by Dana Mentink
“Her girls, her children.” The thought made his throat thicken. “They think she was a failure.”
“You can tell them the truth.”
He laughed bitterly. “I don’t even know where Rose is. She’s been in and out of trouble for so long we’ve lost track of her. It might be too late.”
“You’ll find her, I know you will. I’ll help you.”
He closed his eyes. “That day, the day I found you driving drunk. You asked me to let you off, you begged me and I wanted to. I wanted to turn my back and forget it ever happened, but I couldn’t.”
He opened his eyes and gripped her hand. “You know why I didn’t.”
Heather nodded, lips trembling. “Because you loved me and you didn’t want me to turn out like your sister.”
For a moment he could not form any words. “I wanted you to get help before it was too late. That’s why I arrested you. That’s why I called and emailed.”
She was weeping now. “But I didn’t answer because I was too ashamed. It was wrong. I know now why you did what you did and I’m sorry. I’m terribly, terribly sorry, Bill.”
Part of him wanted to comfort her, but he could summon up no gentle feelings inside to offer. He put his head in his hands. “All this time I’ve blamed myself for Johnny’s death and now I find out my sister was murdered right under my nose, too.”
She caressed his face, her own wet with tears. “Bill, stop. You can’t shoulder all this blame.”
The words flowed out faster and faster. “The day we finally cornered Oscar, I was calling for backup but Johnny didn’t wait. He ran in when it should have been me.”
“No, Bill.”
“He went in because he knew I wasn’t at the top of my game. I wasn’t sleeping, or eating well since you left. He went in because he thought it would protect me somehow, when I should have been the one looking out for him.”
She caught hold of his other hand. “You’ve got to forgive yourself.”
“No, I don’t.” He pulled away and stood, gesturing to Tina. “Look at that little girl with no brother to watch over her. No parents. My nieces have no mother to come home to. Don’t talk to me about forgiveness.”
“When we knew each other before, you used to give your burdens to God, remember?” She moved to him, arms raised to embrace him. “Bill, He’s still there for you, if you’ll let Him in.”
He fixed his eyes on the rocky cliff that stood stalwart and alone against the brilliant sky. “I’m not going to let anyone in, Heather. Ever again.”
Heather watched in despair as an impassive mask settled into place on Bill’s face. Leanne’s murder was the final shovelful of earth that buried Bill under a massive weight of grief and guilt. He walked away, and leaned against the split rail fence. Suddenly she realized how hard it must have been for him to love her in the first place.
The moments together when he’d let his guard down, his bumbling attempts to learn to cook for her, the places he’d shown her that were precious to him because he and his sister had played there as children. Each of those moments was an act of faith in her and in God. Now it was all gone. She realized there were tears coursing down her face and she wiped them away with her sleeve, surprised to see her mother and Dr. Egan walking over the bridge toward them.
Dr. Egan looked from Heather to Bill. “I came to deliver the water sample results to Margot. Everything’s clean. I thought it might help with the investigation in some way.”
Bill rounded on him. “What made you think my sister was using?”
Egan took a step back at the ferocity in Bill’s voice. “Why do you ask?”
“Because we’ve just uncovered evidence that suggests she was murdered by Oscar Birch,” Heather said.
Egan’s mouth dropped open and Heather would have laughed at his comical expression under different circumstances.
“Murdered? How could that be?”
“Just answer the question,” Bill barked.
Egan still did not speak, his face white. Margot patted him on the shoulder. “What kind of behaviors was she showing that made you concerned?”
Heather was grateful for her mother’s calm intervention. She was afraid to leave Bill’s side in case he went after Egan as he had Al Crow.
Egan wiped a hand over his brow. “I met her when we arranged to have pizza brought in for the lab employees one day. She was very friendly, offered to show us around the town. Pizza lunches became a regular treat at the lab, so we got to know your sister. When the custodial job came up, I recommended her. She was always on time, always cheerful until a few weeks before her death. She came in late, looked pale and haggard.” He looked to Bill. “You must have noticed, surely.”
Bill flushed and then looked at the ground. “I didn’t.”
She saw it in his face. The terrible guilt.
“But it could be that Leanne wasn’t using at all. Oscar killed her and made it look like an overdose,” Heather suggested.
Egan shook his head and she saw moisture gleaming in his eyes. “Leanne was a sweet lady. She reminded me of my daughter. Angie lived with her mother since she was a little girl. I never saw her much.” His face fell. “But I remember her being like that, very open and full of life.” He seemed to snap out of his recollections. “Whether Leanne died from drugs or Oscar Birch, I wish I could have done something to help. Mr. Cloudman, all I can say is if there was anything I should have noticed that would have saved your sister and I missed it, I am sincerely sorry.”
Bill remained silent.
Heather spoke to her mother. “When Rudley gets back I’m going to go with him over to Aunt Jean’s and get Tina settled in there. Her uncle’s going to be in the hospital for a while.”
Margot nodded. “I’ll go, too.” She held up a bag. “I brought the rest of her treasures along. We could finish sorting them on the way.” She looked suddenly anxious. “Unless she is too worried about her uncle. Do you think that’s the right thing to do?”
Heather looked at her mother, noticing how the fully risen sun etched her face with a delicate web of wrinkles. Her heart swelled a little. “Yes, Mom. I think that’s exactly the right thing to do.”
Margot stood there for a moment, bag held up in her fingers. “Good. That’s what we’ll do, then,” she said, her gaze lingering on Heather’s face.
Heather walked Choo Choo back to her house, closing him in securely before she returned to Charlie’s property, noticing that both Bill and the officer stationed in her front yard kept a close eye on her the entire time.
She thought of Oscar. Her skin chilled as she crossed the small bridge. Was he there now? Watching them? Waiting for the minutes to tick by? If Oscar succeeded he would have accomplished five murders; his own wife, Johnny, possibly Leanne, Mr. Brown … and Bill.
The only way Oscar could win was if he murdered Bill, too. Oscar’s words tumbled through her memory.
Tell him I’ll be seeing him soon.
The phone in Heather’s pocket vibrated and she jumped and almost dropped it.
“Honey.” The low voice rumbled through the phone. “I got the new number you left on my voice mail. Did you upgrade to one of those fancy phones?”
She blinked back tears. “Hi, Dad. Nah, just a loaner because mine … broke.” Walking away a few paces, she sought the shade of the pine while her father filled her in.
“Sorry I didn’t call sooner. One of my guys was injured and I’ve been at the hospital with him. Couldn’t use my cell much and I forgot my charger. Looks like they’ve got him all patched up. How are things there?”
How were things? With Oscar’s deadline approaching? Charlie in the hospital? And evidence of Leanne’s murder surfacing? Things couldn’t be worse, but she would not worry her father by explaining. Besides, she knew what he was really asking. “Mom got here safely. She’s doing okay.”
“I’m sorry about all that. I didn’t mean to surprise you. It just sort of came up, but it wasn’t fair to spring her on you without
warning. Are you two hanging in there?”
“I don’t know, Dad. I always wanted her to come back, but now that she’s here, I’m all confused. Sometimes I am so mad at her I can’t take it another moment, and other times …”
Her father laughed. “I’ve felt that way quite often myself.”
Heather pictured his smile. “How can you take it, then?”
“Honey, I just remind myself that God’s the ultimate handyman. He can fix anything, if we let Him.”
She glanced at Bill, head bowed, anguish written in the lines of his body. Would Bill ever allow his heart to be fixed? Sorrow swirled inside her, but she forced herself to keep a cheerful tone for her father’s sake.
“Are you sure everything is all right there?” he asked. “You sound strange.”
“It’s fine, Dad. I can’t wait to see you soon.” How would things be when the three of them were together under one roof?
He promised he’d be home in another three weeks.
She said goodbye, wondering what news she’d have to give her father when he arrived.
SIXTEEN
It was hours before Rudley returned to take Tina to Aunt Jean’s. Egan and Margot waited in the shade, talking quietly about geological topics Bill had never heard of. Heather played with Tina and Tank, watching Bill from the corner of her eye when she thought he wasn’t looking.
His heart felt like a hardened lump in his chest. All he could think about was Leanne. She might have had a shot at a normal life, a steady job, two children who could have reconnected with her someday. All the time, he had thought he’d let her down by not noticing her drug abuse. Now he realized he’d been feeling guilty for the wrong thing; Oscar Birch had taken her life, right under Bill’s nose, and he’d never suspected it because deep down he believed his sister would fail.
Deep down he always knew or feared she would start using again.
And maybe deep down he believed the same about Heather.
Oh, God, help me.
He didn’t know what he needed help with. Forgiving Heather? Forgiving himself for not trusting Leanne? He wanted some warm feeling, some tender comfort to latch on to, but he couldn’t see anything but blackness.
There was only one thing left to accomplish that meant anything.
Bringing down Oscar Birch.
Rudley helped put Tina’s bag in the car and approached Bill. “Crow will be suspended pending investigation.”
Bill nodded. It could not be any other way; the man was no longer trustworthy as an officer. Still, Bill felt both angered and sorry. What would Crow do now without his badge? Bill knew firsthand what it felt like to be adrift without a career and only regrets and shame to fill up the days.
Heather took a few hesitant steps toward him but he turned away, his mind too full of despair to risk a conversation with her. He heard the motor start up and watched them drive off.
Egan stood on the small bridge, looking down at the spot where only a dry gulley was carved into the earth by long-ago rains, without appearing to see it. Bill did not want to speak to him, but he found himself drawing close anyway, while Tank bounded down into the dry chasm after a squirrel.
Bill cleared his throat. “Dr. Egan?”
Egan looked up, startled. “I thought you would go with them.”
“No. They’re better off without me.” Both men looked into the creek bed, now filling with dust as Tank raced through it. “I apologize,” Bill said, surprised at his own words.
Egan continued to stare down at the creek.
“I blamed you for not telling me about Leanne’s drug abuse, but there may not have been anything to tell. You were good to her, got her a job and all.” He picked up a leaf that landed on the wood rail and tore it up. “Anyway, I just wanted to say that.”
Egan turned to him, his face pained. “Thank you. I know that must have been hard for you to say.”
Bill nodded.
“So what will you do now?”
“Find Oscar Birch.”
“And kill him before he kills you?” Egan’s eyes locked on Bill’s.
Bill checked his watch. “Almost five. I think I’d better get out of here.” He didn’t want to be anywhere near Heather as Oscar’s deadline approached. “I’ll walk you back to your car.”
Egan stuck his hands in his pockets as they headed back. “Don’t blame yourself too much, Mr. Cloudman, for thinking your sister was using. Sometimes people get in over their heads and one small choice ensnares them.”
The heavy weight in Bill’s chest felt as if it would sink him into the ground. One small choice. Heather’s choice to start drinking to dull the pain of her mother’s abandonment. His choice to arrest her. His decision long ago to pursue Oscar Birch up into the hills. The thoughts all whirled together in his mind, so he didn’t notice Egan had stopped walking until Tank barked.
He jerked from his reverie. Egan stood on the dusty path. “Mr. Cloudman, you aren’t going to believe this, but I think I just figured out where Oscar Birch might be hiding.”
Bill’s breath caught. “Tell me.”
“When I came here five years ago, the lab had just broken ground. They picked out a site to house the construction equipment. It’s outside the fenced perimeter, well off the main road. It’s no more than a small warehouse, really, and it’s completely abandoned.”
“Why do you think he might be there?”
Egan’s eyes darted in thought. “Because I like to hike at night sometimes. It allows me to see angles and geological deposits that I might not see in the daytime. I was hiking a week or so ago and I thought …” He trailed off.
“What? You thought what?”
“I thought I heard a humming noise coming from that area. I moved in closer to check, but I couldn’t see anything and the noise stopped suddenly.”
“A humming noise, like the kind made by a generator?”
Egan’s eyes widened. “Exactly.”
Finally. This time Oscar would be surprised. “Do you think you could show me the spot?”
Egan nodded. “Without a doubt.”
Heather sat in the back of Rudley’s car next to Tina. Her mother was in front chatting to Rudley, who looked as if he would rather be anyplace else. Tina’s pockets bulged and she fished out a length of string and some bright pink beads, which she began to slide onto the string.
“What are you making?”
“A leash for Tank.”
Heather hid a smile, picturing the enormous dog trotting along at the end of a pink beaded leash. Her thoughts turned back to Bill and the impenetrable anguish that had settled over him with news of his sister’s murder. And all the time the evidence of that murder had been right next door, hidden among Tina’s baubles.
“Would you please stop at the post office, Agent Rudley?” Margot said. “I need to pick something up and I believe it closes at six.”
Rudley looked exasperated. “Can’t it wait?”
“No,” Margot said, calmly. “I don’t think so.”
“It’s that important?” he asked.
“It is to me.”
He sighed and pulled over at the post office, where Margot got out and made her way inside. Rudley sat, engine running, fingers drumming on the steering wheel.
Tina had strung more than twenty beads on her string, when the knot at the end gave out, sending the beads sliding all over the floor.
Tina threw the string down in frustration. “It always breaks. Everything breaks,” she wailed.
“We can fix it,” Heather said, hurriedly scooping up the beads as her mother got back into the car, pocketing a white envelope.
“No,” Tina said, sticking her fingers into her mouth. “No more.”
Heather exchanged a look with her mother. Tina was not crying about the beads but about the frustration and fear she felt, which was too much for a child to express. Heather was not sure what to say, so she settled for scooping up the pink beads and putting them into her own pocket. “We can fix it la
ter. I’ll bet Aunt Jean will help.”
Tina did not answer. She turned her face to the window and stared out at the cars coming and going from the post office parking lot.
Heather gave her mother a questioning “what should we do?” shrug, but her mother looked just as perplexed as Heather felt. She remembered with a jolt that her mother hadn’t been there for much of the difficult parenting, so she probably had even fewer tools to fall back on than Heather had.
She was still struggling with trying to coax the child to talk when Rudley asked, “Have we got everything we need now?”
Margot favored him with a serene smile. “Yes, thank you. That didn’t take very long, did it?”
Rudley didn’t answer, but took off quickly out of the lot.
Heather wondered about the subject of the papers her mother had taken out of her pocket to peruse. She could not imagine what would be so important that it would completely absorb her mother for the next few miles, but it did exactly that.
The car was oppressively silent.
Rudley drove at a good clip away from town and toward the reservation. Heather closed her eyes and laid her head back against the seat. She hadn’t realized how exhausted she was, but now the fatigue almost overwhelmed her. Dusk was upon them. The temperature was warm in spite of the air conditioner.
It made her remember a fall day when Bill had taken her to hike along Fox Creek, a scooped-out section between an upland plain and soaring cliffs on the other side. On the dry edge of the white-clay creek bed she’d found an enormous black boulder shattered into fragments. She’d picked up a piece, surprised to find it was dense and porous like an old slate blackboard. Bill had told her it was shale, rock formed from the decayed matter and disintegrated rocks of what had once been the bottom of the sea.
She hadn’t told him she already knew it, a fact remembered from some long-ago conversation with her mother that she barely recalled.
She had stood there holding evidence in her hands that that dry place had once been an ancient sea. It had struck her then how sad it was that her mother, the one person she knew who could appreciate the meaning of that dull rock, was gone, leaving some of her own interests and passions buried deep inside her unwanted daughter. She had stood there for a long time, holding that rock, until she had felt Bill’s hand on her shoulder.