Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. That's why we write this stuff, right? There's no money in it, just a little harmless entertainment. (It's not like I'm stealing someone's story...just borrowing a few characters. I'll bring them back, honest!)
Besides, Stephen King has more money than God, he sure doesn't need my pittance.
Enjoy, y'all....!
If there was one thing Nadine Cooper couldn't abide, it was some know-it-all man trying to tell her how to run her life. She'd had a belly full of that with Leroy, and here was this old fool taking it for granted that she'd be grateful for his sorry advice.
"...we just don't have enough hard evidence to get him put away." the sheriff concluded. "I thought you should know, seeing as how you're about the closest neighbor he's got, now that you're just across the cove. You might want to keep your door locked and don't let your pets run loose."
"Three people, you say?" She shifted from one foot to another, the bag of groceries heavy in her arms.
Three that we know of. His ex-wife and her new beau, and a gent from around here, all just disappeared, all with ties to Mr. Mort Rainey."
Nadine blinked. "Mort Rainey, the writer?" Now, wouldn't that be the damnedest coincidence?
"That would be him." Did this old buzzard spend all his spare time watching "Andy Griffin" reruns? He had a New England whine instead of a southern drawl, but if he'd been wearing a sandwich board saying " Genuine Homegrown Small Town Sheriff", it wouldn't have been any more obvious. She tacked a smile to the corners of her mouth.
"Well, sheriff, writers are an odd breed. There's probably a perfectly good explaination for what happened to those folks. I doubt that Mort Rainey is any crazier than I am." (More than likely, a whole lot less crazy than I am, but what's past is past.)
"Ma'am, I'm just letting you know, you might not want to get too friendly with him. He's killed three people, it'd be a shame if you were number four."
Nadine pursed her lips and cradled the bag on her hip. Her voice sharpened. "I thought you just said there wasn't any evidence?"
"Well, no, but--"
"If there isn't any evidence, sheriff, then you're slandering him every time you open your mouth and say he's been killing people. Any half-wit lawyer could probably get him the fillings out of your teeth for that -- and I'll bet he's got a real good lawyer." She leaned in closer to the old man and bared her teeth. "And since I happen to have a previous acquaintance with the man, I'd be perfectly happy to get on the witness stand on his behalf!"
Glaring at him, she turned away and continued to her car, parked just across the street. Tashmore Lake was a pretty little town; trouble was, it was even smaller than Portico, Georgia. (Too many years in the big city, woman. You forgot, didn't you, how folks talk? They did it in Portico, they do it here, hey, people've been a'doin' it since they were huddled in caves.) She hadn't been in town more than twenty minutes today, fifteen of it in that dinky little market and five with that fool chewing her ear --- three people and that stupid sheriff had been happy to tell her she'd built her new house in the worse possible spot, right across the lake from a maniac who'd probably come over and murder her in her sleep. (Sleep? Right....)
She strapped the bag in place with the seatbelt. The nerve of some people! Okay, maybe claiming to "know" Mort Rainey was stretching the point just a smidgen, but being in the same business, they knew some of the same people. "And he did write that nice review for 'Adele's Promise'," she reminded herself. Not one of her favorite books, but still....
After three weeks residence in her shiny new cottage, Nadine hadn't met the occupant of the house across the way -- it was maybe a mile away if you walked through the woods, two or three miles by road, but only a hundred yards or so from his dock to hers. Now, as she drove toward home, she felt an impulse to drop in on her neighbor and make his acquaintance.