Frozen (Detective Ellie MacIntosh) Page 2

  The tip—just the pink tip—of her tongue touched her upper lip and wiped away a bit of foam from her drink.

  “That’s why I went to grad school. I thought I might write a novel one day.”

  “Really?” She looked interested. “What genre?”

  “Literary.” He gave a negligent shrug. “It hasn’t happened yet.”

  “I’m intrigued. I’d like to know more about you and the book.”

  Bryce had a moment of doubt. Was he being propositioned? By this pretty girl such a short time after they met? He eyed her face over the rim of his glass and decided he had no idea. That said a lot about his level of sophistication when it came to the opposite sex. There were signals; he just didn’t know how to read them exactly.

  It made him feel awkward, but he’d never been good at the game, not even before he was married. He was too serious … maybe that was it. The way his brain worked, he liked a straightforward explanation for everything.

  Straightforward? Was that even possible with women?

  “Pizza.” The proprietor walked over, plunked the cardboard circle on the table, and handed Bryce a couple of napkins.

  Not exactly four-star service, but the pizza was hot, and for what it was, it looked edible.

  “Help yourself.” Bryce pushed one of the napkins toward her with a slight grin.

  “All right.” She smiled back, and she definitely had a pretty smile.

  As bleak as the evening had turned outside, Bryce didn’t even mind the bland taste of the pizza or the vague stale smell of spilled beer in the air.

  As they ate, she told him about attending the University of Wisconsin in lighthearted snippets of small talk, and they both drank their second beer.

  It was over way too quickly.

  “I’d better go. The weather sucks.” She stood and reached for her jacket. She probably was right. The raw night wasn’t getting better. After a small pause, she offered her hand. “It’s been nice.”

  “Sure.” He no longer felt quite as comfortable just because of the music, lights, and people all around them, and he needed to leave too. It was full dark now. The cabin would be ice cold.

  She put on the puffy coat and they walked out together. Her vehicle was a somewhat battered Jeep that had ice crystals on the windshield. Melissa swore softly, the sound whipped away by the wind. “It’s getting icy. That’s the worst.”

  “Be careful.” What a banal thing to say, but Bryce couldn’t think of anything better. “The roads will be slick.”

  She nodded, her ebony hair brushing her jaw, and gave a small wave as she dashed to her car.

  He unlocked the door of the Land Rover, cold rain pelting his head, plastering his hair to his skull, and he slammed the car door closed against the icy deluge.

  Car started, defrost on … but he found the faint glaze on his windshield wasn’t going away without a little help, so he sat a minute or two, startled when he heard a knock on his window. It was Melissa, and when he rolled down his window, she said quickly, “I swear this is not some kind of reverse line, but my car seems to be dead. I can’t even get it to turn over. That makes me really nervous.”

  Well, he supposed it wasn’t a night to get stranded. “Let me try.”

  “That’s sexist, but at this point, I’ll take you up on it.”

  She was right, he thought as he eased out of his car, ran around with his collar up against the bleak wind, and got into the front seat of hers. It had been sexist. She could turn the key as well as he could apparently because he had no better luck. The lights worked, so it didn’t seem to be the battery, and that was about the extent of his skill with cars.

  “I’d suggest a tow truck,” he said apologetically.

  Melissa huddled in the passenger seat. “Great. I guess I’ll run back inside and see if someone can tell me who to call.”

  “I’ll wait.” It seemed like the right thing to do, and if he wasn’t smooth, at least he liked to think he was a nice guy.

  “You don’t have to.” In the dim illumination, he saw her bite her lip and then nod. “But thanks. I’d appreciate it, actually.”

  “No problem.”

  She disappeared back into the lights and warmth of the little tavern and he made the pilgrimage back to his own car, happy to see the defroster was taking care of the film of ice on the windshield. By the time Melissa emerged from the bar again, ten minutes had passed. Instead of heading to her vehicle, she opened the passenger side of his car and slipped into the seat. A cell phone was pressed to her ear, but she flipped it shut with an unhappy sigh.

  “I had to leave a message,” she explained, her eyes luminous in the semigloom. “Can I ask you to possibly give me a ride home? It’s only about ten minutes from here.”

  “Sure.” Though he had absolutely no objection, he was a little startled. He was, after all, a stranger.

  It must have been obvious because she said, “The tow truck will take awhile. It might not even happen until tomorrow. I have experienced the vagaries of the local service before. I need a new car. Since I can’t buy one tonight, you seem nice enough and we pulled in at the same time. There’s no way you could have done anything to my car because you haven’t been out of my sight. I have mace in my purse, by the way.”

  He sensed she was only half joking, so he chose to be amused, not insulted. “Noted. Where to?”

  She gave him directions and, luckily, it was on his way. He pulled out of the lot, driving slowly because the road held a treacherous gleam he’d seen before. Around them the woods gathered like a secret army, closed in ranks, the few remaining leaves clinging to the otherwise naked branches, the sound of crisp rain drumming on the car. It was dark in only the way it can be in the northern woods; hushed, secretive, shrouded, and distant. They passed a few turns, the road glistening, the beating rain a steady presence. Then abruptly, Melissa said, “Here.”

  Bryce braked. “Here?”

  “Yes. Second drive.”

  He wouldn’t have even known it was there but he caught it, a gleam of gravel, and he turned in at the last second, the car sliding just a little. “Whoa.”

  “I wish I’d left the lights on now.” She gathered her coat a little closer.

  He came to a stop and there was only a glimpse of a dripping roof and blank windows, but she was right, it was damned dark “Want me to walk up with you?”

  “No need. Remember my mace?”

  “I’ll stay and make sure you get in safely. And if you ever want to share another cardboard pizza, let me know.”

  There. That was an understated come-on in his opinion.

  Melissa paused, one hand on the door. “I just might. You have a cell phone?”

  He did, in his pocket, and he fished it out. By the dashboard light she slid up the cover and expertly started pushing in buttons. Then she handed it back. “My number, programmed right in.”

  Then she slipped out of the car. He waited patiently until lights flickered on in the windows of the square structure.

  Maybe, he thought as he backed up the Rover, this trip was a good idea after all.

  Chapter 2

  He … hummed.

  There was nothing like it. Nothing like the insidious chill of autumn creeping in, signaling winter; a promise of what nature could dish out. He thought about it all the time. Hunting season soon. That helped. He did it all. Deer, squirrel, grouse—he’d even hunted bear with a bow. Sopped stale bread in grease as bait, his breath puffing in soft clouds the air was so cold, the forest quiet as death, his compound bow propped next to him as he waited ten feet up in the air. Now that was a good challenge. A tree stand didn’t mean much with a deer. All it was there for was insurance against detection. Taking a full-grown bear with a bow took some guts, and using a tree stand might mean the difference between being the hunter or the prey. Besides, there was always the chance you wouldn’t get it right the first time. Bears could climb and then there was nowhere to go …

  But he usually did get it right, no matter his target. Hunting was a mind game as much as a physical one. You had to be smarter than your quarry, more cunning. More ruthless. Stack the deck in your favor if you wanted to win.

  It was almost November.

  Fuck, he loved this time of year. Especially on nights like this one when it was black and inhospitable …

  * * *

  Ellie pointed with her fork. “The report is in and inconclusive. She sold real estate so she takes different people around all the time in the vehicle we found. Lots of forensic evidence to process, but who knows how much of it is worth anything. There was no blood in, on, or near her car.” She speared a piece of lettuce and ate it.

  Across from her, Jody raised her brows. “Seriously, could you not do this?”

  The lights flickered. It was only raining out but the wind was high, so Ellie glanced at the window before she responded. “Do what?”

  Blond, petite, and annoyingly happy with three small children and a husband who worked at an insurance company, Jody sighed. “I love you, but didn’t we go out to dinner for a nice sister-to-sister chat? I realize you live and breathe the job, and I doubt it is easy to be around that much testosterone every single day and hold your own, but I don’t want to talk about Margaret Wilson’s disappearance. I’m just as spooked as every other woman in northern Wisconsin, but honey, I like my chicken salad without gloom and doom hovering over it.”

  It took a moment, but Ellie shook her head with a small rueful laugh. “Oh, yeah. Sorry. It’s this case.”

  Damn. Can’t help myself. That was always part of it. She had an undeniable tendency to focus. How could she explain the juxtaposition of the horror and the hunt? She hated one and loved the other. And as far as she could tell, no one else in her sphere understood it
.

  Jody took another biscuit and broke it in half, but she set both pieces on her plate. “You work too hard.”

  If so, why was it some days she thought she didn’t work hard enough? The hours didn’t count—well, they did—but results were all that mattered.

  “True enough.” Ellie took a bite of walnuts and cranberries and changed the subject. “So tell me about the kids. Is Della still in dance?”

  A half an hour later they were both standing in the foyer of the little restaurant, putting on their coats. Icy rain sluiced across the glass door, and Ellie braced herself to step outside into the cutting wind.

  Winter was coming.

  And that wasn’t the only cold cruel thing out there.

  * * *

  The cabin was cold, the musty smell of disuse already heavy in the air, and his footsteps echoed loudly as Bryce fumbled for the flashlight kept on a shelf by the front door. He found it, flicked the switch, and muttered, “Shit.”

  Nothing. The damn battery was dead. He never had understood why his parents were adamant about the flashlight always being put back in the same place when in his memory it didn’t have fresh batteries when they needed the thing. Disgusted, he shook out his wet hair, groped around so he could set down the leftover pizza—no box, Paul Bunyan back at the bar had wrapped it in some foil—and stumbled off blind to the fuse box in the back bedroom to switch the electricity on. It wasn’t the easiest thing to do in the pitch dark and he whacked his ankle on the corner of the bed frame hard enough to make his eyes water, but he finally found the metal box, fumbled it open, and flipped the main.

  It helped to have light, he thought, as the glow of the little lamp on the side table banished the impenetrable darkness of a small room with the draperies drawn against a rainy late fall night. The bed was stripped, of course—his mother always did that when they closed up for the season—clean sheets were in a small cedar chest in the hallway, a patterned blanket neatly folded at the foot of the bed on top of the mattress pad. This was the room he’d had as a kid and still used as a grown man when he had the time to come up for a few days.

  The blanket has little cowboys on it …

  Suzanne could do derisive like no one he’d ever met. If a man had an urge to be emasculated with a few words, she was a pro.

  He’d shrugged and told the truth. It was a perfectly good blanket and his mother was of pragmatic Scandinavian stock. Nothing wrong with it except it was bought years ago for an eight-year-old boy. She wasn’t going to throw it out and it was a cabin, for God’s sake.

  He could still see the look on his wife’s face the first time he’d brought her up to Loon Lake for a vacation. The only time. She’d hated the whole week. She didn’t like to fish, to swim in the cold water, there was no television, no Internet, no upscale restaurants, no shopping—you name it, she’d complained about it.

  He hadn’t understood her aversion then, and he still didn’t understand to this day. Trees, sparkling clear water, the smell of a woodstove with a crackling fire. What wasn’t to like?

  No, it wasn’t elegant. That wasn’t in dispute. None of the furnishings matched. To this day his mother said the place was furnished à la dump, but it was comfortable and homey not in spite of it, Bryce thought as he moved to the kitchen, but maybe because of it. The tin cupboard for the dishes by the sink, the open shelves holding battered iron skillets, chipped casserole dishes, a vintage coffee pot that still made coffee so good it put Starbucks to shame. The floor was linoleum, worn through here and there but immaculately clean, and the counters held various styles and colors of jars to store pasta, flour, rice, sugar, all with good seals because mice could chew through anything but glass or metal.

  Bryce went back out to his car for the beer, his suitcase and laptop. He put his suitcase in the bedroom, flicked on the baseboard heat in the living room, removed his wet jacket, and flopped down onto the couch facing the long windows overlooking the lake, toeing off his damp loafers. He couldn’t see anything outside because of the darkness and rain, but the comfortable sound of the rhythm on the roof was soothing. He drank his third beer of the evening in solitude and thought about Melissa.

  Pretty girl. Interesting too. It had been awhile since he’d met someone like her.

  His cell phone rang just as he was dozing off, the half-empty beer in his hand. He hadn’t even bothered to turn on the radio, just sat listening to the soporific sound of the rain slapping against the shingles. It took him a minute or so to blink awake and realize the phone was ringing, sitting on the table by the woodstove he hadn’t bother to light. Bryce surged to his feet and fumbled to retrieve it, finally managing to open it by the seventh ring. “Hello?”

  “You made it okay?”

  His mother. The sound of her voice was as familiar in the surroundings as if she stood there. “Yeah.” Bryce ran his fingers through his hair. “Everything is fine. Weather could be better, but I think you can say that ninety percent of the time up here. Stop worrying.”

  “It’s on the lonely side on the lake this time of year.” There was concern and reproof in her voice. “I’m not sure what you’re going to do there all day.”

  Neither of his parents had believed he wanted to spend his vacation in late October at a lake that didn’t have a single inhabitant except himself. All the other places were summer cottages and the road wouldn’t even get plowed if it wasn’t for the fact one lake over there was a couple of people who lived there all year.

  “I’m going to work on my book.” Though she couldn’t see it, he gestured at his laptop, now sitting on the table by the windows. He felt foolish and laughed quietly at himself. “I brought my computer and a backup battery and I can check my e-mail on my phone, so I’m set. I’m fine.”

  “When we saw you last month you looked tired.”

  “Hence the peace and quiet. I always sleep like a rock here, Mom. Besides, you can reach me at any time. I can’t believe I get a good signal here, but I usually do.” Bryce squinted at his watch. “Is it really only eight-thirty? It must just feel later because of the rain.”

  “Have you eaten?”

  Once a mother, always a mother. Since the divorce became final every phone call between them had included that question. He hated to disillusion her, but Suzanne hadn’t been much of a cook. They’d usually eaten out or he grilled something. He could do that all on his own.

  He had to, actually. Suzanne was gone.

  “Some pizza.” He really just felt strange, as if he should go to bed and sleep off the seminar. Sleep off the past twelve months of trying to find himself again as he struggled to accept the failure of his marriage.

  “Make sure you have something more healthy than pizza tomorrow.”

  “I will.” Probably a lie, but it was a nonmalicious one, designed to ease her mind. “Thanks for calling.”

  “Keep in touch with us.”

  “Okay. Have a good night.”

  It was funny he thought as he ended the call, but he didn’t miss his ex-wife. That wasn’t the problem.

  What the hell was the problem?

  * * *

  She couldn’t sleep.

  Again.

  Fuck it.

  Ellie sat up and shoved aside the covers. Barefoot, she padded out to the living room and picked up the remote. The rain was supposed to stop by midnight but it gave no sign of letting up yet if the steady drum against the skylight was any indication.

  A lamp burned on the end table by the sofa, casting the comfortable room in a low haze of light. She never used to leave the lights on, but now … well, let’s say she always left a light burning. It would be helpful if she hadn’t inherited her father’s colorful imagination. There was a monster in the woods, and if this was one of the picture book stories he’d read to her as a child, someone magical would come along and find it so it wouldn’t ever scare anyone again …

  She sat down on the couch and stared at the façade of the fireplace. It stared back, a blank canvas of river rock and the gaping hole of the hearth. Water dripped from the eaves outside.

  Unfortunately, she was supposed to be that someone. But she wasn’t magical. Far from it. The monster so far had the advantage and she didn’t like it one bit.