Dark Signal Read online

  She gripped the seat of the bleachers and clamped her lips as if waiting for a wave of nausea to pass. “I need to tell you something.”

  Just then, Roxy’s high-pitched laughter hit us from halfway across the gym. We both whipped our heads to look. I said, “She’s going to act like she’s the only woman who’s ever had a baby.”

  Sarah swiveled toward me. “Roxy’s pregnant?”

  I nodded, knowing my mouth curled in contempt despite trying to appear unconcerned.

  “Oh,” Sarah said. I waited for the string of expletives or a witty insult, but Sarah gave Roxy a contemplative stare.

  Principal Barkley tinkered with the controls. Static blizzarded across the screen and roared over the speakers. His face fired crimson. A few more tweaks, a hasty confab with Marty Jean Stavick, the current high school IT geek, and the mournful strains of organ music pressed against us. The live feed showed two sprays of purple iris and glads bookending Chad’s casket, which was covered in white roses. The screenshot was stationary with no images of the family or those in the theater.

  Ted and Roxy found a place in the first row next to the door. Everyone quieted.

  I hadn’t known Chad well, but that didn’t stop me from absorbing the grief of everyone around me. He’d never celebrate his fortieth birthday. So much potential squashed.

  I hunkered down, hating to sit through the service of another young person, and when it ended, I jumped up and joined the rest of my family filling the aisles. I headed for Trey, who stood just inside the gym watching as the mourners exited.

  Lauren, my sister-in-law, whispered into our family bunch, “They didn’t mention the burial and funeral dinner. Aren’t they having one?”

  Robert looked confused. “They’re from Omaha. Maybe they don’t do things like that.”

  Douglas shrugged. “Doesn’t seem respectful to just send everyone away.”

  Louise tsked. “She’s having an invitation-only reception at her house.”

  Sarah asked, “How do you know that?”

  Louise’s love of gossip oozed. “Twyla got invited. I guess Meredith knows her from the Long Branch.” She reminded us that Mose and Zeke played their final basketball game of the season tomorrow evening. She suggested we gather at Mom and Dad’s afterward for cake, which she’d bake, of course.

  We gave her the usual noncommitment. A few days ago, that suggestion would drop a gallon of dread into my tank at the thought of the invading hordes to disrupt a quiet evening of reading. Now that I knew how important it was to Mom to have her house filled with life, I had a little more tolerance.

  I made my way to where Trey waited. The closer I got, the more his face clouded. “What the hell happened to you?”

  I ignored him. “Anything new in the investigation?”

  We’d marked the end of a life with a solemn ceremony, and now we were going back to our lives. We made plans for family get-togethers, plunged into work, refocused on our own problems. It didn’t seem fair or right. And yet, what else could we do? I fought the guilt that blossomed every time I walked out of a funeral. And I remembered Glenda.

  Trey’s focus stayed on my face. “Tell me.”

  I took a few steps back from the doorway with people still meandering through. “I checked out the car Bobby said they set out on the siding. I don’t think Chad was the target. They wanted to stop the train.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  I’d rather lay it out for him in my office, but he looked ready to hog-tie me for the details. With a low voice I told him about the car and the man who escaped. I added the details Burke explained about train thefts.

  He crushed his back teeth together. “Why didn’t you call me?”

  I stepped back. “I talked to Clete. He was going to contact the BNSF investigator. If they need any help from us they’ll call.”

  I braced for his indignation for me relinquishing the investigation. His face tightened like a twisted rubber band. “You shouldn’t have gone out there alone. You got hurt and it could have been worse.”

  “This is my job.”

  He clenched his fists. “But you’re not experienced. What if he’d attacked you instead of escaping?”

  Now I was running hot. “You think you need to protect me?”

  We stared at each other while the gym emptied. Gradually he calmed down, and his color returned to normal. “Okay. It’s over. But I’m not convinced Chad wasn’t the target. Let’s look into it a little more. I heard there is a gathering at Meredith Mills’s house. You should go.”

  I held my hand up. “I can’t do that. I wasn’t invited. I barely knew Chad, and I don’t know Meredith at all.”

  Trey considered that. “I understand. But there’s no way Meredith’s father will let me past the door.” He tipped his chin toward my skirt. “You look like a friend.”

  “What is it you think I’ll find?”

  Trey tilted his head. “Anything, maybe nothing.”

  “Bobby Jenkins said everyone knew how devoted Meredith and Chad were to each other.”

  He nodded. “But the yard light signal of their devotion didn’t flash that night.”

  I paused. He had me there. The light had been on when I drove there later.

  Trey shrugged. “No, I don’t think Meredith killed her husband. But it would be good to rule her out. Maybe you can find out something useful about Chad from his family.”

  I looked out the gym door. Sarah and Robert made their way down the hallway with the rest of the crowd. She threaded her arm through Robert’s and leaned into him. He bent his head and kissed her hair. Concern zinged through me. Tenderness wasn’t their public face.

  Trey waited for my response. “I’ll go out there and see if I can find out anything. But there’s something I want you to do.”

  He raised an eyebrow, probably in response to me giving him an order. “What’s that?”

  “Yesterday I thought I saw some new Dell boxes in the back of a citizen’s car. Since that’s something Burke mentioned is often taken from railroad cars, I think you should investigate.”

  He got all huffy. “You were going to tell me about this when?”

  “Now.” I gave him directions out to Newt and Earl’s. “We can meet at the courthouse and compare notes later.”

  He didn’t look happy about his assignment, but I’d have gladly changed places with him.

  21

  By the time I reached Meredith’s house, expensive foreign sedans and shiny tasteful sports cars with Omaha plates lined the gravel road in front of the white fence. A smattering of mud- and dust-encrusted pickups and SUVs with Grand County plates mingled with the classier herd. I slammed Elvis’s door and raced for the house, hoping to get inside before my body heat vanished.

  Emily opened the door and pulled me inside. She wore a simple black sheath dress—I only know that’s what it’s called because my sister Diane tried to give me one of her hand-me-downs, and that’s what she’d called it. Diane’s dress didn’t love me nearly as much as Emily’s adored her by embracing her thin curves. The same delicate silver chain with a glinting diamond circled her neck. She held out a pale hand. “Kate, isn’t that right?”

  I envied her name recall, especially since she’d probably been presented with a gaggle of Sandhillers over the last couple of days. “Good to see you, Emily.”

  People milled around the living room and toward the dining room. The folks from the Sandhills wore crisp jeans and boots, with one or two women in dresses.

  The people in black wool dresses and suits, with pumps or wingtips, those wearing ties or pantyhose were, I assumed, Meredith’s family. Heels clicked and thumped on the gleaming hardwood floors. The faltering sunlight and dead white of the sky seeped through the bank of southern windows that ran from above the couch to the breakfast nook.

  The lingering scent of burning pine from the fireplace mingled with brewing coffee and the unusual smell of perfume. Delicate perfume that smelled like money. The San
dhillers I recognized looked as out of place as I felt. Our traditional post-funeral protocol involved a meal served at one of five churches in town. Roast beef cooked overnight in roaster pans, buckets of mashed potatoes, and brown gravy.

  For our usual funerals, the churches not hosting the dinner divvied up desserts and salads, and the ladies of the various congregations were then assigned their contribution, which they delivered whether attending the funeral or not. In some instances, the roast beef could be switched with ham, in which case, the roaster pans were filled with “funeral potatoes,” a magical mixture of sliced potatoes, cream cheese, sour cream, and cream of mushroom soup, all covered with crushed corn flakes and melted Velveeta.

  The food would be strewn on long tables covered with plastic cloths. People would fill paper plates, their voices rising in the church basement. Everyone had been to these dinners in these same basements all their lives and knew what to expect. When they cleaned their plates, they’d deposit them in the big Rubbermaid trash can by the front door.

  Here, a lace table cloth covered the dining table. Delicate white china cups and saucers were lined like soldiers at attention next to a coffee urn. An honest to goodness sparkling urn. Not a decrepit five-gallon percolator with tepid, weak coffee. A full bar was laid out on the counter between the kitchen and dining room with crystal of various shapes and sizes waiting for anyone knowledgeable enough to mix a cocktail. Instead of stained roaster pans of greasy or fat-infused comfort, Meredith served uniform platters of cheese and fruit, some kind of spring rolls with raw salmon, and fancy finger food that would send Twyla into apoplexy.

  While not a woman of the world, I had occasion to eat sushi and other Asian and fusion food. I loved me some spicy Thai green curry. It’s true I usually skipped the chopsticks and embarrassed companions by asking for a fork, but I wouldn’t run from the food lining the table.

  I placed a few tidbits on a china plate and wandered over to Clete, who held up a wall between two windows. He gripped a china saucer in one hand and wound a gnarled finger through the delicate handle of a tea cup.

  He glanced at me then dragged his attention to the crowd of city folks cheerful as if at a cocktail party. “Can’t believe he’s really gone.”

  “What did the railroad investigator find out?”

  Clete slurped and looked irritated enough to crush the cup and saucer. “They confirmed a theft, but no telling where.”

  “But the bolt cutters and cut seal were right there on the ground. What did they steal?”

  Clete bent over and set the saucer on an end table and clinked the cup on top of it. “They counted thirteen missing computers.”

  “Dell?”

  Clete’s face pinched and he shifted. “How’d you know?”

  I changed topics, hoping Clete would understand my reluctance to discuss an investigation. “Are Chad’s folks here?”

  Clete’s hands clenched. “Too busy being missionaries in the Amazon or some godforsaken place to get to their boy’s funeral.”

  It wouldn’t make much difference to Chad now. “No other family?”

  Clete shook his head.

  Twyla stomped over to us. She’d wound her hair into a bun and applied eyeliner and blue eyeshadow. She even wore a black skirt and Western shirt with pearl buttons. She curled her lip at my plate and patted Clete’s arm. “Sorry day for you. I know how close Ron and Chad were. How’s he taking it?”

  Clete’s frown deepened. “I don’t s’pose Ron and Chad were that good of friends. Ron, well, he’s pretty busy with work. I’m not sure he knows about this.”

  Twyla blinked in shock. “You haven’t even called him?”

  Clete’s head sunk into his shoulders. “Mostly it’s his mother that talks to him. She probably let him know.”

  I tried to smooth it over. “People move away. They lose touch.”

  Twyla eyed Clete, and he cleared his throat and studied the leaf-wrapped dolmades on my plate. “What is that?”

  Twyla sniffed. “Fancy-ass hord-de-vores.”

  I offered the white china to him. “It’s some really good stuff wrapped in a grape leaf. Give it a try.”

  He searched my eyes as my old college roommate would after I told her to “smell this sock” or I would at one of my sisters telling me to “taste this and see if it’s off.” I guess he must have seen something trustworthy in me. With great trepidation, he inched his gnarled hand to my plate, and using two fingers, as if it might be poison, he lifted the dolmades to his mouth and took a bite. In a second he shoved the whole thing in and chewed. With his mouth still full, he said, “Holy cow. That’s good eats.”

  I nodded, chewing on a bite of well-aged cheese. Clete backed away from me and headed to the table.

  Twyla watched him. “He’s a real asshole.”

  Before I could comment, she wandered away to talk to other offended church ladies who hadn’t been asked to bring food.

  I spoke to a few people I knew. Several congratulated me on my new position. Most had a lame joke about my stitches. No one asked about the investigation, but they all gave off the whiff of curiosity. Thank goodness they didn’t know Chad had been murdered.

  Like a junior high dance with boys on one side of the gym and girls on the other, the Sandhills contingent loitered in the open dining area or leaned on the breakfast bar wall away from the tonier set. They whispered. No one laughed. More than one of them checked a watch as if wondering the minimum time they had to stay for politeness’s sake.

  Emily and Mrs. Sterling rose to some secret signal and slinked into the kitchen like lionesses. I followed them. With a murmur and nod, the older woman directed Emily to collect a few of the Tupperware and casserole dishes full of food brought by Meredith’s Sandhills neighbors. Mrs. Sterling filled the sink with sudsy water and searched in the cupboard under the sink. She emerged with yellow plastic gloves. While Emily pulled containers from the rows of knotty hickory cabinets and transferred food from original dishes to Meredith’s plastic, Mrs. Sterling started to wash the original containers.

  Mrs. Sterling was the mature model of the sisters. A few shades darker blonde, she wore her hair in a tasteful French twist. Her body, no doubt sculpted under the direction of a personal trainer, traced the same sleek lines as the younger versions. Black wool draped over a gazelle frame, accented with two long strings of pearls, with matching pearl clusters on her earlobes.

  She braced herself against the bottom of the sink with one arm and sawed a scrubby on the remains of “Potato and Cheese Perfection.” That was Twyla’s specialty. It appeared at funerals and pot lucks. Despite the foreign nature of Chad’s funeral, some of the Sandhillers wouldn’t dream of showing up without food.

  Mrs. Sterling hesitated and studied the dish. She brought it out of the suds and lifted it, turned it over, and squinted at the bottom.

  Mom did that sometimes, when she wondered whether the artist signed the piece. I imagined Mrs. Sterling was more interested in the authenticity of the old dish.

  When I approached, Mrs. Sterling splashed the dish back into the water as if embarrassed to be caught sizing up the bakeware. Emily rushed over and pulled the plate from me. “Here, let me take that.”

  The older woman twisted her head over her shoulder and offered a perfunctory smile. “You can set it there, Emily. Grandmother would roll over in her grave if we put it in the dishwasher. The gold plate will wear off.”

  Emily set the plate on the counter and winked at me as if we understood the eccentricities of picky mothers.

  Twyla pounded into the kitchen. “Oh, honey.” She threw a hip at Mrs. Sterling, nearly knocking her into Choker County. “You don’t need to worry about doing these up now. Just throw some tin foil over them and pop them in the deep freeze. They’re for Meredith, and no one expects to get their dishes back for a long time.”

  Mrs. Sterling held her left hand under her right, catching the drips from one but letting the other hand splash onto the wood floor. “It seems far simp
ler to send the clean dishes home today.”

  Twyla plunged her hands into the dishwater, and with muscle Mrs. Sterling could only hint at, scrubbed the burned potato from the casserole. “Oh no. The point ain’t the food exactly. It’s that it gives Meredith the excuse to get out of the house and see folks. Or sometimes, it’s the duty to return the dishes that forces people out of theirselves. You know what I mean?”

  Mrs. Sterling raised a gloved hand toward the sink as mothers automatically throw an arm across a child in the front seat when they put on the brakes. “Careful. That’s an antique.”

  “What it is, is my granny’s old dish I’ve had since dirt was young.” She lifted it from the water and grinned at it. “I always kind of liked the blue flowers. Makes me glad and reminds me of Granny. Plus, it’s the right size for Potato and Cheese Perfection.”

  Emily stepped back and kept her eyes on her mother, as if gauging the exact moment of the explosion. Mrs. Sterling dripped on the floor.

  Twyla tugged the dishwasher door down, fought with it, and accidentally slid it out. “I’ll be darned.” She popped an excited face to me. “Did you see this, Kate? It’s like a giant drawer. Now ain’t that clever?”

  She picked up my plate and plunked it onto the bottom rack. More plates followed in rapid succession. She yanked out the top rack and deposited several crystal cocktail glasses. Mrs. Sterling stood in horrified paralysis.

  Probably out of genuine concern for Twyla and maybe to save the day from another murder, Emily inserted herself between Mrs. Sterling and Twyla. “Please, you’re a guest here. We don’t expect you to do the dishes.”

  Twyla waved her off. “Oh honey, we’re here to help any way we can. Now you and your mama go back in and sit with Meredith. I’ll get this kitchen spick and span and put the food up. Don’t you worry.”

  Emily pulled Twyla away. She reached into the sink and tugged the stopper. “I insist. It would make us uncomfortable for you to do this work. Really. Leave it.”