The Marsh Madness

“Yeah.”


“I’ll reach her as soon as we get to a place where we have cell phone reception. I wonder if I wander around outside when it stops raining if I could find a high spot with a signal.”

“Nah. I tried that. Even stood on the van. But I’ve got her on the line for you.”

With horror, I saw that he was holding the receiver of the landline in the cabin.

Two things became apparent. One, we couldn’t have been in the middle of nowhere, as Kev claimed, if there was phone service. And two, if the police discovered we’d been in this cabin, they could make a link to Cherie by checking the phone records. Well, maybe that was an unlikely scenario, what with the storm and all. I hoped she had a burner and that was the number Kev had called.

“Cherie?”

“You’re all over the news.”

“Let’s not, um, go there. What did you discover about our mutual friend when you visited her home?”

“Oh. Right. Our mutual friend. Yeah, really interesting, and I think it explains why the neighbors were so fascinated by you.”

“Okay.”

“Guess who showed up?”

“Can’t guess. Not a good time for games. Could you just tell me?”

“Repo!”

“What?”

“Ree-po.”

I hadn’t seen that coming. I thought back to the pleasant home on the leafy street in Grandville. “But what was being repossessed?”

“Her car. You know you’re having a real bad day when they try to repossess your car and then you get—”

“Don’t say it. Are you sure?”

“Yup. Talked to the guys. Wasn’t too hard to get into a conversation.”

It never is for Cherie. That’s what comes of looking like a modern-day Marilyn Monroe with a side order of Wonder Woman and a dash of the Cable Guy. “And?”

“They’d been trying to get that Lexus for quite a while. She was pretty slippery, the guy said. She’d moved back home with her parents and didn’t leave a forwarding address to any of her creditors. Threw them off.”

“I guess it would.” I thought back to Shelby Church, whom I still thought of as Lisa Troy. She’d been a woman with a lot going for her. How had all this happened?

“Yeah,” Cherie said. “Why do you suppose she’d leave a job and a life and come back here? No offense.”

“None taken. I came back because I was broke and needed a place to live.” I didn’t mention a place to heal. “And I needed to save some money and rebuild.”

“That explains it, then. I got a chance to talk to one of the neighbors. I guess the repo guys weren’t the first. Everyone at the Church place was going crazy. Lots of bill collectors.”

“Coming to the door? Really?”

“On the phone. One of the neighbors has a part-time cleaner who also does the Churches’ house. The stories she could tell, apparently. No one could figure out how this girl, who wasn’t doing well as an actress, could afford that car.”

“So were the parents drowning in debt? Or was only the daughter?”

“As far as I can tell, it was just the girl. The parents are salt of the earth, if you listen to the neighbors. Boy, were they keen to talk. I guess the daughter was in a bad way. Crying all the time. There was no way she could pay off her debt. Guess it was more than credit cards and car loan. She had personal loans, line of credit, everything.”

“Student loans too, I guess?”

“No, her parents had put her through. They had a college fund for her from the time she was born. They wanted her to have a great education. And in the end, after she got a good, solid degree, she got herself in this mess. She was trying to make it as an actress, and roles had dried up lately. And then she met this guy. The parents were afraid of what she might do to herself. Everyone says they were trying to help her. They were going to take out a second mortgage. And now . . .”

“Yeah. And now look.”