Brian Freeman - Thief River Falls

“What do you mean by that?” she asked.

“Lisa hit him and ran.”

“She hit him?” Laurel asked sharply. “Is Curtis okay?”

Denis dismissed her concerns with a wave of his walking stick. “Oh, please. He’s a farmer. Farmers are indestructible. The man could stick his face in a thresher and not even need a bandage. He’ll be fine.”

“I need to go to him.”

“Don’t bother. We’re busy here, and you and I have work to do. I’ll text Garrett to pick up Curtis and bring him back here.” Denis ran a hand along the many hardcovers on his bookshelves, which rose all the way to the ceiling. He’d collected them for most of his life, and there wasn’t a speck of dust on any of them. His interests were wide ranging. Novels. Histories. Biographies. Political theory. Among the shelves were Lisa Power’s four books, including the one that had made her a legend in town. Thief River Falls.

The book in which she’d humiliated him.

“According to Curtis, Lisa is armed now,” Denis went on. “Apparently this taxi driver passed along some of her guns to her.”

Laurel closed her eyes. “Oh, no.”

“Dr. March, do you have any idea how dangerous this situation has become? Do you understand the risks if this goes bad?”

“I do,” Laurel said. “Of course I do.”

“This is a disaster. Why do you think I told you to come down here? You said you could prevent this from happening. You told me the best thing to do was play along and pretend to be on her side. You told me you could get the boy back and make this whole thing with Lisa go away. Instead, now I have her out there somewhere in town with an assault rifle!”

“I’m sorry. You’re absolutely right; this was my mistake. Curtis didn’t want to be part of the plan. I forced him, and I shouldn’t have done that. I just thought it would be easier to get Lisa to do what we wanted if she was dealing with a familiar face.”

“You were wrong. Instead, the two of you managed to make it worse.”

“We had no way of anticipating what would happen with Shyla Dunn,” Laurel protested.

“That’s no excuse. In my business, you have to learn to expect the unexpected. Anyway, how big a threat are we talking about here? Does Lisa even know how to use these weapons?”

“Sure, she does. She grew up with guns.”

Denis shook his head. “Well, that’s just great.”

Laurel got out of the chair and made her way across the office. Her face was expressionless. For someone who had driven down here in the middle of the night, she looked clean and put together, which was annoying to Denis. She had this unshakable evenness of temper about her that always got on his nerves. He didn’t trust people who weren’t emotionally invested in the outcome of a problem.

“Look, I know how difficult this situation is,” Laurel said, “but don’t do anything simply because you’re angry, Denis. You need to listen to me. I know you. We go back a long way. We’ve worked together for years.”

“I realize that,” Denis replied, “and I’m sure you know I’m grateful for your help. By the way, does Lisa know about our relationship? Did you tell her?”

“Of course not.”

“All right. So what’s your point?”

“My point is, you and Lisa have history, but that has nothing to do with what’s happening right now. You have to put that aside.”

“This is not about me having a grudge against Lisa Power,” Denis snapped.

“Are you sure?”

“Yes, I’m sure. This woman is putting everyone at risk. I know she’s a friend of yours, and I know the whole town loves her, but right now, I can’t afford to think about any of that. She’s a threat, and with every hour that passes, she’s becoming more of a threat. She is armed and dangerous. I’m going to do what needs to be done to take care of this situation before it gets worse.”

“What does that mean?” Laurel asked.

“Exactly what I said.”

“What are you going to do? Shoot her? Do you think that’s the answer?”

“I hope it doesn’t come to that, but that’s up to her.”

“Lisa won’t turn to violence,” Laurel insisted. “Trust me. That’s not who she is.”

“Your word doesn’t count for much right now,” Denis replied. “And I believe your husband would tell you that she’s already violent. She attacked him, remember?”

Laurel said nothing.

“Meanwhile, what do we do about the boy?” Denis asked. “That’s where this all started, and we’re still no closer to getting him back.”

Laurel grimaced and stared through the office windows at the first glimmers of morning over the river. “I promise you, Denis, we will find Harlan. I told you that from the beginning. Sooner or later, we’ll convince Lisa to give him to us. But right now, that may be the least of our worries.”

Before dawn broke, the temperature fell, and the freezing rain turned to snow. As Lisa drove, the whole world became white around her. Snow poured through her headlights and swept across her windshield. She had to go slowly. The Camaro was unfamiliar to her, and the car’s tires fought for traction on the ice.

She wanted to go south toward Minneapolis, but she assumed that was what they expected her to do. So she headed north through town, making multiple turns, staying on the side streets while she figured out their next move. The darkness and the snow gave her cover, which she needed, because she knew the word would be out soon. Everyone would be looking for a blue Camaro.

On Atlantic Avenue, she passed one of the local diners. Despite the early hour, the neon sign told her that the restaurant was open. She could get food and coffee and make a plan. She pulled into the diner’s unpaved parking lot and drove to the far back, where the Camaro couldn’t be seen from the street. There were only four or five other cars in the lot.

“I’ll be right back,” she told Purdue. “I won’t be long. Do you want something? Maybe pancakes?”

“French toast.”

Lisa smiled. “Okay. That’s my favorite, too.”

She climbed out of the sports car into the snow, which whipped into her face. She wore a flannel shirt under her leather jacket, but she was still cold. She trudged through the long parking lot to the diner entrance, and she peered through the window before going inside. The interior was long and narrow, with laminate booths. It wasn’t even six in the morning, and only a couple of the booths were filled. She slipped through the door and took the first empty booth near the front window, where she could keep an eye on the street.

Her desire to remain anonymous lasted all of five seconds.

“Lisa Power!”

The excited voice of the waitress boomed through the mostly empty restaurant like a foghorn. In an instant, everyone in the diner was looking at her. Some obviously knew who she was; some were simply curious. As Lisa forced a smile on her face, the waitress hurried over. She slipped into the booth and leaned across the table to grab Lisa’s hands.

“Lisa, I am so thrilled to meet you!”

Her name tag read MISSY. She was slim and in her fifties, with sandy-brown hair in a messy pile on her head and a long face dotted with a few age spots and wrinkles. She wore a homemade crocheted blue top and jeans, with an apron tied around her waist. She had the throaty voice of a smoker and brought a whiff of cigarettes with her.

“I’m sorry — do you mind if I call you Lisa?” the waitress went on. “I feel like I know you. I am a big, big, big fan. Me and my sister and my mother, we all love your books. They are not going to believe it when I tell them you came into the diner. Can we take a selfie together?”