He ended his routine in the kitchen and grabbed a glass from the cabinet. Walking to the refrigerator, he poured himself a tumbler of milk and sat at the kitchen table, sipping his milk. His thoughts were for the women in his family who lay upstairs, sleeping.
Kerry wasn’t getting any better. The physiatrist who was working with Kerry kept telling him it would take time; it could be years before Kerry were better.
After all, he explained, it had only been a matter of weeks since Kerry had come home. The doctor said, after learning what she’d been through, how surprised he was that she was coping as well as she was.
Jason had his own thoughts about that. He thought she’d never really feel safe until that bastard was dead.
God, he wished he knew where the man was. He would be tempted to kill him, himself, and this from a man who abhorred killing of any kind. He would cheerfully shoot the bastard in the head if he got half a chance.
He finished the milk, rinsed the glass out and put it in the dishwasher.
He yawned and glanced at the antique wall clock. Two o’clock in the morning. Wearily, he started to bed.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Bubba Walters leaned on the dark wood bar and took a swig of beer from his bottle of Schlitz. His mouth was dry as sand with anxiety about his little brother. The beer tasted wonderful and it was absolutely needed.
He had been a nervous wreck all day and he desperately needed to talk to someone about it. Jimmy Joe had called him at work that day and ordered him to get that poor girl’s address. He told Jimmy Joe no way was he getting involved. Then Jimmy Joe got nasty. He threatened to tell Dora about his past indiscretions, which Bubba would never willing admit to, even if his life depended on it. He was terrified of his wife. She was a little woman but she was twice as mean as any junkyard dog he’d ever come across.
Dora swore the next time she caught him fucking around on her she was going to cut his balls off. He knew she was dead serious.
Now he was depressed and looking to talk to his latest love interest, May. May was older than him, but she was still sexy. She was tall, with huge breasts and a tiny waist. May was also smart. After all, she didn’t get to be head of the Welfare office being stupid.
He admired her brain and loved her body. He knew he wasn’t the smartest apple in the bunch. He was one of the regulars in that made their way to the local bar every night, and he knew May found him funny because she laughed at his jokes and bought him beers when he was running short of cash.
Bubba thought he was good looking, in a good old boy way. Anyway, May called him her sweet, loving man.
Dora wouldn’t understand their relationship. He didn’t think he loved May. He guessed he loved his wife. He just had fun with May a couple of nights a week. That was all, and he wasn’t anxious for Dora to hear about that.
“Hey Bubba.” Harry, the bartender was an old school pal and they were on good terms, but Bubba hesitated to talk to him about Jimmy Joe. It seemed like every person in town hated his brother right now. Harry was a good enough guy. Bubba just didn’t know how long he could keep a secret.
“Hey, Harry. Seen May?”
“No, she ain’t been in yet. She’ll probably show up here after while.”
Bubba nodded, wondering how long he could stay without arousing Dora’s wrath.
“Dora finds out about May and your balls are history,” Harry joked.
Bubba shuddered at the thought of Dora near his balls. “You ain’t telling me anything I don’t know.”
Harry stopped and gazed at his buddy. “What’s the matter? You look almost peaked?”
“Ah, I just got me some worries I need to talk to May about.”
“Well, hang in there. She’ll be in after six. She always stops in after work.”
“Yea, I know,” Bubba said, “I ain’t worried about that.”
Harry shrugged his wide shoulders and looked around. Harry was a large man, well over six feet tall. Same age as Bubba, Harry had a shock of gray hair that was still thick. He made out every night of the week with the women that found their way into the bar. Bubba figured him and Harry were the studs of the bar.
“So, you heard anything from that chicken-shit piece of crap, Jimmy Joe?”
Bubba frowned at the name-calling and shrugged. Jimmy Joe was a piece of shit. “No, me and him never got on that good.”
“That’s ‘cause you’re normal,” Harry said, bending down to wash a glass. “That guy needs his dick cut off for what he did to that poor little girl.”
“Yea, that was something,” Bubba agreed, leaning against the bar watching Harry.
“Why’d he do that anyway? I mean, he wasn’t great with the women around town but I saw him get laid in here every once in a while.”
“He did?” Bubba asked surprised. “Who’d he screw?”
“Oh, I saw him leave with Banging Betty a couple of times.”
“Ah, everybody has left with her.”
“Ain’t that the truth.” Harry was distracted by the ringing phone. He reached back and picked up the receiver. “Harry’s.”
After a few minutes, he turned white. “I didn’t say he wasn’t here, Dora. And you ain’t got no business threatening me with no God damn ice pick.”
Bubba straightened, already shaking his head no.
Harry listened a few more minutes before thrusting the phone at Bubba. “There ain’t enough money in the world for me to tangle with your crazy wife, Bubba.”
Bubba sighed and placed the phone to his ear, “Hey Dora.” He scowled at Harry. “No, I ain’t staying. I just stopped in for a beer.”
Bubba listened a few more minutes before he handed the phone back to Harry. “Thanks a lot, Harry.”
“Hey Bubba, you married the crazy bitch.”
“Yea, well, now I have to go home.”
“That’s what I would do,” Harry agreed, remembering how Bubba looked the last time Dora got pissed at him.
Bubba drained his bottle of beer and set the empty bottle on the bar. “Tell May, I’ll call her.”
Harry only nodded, as he watched Bubba shuffle out of the bar.
***
Bubba jumped out of his truck the next afternoon and hurried into the bar. He had caught sight of May’s old Lincoln in the parking lot and made an unexpected stop. When he hurried in, he caught sight of May playing pool in the back and sauntered over to her.
“Hey sugar.” May always called him sugar.
“Hey yourself,” Bubba said, sliding over to catch a feel of her behind.
“Now, watch out, Bubba. I don’t want Dora after me.”
“She ain’t going to know anything. She’s at her Church sewing class tonight.”
“Well, ain’t she sweet,” May drawled.
“No, she ain’t sweet at all. Not like you, honey bum,” Bubba whispered.
May laughed and put the pool stick in the rack, glancing at the men she’d been playing pool with. “I’m done fellas, you all play my game.”
Bubba followed May into a booth on the dark side of the bar and slid in after her.
“I heard from Harry that you were in here Tuesday looking for me.”
“Yea, I need to talk to you.”
Bubba motioned for Harry to bring two beers then moved his hand to May’s lap so he could caress her leg. “I got a big problem.”
“Oh, it ain’t that big, is it?” May joked.
Insulted, Bubba removed his hand. May laughed and grabbed his hand and put it back in her lap. “I didn’t say for you to stop.”
Pleased, Bubba stroked her thigh. “Jimmy Joe called me Monday at work and said if I don’t help him get that girl’s address, he’s gonna tell Dora about me and you.”
May gasped and swung around to stare at Bubba. “You didn’t do it, did you?”
“Yea, I had too. He was going to call Dora and tell on us.”
“Bubba, you big dumb elephant. You could get in trouble for helping Jimmy Joe.”
�
�Well, that’s what I wanted to talk to you about Tuesday but then I had to leave.”
“God, please don’t tell me you gave him the address.”
“I had Bubba Junior find it on his computer. Jimmy Joe called me Wednesday and I gave it to him then.”
May shook her head. “Bubba, you got to go tell the sheriff you gave Jimmy Joe that address.”
“No, I don’t.”
“Jimmy Joe is a deviant son-of-a-bitch. If he finds that girl, he’ll kill her. And you, my cup of sugar, will be an accomplice.”
“What does that mean?” Bubba asked, worried.
“That means at least ten years in the Federal Pen.”
Bubba withdrew his hand and glared at May. “I didn’t do anything but give him the address!”
“Bubba, every law man in the state is looking for him. Whoever helps him will be in a lot of trouble.”
Bubba felt weak and sank back against the booth. “Hell’s bells.”
“Does Dora know?”
“Hell, no. I wanted to talk to you first.”
May felt her heart lift with happiness. The thought that Bubba talked to her instead of his wife was so sweet it almost made her cry.
May placed a soft hand on his rough one. “Trust me on this, Bubba. Go talk to the sheriff. The sooner the better.”
***
Sheriff Andrew Butler sat with his feet propped on his desk, relaxing. He didn’t notice the large man that had stepped self-consciously up to the police station’s front desk.
Vaguely aware that Carol was talking to someone, he wasn’t surprised when she popped her head into his office. He looked up. “What going on?”
“Bubba Walters is here. He said he needs to talk to you.”
Andrew stroked his chin thoughtfully and repeated, “Bubba wants to talk to me? Okay, send him in.”
He watched Bubba walk slowly into his office. Andrew stood up and held out his hand. “Bubba, how you doing?”
“Doing all right, Sheriff. ‘Course it ain’t the same with mama gone.”
“No, I know it’s not, Bubba. She was a good woman.”
“She was that,” Bubba agreed, standing just inside the door.
Bubba was a big man with a square face and deep blue eyes. His shaggy brown hair was combed back behind his ears and he wore his best blue jeans overalls over a brand new blue checked flannel shirt. He was dressed for serious talking, Andrew thought.
He waved Bubba to a chair, then walked around and sat down. “Carol said you needed to talk to me.”
Bubba took a piece of chewing gum from his pocket and stuffed it in his mouth, then sat down. Sliding to the edge of the chair, he folded his hands together and eyed the sheriff.
“What can I do for you, Bubba?”
“I need what you call annesty.”
“You mean amnesty?”
“Yea, amnesty.”
“Why would you need that?”
“Because I think I did something that could get me in trouble.”
Andrew narrowed his eyes and stared at Bubba. “Go ahead and tell me what you did. I can’t promise you anything but I’ll do what I can.”
Bubba always had a lot of trouble when he tried to think very hard. It always seemed to give him a headache, so he didn’t like doing it much. However, this time he’d given it some time- consuming thought after his talk with May and he was pretty sure he was doing the right thing.
He hunched his shoulders and said slowly, “Jimmy Joe called me at work last week and said if I didn’t help him he was gonna tell Dora about me and May down at the bar.”
“Oh,” Andrew said frowning, thinking of Dora. She was a tiny, tiny woman with one of the worst tempers in Lepanto. Last time she caught Bubba with another woman she almost beat him to death with a coffeepot. Took three men to pull her off him. Bubba had thirty-two stitches across his head when he got out of the emergency room. “I understand why you wouldn’t want that. Maybe you should stay out of the bars, Bubba.”
“I go to the bars to relax, sheriff. I get, well, bored when I stay home all the time.”
“Next time you get bored, try something else besides drinking.”
“Hell sheriff, drinking don’t get me in trouble. Dora don’t care if I drink. It’s the whoring around she gets mad at.”
Andrew sighed and shook his head. “You said Jimmy Joe called you. What did he want, Bubba?”
“He wanted me to get that girl’s address, that one he kidnapped.”
“How would he think you could do that?”
“He said I could get it on the Internet.”
Andrew sucked in a small breath. He feared he knew what was coming. “You know how to work a computer, Bubba?”
“Lord no, I don’t. But you know my son Harry Herman; he’s a whiz at them computers.”
Andrew took a deep breath and looked down at his desk, “And?”
“He got me the address and I gave it to Jimmy Joe yesterday.”
“How did you get hold of Jimmy Joe?”
“I didn’t get hold of him. He called me at work yesterday and I told him then.”
“Did he say what he wanted it for?"
“Yea, that’s what got me worried. He said he was going after her, ‘cause she was the reason mama died.”
Andrew counted to ten. “Bubba, you’re going to be in a lot more trouble than anything Dora could do to you, if he gets to that girl.”
Almost crying, Bubba began rocking in his chair. “That’s why I came to tell you, so I wouldn’t get in trouble.”
“Damn it Bubba, you should have came to me before you gave him that address. Do you have any idea what you’ve done?”
Big drops of tears started rolling down Bubba’s cheeks and dropping on his brand new flannel shirt. “I don’t want to get in no trouble, sheriff. I told Jimmy Joe that, but he just laughed. He said I had better do what he said or I’d be sorry. Said he made Bonnie and Orley rob some liquor store and they’d killed some poor old doctor in Tennessee. He was talking crazy. When I asked him about Bonnie, he just laughed and said she minded him and I better too, if I knew what was good for me.”
Andrew stared at Bubba. “This is a pretty serious thing you did, Bubba, but there are extenuating circumstances, so I’m going try and help you as best I can. You need to go on home and if he gets in touch, you call me right away.”
Bubba pulled out a bright red handkerchief and wiped his eyes. “I’m sorry, sheriff, I am. Dora and me, feel real bad about that girl.”
“Go home Bubba.”
“I’ll do that, Sheriff,” Bubba promised, getting up and lumbering out the door.
Andrew glanced at his watch, then shuffled through his papers until he found the Stewarts’ phone number. Better let them know that Jimmy Joe was headed their way.
Chapter Thirty
Jason Stewart hung up the phone, and turned to face his wife and in-laws. “That was Sheriff Butler, he has reason to believe Jimmy Joe is headed this way.”
Sherry Stewart grabbed the top of a kitchen chair and gasped, “How… how does he know where we are?”
“He wouldn’t say. He thinks we should get Kerry out of here.”
“What kind of place do they have down there?” His father-in-law demanded. “How did he get the address? We made sure it wasn’t in any of the newspapers.”
“Look George,” Jason said, glancing over at him, “we can’t worry about that right now. We need to get Kerry out of here.”
He turned to his wife.
“Sherry, why don’t you pack up the girls and head to Hawaii? It would be hard for him to track her there.”
“What about you?” She asked, clutching the chair.
“I’m staying here. You and your parents take the girls and stay there until this thing is settled.”
“How long will that take?”
“I don’t know. We can work things out after you leave.”
“Why can’t you come?" Sherry cried.
“Because I have to
work. I’ve been off work way too much.”
“I’ll stay with you,” George offered, looking stubborn.
“Thanks George, it’s not that I don’t appreciate your offer. I do. It’s just that I’d feel better if you were with the girls.”
“Jason, you don’t need to be here by yourself,” Sherry said.
“He’s not after me,” Jason reminded them. “I’ll be fine.”
“Right,” George said, looking over at his daughter. “Sherry, go get the girls packed and I’ll call the airport. With any luck we can leave tonight.”
Chapter Thirty-One
Jimmy Joe lay flat under the evergreen shrub and watched the house across the street with his hunting binoculars. It was just as he suspected - the bitch was rich. Her house sat back off the street with at least five acres. It was a huge two-story dark brick house. Black shutters were attached to every window and the white columns on the porch towered to the roof. The driveway that led to the back of the house was brick and had old-fashioned streetlights bordering it. The place fairly stank of money, Jimmy Joe thought, disgusted.
Although it was only four o’clock in the afternoon, it was already growing dark in Indiana. The only thing that wasn’t lit up in the house was the Christmas tree in the big front window.
He settled into a more comfortable position and wondered which window belonged to her, his Lucy. She was in there. He just knew it, and he’d gotten to her once. He could do it again.
He lowered his head, and watched a police car cruise up in front of the house. This was the second time in thirty minutes that one had driven by. What the hell was that all about?
He fished a coffee flask out of his coat pocket and shivered. Freaking cold state. Why would anyone live in such a frigid bastard state? Placing his binoculars in his lap, he stared at the house. He briefly wondered what it would be like to live in a house like that. It probably felt pretty grand.
His poor mama would’ve liked just to walk around and look at it. She’d always bought magazines with houses on the front. Feeling hatred well up inside him, Jimmy Joe touched the pistol he had in his coat pocket. He would kill the whole fucking family if he had to.The most important thing though, was that the girl had to pay for what she did. And that would take time, because he meant for her to suffer.
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