December Dread (The Murder-By-Month Mysteries) Read online

  “Mira?”

  I glanced up guiltily, feeling like a spy. Which I was. The man walking toward me was in his late 20s if he was a day, with long, straggly hair pulled back into a ponytail at his neck. “Jake?”

  “At your service.” He glanced at his watch.

  His body language was impossible to ignore. He had much better things to do. I couldn’t blame him. “Thanks for making time for me.”

  He nodded once, abruptly. “This is going to be a short tour. We don’t have a lot here. Mind if I ask why you’re interested?”

  “Didn’t Ron tell you?” I asked, stalling for time. I hadn’t formulated a believable lie yet.

  “No, but I figured it’s because our circulation numbers just bumped and he wants to know our secret.”

  I immediately decided to like this guy. I didn’t need to waste any good fibs on him. “You figured right. Are you one of the reporters?”

  “I suppose I am. I’m also the editor and the publisher, just like Ron. I only have two other employees, one you met at the front desk and the other sells ads for us. Keeping the overhead small is the only way to make a newspaper work in a small town.”

  I studied him some more as he led the way down the narrow hallway. “You look pretty young to have your own newspaper.”

  “My parents owned it before me. Didn’t you graduate from here?”

  “Yeah,” I said, wondering if he knew my history. I hoped he didn’t. “I didn’t get out much, though. I grew up eight miles out of town, over by Lake Koronis.”

  He nodded in a distracted way. I got the sense he was a habitually busy man. “Well, this is the do-all room,” he said, flicking on the light. “You’ll recognize the layout table, computers, file cabinets. We don’t have all our archives transferred into a computerized form yet, but we’re working on it.”

  A fully-extended copy of the front and back pages of the newspaper caught my eye. “Your paper comes out tomorrow?”

  “Yep. Deadline is Monday and the paper comes out every Wednesday.”

  I pointed at the headline article. “You’re reporting on the River Grove murder.”

  He pushed a strand of hair behind his ear, his brow furrowed. “I rearranged what I thought was the final layout to make room for that story. The victim graduated from here.”

  “I know.” We both stared at the headline for a couple beats, the atmosphere in the room suddenly heavy. “Did you find out anything that they haven’t aired on the news?”

  He shook his head. “Not really. The same FBI crew that covered the case in Chicago and Wisconsin is handling it in Minnesota. The supervisory agent is Walter Briggs. He’s with the Behavioral Analysis Unit, and he’s not big on answering reporters’ questions.”

  “So we all just wait.”

  “Yeah.” He regarded me thoughtfully. “Some more than others.”

  I pushed back my hair. “I wonder if I should dye it.”

  He shrugged. “You can’t change your life. If I were you, I’d make sure I wasn’t ever alone, though.”

  “Thanks. I’m actually taking a self-defense class. Starts tonight.” I didn’t know that I’d reached that decision, but something melancholy in his gaze made me want to stay positive.

  “Good idea,” he said, walking back toward the front of the building. “That’s about it for the tour. Got a bathroom over there, my office across from it, and you already saw the front desk. Not a lot of magic here.”

  “But your circulation, it’s going up. Can you tell me the secret?”

  He stopped and turned, offering me the first hint of a smile. “No secret. Good writing, clean layout, loyal community. Oh, and the woman we hired two months ago to sell our ads? She looks like Angelina Jolie.”

  I couldn’t help but laugh. Mystery solved. “I’ll be sure to tell Ron the secret, though I don’t know if it’ll do us any good.”

  He led me out and told me his door was open if I had any more questions when I was in town. I thanked him and crunched down the sidewalk, deep in thought. The stores on the street were exactly the same as I remembered—small mom and pop gift shops, a Jack and Jill grocer, a Ben Franklin five and dime. I’d almost reached my car when I spotted something that turned my blood to sludge: a woman who looked like my mom, her jacket pulled tight around her ears, walking into an alleyway a block up, toward the rough part of town.

  Twelve

  Okay, so Paynesville doesn’t really have a rough part of town. It’s composed mostly of family-owned businesses, a car dealership or two, some churches, and row upon row of walk-out ramblers and ranch-style houses sprinkled amongst the colonials. There is, however, a section on the edge of the small downtown area that is mostly rentals, and the serial killer scare had me seeing ghosts. “Mom!” She didn’t hear me, so I jogged toward the alley she’d disappeared into. My boots crunched on the salt littering the sidewalk. “Mom?”

  I peered down the alleyway that ran between the old creamery and the turn-of-the-century Paynesville hospital, both of which had been converted into apartments in the ’60s. The alley led to a webbed series of stairs attached to the three-story brick building on each side. The stairs led up to apartment doors. Just a glance was all it took to ignite the memory. A summer night smelling of blooming peonies and fireworks. Me, Patsy, and another girl here on a dare. Instructions to walk to the farthest set of stairs, go up to the third floor, and knock on the blue door. A Ziploc bag of Minnesota ditchweed exchanged for a hot ten-dollar bill. I remembered getting more headache than high, but we did a lot of laughing that night nonetheless. I half-smiled at the memory. Where had I been storing all these positive recollections?

  I pulled myself back into the moment, counting eight separate balconies and doors, four on each side of the alleyway. Mom could have gone into any one of them. Was it possible the town dealer was still living here? Unlikely, and even if he was, he’d be the last person my mom would visit. Right? I replayed the image of her in my head. Had she looked scared, or in a hurry? That’s when I realized I hadn’t been able to make out her face, and come to think of it, the black down jacket she’d been wearing was a generic design that everybody seemed to sport nowadays. I’d assumed it was my mom because of her height and build and something essentially mom-like about her, but maybe it hadn’t been her after all.

  Still uneasy but lacking an alternative, I returned to my car. The decision that followed—to drive west—wasn’t a conscious one, but I found my Toyota pointing that direction and soon, I passed the green sign trimmed in white letting me know that I was entering River Grove, population 767. The town’s streetlight poles were swathed in plastic green garlands and topped with Santa heads that I’m sure lit up at night. The layout was similar to Paynesville’s, with two main streets that intersected at the downtown area. The town consisted of churches, grocery stores, and assorted offices surrounded by neat houses. A sprinkling of people walked the streets, but they all appeared to be in a hurry. Everyone’s head was down.

  I wasn’t sure what I was looking for, so I crisscrossed the streets. Not one snowman existed in a single yard, even though today’s sticky snow conditions would be perfect. Three large globes of snow scattered in front of a blue rambler near the town park suggested that any existing snowpeople had been destroyed after the murder. Many front yard fir trees were still trimmed with lights, and one house had a giant balloon Santa tethered to its roof.

  I took a right, away from downtown, and made my way to Oak Street, which ran parallel to the town park. The houses here were more lavishly decorated, with elves frolicking in the snow, deer silhouettes in various stages of surprise and bristling with twinkle lights, walks lined with huge colored bulbs in red, green, and blue. The effort at good cheer relaxed me marginally, and I stayed that way until I reached the end of the block and spotted it: a white bungalow, its entire lawn thick with candy canes. There were red-and-white striped canes rimming the yard, a gingerbread playhouse covered in candy canes erected in the center, and candy cane ligh
ts trimming the roof, porch, and windows. It made my stomach cramp to look at them. Who lived there, and why hadn’t they taken down their decorations when the Candy Cane Killer struck their town?

  It was a crazy, unfairly judgmental thought, one I quickly dismissed. Maybe an elderly couple lived here and they had no way of removing the decorations without help. Why should they have to change something that obviously brought them happiness just because of one twisted human? It certainly wouldn’t bring anyone back. Still, I couldn’t flee this street fast enough and took the first right I could. I found myself in a sea of official-looking cars. Behind the row of sedans sat the house from last night’s news, Natalie Garcia’s sweet little black-shuttered home, one unassuming home in a block of many. Only this one was criss-crossed with yellow and black crime scene tape, a local news crew shuffling from foot to foot as they stood a respectful distance from the crime scene.

  I drove to the end of the street and parked. I suppose this is what I’d come for, to see her house, to feel a connection with her, to pay her back for the kindness she had shown me 15 years earlier. And maybe a part of me had even come for some reassurance that I or somebody I loved wouldn’t be next. It was a fool’s errand, for sure. In my rearview window, I saw men in too-thin dress coats standing in her yard, their red cheeks and breath plumes revealing their discomfort. A pair in head-to-toe white traveled from a van in the driveway to Natalie’s house, their face masks and full gowns rendering them genderless. This was the FBI, and they needed a small-town, aspiring PI around like they needed a toothpick in their eye.

  “Hello?”

  The voice was muffled, but still, I jumped. I’d been so intent on watching the scene play out in my rearview mirror that I hadn’t noticed the man walk up to my driver’s side door. I rolled down the window. “Hi.”

  He was about 5'10", and the way he carried himself suggested he was lean and rangy under his over-stuffed blue jacket. His eyes were a friendly brown, and he didn’t appear to be upset. “Hi. Sorry to startle you.” He glanced over at the cluster of FBI agents. “Did you know Natalie?”

  “Are you with the FBI?”

  His mouth curved into a smile. “Nope. They don’t get to wear the puffy jackets. They have an image to uphold, you know.” He yanked off his glove and offered me a handshake. He was a lefty with no

  wedding ring. “Adam De Luca. I’m a reporter for the Chicago Daily News. Did you know her?”

  I immediately felt protective of my history with Natalie and avoided answering his question. “What are you doing all the way out here?”

  A pained look crossed his face. He pulled his glove back on and stuffed his hands into his coat pockets, standing fully upright. I had to lean out to see him. “This is my beat, I’m afraid.”

  “Minnesota?”

  He shook his head. “Crime, generally, and right now, the Candy Cane Killer specifically. He started in Chicago. That’s where I started, too. Assigned to him almost since day one.”

  I swallowed past a lump in my throat. “That’s a pretty gruesome beat.”

  “I agree. It’s not all I do, but come December for the last three years,

  it becomes the focus of my life. Nobody’ll be happier than me when this case is solved.” He glanced to his right, a rueful smile on his face. “The FBI will probably be happy to never see me again, too.”

  I leaned my head the rest of the way out. A man had broken off from the main group in front of Natalie’s house and was making his way toward us. He was an inch or so taller than Adam but beefy, his shoulders poking through his coat like armor. His expression was as inviting as stone, but Adam seemed to know him.

  “Agent Briggs,” Adam said, when the man was within ten feet.

  “De Luca. You still around?”

  Adam smiled crookedly. “Looks that way. You can get rid of me anytime. Just solve this case.” His voice was pitched light and easy, but his eyes and mouth were tight.

  Agent Briggs grunted and brushed ice off his bushy mustache. “I’ll see what I can do.” He turned his attention to me, and I felt reduced to the confidence and brains of a six-year-old. “Something we can do for you here, ma’am?”

  “No. I mean, I don’t think so.” It felt important suddenly that he not think I was an ambulance chaser. “I went to high school with Natalie.”

  “So you’re not a reporter like him?” He jerked his gloved thumb at Adam, balancing as much loathing as he could on one word.

  Don’t lie to the FBI. Don’t lie to the FBI. “I’m here as a friend. I heard about Natalie on the news last night, and I’m concerned for her family. I’m worried about the rest of us, too. Do you have any information on the killer?”

  “We know he’s a bad man.” He delivered this understatement in a flat voice.

  I couldn’t tell if he was being sarcastic or just tired of answering that question. Either way, his response made me defensive. “That wasn’t information, it was unformation. As in, it was very unformative.”

  His eyes narrowed. “What’d you say your name was?”

  The words “Lola Clambaker” bubbled up in my throat, but I held them back with great effort. “Mira James,” I mumbled.

  He shrugged. “Sorry, Mira James, for the unformation. I’ve got work to do.”

  I watched his retreating back, and it wasn’t until the grinding sound of boots on snow disappeared that I realized Adam was chuckling. “I think you’ve made a friend for life.”

  “He’s not a real people person, is he?”

  “Supervisory Agent Walter Briggs is the best in the business. We’ve both been on this case too long. I think he’s a good man but no, he’s not the warm and fuzzy type. So,” he said, leaning back into my window. I smelled the soothing scents of cinnamon and aftershave. “You did know Natalie?”

  “I haven’t seen her since high school, but I used to know her. As much as you can know anyone at that age, I suppose. Have they figured out how the killer targets his victims?”

  His eyes grew pained again. “If they did, they’d have him. But no, other than their appearances, and some career choice similarities, none of the victims seems to have any connection with each other, though I heard Briggs is looking into a possible resort area in Mexico three of them visited at different times. You didn’t happen to know the first Minnesota victim, the one from White Plains, did you?”

  I shook my head.

  “Good for you, bad for the case.” He reached into his back pocket and pulled out a silver case. He slid a business card from it without removing his gloves, pulled a pen from his pocket to scribble something on the back, and handed it to me. “It’s too cold to stay out much longer, don’t you think? Here’s my card. Give me a call if you remember anything that might be relevant. I put Briggs’ number on the back, too. Like I said, he’s not a man whose time you want to waste, but if you get something good, he should know. Okay?”

  “Sure.” I took the card and considered telling him I was also a reporter, except it would be like telling Michael Jordan that I dribbled a little in my spare time. The Chicago Daily News was one of the biggest papers in the Midwest. “See you around.”

  “Yep.” He tapped my window ledge and gave me a little wave. As I drove away, I wondered what level of skill and education were required to become a real reporter, one with an actual beat. He only seemed a few years older than me. Grayer, certainly, and reserved in a way that was hard to pinpoint, but I assumed that was a natural byproduct of covering a rampaging serial killer for three years.

  I noticed my gas gauge was inching below empty. I pulled into a Munch-N-Go station, filled my tank, and went inside to pay and buy a bag of corn nuts. For a couple months I’d been trying to kick the corn nut habit because they smelled bad. Also, I felt like corn was the bully of the grain world and wanted to start giving other foods and maybe even a legume or two more attention. Too bad the nuts of the corn plant were so delicious. I was choosing between plain and ranch-flavored—the latter being fairly poor marke
ting if you think about it—when a conversation at the front of the store caught my ear. Some guy in an ill-fitting suit was trying to sell a line of candies to the woman behind the counter. It was his nasal accent that stood out.

  “Salted caramels are our best-seller. We’re famous for ’em.”

  “Where would I put them? I don’t have any counter space as it is.”

  “Not to worry. Check this out!”

  I inched away from the corn nuts so I could see what he was referring to. He held a tiered metal basket that he hooked to the cigarette pack dispenser over her head, where it dangled in previously unused space. Each level was stocked full of a different kind of candy. Saliva began to pool in my mouth.

  “Wow,” she said, and it sounded like she meant it. “Well, I’d have to talk to my husband first. Do you have a card?”

  “I have one right here. Take some complimentary candies, too. I hope to hear from you soon.”

  He bent down to grab his materials, and I caught his profile. It was pointy, his generous nose and mouth close together at the bottom of his face and his eyes up high in his forehead. He wasn’t disfigured, exactly, but if you rolled him in brown fur, he’d at least place in a guinea pig lookalike contest.

  “Thank you! These are delicious. You drive safe now, okay?”

  He turned back toward her, and I heard a smile in his voice. “Will do.”

  I grabbed the plain corn nuts and a pack of peppermint gum and made my way to the counter. “Gas on pump two,” I said.

  The woman smiled at me. “Nice weather, isn’t it?”

  I glanced outside. The day was gray, but it wasn’t snowing and the roads were clear. “Sure.” I pointed at the pile of caramels. “Are you going to start carrying those?”

  “I don’t know. I just got them. Want to try one?” She slid over a candy about the size of my pinkie finger, creamy brown caramel in a clear wrapper. The outside read “Chi-Town Candies Famous Salted Caramels” in fancy white script.