The digital display on the dashboard had gone from 12 MILES REMAINING to LOW FUEL.
If she ran out of gas—which was very possible—she didn’t know how long it might be before someone came by to help her. Since she’d passed through Wibaux fifty miles north of where she was, she’d not encountered a single car on the road.
The terrain was as flat as it had been in North Dakota but even more desolate. There were ponderosa pine–covered buttes every few miles, and weather-beaten signs for distant ranches, but no place to stop for fuel.
Thanks to Jon Kirkbride she had the cell phone number for Carter County Sheriff (and Coroner) Bebe Verplank entered into her phone. Kirkbride and Verplank were both officers of the Western States Sheriffs Association and knew each other well. Cassie knew she could call Verplank if she ran out of gas and was stranded—but what an inauspicious way to meet, she thought.
People in small towns loved to talk about knuckleheads like her—city types who didn’t have the sense not to run out of gas in the most remote and least populated corner of the entire state. Her North Dakota license plates would work against her as well. Montanans, as she knew, loved to make fun of North Dakotans. That Montana was her home until two years before would only muck up the narrative.
She’d checked a map before she’d departed that morning. Ekalaka—pronounced Eek-ah-lack-uh—seemed to be the dead center of Nowhere. It was twenty-six miles from the North Dakota border, twenty-four miles from the South Dakota border, sixty miles from Wyoming, and one hundred miles from the nearest town in Montana of any size: Miles City.
Everybody growing up in Montana had heard of Ekalaka because the name kind of rolled off the tongue. Few actually knew where it was. Fewer still had ever been there.
She’d concluded there was no logical explanation for Kyle and Raheem to push off on the Missouri River in Grimstad and wind up hundreds of miles away and upstream in Ekalaka.
Yet, here she was.
And she had an appointment with Sheriff Verplank at 5 P.M.
*
SHE PULLED OFF THE HIGHWAY at the first gas station she saw a half-mile north of town. It was a tiny A-frame building she assumed was open because there was a light on inside. A hand-painted sign on the side of the building read WE ASSASSINATE DRIVE-AWAYS.
When she climbed out of her car and stretched she blew out a long breath. It had been nerve-wracking driving on fumes.
The pumps were old-fashioned and instead of a digital display that showed the cost and the volume of fuel dispensed, there were spinning dials and no way to use a credit card.
She cursed and grabbed her purse from the front seat and walked across the gravel to the office. She could see a man’s face peering at her through a cloudy window.
Inside it was dark and musty. The small space was crowded with shelving with very few items for sale outside of .22 shells, beaded jewelry from what was no doubt a local artisan, and used paperback books. Dust-covered mule deer heads looked down at her from the walls.
“I need to fill up,” she said to the man seated behind the cash register. The top of his head barely cleared the top of the counter.
“Well, go ahead.”
He had a large bald head and owl-like eyes. She wondered why he didn’t stand up until she got closer and realized he was in a wheelchair.
“Here’s my credit card,” she said, offering it to him. That’s when she saw the large caliber revolver in his lap.
“Just pay for it when you’re done,” the man said. “But this isn’t full-serve. You have to pump it yourself.”
“That’s fine.”
“And we don’t take credit cards. Cash only.”
“I see,” she said. “I can’t remember the last time I paid cash for gasoline. Probably high school.”
The man shrugged. “You can always go on into town, I guess.”
“No, it’s fine,” she said, thinking of the envelope of cash Dottie had given her and refused to take back. She had only twenty dollars herself. “Is the women’s bathroom open?”
He handed her a key.
When she brought it back he asked, “What brings you to town? Here to see the dinosaur museum? This is dino country, you know. Bones everywhere.”
“Is that so?”
“That’s so.”
“Do you always keep that gun on your lap?”
He paused as if the question confused him. Finally, he said, “Yep, I do.”
“I’ll be back,” she said.
“Yep.”
*
SHE ALMOST DROVE OUT the other side of Ekalaka before she realized there was no more Ekalaka, only one short main commercial street and unpaved roads to scattered homes. She did a U-turn and parked on the shoulder of the highway. The tiny community was in an oasis of trees in the high desert landscape. The whole of the town spanned her windshield.
Cassie punched in the number Kirkbride had given her.
“Yullo?” A man’s deep voice.
“Is this the Carter County Sheriff’s Department?” she asked.
He chuckled and said, “This is Sheriff Verplank. You’re calling my cell phone.”
“Oh, I’m sorry. This is Cassie Dewell from North Dakota. I made an appointment with your receptionist this morning.”
“That was my wife, but yeah. You want to meet at the Old Stand Saloon?”
“Sure,” she said. “Where is it?”
He laughed again and said, “You can’t miss it. Are you in town?” Then the sheriff said, “Oh yeah, I see you.”
She looked up. A stocky man in a beige uniform had stepped out the side door of the only three-story building in town. It was a square wooden structure with a cupola on top.
He waved. “You’re looking at the Carter County Justice Center. We’re on Pine Street. The Old Stand is on Main Street,” he said, indicating the area on the other side of the building. “Everything,” he added, “is on Main Street.”
“I’ll see you there,” she said.
“If it’s open,” he said cautiously.
*
OVER THE PAST FEW DAYS Cassie had gone to the office supply store to replicate the things she had on her desk at the Law Enforcement Center—stapler, paper clips, highlight pens, and other items. She fell back on her police training and assembled a case file. It included printouts from the databases, copies of her interview notes thus far, photos of Kyle and Raheem, and the missing persons reports filed by Lottie and Raheem’s father. Both reports were public records although she’d received them more quickly than usual because Judy Banister made sure she did.
She constructed a timeline of what had happened so far: the disappearance, the initial contact with law enforcement, the follow-up—and lack thereof—up to when Lottie cornered her in the lobby of the Law Enforcement Center. The list of contacts for the case was short.
She assembled the file meticulously with the thought in mind that when her investigation was complete—one way or other—she could turn the entire thing over to law enforcement.