The Keeper of Bees ARC by Gregory Ashe

Author:Gregory Ashe [Ashe, Gregory]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Hodgkin and Blount
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

JULY 4

THURSDAY

11:16 AM

HOLIDAY TRAFFIC REALLY wasn’t bad, probably because most people traveled before and after the Fourth, instead of on the day itself. Hazard made excellent time. He called and left a message for Somers, letting him know where he was headed, and he still hadn’t heard back from him by the time he got to the outskirts of Golden City, a twin to every other small Midwestern town. On the outskirts, fields of alfalfa and corn crashed to a stop against cinderblock buildings with tin roofs and sheds of corrugated metal; then came matchbook-sized homes from the 50s, 60s, and 70s, small, with peeling paint or crumbling tuckpointing; then a downtown of brick storefronts. When he idled at a light, a boy and girl, each holding a joint, both dressed in ripped black denim, jogged in front of him. At the sidewalk they dropped the skateboards under their arms and kept moving, not missing a beat as they transitioned. He thought they were both probably twelve.

He followed the GPS directions through the city, and he cut off at an access road. After five hundred yards, the access road’s pavement ended, and a dirt track continued. The Odyssey lumbered along the uneven surface, and Hazard found himself climbing a low bluff. When he cleared the top, he could see a house set farther back: two-story clapboard, with a barn that looked like it had never been painted, and at the back of the property, a series of white studs against the blue sky. He couldn’t tell, not from that distance, but he knew: beehives. Set at the right of the road, a four-by-four piece of plywood had two uneven rows of stenciled letters: KLEINHEIDER HIVES.

After parking near the barn, Hazard got out of the minivan, popped his back, and considered the Blackhawk, which he had brought in a portable gun safe and secured under the seat of his car. Normally, it would have seemed like overkill; he was here to ask about Dulac—and, of course, to ask about any hives or queens that might have been sold recently. But Hazard unlocked the safe, holstered the gun, and pulled on a windbreaker in spite of the heat baking the tall Indiangrass. Nothing had been normal for the last few days.

When he knocked on the door, no one answered. Hazard checked the time; when a full minute had passed, he knocked again. Louder. A piece of clapboard, the nail at the end already loose, wobbled in time with the pounding. Still nothing.

Hazard moved to the barn, and when he got to the judas door, he called ahead. There was no answer, so he pushed his way into the barn and moved slowly through the structure. It was bigger than he had realized, with one side reserved for tools and a woodworking shop, while the other side of the barn was divided up into pens, all empty. The smells of old animal dung and straw and leather mixed in the hot, closed-up air.

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