Promises of Home

by Jeff Abbott

  “Did y’all know Clevey was in therapy?” I asked suddenly. The looks on Davis and Ed’s faces said no.

  “What for?” Davis asked, helping himself to another dollop of whiskey.

  “I don’t know. Do y’all have any idea what his problem was?”

  Ed scratched his chin. “Aside from his mean streak?”

  Junebug frowned. “That’s not treatable, Ed.”

  Davis swished whiskey in his mouth. “Clevey seemed perfectly healthy. But I don’t think he would have confided a personal problem to me.”

  I abandoned that tack. “Okay, then, back to the newspaper. Let’s say Clevey was working on a story about Rennie Clifton and it got him killed. Why would anyone then kill Trey? He hadn’t been in town in years. As far as we know, he and Clevey hadn’t been in touch for years. What would Trey know that Clevey knew?”

  “We don’t know for certain that Clevey and Trey hadn’t been in contact. Trey’d already been here a day before Clevey died, right?” Davis said slowly. “They could have met. Maybe the two of them did know something. Maybe that’s why Trey came back to town after all these years.”

  “He came home to recuperate,” I said tonelessly.

  “So he said.” Davis shrugged.

  “We better hope that it’s something only the two of them knew,” Ed added. “Because what if … the killer thinks that the rest of us know it, too?”

  “If any of you boys know something you ain’t telling,” Junebug said softly, “now would be a real good time to spill the beans.”

  No one answered.

  I sipped again at my whiskey, letting the smoky taste fill my mouth. “I got a question. Why would Clevey even start digging into the past?”

  “He wrote that article last summer. The twenty-year anniversary of Hurricane Althea,” Ed said slowly. “Remember, it came out last August. Maybe in writing that, he found out something about Rennie Clifton’s death. And now he’s dead.”

  No one spoke for a long moment.

  “Maybe we should all get out of town,” Ed blurted. “I mean, if someone’s knocking off our circle of friends, I say we all take our money, get the hell out of Dodge, and go party in Vegas or something.”

  Davis snorted. “I’m not about to be chased away on a whim, Ed, and leave my radio station, my law practice, and my family. Get real. You got a business to worry about, too.”

  “I don’t think it’s worth dying over!” Ed squeaked.

  Davis laughed. “I agree, Ed, I wouldn’t die over Wanda. And I don’t expect you’ll have your ridiculous Elvis emporium much longer. So if you want to vamoose like a scared rabbit, go ahead.”

  “The Institute of Elvisology is not ridiculous! Celebrity collectibles are a growth industry!”

  “Ed, shut up!” I snapped. I pressed fingers against my aching temples. I wasn’t in the mood to discuss the comparative economic gains of peddling Elvis trinkets. “Look, none of us knows anything that Clevey or Trey knew, right? We’d admit it, right?” Nods of assent went around the room. “So we’re not in any danger, right?”

  “Unless the killer thinks we know,” Davis said. “Then it doesn’t matter what the truth is.” God, sometimes I don’t like lawyers.

  Sister was curled in a fetal position on her bed when I got home. Her quiet “come in” was barely above a whisper. I sat on the corner of her bed, afraid to touch her, nearly afraid to speak.

  “I just got back from Junebug’s,” I said. “He sure is worried about you.”

  The clouds didn’t let much moonlight through her window, but there was enough where I could see fresh tears on her face. “Junebug. God, he thinks I did it. He thinks I killed Trey in cold blood.”

  “Of course he doesn’t. He has to take himself off any case where he’s got a personal connection.”

  “Crap! He’s got personal connections with half the town. He did it so he won’t be the one to arrest me when they finally issue the wairant. He doesn’t want to put the handcuffs on the woman he claims to love.”

  “Where were you today, Sister?”

  “I told you, I told him. I needed quiet time, so I went for a long drive, out on the roads between here and La Grange and Bavary. I went down to Mears Creek. You know that’s where Trey proposed to me, don’t you? That was … our place.”

  “Who gave you the black eye, then?”

  “I told you! I stumbled against a tree.” She shifted her face into the pillow, and I knew this phase of the conversation was over.

  “I want Mark to see Steven Teague,” I started, but she didn’t let me finish.

  “Who?”

  “He’s a therapist. A counselor. I think Mark needs help dealing with what he saw.”

  “Jordy, I know you have good intentions. But I’d made it clear I didn’t want Mark to be around his father. You had no business interfering.”

  “I’m sorry.” I felt miserable. “I’m sorry he saw what he did. I know you’re pissed at me, but, at least, he got to know that his father loved him.”

  Sister gave a shuddering sob. I couldn’t tell if it was anger or despair that racked her body.

  “Sister—”

  “I’m sorry I hit him. I’m sorry he didn’t get to see Mark as Mark really is. Why? Why did he have to leave us?” she cried.

  In the six years Trey had been gone, I’d never heard her ask that question. Of course I had no answer. Instead, I took her in my arms. She cried for a while, then pulled her face away from my shoulder.

  “Stupid crybaby.” She sniffed, wiping her face with her robe’s sleeve. “I should know better.”

  “His leaving never made sense to me.” I pushed an errant lock of hair out of her face.

  “God. Now he’s gone, truly gone.” Sister stared at the moon-limned clouds in their dreary, dark parade southward. “A part of me always believed he’d come back. Isn’t that the most idiotic thing you ever heard?”

  “No, it’s not.” Silence hung between us for a minute.

  “Sister?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Did Trey send you money—support—for Mark?” Trey’d alluded to that twice, once at the library, once at Truda Shivers’s, but both times I’d been convinced it was a lie to salve his ego.

  Sister lowered her eyes. “Yes. Every month for the past six years. Sometimes he’d miss a month, but he’d always make it up. And always with a money order. The letters were postmarked from all over.”

  I let my breath out. And I’d called Trey a liar. “Why didn’t you ever tell me?”

  “I don’t know. I put most of it in an account at the bank. I want Mark to go to college. Sometimes I had to tap it, when times were hard, but most of it’s in that account.”

  “So Trey wasn’t entirely a deadbeat dad?”

  Sister’s tone grew cold. “He wasn’t here. Money doesn’t replace a father’s love. That’s what I don’t understand. Okay, our marriage wasn’t perfect. There were times that we fought. But leave Mark? How could he abandon his own flesh and blood?”

  In that last phone conversation with Trey, I could hear the joy, the anticipation of seeing his son. “I don’t know. I only know that he loved Mark, even if he wasn’t here to show it.”

  She threw herself on the pillows. “I don’t want to talk about him now! Go to bed, Jordan. We’ve both had horrible days.”

  While she was in this state of honesty I wanted to ask about the batik scrap I’d found; but I couldn’t. Not without it sounding like an accusation I wasn’t ready to make. I got up and went back downstairs. Candace had gotten Mama down for the night and was sipping a ginger ale and watching the news from Austin.

  “Thanks for staying over.” I went and kissed her on the mouth. She kissed back for a moment.

  “You want me to sleep with you? Or in the guest room?” she asked softly. “I never stayed here since we’ve been dating.”

  “It can’t make any nevermind to Mama, but, for Mark’s sake, it’d be best if you slept in the guest room.”

&nbs
p; She didn’t take it as rejection. “All right, babe. You doing okay?”

  I looked down into her cool blue eyes. I wanted to say no, I wasn’t doing okay. I was scared shitless by the two options that seemed to be looming before me; either my sister was a killer or my friends were being murdered for some hidden reason from boyhood days. Death has a long shadow, my grandfather used to say, and I never appreciated what he meant until now. I wanted to explain this to Candace, but instead I kissed her again and said I was going to bed.

  It was only after I pulled myself between the cold, lonely sheets and lay back on my pillow that the most disturbing thought of the day came to me: what if Trey had been killed simply because he’d come home?

  “NOT LIKE THAT,” TREY SCOLDED ME. “YOU always, always get on a horse from the left, not the right!” He yanked the reins out of my hand and patted the horse’s side.

  “Well, excuuuse me,” I retorted. “I was on the left.”

  “Not your left. The horse’s left.” Trey took me by the shoulder and led me around to the proper side.

  “You didn’t say that,” I said indignantly.

  Trey pushed back his black cowboy hat and shook his head in smiling resignation. He was fourteen, but he already looked sixteen, filling out and growing more quickly than I had. I still looked like a scrawny little kid next to him.

  “I swear, Jordy, you are the most impatient person I’ve ever met. Now, let me tell you what to do, and wait until I’m done”—here he fixed me with a steely gaze—“so’s you don’t rush off and kill your fool self.”

  I nodded. He went through the steps again: placing the reins over the horse’s neck and grasping them in his left hand, putting his left shoulder against the horse, facing its tail, and gauging his weight against the horse’s brown shoulder. Finally, he turned the stirrup from back to front before putting his foot in it (he stressed this step to me so I wouldn’t twist my leg wrong once I was up in the saddle). He demonstrated by swinging gracefully into Fafnir’s saddle, his whole body an exercise in control and power. The huge horse obeyed the boy without a tremor.

  “See. Ain’t so hard. You’re gonna do fine,” Trey assured me, dismounting and giving Fafnir a pat.

  I went for a second try. Fafnir regarded me with disdain; the smell of my fear was probably palpable to him. Trey’d said he’d teach me to ride if I helped him with history, and now I was thinking I’d gotten the raw end of the deal. The horse moved uneasily, as though unwilling to give me a chance at mastering him.

  “Remember what I told you, okay? First take the reins over his neck and take hold of them real firm.”

  I did.

  “Now get your left shoulder against the horse and look down toward his tail.”

  I did.

  “Okay, now move back toward Fafnir’s shoulder.”

  I did. That’s when the script went wrong and Fafnir suddenly moved and a sharp pain jabbed my butt. I hollered like a stuck pig and jumped forward, letting go the reins. I thought for sure the next thing I’d hear was Trey’s hysterical laughter at his horse biting me in the ass.

  Instead Trey stood there, shaking his head and not laughing while I rubbed my jeans where Fafnir had nipped me. Fafnir regarded me without an ounce of pity and snorted, stepping away awkwardly.

  “What’d I do wrong?” I muttered.

  “Nothing. Faf’s being particular.” He took the gelding by the reins and walked him around the barn, murmuring to him and patting his shoulder. I watched, wondering what you said to an ornery horse.

  When Trey led Fafnir back up to me, I fidgeted. “I don’t know, Trey. He doesn’t like me much.”

  “He just ain’t used to you. He’s a good horse, and you’re gonna ride him today.” A faint smile touched his mouth. “Less you’re too sore to sit in the saddle now.”

  “Shut up.” I took the reins again, faced the horse’s end, turned the stirrup, and swung up and into the saddle. Fafnir didn’t budge. I sat in silent amazement for a moment, forgetting what I was supposed to do next.

  Trey smiled, and I let myself bask in the glow of his approval. “Now there, young master Jordan. Weren’t so hard, was it?”

  “Once we got the ass-biting out of the way, no,” I observed.

  “Yeah, I just hope ol’ Faf doesn’t the from that bite. He’s probably been poisoned if he broke your skin.”

  “Very funny. If he does it again, I’m calling the glue factory.”

  “He’s gonna be just fine. So’re you.” Trey rubbed Fafnir’s shoulder with real affection. I decided not to make any further glue-factory remarks.

  Trey walked alongside me, showing me how to urge Fafnir into action. Once I was in the saddle, Fafnir proved willing enough and he didn’t give me much trouble. He was a good horse, like Trey promised.

  I surveyed the springtime peacefulness of Hart Quarlander’s horse farm. The live oaks that dotted the banks of Grunewald Creek swayed with their laden branches in the brisk breeze, and the grass gleamed that peculiarly strong green that always follows heavy spring rains. The air smelled fresh and clear and ripe with horse. “The world looks a little different from up here.”

  “Don’t it, though? How come you never mentioned wanting to ride before? I’d have taught you long ago.”

  I coughed. “My daddy hates horses. He got thrown by one when he was little and broke his arm. He won’t let Sister or me near ’em.”

  “But you’re riding today.”

  “What Daddy don’t know won’t hurt me.” I laughed.

  “Don’t you worry. If he finds out, I’ll tell him it was my idea.”

  Daddy and Trey got on like a house afire. Trey’d sweet-talked me out of more than one escapade by conferring with Daddy. Mama remained somewhat suspicious of Trey, but mamas are like that.

  “Too bad Arlene didn’t come today,” Trey said, taking in the overarching blue sky. “I guess she’s too snooty to take a riding lesson from a freshman.”

  “She’s sweet on Billy Kiblett.” I shrugged. “She spends all her time with him.”

  “Billy Kiblett can’t do jackshit ’cept throw a football.”

  “Yeah, but in Mirabeau, that’s a highly prized skill. You know that.”

  “Bastrop kicked our asses last year ’cause holy Billy Kiblett couldn’t connect with his receivers. What’s so special about him?”

  “Hey, Trey. You act like you’re in love with her.” If he could tease me about getting my butt bit, I could retaliate with the suggestion of amorous intentions toward my sister. Who would wriggle more?

  “Naw, I ain’t in love with Arlene. She’s a pain in the neck.” He looked off at the line of live oaks near the creek and straightened his hat. “When you’re a better rider, we’ll go for a ride along the creek. It’s real—” His voice broke off. I turned to where he looked.

  A man staggered out from the trees in the creek, weaving and walking as though yanked every few moments by invisible strings. Hatless, he kept one chambrayed arm over his eyes against the springtime brightness. He shuffled along toward the main house, barely staying on his feet I saw a leaf tangled in the man’s dark hair and suspected that if I was closer, I’d smell cheap whiskey.

  I didn’t say anything; I stared down at the saddle horn. Fafnir snorted.

  “Trey—”

  “Never mind, Jordy.” There was ice in his voice. “Shit. And it ain’t even noon yet.”

  I watched Trey’s daddy yank open the screen door to the Quadlander house and totter inside.

  Sitting on the horse made me feel bold. “Why does Mr. Quadlander put up with it, Trey? Why do you?”

  He might have punched any of his other friends for such bluntness, but instead he looked up into my eyes and then quickly averted them. “Hart’s a good man. And Daddy only gets drunk some of the time, it ain’t always.”

  I remembered when Mama’s uncle Buell drank too much at Christmas a few years back and then was gone from town for a while. Sister and I’d finally found out he’d gone to a r
ehab place in Bryan, where he quickly dried out and found a new addiction to Jesus. Well, better that than whiskey. Sober and sanctimonious was preferable to drunk and disorderly.

  “Trey, listen to me for a minute. There are places your daddy could go, help he could get—”

  “Get off the horse, Jordy, I got to go tend to Daddy.” He stared at the house.

  “Trey—”

  “Look. I know you mean well. I do. But this is my problem. It ain’t yours.” His bottom lip vanished into his mouth and his face couldn’t hide the anguish. “Please.”

  I swung down from Fafnir. “I’m sorry. I just want to help you.”

  “I don’t need your help, Jordy. Go back to your perfect father and let me tend to mine.” He took Faf’s reins from my hands. “Why—why don’t you just wait out here? I’ll get Faf situated and I’ll call your folks to come pick you up.”

  “I could help you with your daddy,” I said softly. “I could brew him some coffee. I remember when Uncle Buell—”

  “I don’t want your help!” he screamed at me, and Fafnir whinnied, eyes rolling in panic at the noise. The horse’s reaction brought Trey back. “Please. I can take care of my own problems. I don’t need anybody’s help. Just wait out here.”

  “All right.” I turned toward the oaks and creek. I wondered how many bottles of whiskey Louis Slocum had emptied, sitting between the gnarled roots of the trees. Then I heard the gunshots.

  I whirled around. The world shimmered with unreal light. The farm was gone. The grass was gone. Fafnir was gone. There was only Trey, a grown man, dying, lying with three wounds in his back, staring helplessly at me through a mask of blood.

  I snapped awake in bed, the gasp of horror caught in my throat. Dim moonlight silvered my bedroom. Long, shuddering breaths emptied my chest. The November chill pressed against the window and I felt the uncomfortable dampness of sweat cooling the sheets. I pushed the bedclothes away and pulled on a robe. I sat by my window and stared out at the crescent moon, hanging like a cut nail above the fingers of the trees. The clouds had scudded away, to take rain and darkness south toward Victoria and Corpus Christi.