“Alright, slow and easy.” Pearl did take her finger off the trigger but kept the gun leveled on him.
He unhooked his watch and slipped it into the bag, then handed June his keys. Once she had them in her hot little hands she headed for his baby.
“I bet you’ve got one of them fancy cell phones too,” Pearl said.
“In the car.”
Pearl slowly backed away from them and made her way to his most prized possession.
“What about her?” June gestured to Luanne.
Pearl looked Luanne up and down. “Please, his thrift store girlfriend doesn’t have anything we want. I bet she ain’t got a pot to pee in, or a window to throw it out of.”
“Hey, I’ll have you know—”
“Let it go,” Jack said, and shoved his hands into his pockets.
“Are you kidding me? You could’ve easily overpowered them.”
He shrugged.
She made a disgusted sound. “If you’re not going to do something about this, then I will.”
He grabbed her arm before she could take a step. “No.”
“No? Have you lost your mind? Everything we have is in that car. We can’t let them take it.”
He glanced at the boy in the back of the car. His spindly arms dangled out of the window, and he was wearing a toddler sized Dallas Cowboys jersey, so old and faded that the numbers on the shoulders were peeling off.
Shit.
Shit.
Shit.
Memories and sympathy sliced through his mind like a serrated blade. “Let ’em have it. It’s only stuff and we can get more stuff. It doesn’t look like they can.”
June walked back to them a little sheepishly. It might’ve been convincing, but now she carried the gun, and it was aimed at them. “I’m sorry for all the trouble. You seem like nice people, and we don’t want to leave you out here with nothin’, so…” She handed him a twenty-dollar bill. His twenty-dollar bill.
“Nana, I hungry,” Bobby whined.
“In a minute, sweetie,” June cooed.
Jack stared at the money, glanced at Luanne’s hopeful face, then looked back at the too-skinny boy. “You know what? Keep it.”
Chapter Thirteen
Luanne had blisters on her blisters. The little white tennis shoes she’d bought at the thrift store were not made for eating up miles of country road. She wanted to throttle Jack. How could he let two gray-haired grannies drive away with all of their possessions? She probably wasn’t being fair to her companion—the women did have a gun pointed at them the whole time. But still.
They hadn’t even sped away. Pearl had put on her blinker before she pulled Jack’s car onto the road. In fact, if she and Jack picked up their pace she was fairly certain they could catch the bandits on foot.
Jack’s whistling cut through her misery.
“What are we going to do, Jack?” She was only a few decibels from full-on panic.
“Calm down, Luanne. When we get to the town we went through a few miles back we’ll borrow someone’s phone and call for help.”
“Oh.” She hadn’t thought of that. Of course, they would call for help. Scarlett and Gavin would help them, and they had more money than she and Jack put together.
“Yeah, oh.” He continued strolling along as if he didn’t have a care in the world. “You worry too much. You keep that up and you’re going to get wrinkles.”
“You worry about your wrinkles and I’ll worry about mine.”
“Oooh, good one.”
She snorted. “Weak, I know. Being robbed at gunpoint has thrown me off my game.”
Jack scratched the back of his neck. “I feel sure you’ll be back to filleting me with that wit in no time.”
“Wonder what made them turn to a life of crime?” She had to take two steps for every one of his.
He tilted his face to the sun. She noticed that he did that a lot when he was outside. “Being poor makes some people do desperate things, Lulu.”
“How do you know it’s because they’re poor? They could just be bored, or crazy.”
“Did you notice Pearl’s shoes?”
“No.”
“There were holes in both of them. And did you see how June kept squinting? Twenty dollars says she needs glasses, but can’t afford them.”
“You don’t have twenty dollars. You gave it to the thieves.”
He laughed. “I thought I’d bust a gut when I looked over and saw your hands in the air with the sleeves flopped over your hands like limp limbs.
She flung her arms around and smacked him with the ends of the sleeves. “Watch it, bud. I’ll attack you with these limp limbs.”
“I have no doubt about that.”
“Bobby did look kind of scrawny.” She kicked a rock with the toe of her now brown, white tennis shoe.
“I saw a lot of stuff in that backseat. My guess is they’re living out of the car.”
“You don’t really think that, do you?” Bile churned in her stomach at the thought of those three skinny people huddled in that car sleeping together.
He shrugged. “That’s what our car looked like when we lived in it.”
She skidded to a stop. “You were homeless?”
“Only for a few weeks, then my dad got a job managing a ranch. The job came with a double wide mobile home. It was nice.” He picked up a rock and chucked it down the road.
“Jack, I…I don’t know what to say.”
His sad smile kind of broke her heart.
“It wasn’t so bad. My mom tried to make it an adventure. We were like the Swiss Family Robinson, only instead of a tree house, we lived in a car. I was pretty oblivious to the magnitude of the situation. It was only later that the full impact hit me.”
“Wow, you’ve really made something of yourself.”
“That was the plan. From the time I was thirteen years old. Get an education, get a job, and get out of poverty.”
“Mission accomplished.”
“Yes, but now I am broke, with a thrift store girlfriend, wandering down a backwoods country road in need of money and help. It’s a little too déjà vu.”
Shame cut through her. What had she made of herself? Done for herself? Sure, she was an attorney and had a successful law practice, but when she hadn’t had the seed money for the business and her father had offered to help, and she’d accepted. Same with college and law school. She’d taken help from him and fooled herself into believing that he was helping because he loved her. All he’d really wanted was a way to control her.
So while she looked like an independent, successful woman, really she was a weak, sniveling child waiting for her father to give her his next handout.
“Luanne.” Jack’s words cut through her misery.
“Yes?”
“Can we talk about what happened after Scarlett and Gavin’s wedding?”
He wasn’t looking at her and somehow that made it easier to talk about. “Sure.”
Without missing a step, he scooped up a couple of rocks and shook them in his hand. “I’m sorry I ran off. I just…”
“It’s fine. I know I lost it. I’m sure the sure the tears and carrying on freaked you out.” Pinpricks of heat and mortification stung her cheeks. She’d gotten drunk and told this man that she wanted to look like a fairy princess when she got married. And if that wasn’t bad enough, she’d started crying because she didn’t believe that would ever happen. And somewhere in all of that mess there’d been a proposition for him to be her Prince Charming. Ugh, how humiliating. Who knew it would only be the first in a long line of humiliating things he’d be a witness to?
One of the rocks went sailing down the road. “It caught me off guard, but I shouldn’t have run off the way I did.”
“I don’t blame you. In fact, I’m glad you left. We could’ve made a huge mistake that night if you hadn’t.” He frowned at that, but didn’t agree or disagree. Some part of her wondered if he thought it would’ve been a mistake too.
He chu
cked the second rock at a tree on the side of the road and missed. “Regardless, it’s bothered me, and I’ve wanted to apologize since it happened. But I didn’t know how to bring it up.”
“Apology accepted. Thanks for clearing the air.” She didn’t know what surprised her more—the fact that he’d apologized, or how much better she felt now they’d talked about it.
“Looks like we’ve made it to town.”
“What did you say?”
He pointed to an enormous billboard, so out of place on the edge of a cornfield, that read Quincy, Alabama, The Home of the Fighting Hornets—1978 State Football Champs.
“Wow, 1978 state champs.” Jack chuckled. “The town’s had a bit of a dry spell.”
She picked up her pace. “I don’t care if they’re the home of Jack the Ripper, as long as there’s a telephone and a place for someone to wire us money.”
Jack held the door to the convenience store open for Luanne. Monday afternoon in Quincy was slower than life in Zachsville, and that was saying something. They were the only customers in the place and they hadn’t seen one car on the road on their walk into town. Their only hope now was the Western Union sign in the window.
A reality show blasted from the small TV located behind the counter, where a teenaged boy sat enthralled. He never looked away from the screen when they came in. Clearly, customer service wasn’t a priority.
Luanne marched up to the counter. “Excuse me.”
No response.
“Pardon me, sir.”
Still nothing.
“Sir, we need to use the phone.”
Nope, nada.
Oh, this was going to be good. He could see the color creep up Luanne’s neck, and when she slammed her hands onto her hips he knew the show was about to begin. He’d been on the receiving end of that attitude more times than he cared to remember.
She waved her hand in the clerk’s direction. “Can you believe this guy?”
“Youth today. It’s hard to find good help anymore.”
“I’m glad you think this is funny. It’s not like we’re in dire straits or anything.”
“You’ve got a point.” He waved his hand in the kid’s direction like she had. “Do your worst.”
The little flash of evil that sparked in her eyes scared and thrilled him. She stomped around the counter and yanked the TV cord from the wall. Silence. It seemed to take the guy a few seconds to catch on.
“Hey.”
“Excuse me. I’ve been trying to get your attention for five minutes.”
“Oh, sorry.” He did have the decency to look a little embarrassed. “Don’t tell my boss, okay? I need this job.”
“That won’t be a problem as long as you have a telephone we can use.” Luanne walked back around the counter.
“A telephone? Sure, there’s one in the office.” He chewed his lip ring and glanced toward the door. “But I’m not supposed to let anyone in there.”
“Then can we borrow your cell?” Luanne asked.
“No. My parents took my phone because of my grades. It totally blows.”
Jack leaned on the counter. “What’s your name?”
“Trevor.”
“It’s okay, Trevor, we’re both attorneys. We ran into a little trouble back at the rest stop and need to make a quick call.”
When the kid hesitated, Jack realized he’d have to turn up the heat. “Trevor, I’d hate for you to be held in contempt for obstructing justice.”
Trevor shifted from one foot to the other. “Obstructing justice. That sounds bad.”
Jack glanced at Luanne. “Shame, he seems like a good kid.”
“It is a shame, but habeas corpus and all.” She shrugged as if to say, what can you do if folks are too stupid to cooperate?
Trevor ran his fingers through his stringy hair. “I don’t want any trouble.”
Luanne placed both hands on the counter and leaned forward. “Well now Trevor, whether you have trouble or not is entirely up to you.”
“I guess if y’all are attorneys, then it’s alright.”
When he turned to lead them to a small office behind the soda machine, they exchanged a fist bump. He mouthed habeas corpus, and she stifled a laugh and shrugged. No need for explanation with Luanne. She kept up with him and then some…and he could tell she was enjoying herself. What a woman.
Trevor moved some spreadsheets that looked like they were from the eighties to reveal the phone. “Here you go. Don’t touch anything else. My boss is real particular, and he’ll know you were in here.”
Jack looked around the cluttered, dusty space. “No problem.”
Trevor gave them another nervous look before he left the office.
“Yeah, boss man’s a real Martha Stewart.” Luanne toed a pair of pants that were on the floor and eyed the phone receiver. “I’m glad I’ve had all my shots.”
“No joke.”
She lifted the phone with two fingers. “What’s Gavin’s number?”
“I don’t know.”
“What do you mean you don’t know?”
“I don’t know. It’s in my phone.”
She made a disgusted noise.
“It shouldn’t matter, call Scarlett.”
“Fine.” She punched a few numbers and stopped. “Oh, my gosh. I don’t know it either. She changed it after she and Gavin got married, and I never learned it. It’s in my phone.”
For the first time since Pearl shot the gun he was a tad bit worried. It had never occurred to him that they wouldn’t be able to get help. “Whose number do you know?”
“Gigi’s, but I’m not calling her. My father would know where we were in a New York minute.”
“Even if you asked her not to tell him?”
She snorted. “Her loyalty is to her son, period. She’s proven that over and over again in my life.”
The bitterness and pain in that one sentence cut him to the core. He decided right then and there that he hated her family.
“Oh, wait. I know the number to Floyd and Honey’s house.” She quickly punched in the digits and hit the speaker button.
“Hello.”
“Honey, it’s Luanne.”
“Luanne? Lordy, girl, you got the whole town in an uproar.”
“I bet I do. Listen, Honey, I’m in a little bit of—”
“Everyone’s worried sick about the status of Tank Thompson’s testicle. The ladies at the senior center have organized meals for poor Tank. I’m taking my chicken pot pie. Do you know that Sally Pruitt took Swedish meatballs? I find that very insensitive, and I told her so too.”
“Insensitive?”
“On account of the fact that he might lose one of his own balls.” She whispered the word balls like it was the foulest and most delicious of cuss words.
“Yeah, well, Tank tried to—”
“The good news is that there is an experimental treatment the booster club found out about, but it’s costly. I’ve started a fundraiser to try and raise money to help with expenses. I’m callin’ it Tots for Tank’s Testicle. We’re gonna sell ’em at the concession stand at the baseball fields, it ought to go real well.”
“His testicles?”
“No! Tater tots. Lord, Luanne, what kind of operation do you think we’re runnin’ around here?”
“That’s nice. Is Scarlett around?”
“No. She and Gavin left for their trip. They won’t be back for several days.”
“Do you have her cell number?”
“Sure do.”
“Oh, good.” She gave Jack a thumbs up. “Can I have it?”
“No.”
“No? Why?”
“Because my phone’s in Floyd’s truck and he took his truck to take Joyce to get her car that’s been in the shop. Then he’s going over to Blade Rock to look at a horse.”
“I don’t suppose you have either Floyd or Joyce’s number?”
“Of course I do.”
“Great. Can I have them?”
“I ju
st told you my phone isn’t here, Luanne. Are you sure you’re feelin’ okay?”
“But you said you had them.”
“I do. In my phone.” She was now speaking to Luanne like she was a few bananas short of a bunch.
“Tell Scarlett I called, and that I’m fine.”
“You take care, Luanne.”
“I will. Bye, Honey.” She disconnected the call and plopped down in the desk chair, oblivious to the pair of tube socks draped across the back. “That was a bust. What about your dad?”
“Yeah, I can call him. I don’t want to, but I can.” He picked up the receiver and punched in the numbers. No way did he want her hearing this conversation.
“Yeah?” His father slurred over the line.
“Dad, it’s Jack.”
“For God’s sake, can’t you leave me alone in my misery?”
“I know, Dad—”
“Just like your mother. Never let me work anything out on my own. Pick, pick, pick.”
“I wouldn’t have called, but I—Dad? Dad?” The receiver fell into the cradle. “He hung up on me.”
“I’m sorry.” She placed her hand on his arm.
He didn’t acknowledge her. He couldn’t. The pain ricocheting around his body might escape and he had to lock that shit down. That was how he got to where he was in life—swallow the humiliation and pain and move forward, all with a cocky grin on his face. Except today, he didn’t have it in him. He couldn’t pretend that this situation didn’t gut him to the core.
“Jack, I’m—”
“Oh, my God. I can call my office.” He yanked up the phone. “I don’t know why I didn’t think about this before.”
“Jack, you told your assistant to only work half days, it’s nearly six o’clock.”
He quickly dialed his office. “She might still be there. Caroline’s very dedicated.” Even he could hear the edge of panic in his voice. When the answering machine pick up he slammed the receiver down. “We’re fucked.”
Luanne tried to hold her panic at bay, but with every step she took it crawled up her spine like a daddy longlegs scaling a wall. They had no money and no way to get any. It seemed crazy that in this day and age they could find themselves in this position. But here they were.
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