by Ed Gorman
“Or maybe she wasn’t alone. And maybe it didn’t happen that way. Maybe someone just wanted it to look like it did.”
“Jesus, Glen. Did you listen to the cops at all?”
“Yeah. I listened to them tell me what made sense to them so they could slot a file into a cabinet pretty damn quick.”
“So what do you plan to do about it?”
“A lot of that depends on you. I only know what my gut tells me … and that’s that I need to get Kale Howard in a place where he’s going to do some straight talking. I want to hear what he has to say about this, and I want to look into his eyes when he says it.”
“You tried that before, Glen. If you remember, it didn’t work out so hot.”
“Yeah.” Glen stared at Lisa. “I remember.”
And Glen did remember. All of it. Images came at him like hard popping jabs. He and Kale had exchanged a couple of simple, unvarnished words. And then Kale Howard had thrown a punch that rocked Glen solid, and Glen’s hands were on the rangy bastard, handling him the way you handle a chicken leg when you’re real hungry and you just want to tear it apart at the joint. Which meant that Kale had exited the room through a plate-glass window before Glen even realized what he was doing.
“Look, Lisa. I only came here for one thing. You need to tell me where Kale is.”
Surprised, she raised an eyebrow. “Who’d you talk to over at the cop shop, anyway?”
“Some joker with a roll of nickels up his ass. Guy named Bryce.”
“And he didn’t tell you?”
“Tell me what?”
“Things changed after you cut out of town last December. Kale moved in with Kim.”
“You’re kidding.”
“Not a chance.”
“And he’s still there? That’s what you’re telling me? He’s living in her house?”
“It’s his house, Glen.”
Lisa stared at him.
“Kale and Kim drove up to Vegas on Valentine’s Day and got married. Kim left him everything.”
A bitter laugh caught in Glen’s throat. “Okay,” he said. “Things are beginning to make sense now.”
“Don’t you think the cops thought that, too?”
“If they did, they sure as hell didn’t show it. They found my sister torn to shreds out at Tres Manos. Her climbing gear was scattered around, and she had a broken leg, and they figured … Gee, there are coyotes around here, aren’t there? So they did the math the easy way and wrote the whole thing off as an accident times two.”
“Uh-uh. Not the way it happened. This may be a small town, but you’ve got to give the cops some credit. They grilled Kale. They were all over Kim’s house. They didn’t find a thing.”
“Hard to find what’s locked up in a bastard’s head … unless you’re willing to use the right tools, that is.”
“You’d better think about that. You know the law around here. You try something like that … twice? And with a guy who’s got a restraining order against you? It’d be crazy.”
“Yeah. Maybe that’s exactly what it would be. And maybe that’s the way it should have been all along. The truth is that I stopped short when I tossed Kale through that window. You know that better than anyone, Lisa. I should have whipped that dog until I was sure he’d turn tail and run. If I’d done that, maybe Kim would still be alive. Hell, if I’d done that, maybe I wouldn’t have had to leave.”
“You never had to leave. That was your choice.”
“No. It was your choice, Lisa … you made it when you called the cops and stopped me cold last December.”
The words were out of Glen’s mouth before he even knew they were in his brain. Lisa stared at him like he’d just crawled out from under a rock. Seeing that expression, Glen knew it might as well have been that night last December, with the kitchen door closed to the cold and the herbs cut back against the frost and an icy wind rattling the window at his back. His left eye throbbing from the sucker shot Kale Howard had landed just before getting his miserable excuse for an ass tossed through the living room window, Glen trying to explain to Lisa how he knew in his gut that kind of punishment wasn’t enough for a guy like Howard, how a guy like that needed more if he was going to get the message.
He’d never forget that moment, just as he’d never forget the anger that flared inside him when Kim admitted for the first time how things really were with Howard, or what he was certain needed to be done with that anger, or what he’d done with it in the moments after his sister’s confession. And he’d sat there that December night in Lisa’s kitchen with all those things roiling inside him, and no way to get an explanation past his lips that could make sense to the woman he loved.
It didn’t make sense to her now. “You’re saying that if it weren’t for me, everything would be okay today?”
Glen took a breath, but he didn’t say a word.
“Jesus, Glen. You’re not really sitting here saying I’m responsible for Lisa’s death, are you?”
“No. But you’re the one called the cops when I told you I was going back over there.”
“And I told you I’d do that. You walked out of here with a gun, Glen.”
“I was just going to scare him. That coward would have been across the state line by midnight.”
“C’mon. You don’t know how Kale would have reacted when he saw a gun. And when it comes to the cops, I would have called them anyway. Remember, I’m the one who reported Kale as an abuser. Hell, I would have let Kim move in here until things straightened out if she would have done it. I made the offer while Kale was locked up. She wouldn’t even admit that they had a real problem.”
“Sometimes people can’t handle what happens to them.”
“They have to.”
“And what if they aren’t strong enough?”
“You help them get strong.” Lisa sighed. “But you can’t live their lives for them. You can’t walk through the fire they’ve got to walk through. And you can’t burn down your own life because they’re not strong enough to do the job. But that’s what you did. To yourself, when you walked out of here with that gun. To me, too … and to us. And you paid the price for it. But it could have been worse.”
“I don’t see how.”
“I do. If I hadn’t stopped you that night, you’d probably be sitting in a jailhouse, serving time for murder. We both know that’s true.”
Glen shook his head.
“Maybe that’s where I’ll end up still,” he said.
Now it was Lisa’s turn to look at him without saying a word.
“Guess we’re done here,” Glen said.
“Yeah. I guess we are.”
Glen stepped to the door. There was a phone on the counter. “Hate to do this,” he said, and then he unplugged the phone, cradling it under his arm.
“One other thing before I go,” he said.
“What’s that?”
“Your cell phone, Lisa. Hand it over.”
Glen hit the gas, bulleting down that red road. Suddenly, it was just like it had been six months before. Lisa and his life in the rearview, God knew what ahead.
At least the cops wouldn’t be waiting for him at the end of that road tonight. That wouldn’t happen, now that he’d taken Lisa’s phones. From Lisa’s place, it was a long walk to anywhere.
But he hadn’t had a choice in the matter. No way he could afford a rerun of last December’s action. That night, Sheriff Randall himself had responded to Lisa’s 911 call. The old man had been quick about it, too, heading Glen off at the point where the dirt road that led to Kim’s place met highway blacktop.
After Kale Howard got into the act, Glen ended up in lockup for a week on an assault charge. Of course, Howard had gotten the restraining order, dropped the charges — all like that.
Kale took some heat, too, but in the end he got off with probation and counseling … and soon he was back with Kim, who wasn’t talking to either Lisa or Glen.
That wasn’t the worst of it, though. Glen h
ad issued his own sentence, and in retrospect he was one hard-ass judge. Because somehow, he had turned out to be the bad guy. In the eyes of the law, and his little sister, and in Lisa’s eyes, too.
And maybe even in his own eyes. Because he was the one who hit the road, not Kale Howard. He was the one who didn’t hang around when things went bad with Lisa, and with Kim. He was the one who didn’t talk to either of them for months. He couldn’t dodge that fact any more than he could make up for it now.
More than anything, that was what drove him forward. He cut the wheel harder than he should have and hit the blacktop, heading north. He tried to bury the regrets he’d felt while sitting at Lisa’s table, and the familiar longings that went along with them. But he couldn’t manage the trick. Though his gaze traveled the road ahead — tracking the painted line that gutted its center — his thoughts lingered behind.
He could still see Lisa there, sitting at that table. It had been six months since he’d seen her, but the way things had been six month ago was not exactly far-removed in his memory. He imagined what it would be like, burying his head in her hair again, touching her, going to bed with her, getting up in the morning together. That’s the way it still was, in one small place inside him. And if he were another kind of guy, maybe he could have made it happen all over again … and just that way.
But that was the pure hell of it. Because Glen Barlow wasn’t another kind of guy … and the worst thing about it was he knew that better than anyone. Even better than the other kind of guy who at that moment was stepping through Lisa Allen’s front door.
That guy’s name was J. J. Bryce.
The deputy put a sixer on the counter, and set the bag with the tortillas and carnitas he’d bought at that Mexican grocery store next to it. He undid his gunbelt and put it on a chair. Then he bent low, gave Lisa a kiss, and passed her a beer.
“Has Barlow been here yet?”
Lisa shook her head. But that was just a comment about Glen, not an answer to J. J.’s question.
The real answer took a minute … a popped bottle cap … a deep swallow.
“Oh, yeah,” she said finally. “He’s been, and he’s gone.”
J. J. sighed loud and long, staring down at the place the phone should have been.
“Jesus,” he said. “This guy.”
“I told you how he is. And you said you could handle him.”
“For that little job, I would have needed some of those gloves the bomb-disposal boys use. Man, what a handful of dynamite. Your boy Barlow was ready to go to war as soon as he stepped into my office. One quick chew of my ass and he was out of there. I didn’t get to say a word about Kale and Kim getting married — ”
“Yeah. I noticed. I got to drop that bomb myself.”
“Did you tell him about us?”
“Are you kidding?”
“Hell, someone’s got to tell him.”
“Oh, sure. That would have been a sweet follow-up to the news about his sister marrying the guy who used to beat the crap out of her. Hey, maybe we should invite him over to dinner and break the news. We could hold hands, and he could carve out his own heart with a steak knife.”
“Don’t play that, Lisa. Barlow walked out on you … and his sister. If he wants someone to blame for that, he can go find himself a mirror.”
Lisa laughed sharply. “Funny thing is, I think he’d agree with you.”
“Well, that doesn’t mean squat to me. He walked out six months ago, and you didn’t hear from him until today. I’ll bet he didn’t keep in touch with his sister, either. Now, I’m not exactly sure what happened to Kim out there at Tres Manos. Hell, I’m not even sure Kale Howard didn’t have something to do with it. But one thing I’m sure of is that Glen Barlow did dirt to both of you when he left town, and now he’s here trying to make things right when it’s way too late to tote that load.”
“Wow. You sound just like him. If he would have stuck around, I bet you would have rubber-stamped his plan for the rest of the night.”
“What plan?”
J. J. sipped his beer and listened while Lisa laid it out for him.
When she was done, he took a deeper swallow.
Then he drained the bottle.
“That goddamn coyote,” he said, and he stepped outside.
J. J. flipped open his cell phone and called dispatch. It was dark now, and a light breeze was blowing from the west. Lisa watched as J. J. moved over to the barbeque. He took off the lid and scraped down the grill while he talked. She couldn’t hear his words, just clipped short sentences. But his tone told the story, and that tone was all business.
Across the table, an empty chair waited. Lisa saw Glen sitting there an hour before. She saw J. J.’s empty beer bottle on the table, right now. She heard the words of both men, sizing up things in ways that really weren’t that different.
The breeze carried the smell of sage, rosemary, and thyme through the open door. Glen had always trimmed back the rosemary way too tight. He said it made the plant grow stronger. J. J. was the kind of guy who thought anything you put in your mouth should come from the grocery store. She wondered if he ever noticed the herb garden at all.
Lisa had been with J. J. two months. The relationship had started slow and easy, then come on fast. Bryce was a what you see is what you get kind of guy. You wanted to know how he felt about something, all you had to do was ask. He’d tell you. And things worked best if they operated that way from his side of the equation, too. He wanted to know something, he’d ask you straight out. It was never that way with Glen. Glen could be as silent as a shadow. Sure, the two men weren’t exactly yin and yang or night and day, but Lisa definitely didn’t have a problem figuring out which one was left brain and which was right —
Mr. Left Brain stepped through the door.
“Change of plans,” J. J. said. “Dinner’s on the backburner.”
“What do you mean?”
“Jeff Keats is out sick tonight, and Einar Cerda’s transporting a couple of prisoners over to county lockup. That Garcia kid from California’s pretty much running the show, and he’s out on a domestic dispute call. Since all I’ve got is a suspicion your boy Barlow is going to jump a restraining order, there’s no way Glen gets priority. Besides, I wouldn’t want to put the kid up against Barlow and Kale Howard, even if he was available. Not by his lonesome, anyway. You ask me, both those guys belong in strait-jackets.”
“Can’t they call in someone from the day shift?”
“Sure. They could start with Randall, like they did last Christmas Eve. He’d love that.”
“Who then?”
“Well, if someone’s stupid enough to be proactive when nothing’s happened yet, he might head out there. Someone with a solid knowledge of the parties involved. Of course, an idiot like that would have to put his off-duty self in the middle of things and worry about lawsuits later-”
“If you’re saying that you’re doing this off the clock, I’m going with you.”
“Don’t be crazy, Lisa. Let’s leave that job to your buddy the road dog. I think he’s made for it.”
Bryce grabbed his gunbelt from the chair and buckled it on.
“Well,” he said, “I guess I’ll go catch some bad guys and get our phone back.”
Lisa laughed, then kissed him.
“Thanks,” she said.
“No need, darlin’. But let’s not let this get too complicated. You just remember who’s going to walk through the door when this is over.”
“I’ll remember,” she said.
“Okay.” Bryce stepped outside. “Be back soon. Don’t worry.”
“I won’t.”
“Liar.”
Lisa laughed again. Another kiss that was too quick, and then J. J.’s truck was raising a cloud of dust as he headed for the highway. Lisa watched him go, and she kept on watching after the dust settled and the truck had disappeared from view.
The night air was cool.
The crickets had gone quiet.
Behind the house he’d shared with Kim Barlow — the same house he’d once exited through a window thanks to her brother Glen — Kale Howard eyed Tres Manos.
The place the Anglo locals called The Hands was a sight to see, even from this distance. It was something different every time you looked at it. Red as a thickening puddle of blood in the hard light of afternoon. Black as the devil’s silhouette in the hours past midnight … and right now, with silver moonlight creeping up its backside, it was as smoky and ethereal as a dream any fool could climb.
Kale smiled. Though he stood in darkness, that same moonlight crept up his spine like a dozen furious scorpions in a hurry to plant stings at the base of his brain. In his world, that wasn’t an unfamiliar feeling, and it dug down to his core like a grave robber’s shovel, churning up secrets buried in the deepest, darkest corners of the shriveled black hunk he called his soul.
There were visions in that place that would have made a sane man slash his wrists. Visions of women like Kim Barlow as they screamed their last screams, and visions of Kim Barlow herself, on the final night of her life, out there in the desert beneath a towering hunk of rock that might as well have been a gigantic tombstone.
They weren’t exactly Kale’s visions. Not completely. They were owned in part by the thing that lived inside him, the disease that sent those scorpions scurrying across his spine. But the visions were nothing to be feared, any more than he feared the silhouette of Tres Manos in the distance. And, hell, if he raised a hand right now, he could cover up that mother-of-all tombstones where Kim had died, and he could do the job with one little finger. This he did. And just that fast, every memory of Kim Barlow vanished from his mind except that very last one … and, for Kale, that was the one worth keeping.
The moonlight brought it home. As its clean halo broke over the rim of The Hands, the memory shimmered in the clear white light surrounding Kale’s raised finger. Quite suddenly, his raised finger itched as if those ghostly scorpions had launched their own dark vision-quest, scrambling across the enormous sandstone tombstone that rose from the desert of Kale’s hand, jabbing barbed tales into that tower, reducing it to fine grains, burrowing through Kale’s flesh and blood and bone until they unearthed that bedrock of hidden memory.