Chapter 8
Clay returns to his truck to find a parking ticket on the windshield.
He’s not parked illegally and pulls off the ticket to see what infraction he’s supposedly committed.
No boxes are checked. Instead he sees handwriting in black Sharpie: Betty-Mae’s.
We need to talk. No signature. No nothing.
Clay checks his watch. He has plenty of time before he has to pick up Braedon, so he shoves the ticket into his jeans pocket and walks a block and a half south on Main Street to Betty-Mae’s Bakery.
The place smells of sugar and butter. Baked goods fill glass cases, and people sit at orange Formica tables in aluminum chairs.
Clay spots Riverwood police officers Mike Wahlquist and Andy Kimmich with coffee and a dozen assorted donuts.
Both men are about Judd’s age. Clay approaches, drops the wadded-up ticket into the donut box, and says, “Heard you guys want to chat.”
Mike Wahlquist carries an extra fifty pounds, mostly between his chest and former waist, and has gray eyes between heavy lids and swollen bags, a gin-blossom nose, and silver stubble atop his head.
If he were standing, he’d measure six feet, three inches.
He says, “Pull up a chair,” in a mismatched voice for his ample size.
It’s weak and high-pitched, as if he’d been punched in the larynx when he was eleven and his voice didn’t mature after that. “Have a donut.”
“I’m good,” says Clay. “Just ate a scone at Maisy’s.”
“A scone?” says Andy Kimmich. “Ooh-la-la. You can take the boy out of Europe…” Kimmich started dyeing his hair black in his thirties with a store-bought dye that might as well be called Black Hole because it sucks in everything around it.
He’s thin with slight shoulders and a bit of a neat freak about his appearance.
His uniform is clean and pressed just so.
He also has a meticulously trimmed mustache, also dyed black.
It is currently flaked with specks of glaze from a just-eaten donut.
“Come on, eat a donut like an American.”
“No thank you,” says Clay, “but I appreciate the offer.”
“Used to be ‘Uncle Andy’! ‘Uncle Mike’! Now he won’t even eat with us. Will you at least have a seat?”
Clay eyes them suspiciously. “What’s going on?”
“Why you talking to the chief?” says Wahlquist.
“Because Teddy is missing. My father didn’t want to talk to her. So I did.”
“He spoke to us,” says Kimmich. “That’s good enough. You stay out of it.”
“Is it good enough?” says Clay. “Because the only thing you seem to be looking for is diabetes and a bigger belt. And I was just with your superior officer when she got a call from Sue. Sue thinks you’re out on patrol. How smart of a lie is that in a town with one street?”
“What happened to you?” says Kimmich. “Your father raised you to respect your elders. I’m not feeling any respect here.”
Clay says, “Why do you talk like an East Coast mobster, Andy? The farthest east you’ve ever been is Wisconsin.”
“If you weren’t the only child of my dear friend Judd,” says Kimmich, “I’d take you out back and show you a thing or two.”
Clay sighs. Ever since he returned three months ago, Wahlquist and Kimmich have been having a hard time accepting that he’s no longer a boy. “Anything else you guys want?”
“Don’t worry about your uncle,” says Wahlquist. “We’re leading the search for him. Got the word out in Chatfield, Preston, Lanesboro, St. Charles … All of Fillmore County. Let us do our jobs and we’ll get your uncle back to you. No need to get Zoey involved.”
Clay eyes the two men who are a few years short of retirement. He smiles.
“Come on, Clay. Don’t give us that look. We know what we’re talking about. Zoey’s not local like we are,” says Kimmich. “This is our—”
“Don’t say turf,” says Clay. “Please stop talking like that. Nobody talks like that around here.”
Wahlquist pats his ample belly. “All we’re saying is we don’t need any interference in doing the job we’ve been doing for forty years.
City council got a bug up their ass to hire a woman chief.
That’s politics. But when it comes to actual police work, to protecting and serving the good people of Riverwood, Minnesota, Andy and I know how to get the job done. ”
“See,” says Kimmich, brushing the crumbs out of his mustache with a tiny comb, “the city council is getting out of hand. Think they know how to run this town. They don’t know how to run anything.
Half of them are salmon who came back during the pandemic because they could work remote.
That’s why everyone around town calls the city council the clown council.
They’re a bunch of know-nothing knuckleheads.
Mike here is thinking of running for mayor. Setting things straight.”
“I didn’t know that,” says Clay. “Congratulations, Mike.”
“Haven’t announced it yet,” says Wahlquist. “Saving it for the Fourth of July parade. And I’d appreciate your support, Clay. I was there for you when you were just a little guy. Now I’d like you to return the favor.”
Clay smiles. “Happy to.”
Wahlquist raises his eyebrows. “I’m getting the Ozempic,” he says. “Seeing the doctor on Monday. The pounds will soon be melting off me. I’ll need the energy for the campaign.”
“Sounds like a good plan,” says Clay.
“Clay,” says a woman.
Clay turns to see Steph Becker. She is Clay’s age, has long blond hair and clickety-clackety fingernails painted peach.
They’re long and may or may not be real.
A dark line surrounds Steph’s ice-blue eyes, and her lips match her peach nails.
She wears tight jeans and a black T-shirt bedazzled with the word CYNIC, and holds a to-go cup of coffee and a white bag with grease stains.
“Hey, Steph. How are you?”
“I just had a cancellation. I can cut you now if you’d like. Or see you next week as scheduled.”
“I’ll be there in five,” says Clay.
She sips her coffee, then lowers the cup, leaving a peach lip print on the cup’s white plastic lid. “Great,” says Steph. “See you then.”
She heads out, Wahlquist and Kimmich watching her as she goes.
“Clay, you never should’ve let that one go,” says Kimmich.
“She’s over forty,” says Wahlquist, “and could still win Miss Riverwood if she wasn’t married.”
“Guess I’ll have to live with that mistake for the rest of my life,” says Clay. “See you guys around. And thanks for looking for Teddy.”