"You're back with Stan Stanwick on 87.9 FM, the STYR! It's 6:02 in the AM and you're waking up to another rainy day in Arcadia Bay. Top of the hour news—celebrated photographer and Blackwell faculty member Mark Jefferson seems to have skipped town after being suspended from Blackwell Academy. Reporters at his residence have noted that his car is gone and his house empty. This after local police confirmed that the FBI is seeking to question him regarding cases involving missing girls—"
"Turn that shit off, Marl," Eduard Stuart growled at his wife as he sat down for breakfast in their kitchen.
Without looking away from the hashbrowns in the frying pan, Marla reached over to the radio and lowered the volume. "What's wrong? I like hearing when pricks like him get got."
"Same, but not first thing in the morning." As he tucked into his eggs and crispy bacon, he thanked God that his daughter would never set foot in that uppity little art school. The tuition was murder for one, and despite his lip service to the black community, Raymond Wells always rubbed him the wrong way, especially after what happened with Tony North's sons.
Now this—some sick teacher taking pictures of young girls. Really, his kids couldn't get out of this town fast enough. Let that turd Prescott and his pasty-faced son rule it till kingdom come.
Finishing up his breakfast, he pushed his plate away and heaved his enormous bulk out of the chair. "I'mma go open up the garage."
"Don't forget it's your turn to take Mari to school today."
"Ah, shit. Can't you do it, just this once?"
"Not if you want me to finish cooking pot roast for lunch."
"Now why you gotta do me like that? Fine. Guess I can open in another half hour."
"You do that. Oh, and if Chloe comes by, there's extra casserole in the fridge. Make sure she takes some home."
"She ain't the casserole type."
"She ain't the type to turn down free grub either."
Ed snorted, wondering if Chloe was even going to show up for work at the garage today. She'd been AWOL for a week ever since he sent her on that errand the next town over. And she'd been doing so well too. Shame.
Rubbing his bald pate, he trudged out the backdoor of his one-story house and turned his feet to his shop. The rain had faded to a light drizzle, thank goodness. Still, any customers of Pop's Garage were gonna have to wait a bit to get their spark plugs replaced and their carburetors checked—
He paused, gazing down at the padlock hanging from the unlatched door. Didn't I lock this up the last night? I could swear I did. Shit, did I just get jacked, or...?
A jolt of fear ran through him as he remembered that that nutjob Jefferson was still at large. Is he creeping in there, waiting to jump me soon as I open this door? Is he after my kids?
Cold sweat appeared on his forehead as he unhooked the crowbar hanging from the nearby tool rack. Then he reached for the doorknob, took a deep breath, and yanked the door open.
Daylight flooded into the garage. By the opposite wall, a sleeping figure on the cot bolted upright and gave a girlish scream. Ed cried out in perfect unison as he raised his crowbar and rushed inside. Then he registered the unkempt blue hair and the gangly figure. "Chloe?"
"Yeah, yeah, it's me, Pops!" Chloe had both hands raised, palms out.
"Shit, I coulda bashed your head in!"
"I know! Could we drop the crowbar now, please?"
He set the crowbar against the wall and scowled at her, fists on hips. "Girl you better have some damn good answers! What in hell are you doing in here? What were you thinking breaking into my shop?"
Chloe licked her lips. "I-I wanted to talk."
"Talk? You couldn't wait till I opened the place up first?"
"It was cold, and I hadn't slept more than an hour tonight, and I ran out of cash, and—and—I just didn't have anyplace else to go." She hung her head. "Sorry."
He squinted at her. "What do you mean, you got no place to go? Your house burn down or what?"
"No." Chloe shook her head, her mouth turning crooked. "I can't go back there. I need to—to leave town. I have to build up my savings and fix up my truck a bit, then I'm out of your hair for good."
"Did you just make a bald joke on me? I swear to God—"
"It wasn't intentional!"
"Huh. So where're you goin'?"
She shrugged. "Anywhere. Nowhere."
Now that he looked at her, he noticed the yellowing bruise on her cheek. In a softer tone, he said, "Chloe, are you in trouble?"
The girl shook her head. "It-it doesn't matter," she stated, her hands closing into fists. "If you can't, it's fine. I can find someplace else to crash."
"Okay, okay, hold up." Ed rubbed his scalp as he looked down at his boots. Jesus Christ, trouble first thing in the morning. But Marl would never let him live it down if he turned Chloe away. Nor did he want to, really. Delinquent that she was, she seemed like she needed a friend.
He looked up and said, "I'll have to talk to Marl about this. If she okay with it, you can stay here for a while."
Chloe's face lit up. "Thanks! I can help with the shop—"
Ed shook his head. "I ain't letting you near a carburetor what with the shape you're in. Take a couple days off and get your head on straight. Then we talk about work."
"Okay, thanks, Pops. Really, I just need a place to stay for a while."
"I heard you. Lemme clear it with Marl."
As he left the shop and trudged back to his house, Ed wondered what the hell he'd gotten into.
Chloe breathed a sigh of relief as she struggled to her feet. She got what she needed: a roof over her head—no more waking up in her truck in the dead of night, freezing from the night air—or getting a crick in her neck from curling up in her driver's seat—or feeling rainwater drip down on her face from the leaky roof.
All she had to deal with was waking up to another day without Rachel or Max.
She'd kept her phone off the entire week. She didn't want to hear David bitching about the laptop, Max's frantic apologies, or her mom begging her to come home. Any form of contact felt like salt on the wound.
It was strange to think that she should be over losing someone by now. It was hardly her first rodeo. Yet here she was again, longing for something out of reach.
It was the same sting as when she had lost her dad—like the world had come to an end, except it hadn't. She quickly discovered the true horror of it all—they never say it, but people expect you to move on. Tomorrow drags you along from one day to the next. And then they say you've healed, you've coped. But in truth, there aren't enough words to scream about how it feels to lose someone you love and still have the love remain.
And her dad...she half expected him to show up in her dreams somehow, to give advice, to keep her company. Even if he were a figment of her subconscious, like Max had said, it would have been good to see him again. But right when she needed him, as usual, he was nowhere to be found.
So she was on her own again. No home, no Max, no Rachel. No dreams. I wish I knew how to stop feeling, how to go numb, or disappear. The sooner I'm out of this fucking town, the better.
That was why she came to Pop's. It wasn't just for the money, though that was surely important. She wanted to keep busy. The more she worked, the less time she'd have for remembering the spite in Rachel's words. Or the look on her face as they parted. Or the guilt that threatened daily to eat her alive.
She looked down at her disheveled clothes and grimy hands. If she was going to stay here a while, she might as well look halfway presentable. It wouldn't hurt her chances with Marla, at least.
She staggered out of the garage and looked up at the sky. It had remained stubbornly dark and rainy these past few days—likely Rachel's doing. Well, if the goddess of Arcadia Bay wanted to play the insufferable little bitch, there wasn't a lot Chloe could do about it.
Some pirate captain I turned out to be.
Her head ached from lack of sleep. Her mouth tasted like something had crawled into it and died. She remembered an outdoor sink behind the garage, so she dragged herself over there.
She turned the faucet on and let the cool water flow through her splayed fingers. She cupped some in her hand, rinsed her mouth, and scrubbed at her face. Slipping the rubber stopper onto the drain, she let the sink fill halfway.
She looked down and watched her reflection quivering in the water, like she was looking into a window to her past, younger self. Say hello to the broken girl from a broken home.
Hello, Chloe. Can we talk? Let's step into my office. I won't take much of your time.
No.
Chloe plunged her entire head into the water as if to drown the memory. It didn't work. Like lost love, it seemed guilt and secrets didn't die easy.
We have something in common, you and I—we both love Rachel dearly. There's nothing we wouldn't do for her.
Stop it.
Stop it stop it stop it stop—
Finally, she couldn't hold her breath any longer. Chloe raised her head from the sink, gasping for breath.
"You tryin' to drown yourself or what?" someone said behind her. Chloe whirled to see Marla, her crinkly hair done up in a bun, standing there in her white shirt and jeans, a blanket, and some towels in her arms.
"Marl! Uh, hi." Her hand grappled with the faucet to shut off the flow. "S-sorry about this. I was just talking with Ed and I—"
Marl shook her head. "No, no, you don't gotta explain. You can stay here long as you need to, Chloe. I had my fair share of running away from home back when I was your age. You need a little break—it be that way sometimes."
Relief swelled in Chloe's chest. "Y-yeah. Wow, uh, thanks for letting me crash."
"Like I said, it's no problem." She set the towels and bedding down on a nearby pile of cardboard boxes. "But you know, Chloe, you gotta face what you can't run from sooner or later. Found that out too, the hard way. I'm hopin' you can spare yourself some of that misery."
In her mind, Chloe saw the ring she had slipped on Max's finger, and the one that Rachel used to wear as a necklace. Knowing she was close to crying, she looked up so the tears wouldn't fall. "Yeah. Yeah, I'll think about it."
"Sounds like you got a lot to think about." Marl watched her for a moment before continuing. "Ed's going to take our girls to school in a bit. When he gets back, he's likely gonna sit you down and talk about the rules of this house."
Chloe grimaced. "Like forcing me to listen to his Great Depression-era playlist?"
Marl laughed. "Hey, his house, his tunes. Though I will try and sneak in some Ramones once in a while. And don't mind Ed. The way he talks about you sometimes, I get the impression we got three daughters instead of two."
"Uh...okay." Chloe didn't know what to make of that, but hearing it cheered her up a bit. "Thanks."
Nodding, Marl turned to head back inside. "Well, you're probably hungry. Why don't you come in and I'll fix you something to—"
"Actually," Chloe said, "can I ask a favor?"
"Shoot."
"You got some vinegar and baking soda lying around?"
Marl squinted at her. "What do you need 'em for?"
"Just wanna clean something up."
"...Sure, okay. Gimme a sec."
Chloe watched her walk away before picking up the towel and scrubbing her face. She noticed her hands shaking and forced them to stop. There was no fucking point in chickening out now.
Marl came back a few moments later, a bottle and an orange cardboard box in her hands. "There you go," she said, handing the items over. "You sure you gonna be alright, Chloe?"
"Guess we'll find out," she replied. "I'll join you in a minute."
With a nod, Marl went back inside the house, leaving Chloe by the sink. Chloe found an empty soap dish and dropped a generous amount of baking soda, followed by some vinegar. As she watched the mixture sizzling in the dish, Rachel's voice echoed in her mind:
You're so married to your memories here...
"Married, huh?" Chloe muttered. Pouring in a dash of water, she grabbed double handfuls of the mixture she had made and slathered it all over her blue hair.
"Well, consider this a divorce."
As he cruised down Arcadia Bay Drive, Sheriff Hank Skinner mentally rehearsed what he would say to the reporters later that morning at the town hall presscon.
"Currently, there is no warrant of arrest for Mark Jefferson. He has not been charged with a crime. But he is a person of interest in a few ongoing cases under the FBI."
"Yes, the FBI has contacted my office to get information. No, we will not be assisting in their investigation apart from providing said information. I'm not at liberty to say what information we shared."
"No, there is no reason to believe he is dangerous. We can't ascertain why he left. However, we would like to ask for everyone's cooperation. If you happen to see Mark Jefferson, please contact the Tillamook County Sheriff's Department."
The whole affair left him in a foul mood all morning—his staff had sensed it the moment he stepped into his office and made it a point to steer clear. Mostly, he hated the fact that Jefferson had skipped town before he could get his hands on him. That slippery son of a bitch done drove out of Arcadia Bay without anyone catching wise. Patrols found his car abandoned at Castle Rock Campground, some 30 miles south of here. After that, the trail got cold as a day-old corpse.
More than anything, Skinner hated being made a fool of. He was in his fourth and final year as sheriff, and there was no way that bespectacled picture-taking pussy was going to give him the slip. Catching that teen killer would have been his crowning achievement before retiring. Plus, he'd have Prescott's gratitude in his back pocket, which was always handy to have.
He won't get far, by God. Little bitches like him can't live without their comforts. We'll likely find him shacked up with a broad at a motel in Portland. And when the Feds get to him, he'll have two bullets in his chest for trying to wrestle a gun from his arresting officer.
Imagining himself pulling the trigger on Mark Jefferson made him grin. One final feather in his cap. Who knows, CBS might turn the case into a mini-series. Names have been changed to protect the innocent.
As he was about to make a right turn into town, he caught sight of the Two Whales at the next junction. Screw it , he thought. If he had to talk to the press, he should have a cup of good coffee in him. It might put him in a more agreeable mood, at least.
He parked his car to the right of an enormous black SUV—a Chevy Tahoe, the choice of overweight men. Brand new too, by the looks of it. Probably belonged to some tourist family heading up to Seattle or south to California.
His long shadow crawled up the front door as he approached the diner, and silence greeted him as he stepped inside. He was used to it. People usually hushed up at the sight of him approaching, as if they had a secret crime they wanted to keep from his ears.
A glance at the bar told him the morning shift waitresses today were Joyce "Rube" Madsen and Annie "Honeytits" Hicks. They stood stock-still as he ambled over to a stool and put his ten-gallon hat down on the counter.
"Coffee," he said to Joyce, not bothering to take off his aviator glasses. "Make it a double."
The waitress, however, didn't move, didn't even acknowledge his request or his presence. Frowning, he moved to knock on the countertop before realizing that neither Joyce nor Annie were looking at him. They were staring, round-eyed and dumbfounded, at something to his right. Now that he thought about it, so was the trucker seated next to him and the couple in the booth to his left. Irritated, he swiveled his seat to the right—and found his jaw dropping open as well.
Seated at the corner booth of the diner was a giant of a man. Skinner reckoned he must be at least six-foot-five and looked like he could lift a gorilla and snap it in two. His head nearly cleared the height of the window beside him, and his suit bulged with every tiny movement of his arms. The stranger's pale skin stood starkly against his black business suit and tie. In the sun, his long platinum hair glowed lightning white. He had a chin like the back of an anvil and a scowling face that might have been carved from granite. The steaming cup of tea he held looked like a toy, as did the pencil he used to answer the newspaper crossword.
Yet even this giant wasn't the one who had captured every helpless gaze in the diner. That distinction went to the slim shadow of a woman standing before the jukebox. Standing wasn't quite the right word—she was posing, her back to everyone, hips canted to the side, one hand on her waist, the other stretched overhead with her finger pointed to the ceiling. She wore the same dark-toned business suit as her companion, and though she was nowhere near as tall, her mane of straight pale hair told Skinner the two were related.
Then the music came on: Oliver Cheatham's "Get Down Saturday Night." And the woman started to dance.
Jigging her leg in time with the music, she pointed her finger overhead, then to the side, the back overhead, like John Travolta in his disco days. Then she spun around to face the rest of the diner, her tie lashing out like a black blade. She was wearing one of those fly shades, the kind that wrapped around your eyes. She swept her finger around the room as if challenging everyone to a dance-off, then stuck out her chest and bopped her fists to the beat. She kicked her foot out, clapped her hands, and shuffled left and right.
By the carefree expression on her face, it wasn't a performance—the woman just really wanted to boogie. Meanwhile, her companion completely ignored her as he sipped his tea and frowned down at his crossword.
For a moment, Skinner wanted to slap himself to make sure he wasn't hallucinating. Finally, he had enough. "If you're done gawking," he growled at Joyce, "I'll have that coffee now."
The waitress jumped as if woken from a dream. "Oh! O-of course, Sheriff. Sorry." The woman in the suit, meanwhile, either ignored or didn't notice his outburst—she kept dancing like it was nobody's business.
"Make it to go," Skinner added. He wasn't going to waste another moment here with these fucking tourists, bothering locals with their unsanctioned buffoonery. He grabbed the paper cup from Joyce's hands before spinning off of his stool and heading back out into the morning sunshine.
He made it to his squad car when he realized that idiot Joyce hadn't given him the double he'd asked for. But fuck it—he'd rather choke on the town hall's putrid instant coffee than go back in there.
As he was reaching for his car keys, a cheery voice behind him said, "Good morning!"
He turned slowly to the speaker. Of course, it was the woman in the sleek black suit, standing there with her hands in her pockets, her long pale hair glowing in the sun, and not looking even slightly out of breath from her performance.
Following her out the door was her companion. Good Christ, that fucker must be all of seven feet tall. Nearly cracked his enormous forehead on the door frame—or vice versa. The giant came to stand behind the woman, saying nothing while wearing a scowl that could bore a hole through a steel piling.
Skinner pulled off his aviators and sized them both up. The tall one wouldn't meet his eyes. The woman, meanwhile, didn't bother removing either her own sunglasses or her playful smile.
Their presence irritated him; visitors always did. But now, he also felt a thread of unease. There was something about the nonchalance in the woman's toothy grin. Something in the way the man behind her stood so still, all his strength held in reserve, like an earthquake waiting to happen. Skinner's fingers unconsciously brushed the leather of his holster.
"You must be Sheriff Hank Skinner, yah?" The woman spoke with an odd accent, a slight rounding of the o's and trilling of the r's—perhaps German, or Russian?
"Have we met?" Skinner drawled.
"Not at all," came the woman's reply. "But we've read so much about you. You work for someone we're well acquainted with." She put her hand to her chest. "My name is Maja Volden, and this," she gestured to the man behind her, "is Alrik, my younger brother. A pleasure, Sheriff."
The giant gave him a nearly imperceptible nod, then went back to his thousand-yard stare.
"Uh-huh." Skinner scratched his chin. He'd misjudged in his assessment. She didn't sound Russian or German. She sounded like a Viking.
"Read about me, you say?"
"We read all the dossiers of the people who work for our members," Maja replied, still smiling. "We know, for instance, that your boss is Mr. Sean Prescott. You see, he's the reason why we're here." She folded her palms before her, fingers pointing down. "We are of Dionysus, and we'd very much like if you took us to see him."
Every word she said rang alarms in Skinner's head. No one was supposed to know about his relationship with Prescott. And Dionysus was supposed to be their distant, silent ally, someone to call on for help but never to directly intervene. He didn't imagine they kept files on him.
And who the fuck are these people to tell him what to do?
"Let's get something straight here, missy." Skinner edged closer, one warning finger raised. "I'm no errand boy for some rich asshole. I don't answer to anyone but the good people of Tillamook. I'm the sheriff of this county, and by God, when you speak to me, you'd better do it without those damn shades on."
He kept one eye on the giant, but Alrik didn't even look like he was even listening. It was Maja who arrested his attention—her thin lips pulled wide apart, reaching for her ears, and Skinner found he hated that smile of hers most of all.
"Of course, Sheriff. As you wish."
She raised her sunglasses to her hairline. He'd expected to see the same gray gaze as her brother, but he was very, very wrong.
"What's wrong with your eyes?" he demanded.
As soon as he said it, his mind started to swim. It was like his head was a fine crystal glass that someone was gently tapping with a spoon. The paper cup fell from his limp hand. All his anger drained away as strange colors invaded the edges of his vision. For a moment, he thought he was floating inches from the ground, but Maja spoke and her voice anchored him back to reality.
"Nothing," she said slowly, as if speaking to a child. "My eyes are perfectly fine."
"Perfectly fine." Skinner nodded, listening like she spoke the word of God.
"We're all normal here, aren't we?"
"Yeah. Absolutely."
"Very good." With a wink, Maja lowered her shades. Just looking at her chiseled features drove Skinner blind with adoration. "Now, my good Sheriff, would you kindly escort us to Mr. Prescott's home? We'd very much like to see him."
"Sure, you got it," he said. And when she grinned, he grinned right back.