Jack Beale 00 - Killer Run

he had ended up in the brush.
    It wasn’t like the movies where every detail is remembered and at some time in the future, retribution meted out. He thought about this phenomenon until he turned off the road and back onto the fire road that would bring him back onto his trails. When he reached the clearing, he checked his watch. Perfect. He had been out for two hours. He squeezed a packet of gel into his mouth, washed it down with some sports drink, watered a tree, checked his watch again, and started his last hour.
    This time he ran in the opposite direction. He took the more challenging loops first and left the best for last. The single track trail, and then the hills, reminded him of that run at The Willows with Alfred, whom he had not thought about since that day. “Good runner,” he recalled now, “but odd. Maybe those two qualities aren’t totally exclusive to each other.”
    The hard loops finished, he slowed a bit as he began the last loop. He had started his run on this loop, and it was the perfect way to end it. He checked his watch. He would meet his goal of three hours. He felt good, tired but good so he slowed a bit, partly to begin cooling down and partly because he didn’t want it to end. Other than his brush with that truck, it had been a perfect run on a perfect day. As he ran those last strides into the clearing, once again he was all smiles.
    As he walked back to the Inn, his backpack nestled into the small of his back and pulled him a bit more upright. He squared his shoulders and stretched out of the slight slump he had settled in from running for such a long time. As he neared the Inn, he picked up his pace slightly. He was beginning to feel a bit chilled and he knew that a long, hot shower awaited him.
    As the screen door slapped shut behind him, he called out to Polly.
    “I’m in here,” she called back. He wasn’t sure, but he thought there was a bit of a strain to her voice. As he went into the front room, she was standing in front of the window looking out at the road. She didn’t turn. “Hey, Pol. What’s up?”
    “I just had the strangest thing happen.”

CHAPTER 28
    AS MALCOM SUNK INTO A CHAIR, Polly explained what had happened. After he had disappeared into the woods, she had opened the garden gate. Since no guests were staying in the Inn, she had planned a special evening that would start with dinner.
    The greens, red leaf lettuce, curly green leaf lettuce, and baby spinach were still producing well and would make a perfect base for the salad she had in mind. As she picked the greens, she planned the rest of the salad. They had several apple trees in the yard, and the day before she had picked the first apples of the fall. She would slice one of them onto the bed of greens, add some chopped walnuts, shave some pecorino romano cheese over the top, and dress it with poppy seed dressing.
    Surveying the garden for ideas for the main course, she spied a butternut squash on a vine hiding under one of its leaves. Upon closer inspection she decided that it was ripe enough; this gave her an idea. She looked over her herb patch and picked some parsley, lovage, and chives. With greens, the squash, and herbs filling her arms, she walked back to the house.
    Polly nearly dropped the squash as she gingerly pulled the kitchen door open. She managed to get the squash onto the table without dropping it and was putting the greens and herbs in the sink when the front doorbell rang.
    Since they weren’t expecting any guests, the bell startled her. She walked through the dining room toward the front door. As she passed one of the front windows she looked out and saw an old pickup truck in the drive. A man was walking back toward the truck. She watched as he opened the door and leaned in. He was obviously looking for something. It wasn’t long before he extricated himself from the truck and began to walk back toward the inn, this time with a thin valise in hand. The bell rang again.
    She went to the door, and through one of the sidelights she got a close look at him. The first thing about him that caught her attention was his glasses. They were thick, giving him an owlish kind of appearance, and the round shape and wire rims only reinforced that look. He was wearing jeans, neatly pressed, and a jacket that was zipped all the way up. One hand held a small briefcase.
    “Shit,” she thought to herself as she began to pull the door open. Two options flashed through her mind. Either he was a