by Rachel Ford
“You did,” I said. “The same time you told me your business with Jason was done. Before your guy burned his truck, and tried to burn down his sister’s house.”
Trav’s eyes narrowed, but he said nothing for a long moment. Then he gestured to three guys, Mike and the two gossips. “Go see if they need help in the garage.”
The guys nodded. Mike paused at the door to glance back. Then he walked through, into the garage. The other two followed.
Travis waited until the door clicked shut behind them. “I’d say you got balls coming into my shop and throwing out an accusation like that. But it’s more stupid than balls.”
“Not as stupid as your guy coming for my family.”
Travis looked me over. “I’m going to give you thirty seconds to explain why you’re here. If I’m not impressed by time the thirty seconds are over, they’re going to be taking you away in an ambulance.”
“Your guy’s truck was spotted twice, before and after each fire.”
“That doesn’t prove shit.”
“Maybe not. But the cops are looking for a truck, and a connection. So far, I’ve kept my mouth shut, because you and I: we had an understanding. Our business had concluded. And I took you to be a man of your word.”
“I am a man of my word.”
I nodded. “Then your guy is going rogue. He’s causing me problems, and there’s a good chance he’s going to cause you problems.”
“Don’t make threats you can’t back up, Mr. Day.”
I smiled at that. So he’d done some digging, to find out who I was. I guessed I was supposed to be surprised, maybe even scared. “I never do. And I’m not threatening you. Because I believe you, when you say you’re a man of your word.
“I’m giving you a head’s up: sooner or later, the cops are going to connect the dots. And if they track the burnings back to Tiny, they’ll track them back to you.”
“I had nothing to do with that,” he said.
And I believed him. Not that I thought he’d hesitate to lie if it suited him, but I didn’t think he was lying now. He looked genuinely surprised. But more than that: the attacks had been too stupid, and Tiny had been too obvious. Travis would be more subtle than that.
“But your guy did. And something tells me that a guy who is going to go behind your back to burn your business associates’ relatives in their beds over a bloody nose isn’t a guy you can trust not to finger you when he goes down.”
Travis said nothing.
“See, what I want is what we agreed to in the first place: no more trouble.”
“That can be arranged,” he said.
“Can it?”
He nodded slowly. “I’m promising nothing, until I have a talk with Tiny. But if you’re right –”
“I am.”
“I’ll deal with it.”
“And no one messes with me or my family again?”
He nodded a second time. “Same deal as before.”
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Clark’s fingerprinting team wrapped up that night. The truck got hauled away Thursday morning. Jason separated the garbage from his belongings, and his father picked him up Thursday afternoon.
Missy called to tell me she, Toby, Michaela and Jon would be down for the funeral. She confirmed the details with what she’d seen online. I should have called her and told her. She didn’t say it. Maybe she didn’t even think it. But I did.
I’d been so focused on everything else – Megan and the kids, Jason and his drama, and the killer – that I’d forgotten about her and Jon. I felt bad about that.
I moved back to my own place Friday morning. The yard still smelled faintly of burned plastics and rubbers and who knew what else. The house smelled worse. I spent the morning airing the place out and washing everything: curtains, blankets and anything and everything that could have absorbed the smell.
I attended Andy’s funeral that afternoon. Megan was there, and so were the kids, all dressed in black, all red-eyed and puffy cheeked. Jason was there too.
They were in the front of the chapel, right before the dais. An urn sat on a low table in the center, surrounded by flowers: hundreds of lilies and roses, orchids and chrysanthemums, carnations and gladioli, all of them white. They sat in baskets and vases. They’d been strewn over the ground and lain on the pulpit.
I started to move toward the front of the church, to join the family. Jason turned around, recognized me, and shook his head. Three quick shakes, then a gesture toward a form by Megan. A wizened form, with fine strands of silver hair, and a back all hunched over with age.
Not her father. It was a woman’s figure. Not her mother. It was too old for that. And they were both standing by Jason.
It took a second, but I understood: Roxanne Miller. She looked unlike the woman I’d grown up with. Too old and bent for that. But exactly like the woman in Wagley’s video, albeit it from the back.
I stood in the aisle for a moment. Then I detoured to a back pew. Not really a pew, but rather a long, comfortable plush neon yellow bench.
More people came in. More people took their seats. No one sat in the back with me. Which was alright by me.
A man in a suit shuffled to the far corner of the dais. The acting minister, I guessed. Whoever they’d picked to give the funeral service.
More people came in and took seats. The place was filling up fast. I picked up a family from my peripheral vision. They hesitated in the doorway and diverted my way.
I glanced up, about to be annoyed that someone had decided to approach me when I’d made myself so unapproachable. But it was Missy and Jon, and Toby and Michaela.
I got up. Toby and Michaela shook my hand. Missy and Jon gave me hugs. “How are you holding up, sweetie?” she asked.
“I’m fine,” I told her. “How are you guys?”
She squeezed Jon’s shoulder. “We’re okay.”
I looked them over, and I believed her. Missy looked good: healthy and happier than she’d ever looked during her and Andy’s time together. Not happy in the moment. This was a different kind of happy. This was a tranquility of the soul, an overall state of life happiness.
It looked good on her. And it looked good on Jon too. He’d been a quiet, almost fearful kid. He wasn’t anymore. He had the same kind of happiness his mom did. The kind that sorrow in the moment couldn’t erase.
He hugged me and said, “I’m sorry for your loss, Uncle Owen.” Like his mother had no doubt coached him to say: very polite and very proper. Not necessarily very heartfelt.
“Me too, little man. And I’m sorry for yours.”
“Thanks,” he said.
Toby was sympathetic, and much the same as he’d always been: an easygoing guy, not overfond of me as the brother of the ex, but not hostile. He looked like he meant it when he shook my hand and said, “I’m sorry, man.”
Michaela looked like a cross between her mother and father. We’d met a few times already, but only in passing. So she watched me now a little shyly. “I’m sorry for your loss,” she said, with the same grave politeness her brother had used.
Then we took our seats. A pianist took up station at her instrument and started to play. Something classical and sad. The preacher took to the pulpit.
The service was good, as funeral services went: full of fond anecdotes and hopes for better days to come. Resurrection and reuniting; heaven and eternal life; a better place, without sorrow and sadness.
People wept. Megan wept, and Roxanne wept. Daniel wept and Ben wept. Maisie watched blankly, expressionlessly, like her mind was miles away from her physical body. The look I knew too well, again.
Missy squeezed my arm now and then. Jon watched soberly and silently.
The service ended. People walked to the dais and left more flowers, and random tributes. A woman left a miniature rose plant in a pot. An old guy left a book. I couldn’t tell what; it was too far away to read the title.
I hadn’t brought anything. I hadn’t realized that had been the pla
n. Neither did Missy, for I guessed the same reason. We weren’t church regulars. We didn’t know the congregation’s customs.
While this went on, the preacher ushered Megan and the kids to the exit for the funeral line. Her mom and dad walked with them. So did Jason.
And Roxanne Miller.
The preacher was talking to Megan. She didn’t look our way. The kids noticed me. Maisie gave me an almost half-smile. Her eyes still had that vacant, grief-stricken look. So did Daniel and Ben’s.
Jason flashed me an uneasy and apologetic half-smile. Mr. and Mrs. Rathe nodded. I stared straight ahead as Roxanne Miller passed.
Missy watched the little procession, then turned surprised eyes to me. “Is that…?”
I nodded.
“What the hell is she doing here?”
“I have no idea.”
Toby leaned in. “What’s going on?” She whispered a quick reply. His eyebrows rose. “The grandmother?”
She nodded. He puffed out his cheeks and blew out a long breath. “Okay…”
Then the pianist started to play again, and the crowd started to usher out. We waited in silence until it was our turn to go.
Missy squeezed my arm again. She didn’t say anything. Not to me. She leaned over to Toby and whispered something a second time. He nodded and moved ahead in the line.
They were arranged in a line: Megan first, then the kids, then Roxanne, the Rathe’s – Mr. and Mrs. and Jason – and finally the preacher.
Megan shook Toby’s hand robotically, like she might any well-wishing stranger’s. Her expression changed when she noticed Missy, though. It hardened. She glanced over the entire party. Her eyes rested on me for half a second before her gaze faltered.
She looked away. She shook Missy’s hand, though.
Missy said, “I’m so sorry for your loss, Mrs. Welch.”
Megan said, “Thank you.”
Missy moved down the line, shaking Maisie’s hand, and then Daniel’s, and then Ben’s. Repeating the same sentiment. “I’m sorry, sweetie. We’re praying for you, honey. You’re in our hearts, sweetie.”
Michaela echoed her mother’s words in a quiet tone, “I’m sorry for your loss, Mrs. Welch.”
Megan smiled and leaned down to pull her into a hug. “That’s very sweet of you.” Then she looked at Jon, the next in our line.
He was a lanky kid, already as tall as his dad had been. He was probably going to end up over six feet tall. Maybe considerably over. He looked like a combination of Missy and Andy and my mom, like the genes of the men in his family had skipped over him completely.
She stood again and pulled him into a hug too. A less willing hug, to judge by the tension of his body, than Michaela’s had been. “Oh Jon, it is so good to see you. Your father would be so happy to know you came.”
She kissed him on the cheek and smiled with eyes that brimmed full of tears. “It is so good to see Andy’s family back together again.”
He murmured out his condolences and eyed the line, like he was looking to make his escape.
She squeezed him. “Oh baby boy, don’t worry about us. You lost your dad too.”
He eyed the line again.
“Here, your great-grandma is here. Your daddy’s grandma.”
Missy glanced back at that. She was shaking hands with Jason at the moment. He must have heard it too, because his face went red with embarrassment.
“I don’t think you ever met her,” Megan was going on. She wrapped an arm around Jon’s shoulder, and was drawing him with her, down the line. She was sniffling and smiling. “But this is so like your dad: bringing family together even in death.”
Toby had seemed to stall in front of Roxanne. I guessed that was what Missy had whispered: keep her busy.
Now, Megan was heading toward the old woman with Jon in tow. Missy said, “Excuse me,” to Jason, and turned around. She took a step back and stopped directly in front of the other woman.
She arched her eyebrows inward and upward like she was going to cry. “Oh honey, let me give you a hug.” She didn’t give Megan a chance to say no, or pull away. She moved in quickly, wrapping the other woman in a firm embrace. “My God, my heart is just breaking for you and those kids. You poor, poor thing.”
Jon made his escape. Toby ushered him and Michaela toward the door. Missy didn’t hang on any longer than necessary, and Megan pulled away as soon as she could.
But it was enough. They bypassed Roxanne.
Megan scowled at me as I passed. I pretended not to notice. I shook her hand and hugged the kids. The line was all out of order now, so I could skip Roxanne without being terribly obvious about it. I shook the Rathes’ hands, Jason’s a bit more firmly than his parents’, and the pastor’s.
Then I left the church. Missy and Toby were waiting for me. “Sorry about bailing on you like that, honey,” she said. “But that woman was about to catch hands. To think – to even think – of introducing my boy to that monster. Of bringing her here, to Andy’s funeral, after everything she did to him – to both of you.”
She shook her head, her face red with rage.
“She’s on some kind of forgiveness thing,” I said.
“Oh yes. Andrew mentioned it to Jon.”
Jon nodded. “Spent a whole call talking about it, you mean. ‘He who is without sin among you, let him be the first to throw a stone.’”
“He wanted Jon to watch his sermons,” Missy explained. “Online. I guess they stream them.”
“I didn’t want to,” he said. “He thought it was because of…well, everything. I told him it had nothing to do with that, I just wasn’t interested. He got real mad about that.”
“Said we weren’t ‘real Christians.’”
“He never did get over the temper,” I acknowledged.
“Yeah.”
“Listen,” Toby said, “we were thinking we could get something to eat. You want to come with us?”
I glanced back at the church. I wanted to stay for Maisie and the boys. I wanted to go for Jon and Missy. In the end, I chose Jon and Missy.
We went to a steakhouse, and the kids ordered more appetizers than anything else. Michaela got chocolate milk, French fries, some kind of fried corn and cheese ball appetizer drenched in southwest sauce, cheese and bacon bits. She paired it with mac and cheese. Jon got fried pickles and mac and cheese bites – another deep-fried concoction, this time of breaded balls of macaroni and cheese, fried until golden brown. He paired this with ribs and curds.
The meal started with an awkward silence. No one seemed to know exactly what to say. But things livened up when the food came. Jon wanted to try Michaela’s bacon corn bites. She wanted to try his mac and cheese bites. They both decided the other had chosen well. “I should have got those,” he said.
“I’ll trade you,” she said.
So they swapped. Toby declared he needed to collect the dad tax – which consisted of sampling everything. Missy wanted French fries.
The dad tax didn’t end with a sample. Michaela protested that her dad was going to eat all of her mac and cheese bites. He concurred and decided to order his own basket. “I’ll share with you.”
Missy had ordered some kind of fruity drink that smelled strongly of rum. She took a sip and sighed. “I don’t care how the steak is: this alone makes it worth it.”
Her kids declared the appetizers sold them. Toby murmured his agreement through a mouthful of mac and cheese bites. The meal went okay.
Better than okay. Despite the circumstances, they were happy. They laughed, they teased each other, they traded jokes. They got along.
They were, I guess, a functional family. I didn’t have much experience with that. But I knew the other kind, the kind full of anger and aggressiveness, either passive or otherwise. They weren’t that.
“So,” I asked as everyone settled into their entrees, “how long are you guys here for?”
“We’re just staying the night and heading back tomorrow,” Toby said.
�
�Ah.”
“We figured it would be best that way,” Missy said.
I nodded. “I’m glad you could make it.”
She smiled at me. “Us too, sweetie. Now, how are you holding up?”
I shrugged. “I’m fine.”
She made a face, the kind of face that said she wasn’t buying that. “What have you been doing?”
“Doing? Not much.”
“Owen,” she said, and her voice was almost chiding. “You know I know you better than that.”
“We saw the videos, Uncle Owen,” Jon said. “That Truther guy?”
“Wagley,” I said with a grimace.
“Momma says you’re trying to solve the mystery,” Michaela declared.
I raised an eyebrow at Missy. “Does she?”
“Well?” she asked. “What else were you doing with all those diagrams and whatnot?”
“I’m just trying to figure it out,” I said.
“Oh Owen.” She sighed. “You’ve got to be careful.”
“I’m working with foam board and my printer,” I said. “I don’t know what the stats are, but I’ve got to think death by poster board is pretty rare.”
She made a face. “Very funny.”
I grinned. “Thank you.”
“But what happens when you do figure it out?”
“I might not.”
She snorted. “Please. You’re probably smarter than half the police department. So if they don’t figure it out, you will.”
I felt her vote of confidence was wildly misplaced. But I didn’t belabor the point. “Well, if I figure it out, I’ll tell Detective Clark.”
She nodded. “You make sure you do, Owen. I’m going to be extremely, extremely pissed off if I find out you decided to do something heroic – or stupid – and got yourself killed.”
“Believe me,” Toby said, “you don’t want her pissed off.”
Jon and Michaela laughed and agreed.
She nodded a second time. “Exactly. Not even death will protect you, you do something that stupid.”
Chapter Thirty-Eight
I went back to their hotel with them. I said my goodbyes to Jon and shook Michaela’s hand again. Toby took the kids up to bed.