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9 2 Sadie found herself alone, feeling scared and vulnerable in this new place. She didn’t know anyone in Liberty other than the folks who had made themselves at home in her café that morning. They seemed nice enough, but the thought of Goldie being found dead unnerved her. She decided to lock up and go back home. Hector had already said he didn’t know how long it would take for him to return, and she didn’t need to be there while he worked. She would have to trust him. She locked the doors of the café and climbed into her car for the fortyfive minute drive home to Eucha. As she backed the Explorer out of the parking space in front of the café, she lowered the windows to allow the July heat to rush in, hoping it would chase the chill of death from her soul. The morning events had transported her to another time and place she wished she could forget. Even the music on the radio could not compete with the memories of the deadly bank robbery she had survived on April Fools’ Day two years earlier. She couldn’t stop the harrowing scenes from pushing back into her mind, forming a mental video that replayed in an endless loop, sending shivers through her body. Now some lunatic woman had aimed a shotgun at her, and she assumed the only reason it hadn’t discharged and blown her to bits was because the woman had already emptied it into Goldie. Sadie’s first impulse had been to rush to Goldie’s house to see if maybe it was all just a bad joke. But she couldn’t bring herself to turn the steering wheel in that direction, so she continued to drive north. Nothing made sense. Why would Pearl want to murder a good woman like Goldie? And why was Pearl so angry about the reopening of the café? Sadie didn’t want to be drawn into another murder investigation, but she couldn’t sit idly by and have her new business ruined, either. 10 The familiar Oklahoma landscape flew by Sadie’s open window. The foothills of the Ozarks, covered with a healthy variety of oak, birch, maple, and sycamore trees rooted in rocky red dirt scarcely registered in her mind. The curves disappeared before her as she thought about how she had ended up owning a café in Liberty, Oklahoma, in the first place. The decision to buy the café had not been quite as impulsive as some of her friends had thought. Twelve years working at the Mercury Savings Bank had taught her a lot of things. For one, her life was too short to spend trying to please an elitist bank board, most of whom had no idea how to go about handling an irate customer, much less what to do when a teller couldn’t balance his, or her, cash drawer. She was also quite certain none of them had ever faced the wrong end of a Smith and Wesson in the hands of a crazed robber. She craved a job that made her want to get up and go to work in the morning. She wanted to feel the pleasure she saw in her great-aunt’s face in those old, grainy black-and-white photographs. Finding the newspaper ad about a restaurant for sale in Liberty, Oklahoma, seemed the answer to a lot of prayers. Instead of calling the number in the paper, Sadie had gone unannounced to see the Liberty Diner in operation. It was easy enough to find, on the main road in the middle of the small town. The brick building looked empty, which didn’t seem like a good omen to Sadie until she noticed, according to the information painted on the window, it was almost closing time. She went inside and took a seat on one of the red vinyl-covered stools at the counter just as a woman burst through the kitchen door carrying a tray of cups. “Afternoon,” the woman greeted Sadie as she deposited the coffee mugs on a shelf behind the counter. “Am I too late to get something cool to drink?” asked Sadie. “No, no. Not at all.” The woman introduced herself as Goldie Ray, beaming a welcoming smile as she filled a glass with ice water and slid it, along with a laminated menu, in front of Sadie. “I’m out of the special for...
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