Home Fires

by W L Ripley

  “Anything you say.”

  “There. You’re learning.”

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  Tommy Mitchell was surprised by his emotions. His sense of loss over his father’s death had more impact than he would have guessed. The tears came and he couldn’t stop them. He loved the old man and now he was gone. Tears dried and composed for the funeral. Fucking Haller killed his father. Some friend. Didn’t understand it but Pam told them Vernon was going to fire Fat ass.

  Tommy’s father lay in a coffin at the Evergreen Funeral Home, there’s a shitty name for a place where you take dead people. People he knew came by the visitation ceremony to offer their condolences, Tommy chain-smoked in his dark blue suit, being asked to smoke outside. Wearing no tie, no tears now, he thought about his future and intermittently took surreptitious sips off a flask of Wild Turkey. What he really wanted was a hit on some good weed, but not here. His head wasn’t in the same place as the event. Unsure how to deal with it. Get this funeral over and then figure out what to do next.

  Pam and Alex were there, Pam in a black dress, looking like a movie star with her legs showing, Alex looked like a zombie, as if somebody woke him up in the middle of a dream.

  “You okay?” Alex asked him.

  Tommy nodded. “Thanks, I’m okay.” They hugged. Hell, the guy was his brother.

  Pam was greeting people and smiling, thanking them for coming. He looked at Pam and she looked back giving him a funny look. What? She walked to the door, and then with her hand on the knob, looked back at him and nodded with a flirty wink. Outside?

  Okay. So he followed her. She was over to the side of the parking lot now and waiting for him, nobody around, asking him if he had a cigarette and, “maybe a sip out of that flask you think you’re hiding”.

  You think you’re so damn smart, don’t you, was what he wanted to say but instead he shrugged and said, “Who cares anyone sees it? I’m in mourning. Can’t you tell? Got a suit on and everything.”

  She accepted a cigarette, smelling her perfume as she leaned over to take the flame. He lighted it and she placed a hand lightly on his arm, lingering there, him feeling the warmth. She smelled like a million bucks and he caught a little cleavage. Why was he thinking about that with his dad lying inside a box?

  She surprised him saying, “Get a good look?”

  He said, “You want guys to look, way you dress and act.”

  She gave him a funny smile like she knew something or like she was in control asking him did he like what he saw? Always turning things around on a guy. He was aroused, hating it, but still caught by her smell, her look, and those legs.

  “Maybe we can work something out,” she said.

  Looking at her, trying to figure out her meaning. Looking back at him, half-smile on her face, then taking a drag on her cigarette. He had to admit the bitch was smoking hot.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Depends on what you think I mean.”

  He gave her an up-and-down look of appraisal, chewing on it in his head, damn, it’d be worth it wouldn’t it? Look at her; she’s ready. She wants it.

  Tommy said, “What about Alex?”

  She smiled, crossing one lovely ankle over the over, leaning against a black SUV, careful not to muss her dress, putting some breath in it and said, “What about Alex?” Shining it back on him but still leaving the meaning open to interpretation, felt the bourbon swimming around in his head. This was some dirty shit in his head but man she was spinning his wheels.

  He didn’t know what to say so she said it for him. “I got a bottle of Pappy Van Winkle out at my place. How about you come out and drink real bourbon instead of that convenience store bullshit?” she said. “Alex has to stay here, take care of some of tomorrow’s funeral arrangements. We both need to get away from this. Nobody will think anything of it.”

  His mouth was dry, but he said, “Sure.”

  She let her fingers delicately trace his jawline. “See you there.”

  Wow.

  Jake pulled the Lincoln Mark IV behind the grain elevator. Harper produced the office key and showed it to Jake.

  Jake said, “There is a sneaky side to you that concerns me going forward.”

  “Says the man about to illegally break into a place of business.”

  Tommy Mitchell drove out to Alex’s place. Pam called it ‘her place’, Tommy thinking of it as Alex’s, wondering if Pam thought dad’s ranch was now ‘hers’, Pam hard to figure but boy could she ever sell her stuff.

  Stereo played hip-hop, got his motor revving with Tech-Nine rapping through his speakers. He found a joint in his glove box and fired it up getting his mellow on; toking on some top drawer weed, mixed in with swallows off the flask. Synergy was good for you, saying it out loud, laughing at himself.

  Shiiittttt, feeling good now.

  Everything was going to be all right, baby. Get his sister-in-law in a compromising position and show her who was boss. Yeah. Who’s your daddy now, girl? And, he’d have something to hold over Pam, the cunt’s, head. Pulling into the driveway now thinking, things were about to change.

  Too late and what the hell anyway?

  He’d always been a what-the-hell guy. Why change?

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  “I’ll check the office,” said Harper as they entered the office of the Mitchell Enterprises’ grain elevator. “You go ahead and do whatever you need to do inside the plant.”

  “I’m uncomfortable you being here,” Jake said. “This is nothing but a preliminary look. Nothing I learn here can be used in court. I just want to see if I’m on the right track.”

  “No access without me. Besides, it’s exciting.”

  “It’s not a movie. This could go south so quick we’re caught.”

  “I’m just a poor little girl, thought she’d left an earring in the office and can’t find it anywhere and know anyone would understand me being out here looking for it.”

  “Yet maybe not as understanding that I’m with you.”

  “I’ll pout and look sincere and give it back if we’re caught.”

  Shaking his head, Jake saying, “I don’t know which of us is crazier.”

  “I do,” she said, batting her lashes.

  Jake walked back to the floor where employees would bag up feed corn and looked around, hoping to find something to prove Gage may’ve been killed here. If Haller was one of the killers he might go down for a different killing. It was a jumbled mess of intrigue, greed and sex but somewhere there had to be an element to tie it all together.

  Jake checked the sump area and the rancid stench of rotting grain assailed his olfactory. Wondering why they just didn’t throw Gage in the pit and call it an accident. That’s when Jake noticed it.

  The grain sump. Floating on the rancid pool of decayed grain was a sediment that looked similar to what he’d found on the gas and brake pedals of Gage’s Dodge Charger. It was also on the floor around the sump.

  Meaning that the killers were likely employees of the Mitchells or one of the Mitchells. Not just random farmers. One would have to be around the silage pit to get the sediment on their boots. He would need a search warrant and a forensic match. That might be a tough get but at least he was amassing circumstantial evidence.

  What to do next? What to look for? He walked around outside behind the facility into the lot behind it where the elevator fed train cars from a long spout.

  Then he found it.

  Dog tag. Travis’ name on it with Gage’s phone number. Blood splatter on some gravel. The dog’s blood or maybe belonging to Gage? Jake wrapped the dog tag and gravel in his handkerchief. So now he could prove that Travis was there but again it was circumstantial. He’d take what he could get.

  “You find anything?” Harper asked him as they prepared to leave the facility.

  He nodded. “I need lab work which will be the trick.”

  “How about you? Find anything in the office?”

  She cocked her head and smil
ed. “Hardly anything,” she said, “Just some plans for a proposed airfield along with a relief map of property to be included. Got photos too. Aren’t you glad I came along?”

  Chapter Forty

  When Tommy Mitchell opened the door to his brother’s house he noticed it wasn’t latched properly, asking her what was wrong with the door and Pam telling him Haller had forced it open to get Alex’s gun and she needed to get someone out there to fix it and would he take a look at it.

  Tommy looked at it, running his fingers over the freshly splintered wood. “The facing will have to be replaced and a new latch installed.”

  “Can you take care of that when you have time?” she said. “That would be great. Alex is just – .” She tailed off shaking her head. She still wore the black dress but had kicked off her shoes and was barefoot. Her calves and ankles were smooth and perfect, thought Tommy. Love to get those things locked up behind his neck. Damn, the woman looked good. Tommy saying, “You mentioned Pappy Van Winkle.”

  She lifted the hair off the back of her neck and the aroma of her perfume filled his head. She poured the 23-year-old bourbon into a heavy rocks glass and handed it to him.

  He took a sip. It warmed and tingled his mouth like liquid sunshine.

  She put her arms around his neck and kissed him long and deep, her tongue searching his mouth, Tommy feeling the stirring and his breath catching. She let him go and led him to the couch. He followed docile as a lamb.

  She pulled him down to the couch and said, “There are certain things I like.”

  “Whatever you say, lady.”

  “Tear my dress off.”

  “Wha—-? Really?”

  She said, “Really.” Breathing it out.

  Tommy tore at it, not believing how aroused she became when he did. Set him on fire too. Shit, this could be the best he ever had, the taboo added to his excitement. They staggered to the bedroom, coupled as one. Urgency fired his need. They collapsed on the bed and as he entered her, she clawed at as his back and neck really digging in and hurting him. She had to be drawing blood, but he didn’t care as he drove himself hard into her, as she tore at him.

  Alex Mitchell left the funeral home and called Pam but got her recorder. Now what? His father lay in a casket and his wife nowhere to be found. Tommy either. Everything left to him. Like always. Alex gets the scut work while Tommy gets drunk or high and Pam and Dad did the business planning. Well, that was how it used to be. Things would change. Finally, things would even out for him. He hated it that he was thinking like that because he loved his father, despite his faults, but had to plan and look logically at the future.

  Alex was headed home to change when he met his brother, Tommy, flying low, a flashing crimson streak, on the way back to town. What was his big hurry?

  Vegas Metro, called Jake back concerning the death of Pam’s first husband.

  “Nothing here,” said the female voice, a Lieutenant Tara St. John. “We had our suspicions but nothing to get traction on. No way to indict her. It was a thorough investigation and we autopsied the victim. It looked dicey, we had questions and perhaps missed something, but we didn’t have anything prosecutable. I still have thoughts that she got away with something. Don’t like that feeling.”

  Jake thanked her and broke the connection. A dead end yet added to Jake’s suspicions. Maybe Fat Boy Haller had something worth hearing, Needed to interview Noah Haller. Harper talked to her boss, lawyer Jessup, telling him, “You get a free experienced investigator, Jerry. And he has training.”

  The meeting with Noah Haller, AKA “Fat Boy” Haller, took place over the objections of Sheriff Kellogg but Jessup had already checked with a judge and brought the okay from the magistrate in writing, so Kellogg was reduced to sour expressions.

  First thing out of Haller’s mouth? “You got a cigarette?”

  The things they thought of, their lives on the line. Like the guy Jake interviewed who cut up his girlfriend with a broken bottle wanting to know if this was going to affect his résumé, telling Jake he applied for a job at a local factory. Then there was the woman who shot-gunned her husband’s mistress, telling Jake she’d killed the woman instead of her husband because she saw the woman before she saw her husband, and had a hang-nail driving her nuts and did he have some fingernail clippers?

  Second thing Haller said was, “I ain’t tellin’ you nothin’.”

  “How do you think this ends?” Jake leaned down, elbows on his knees. “They have your prints on the weapon. Does that register in your head? I’m here on behalf of your attorney which means I’m on your side. I want to know about Gage Burnell,” Jake said. “You give me something and we’ll look into what you’re telling us.”

  Haller looked apprehensive, biting his lower lip. “Why should I trust you?”

  “You don’t have much choice,” Jake said. “You’re washed out of friends. How do you think the Mitchell brothers feel about you right now?”

  “What do I get in return?”

  “I don’t have anything to give you except find the real person killed Vernon.”

  Haller crossed his arms and leaned back in the wooden chair. “Fuck it. I’ll take my chances.” The big man sat back. Haller let out a huge breath. He smelled of body odor. “All you get for now. I didn’t shoot Vernon.”

  “I were the prosecutor,” said Jessup, “you, Mister Haller, will take the full weight for Mitchell’s death. This is a lock for the PA and I don’t foresee an alternative outcome. Noah, I’m being honest. I am at a loss to find anything that could possibly turn this in your favor unless we get a handle on something that exonerates you. You have to help us if I’m to effectively represent you in court, or you’re going to prison.”

  “You don’t give us something you’re tying our hands,” Jake said.

  Then Haller did something strange. A look of confidence came over Haller’s face and he said, “I won’t go down for this. Bet on it.”

  Jake looked at the man for a long moment, considering the man’s statement. “What are you telling us?”

  Haller lifted a big paw and waved off Jake. “All I’m saying.”

  Jake mystified by the man’s response. Was he that stupid or... Or, did he have information that would compromise someone?

  Jake and Jessup left the lock-up. Okay, according to the information Harper found at the grain elevator office there was a new highway and airport but none of it was planned for his Dad’s place.

  Why had the Mitchells been interested in purchasing the place and then reneging? Jake was convinced it hinged on Franklin Yoder’s disappearance. It was thin, almost ephemeral but he wouldn’t let go. Wondering about his part in this. His nostalgic night with Pam was stupid and may have been a catalyst for the events since.

  As if she read his thoughts, Harper said, “None of this is your fault.”

  “Hope you’re right. Haller’s looking down a hole where he’s inside for the rest of his life but he’s not talking and doesn’t think he’s going down. He’s either the dumbest person I’ve ever met, or someone is offering him a lifeline. I have no idea what that would be, and I don’t see how he extricates himself from this.”

  “So, what do you do next?”

  “I’ll convince your dad to authorize a homicide investigation and include the grain elevator. The trick will be to get a judge to go along with a search warrant.”

  “What are you looking for we don’t already know?”

  “I have no idea,” Jake said. “But I’m running out of time.”

  Back at his place Tommy thought about what just happened and how stupid it was. He didn’t feel right about it. He had scratches on his back and neck and Pam had bit down hard on his lower lip, drawing blood, as he exploded inside her. It was Guinness Book sex.

  When they were done, she told him he’d better get out of there before Alex got back, almost pushing him out the door. Deciding she’s a crazy bitch and no longer wondered why Alex couldn’t keep her happy or why Alex thought she was ge
tting boned by the Texas boy. The girl liked sex. More than any girl he ever banged.

  Pam had given him some cocaine and the mixture of coke, dubawana, and high-test whiskey blurred his thoughts and dulled the pain, but it was wearing off now, so he felt the scratches on his back. She bit his lip, as if trying to bite through, vampire shit, and it hurt. When he checked the bathroom mirror his lower lip was an angry purplish color and swollen like a bee sting.

  He needed ice and hydrogen peroxide. He was still jacked up by the coke and knew when he crashed he’d sleep for about two days.

  He looked like shit.

  How would he explain this lip? How was Pam going to explain the torn dress?

  What’s a couple of broken fingernails, thought Pam, as she changed into different clothes being careful about the ripped dress and especially the semen stain on the hem line. She wasn’t going to wash up, just yet. First, she made a call to her father’s office but asked for Deputy Bailey, instead of her dad. They told her Bailey was posted out at the Morgan place.

  Even better.

  She asked for Bailey’s cell number and though the dispatcher hesitated, Pam insisted and knew the guy would do as she asked: the man’s boss her father, the Sheriff of Paradise County.

  Pam hung up the landline and used her cell phone to place the call to Deputy Sheriff Bailey.

  Bailey answered and Pam put the right amount of distress and pain in her voice when she told Bailey she needed the deputy to come out to her place and “bring a rape kit but please don’t say anything to Daddy”.

  Chapter Forty-One

  Tommy heard the doorbell and then a loud banging on his door as he got out of the shower. He looked at his cell phone. 6:30 PM. What the hell? He’d passed out. Damn, his head fuzzy with alcohol and drugs and his back and lip burning with cuts and bruises? Naked, he padded to the front room.