Best Served Cold

by Susan Rogers Cooper

  ‘The one where he killed the guy who was gonna shoot his wife?’ Anthony asked and I nodded my head. ‘Before my time.’

  ‘Yeah, but we’re gonna look into them just the same.’

  ‘Shouldn’t we be concentrating on the Connors’ and the Evans’ clan?’ he said, showing more of the heat I’d seen at his house. ‘I mean, Danny, Jr may be out in west Texas but there’s another boy. And Miz Evans wasn’t exactly nice about any of it.’

  ‘What about Tom Vaught’s family?’ I asked. ‘The guy Evans shot? They still around?’

  Both Anthony and Emmett shrugged. ‘Don’t know,’ Emmett said.

  Anthony followed up with, ‘Me neither.’

  Emmett wrote on his pad. ‘I’ll have Holly check that out, too.’

  ‘What’d we ever do before Holly?’ I asked the room in general.

  ‘A lot more work,’ Emmett said. We all three turned and stared at the young woman at the counter, busily pounding away on her keyboard. ‘You know the best thing that ever happened to this department? Other than me joining, I mean.’

  I ignored the last comment. ‘Gladys retiring?’ I said, mentioning the name of the mean old biddy that had been the sheriff’s department’s civilian clerk for almost thirty years.

  ‘Exactly,’ he said, and we both grinned.

  Next couple of days we found out a few things, thanks to Holly’s expertise with the computer and the telephone. Jesse Trevino, the redneck who held up the liquor store, rolled on his buddy and only got two years, did get hurt while serving his time. Seems he got shanked in the kidney, which necessitated an operation and the removal of said kidney, and which also got him out eight months earlier than his two years. He was living in Longbranch at his mama’s house, and pissing in a bag, according to what the warden told Holly when she got a hold of him on Monday.

  The younger Evans boy, son of the F150 driver, was named Tyler. He was living in the county and going to the community college in Bishop while working at his daddy’s gas station in Longbranch. With the elder Evans dead, seemed the missus and Tyler were running the station. I thought maybe we could have a chat with both Jesse Trevino and Tyler Evans. I took Jesse and Emmett took Tyler.

  Jesse’s mama’s house was a single-wide in a run-down trailer park just inside the city limits of Longbranch. I called the police chief and told him what I was up to, and he sent a uniform over to meet me. Jesse’s mama’s trailer was the neatest one in the trailer park. Recently painted blue and white, it had a nice little deck on the front with an awning. There was hardware on the awning where hanging baskets of flowers probably hung when it wasn’t winter and empty pots for potted plants here and there. There was a bike sitting on the tiny bed of winter-dead grass in the front, with a Barbie hanging from the handle bars. The seat of the bike still had a little snow on it, and the once-bright colors seemed a little dimmed, probably due to sitting out all winter. I walked up the steps of the deck and knocked on the door. When it opened I found myself face-to-face with a girl of about three with thick black hair and the biggest, prettiest, brownest eyes I’ve ever seen. She stared at me, her mouth turning down at the corners.

  ‘Your mama home?’ I asked her.

  She shook her head.

  ‘Your daddy?’

  She shook her head again.

  ‘Anybody?’ I asked.

  ‘Nana,’ she said. Looking over her shoulder, she yelled, ‘Nana! Man!’

  An older woman pushing a walker scurried toward the door. ‘How many times I tell you not to open that door, mija? How many?’

  ‘Lots,’ the little girl said, and turned and walked further into the trailer.

  The older woman looked at me. She was wearing something my mama used to call a house dress, something I hadn’t seen on a woman in a lot of years. Her once-black hair was thin and graying and she wore heavy support hose on her legs. ‘We don’t want no trouble,’ she said, her hand on the door, ready to close it. Then she saw the uniformed officer at the bottom of the steps. She frowned at me. ‘What you want?’

  ‘Jesse home, Miz Trevino?’ I asked.

  ‘You leave my Jesse alone!’ she said. ‘Bad enough he gotta pee-pee in a bag! Now you come ’round here accusing him of God only knows what!’

  ‘Just need to talk to him a minute, ma’am,’ I said.

  ‘Get out of here with you—’ she started but another voice was heard.

  ‘It’s OK, Mama,’ Jesse Trevino said as he walked to the door. ‘You go take care of Cara. I got this.’

  Still glaring at me, his mother said, ‘You leave my boy alone!’

  ‘Mama!’

  She turned with her walker and headed further into the trailer. Turning to me, Jesse said, ‘Sheriff. Long time no see.’

  ‘Been a while, Jesse. You gonna invite me in or you wanna sit out here on the deck?’

  He stepped out and closed the trailer door behind him. Seeing him now brought back the incident, and I couldn’t help thinking how much the boy had changed in the couple of years since I’d last seen him. His formerly olive complexion was wan, he had bags under his almost-black eyes and lines around his mouth. He was thinner – a lot thinner, like maybe thirty or forty pounds thinner – than he’d been when we’d arrested him. I was thinking prison food and a lost kidney hadn’t been kind to the boy. ‘Out here would be best,’ he said. ‘No need for my mama and my niece to hear any of your business.’

  ‘Hear you got yourself hurt while up in McAlester,’ I said as I took a seat on the top step of the deck stairs. It wasn’t wet, but it was still cold enough for me to think about buying sturdier pants.

  Jesse sat down beside me. ‘Yeah. Lost a kidney. But that’s OK. They tell me you can live with just one.’

  ‘That piss you off?’ I asked.

  ‘Well, duh! What d’you think, Sheriff? I said, “Hey, guy, wanna try for the other one?” Yeah, it pissed me off, but I was in no shape to get back at the bastard. I was in the hospital for a couple of weeks. And then they decided to let me out early.’ He grinned. ‘Almost worth a kidney.’

  ‘You hear anything from Hank Witovec?’ I asked.

  ‘Shit, no,’ he said, shaking his head. ‘He got transferred out of McAlester to some high-security place after he beat up a guard. Hell, that had to be, what? Third or fourth week we were both up there.’ Again he shook his head. ‘Ol’ Hank, he’s got a temper on him. Threatened me every time I saw him when he was still at McAlester, but we were in different units so we didn’t see each other much, thank God. I think he got a few more years tacked onto his sentence for beating up that guard. God only knows what he’s done since he got moved.’

  ‘So you haven’t heard from him? Or about him?’ I asked.

  Again with the shake of the head. ‘Naw. And I don’t care to. You know what folks always say when their kid gets in trouble? He was hanging with a bad crowd?’

  ‘Yeah,’ I said. ‘I hear that a lot.’

  ‘Well, in my case it was true. Hank Witovec was a bad crowd all by himself. I never done nothing illegal until that gas station and I ain’t done nothing since I got out. So I don’t exactly know why you’re here, Sheriff.’

  ‘Someone’s been messing with my deputies,’ I said. ‘Silly pranks mostly, but it’s been escalating.’

  Jesse got wide-eyed, not unlike his little niece. He pointed a finger at his own chest. ‘And you think I had something to do with that?’ Again with the head shaking. ‘No siree-bob. Ain’t me. For one thing, I don’t get out much, and for another, why would I mess with y’all? You done me a favor, giving me only two years for what me and Hank done. I got no beef with you or any of your deputies.’

  I sorta believed him. Of course, he did lose a kidney because he went to prison, me and my staff were the ones who sent him there, and, even if that had been his first and only crime, you learn a lot of bad things in prison. Lying’s just the tip of that iceberg.

  I stood up. ‘Good talking to you, Jesse,’ I said. ‘But do me a favor: don’t lea
ve town without notifying the Longbranch police, or me, or both. OK?’

  He pulled himself up from the deck. ‘I ain’t going nowhere, Sheriff. And believe me, I ain’t been messing with you and yours. But if I hear anything, I probably won’t let you know.’

  Then he grinned real big and went back inside his mama’s trailer. I headed back to the shop.

  THREE

  Emmett wasn’t happy. He didn’t like any of this and wasn’t sure why he and Milt were interviewing these two people. Seemed stupid to think Tyler Evans would want to harm the sheriff’s department and even stupider to think Jesse Trevino would want to. But he didn’t have any better leads than Milt did. All he knew was that whoever the hell it was better not go messing with him or his or there was gonna be hell to pay. He felt bad for Anthony, he really did, but secretly he was glad it was Anthony’s family and not his own. Emmett felt bad for thinking that, but there it was. Truth he’d take to his grave.

  It had turned cold overnight, and he was wearing a heavy coat as he got in his car and headed out. He decided to go by the Evans’ gas station first, thinking mother or son or both would more than likely be there during the day than at home. It was your typical fifties Gulf station: six pumps, two bays, outside toilets and a small office. One pump was still serviced, the rest pump your own. The only pump in town, Emmett reckoned, where you’d still get service. He decided not to try it, thinking it was a good way to get a belt cut on a squad car if the Evans family was still holding a grudge. He pulled up to the side, trying not to block a pump or a bay, got out of his car and headed to the office. Once inside, it only took seconds before he began to sweat in his heavy coat. He took it off quickly as he approached the woman who sat behind the counter. He assumed it to be Mrs Evans, although he’d never met the woman.

  There was a display case with cans of oil, windshield cleaner, extra wiper blades and little pine trees to make your car smell like a public toilet. A Coke machine was next to the door and advertised Cokes, Diet Cokes, Sprites and Dr Pepper. Emmett could hear hammering going on in one of the bays and thought maybe the son was out there working. The woman looked up when Emmett opened the door.

  ‘Help you?’ she said.

  She was a pretty woman in her late forties, early fifties, with fluffy champagne-blonde hair, blue eyes enhanced with lots of make-up, buxom and showing more cleavage than she probably should have. But then, Emmett didn’t mind that a bit.

  ‘Miz Evans?’ he asked.

  ‘Yeah?’ She looked from Emmett out the window to the squad car then stood up. ‘What do you want?’ she asked, her tone not exactly friendly.

  ‘Wondering if either of your boys might be around?’ Emmett asked.

  ‘No,’ she said.

  ‘Who’s that out in the bay there?’ Emmett asked, pointing.

  ‘A hired hand,’ she said.

  Emmett knew she was lying. The way she squared her shoulders and looked him straight in the eye was a dead giveaway. She was gutsy but she was still lying.

  ‘Mind if I talk to him?’ Emmett asked.

  ‘Yes, I do, Deputy,’ she said, with the word ‘deputy’ sounding a lot more like ‘asshole’ than it should have. ‘He’s hourly. I’m not paying him to be gabbing with you when he should be working.’

  ‘Mind if I just stick my head in there and say hidy?’ Emmett said as he walked toward the door to the bay.

  ‘Yes, I do!’ Mrs Evans said, rushing to said door. But Emmett got there first and opened it.

  A young man, maybe nineteen, twenty years old, was working on a ten-year-old Buick up on the rack when Emmett opened the door. The boy turned when he heard the door open and saw Emmett and Mrs Evans standing there.

  ‘Mama?’ he said.

  Emmett turned and looked at Mrs Evans. ‘I do think you were mistaken, Miz Evans,’ he said. ‘Must be your hired hand’s day off.’

  ‘Fuck you,’ the woman said. ‘This is private property. Unless you got a warrant, get the hell out of here.’

  ‘Now you really should watch your language in front of your boy, there, Miz Evans,’ Emmett said.

  ‘Mama, what’s going on?’ the boy asked.

  ‘Nothing. Get back to work.’ She turned to Emmett. ‘Get out of here before I call my lawyer.’

  ‘Ma’am, I need to talk to your son. I can do it here – it’ll just take a minute. Or I can sit outside in my car with the lights and siren going and wait for your lawyer, then take your boy into the station. That could take the rest of the day. When’s this Buick due back?’

  ‘Mama, let him talk. I got nothing to worry about,’ the boy said.

  Mrs Evans leaned against the doorjamb, crossing her arms over her ample chest. ‘You got five minutes,’ she said.

  ‘Or however long it takes,’ Emmett corrected. He turned to the boy. ‘You Tyler?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘Seems to me you know your way around cars a bit, huh, Tyler?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘You do brake jobs?’ he asked.

  ‘Your squad car got a problem?’ the boy asked back.

  ‘Answer my question,’ Emmett said.

  ‘Yes, sir, I do brake jobs.’

  ‘Fix ’em and break ’em?’ Emmett asked.

  The boy frowned. ‘What’re you talking about? Yeah, I fix brakes.’

  ‘I suppose you’d know how to cut a brake line, now wouldn’t you?’ Emmett asked.

  ‘I didn’t cut any brake line!’ Tyler said.

  ‘You and your brother seemed to have a problem with one of our deputies, Anthony Dobbins, who witnessed your daddy killing that man Vaught. You remember?’

  ‘Of course I remember!’ the boy said, getting heated. ‘Worst day of my life! What’s that got to do with anything?’

  ‘Seems your brother said something pretty awful to Deputy Dobbins after your daddy got sentenced,’ Emmett said.

  ‘You need to leave!’ Mrs Evans said, pushing away from the doorjamb, hands on her hips.

  ‘What?’ Tyler said.

  ‘He said, and I quote, “You’re one dead nigger.” Unquote.’

  Tyler shook his head. ‘Yeah, well, that’s just the way JR is,’ he said. ‘He’s hot-headed. But that was a long time ago. What’s it got to do with anything?’

  ‘JR?’ Emmett asked.

  ‘Danny, Jr,’ Mrs Evans said. ‘We just call him JR for short. You can leave now that you know all our secrets.’

  ‘So where’s JR now?’ Emmett asked.

  ‘None of your damned business!’ Mrs Evans said, moving closer to Emmett. ‘You talked to my boy and now you can leave! Get your fat ass out of here!’

  Emmett looked behind him. ‘You shoulda seen it before my wife put me on a diet,’ he said with a grin. Then he sobered. ‘Where is JR?’

  ‘Look, asshole—’ the woman started but the boy broke in.

  ‘Mama, stop.’ To Emmett, he said, ‘JR’s in west Texas on a drilling rig. He comes home for Thanksgiving, Christmas and Mother’s Day, and an occasional weekend. He’s married, got a little girl and he’s been born again. So whatever you think he’s done, you best rethink it.’

  Emmett took his leave, wondering if he could believe what Tyler said about his brother or anything else. Was Tyler just shining him on about not holding a grudge against his daddy? Did JR’s born-again status make him want to turn the other cheek or decide an eye for an eye? He thought it might be a good idea to talk to Milt.

  Me and Emmett met up at Manuel’s on Highway Five. It was a Mexican place my wife didn’t know about. I don’t think Jasmine, Emmett’s wife, was aware of the many times me and Emmett met there either. We both thought it wise to keep Manuel’s a secret. They make a damn fine chili relleno, stuffed with fajita steak and cheese, then deep fried in panko breadcrumbs over a bed of rice and beans with a chicken taco on the side. Me and Emmett always split a salad, in case either wife asks what we had for lunch. We wouldn’t tell a lie.

  ‘What d’you think about your guy?’ Emmett as
ked me.

  ‘Jesse Trevino?’ I shrugged. ‘Lost a kidney ’cause he was in prison but that got him out of the joint eight months early.’ I shrugged again. ‘Didn’t seem to harbor any resentment but then again …’

  ‘Same with the Evanses. The missus is still mighty pissed, but the kid, Tyler, the younger one,’ Emmett said, ‘seems copacetic. Says his brother, JR, for Junior, is born again and not anywhere around anyway. Married, got a little girl. Life goes on?’

  ‘So the mama?’

  It was Emmett’s turn to shrug. ‘I could see the note and the zombie baby, but cutting the brake lines? She’d chip a nail.’

  ‘My wife would say that was a sexist comment,’ I said, shoving illegal refried beans into my mouth.

  ‘I’d say she’s more into advertising for a new husband than getting vengeful over a dead one. Lots of make-up, big hair, some real nice cleavage.’

  ‘But she runs that gas station. Should know how to cut brake lines.’

  Emmett shook his head. ‘Naw. I doubt it. She’s front desk. Doubt if she knows how to fill the gas tank.’

  ‘There you go, being sexist again,’ I said.

  ‘Then go check her out yourself,’ Emmett said, head down as he got serious with his enchilada platter.

  ‘I think we should check out the Permeter brothers,’ I said.

  ‘Who?’

  ‘The two brothers that went after Dalton after he shot their other brother in that domestic.’

  ‘Oh, yeah. Them. They still in town?’

  ‘I have Holly looking into them. We’ll check when we get back to the shop,’ I said.

  ‘Sounds like a plan.’

  My cell phone rang just as I was getting a good rhythm going with my chili relleno. ‘What?’ I said into it, seeing from the read-out thingy that it was the shop.

  ‘Milt? It’s me, Dalton.’

  ‘Hey, Dalton. What’s up?’

  ‘I dunno. Something’s going on at my mama’s house. I gotta get over there. That OK?’

  ‘You do what you gotta do,’ I told him. ‘Me and Emmett’ll be at the shop in twenty. But you go ahead and take off.’