A Cold, Fine Evil Page 6

  I wonder to this day what god listened to that prayer.

  Alicia didn’t look up but murmured a polite greeting as the bell jingled and the door swung closed behind her next customer.

  “Hi to you, too.” The man’s voice was amused.

  The book she’d been reading snapped shut and the sound was embarrassingly loud as her gaze flew upward. At least she didn’t fall off the stool she was perched on behind the cash register.

  Jon Palmer was back to the expensive leather jacket, this time over a dark red shirt tucked into tan slacks. As usual, he looked like he just stepped out of a magazine, but maybe it was those years spent in the corporate world that made dressing the part as natural as breathing.

  She pulled out her usual brilliant wit. “Oh, it’s you.”

  Seriously, that’s what I just said?

  His laugh showed a flash of white teeth. “Yep, it’s me. Before you start worrying over my excessive drinking habits, I didn’t come here for more scotch. I didn’t know how to get in touch with you any other way and was just wondering if you might be free for dinner. If not tonight, maybe some other time. My schedule is pretty open.”

  Talk about an open schedule. Hers was packed full of laundry and reruns on the only cable package she could afford. It didn’t come naturally to her to be coy—she had an annoying streak of honesty that one would think would be a positive trait, but usually just made her look naïve. She did manage to stifle: I’d walk through broken glass to go out with you and just said, “I’m free tonight, actually. That sounds great.”

  Whew, close call.

  “You said you didn’t work many evenings, so I took a chance when I saw your car.”

  He knew her car? Of course he did, she instantly reminded herself. He’d seen it there and at the hardware store. “I get off in an hour but I need to go home and change.”

  It seemed like every single time she ran into him she was dressed like a certified slob, but in order to keep the lewd comments and come-ons to an endurable level, she’d learned to play down anything remotely revealing at work.

  “I can pick you up here or where you live, it’s up to you.”

  In a place like Black Lake he could find out her address in about three seconds, but she appreciated the courtesy. “My house is fine. Pine Street, number 215.”

  His brows lifted minutely in question. “Hour and a half, or is that not enough time?”

  Diplomatic of him to ask how long it would take to make the mess into a tidy date. “It depends on our destination. The Chalet or Ruthie’s?”

  He laughed softly. “Still only the two choices for a decent restaurant around here? Definitely The Chalet. Do I need to make a reservation?”

  “Not this time of year,” she said with the assured knowledge of someone who had never left this Minnesota backwater. “I’ll see you in an hour and a half.”

  The minute he walked out the door she smacked herself in the forehead. At least a five minute drive home, she needed to pick up the living room, plus get ready…

  Twenty-five minutes. Sure, she could do this.

  And she did. Not perfectly but she accomplished the time line anyway. Ingrained behavior? Maybe. Her ex had hated it if she was late but Gary had been kind of an ass all around.

  The green dress. Not fancy but not too casual, bought last year for a date that went nowhere. On sale, so no harm, no foul. Bracelet on wrist, very pale lipstick, flats to match her dress. Cleavage? Well, yes, of course, since she knew men took one look at her and their gazes went south, so why not?

  She could be offended or just be realistic.

  Jon didn’t do the south move and that was actually more disconcerting. He just stood in her doorway and looked at her directly in the eye. “You look nice.”

  He seemed sincere. One of her worst faults was self-criticism but she was working on it, so she accepted he thought so and stepped out on the porch with a murmured thank you.

  “Not so fast. I mean it. You look nice.”

  Great. Intuitive too, since he sensed her insecurity.

  “I don’t get dressed up often.”

  His smile was as charming as usual, but she noticed the strained lines around his mouth. Alicia took a closer look as they walked down her steps. The bricks were cracked but she put pots of geraniums there in the spring and right now in the fall purple and yellow mums were nestled around the flaws. “Everything okay?”

  “Fine. I’m having dinner with a pretty woman. What could be wrong?”

  He wasn’t going to answer her question. All right. Maybe they didn’t know each other well enough for that. Still, the faint frown persisted even when he opened her door with a courtesy she appreciated, and went around to get in his expensive car.

  There was, she noted as they pulled away, nothing personal at all in the interior of his vehicle. She usually had some junk mail that had slid to the floor, an air freshener she never replaced dangling from the mirror, an umbrella behind the driver’s seat, a slew of assorted CDs on the visor…

  His car said nothing about him except that he could afford it. Even the radio wasn’t playing.

  They drove in virtual silence to the resort, but luckily it was only a few minutes away. It was actually a very charming old-fashioned lodge, with a pitched ceiling and log construction and it had been around ever since she could remember. As predicted the dining room was only half full, the lighting muted, the tables covered in white cloths, very soft classical music playing in the background. They were offered a table overlooking the water where in the summer people would be boating and swimming, but on a cool autumn evening it was silent, the water rippling just enough to reflect the lights from inside.

  She ordered a glass of Chardonnay and wasn’t surprised when her date asked for a scotch, rocks. Jon said wryly, “I think the last time I was here was senior prom.”

  Her wedding reception had been at The Chalet, but she preferred to not relive that memory. “You took Amy Wells.”

  His expression reflected surprise. “You remember who I took to prom?”

  “You were somewhat of a celebrity at our high school. Most popular boy takes most popular girl. Yeah, us peasants remember those sort of things.” She paused and made a face. “Whoops, that sounded bitter and I wasn’t then and I’m certainly not now. I had a great circle of friends back in the day, even if we weren’t in the chosen inner group. I still keep in touch with some of them. While we’re on the subject, did you know George Walda had a heart attack recently? I know the two of you hung out back in the day.”

  The waiter delivered their drinks and leather bound menus and Jon absently thanked him but was staring at her. “I’ve seen him since I came back here. George did?”

  She nodded and picked up her wineglass. “On the steps outside the library at the college.”

  “Did he make it?”

  It was impossible to not notice the ice rattled in his glass as he took a drink.

  “Yes, he did. At first they thought he’d slipped because of the rain and hit his head because he took quite a tumble. Amy is the one who actually told me about it.”

  Amy Wells, now Amy Walda, stopped by the liquor store fairly often. Everyone knew about Troy’s problem because he’d been honest about it before he was elected sheriff, and Amy had once confided that she never drank in front of him but said a nice glass of whiskey now and then helped her out when she couldn’t sleep.

  Alicia just sold the stuff, she didn’t pass judgment.

  “In the midst of life, we are in death,” Jon quoted softly, his blue eyes shadowed. Then he visibly shook it off and opened his menu. “Since it has been established I haven’t been here in a long time, any recommendations on what to order?”

  * * * *

  The salad was fresh and the dressing homemade, the steak perfectly done, and there was no way to go wrong with a double baked potato that was a cholesterol fest of sour cream, cheese and bacon, but Jon only ate with an abstract appreciation, hoping the distraction d
idn’t show.

  The heart attack had nothing to do with his return to Black Lake.

  Right?

  George was overweight, he’d never been an athlete, had a sedentary job, and he was still unmarried so he probably subsisted on a bachelor diet of stuff out of the freezer or a can. He was, as they say, a heart attack in the making.

  Nothing to do with him.

  Dismiss it.

  Alicia had ordered broiled walleye, vegetables instead of a salad, and skipped the potato but had looked wistfully at his plate when it was delivered. Why it should make him feel vaguely guilty he’d never had to worry about his weight he wasn’t sure, but he had plenty of other things to worry about, so he should dismiss that too.

  He’d been honest earlier. She really looked attractive without the careless ponytail and shapeless shirt and jeans. The dress she’d chosen emphasized not just her generous breasts, but the word hourglass came to mind since it flattered her form all the way around. Her makeup too, was understated, and after his marriage to Connie, he was sick to death of women who took two hours to get ready to step a foot out of their bathroom. He could swear his ex-wife had gone and refreshed her lipstick before she came to bed.

  It would have been better if she’d devoted some more time to her inner beauty, but that cliché was overused.

  There was a cold, pale moon above the lake, making the water shimmer. He thought about the cabin and the laughter in the woods and contemplated Alicia across the table. Not only was she from Black Lake—he was too—but she’d stayed. She didn’t seem unintelligent and maybe he suffered from too much imagination, but her feet were firmly planted on the ground.

  So he asked, “Tell me, Alicia, do you believe in malevolence?”

  Obviously his choice of word threw her a little. Startled, she stopped with her second glass of wine part way to her mouth. “Excuse me?”

  “Malevolence. The act of consciously committing an evil or cruel deed.”

  “I know what it means. I guess I’m just not clear on the exact question.” She brushed back her hair behind her ear, which he guessed was an unconscious mannerism because several times already she’d done it and quickly fixed it.

  They had both finished eating and declined dessert. By now the place was almost empty. The town tended to roll up the sidewalks a bit early as the winter chill crept in. He elaborated, “I think I’m asking if you think that essence—malevolence—can attach itself to a person or a place.”

  That was going a little deeper than what he intended. So he modified. “I’m being hypothetical.”

  “No, you aren’t.” She took her sip of wine and looked at him with straightforward consideration. “You’re talking about here, aren’t you?”

  “I’m asking a simple question, that’s all.”

  “I don’t think that question is simple in the least. Is that why you came home?”

  Jon rested his hand on the edge of the table and looked right back. “How can anyone who lives here ignore there is a disproportionate amount of murders and disappearances in this area and that it has been going on for well over a hundred years?”

  “Everyone is an exaggeration and disproportionate is a relative term,” she argued. “How many murders were there in Chicago last year? It is just more noticeable here because of the density of the population. When something happens to someone from Black Lake, everyone knows about it. As for ignoring some of the dark past around here, there have been at least two books written about William Murray.”

  She was right. He’d read them both. Several times.

  The first one had been written over fifty years ago and had been titled: Blood of the Woods.

  The second one had been written only a decade ago and that author had detailed some grisly details Jon could have lived without. The Lost Graves had been even more chilling.

  Murray was a Scandinavian immigrant who settled in the area, and though the versions of what happened exactly aren’t the same, the consensus was he murdered at least a dozen people and buried them in various places, mostly in the woods.

  Speculation in the second book was that a dozen was a very low number. And after he was hanged, people still continued to disappear…

  “Neither one of those books is cheerful bedtime reading,” Jon acknowledged. “And this isn’t cheerful after dinner conversation either. All my fault. I brought it up. Shall we go?”

  They walked out to the car in a silence he wouldn’t even remotely call companionable and he doubted the sudden tension in Alicia’s shapely shoulders had anything to do with the topic they’d just abandoned.

  She didn’t need to worry about whether or not he wanted to sleep with her. She was attractive enough and he’d been celibate for a while now. Even before the official split he’d lost interest in Connie, so it was nice to feel that stir of male arousal again. He’d considered having an affair with a colleague who’d made it clear on a daily basis she was interested before he quit his job, or as George had suggested, taking one of those tanned co-eds giving him the eye on that tropical beach back to his hotel room. But at the end of it, he’d been in the middle of making some important decisions about what to do with his life, and sex had been a low priority.

  Now the die was cast, he was back, and if Alicia Hahn offered—it wasn’t vanity, but he knew she would since all the signals were there—he was interested. It didn’t say anything about him as a person, but women liked how he looked—so he’d accept. She seemed so normal with her wholesome smile and he could use a good dose of normal.

  But she was definitely struggling with the thought of rejection. Her ex-husband must have really been an asshole.

  In the end, he helped her out as he walked her to the door of her modest frame house. He said mildly, “I shouldn’t have probably had that glass of red wine with my dinner after the scotch. Two blocks through town is one thing, but those winding roads in the woods are pitch black and I think deer make a sport of hanging out and seeing how many cars they can run off the road by leaping into headlights. Mind if I come in for a few minutes to let it wear off?”

  Chapter 8

  In a rare moment of regret, I once decided confession truly was good for the soul. The concept is absurd, of course. Any sane person knows that once the proverbial cat is out of the bag, capturing it again is going to take quite some doing.

  Cats have sharp claws.

  The moral of this particular story is that it’s bad to be on the receiving end of information of the damning kind, especially from someone like me. I didn’t feel better; instead I instantly realized my mistake.

  So did my confidant.

  I still remember the look in her eyes. I imagine it is the same one that a person gets when they finally step off the roof of a tall building or jump off a bridge. An awareness of the moment and what it meant accompanied by a resignation the consequences were going to be unpleasant.

  My mistake, I admit it.

  To my credit, there was no suffering involved when I killed her.

  The whole thing was unfortunate.

  Alicia had done her best to not be too talkative during dinner because when she was nervous she sometimes chattered, then she’d been tongue-tied during the short drive back to her house, and so some sort of middle ground might make her seem at least composed.

  “Would you like a cup of coffee?”

  “No, but thank you.” Jon’s gaze traveled over what was probably to him a pretty generic room. Moss green couch in the center, her mother’s old coffee table that she’d refinished, an oriental style rug that she’d bought online, small table and lamp…it wasn’t exciting, but it was comfortable.

  Then he looked at her. “I appreciate you asking me in but if you’d prefer I leave, just say the word.”

  Well, shit. He knew.

  He stepped close enough to touch her, but the living room was so small, that wasn’t hard to do. His azure eyes held hers. “Yes, or no?”

  The man was just being polite, he knew it was yes. Whe
n she looked back on this moment in the future she’d probably feel at least some humiliation because she was so transparent, but at the moment, she really wanted nothing more than for them both to take off their clothes and fulfill a fantasy that had been in the back of her mind for a very long time.

  Sleeping with Jon Palmer…

  On the first date, no less, but she was thirty-six years old.

  “Can I take your coat?”

  He laughed. “That’s the answer I was hoping for. Sure.”

  After he shrugged out of the garment, she took it, inhaled the light scent of his cologne as she hung it up in her minuscule front closet. No part of her thought for a minute this would be anything but a casual night for him. She was resigned to that.

  “I…” She stopped and took in a breath as she turned around. “I want to say I don’t do this. I absolutely don’t sleep around.”

  “You don’t have to say that. Give me some credit. I’ve already figured that out. I want to say something too.”

  “Of course.”

  He looked very tall in her living room, his face drawn into taut planes and angles since she only had the one lamp on. His voice was low. “If you think you’re getting the football hero from high school, he doesn’t exist. He never did really. I’m not easy to know since I’m not even sure I know me, so as long as we have that straight before we walk into your bedroom, it will be easier on both of us. I look at you and I know you don’t sleep around, but you look at me and have no idea what you’re stepping into and I can’t help you out with that one.”

  He meant it but it wasn’t news to her. There was a pause when she wondered if she shouldn’t just go get his coat from the closet and hand it back to him, but she wasn’t going to do that, they both knew it, and instead she walked past him down the hall toward her bedroom.

  They undressed without speaking but the awkwardness of the drive home was now gone, though she had to admit to some self-consciousness about being naked in front of him. When he joined her on the bed, the charged silence heightened her arousal in a way she didn’t understand but didn’t argue with either.