Maybe I should reconnoiter.”

  Cork did a quick appraisal of her outfit: a white sweater, black jeans, white Reeboks. “You’d look like a zebra prancing through the woods.”

  “It was my intention,” she said evenly, “to change into something more fitting. And to arm myself appropriately.”

  “What are you packing?”

  “In addition to my Glock, I’ve got a Colt .45 with a suppressor. Or I could opt for the Ruger .44 carbine still in my trunk. How about you?”

  “Just the Tomcat you gave me. It’s in my cabin.”

  “Maybe you should get it,” Dina said.

  “You go on and change. I’ll stay and let Charlie know what’s up, then get the gun.”