The Last Innocent Hour

by Barbara Taylor Sissel

  “Daddy!” Chrissy cried. “Daddy!” She cried his name again and came running.

  Beth bent over, bracing one hand on her knee, laying Hollis's gun on the ground at her feet. After a moment, she straightened, and put her hand to her chest, and beneath her palm, her heartbeat felt light, as if it had no substance. She looked at Jason. He was still. Except for the blood puddled around the wound she had inflicted, the rest of him seemed as colorless as the droplets of mist that glistened in the air around her. Slowly, she turned her gaze toward Charlie in time to see Chrissy hurl herself into his arms.

  He caught her to him, shielding her view from Jason's body. Beth saw his grin-- that was more like a grimace that mixed agony and joy. “Stinkerbelle,” he murmured and spinning her in a slow, wobbly circle, he smothered her with kisses and told her how much he’d missed her. And for a moment, there was nothing else other than the pure happiness of their reunion and their love for each other. Beth gave herself up to it; she reveled in it, but then she caught sight of the blood that darkened Charlie's jeans above his left knee. The bullet Jason fired hadn't missed.

  Charlie met her glance.

  “You’re hurt,” she said.

  He didn’t answer, but only stared at her and his eyes were shiny. Beth extended her hand, and he took it.

  “Are you real?” he asked and his voice slipped. He glanced from her to Chrissy. “You look like angels to me.”

  Chrissy buried her face in his neck as if she would never be pried loose.

  Charlie hugged her; he let go of Beth’s hand, but not her gaze. “What about you,” he asked. “Are you hurt?”

  She shook her head. She sensed he was waiting, uncertain of her and her feelings. A lot about him was different now, but the light in his eyes still pulled her like a beacon into a safe haven. She took his hand again and stepping in close to him, she used the tip of her finger to gently trace the contorted path fire had made on his neck and over his jaw. He flinched from her touch, but then grew still as she persisted in her exploration of his raw and knotted flesh until her own tears made her blind. “I’m so sorry,” she whispered.

  “No, no,” Charlie murmured. “It’s my fault. Maizie warned me, and I ignored her. I did so many things wrong.” He glanced away, blinking.

  After a long moment said her name, “Bethie,” to the shadows under the trees. Looking back at her, he said, “If anyone is sorry it’s me for what that bastard did to you, and for leaving you when you needed me most.”

  “How did you find out, about the abortion, I mean?”

  “Maizie told me, and then Metzger asked if I knew. You confided in him I guess.”

  “I’m so sorry,” Beth began. She touched the muscle where it jumped at the back of his jaw.

  He gently took her hand away, lowering it to her side. “It’s all right if you’re with him now. I won’t hold you.”

  “No, it’s not— It’s not like that. It could have been, but I--” Beth stopped, closed her eyes and swallowed. She found Charlie’s gaze again. “I don’t blame you if you hate me. I let Jason— I--I didn’t--”

  Charlie gently set his fingertip against her lips. “He was a sick monster, Beth, and he preyed on you and on your mama. What he did was unspeakable, but nothing he ever was or did could touch the things I love about you.”

  Tears flooded her cheeks. Charlie dabbled his fingers in the stream as if he couldn’t quite believe she was crying. He dropped his arm around her drawing her close, and she clung to him.

  Chrissy leaned back in his embrace, looking him over intently, then patting his cheek gently, she asked, “Does it hurt, Daddy?”

  “No, Stinkerbelle, not anymore.”

  She sighed. “Then can we have ice cream for dinner?”

  “Yes, sugar,” Beth said, laughing. “We can have ice cream for dinner.”

  The sound of sirens floated in the distance. Someone was finally coming in response to Frieda Pearson’s emergency call.

  -o0o-

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Barbara Taylor Sissel is a freelance writer, book reviewer, and editor, and the author of two other novels, The Ninth Step and The Volunteer. A one-time editor for a small regional press, Barbara has written extensively for the public relations field. Her short stories and articles have appeared in a number of venues.

  An avid gardener, Barbara is currently working with numerous clients on a variety of projects and writing a new novel. She has two sons and lives in The Woodlands, Texas. For more information on past and forthcoming books, you can visit her website at www.barbarataylorsissel.com

  If you enjoyed

  The Last Innocent Hour

  you’ll love

  The Volunteer and The Ninth Step

  Excerpts follow.

  See Barbara’s website for further details. www.barbarataylorsissel.com

  Keep reading for a sample of The Volunteer

  The Volunteer

  Chapter 1

  Tuesday, September 14, 1999 - 33 days remain

  Sophia doesn’t register the sound when the truck pulls into her driveway. She doesn’t hear the sharp click of the truck’s door when the man makes his exit or the approaching scrape of his steps that slow and then stop at the foot of the stairs. She isn’t aware that he’s watching her. She’s on the small landing above him, outside her office. She came out when her mother called, when the conversation grew heated, needing fresh air, a remedy, knowing there isn’t any. Not in this situation. She holds the cordless receiver a little away from her ear in a vain attempt to soften the complaint in her mother’s voice.

  “I won’t have it, Sophia,” her mother declares for at least the fifth time. “You had no right to take my car keys. I will not have you treating me like an incompetent teenager.”

  “Believe me, Mother, I’m not too thrilled about it either.” Sophia could laugh, it is such an understatement. “But the State of Texas has left us no choice. They’ve taken your driver’s license.”

  “They’re a bunch of fools! I told you that accident wasn’t my fault. The policeman who gave me the ticket was a smart aleck. He wouldn’t listen.”

  “Oh, Mother.” Sophia isn’t sure who she’s sorrier for. The only way she and Esther have managed to stay civil to one another is by keeping their distance. Now they will have to be involved almost daily. Sophia is disturbed by the prospect; she resents that it is all on her shoulders now and she’s unhappy with herself, that she can’t summon a more generous spirit. Loosening her gaze, she lets it wander over the backyard toward the lake. She will walk down there, she thinks, when her mother is finished with her tirade. She will take a glass of iced tea and sit at the end of the rickety dock and listen to the water slide against the shore.

  The man at the foot of the stairs shifts his feet. Above him Sophia registers the sound, but subliminally, the way you might divine a tiny foreshock, the one that in the moment seems random, but that is actually part of a larger pattern, an announcement of the greater explosion yet to come.

  “Frances wants to make peach cobbler,” Esther’s voice needles Sophia’s ear, “but she can’t because we haven’t any peaches. And we need a new birdfeeder. The old one’s lost its perch. I could drive us to get these things, but no, you took the car keys all because of a little fender bender. Everyone has them, Sophia.”

  “What is she saying, Sister?” Frances speaks in the background.

  “Just make a list, Mother,” Sophia says. “I’ll shop on Satur--”

  “No.” Esther is adamant.

  Sophia closes her eyes. She isn’t young herself anymore. How much of this can she do? Without losing her temper, her sanity? But now there is a discreet cough behind her and she turns and sees him, the man at the foot of the stairs.

  “Someone’s here, Mother. I have to go.”

  The man says her name: “Dr. Beckman? Sophia Beckman?”

  She clicks off the cordless and in the moment before she answers, along with a dart of annoyance, she has an unreasoning
urge to run. Perhaps it is something in the man’s voice that unsettles her. The impulse is gone before she can decide.

  “I hope I didn’t scare you.” The man smiles.

  She doesn’t.

  “I’m Cort Capshaw,” he says.

  Sophia sets the phone on the small bench beside her office door and looks beyond him to what she assumes is his white pickup truck parked in her driveway. When she looks back, his gaze seems intense. The line of his jaw, the set of his shoulders is very determined, but not in a way that makes her feel threatened, only more impatient. He’s selling something. He’s going to have some take-no-prisoners spiel. “Can I help you?” she asks. He’s younger than she is but older than her daughter, Sophia decides. Carolyn is twenty-six. He’s nearer forty. Medium height, solidly built, cropped sandy-hair. There’s a quality of stillness to his presence that she could admire, but she won’t. She’s not buying regardless.

  “I’m a house painter.” He half turns to gesture across the street. “I’ve been working at Miz McKesson’s and before that I painted the Nelson’s house, around the corner?”

  “I’m not interested in having my house painted,” she says, although she’s well aware that the house needs work. In fact, she and Russ had discussed getting bids last fall.

  “Oh, I thought--that is Miz McKesson told me you might be putting the house on the market, that you mentioned it would need a bit of sprucing up beforehand.”

  “I’m sure she meant to be helpful.” Sophia averts her glance. Nosy woman. It was true; she had told Lily McKesson that she was considering a move. Into something smaller. A rabbit burrow maybe or a tree hollow. Someplace small and obscure where life never fell into uncertainty.

  “Painting isn’t just for looks, you know. Can you see there?” His gesture describes an area of siding over the backdoor. “The old paint is flaking. Plus, I noticed a lot of mildew and just an overall chalking.”

  Sophia thanks the man for the information. She comes down the remainder of the steps. She’s thinking how warm it is for autumn, as if summer is reluctant to give up its tenancy. She’s thinking if she were rude, she would cut the painter short, tell him she has something more pressing to do.

  “What if I come back later and talk to your husband?”

  “He died a year ago,” Sophia announces and then wishes to bite off her tongue. What has gotten into her that she would blurt out to a complete stranger that she lives alone? Russ would be appalled.

  Cort Capshaw apologizes and says he had no idea.

  Sophia is murmuring the obligatory reassurance and thinking Nosy Lily must have failed to inform him of her loss when Lily’s Cadillac pulls to the curb. Speak of the devil. . . .

  “You said you needed a painter,” she calls through the lowered car window.

  “Yes, I suppose I did.” Sophia raises her voice.

  “Cort does excellent work, all by hand. There wasn’t a speck of damage or a drop of paint to be found on a single one of my azaleas. You won’t find anyone better, Sophia.”

  The painter hollers his thanks.

  Lily waves and drives off.

  Cort hands Sophia a business card.

  Capshaw and Company it reads in addition to his name. House painting, custom remodeling and renovation. Quality service.

  “If you like, you could call the historical society in town. I do a lot of preservation work for them. Actually it’s what I prefer, but circumstances being what they are, you know, with the economy. . . .”

  Sophia angles her gaze toward the house.

  “Why don’t I work up a bid and leave it with you along with a list of references? In case you change your mind,” he adds.

  She hesitates, feeling herself frown even as she agrees. “I suppose it wouldn’t hurt.” She isn’t sure what prompts her. His talk of hard times, perhaps, her inclination to be helpful.

  She asks how long the job will take, “Assuming I accept your bid,” she cautions.

  He paces the drive, eye to the roofline. “A couple of weeks, if the weather holds, which this time of year. . . .”

  She nods. He could mean because it’s the tag-end of hurricane season, or perhaps he’s referring to the vagaries of south Texas weather in general.

  A pause falls. One heartbeat’s worth of silence is followed by two and three. A hot wind scoots a swirl of sun-dried leaves along the driveway, scattering them over the grass where it verges on the concrete.

  Sophia lifts her hand indicating the iron-railed steps she had, minutes ago, descended. “I have an office upstairs. People coming and going. Will they have access?”

  “Shouldn’t be a problem. I’ll use a ladder over here instead of scaffolding. It’ll take up less room.”

  “I’m keeping a limited schedule of appointments at present.”

  “That’s understandable, considering your recent loss.”

  “I’m a psychologist.”

  “I know,” he tells her. “I know who you are.”

  Their glances clash. His look is searching as if he’s waiting for Sophia to recognize him. Should she?

  “Two years ago,” the painter says, “I followed Jody Doaks’ trial; you were interviewed on TV. The story was big news.”

  Sophia shifts her glance, thoroughly regretting now that she has encouraged him. What is it about appearing on television that causes perfect strangers to assume you welcome their attention? In the months since the trial she has been approached in the grocery store and the dentist’s office; people have followed her across parking lots, argued with her over the median at the gas pump. Once, a woman blocked Sophia’s exit from the ladies room at the mall threatening to hold her there until she agreed to recant the testimony she’d given on Jody’s behalf. The woman had ranted that Sophia was the devil incarnate. If only, Sophia had thought. She would have whipped out her pitchfork and prodded the woman in her ample behind.

  “I’m against the death penalty, too,” the painter says, assuming, erroneously, that Sophia shares his opinion, when, in all honesty, she isn’t certain. “I don’t think it works as a deterrent to anything other than our humanity, do you? Don’t get me wrong. It’s not that I think Doaks should ever get out.”

  Sophia thinks of Jody. Poor demented, pathological Jody. Charming in the extreme. A baby-faced man who called his sister Momma because she’d raised him. A man who professed to love children, but who, in actuality, loved having sex with children. When the police searched the farm where Jody lived, they turned up the bodies of eight children buried John Wayne Gacy style in a crawl space under an old shed on the property. Jody had given Sophia this detail along with others that were more horrifying when he’d broken down during his third session with her in as many days. She is still uncertain how she managed to stay calm, handing him tissues to dry his copious tears, while he confessed he was doing things, hideous things to children, and he couldn’t stop. Sensing there was more, Sophia had prodded him very carefully and gotten him to confide in her about three-year-old Benny Chu, who at that very moment had been locked inside a room of Jody’s house. Jody hadn’t cleared the driveway before Sophia called the police.

  Without a single thought of the ramifications. It had been like running into a burning building. That was how she explained it to Russ. She hadn’t considered the risk. Hadn’t reckoned that as a result of her impulse she would be caught up in a maelstrom of publicity, hounded by reporters for weeks on end and subpoenaed by the State to give expert testimony, all of which, as Russ had pointed out, left her, and by association, Russ, himself, vulnerable to exposure. Which was unfortunate, but they both knew there was no question of letting Jody go. And in any case, for all Sophia knows, the very fact that Jody chose her to confess to, and not some other psychologist, might very well have been a test, the gift of a second chance to do the right thing.

  Not that it absolves her. She can never be forgiven for her past wrongdoing. But at least Benny was found alive and relatively unharmed, to his parents’ eternal gratitude. But
that’s something else Sophia doesn’t deserve.

  “It was a good thing you did saving that boy,” the painter says now.

  Sophia doesn’t respond. Admiration is one more thing she isn’t comfortable with. A lot of it turned sour anyway when during the punishment phase of Jody’s trial, she made the controversial statement that she was unsure whether it was right to execute a man who couldn’t understand why he was being put to death. Certainly what Jody had done was of the blackest evil, but should he die for it? Who is she to judge? She of all people?

  “Do you still see him?”

  Sophia glances sidelong at the painter. Suppose he isn’t a painter but a reporter? That would explain the overly meaningful looks he’s been giving her. But in all likelihood he’s merely curious like the countless others who have no qualms about approaching her. “If you could leave the bid on the patio table under the hurricane lamp. . . ?”

  “That’ll work,” he says. “It was nice meeting you,” he adds. “Interesting.” The word is tacked on.

  Sophia has no idea what he means. Not then.

  Chapter 2

  Friday, September 17, 1999 - 30 days remain

  Grace has told him that she repainted their bedroom the same shade, robin’s egg blue. She still sleeps under the quilt they shared, one that his mother pieced for them as a wedding gift. His favorite ball cap hangs where he left it on a hook in the mudroom. She talks as if she expects him to walk back through the door one day and magically, their lives will be restored to the time in the beginning of their marriage when they were happy.

  Often when she visits him, she’ll put her palm to the thick sheet of Plexiglas that separates them and say, “If only you could see it,” as if he’s in a hospital and suffering from a loss of memory. But he isn’t. No.

  Jarrett swings his feet over the side of the bunk onto the concrete floor. He’s housed at the Terrell Unit outside Livingston, Texas, prisoner number 22116. The black block letters DR on the back of his shirt stand for death row. Forty-one days ago the court granted his request to end all appeals on his behalf and set the date for his execution. Forty-one days ago he became a dead man walking, a man they call a volunteer.