She recited the only prayer Laura had ever taught her. “God grant me the confidence of a mediocre white man.”
“Very good.” He looked impressed. “You southern ladies come out swinging.”
“You mean like the person who swung a piece of wood at Emily Vaughn’s head?”
Nardo’s expression twisted into a familiar snarl. “Dyke.”
Andrea supposed his generation thought that was an insult. She watched him stomp off toward the barn. She waited until he was inside to take a deep breath and hiss it out.
She looked down at her left hand. Her wrist was throbbing where Wexler had grabbed it. She would have a bruise, probably the same type of bruise she had seen on Alice Poulsen’s wrist.
Andrea took another breath. She had to concentrate on the crime that was in front of her. Dean Wexler and Nardo Fontaine’s storied past with Emily Vaughn was not the reason that she and Bible were at the farm. There was another young girl who’d lost her life only hours ago. She was lying in the field under a white sheet while a group of officers milled around checking their phones and tucking their hands into their pockets.
Andrea’s own phone had documented the ravages of Alice Poulsen’s daily existence. The young woman’s parents were thousands of miles away, probably thinking their daughter was having an adventure in the States. Soon, someone would knock on their door and tell them otherwise. They would want to know what had happened to their child. Andrea and Bible might be the only reason why they got any answers.
Analyze, understand, report.
She took in her surroundings. Like the barn and three outbuildings, the one-story farmhouse was painted in bright, rainbow hues. Streamers hung from the wraparound front porch. Candles had been placed in the windows. There was a chicken coop filled with round hens. Three goats grazed under a beautiful willow oak. Wheelbarrows and farm tools were over by the large Day-Glo barn that housed a tractor that was probably worth more than a Lamborghini. In the distance, silos fed into what she assumed from the DEAN’S MAGIC BEANS sign outside was the warehouse. The logo colors were blue sapphire and aquamarine, the same as the gemstones in Alice Poulsen’s ankle band.
“Fucking asshole,” she muttered. Dean Wexler knew exactly who that girl was.
The crunch of gravel pulled her attention away from the sign. The chief’s cruiser crawled up the road. They had taken their time, probably so Andrea could work Dean Wexler. Bible had thrown her in the deep end again. The jury was still out on whether she had managed to swim a few laps or tread water.
The cruiser took a sharp turn around a bend. Andrea noticed two low-lying metal buildings in the distance. The festive paintjob had stopped at the gravel road. The bare metal structures were dark with patches of rust. The roofs were caked with leaves. A stencil over the door on the larger building read BUNKHOUSE. The smaller one was marked CHOW HALL. All of the windows in both buildings were open to fight the coming heat.
Since Andrea had grown up in the south, she had to remind herself that it wasn’t cruel and unusual up here to forgo air conditioning. The same could not be said for the line of five blue porta-potties standing thirty feet away from the chow hall.
The farm looked successful enough to have indoor plumbing. Especially given that the labor seemed to be supplied by volunteers, which Andrea assumed was a euphemism for unpaid help. Having read about her share of internships, she could imagine the ad touting the lived experience of the organic farmer’s world: housing and Wi-Fi available. The accompanying photos would skip the primitive bunkhouse and showcase the multi-colored main buildings.
As a point of interest, the farmhouse had air conditioning.
Chief Stilton’s cruiser parked behind the blue Ford truck. If he’d had a deep conversation with Bible on the ride over, neither one of them looked happy about it. Stilton slammed the car door almost as hard as Wexler had.
Andrea stepped back as he pounded his way toward the farmhouse.
“Not sure what’s goin’ on with Chief Cheese,” Bible said. “How’s the old guy?”
“Pissed off,” Andrea said. “He grabbed my wrist. I put his face in the steering wheel.”
“That’s exactly right.” Bible sounded very serious. “Marshal rule number one: don’t ever let nobody lay hands on you.”
Andrea was glad for the support, but she had to admit, “It’s going to make things harder when we try to talk to him about Alice Poulsen.”
“That ain’t even part of the equation as far as I’m concerned.” Bible looked back at the farmhouse. “Partner, I don’t know about you, but I regret my sartorial choices.”
“Same.” At least he had on an official-looking T-shirt with his running shorts. Andrea’s lavender pajama shirt had a ring of cartoon ‘Z’s floating around the collar.
The screen door opened. Wexler shouted, “I don’t have all damn day.”
“Curiouser and curiouser,” Bible said.
Andrea was following him up the walkway when she saw two women leaving the barn. They were heading in the direction of the bunkhouse. Their matching gaits were slow and deliberate. Both were wearing long, yellow sleeveless dresses identical to the makeshift pillow that Alice Poulsen’s head rested on. That wasn’t the only similarity. Their feet were bare. Their stringy, dark hair was almost down to their waists. They were both so emaciated that their arms and legs looked like strings hanging down from their dresses. Either or both could’ve passed for Alice Poulsen’s twin.
They both had silver bands clamped tightly around their left ankles.
“Oliver?” Bible was holding open the door. She could see Dean Wexler and Chief Stilton standing inside. Neither man was looking at the other, but the hostility between them was like a third person. Clearly they had a history. People always talked about how quaint small towns were, but the fact was that blood feuds lurked around almost every corner.
Andrea caught the screen door before it slammed shut. She had been expecting a depressingly grungy house, but what she found was surprisingly bright and modern. The open-concept living room and kitchen were painted in soft variations of gray and white. The leather couch and matching club chair were black. The kitchen appliances were not just stainless steel, but Sub-Zero and Wolf, probably topping out at her annual salary. All of the color had been saved for the floor. Each wide plank represented a hue from the twelve-point color wheel. Rabbits and foxes and birds swirled into the repeating patterns.