“Would you like some water?” he asked, and she ought to have found his solicitude reassuring, but she didn’t.
Thanking him, she declined his offer and cleared her throat. She wanted to ask him outright if he agreed that Tucker was innocent. She wanted to demand that he tell her what he knew, because he did know something. His gaze was so intent, she felt under scrutiny. She felt the way she had when she’d sat across the desk from Detective Sergeant Garza, as if there were some agenda working that she knew nothing about. Maybe it was a cop thing, but somehow, Lissa didn’t think so, and doubt made her cautious.
“I want to help Tucker,” she said. “But I don’t know how. I thought maybe you would know—because you work at the club, you would know whether there were other men who— I mean, you must hear things, see things.”
“I can only imagine how difficult this is,” he began.
“Yes.” Lissa cut him off. “My parents are a mess. So is Tucker. Do you remember Darren Coe from high school?”
“Coe? Sure. Why?”
“I heard a couple of things recently about him that make me wonder if he wasn’t involved with Jessica and Miranda and not in a good way.” Something like interest flickered across Sonny’s expression, or did she imagine it? Lissa wasn’t sure.
“What couple of things? Who have you been talking to?” Sonny’s tone was conversational, not in the least threatening.
Still, Lissa felt the small hairs rise on the back of her neck. Remembering her dad’s caveat regarding a man’s silence, she didn’t answer.
Sonny bent forward on his elbows. “If you’re asking whether Coe frequents the club, the answer is yes. He comes around. He’s like a lot of guys. Married or not, they’ve got a thing for the ladies. In Coe’s case, they’re his after-school sport, if you get me.” Sonny laughed at his joke, then his mouth flattened. “I heard his wife doesn’t much like it.”
“You don’t look as if you like it, either.”
“The guy’s an asshole. We both know that. He’s been an asshole his whole life.”
“He assaulted Miranda the month before she was killed. Did you know? Was he an asshole to Jessica, too? Did you ever see him get rough with her? Could he have done this, Sonny? Could he have murdered these women?” Lissa was begging; she could hear it, but she couldn’t feel badly about it, given what was at stake, and she thought it was worth it when she saw Sonny’s expression soften. She saw his guard come down.
“Look,” he said, “between you and me, Tucker’s problem is Darren’s reputation here in town. You ran around with his sister in high school, right? You know she’s married to a Houston city councilman.”
“But this is Lincoln County.”
“Lincoln County, Harris County, doesn’t matter. Coe’s got family on the force up here, an uncle. Either place, whatever complaints come in about him, they hit the circular file. Are you getting me?”
“You’re saying Darren can do whatever he wants, break whatever law, batter women, murder them and get away with it, and my brother can go to prison for it.”
“I’m not saying anything, really.”
“Because you could get into trouble.” Lissa wasn’t asking. “Something else is going on here, isn’t it, Sonny?”
He regarded her steadily.
“That sting operation—” She paused to pass a hand across her brow as if she might clear it of her disbelief that she was sitting here, having this discussion. She thought if she didn’t know better, she would look around for a television camera. She began again. “That sting operation, the one that got Todd Hite arrested. Miranda was the one who told the police what was going on. She was working for them. Were you aware of that?”
“I might have been,” he said, shifting in his chair.
“Did Jessica work for the police, too? Could that be the motive in her murder? Because Tucker wasn’t involved in any of that, he wasn’t arrested. He didn’t even know Miranda was a police informant.”
“He was arrested, though, last fall for stalking Revel Wiley. Did you know about that?”
Lissa’s breath left her in a dejected gust. “I only found out yesterday when Mom told me.” She met Sonny’s glance, looked away, looked back.
“What?”
“I talked to Revel.” Lissa didn’t know whether to be frank. She couldn’t get beyond her sense that she was endangering Tucker, herself, her family, with all this talking. This was what happened when you lost your ordinary life, she thought, and another life was substituted, one for which you had no road map and you were afraid to ask for directions, because you didn’t know who you could trust.
Sonny, who had been leaning back with his hands behind his head, sat upright now. He repeated what Lissa said. “You talked to Revel,” and she caught it again, that bright note of interest, curiosity—suspicion?—that shiny edge in his tone of voice that made her nervous.
“You know her, right?” Lissa asked.
“She’s a piece of work,” Sonny said. “Where did you find her?”
“She found me. She came up to me in the parking lot of my office and tried to blackmail me into paying her for her silence about Tucker. She acted as if she knows things about him. At least, it’s what she wanted me to believe.”
“Huh.” Sonny toyed with the edge of his desk blotter.
“She said she has Tucker’s cell phone, that there’s information or something on it that proves he wasn’t in Austin, but he’s got receipts that show—”
“She doesn’t have his cell phone. The crime lab techs in Houston have it.”
“Revel turned it in?”
“I’m not sure how they got hold of it. I don’t see how they could have gotten it from Revel, though.”
Sonny said this almost to himself, and he did look confused. Lissa would remember it clearly later, the bafflement on his face.
He met her glance. “I heard it was underwater at some point, that they don’t know whether they can get any data off it.”
“Underwater?” Lissa was mystified.
Sonny didn’t respond.
In the pause that came, Lissa heard Pammy talking and thought she must be on the phone.
“There’s one other thing I can tell you.”
Lissa brought her gaze back to Sonny, who eyed her somberly. “You didn’t hear this from me, okay? But the coroner’s report indicates he found Coe’s DNA on Jessica Sweet’s body.”
“Really?” Lissa felt hope rise. “Does that mean—? Isn’t that good news?”
“It could be. The thing is he found Tucker’s DNA, too, so in this case, the DNA doesn’t necessarily mean anything. Both those guys had a thing for her. Both of them were seen with her the night she was murdered.”
“Tucker has an alibi, though, I started to tell you—”
“Yeah, I heard that, too. He claims he’s got receipts, proving he wasn’t in the vicinity at the time of Jessica’s death, but he never turned those over to the cops that I know of.”
Lissa started to say the police had taken Tucker’s car; they would find the receipts in the glove box. But suppose they didn’t?
Sonny got to his feet, and she did, too.
He said, “I wish I could be more help.”
She shouldered her purse. “Tucker didn’t do this, Sonny.”
“My money’s on Coe, but then I think the guy’s a son of a bitch and being a son of a bitch doesn’t get you convicted of murder in this state.”
“What does, Sonny? What will it take?”
“A witness,” he said, “or a confession.”
Lissa thought about that. She repeated the word confession in her mind. Sonny’s voice stopped her at the door of his office as she was leaving.
“What was Revel driving when you saw her?” he asked. “Did you notice?”
“Couldn’t help it. A brand-new red Lexus. Lipstick red. I always heard exotic dancers made good money. Why?”
“Oh, no reason,” he answered.
Lissa kept his glance a moment longer, and somehow, she knew he was lying.
* * *
Outside, she hunted for her own truck for several moments before remembering she had driven here in her dad’s truck. Sliding behind the steering wheel, she backed out slowly, and that’s when she noticed it, the light-colored Camry. At first, Lissa thought the driver, a woman, wanted her space, but then the car fell in behind her. Lissa glanced at it in the rearview. She thought how she wouldn’t have recognized, or paid attention to, the make of the car at all, if Evan hadn’t mentioned that he thought a Camry followed them from her parents’ house last night. But he had said the driver was a man.
Turning left under the freeway overpass, she found the sedan again, traveling in the lane adjacent to hers, several discreet car lengths back. Lissa deliberately slowed, waiting for it to close the gap. The driver directly behind her honked his horn, a long angry blast. Ignoring him, Lissa slowed even more. Traffic made it impossible for the Camry to do anything but pass, and when she caught sight of the driver, her breath stopped.
Revel?
Could it be her? Lissa saw only the driver’s profile as she sped by. Still, Lissa was almost positive Revel was at the wheel. She hung back, and it was only as she watched the Camry disappear that she realized she should have taken down the license plate number and called the police. Or Sonny. But then Lissa thought, No; she didn’t trust them any further than she did Revel.
18
EMILY FOLLOWED ROY into his workshop, worried for him, needing to know his mood, what he was thinking. The window glass was fly-specked and cloudy from age and rainwater. The stone floor was cool under the thin soles of her flats. The air smelled of wood shavings, linseed oil, an underscore of turpentine. It reminded her of her father. He’d spent a lot of time out here; it had been his refuge.
“Lissa’s pregnant.” She began with the lesser of her anxieties, and when Roy didn’t answer, she said, “I don’t know if she’ll go through with it. She’s afraid.”
Roy’s silence continued. It was so quiet Emily could hear his breath. She could hear the drone of an airplane overhead. Someone down the street was mowing their lawn.
“Roy?” Emily turned.
“I didn’t think she could have kids. I didn’t think she wanted them.”
“That’s what she’s said in the past.”
“What does Evan say? Does he want her to have it?”
“He does. I think they’ve had words about it. Lissa sees it as a kind of betrayal, because Evan has always said he didn’t care whether they had children. It’s the reality, you know? It’s different than the possibility. For him, anyway. I think it is for her, too, but she’s fighting it.”
Roy fiddled with his tools, picking up a whittling knife.
“Are you all right? I’m talking about last night. Do you remember?” Emily wasn’t thinking of anything other than the Colt revolver. She saw it in her mind’s eye, the way he had held it on her, then on himself. She had half hoped the police would find it and take it, take all the guns. But that one, the revolver, she had to get it out from under their bed, out of their room.
Roy said he remembered, and somehow she knew he was referring to their intimacy.
“I’m talking about before,” she said meaningfully. “You were in— You were really struggling. A nightmare, I guess?” Her voice lifted; she was asking, hoping he would say what triggered it.
He wiped a hand over his head. “I’m under a shitload of stress.”
“I know. We both are. The whole family is.”
“You don’t know the half of it,” he said, and something in his tone raised the fine hairs on the back of her neck.
“What does that mean?” she asked.
“Nothing,” he said. “I’m sorry about last night,” he added, and his voice was rough.
“We just have to get Tucker home safe, Roy,” she said.
“I know about Joe Merchant,” he said, locking her gaze.
“Joe?” The name from her mouth was a question, a protest.
“Don’t.” Roy raised his hand at her. “Don’t come off like you don’t know who Joe is, or what I’m talking about, okay? Give me that much, won’t you?”
She stared at him, feeling caught, snared; she was a deer in the headlights. “It’s not what you— He’s a friend, Roy. That’s all.” She stammered as if she were guilty, but of what? What did Roy know? From whom?
He turned his back to her.
“Am I not allowed to have friends?” Her tone rose, bordering on shrill. Even as she spoke her mental eye was loose and flying over her memories of the hours she and Joe had spent together. There was nothing there, no adulterous act, nothing close...other than the truth her heart knew.
The sound Roy made was derisive.
“Are you accusing me?” She was furious now, that he had made her feel guilty, that she had allowed him to have this effect on her.
“Should I be?” He faced her. “You just said it isn’t what I think. How do you know what I think? If it’s only a friendship—”
“It is,” she insisted.
Roy picked up a chunk of balsa wood, turning it in his hand. It was four or five inches in length, an elliptical shape. A project already in progress. “Here’s what I think—know,” he amended, setting the blade of his knife against the wood. “You have never been happy with me.”
“Oh, Roy, that isn’t—”
“Let’s be honest, can we? Once?”
“If you’re saying I’ve been unfaithful, I would never do that to you. You should know that about me. After almost forty years together I would think you would know that. After last night, I was with you, there with you, loving you—”
“What I know is that after I got back from ’Nam, I was bullshitting myself when I believed you weren’t marrying me out of pity.”
She started to object. He cut her off with a gesture, and after a moment, she admitted that maybe she had felt a certain amount of pity. “How could I not? I still feel it—pity, sadness, call it what you will—I call it compassion—for you and all the men who fought in that war, any war. Does that make my commitment to you less, because I hurt for you, because I’m sorry you lost your leg?”
He didn’t answer.
“Roy?”
“It doesn’t matter anymore.”
“Of course it matters.” She crossed the floor to stand next to him, to look into his face, and she was shocked to see his anguish. It was carved into the creases that bracketed his mouth; it sharpened the shadows in his eyes. Somehow they fumbled their way into each other’s arms, and she felt him clinging to her. He bent his head awkwardly into the hollow of her shoulder.
It wasn’t a lover’s embrace, but more one of desperation, even of fear. She thought of the ways he had always been at war inside himself. She thought of who he might have been if he hadn’t gone to war. The loss of his leg was horrible enough, but it was the loss of his dreams that had crippled his soul. What was a man without dreams?
If only he could accept the rewards from the life he had lived, if he could be content with that, but that, too, seemed beyond his scope.
“It’s my fault,” he said now, raising his head.
“What is?” she asked.
“Every goddamn bit of what’s happening to us, to Tucker, and I’m sorry, Em. Sorrier than I can say, and I mean to take care of it. I’ll fix it. I will. I promise.”
Emily tightened her grip on him. She had never thought she would hear that promise again, had never imagined they would be in circumstances that would require it. “It’s all right,” she said, forcing herself to soun
d calm. He didn’t need to know he was scaring her. “You’re exhausted,” she told him.
Roy broke their embrace, wiping his hands down his face. He said he was fine, but of course, it was obvious that he wasn’t, and now, on top of everything else, he was ashamed. She wished she could spare him that much at least.
“I should check on Lissa,” she said, thinking that to give him time alone to collect himself was the next best thing. Thinking if she could somehow get by Lissa, she would go straight upstairs to retrieve the gun. But where would she put it?
Roy said he’d be in later. He said, “It was that woman, Revel, who told me.”
Emily frowned.
“About you and Joe meeting with her. I know you paid money to get the stalking charge against Tucker dropped. Revel wants more now, which, if you’d asked me, I could have told you would happen when you paid her the first time. But you didn’t ask.”
“I didn’t want to worry you, Roy. You were already dealing with your retirement, and we were just getting through Tucker’s involvement with Miranda’s death.”
“So you called Joe. Yeah, I got that.”
She had injured his pride, wounded him more deeply than she could have imagined, or would have ever wanted to do. The harm she’d done him sickened her. “I’m so sorry. I thought—” she began.
“I figure you know she’s got Tucker’s cell phone,” Roy cut her off. “She wants five grand for it, or she’s giving it to the cops.”
“Evan thinks she’s bluffing.”
“Well, even if she doesn’t have it, she can cause trouble.”
“How do you mean? What else can she tell them?”
“Come on, Em. You basically bought her off to get Tucker clear of that charge. You think she won’t tell the cops about that and how you did it?”
Emily said she would have to face that when it happened, and she was almost to the door when Roy’s voice caught her. “You’ll be fine, you know,” he said.
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