The Mystery Megapack

the town could still trace its roots back to the same handful of villages on the Ukrainian-Polish border. Their ancestors—and hers—settled in these coal-rich hills, working in the mill down by the river, saving up to buy a tiny house with a deep front porch up by the Orthodox church.
    Dark, wet patches spread under the cop’s arms. A shrug, a glance over his shoulder at the knot of people busy on the other side of her car. “Lucky for you, you got a couple witnesses who say it was an accident, too.”
    Lucky, indeed.
    Her lips twisted, and she lowered her head. The charms bit into the tender underside of her arm. She’d taken a man’s life.
    Her fingers groped for the small boot that hung on the bracelet. Drops rolled down her cheeks, collecting in the corners of her mouth. Salty, like a faint taste of the sea. The cop would take them for tears of shock or sorrow.
    * * * *
    The door of the bar had opened and three men emerged, squinting in the brutal sunlight.
    Mouth suddenly dry, she took a sip of her soda and glanced at the clock on the dash. 4:07. As she suspected: creatures of habit. She tucked the cup into the holder between the seats and pulled out of the parking lot. The tires sent an empty beer can skittering across the broken asphalt. Two of the men, bellies lapping over their belts, crossed to the left side of the street near the corner. They turned and called to the other man. Brown hair scraped back into a scraggly ponytail, a faded yellow Steelers tee-shirt stretched across his narrow shoulders, he flipped them the bird and continued his shambling course down the opposite sidewalk.
    Keeping the speedometer exactly on twenty-five, she headed down the street.
    Not much traffic. A quiet time, school buses finished with their routes, and the evening shift at the mill already underway. Down the steep curve of the hill; remember to flip on the right turn signal and brake for the stop sign at the bottom. The two men stood on the left corner, gesturing expansively. She craned to see around them. All clear. A pause, a breath. Then she turned the wheel to the right and pressed the gas. The car shot forward.
    A flash of yellow as he stepped into the path of the car.
    Fast, so fast her foot still held down the pedal, the hood plowed into him. For an instant, his startled eyes met hers. Then a thud and his body rose, a crane poised for flight, quickly aborted. A shout from behind. She jammed on the brakes, her heart pounding wildly, a scream clawing its way up her throat.
    He sprawled on the patched asphalt, arms and legs twisted, yellow against black. And red.
    She struggled with the seatbelt catch. The belt retracted with a whirr. The two men she’d passed pounded up to the car; one wrenched open the door.
    “Jesus Christ, lady! You—”
    “I didn’t see him!” Her nose wrinkled at his cigarette-and-beer stench. “I turned, and he stepped out in front of me.”
    The man raised one hand and shaded his eyes. The hair on his arms glinted gold, his fingers tightened on the door frame. The other man knelt on the street, next to the … He looked up, ran a hand over his thinning hair and shook his head slowly.
    “Damn,” the man beside the car murmured. “You got a cell phone, miss?”
    She nodded and fumbled in the backpack on the seat next to her. Her hand shook as she pulled out the phone, and the man gently took it from her.
    “We need an ambulance.” His voice husky, he stared at the men in the street. “There’s been an accident at the corner of Fourth and Cedar.”
    * * * *
    Her Aunt Natalie had warned her about the speed traps when she first arrived, so she’d been careful when she drove around town. Things had changed so much over the years; the neighborhood she’d grown up in suffered from what politicians called urban blight, and what her aunt called too damned high property taxes and not enough decent work. A few landmarks remained, though. Enough for her to get her bearings.
    Fat raindrops polka-dotted her windshield as she turned down Fourth, passing boarded-up shop fronts—the shoe repair, the beauty parlor, and the little grocery where her mother would send her to buy a forgotten dinner ingredient. Where she and her best friend Donna would spend their hard-earned dimes and nickels on licorice whips or a box of Cracker Jack. Across the street, Pete’s bar, sole survivor on the block, celebrated business with lurid neon lights that could barely be seen through the grime-caked