Wildburn (A Whicher Series Novella)

by John Stonehouse

  The marshal squares his hat.

  “I'll take him,” the sheriff says, “hold him over to Floyd, or Dickens.”

  “I'm going back down and check the house.”

  “What the hell for?”

  Whicher steps to his truck, yanks open the driver door. “Lynch took some kind of load out of a lockup tonight.”

  “I was out just driving,” the young man says.

  “Whatever's in the truck back there is set to burn.” The marshal glances up the creek, at the fire raging. “The house could go the same way. If there's evidence inside, I want it, before it's destroyed.”

  “I don't want people in the town,” McCoy says.

  “Sheriff. I didn't come here for what you want.”

  Cutting by Deputy Pierce at the town main intersection, Whicher sweeps off the highway into the unlit gravel lane.

  At Miss Bonnier's place, lights are on—an aging station wagon parked out front at the foot of the yard. Whicher sees her toting a canvas carry-all.

  He slows, rolls the window, calls out; “Ma'am—are you alright?”

  She peers into the dark at the unfamiliar truck.

  “You need help?”

  She shakes her head. “Sheriff says to head out to Dickens, they'll put us all up...”

  The marshal waits a moment. She turns, waves him away.

  He squeezes down on the gas, drives to the end of the lane—rounds the corner onto the asphalt road.

  Through the branches of the live oak, lights wink from the few neighborhood properties.

  Outside Lynch's house a vehicle is parked.

  Whicher stares through the windshield.

  The truck beams light up the rear end of a battered SUV.

  He steers in behind it, brakes to a stop, feels the quickening in his chest.

  The SUV is a Nissan Pathfinder.

  Butch's car.

  Whicher shuts off the motor, slides out, steps alongside the vehicle. It's empty.

  He turns, crosses the burnt-dry strip of yard to stand at the door of Lynch's place.

  The door is open.

  Whicher studies a mark in the wood frame, around the lock.

  He puts the elbow of his jacket to the flat of the door, pushes it open.

  The hall is unlit.

  Dim light shows from a room in back.

  “Somebody in here?” Whicher calls out.

  The sound of movement is coming from the kitchen.

  Butch Jones steps into the hallway.

  Whicher takes a pace forward. “What the hell are you doing in here?”

  The smell of whiskey seeps through the air.

  “I thought you were headed out to see Dolores? How'd you get into Torero? They're stopping people on the road...” The marshal rocks back on his heels, staring at the hulking shape of his friend. “This here's the scene of a crime.”

  Butch grunts, touches a hand to his cheek—face flushed, eyes bleary. He turns in the door frame, steps back through into the lit kitchen.

  Whicher follows. “Nobody's supposed to be in here. What the hell is going on, you popped the God damn lock?”

  At the sink, Butch stops, turns around leans back all of his weight.

  The marshal feels his throat tight, despite himself. “What the hell are you doing in here?”

  Outside, out the window, the sky above the pecan tree glows red with fire.

  Butch stares, silent. He lets out a long stream of whiskey-tinged breath.

  From outside in the street is the sound of tires in the roadway—a siren wails in the distance.

  The drainer creaks as Butch rolls his head from side to side. “I fired the shot.” He twists around, angles his head toward the window. “I shot Fallon. Outside in the yard.”

  Whicher stands, wordless.

  “I dragged him over to the back door. I figured they'd think it was Lynch. I never thought of Juanita showing up.”

  “That's a flat out lie.”

  Butch levels his eyes. His shoulders drop.

  For a moment, neither man speaks.

  The marshal presses his tongue against the edge of his teeth.

  “I came here yesterday,” Butch says. “Looking for Lynch. Instead of that, Fallon showed up.” He rocks against the sink base. “He was after taking her to Lubbock. I never meant to shoot him.”

  Whicher shakes his head.

  “We got into a fight...”

  “A fight?”

  Butch stares.

  “So, where's the gun?”

  “I got rid of it.”

  “You even know what kind it was?”

  A dry laugh catches in the back of Butch's throat. He leans forward, a look on his face. “One time in your life, you need to listen to me...”

  Whicher eyes him.

  “I shot Fallon. He was dead by the time Juanita got here.”

  “I asked for gun-shot residue tests,” the marshal says.

  Butch's face is uncomprehending.

  “They probably tested her by now.”

  Thoughts pass behind the big man's eyes, one following another.

  “If she fired a weapon, it'll show on her clothes—her skin, her hair.”

  In the sky beyond the window, white embers spiral in the wind.

  “Did Juanita ask you to come here?”

  Still his friend won't speak.

  “Did she tell you she did it? When? After Torero?” The marshal feels a sinking in his gut. “I let you sit with her—in the lot, in my truck, in the sheriff's yard. Was that it? Did she tell you then?”

  Butch pushes off the drainer.

  “If Juanita killed somebody,” Whicher says, “I can't protect her.”

  The tendons in the man's neck stand out like steel cord.

  “You think you could plant evidence?”

  “It was me...” Butch makes a choking sound.

  “God Almighty. I'm sorry, buddy.”

  The ceiling light snaps out—the hum of the refrigerator falls silent.

  Through the kitchen window, no lights shine from any quarter in the town.

  Butch is just a shape in the powered-out room. “My wife's gone, man—fuck it, my life is a wreck. I can do time, Jesus. I lost the house, the business...”

  Whicher makes to step away.

  Butch lunges, grabs a hold of the marshal's jacket. “I did this, can't you see?”

  Whicher puts up his hands, takes a hold of his friend's wrists.

  Butch swings him across the room, teeth bared, fists bunched beneath the marshal's jaw.

  “What the hell are you doing?”

  “You ain't standing in the way of this...” Butch slams him back against the wall.

  Whicher feels his feet lift off the floor. The hands around his neck lock in a blood choke.

  Needles prick at his skin.

  He whips an elbow high, smashes down on Butch's outstretched arms, barreling sideways, ripping down, breaking the hold.

  Feet on the ground he charges the big man.

  Butch flails, Whicher forces him back.

  A punch hammers into the marshal's ribs—pain exploding, taking his breath.

  He hooks a fist into Butch's ear, drives another to his face.

  A boot sweeps against his ankle, his feet go from under him, he drops to the side.

  Butch snatches up a kitchen chair, whips it across the room—the marshal takes the blow against his arm, his shoulder, shielding his head.

  The chair clatters, spins to the floor, Whicher scrambles to his feet.

  Butch lashes out a hand, Whicher catches it. “Damn it, you have to be there...”

  His friend's eyes drill him.

  The big man draws back his arm, fist in a ball.

  “Now...” the marshal says, panting “and after...”

  Butch staggers back against the sink—his voice a raw whisper. “Even through this?”

  The marshal folds his hand over his friend's hand.

  Butch crumples, pulls free.

  Whi
cher holds his eye in the darkness. “Even through this.”

  The burning sky flickers.

  He tells him; “Even through this.”

  Epilogue

  Three days later.

  * * *

  Visitors' reception at the tri-county jail is a stripped down, sterile, soulless space.

  Butch Jones paces like a six-feet-four caged bear. He holds his elbows with scarred-up hands.

  Whicher stands with his back to the wall, surveying the room. Row after row of benches stretch out across a tile floor—a disinfectant smell hangs in the air.

  The state was looking at a charge of murder.

  According to Evelyn Lopez, they could fight.

  The gun shot residue test came back positive on Juanita. Whichever way it stacked up, a homicide had taken place.

  Sheriff McCoy brought in FBI investigators—asked the marshal to stand aside. Whicher acquiesced.

  The day after the fire, Butch told him everything Juanita'd said in the few minutes he'd left them both alone.

  She'd stayed with Zamora the night after missing court. Turned up at Lynch's place the day after. She'd been at the house alone when Tommy Ray Fallon showed up. She turned him away—Fallon refused to go.

  He said he'd been looking everywhere, found out she hung in Torero, with a man named Lynch. She sent him away, but he'd gone to the back door—he was trying to get inside the house, shouting, threatening—she said he'd hit her before, when they were together—she was afraid for her life.

  She never meant to shoot anyone, to kill anyone.

  But she had a gun—a Smith & Wesson M&P22.

  A buzzer sounds in the waiting room.

  Butch stops pacing—he meets his friend's eye.

  “That means you can go in,” Whicher says.

  The big man looks at him—feet planted, he doesn't move.

  Evelyn Lopez said they could fight it. She could look to mitigate, build a case for self-defense. “Visiting time is two hours,” the marshal says. “Don't want to waste it.”

  “Do you want to come in?”

  Whicher shakes his head. “I'll be waiting here.”

  Words.

  Worthless words.

  Everything Butch had said was hearsay—second-hand, sworn to no oath. Nothing Butch had told him would stand up in a court of law. If he told the FBI investigators, they couldn't use it.

  Butch stands staring at him—slack look of shock across his face.

  A prison guard approaches from the corridor.

  She eyes the marshal. “Here to see Miss Jones?”

  “Yes, ma'am.” He nods toward Butch.

  His friend takes a pace forward beneath an overhead square of light.

  The guard proffers a clipboard and pen, Butch signs it, half dazed. Then follows the guard, no words. Nothing but the dull tramp of their feet.

  Whicher thinks of Torero—of Sheriff McCoy. Of Brandon Lynch.

  A second search of the rental unit in Lamesa turned up methamphetamine, crack cocaine and marijuana, in dealer quantities.

  Lynch's lawyer said his client would be co-operating. DEA were saying; time to reel him in.

  Whicher thinks of the weight—deep and bruising. The pain of hitting life hard.

  Butch would be waiting for his daughter.

  Whicher would be waiting there, for Butch.

  The marshal thinks of the long road back to Abilene, to home, to family. To his wife, Leanne, to Lori. He thinks of the distance, picturing the road, the country laid out, dusty highway, in his mind's eye already starting down the miles.

  As he sits alone in the empty room. Closes his eyes, feels the sun touch the side of his face.

  And thinks of two souls that beat inside him.

  Always.

  Already half the way home.

  About the Author

  John Stonehouse is a writer who's spent a lot of time traveling, both in the states and overseas. Interested in history, literature, music and poetry he's drawn to wide-open spaces; places few people go, inside or out. His 2014 debut An American Outlaw gained widespread acclaim - earning a place among 50 'successors to the greats' in contemporary crime fiction. (forensicoutreach.com)

  * * *

  His second book An American Kill also features Deputy US Marshal John Whicher. It became a bestseller at Amazon, Apple i-Books, Barnes & Noble and at Kobo. Book three in 'The Whicher Series' is currently underway.

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  Also by John Stonehouse

  An American Outlaw (The Whicher Series Book 1)

  An American Kill (The Whicher Series Book 2)

  Also by John Stonehouse

  The Whicher Series

  An American Outlaw

  An American Kill

  The Whicher Series Books 1 & 2

  Wildburn (A Whicher Series Novella)

  An American Bullet

  Watch for more at John Stonehouse’s site.