The Silver Lake Murder by Gregg Matthews (read novel full txt) 📗

Jackal Marijuana stamped on them. The scale on the table was used at every step in the process. She did a quick inventory, wrote the numbers in her notebook, and moved on to the next workstation

There were two more workstations doing the same thing. They had a large amount of pharmaceutical pills and bottles on top of the table. The two men were emptying the pills from the bottles to a cardboard box on the table. Each box had a different kind of pill in it. She did a quick inventory and wrote the numbers down in her notebook.

The inventory was completed. She had been down in the Punchbowl for the better part of the day and was tired. She slowly walked up the long flight of stairs triggering an uptick in the number of Chinese workers saying things to each other about her and laughing amongst themselves. She walked up the stairs as fast as she could. She could imagine what the workers were saying about her.

She walked back to Luke’s office in The Devil’s Den. She needed to give him the latest numbers. She knocked on the door marked The Devil’s Den.

“Come in.”

She stepped into the office to a smiling Luke, something she has never seen.

“Hey, look who’s back. I didn’t think I was going to see you again,” Luke says laughing.

“Very funny, here are the latest numbers,” Cindy said, handing Luke the notebook.

“Thanks for working today. I will take some money off your tab. I have to look at the numbers.”

“Thanks Luke.”

Turning quickly before he changed his mind and gave her more work to do, she exited The Devil’s Den. Quickly making her way down the stairs, out the front door of the Lakeview Lounge.

Walking down Shady Lane slowly, she was trying to process everything she had seen in the Punchbowl. She also noted the name, Punchbowl was a good fit. The Punchbowl was a mixture of a lot of different things that are all bad. If someone ever mixes the Punchbowl with The Devil’s Den, bad things will happen.

Shady Lane is a dirt road intersecting with Route 38. The commercial buildings were on her right, and the crushed stone parking lot was on her left. She noticed the cars in the parking lot all had flyers on their windshields. She pulled one of them off a windshield and read it.

Giant July 4th fireworks display at Silver Lake. As soon as the sun sets, the fireworks will start. There were a couple of pictures of bursting fireworks over a lake.

The local residents of Silver Lake collect a small amount of donated money all year long in anticipation of the July 4th celebration. Most of the residents don’t know what the July 4th celebration is in reference to. The residents use the celebration as an excuse to drink more alcohol. They do the same thing every year. She let the flyer drop to the ground and watched the wind take it down the street. Tomorrow night is July 4th.

Walking down Shady Lane until she reached Route 38, she walked to the left. She walked along the edge of the lake water in front of Route 38 like she has many times before. Looking at the water, she realized how clean it was. There were breaks in the water with fish swimming to the surface trying to catch the insects on top of the water. She was not sure if the fish were largemouth bass or trout. She has heard the customers talking about the town stocking the lake with fish every spring. There are lots of frogs trilling, and crickets chirping. She watched a turtle reach the surface and take in the sunshine. The turtle goes back underwater to hunt for food with the other creatures in the lake.

The glimmer and shine of the sun reflecting off the water made her eyes squint. She opened her eyes and could see there were some rocks and dirt before the water, some green grass before, a wide cement sidewalk, and Route 38 next.

Up ahead, she saw a local town worker digging two holes in the green grass area right in front of the lake closer to Route 38. The sign was upright, being held in place by the man who dug the holes. Both hands were holding the sign up. With his right foot he was kicking dirt, and rocks back into the hole. The dirt and rocks were keeping the sign upright and in place.

“Hey Cindy,” the older man wearing, untied, tan, work boots, dirty jeans, a green with white lettering Lakeview Lounge T-shirt, long gray hair, and leathery skin said.

“Hey Rick,” Cindy said cheerfully.

Walking around the front of the white sign with blue lettering, she read, “Welcome to Silver Lake”.

“Looks good, Rick,” Cindy said.

“Yeah, whatever, I will see you at the bar,” Rick said, struggling to keep the sign upright.

Continuing her walk around the lake, enjoying the water views. Walking on the sidewalk along Route 38, she looked back and saw the new sign was in place. Reflecting back, she thought the sign was the one thing she has ever seen the town do to fix up Silver Lake. She has never seen anything else to make the lake more appealing to attract more people to the area. It’s a sign.

As she walked, she wondered if she will ever get her life together to move on from this place. She realized the amount of drugs and alcohol she was consuming was enough to keep her here forever. She doesn’t want to give in to a life here in Silver Lake. The money she owes from the drugs and alcohol seems like a mountain of debt she needs to climb and conquer.

She took a small package out of her right front pocket and put the white powder in between her thumb and index finger, right on the jackal tattoo. She brought her hand up to her nose and snorted the white powder. She used her right hand to pinch