Page 35 of Never Flinch

He looks up and closes his book. Something in her voice.

“Do you have a mask? A Covid mask? This envelope… it’s probably fine, but we’ve had threats, and in Reno—”

“I know what happened to you in Reno,” he says, and now there’s something inhisvoice. Also in his face. Corrie thinks it might be a glimpse of the man Wilts was thirty years and eighty excess pounds ago. “Let me see that.”

She hands it over. “I feel something in there, maybe just the embossing on a fancy greeting card, but it seemed toshiftwhen I pressed down on—”

He’s frowning. “This is wrong.”

“What?”

“The mayor’s name. It ain’t Stodart, it’s Stothert.”

They look at each other. On the TV, muted, Kate is making her trademarkc’mon, c’mongesture, and faintly Corrie hears applause. It sounds like it’s coming from some other world.

Wilts doesn’t have a Covid mask, but he drove them to the venue in his cruiser and hedoeshave a few drug masks, the N95s officers wear if they collar a suspect who’s holding. Wilts tells Corrie they’ve had officers pass out after inhaling coke spiked with fentanyl or heroin from a busted Baggie. He hands her a mask and says, “Better safe than sorry.”

Corrie puts on the mask. She can’t tell for sure, but looking at the monitor she guesses Kate has started the Q-and-A part of the program, ready to rain down well-honed ridicule on anyone who dares to disagree with her positions on matters political and female… which, to Kate, are one and the same.

Wilts, seeming more and more like a police officer, slits the envelope along the top. He peeps in. His eyes widen. “Leave the room, ma’am, this stuff’s probably talcum powder, but—”

“Better safe than sorry. I hear you.”

Heart pounding hard, Corrie retreats to her usual position by the stage manager. Time passes slowly. She imagines Ham Wilts stretched out dead on the greenroom floor. Stupid, but since Reno and Spokane, her mind has a tendency to default to the worst possible scenario.

Kate finishes with a hands-up bellow of “Thank you, Omaha!” and comes offstage, smiling and flushed. It’s obviously been a good one, which is no surprise to Corrie; Kate has been honing her performance at every stop. By the time they get to New York, she’ll be raising the roof.

She gives Corrie a brief hug and says, “Was it good?”

“Sure, fine, but—”

“Let’s blow this pop stand. I want a steak and I want a shower. I stink.”

Corrie says, “There may be a problem.”

4

Itisa problem.

Instead of spending some time off in Des Moines, as they had planned, Kate and Corrie spend it in Omaha. It wasn’t talcum powder or baking powder or baking soda. It wasBacillus anthracisand silica. The Douglas County sheriff shows them a photo of the powder that spilled out of the card and into the crease at the bottom of the envelope. Then he shows them a photo of the powder heaped on a lab scale. He says they put a rush on it. If he expects thanks from either woman, he doesn’t get it. Kate looks solemn and pale.Maybe this is starting to be real to her now, Corrie thinks.

Wilts doesn’t try to embellish his story, and Corrie respects him for that. He was absorbed in his book. An usher knocked and came in. He knows it was an usher because of the gray slacks and blue blazer. He usespersonbecause he’s not entirely sure it was a woman, but he’sprettysure. Lots of dark hair. The usher gave him a nod, propped the envelope against one of the flower vases, and left.

“I wish I could say more,” Ham Wilts says, “but several people were in and out while Ms. McKay was on. Plus the book was really good. I feel like I let you down.”

“You didn’t really think anything was going to happen, did you?” Kate’s tone is flat. Not accusatory but notnotaccusatory.

Wilts has to be aware that the sheriff is glaring at him. He makes no reply. Which is answer enough.

“Do you have a picture of the card?” Kate asks.

The sheriff slides another photo across the desk. Kate looks at it and shows it to Corrie. It’s the kind of card you buy blank at a drugstore orstationers’ shop, allowing you to put your own message on the outside and also on the inside. What’s on the outside of this one is A BASIC CARD FOR BASIC BITCHES.

“Nice,” Kate says. “What’s on the inside? Best wishes from your crazy-as-fuck friend?”

A fourth photo is passed across the desk. Printed inside, once again in caps: HELL AWAITS THE DECEIVER.

5

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