Jailbird

by Heather Huffman

  “The death penalty for escaping?”

  “You hit the other inmate over the head with a skillet. He’s saying it shows that you have an MO.”

  “That’s the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard. The only MO I have is an aversion to being attacked. And that inmate lived. Rachel Cooper said so.”

  “I’m not saying they’ll change your sentence. I’m just telling you he’s made a statement. He’s reminding people that you killed an important man.”

  “It’s the same as with Julie… we just need to find a way to smudge the spit-shined façade. Once I’ve got her figured out, I’ll start working on him.”

  “No,” Charlie startled me with his stern growl.

  “But I….”

  “No… please no. If you love me at all, no.”

  “We’ll talk about it later,” I conceded.

  “You won’t go without talking to me?”

  “Promise,” I could at least give him that much.

  “I miss you,” his voice gentled.

  “I miss you, too,” that seemed like the understatement of the year—the yearning to be near him was so strong it was a physical need. “I’d better get some sleep or there won’t be anything left for breakfast by the time I wake up. Give Cara our love.”

  “Same to Gabrielle. Good night, baby.”

  “Good night, mon ange,” it was more than a term of endearment. Charlie really was my angel. He brought light into my world again. I was determined to hold tight to him until this darkness passed.

  Maybe my morning sickness had passed, but my hormones were still completely out of whack. At least, that’s what I told myself as I cried until dreams finally laid their claim.

  The next day was spent holed up at the hotel reading old tax returns. I might have dozed off a few times, but given the content of my reading material, I figured I was justified. Gabrielle tended the horses for me. I think she was worried about the dark circles under my eyes. I tried to reassure her I was fine, but she was having none of it.

  By dinnertime I was sure of two things. I needed pizza, and there was nothing that would help me on the tax returns. Halfway through the second slice, it occurred to me that what wasn’t on the tax returns might be helpful. I set my plate aside and went to retrieve the stack of bank statements.

  As little as Julie seemed to care for her house, she was meticulous about her money. It seemed odd that she kept bank statements showing money that wasn’t recorded on her tax returns in the same file cabinet, but I guess she never thought someone would come in her house and prowl through her files. Sure enough, there were several bank statements that showed substantial deposits not on the returns. Even fishier, the deposits all seemed to come from the same overseas account.

  I might not be smart enough to connect all of the dots, but I knew Charlie could get to the bottom of it now that he knew where to look. I gathered the pages I needed from the tax returns and the statements as I dialed Charlie’s number.

  “Is everything okay?” he answered the phone.

  “Yes, sunshine. Everything is wonderful. What’s your fax number?”

  “You found something?”

  “I think so. Give me your fax number and I’ll send it now. It’s a start, anyway,” I jotted down the number he gave me and gave Gabrielle and impulsive kiss on the forehead.

  “Good job, Mom,” she encouraged.

  “I’m going to see if I can fax this from the motel office. I’ll be right back,” I slid on my shoes and nearly skipped to the office.

  “May I help you?” the woman was friendly enough, if not a little skeptical of the skipping 32-year-old Native American in short pig tales.

  “Could I possibly use your fax machine?”

  “Is it local?”

  “Sure,” I lied.

  “It’s right there,” she motioned to the machine sitting on the far side of the office and turned her attention from me.

  I sang “Rainbow Connection” a little loudly to cover all of the beeps as I entered a decidedly not-local number and hit send. I quieted down guiltily when she glared at me. There were quite a few pages and it was an ancient machine. My eyes roamed the room, reading little motivational sayings and old Family Circus comic strips taped to the wall to kill time while I waited.

  And then my eyes landed on a forgotten cork board on the far wall. Along with the “Have you seen me?” posters of children was an honest-to-God wanted poster… with my name and mug shot on it.

  I stared in disbelief, rooted to the spot. Why? Why me? There were much worse criminals on the loose. Wasn’t there a most-wanted list frolicking free out there somewhere? Why not put their poster up?

  The machine ground to a halt and I startled, looking around the room as I pulled my papers from the tray. The woman’s eyes were on me, narrowed—or was I imagining that? Had she seen me staring at the poster and figured it out?

  I smiled and thanked her, willing myself to walk calmly from her office and back to the room. The second the door closed behind me I flew into action, throwing things into our packs with little thought to neatness.

  “Someone found us, huh?” Gabrielle sighed and started putting her shoes on.

  “Pretty sure,” I nodded, grabbing my piece of pizza so I could finish it while I gave the room one last look.

  “Go tack the horses; I’m going to try to check out.”

  Gabrielle nodded, swinging her pack over her shoulder and going to do as told.

  “Wouldn’t you know it? I got a call from work… gotta head home,” I smiled sweetly at the woman, pretending not to notice her discomfort. “Can I settle our bill?”

  The woman handed me the paperwork and fidgeted while I signed the credit card slip. Her husband joined us in the room, inching closer and closer to me as I handed her the keys and pocketed my card. I could feel his presence and knew he’d grab me if I tried to leave the little room.

  I reminded myself that it was very admirable that he was playing the hero, and immobilized him by whirling around and kicking him in the groin instead of hitting him over the head—as was apparently my style.

  The second his knees hit the floor, I dodged his fumbling grasp and darted out the door. Gabrielle was waiting on the front lawn with our horses. I swung onto Daisy’s back and kicked her into a lope with Gabrielle right behind me. First chance we got, I needed to find an ATM so we could pull the remaining cash off the card I’d used to pay for the motel. It was just a matter of time until that card was frozen and the money was lost otherwise.

  Gabrielle and I exchanged meaningful looks. We’d miss the beds. We’d miss the shower. We’d miss the pizza.

  Chapter Twenty

  If Todd Winslow was terrifying, he learned the art from his father. Their family was from money so old no one seemed to know where it came from anymore. For as long as I could remember, rumors had circulated that they amassed their wealth in the slave trade. That seemed like a fitting story to me.

  Truth is, when someone has a fortune that big, people don’t really care what it’s from. In my mind, the danger from being rich for as long as anyone can remember is that you run the risk of forgetting you’re mortal just like the rest of us.

  So I understood Charlie’s hesitancy for me to grab that tiger by the tail. By my way of thinking, if the tiger was already hunting me—having hold of his tail might be the safest place to be.

  Daniel Winslow knew I was alive. His attention had turned my direction, and there was no turning it back. And the hard truth was—now that his gaze was on me, it was only a matter of time until he went after Gabrielle, Conrad, Charlie and anyone else I cared about.

  I could still remember his cold glare pinning me from across the courtroom. His countenance was not that of a grieving father, but one of pure hatred. I could see the same lifeless vacuum in his eyes that I’d seen in his son’s. When those eyes were on me, I felt somehow stripped of my humanity. Like it didn’t exist as far as he was concerned.

  People like Elena did mean
things because they were spoiled and couldn’t see beyond the end of their own nose. People like the Winslows seemed to do things for the sheer pleasure of watching others squirm.

  It was with the memory of his eyes boring mine we began our slow journey back to Louisiana, a journey made slower by swinging a wide berth around Hampton. Thanks to Charlie, we had untraceable money and an untraceable phone. Thanks to Conrad, I had a stack of phony driver’s licenses to use at hotels. Thanks to Clairol, Gabrielle & I were both sporting dirty blonde hair. It was the lightest our jet-black locks seemed to want to go, and it had taken two bottles each to accomplish that.

  I now faced a few problems, and Conrad seemed to be the solution for all. For one, the woman in the driver’s license photos had black hair. And while most people were too apathetic to notice or care, all it took was one diligent night clerk for me to find myself in a bad situation. That knowledge forced me to limit how often we stayed in a motel. We saved that risk for the really cold nights when no other housing seemed to present itself.

  Had I been alone, I would have stuck to the woods and—however grudgingly—lived off the land. I couldn’t expect Gabrielle or my pregnant body to sleep on the cold, hard ground, though. And as mild a winter as it was, it was winter nonetheless. So some nights, I just took the risk and slept with one eye open.

  My other issue came in the form of my ever-thickening waist. I was starting to show and it was getting harder to live in a saddle. There were nights my back ached so badly it brought tears to my eyes.

  I’d thought being pregnant in prison was hard. This was downright misery and I hoped to God things settled down before I got really big. It did give me a whole new appreciation for my ancestors, albeit an appreciation I was ready to enjoy from afar. There was this little-but-growing piece of me that thought it would be super to just once be pregnant under normal circumstances.

  Our third problem was that horses were great for making time through the woods but not so good for checking into motels or swinging by an ATM.

  Some nights we found vacant hunter’s cabins. Some nights we parked our horses in a farm’s outermost fields and walked into town. Some nights, our home was a cave. We always made do and we were always provided for, but our patience was wearing thin.

  Thanks to Daniel Winslow’s statement, the news outlets slowly began to pick up my story. I found myself immensely grateful that we live in a society that doesn’t watch the news as often as they used to. Still, I felt less and less comfortable showing my face in town.

  While we caught the occasional report that mentioned I wasn’t traveling alone, Gabrielle’s picture had yet to be posted. So she took over shopping duties, getting cash from ATMs, and buying groceries from roadside convenience stores along the way. Every now and then, we’d hit a jackpot and find an out-of-the-way diner or a gas station with amazing food. Whenever we did, I made sure we sat close to an outlet so I could charge my phone.

  Being mostly in the woods, cell reception wasn’t the greatest. I got lots of worried messages from Charlie. I left lots of reassuring ones in return. Having a marriage via voicemail was getting really old. Of course, so was being a pregnant nomad.

  I told myself that if my ancestors did it, I could. I told myself that women gave birth for thousands of years before ultrasounds or doctor’s offices existed. None of that lessened my guilt at feeling like I was failing this child just as I had Gabrielle.

  Still, I was encouraged to know that Charlie had used the information I sent him to start unraveling some of the lies woven by Julie. Now he knew what questions to ask and what motions to file. And he had to be making headway, because the request that Cara be removed from his custody while this went to trial was denied.

  His messages also told me that Anjelita was worried about me but Manny’s business was doing well. Gossip was beginning to subside, but the occasional room still hushed when he entered. Elena was eerily absent and the worry lines on Sheriff Taylor’s brow seemed deeper than ever. Mary called him, eager to know what was really going on. He’d dodged her questions but wondered if I should call her. One day blended into the next. The world continued to turn; Gabrielle and I continued to ride.

  “Hey Mom… do you think we’ll get to go home soon?” Gabrielle broached the subject tentatively one evening over a dinner of gas station hot dogs and Cheetos.

  “Sweetie, you don’t have to do this,” my heart broke for her. “I bet Anjelita and Manny would let you stay with them if Conrad thinks it’s still too risky to be on the res.”

  “I don’t want to leave you,” she shook her head.

  “I don’t want you to leave me either, but it would only be for a little while,” I urged. Now that the words had been spoken, I knew it was pure selfishness on my part that she hadn’t started out with the Torres family.

  “If it’s only for a little while longer, then it shouldn’t be a problem us sticking together. Forget I said anything.”

  “We’re almost through Arkansas,” I commented. “Let’s give it a couple more days and maybe the answer will come to us.” She seemed satisfied with that. Putting it off did little to dull the guilt that started with a twinge and was turning into a roar.

  Sometime after we hit the Louisiana border, I called Conrad. In typical Conrad fashion, he agreed to meet us at the Motel 6 where we were staying that night. In not-so-typical Conrad fashion, he brought a hostage with him.

  Part Three: Circles

  Chapter Twenty-One

  “Really Conrad? You thought this was a good idea?” I stood to the side and let him enter, his arm wrapped around a woman whose bound hands were mostly concealed by her coat.

  “Neena, she’s a stubborn, obstinate woman… if she won’t listen to reason, then what else am I supposed to do?” he had a wild look in his eyes that was almost amusing.

  The look on her face was one of pure mutinous rage. I pinched the bridge of my nose and closed my eyes, silently wishing she’d be gone by the time I opened them.

  She wasn’t, and the room was getting cold with the door open. I swung it shut and crossed my arms tightly around my chest. “Please untie her, Conrad. And tell me you didn’t hurt her.”

  “Really, Neena?” he looked wounded. “Do you think I would hurt her?”

  “Well, you seem a little touched right now, big brother.”

  “Oh my gosh—you’re pregnant.” Rachel Cooper couldn’t take her eyes off my stomach.

  “This would be an awkward moment if I weren’t,” I don’t know why I said it. Nerves make me stupid I guess. “Yes, I’m pregnant… look, come in and sit down. You are safe here. I’m sorry if my brother did something rash. He means well.”

  “You’re not my handler,” he grumbled, brushing past me to scoop a very-expectant Gabrielle into a hug.

  “Maybe you need one,” I retorted before turning my attention back to Rachel. “Seriously, let me help you get these off.”

  “Thank you,” she held her hands out to me as I cut the rope with my pocket knife.

  “You’re welcome. Can I get you something to drink or eat? We were just getting ready to order a pizza.”

  “Mom likes to eat a lot of pizza.”

  “I don’t hear you complaining, tattle-tale,” I shot back.

  “I wouldn’t mind a diet soda,” Rachel conceded. “If it’s no trouble.”

  “My brother kidnapped you. It’s the least I can do,” I assured her as I slid into my jacket. “Does anyone else want anything?”

  “A Coke would be good,” Conrad looked up.

  “Can I have caffeine?” Gabrielle asked hopefully.

  “No.” Conrad and I both answered.

  “Sprite,” her shoulders sank.

  “Be right back… Gab, can you order the pizza?”

  It was one of those nights where everything seems surreal—like a moment from a dream. My steps seemed to echo on the concrete walkway. Each coin I dropped in the machine sounded loud in my ears. I fully expected someone to jump out of the shado
ws to grab me and take me away—if not to Dixon, to some other dark hole in this world.

  I had myself worked into a regular tizzy by the time I kicked the door to get someone to open up for me. I handed out their sodas and sank into an open chair, unable to take my eyes off of Rachel Cooper.

  “You’re prettier in person.”

  “Excuse me?” she frowned at me.

  “I’m sorry, I have no filter… I just meant that as pretty as you are on television, you’re even prettier in person. I mean, I saw you through the window once, but still… I’m a little jealous.”

  “Oh. Thank you. And I thought that was you running through Charlie’s office.”

  “Do I want to know why you kidnapped a reporter?” I asked Conrad, who now sat with Gabrielle tucked up under his arm.

  “I wanted her to see it was real people she was toying with,” he scowled menacingly at her.

  “Ah.”

  “I knew they were people…” she met his stare with one of her own.

  “Neena has yet to go to a doctor for prenatal care… because of you. Gabrielle has not been in school because of you….”

  “I didn’t crack Todd Winslow over the head with a tire iron,” she spat out.

  “I would think any reporter worth her salt would want to look past the story on the surface to discover the truth. If she were a real journalist and not just a glorified weather-girl, that is,” I interrupted calmly before their rising voices drew attention. Rachel whirled to face me, her expression one of disbelief. A shocked silence settled over the room. And then a slow smile spread across her face.

  “Okay then,” she conceded. “Why don’t you tell me what deeper truth I should be searching for?”

  “You know, I think I’ll take Gabrielle out for a real dinner,” Conrad offered instantly then glared at Rachel. “If this is some sort of trick and you do something to hurt my sister, I will hunt you and I will find you.”

  “I’m pregnant, Conrad, not an invalid,” I rolled my eyes. “Just bring me back a doggie bag.”