Kayli Unknown

Chapter 16 - Pizza with Loggers

They didn't go straight back to the lodge or to the store. They looked around first. Up County H and then up and down Highway 8. There were side roads – unplowed and unused. Summer cabins, maybe used for deer season. Not used in January. They spent an hour cruising any backroad that had been plowed, any road where a twelve year old girl might meet a logger. Maybe half a dozen houses were occupied. This part of Wisconsin was emptying faster than the rest. The houses that were still in use – smoke coming out the chimney, driveway plowed – all had electricity running to the home. If the girl had met any of the loggers, it wasn't anywhere around Goodman.

So, no progress so far. But, it turned out the pizza and beer idea worked well. Not only did the men relax after the first couple beers, but Kat or Lisa had at least a short – relatively private – conversation with each. The key was movement. Lisa was responsible for most of that. The men had never been to the lodge before (few in Amberg had), so she gave tours. Pizza slice in one hand, can of beer in the other, she took them around the place.

While the six younger loggers went with Lisa, Chuck White stayed with Kat. Close. Both women had changed into dresses – heavier, cotton dresses with long sleeves and longer skirts – but dresses just the same. They were hostesses after all. Not that the men were not already paying attention, but, well, somehow their attention level moved up a notch or two.

Chuck followed Kat into the kitchen as she warmed up pizza number three (the first two disappeared almost instantly). He offered to "help," but of course what he really wanted was to stand close. As far as Kat knew, Chuck didn't really cheat on his wife, he just made all the preliminary moves, and then stopped. He was making all the moves with her, saying nice things about Kat's looks, and her lodge, and her pizzas, and her kitchen... It was a long list, but he stood close while running through it. Kat let him, then moved the conversation.

"Chuck, you sounded pretty serious about guys up long roads. Have you run into any of them while logging this year?"

"This year? Yeah. You know the road to the old Kremlin mine? We were working a forty along there, maybe two miles east of 141, and we had this guy stand at the edge of the forty every day we worked. Deer rifle in hand. Yelling at us about staying off his land. Little guy. Hadn't seen a barber this century. Every day I had to walk over to him, show him the plat map, and repeat we would not cut his trees. He'd just tell me to stay off his land, and stand watching all day."

"Did he ever have a girl with him?"

"Him? He didn't even have a dog. You don't know these guys, Kat. Well and truly scrambled between the ears."

"Any others?"

"No. But there will be. Want my prediction for the future?" He puffed himself up a bit, and smiled. Proud of himself. He had Kat alone, and he had her listening.

"Sure."

"Yours will be the only business to survive in Amberg, I will be the last logger working Marinette County, and every backroad up here will get some guy who thinks he's a survivalist, or a sovereign citizen, or a doomsday prepper. They will be men, they will be alone, and they will be dangerous as hell."

"Two miles east of 141?"

"Kat, I know you want to find out where that girl came from, but you need to be careful." Since he was giving advice, he thought he had the right to put his hands on Kat's shoulders. For the first and only time, she let his hands stay there.

"Nothing around Goodman?"

"Not a soul, and we've been there since December."

"And before that?"