Page 42

When she walked away, I lowered my voice and leaned forward, “What happened in those classes?”

“Please, Hazel. Listen to the podcasts and then talk to Minnie if you know her. She won’t tell Calloway the names, and he was hoping you could help. He thinks the killer might have killed because of those days with your father.”

Anger simmered through me. It wasn’t valid anger, but it wasn’t frivolous either. I didn’t appreciate Graham as the messenger. I didn’t understand why I had to listen to a whole podcast, like some school assignment, about the man who’d raised me until he was gone.

I looked around the diner, suddenly wondering how many people here had listened to it. Had Dixie? Doug? Did everyone in town know about classes that … I didn’t remember?

Was it a lost memory or something else?

What was going on, and why hadn’t someone mentioned the classes to me before now? Also, why were they suddenly important?

Once again, I wanted to storm out of the diner. I didn’t want to be that person, so I tried to keep it low key as I grabbed my wallet from my back pocket and left a ten-dollar bill on the table.

“Hazel, wait … I don’t think I handled this right.”

“It’s okay.” I worked hard to control my tone. “It’s not your fault. Thank you for all the information.”

I stood and made my way to the door. In the background, I thought I heard Dixie say something like “Let me know if you need anything.”

I debated calling Calloway on my way out to Minnie’s trailer, but I thought better of it. He might be a friend, but he was also the sheriff, and he was working. I wasn’t sure yet if I had the right to be angry or of all the things I had the right to be angry about.

Or if I was just plain old ornery.

Though there were some days I wasn’t thrilled about the lack of paved roads around town, today they gave me something else to focus on. They also helped to calm me down.

I was sure that if my father had taught anyone but me any sort of taxidermy, I hadn’t witnessed it. Why wouldn’t he have shared his skills, though? He was very good at what he did.

I’d been rattled by what I’d heard because I’d felt left out. But maybe that was my own fault. And if I really thought about it, maybe no one had mentioned the classes to me because everyone in Black Vulture had been assigned to take care of me, which probably included not upsetting me.

I thought about Calloway’s nudge for me to listen to Minnie’s podcast, Jenne Griffen and now Graham piling on. I snorted a laugh. What exactly was I so upset about? That Wilmot might have shared his skills or that I didn’t remember him doing so? Or that I’d ignored the podcast for some reason that ultimately led to what—self-preservation? Did I know something that I didn’t realize I knew or was I just being stubborn?

I still didn’t want to listen to the podcast, but I would.

Wilmot was my father. Mine. I didn’t want anyone to take away the good things I remembered. I didn’t want to have to explain to anyone the happiness he’d left me with. I’d missed him and, only learned little by little after he’d gone, how he might not have been as perfect as I’d made him in my mind. He was human, and we don’t see that in our parents until we grow up a little too.

I’d stopped bringing him up in conversation a long time ago. I didn’t want to listen to anyone’s stories about him. I just wanted the memories I had about him to stay right where they were. I didn’t need more good stuff, and I certainly didn’t want anything bad.

Now there were horrific things happening in Black Vulture that he might have been a part of. Or was still a part of.

That tenuous sense of my life with my father, the past that should stay in the past, was beyond wobbly now. It was falling apart. I was a grown-up and I should be able to handle it, but I wasn’t sure I could. I certainly wasn’t doing so great at the moment.

I needed to talk to Minnie Chavez.

The Jeep took bumps and divots like a pro, but as I came to a stop outside Minnie’s trailer, I wondered why she hadn’t moved closer to town.

Lots of people with trailers out in the middle of nowhere were content with their life choices. I didn’t really get it. I wasn’t much of a people person myself, but I still didn’t understand why this sort of life was ideal for anyone. I enjoyed my own company, but the moment I needed someone else to talk to, I could just walk to the diner or the bar or even the post office. The thought made me remember that box of bones on the way. I still hadn’t heard from Pearly, but I needed to check my mail.

“Minnie Chavez, it’s Hazel Dylan. I’m going to knock on your door.”

The trailer was a single-wide that had been painted yellow and orange at some point. All the paint was peeling now. A firepit sat in front of the trailer, its border done in big rocks probably gathered from a nearby riverbed—dry except when it flooded. The ash inside the circle was black. I reached a toe into the pit, but it was cold, with no sign of a recent fire. Even if it had been doused the night before, water might not be visible.

“Minnie?” I called.

From what sounded like a distance farther than inside the trailer, I heard, “Come in!”

I climbed the two rickety steps that led to the door and turned the wimpy handle. I took my hat off and held it as I stuck my head inside. “Hazel Dylan.”

“So you said. Come in.”