Deb Baker - Murder Talks Turkey

“Fred’s back home with Grandma.”

“Look out for him. He’s in hostile territory.”

George backed up, clearing the way for my escape. One more time, I’d lucked out, turning away from the sound of sirens and blowing a cloud of dust up behind me. It would settle before they arrived. And Dickey would spend the rest of the day combing the neighborhood and lifting useless clues from Shirley’s house.

As it turned out, I spent the rest of the day doing the same thing I suspected Dickey was doing. But instead of combing the woods, I was searching Escanaba for Laura Deland. She wasn’t at her house or at work. Either she was out on assignment, or she had skipped town.

After hours of wasted effort, I put myself in her shoes. Mentally, of course. What would I do if I were her? Where would I go? Then it hit me. She’d be in Stonely driving right behind the sheriff, getting first dibs on a breaking story and killing two birds with one stone. She’d tipped off the cops to my whereabouts, now she got to reap the rewards by writing the wrap-up story. Both a personal and a professional coup.

And I used to think she was sweet.

If I ever got out of this mess, I’d have to improve my people analytical skills. My character judgment needed an overhaul. That’s what being on the run does to a person. Before my criminal career, I took trust for granted. Now, I couldn’t find any reason to believe in anyone.

How could I have misjudged George so badly? He’d been a friend for years and years, and in one minute at Ruthie’s restaurant, with one misinterpreted look from him, I had been ready to count him out as a true friend. Had I seen only what I wanted to see? Was I afraid of him, of my feelings for him, of closeness?

Driving back to Stonely to spend the night with George, I thought I understood Barney’s words better. I didn’t want to let go, like he’d advised me to do when we chatted at Tony’s blind. Barney had been my life, and I was still hanging on with all my might. But he was right. I didn’t have to forget him. And as he said, maybe I did have a lot of love inside me. I just had to release a part of my life that would never come back, that was gone for good. I had to move on. Start living and loving again.

Tonight I was going to do it with the only other man I ever cared about.

George had a big pot of chili simmering on the stove. Its wonderful aroma would have bowled me over, but Fred beat it to the punch. What a surprise! George grabbed me as I fell backwards while a two-ton black shepherd tackled me with slurpy, sloppy dog-breath kisses.

“Thank you, George,” I cried, happier at that moment than I’d been in a long time. Both of my favorite males together, at least for this moment.

We settled at the kitchen table, and I ate two bowls of George’s chili. It took a while because between bites I told him everything that had happened so far. I have a tendency to intentionally leave out facts when I tell a story, but this time, with George, he got the full text. We recorded our conversation on a fresh tape as a backup, in case anything happened to us. Neither of us wanted to think about what could happen.

George suggested putting the tape in the mail and sending it back to his house. That way we could use it as leverage, just like in the movies. And no one could get their mitts on it in the meantime.

George and I worked out a plan from the cushions of his leather sofa, side by side, holding hands and speaking in whispers while soft music played in the background. The drama of the situation made for heady sensations and impulses on my part. I kept glancing at George’s muscles. He wore a white T-shirt, the sleeves riding just above his biceps.

I was sixty-six years old! Married to the same man for over forty years! I couldn’t believe what was going through my mind. And through the rest of my body. Barney was my first and I thought he’d be my last.

“I’ll drop the tape in the mail first thing tomorrow,” George said. “You better stay out of sight and let me be your eyes and ears and legs.”

I felt like I’d come home. To stop running and have three square meals a day, hanging out with George and Fred. I gave a big, contented sigh and could almost forget I was a hunted woman.

“You’ll pick up Laura for me?” I asked. “So I can get some answers?”

George ran a finger down my arm, sending shocks of electricity through all the right places. Until now, I hadn’t realized how much I missed a good man’s touch. “I’ll bring her to your doorstep,” he said.

“I have a better idea,” I said.

“You want me to bring her someplace else?”

Could I go through with it? Maybe we could keep the lights off so he couldn’t see. I gulped. Then I remembered how George’s wife had run off at Christmas time all those years ago, leaving a letter on the kitchen table. As far as I knew, he hadn’t been with another woman since, not that I didn’t understand. After what she did!

George might be just as nervous as I was. What if he said no? Shouldn’t I wait for him to make the first move? Doubt crept into my thoughts. What was I doing?

If I thought about it much longer, I’d end up running out the door.

“Laura has nothing to do with my better idea,” I said, standing up and leading him through the living room toward the bedroom. George scrunched his brow like he was trying to understand a foreign language without a single lesson to make it easy. By the next look on his face, I knew he’d caught on to my plan. When he didn’t pull back, I knew he approved.

All I’m saying about that night is that Fred slept on the floor.

The rest is between me and George.

WHEN I WOKE UP, GEORGE was gone. It was ten o’clock in the morning. I hadn’t ever slept that long before. It must have something to do with the straw bed I had to sleep on Tuesday night, and…well…George and I hadn’t slept much through the night either.

I stayed in bed for awhile, replaying the night in my head, over and over like my mini recorder tape. What a man!

A fresh pot of coffee greeted me along with Fred. I let him out and he disappeared around the corner of the house at a trot, heading for an outbuilding. George is our local dog catcher, along with everything else he does. He rounds up strays and keeps them in roomy kennels in the outbuilding until he can find their old homes or new ones for them. Fred must have a new girlfriend out back to get him fired up like that.

More coffee, a shower, and I was set to go. George and I were meeting at noon with or without Laura in tow. The tape would be in the mail. After checking on Fred and finding him nose to nose with a cute Irish setter, I snuck off without him. He didn’t mind at all. Last I checked, the two of them were wagging their tails like crazy. Fred’s ears were at an awkward angle, slicked back with romance.

Love does crazy things! Don’t I know it!

Close to my home, I left the road and drove through a field into the pines. When I was sure no one could see the truck, I parked and walked in to the deer blind Barney built years ago on our back forty.

We have so much land in the U.P. we referred to it in forty-acre parcels instead of single-acre lots. I have two forties left after giving a forty each to Blaze and Star. Heather, my Milwaukee-dwelling other daughter, didn’t want anything to do with living in the woods, or I would have given her one, too. Maybe someday her son, Little Donny, will want one of my two.

My hunting blind hadn’t been used since November when deer hunting season ended. I used it as a retreat when my family got to be too much for me. I’d lay back in the La-Z-Boy with my feet up, listening to the crackle from the propane heater while watching deer come along to eat apples and corn I’d throw out for them.