The Good Daughter

  Charlie let her hand drop.

  Sam asked Ben, “The video—”

  “Shit,” Charlie whispered.

  Sam said, “What do you think? Is she guilty?”

  “Without a doubt, she’s guilty. Forensics backs it up. She tested positive for gunpowder residue on her hand, the sleeve of her shirt, and around her shirt collar and right breast, exactly where you’d expect to find it.” Ben chewed at the tip of his tongue. At least part of him still knew what he was doing was ethically wrong. “I don’t like the way they got her to admit it. I don’t like the way they do a lot of things.”

  Sam said, “Kelly can be talked into anything.”

  Ben nodded. “They didn’t Mirandize her. Even if they did, who knows if she understands what a right to remain silent is.”

  “I think she’s pregnant.”

  Charlie’s head whipped around. “Why do you think that?”

  Sam shook her head. She was talking to Ben. “Do you know what happened to the gun?”

  “No.” Ben asked, “Do you?”

  “I do,” Sam said. “Did Kelly say if she knew the victims?”

  Ben provided, “She knew that Lucy Alexander was Frank Alexander’s daughter, but I think that information came after the fact.”

  “About the Alexanders,” Charlie jumped in. “Jimmy Jack told me that Frank got caught cheating on his wife a few years ago. He was pulled over for a DUI and the story came out.”

  “Ah,” Sam said. “So, he’s done it before. Was it a student?”

  “No, a real estate agent. Wealthy, but older, which is apparently the wrong way to do it.” Charlie added, “Dad represented Frank for the DUI. Jimmy Jack said it was routine.”

  “It was,” Ben said. “Coin already looked into it. His focus is on the fact that Kelly had Frank for algebra. Frank was going to fail her. You heard the theory yesterday. Coin thinks a girl who has the IQ of a turnip is so worried and ashamed about failing algebra that she took a gun to school and killed two people. The wrong school, by the way.”

  “That’s an interesting point,” Sam said. “Why was Kelly at the middle school?”

  “Judith Pinkman was tutoring her for some kind of English proficiency test.”

  “Ah,” Sam repeated, as if pieces were finally clicking into place.

  Ben added, “But Judith said she wasn’t supposed to meet Kelly that week. She had no idea Kelly was even in the hall until she heard the gunshots.”

  Sam asked, “What else did Judith tell you?”

  “Not much more. She was really upset. I mean, that sounds like an obvious thing because her husband was dead and then there was the stuff that happened with Lucy and probably seeing Charlie—” Ben glanced at Charlie, then back at the road. “Judith was really shaken. They had to sedate her just to get her into the ambulance. I guess that’s when it hit her, like, the second she walked out of the building. She became hysterical, but like in the real sense of the word. Just completely overcome with grief.”

  “Where was Judith when the shooting started?”

  Ben said, “In her room. She heard the gun go off. She was supposed to lock the door and hide in the corner at the back of her classroom, but she ran out into the hallway because she knew the first bell was about to ring and she wanted to warn the kids not to come. I mean, if she could do it without being shot. She wasn’t thinking about her own safety, she said.” He looked at Charlie again. “There was a lot of that going around.”

  Sam told him, “Boats are very expensive to maintain.”

  “I’m not looking for a yacht.”

  “There’s insurance, docking fees, taxes.”

  Charlie could not listen to her estranged sister talk to her estranged husband about boats. She stared blankly at the road. She tried to work out what had just happened. Ben resigning—that was something she couldn’t deal with right now. She concentrated instead on the conversation with Sam. Ben had prattled on like a jailhouse snitch. Sam had been more circumspect. Kelly pregnant. The gun missing. Charlie had been at the school when the shooting occurred, she had been a witness to part of what played out, but she was more in the dark than either of them.

  Ben leaned over to look at Sam. “You should take over the Wilson case.”

  Sam laughed. “I couldn’t afford the pay cut.”

  He slowed down for a tractor on the road. The farmer was taking up both lanes. His combine was down. Ben beeped the horn twice and the man edged over enough for him to pass on the median.

  Ben and Sam resumed their idle boat chatter. Charlie found herself going back to Sam’s questions, trying to see where they led. Sam had always been faster at solving puzzles. Faster at most things, to be honest. She was certainly better in the courtroom. Charlie had been in awe yesterday, and she had also called it right the first time. Sam had looked like the quintessential Victorian Dracula, from her stylish clothes to her air of entitlement, to the way she had unhinged her jaw and swallowed Ken Coin like a plump rat.

  Sam asked, “How many bullets were fired?”

  Charlie waited for Ben to answer, but then she realized Sam was talking to her. “Four? Five? Six? I don’t know. I’m a really bad witness.”

  Ben said, “There’s five on the tape. One in—”

  “The wall, three in Pinkman, one in Lucy.” She leaned back over to look at Ben. “How about near Mrs. Pinkman’s room? Anything near her door?”

  “I have no idea,” he admitted. “The case is only two days old. They’re still doing the forensics. But there’s another witness. He said that he counted six shots, total. He’s been in combat. He’s pretty reliable.”

  Mason Huckabee.

  Charlie looked down at her hands.

  “What about the audio?”

  “There’s a really shaky cell phone call from the front office, but that was made after the shooting stopped. The audio you want came from an open mic on the cop in the hallway. That’s where Coin got the thing about ‘the baby.’” Ben added, “None of the gunshots were captured. We—at least I—don’t have the coroner’s report. There could be one more bullet inside the bodies.”

  Sam said, “I think I want to look at that video again.”

  “I can’t access it. I was kind of frank in my resignation letter,” Ben said. “I’m pretty sure I won’t get a referral.”

  Charlie wanted to crawl under the covers in her bed and go to sleep. They had a mortgage. They had a car payment. Health insurance premiums. Car insurance. Property taxes. All the bills from three years ago.

  “I’ll be your referral.” Sam had her hand deep in her purse, a leather bag that would likely pay for all of their bills. She pulled out Ben’s Enterprise USB. “Does Dad have a computer?”

  “He’s got a great TV,” Ben said. They had bought Rusty the same model that they had at home. This had been four years ago, before Colorado. Before the boat.

  Ben slowed the truck. They were at the HP, but he didn’t turn into the driveway. Blood had stained the red clay an oily black. This was where her father had fallen the night he’d walked to the end of the driveway to get the mail.

  Ben said, “They think the uncle stabbed Rusty.”

  “Faber?” Sam asked.

  “Rick Fahey.” Charlie remembered Lucy Alexander’s uncle from the press conference. “Why do they think it’s him?”

  Ben shook his head. “I’m way out of the loop on that one. I heard some gossip at the office, then Kaylee was complaining about getting called out late the night Rusty was stabbed.”

  “So they needed someone to talk to a possible suspect,” Charlie said, pretending that the way he’d casually dropped the name of the woman Charlie thought he was cheating with hadn’t driven a knife into her own gut. “I think Dad saw whoever did it.”

  “I do, too,” Sam said. “He spun a yarn to me about how there is value in forgiveness.”

  “Can you imagine,” Charlie said. “If Dad had lived, he probably would’ve offered to represent Fahey.”

 
No one laughed because they all knew that it was possible.

  Ben put the gear in first. He made the turn into the driveway, driving slowly to avoid the ruts.

  The farmhouse came into view, paint chipping, wood rotting, windows crooked, but not otherwise altered since the Culpeppers had knocked on the kitchen door twenty-eight years ago.

  Charlie felt Sam shift in her seat. She was steeling herself, strengthening her resolve. Charlie wanted to say something that would bring her comfort, but all she could do was hold onto Sam’s hand.

  Sam asked, “Why no security bars and gates here? The office is a fortress.”

  “Dad said that lightning doesn’t strike twice.” Charlie felt the lump come back into her throat. She knew that the over-abundant security at the office was for her sake, not Rusty’s. Of the handful of times she had been to the HP over the years, she had inevitably stayed out in her car, laying on her horn for Rusty to come out because she did not want to go inside. Maybe if she had visited more, her father would have taken better measures to keep the place secure.

  Ben said, “I can’t believe I was here last weekend, talking to him on the porch.”

  Charlie longed to lean against him, to put her head on his shoulder.

  “Brace yourselves,” Ben said. The wheels bounced into a pothole, then hit a deep rut, before smoothing out. He started to pull to the parking pad by the barn.

  “Go to the front door,” Charlie said. She did not want to go through the kitchen.

  “‘Goat fucker,’” Sam said, reading the graffiti. “The suspect knew him.”

  Charlie laughed.

  Sam did not. “I never thought I would come back here.”

  “You don’t have to.” Charlie offered, “I could go inside and look for the photo.”

  The set to Sam’s jaw said she was determined. “I want us to find it together.”

  Ben looped the truck around to the front porch. The grass was mostly weeds. A kid from down the street was supposed to keep it mowed, but Charlie was ankle-deep in dandelions when she stepped out of the truck.

  Sam held her hand again. They had not touched each other this much when they were children.

  Except for that day.

  Sam said, “I remember that I was sad about losing the red-brick house, but I also remember that it was a good day.” She turned to Charlie. “Do you remember that?”

  Charlie nodded. Gamma had wafted in and out of irritations, but everything had felt like it was starting to smooth out. “This could have been our home.”

  Ben said, “That’s all kids want, right? To have a safe place to live.” He seemed to remember himself. “I mean, safe before or—”

  “It’s all right,” Charlie told him.

  Ben tossed his suit jacket back into the truck. He grabbed his laptop from behind the seat. “I’ll go inside and work on the TV.”

  Sam placed the USB drive in his hands. She told him, “Make sure I get that back so I can have it destroyed.”

  Ben gave her a salute.

  Charlie watched him bolt up the stairs. He reached above the edge of the door frame for the key and let himself in.

  Even from the yard, Charlie could smell the familiar odor of Rusty’s unfiltered Camels.

  Sam looked up at the farmhouse. “Still higgledy-piggledy.”

  “I guess we’ll sell it.”

  “Did Dad buy it?”

  “The bachelor farmer was a bit of a peeping Tom. And a foot fetishist. And he stole a lot of lingerie.” Charlie laughed at Sam’s expression. “He had a lot of legal bills when he died. The family deeded the house to Rusty.”

  Sam asked, “Why didn’t Dad sell it years ago and rebuild the red-brick house?”

  Charlie knew why. There had been a lot of bills from Sam’s recovery. The doctors, the hospitals, the therapists, the rehab. Charlie was familiar with the crushing weight of an unexpected illness. Not much time or energy was left for rebuilding anything.

  She told Sam, “I think it was mostly inertia. You know Rusty wasn’t one for change.”

  “You can have the house. I mean—not that you asked, but I don’t need the money. I just want Mom’s photo. Or a copy of it. Of course I’ll make one for you. Or for me. You can have the original if—”

  “We’ll figure it out.” Charlie tried to smile. Sam was never rattled, but she was clearly rattled now. “I can do this for you, you know.”

  “Let’s go.” Sam nodded toward the house.

  Charlie helped her up the stairs, though Sam did not ask. Ben had left the door open. She could hear him opening more windows to help air the place out.

  They would be better off sealing it, like Chernobyl.

  The bulk of Charlie’s inheritance filled the front room. Old newspapers. Magazines. Copies of the Georgia Law Review dating back to the 1990s. File boxes from old cases. A prosthetic leg Rusty had taken as payment from a drunk everyone knew as Skip.

  “The boxes,” Sam said, because some of Gamma’s thrift store finds had never been unpacked. She peeled back the dry tape on a cardboard box marked EVERYTHING $1 EA and took a purple Church Lady shirt off the top.

  Ben watched from behind the TV set. He said, “There’s another box in the den. You could probably make a fortune from that stuff on eBay.” He looked at Charlie. “No Star Trek. Just Star Wars.”

  Charlie couldn’t believe she had managed to disappoint her husband even as far back as when she was thirteen. “Gamma picked everything out, not me.”

  His head ducked behind the set. He was trying to hook up the components that Rusty had unplugged, claiming all of the blinking lights were going to give him seizures.

  Sam said, “Okay, I think I’m ready.”

  Charlie did not know what she was ready for until she saw Sam looking into the long hallway that ran down the length of the house. The back door with its opaque window was at the far end. The kitchen was at the top. This was where Daniel Culpepper had stood when he had watched Gamma leave the bathroom.

  Charlie could still remember her own trek down the hallway in search of the toilet, the way she had screamed “Fudge” for her mother’s benefit.

  There were five doors, none of them laid out in any way that made sense. One door led to the creepy basement. One led to the chiffarobe. Another led to the pantry. Yet another led to the bathroom. One of the middle doors inexplicably led to the tiny downstairs bedroom where the bachelor farmer had died.

  Rusty had turned this room into his office.

  Sam went first. From behind, she seemed impervious. Her back was straight. Her head was held high. Even the slight hesitation in her gait was gone. Her only tell was that she kept her fingers touching the wall as if she needed to make sure she had access to something steady.

  “The back door.” Sam pointed toward the door. The frosted glass was cracked. Rusty had attempted to repair it with yellow masking tape. “You have no idea how many times I’ve woken up over the years dreaming about running out that door instead of walking into the kitchen.”

  Charlie said nothing, though she’d had the same kinds of dreams herself.

  “All right.” Sam wrapped her hand around the doorknob to Rusty’s office. She opened her mouth and inhaled deeply, like a swimmer about to put her head under water.

  The door opened.

  More of the same, but draped with the clinging odor of stale nicotine. The papers, the boxes, the walls, even the air had a yellow tint. Charlie tried to open one of the windows but paint had sealed it shut. She realized that her wrist felt sprained from banging on her father’s casket. She was not having a good day with inanimate objects.

  “I don’t see it,” Sam said, anxious. She was at Rusty’s desk. She pushed some papers around, stacked others together. “It’s not here.” She looked at the walls, but they were adorned with drawings from Charlie’s school projects. Only Rusty would tape on his wall an eighth grader’s rendering of the anatomy of a dung beetle.

  “There’s this one,” Charlie said, spotting th
e flimsy black metal frame that had held the photo for almost fifty years. “Shit, Dad.” Rusty had let the sun bleach out their mother’s face. Only the dark holes of her eyes and mouth were evident under the black mop of her hair.

  “It’s ruined.” Sam sounded devastated.

  Charlie felt sick with guilt. “I should’ve taken this from him a long time ago and had it preserved, or whatever you’re supposed to do. I’m so sorry, Sam.”

  Sam shook her head. She dropped the picture back on the file. “That’s not the photo he meant. Remember, he said there was a different one that he kept from us.” She started moving around papers again, checking behind manuscript boxes and bound depositions. She seemed distressed. The picture was obviously important on its own, but this was also one of the last things that Rusty had spoken to Sam about.

  Charlie took off her shoes so she didn’t catch the heels on something and break her neck. The next year of her life was going to be wasted going through all of this shit. She might as well start now.

  She hefted away some boxes from a shaky folding table. A row of unaccompanied red checkers spilled onto the floor. They managed to hit a pristine piece of bare hardwood. The sound was like jacks scattering.

  She asked Sam, “Do you think he’d keep it in his filing cabinets?”

  Sam looked wary. There were five wooden filing cabinets, all with heavy bar locks on them. “Can we find the keys in this mess?”

  “He probably had them on him when they took him to the hospital.”

  “Which means they’re in evidence.”

  “And we don’t know anyone at the DA’s office who could help us because my husband apparently told them all to fuck off.” She thought of Kaylee Collins, and silently added, Maybe not all of them.

  She asked Sam, “Dad was sure that you and I have never seen this picture before?”

  “I told you this already. He said that he kept it to himself. That it captured the moment that he and Gamma fell in love.”

  Charlie felt the poignancy of her father’s remark. His language had always been so annoyingly baroque that she had sometimes lost sight of the meaning. “He did love her,” she told Sam.

  “I know,” she said. “I let myself forget that he lost her, too.”