“Is that the same lady your dad—?”
“You really did get the long version, didn’t you?”
“Took most of the day.”
“I went by there today. Cleaned it up. You’re welcome to move in anytime. I just didn’t know how to bring it up. Didn’t want you to think I was kicking you out. It’s a nice apartment. Furnished. Full kitchen. Nice tub. I call it an apartment, but it’s a good home. Spacious. Clean. Got a porch. Swing. ’Course, most porches around here got one of those. Flat-screen. Cable. If it wasn’t built above a garage, you’d think it was a house. You can walk to work and you can walk Hope to school. Everything’s pretty close.”
She leaned in, pressed her face to my cheek, and kissed me. It was warm, soft, and earth-shattering. She touched my face. “Thank you.”
“Well…” I blushed. Beets were a lighter shade than my face. “You’re welcome.”
She placed her palm on my cheek, pulled closer to me, kissed me a second time. This time on the side of my mouth. “For everything.”
In all the ups and downs with Andie, even after her and the doctor, I’d never been unfaithful. Never strayed. But, I will admit that second kiss tugged on me in places that, well, let’s just say it tugged on me. I said nothing, which was good, ’cause I’d have never gotten the words out my mouth.
She sat next to me, staring up at me, rocking back and forth with her arms wrapped around her knees. “Were you ever unfaithful to your wife?”
I looked at her. “Good night, lady!”
“What?”
“You don’t mess around when it comes to asking tough questions, do you?”
“I don’t have much patience for games.”
“I gather that.”
“Well? Seriously.”
“No. Never unfaithful.”
“Not even in your mind?”
“Well, I got a pretty good imagination, but I’ve never let it go very far.”
“What about me?”
“What about you?”
“Have you seen me in your imagination?”
I laughed. “Well, that’s the funny thing. I’ve never needed much imagination when it comes to you. Between that truck driver’s cab and the parking lot of the Ritz, I’ve seen a good bit.”
“You saw that?”
“Tough to miss.”
She smiled. “Good. I was hoping so.”
The conversation in my mind was loud. Technically, I was no longer married. The formality with the court would take a few days. For all practical purposes, Andie thought we’d been divorced since she signed the papers nearly a year ago. I carried them around in a coffee-stained folder not because I needed her signature, but because I needed mine. We’d been separated more than three years. And three years is a long time to go without a woman when you’ve been used to having one.
She stood. I stopped her. “The apartment, tomorrow?”
“Tomorrow.”
“You sure you’re okay with it?”
She put her hand on her hip. The curve of her body in the moonlight did not escape me. “Let me put this in perspective for you. Anything’s better than Billy’s, or that station wagon, or the last half dozen crap holes I’ve put my daughter in.” She looked around. “This is the first time, maybe in her life, that we’ve had a start. A life. A clean one. With good people. And I’m not saying that to put more pressure on you. I’m just saying, that we think it’s great. A boy, a good boy, held my daughter’s hand and walked her to class today. Made her feel like somebody. Life here is… better than I’ve known in a long time. You know, I actually heard her laugh today. My baby laughed. You know what that did to me?”
I waited. Let her talk.
She knelt behind me, placing her hands on my shoulders. She spoke over me. “You know who made her laugh?”
“Is this a trick question?”
She chuckled. “No. It was Brodie.”
I nodded. “He gets that from his momma. She could always laugh at most anything.”
“Well, wherever he gets it, you need to bottle it up and sell it. Your money woes would disappear overnight.” I was learning that she was real touchy, feely. She liked to have her hands on me. Which, to be honest, didn’t bother me a bit. She squeezed my shoulder. “See you in the morning.”
She walked off and I was pretty sure she knew I was watching. Again.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
We dropped Brodie and Hope at school. He walked her in, carrying her bag. Sam crossed her arms and shook her head. “You done good with that one.”
We walked to the truck, stepped in, and began driving. I was in no hurry. She picked up on it as the streets rolled by. “This is a quiet town. Real Mayberryish.”
“We have our moments.”
“Such as?”
We passed a church on the left. I looked at it as I spoke. “Few years back, a man walked in there Sunday morning. Place was packed. Marquee out front said, REVIVAL. Singing. Dancing. People smiling. Anyway, man walks in and starts shooting people. Kills eight before the ushers rush him. He kills two of them. When I got there, the man was DRT.”
“DRT?”
“Dead right there.”
She shook her head.
“Like I said, we have our moments.”
“You’d think church would be a safe place.”
I laughed.
“What’s so funny?”
I turned, drove a few blocks, pulled out onto a wider street, passed a few farms, a tractor supply store, and finally stopped in front of a large white church that set back off the street. I studied the grounds and church building. “Twenty years ago, I was a newbie patrol officer. Hadn’t even made my way up to narcotics yet. Still wet behind the ears. We got a little elementary school down the street. Closer to town. During recess one day, two boys in a Chevrolet—Carl Trudeau and Kyle Becker—been drinking since the night before, drove by the schoolyard and picked out the only kid on a swing and shot him through the chest. The kid was seven. The boys in the car drove off. We tracked that car and those boys for the better part of three days. Knew if we kept the pressure up, they’d either slip up or go to sleep. We found them passed out in an abandoned barn. We arrested them, separated them, and started our interrogation. Since I’d known that little boy, I was more than a little interested in their answers. Few hours later, we had confessions out of both of them. Detailed, too. Couple of singing canaries. Wrote them out in their own hand. They did a pretty good job, too. But since it was after midnight and the secretary was gone, we just figured we’d wait till the next morning to get them typed and signed. I went home and went to sleep.
“Next morning, when I showed back up, I grabbed a cup of coffee and found a man waiting on me in a shiny brown suit. Alligator boots. Handed me his card. Said he was the attorney for the two. Big smile on his face. The court threw out our ‘unsigned’ confessions. Carl and Kyle walked. Told the judge that we coerced them. Showed them their bruises and black eyes. Said they wanted to press charges against us.” I shook my head. “If I’d have hit that boy, he’d have had more than a black eye. Carl went to California. Never seen again. Kyle disappeared a few years, only to resurface here.” A new white Cadillac sat in front of the church. “Shiny suit. Shiny car. Dapper-Dan hair. He started a church. Pastor Kyle now spends his days talking about ‘the ways of a sinner’ and ‘the Love of the Lord.’ ” I nodded. “I went in there one time. Heard him preach. Lots of people. He’s good. Convincing, too.”
“You’re not serious?”
“Yep. Been in there almost fifteen years. Drives by me and doesn’t even wave. I see him in a restaurant and he acts like we never met. But, we met.” I pulled out my wallet, unfolded his handwritten confession. “I keep thinking one day, I’ll walk into his church, lay this down, and ask him if he remembers that little black boy on the swing. ’Cause I do. I had to take the lollipop out of his mouth and close his eyes.”
She stared through the glass. Spoke softly. “So much for ‘quiet
little town.’ ” She paused a moment. “What can you do? It’s been a long time and while your word is good, it’s yours against his. Plus, you’re retired.”
“Whenever somebody reminds me that I’m retired, I think of Frank Hamer.”
“Who?”
“Captain Frank Hamer. Retired lawman. Pretty distinguished career back in the Roaring Twenties. Kept law and order when there was none. Wounded seventeen times himself. Left for dead four times. He was tenacious and once he started something, he didn’t quit on it.”
“I hear a punch line coming.”
“The governor brought him in, asked him to lead the posse tasked with capturing public enemy number one, Bonnie and Clyde. Frank hunted them for months. Hounded them. Never let up. There were thousands of lawmen looking for the duo but he was the only one who found them. Set up an ambush. Waiting with Browning automatic rifles. Caught them on a deserted country road. All alone. Clyde was shot over fifty times when they pulled him out of the car. Bonnie about thirty.” I did the windshield wiper–thing with my finger. “Never underestimate retired Rangers. Not getting a paycheck doesn’t mean we’re off duty.”
“I’m gathering that.”
I drove her to the apartment, unlocked the door, and let her in. Two bedrooms, kitchen, den. “Given that Andie had a limitless bank account, it’s well decorated.”
“I’ll say.”
“She didn’t spare much expense. Both rooms are furnished. Kitchen has everything you need. TV is HD, which means football games look like you’re in them, and the bathroom looks like something out of a designer magazine.”
She walked into the bathroom. “That’s a big tub.”
“Andie’s always been a big fan of bathing. She’d sit in there till her toes turned to raisins, empty the water, fill it up, and do it again.”
She ran her fingers along the ledge. “I like her.”
I walked to the fridge. “Peterson’s is our local grocery. I have an account, which thank goodness she didn’t wreck ’cause eating just wasn’t on her radar, and John, the guy that owns it, I called him and told him you could charge whatever you needed to get going. Just introduce yourself when you walk in.” She had that look on her face. The one that made me think I’d shamed her ’cause I’d done too much. I tried to dodge it.
“You keep a pretty tight record of accounts, don’t you?”
“What do you mean?”
“Accounts payable versus receivable.”
She nodded, then shrugged. “Not sure how else to do it.”
“It’s a good way to live, I think. Means you’re honest.”
She fought to make eye contact. “I’m not always.”
“I imagine you want to get settled. Buy some groceries. Make yourself at home. Phone works. The number is scribbled on the paper, inside the handset. Speed dial number one is my cell phone.” A set of keys hung on the wall. “I had to sell Andie’s Honda to pay for one of her treatment centers, but below you is an old Ford. Pretty good truck, too. It’s the widow’s but she can’t drive ’cause her cataracts are too bad and she’s asked me to drive it every now and then. Keep it running. You’re welcome to it. No A/C but”—I smiled—“if you drive fast enough with the windows down, you can hardly tell the difference.”
I may be thick sometimes but I’m not stupid. I knew I was doing more than just leaving her to get settled. I’d brought her here, and I was, whether I like it or not, responsible. I’d figured that out in New Orleans. There is an emotional thing that occurs after you’ve been protecting someone. It happens in both the protected, and the protector. Cutting that tie is a purposeful act. I’d done it many times. And rightly so, but this one, for reasons I couldn’t quite nail down, was different. Tougher. And I had helped protect folks who were equally as needy so the degree to which Sam and Hope needed help wasn’t the issue. It was something else and I was afraid of it.
She saw it on my face. “Go ahead. You can leave. I’m a big girl.”
“You sure?”
She smirked and traced her belly with both hands. “I have stretch marks. I earned them. So, yes. I’m sure.”
“That’s probably more information than I needed.”
Ever spunky, she smiled. “And you got the picture, didn’t you?”
“Good point.”
“Besides.” She stopped me. “Hope and I are cooking you guys spaghetti soon as I get paid. And I’m paying for the groceries.”
“Sounds good.” And, it did, too. Not because of the food, although I’m a fan of spaghetti, but rather because there would be an end to the me-not-seeing-her part of the week.
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
A week passed. George called. Said he had some papers for me. I dropped Brodie at school, told him I’d be gone all day, and then stopped by the Peach and asked Sam if she could watch him until I got home later tonight. She said she would.
I stopped by George’s and then drove east. No radio. No noise. No nothing. I was lost in the once Technicolor, now black-and-white, memories of something I’d never get back.
I wanted her to know she was free and we were finished. And I wanted her to know it from my hand. Or, maybe I was wondering if we were. Maybe I was looking for a reason. When I got there, what I found did not give me what I was looking for.
I walked to the counter, envelope tucked under my arm, and said, “I’d like to see Andie Steele.”
“Well, she’s just right popular today.” The receptionist stood and turned a clipboard around. “Sign here, please.”
I did.
“Are you carrying any narcotics or anything that could be used as a weapon.”
I supposed a pocketknife and two handguns qualified. I nodded. “Yes.”
“Sir, I can’t let you in unless you return them to your vehicle or place them with my supervisor.”
I showed her my identification. She pulled another sheet out of her desk and said, “Sign here.” I did and then she clicked a button that unlocked a door. “Her room is that way, room 116, but I think she’s outside near the tables.”
“Thank you.”
I walked the halls. People sat in their rooms staring blankly out windows, read paperbacks, played checkers, or drank coffee. A big glass window overlooked the lawn and tables. Andie sat at one. Still thin. Long hair. Frayed ends. The veins on the backs of her hands were showing. A steaming mug in her hand, the tag of the tea bag fluttering just outside the rim.
It would be a lie to tell you that this was the first time I’d been there. In truth, I’d been there a good bit. ’Course, Andie didn’t know that. The last time was the night I bumped into Sam and Hope on the highway. Having been there was probably the reason I hit them since my mind wasn’t concentrating on the road in front of me but rather the one behind me.
It was the first Sunday in April. I had driven all night and turned off I-10 at an exit with nothing. No gas, no food, no bathroom, no roach motel. Simply the intersection of two roads. They hid this place in the sticks on purpose. A white-clapboard church rose up on the hill surrounded by grass and a dirty parking lot. The marquee read, HAPPY EASTER. A man in a blue suit was setting up orange cones to steer traffic. I wound eight miles through a series of back roads, ending on a red clay one lane. Another mile and I unlatched the gate and drove down the narrow lane to the clearing.
I tugged down on the brim of my hat, pulled up my collar, and eyed a low-hanging, gray sky. The world around me had begun to bloom but winter wasn’t letting go just yet. I threw my pack over my shoulder and shoved my hands deep in the pockets.
East Texas is more piney woods. Some Louisiana swamp. The half-mile trail bordered a cypress swamp, wound along an old hand-dug ditch, through a pocket of towering oaks, around a few acres of ten-year-old planted pines and into a dried-up part of the cypress swamp. Stiff from sitting, I rubbed the ache in my thigh, pushing my thumb into the unnatural knot.
I checked my watch. I had time. I crept along, watching and listening—something I’d learned as
a kid. Dad had seen to that. Some of the cypress trees looked seventy feet tall. I skirted some standing water and walked to the far edge, rimmed by a split rail fence. Winter rye, emerald green, stretched from the fence to a cluster of buildings some half mile away.
My trail ended at the ruins of a large cypress tree. It had been cut four feet off the ground and the stump had rotted itself hollow. Big enough to sit in—a good place to hide. A holly tree grew up alongside it. The limbs draped toward the ground and the waxy leaves offered concealment. On previous trips, I’d trimmed a few of the limbs for a better view. The fence was a visual barrier and not designed to keep people either in or out. The people here, like Andie, could leave if they wanted. Where they went was another issue. As was what happened to them once the court caught up with them. Most had more reasons for staying than they did leaving.
I climbed inside my stump, brushed off my seat, and poured myself a cup of black coffee from a dented and scuffed green thermos. Leaning back against the trunk of the tree, I stared out through the limbs and blew off the steam. Wouldn’t be long now.
A few minutes to six I set up my tripod and attached the spotting scope to it—a 12-40X Leupold. In practice, it allowed me to see the color of someone’s eyes at half a mile. I checked my watch, adjusted my face to the eyepiece of the spotting scope, and began turning the focus ring. The picnic table, a little over 800 yards away, came into focus. One eye staring through the spotting scope, one eye on my watch face, I waited.
A male cardinal perched above me. I replaced the battery in my hearing aid with a spare from my shirt pocket and slid it back into my left ear. The cardinal’s song grew louder. The rocket-red male hopped to another limb and the brownish-red female appeared just below him. Calling upward. Wooing. The two chased each other, a flurry of aerial acrobatics, then they disappeared dancing over the tree line. I sipped, watched the picnic table, breathing deeply and exhaling slowly.
Frankenstein behind the woodpile.
At 6:01 a.m. Andie appeared. Gray sweatpants, light blue hooded sweatshirt, and a steaming mug. Motion lights detected her movement and turned on, lighting the patio in fluorescent orange. She walked to the picnic table and sat on top, her feet on the bench, the mug between her hands wedged between her knees. She hovered, sipping occasionally. The string from the tea bag dangled across the outside of her hand. The breeze rattled and spun it. Her hair was pulled back. A single ponytail. Maybe not as bouncy. Single strands fell across her eyes. The blond highlights had grown out. A few of the other guests woke, stepped outside, and stretched. One or two waved at her and then disappeared back inside to shower and find the courage to face another day. Breakfast started at eight. The programs at nine. The monitoring was 24/7. Urine tests random and often.