He tugged at his collar.
“Is your momma still alive?”
He looked down at the newspaper. “Yeah.”
“I can only imagine what she’s gonna say when she finds out what you’re up to.”
Chuckling, he glanced up with an evil look. “I thought you said I was gonna get away with it. The Henryetta police are a band of imbeciles.”
My eyebrows rose. “Ah, but a momma always knows, doesn’t she?”
His smile fell and his face paled. “Enough talking. Time to go.”
I couldn’t believe that line worked. “I still have to pee.”
“You can pee when you get home.”
Was he going to try to drown me again? My heart tried to throw itself from my chest. Calm down. I’d done pretty well so far, in fact, I couldn’t believe how well I’d done. But we were still in a public place. If he got me alone…I felt like I was going to throw up.
My phone rang.
Jimmy shook his head with a sneer. “You’re quite the popular girl, aren’t you?” He picked it up. “Joe.”
“That’s my boyfriend, the state—”
“—police detective. Got it.”
I grimaced and gave him a sympathetic look. “Yeah, here’s the thing about Joe. You don’t want to tick him off. He’s got this really bad temper.”
The phone continued to ring in his hand. His grip tightened. “How bad?”
“Did you hear what happened to Daniel Crocker’s brother when Joe busted their ring a couple of months ago?”
“Daniel Crocker didn’t have a brother.”
I cringed. “Yeah, that’s what they want you to think. If word had gotten out what Joe did to him…” I shook my head. “Let’s just say, after Clinton was governor, the state police learned how to sweep messes so far under the rug that entire towns have been known to disappear.” Lordy. Where had that come from? I tried to ignore the fact that I had become a bald-faced liar. Apparently, facing my impending murder brought out a scrappiness I didn’t know I had.
He stared at the phone, then stuffed it in his pocket. “Yeah, right.”
I shrugged. “Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”
Picking up the newspaper, Jimmy stood. “Time to go.”
I glanced out the window. Officer Ernie was meandering across the street toward the coffee shop, his mouth set in his no-nonsense purse. If only I could stall Jimmy a bit longer.
But Jimmy followed my gaze and noticed the officer. He pushed me toward the hall. “I think we’ll take the back door.”
Before I lost sight of the window, I saw Joe running down the street, a good fifty feet away. He’d probably found out where I was from Violet. If we left the coffee shop, how would he know where to find me? Joe was going to be furious that I hadn’t gone with my sister.
Panic tightened my chest and I stopped moving.
Jimmy pressed the tip of the gun in my back. “I know you’re thinking ‘Oh, he won’t shoot me in public,’ but you’re wrong. I killed Frank Mitchell and I tried to strangle you last night. I’ll shoot you. But you’re more valuable to me alive right now, so the choice is yours. Stay here and get shot, or go with me.”
One last glance confirmed Joe wouldn’t reach me in time. I had no idea how much damage Jimmy’s gun would do, but I wasn’t willing to take the chance.
“I’ll go with you.” My breath caught and the words came out in a squeak. My irritation rose, momentarily overshadowing my fear. I didn’t want to give this man the satisfaction of hearing that I was afraid.
“Smart girl.” He poked the gun into my back and I marched toward the back door, praying I’d made the right decision.
We exited into an alley, the heat hitting me as soon as we walked out the door.
“Goddamned heat wave,” Jimmy grumbled. “The AC’s out in my car.” He shoved me to the right and had me walk in front of him. “Where’s yours?”
I frowned, the heat and the situation making me cranky. “I already told you that it’s not here.”
“I know that. I asked you where it’s at.”
“I suppose it’s in my driveway.”
“Does the A/C work?”
I looked over my shoulder at him in disbelief. He wanted to drive to my murder scene in air-conditioned comfort. “Not very well.”
“Wait a minute.” He shoved me against the brick wall of the coffee shop. A dumpster hid us from view of the street at the end of the alley.
I tried to swallow, a lump of fear getting in the way. He was going to shoot me outside next to this smelly dumpster. “I’ve changed my mind. I want to go back inside.”
He shook his head in disgust. “You can’t change your mind now.”
“Well, I did anyway. If you’re gonna shoot me, I’d rather die in the air conditioning instead of dying next to the trash.”
“I’m not gonna shoot you. I’m trying to figure out what to do about the car.”
“Oh.”
He rubbed his chin, looking toward the street.
“What are you trying to figure out?”
‘If I drive my car to your house, it’s going to be seen by your neighbors.”
“We could take a taxi.”
“What?”
“I bet it’ll have air conditioning.”
“We can’t take a taxi.”
“Why not?”
His eyes widened as though I’d said the pope was Jewish. “You know, the whole hostage thing.”
“Oh… right…” So much for staying around people.
“We’ll just have to take my car.”
I shrugged. “You’ll be fine. My neighbors are a bunch of blind and deaf old women. They never notice anything.”
He grabbed my arm and pulled me around the dumpster and toward the street, stopping at the edge to peer around the corner. “There’s cops crawling everywhere.”
“It’s the end of the month and I bet they’re handin’ out jaywalking tickets. You know, to boost the revenue.”
“Or they’re looking for you.”
“Yeah, they don’t like me very much. You know, you can just leave me here and I won’t tell anyone about you.”
“The only way you’re walking out of this alley is if you leave with me.”
So much for options. “Where’s your car?”
One side of his mouth lifted into a smirk. “That’s what I thought.”
The back door to the coffee shop opened. I hoped to God it was Joe.
Jimmy dragged me onto the street and around the corner, cutting diagonally across the street to a parking lot before I could see who it was coming out of the coffee shop. We stopped next to a light blue VW Bug, the old kind from the sixties. The car was a rust bucket, and Jimmy had to tinker with the lock to get the door to open.
Putting his hand on top of my head, he pushed me into the front seat.
I was starting to panic again. “I think it’s only fair I warn you that I get carsick.”
“Great.” He rolled his eyes. “Now stay put in that seat or I’ll shoot you, got it?”
I judged my odds of getting away as he made his way to the driver’s door and decided they weren’t very good. For one thing, it was a small car and thus a short trip around the back. And for another, the door would probably get stuck as I was opening it.
My nerves were getting the better of me and I started talking. “Lucky for you, your car’s seen better days so if I get sick, it won’t make much difference. You know, you’d think with all that income from your rental properties you’d be able to afford a new car.”
“Shut up,” he growled and shoved my head to my lap when a policeman walked around the corner.
My forehead hit the dashboard on the way down. “Oww!”
“Shh!” The gun lay across his lap, daring me to try something.
I needed to come up with a plan.
“So where’s this diary of yours?”
“What? Oh, it’s…” Oh crap. I needed a location that would slow him down.
“It’s in my shed.” It would take forever to go through the contents of my shed. Especially since everything had been thrown in there haphazardly after the Henryetta police emptied it looking for a gun.
“Why the hesitation? You lying to me, Rose?”
“Well, it’s not like I want to just hand all my evidence over to you, now is it?” I grumbled.
“I guess not.”
“But then I saw your gun and realized I better tell you the truth.”
“Smart girl.”
I wasn’t so sure. I was barely hanging onto control, my wits starting to slip. I needed to stall him and I wanted to hear why he killed Frank Mitchell. “Can I get up now? I’m getting a crick in my neck.”
“Yeah…” He lifted his hand off my head and I sat up, stretching.
“So you wanted to buy Frank Mitchell’s property because the superstore was goin’ to buy up land around there?”
“Still Miss Nosy, huh?”
“I figure I’m entitled to know what I’m dyin’ for.”
“Fair enough, although you seem awfully calm for someone about to meet their maker.”
I was far from calm, about to start screaming any minute, but I suspected that was the surest way to get shot with the police milling around. Instead, I held my hands up. “And I’m prepared. After Momma’s accident, God rest her soul, I figured you just never know when evil’s gonna strike. Best to always be ready.”
Jimmy shifted in his seat, glancing in the rearview mirror.
I turned around to get one last glimpse of Officer Ernie walking the opposite direction. I was on my own.
Oh, crappy doodles. I really was in trouble now.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
I needed to keep him talking until I figured something out. “The thing about evil, Mr. DeWade, is it often starts with the best of intentions and not even knowin’ it’s evil, don’t you think?”
“Why’re you asking me?”
“Well, you know… the whole murdering thing and all. I figured go straight to the source.”
His face paled and he ran his hand through his hair. “I’m not evil. I was just getting what was comin’ to me.”
“And I bet Frank got what was comin’ to him too. You were just carrying out justice. Like a vigilante.” My eyes widened with excitement. “Like Batman!” My shoulders dropped and I tilted my head. “No, wait. Wouldn’t Bruce Wayne Decker be Batman with his name and all? No that can’t be right. I don’t think Batman ever went to jail…”
He shook his head, growling. “Bruce Wayne went to jail.”
“Are you sure? But what about Batman? I mean, he’s Batman! Who could arrest Batman? And wouldn’t they take off his hood when they took his picture? Or did they take the picture with his hood on? Because I had to take off my ring so I can only imagine they’d take off his hood.”
“What the hell are you talkin’ about?”
“Bruce Wayne Decker. The innocent guy waitin’ to be convicted.”
“No, you got it wrong. It wasn’t anything like that.”
“Well, then what was it?”
He exhaled in a huff. “I just wanted what was mine.”
“You said that already. What did Frank Mitchell take from you?”
His brow furrowed and his eyes turned dark. “Frank Mitchell didn’t take anything.”
I rolled my eyes. “That makes no sense. If he didn’t take anything from you, why did you kill him?”
“You talk too much.”
“And you told me you’d tell me why I was dyin’. So far, I’ve got nothing.”
“I’ve spent over twenty years working for Fenton County. I hate it. It’s a soul-sucking job. But I figured I’d put in my time and then retire on my pension. But a year and a half ago, Fenton County stole our pensions and ruined everything.”
“I heard about that, but Frank Mitchell didn’t have anything to do with it, did he?”
“If you’d just be quiet, I’d tell you.”
Jimmy was halfway to my house and I still hadn’t come up with a plan other than digging through my shed, which wasn’t any kind of plan at all.
“Like I said, I was gonna retire early on my pension, but that got screwed to hell.”
“I work at the DMV, or I did until yesterday, and that has to be a worse job than working with Neely Kate. You don’t see me whackin’ people with crowbars.”
He gripped the steering wheel with both hands, his body shaking as he grit his teeth. “It wasn’t like that!”
“Then what was it like?”
My phone rang in his pocket. “Damnit!” He pulled it out. “Your buddy, the DA.” He shoved the phone at me. “Answer it.”
“What?” I fumbled to snatch the phone from him, dropping it in my lap.
Jimmy picked up the gun and pointed it at me. “Tell him something to make him stop calling.”
My breath came in short bursts and my face started tingling. Get a grip, Rose. Hyperventilating wasn’t going to help anything. “Hello?”
“Rose! Where the hell are you?” Mason’s angry voice shouted through the earpiece.
Jimmy flinched. He must have heard the yelling.
“Uh…”
“Tell him you went to lunch with a friend.”
I put my hand partway over the phone and whispered, “He’s never gonna believe that. He knows Neely Kate is covering the personal property department until you get back.”
I tried to laugh into the phone, which came out sounding like the squeaky breaks on Miss Mildred’s Cadillac. “You said I’m in trouble? Because I didn’t show up for court? I’ll try to make it in later.”
“Rose, are you in trouble?” Mason whispered. “And it has something to do with Neely Kate? Someone she works with?”
I released a snort. “What are you gonna do? Put me in jail?”
“Where are you, Rose?” Mason sounded frantic. “Does someone have you?”
“Well, I don’t care what Joe says.” I tied to sound indignant, but it wasn’t working so well. “Tell him…tell him…” I choked on a sob. “Tell him I love him anyway.”
Jimmy snatched the phone out of my hand and ended the call, a grim expression on his face. “That didn’t go the way I wanted it to, Rose.”
Anger seethed in my gut. “Well, this whole morning hasn’t gone the way I wanted it to, so consider us even.”
“You’re forgettin’ who has the gun here.”
“Then shoot me already!”
“Not until you get that diary.”
That meant I had a little time. He wanted the nonexistent diary and was willing to delay my execution until he got it. However, he seemed agitated enough that I wasn’t sure that he’d take the time to drive to the woods before finishing me off.
Thinking about Joe opened the door to my fear and it swamped my head, stealing all my senses. I shoved it back before I started bawling. I suspected Jimmy would rather deal with a babbling woman than a sobbing one.
“I still don’t know why you killed Frank. I know you’re a murderer and all, but you’re still a Southern gentleman and I would hope you’d keep your word.”
“Well, you keep interrupting.”
“I’m not interruptin’ now!”
“After the pensions were stolen, I was eating lunch at Merilee’s. I happened to be sittin’ behind two zoning employees and they were discussing the rezoning for the superstore. I already had two rental properties in Forest Ridge, but realized if I bought houses in strategic locations, I might get more money. Most of the owners were willin’ to sell. They didn’t know anything about the superstore and with the economy being so bad, I practically stole those houses out from under ’em.”
“Except for Frank.”
“His house was dead center. But that stubborn son of a bitch flat-out refused. He was in debt up to his eyeballs and I kept raising the offer but nothing. They had to get sixty percent of the owners to agree or the deal fell through. If he refused to sell, they might have moved the parking lot fur
ther north and I’d be stuck with all fifteen houses.”
“But I don’t understand. Killing him didn’t help anything. He couldn’t sell it if he was dead and his son sold it to an investment company in Louisiana.”
He grinned. “Owned by my third cousin. We split the profit from the sale to the superstore.”
“So it couldn’t be tracked back to you. It would look suspicious if you bought it a couple of months after he died.”
“Exactly, although the Henryetta Police had already arrested Bruce Decker. Besides, I didn’t mean to kill Frank. I just wanted to scare him. But we got to arguing, and the next thing I knew, I picked up a crowbar off a shelf and whacked him.”
“And you stole the money to make it look like a robbery.”
“Yeah, I would have taken more, but I realized I’d lost my grandmother’s pin and I was searching for it. I heard a noise in the warehouse and took off before I remembered the cash.”
“Not that it mattered. The police didn’t care.”
“Gotta love the Henryetta Police Department.”
I didn’t see the point in disagreeing.
Jimmy was only a block from my house. I needed to come up with something fast. “But an innocent man is takin’ the blame. You don’t feel guilty about that?”
“I did at first. Until I realized he had a long arrest record.”
“But nothing violent.”
Jimmy shrugged.
“What about me?” I didn’t mean for it too sound strangled. I took a breath and forced myself to sound brave. “I don’t have an arrest record. I’m an innocent citizen.”
He laughed. “You are far from innocent. I’ll admit, I felt bad when I first decided you had to go, but it’s you or me. And let’s face it, you’ve annoyed a lot of people.”
Jimmy pulled into my driveway and I pondered the truth of his statement. Maybe I’d annoyed half the town, Jimmy included, but that wasn’t a crime worthy of execution.
I wasn’t going out without a fight. Jimmy DeWade had messed with the wrong woman.
Miss Mildred walked out her front door, watering can in her hand and I knew exactly what she was up to. Only a fool would water her flowers in the heat of the day, and while Miss Mildred was a lot of things, a fool wasn’t one of them.
RG2 - Twenty-Nine and a Half Reasons Page 29