White Nights: The Coast-to-Coast Michigan Mysteries

By Deb Davies

Darkness and mystery follow four friends to the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, threatening them at every turn…

 

Laurel and Arnie are delighted when their friends Claire and Charles join them for a visit at their summer home. Tucked away on beautiful Manistique Lake in Michigan's Upper Peninsula, it's the perfect place for everyone to relax and enjoy all the state has to offer.

 

Their vacation doesn't stay peaceful for long, however, when former cop Arnie is drawn into an ongoing investigation. Although it appears the victim, Maddy Pierce, may have committed suicide, other evidence points to the possibility of murder.

 

Investigating Maddy's death involves the group more than they had imagined, and soon their trip goes from good to wrong. It's apparent they have a malicious enemy and that someone is willing to do whatever it takes to keep Maddy's death a mystery. 

• Language: English
• Publisher: BHC Press
• Release date: Apr 19, 2022
• ISBN: 9781643972947

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Edited by Hannah Ryder

Proofread by Anna Heiar

White Nights

Copyright © 2022 Deb Davies

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law. For permission requests, please write to the publisher.

This book is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents, and dialogue are drawn from the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

Published by BHC Press

Library of Congress Control Number:

2021944521

ISBN: 978-1-64397-292-3 (Hardcover)

ISBN: 978-1-64397-293-0 (Softcover)

ISBN: 978-1-64397-294-7 (Ebook)

For information, write:

BHC Press

885 Penniman #5505

Plymouth, MI 48170

Visit the publisher:

www.bhcpress.com

9779

Northern Light

To the women friends who, in my dreams,

insisted I create Laurel and Claire.

Title28485

"T o old friends," Charles proposed, raising his glass toward Claire, Arnie, and Laurel.

New love, Arnie said. He placed his arm on the back of Laurel’s chair.

New journeys, Claire added, here in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, which should, Charles tells me, have been part of Wisconsin. Those Toledo Wars. She slurred her words the slightest bit.

To concussion protocol, Laurel said soberly.

Arnie had been off work with full pay for six months. He’d then tried to return to work but still had problems with loss of balance. Now on half pay, by the end of the summer, he needed to meet department standards.

They clinked glasses and each drank champagne. Arnie finished his second glass but left the third. Claire eyed it over the rims of her purple-framed reading glasses, but at that moment, food began to arrive, brought by a server named Brandy, a sturdy brunette who did not look, no matter what a song said, like she was looking for a seafaring man.

Everyone had chowder made with small, tender clams suspended in translucent broth. Next came appetizers: pâté de foie gras from geese that had not been force fed, bread made from local grains, and a salad made with diminutive spinach leaves that left Laurel, who hated spinach, chasing the last few leaves around her plate.

Outside the Culinary School window, in the Lake Huron harbor, yachts floated peacefully on lamplit, choppy waves. Nine months had passed since their supposed friend Ann, out of jealous hatred, had attempted murder. Claire’s skin sported only faint pox-like silver burn scars. Arnie, though still burly, had lost weight while healing from the injuries Ann had inflicted. Once religiously stick-thin Laurel had gained weight, as she had promised Arnie she would do. Charles had a bum knee.

As the two couples marveled over their relative well-being, entrées arrived. Whitefish with small red potatoes and locally raised green beans for Charles, and a small steak served with wild rice, which Arnie ate with his brow furrowed because the beef was so tender it could have been cut with a spoon. Claire had deboned quail that had been sautéed in bourbon; Laurel had pasta with goat cheese and salivated between bites.

Charles bemoaned the discomfort of bad knees and injections. Arnie squashed his complaints.

Cortisone injections the size of horse tranquilizers can’t be as bad as driving over the Mackinac Bridge. I’ve been in a car when someone else drove over it, but then I shut my eyes. Driving is worse! This stupid old fart ahead of me stopped for no reason. A Mini Cooper nearly mounted my back bumper. Even if the traffic’s light, driving over the middle lane grates sounds like hell’s doors rattling open. Five men died constructing the thing, and they probably worked in harnesses hooked to guy ropes. The bridge sways! I’ll swim before I’ll drive back over it.

You couldn’t swim, you bison-wisent-stupid beast! Charles was winding up to lambaste the Enbridge 5 oil pipeline, whose existence and proposed repairs under the Mackinac Straits made environmentalists expire from heart attacks.

Claire signaled for Brandy. Dessert and then coffee? Charles, I think Arnie was speaking figuratively. Let’s just talk about the four of us while we’re eating, shall we? She was wearing a green gauzy sundress, the pièce de résistance of her packing, and Laurel was wearing the stylish, short black linen dress she’d bought for her municipal court wedding to Arnie. Since Laurel wore dresses less often than apple trees grew pears, and given the elegance of candles reflecting from windows, Claire felt justified postponing Charles’ diatribe.

Charles speared a last potato before Brandy could remove their plates. All right, he said rudely. Since you, Claire, are paying, my day to lecture will come.

No one at the table pointed out that Charles lectured them daily.

What have you two been eating up here? Laurel asked him.

Bread and cheese, most often. Local whitefish spread on crackers. You should try it while you’re in this area. It’s addictive. Not fishy like tuna, though I love tuna, not salty, just…perfect. You eat and feel cholesterol subside while muscles grow. Scots settlers supposedly concocted the spread, though they probably stole the idea from the Ojibwa. Of course, you have to keep the tubs on ice. The whitefish, not the Scots, who’d be peeved, Charles explained.

We stop at farmers’ markets where kids sell fruit and pies, Claire added. Don’t, she warned, buy thimbleberry anything. The children’s book by that name is great, but the fruit is full of seeds.

The two had been traveling about with a build-it-yourself small camper modeled on the original Egg Camper designed by Jim Campbell from Grandville, Michigan, but no longer produced. Hitched behind Claire’s silver Bentley, once the prized possession of her late husband, George, the camper itself was made of fiberglass. It was so small it looked like a character from Pac Man, and so light a single mule could have pulled it up a steep hill. They carried coolers, coffee, Baileys, and other necessities of small footprint caravan life.

We usually stay in motels when we travel, Laurel said. "Microwave cooking—Stouffer’s can be pretty good—free breakfasts, and Better Call Saul on Netflix. Sometimes there’s a restaurant near a motel where Arnie can get a big pot roast as large as a dinner plate."

Pasties, Brandy, who had overheard them while clearing other tables, stopped by to suggest. You’ve got to try Cornish pasties: usually stuffed with cubes of beef, carrots, potatoes, onions, and yellow turnips. They have to have lard in the piecrust. I’ll never not love pasties, no matter how long I work here.

Is it the lard of local pigs? Arnie turned to face her.

We don’t raise animals for meat here, she explained, but there’s a farm north of here that raises free range cows, goats, sheep, chickens, and pigs. Once a year, they butcher a huge sow—one they haven’t come to love for its kind and clever disposition—and we get the results. You’d be amazed how much of an eight hundred pound pig we can use. It’s also where we get eggs, chicken, cheese, and meat.

So you know how the food you’re serving is made! Claire exclaimed. I know you can’t give me a recipe, but was there watercress in the chowder?

Watercress. Crayfish broth. Leeks. Lemon peel, simmered in water; a few drops of good vermouth. We never reheat. When we run out, that’s it for the night. Some of our recipes are always the same, regardless of what chef prepares them. The pasta and goat cheese can vary, depending on what the goats are eating, but is usually pretty much the same. The chowder varies depending on who is cooking. Dessert choices are up to the chef.

Claire had a dreamy look. We could park on the street, she told Charles, and just stay here in Hessel this summer. It seems like a pretty cool town. Old buildings, picturesque harbor, and some artists moving in.

You don’t want to live on mushrooms we pick? Charles asked.

"Oh, God, no! Laurel exclaimed. Charles, how could you? I never want to think about that night again. I am not normally, she muttered, flatulent."

The conversation broke into exclamatory babble. Claire and Charles had left the AuSable River area and done a how-does-the-camper-work trip to McGulpin Rock, a nine-foot tall, fifty-four ton limestone boulder that had helped French explorers, in 1615, navigate canoes through the Straits of Mackinac. The camper, which Charles and his friend Ed had built, had performed flawlessly. We spent the night, Charles explained. "I was walking down to touch the rock, and I somehow slipped, and smashed my knee again. So we just stayed in the McGulpin Point Lighthouse parking lot. We saw a Great Horned Owl. The one that goes hoo, hoo, hoooo!"

Who was McGulpin? Arnie asked.

Some local chap. Charles’ expression brightened. But the rock, at least, may be renamed, reverting to its name in the Ottawa or Odawa language. Then it would be ‘Chi Sin,’ which means Big Rock.

Sounds right.

I thought the Horned Owl had a kitten in its beak, Charles continued. But then it flew through moonlight, and we could see it had a small opossum. Which is still a bit sad. Young opossums are sweet.

Are you kidding? Arnie said. They look like vampire rats.

Well, until they hit puberty, they’re sweet. But that’s also true of people, Charles reasoned.

I cried when I thought it was a kitten, Claire confessed. I thought of Black Pearl, and how he might be owl food now that he’s living at Marsh’s farm.

Arnie and Laurel, who still lived in Grayling and were closer to Claire’s old neighborhood, assured Claire that Pearl was the self-appointed lord of Swallow Hill Farm’s barnyard. He fancied himself even more since he’d routed a bullying rooster. In the day, he sometimes slept on Bill the donkey’s back. At night, he and fat yellow Colby Cat came in to sleep, safe on Bill and Barbara Marsh.

How’s your daughter, the ineffable Jen? Charles asked.

Oh, who knows? Laurel responded, voice cross. Last I knew Jen had lumped design school and was planning to move to Australia to study aboriginal work. She hardly limps at all now and will weather that trip better than I will, if I go to visit her.

Sawyer? Claire asked. OK with your ex’s marriage?

Seems good. He has a girlfriend. Arnie shook his head. I was shy at his age.

How is Tansy? Claire asked. Is she doing all right, considering, what her mother did?

"I think she’s working through Ann’s, uh, breakdown, Laurel answered. She was relieved to find out she hadn’t exactly killed her mother. She hasn’t heard back from Sean’s parents since she wrote to tell them why he had disappeared. It takes some time to process news, so I think they may still write back to find out who adopted their grandchild."

Did Dannie and Elaine find a sperm donor?

Apparently. Not something they shared with me, but Dannie did say they used someone like a matchmaker, only the woman screens potential donors and makes sure one bozo isn’t a sperm donor to half the would-be mothers in the state. Arnie looked annoyed, which puzzled Claire.

Dannie is blooming in pregnancy, right?

She wanted to bloom, but it turned out she has varicose veins that don’t bother her now, but might have become swollen and painful if she got pregnant. Hence, Elaine is glowingly enceinte.

So? You look grouchy.

Elaine is like my godchild, Arnie admitted. She’s my source of information in the department. Anything the police deal with in Grayling, I expect Elaine to fill me in.

Brandy arrived, juggling the dessert tray—tiny, perfect sugar cookies that melted in the mouth, fifty-cent-sized pastries filled with coffee and toffee and chocolate, meringues drizzled with honey, and ices served with champagne. Claire, who had finished off Arnie’s champagne, ordered a double cognac. Charles had the sugar cookies, and having requested coffee, was brought his own small pewter pot with sugar and cream on the side. Arnie had the pastries and two meringues, and Laurel abstained.

How did you find this place? Arnie pushed away from the table. I didn’t expect this food at a culinary school, let alone here in a small town I’ve never heard of, in the Yoops.

Don’t call it ‘the Yoops,’ Charles corrected him. That’s like calling us lower Michigan visitors ‘fudgies,’ people who buy Mackinaw Island fudge and depart without looking at scenery.

We’re not even getting to Mackinaw Island this trip, Arnie groused. Laurel wants to go sometime earlier in the year, when the lilacs, which she says are spectacular, are in bloom.

Be warned anyway, Charles said. Call people Yoopers and they’ll clam up faster than clams.

George found the restaurant, Claire answered Arnie’s question. He had a cousin in Canada, over by the Georgian Bay, and we went there once when we were first married. We should go, some year, Charles, and see the wild orchids. To get back, we took the ferry from the Bruce Peninsula to the big island, Manitoulin, and took bridges to Canada north of Lake Huron, and lazed our way back here, so George could see the Grand Marais yachts. That was the most leisurely trip we ever took because he was always an ‘if this is Tuesday we need to be in Saginaw’ person. It’s more relaxing spending his money without him. I guess I should think of it as my money by now.

Momentary silence descended. Laurel remembered the shock of striking Ann traveling up her arm. Claire had a pang of contrition. Gog—good old George—could have left his money to Ann in his will.

Arnie grimaced. Laurel would ask him later what he was remembering, though she knew he might just have been letting his belt out a notch.

Remember I said we might see Pileated Woodpeckers? Here’s a tip. They excavate rectangular nesting holes in trees, but they are also drumming addicts. Trees, stove pipes, aluminum siding. If you wake up thinking there’s a drum parade passing, don’t necessarily expect it to pass. Charles, as a conversationalist, marched to his own drum.

Criminal bird brains, Arnie muttered. "Sort of like Criminal Minds."

Laurel grimaced. "No Busman’s Holiday for you, she declared. You are not messing with criminal minds on my sightseeing trip."

Arnie looked at the floor.

I need to encounter a restroom. Claire slid back her chair.

Their break, in a plain, white-painted restroom, was briefly prolonged by questions women have asked for years.

How’s married love life? Claire asked.

Affectionate, Laurel said. "Or tumultuous. Sometimes Arnie and I are done in minutes, sometimes we are languorous. Either way is good by me. We did have one interesting night. When I moved in with Arnie, while he was at physical therapy, I stashed a load of my books under our bed. I didn’t want him to help me with those cracked ribs of his, so I slammed books in, any way I could get them to fit. I was so proud I had done it without bothering him.

"That night when we were amorous, the bed collapsed. Turns out it was an old bed, and the supporting slats broke. The lamp on the nightstand came crashing down and broke—bulb and pottery base—so we were in pitch dark, blinking like blind mice.

Since the bed was shoved into a corner of the room, neither of us could climb out over the headboard or over the side next to a wall. The bed itself had become a V" with untucked covers that kept falling on us when we tried to use them as handholds. I felt like we were trying to get out of a Viking boat.

When we did struggle out, we slid around on coffee table books. We were still in the dark, of course, and trying to not step on glass and pottery. I was trying to get to the door and the hall light; Arnie was heading for our chest of drawers and his flashlight. We crashed into each other, me saying ‘Ouch, dammit, Arnie, be careful! and hopping about, holding a foot pierced with shards of the lamp base.

Arnie was in worse shape. He fell backward over books and fell on his arse on the broken light bulb. So while I was sliding across the room on a book, Arnie was clutching his blood-specked butt and growling, ‘What the fuck is this? What the fuck is this?’

Laurel tugged a comb through her short dark hair and adjusted her amber glasses frames. She added, I had to tell him I’d put—well, forced—those books under the bed. He was nice enough to say it was coincidental, but the timing seems suspect to me.

And yet, Claire guessed, using a phrase that had been much favored by the now-deceased Patsy Cluny, no permanent damage to your relationship was done. Laurel had been her best friend since they had first met in ninth grade in Wyoming, Michigan. After Laurel’s first marriage to a womanizer, Claire had been ecstatic to see Laurel with stable, protective Arnie.

Seems like it wasn’t, Laurel agreed with a grin. How about you? Are you doing all right with Charles? she asked. He’s a good soul, Claire, but he can’t keep his mind on what he’s doing, unless he’s hanging off a cliff to rescue a hurt bird.

"But when I do reel him back to reality, he’s where I need him to be. Which