The Last Breath

by Kimberly Belle

  He breaks down then, his body racked with sobs his lungs are too weak to fuel with much more than wheezy rattles. My father asked me to talk about forgiveness, but the only thing I feel now is a bone-deep sorrow—for Ella Mae, for me and Bo and Lexi, for Cal and Jake. But mostly, for my father. For the daddy I once knew and the murderer he’d become. For the man who lost a woman’s love, and the man I’m about to lose all over again.

  “Tell me you forgive me.” His grip on my shirt tightens, and his muscles give a weak squeeze to pull me closer. “I’m begging you. Let me die in peace.”

  I watch him for a long moment, thinking he doesn’t deserve an ounce of peace. But I’m not going to be like Lexi. I won’t let my bitterness and anger and hatred eat me alive. I won’t let it pull me under.

  Every single decision I’ve made in the past sixteen years has been motivated by an attempt to escape my past. I meant my words to Jake, though. I’m done running.

  But in order to stay put anywhere—in order to still the gypsy in my soul—I have to scrounge up a teeny tiny scrap of forgiveness for my father, even if I will never be able to forgive his action.

  And if I can’t do either of those things just yet, the least I can do is give him peace.

  “Go back to sleep.” I untangle my shirt from his fists and place both his palms gently on his chest. “I forgive you.”

  * * *

  “That was one hell of a performance.”

  Cal’s voice doesn’t startle me. Though I didn’t notice him sitting in the corner of the living room when I confronted my father, I heard his movement, and shortly after, his footsteps, as I stumbled into the kitchen. So though I’m not particularly surprised he followed me, it’s his tone—impressed, almost reverent—that shocks me. I mop up my face with the sleeve of my sweatshirt and turn to face my uncle.

  “I figured it was worth a try.” My voice comes out far calmer than I feel. I lift a shoulder and look straight into Cal’s eyes. “I was tired of waiting around for someone to volunteer the truth.”

  “Well, like I said, bravo.” The dim light in the kitchen paints angry purple shadows under his eyes, across his forehead, around his mouth, where worry and grief have etched new lines in his face. He reaches past me, flicking on the water boiler with a knuckle. “I sure could use a whiskey toddy. How ’bout you?”

  He takes my silence as a yes, because he pulls two mugs from the drainer by the sink, rummages around in a cabinet for honey, gives both mugs a generous squirt.

  “I tell you what, though, baby girl. You certainly had the element of surprise on your side, ’cause your father and I never saw that one coming. Not in a million years. And I’m not being the least bit facetious when I say I don’t think I could have done any better myself.”

  “How long have you known?”

  What I don’t say is that my question is a test. If Cal lies to me now, I will march out of this kitchen and this house, and I will never, ever speak to him again. Not even to give him my condolences at his brother’s death. He must detect something in either my tone or my stance, because he adds an extra glug of Jack Daniel’s to both mugs, tops them with boiling water and drops in two spoons.

  And then he picks them up by the handles and gestures to the kitchen table. “Let’s sit, shall we? My knees aren’t what they used to be.”

  We settle in at the kitchen table, and Cal pushes a steaming mug across its surface to me. “You know I’m breaching attorney-client privilege if I tell you.”

  “You know I’m walking out of here and never speaking to you again if you don’t.”

  Cal smiles. “Touché, baby girl.” He gives the spoon a spin, watching the milky mixture swirl around and around in his mug. “I was the first phone call your father made that night. He was barely making any sense he was so hysterical, going on and on about how Ella Mae was making a fool of him, that she was a cheatin’ whore, that he had to do it. When I asked him what, what did he have to do? he said, calm as could be, ‘I killed her, Cal.’”

  Even though I knew it was coming, I suck in a breath.

  “My reaction was a little more colorful. After I was through cussin’ him out, I told him to call 9-1-1 and turn himself in. That’s when he hung up on me.”

  Cal pauses to take a sip of his toddy. I grip the handle of mine hard enough to snap the ceramic in two.

  “By the time I made it to Rogersville, the police were already here. Your father was being treated for shock and a head injury. He’d rammed himself into the doorpost hard enough to give himself a mild concussion, but of course the police didn’t know that. By then he’d already fed them the story about intruders, and I have to give it to him, he did a damn good job. Breakin’ into his own door, clearin’ any evidence he was the one to drag Ella Mae down the stairs. If Dean Sullivan hadn’t been looking out his living room window at two in the morning your father would’ve gotten away with it.”

  “And yet you still defended him.” Though the words may be accusatory, my tone is not. I’m suddenly exhausted by all the bitterness and blame. I only want to understand.

  Cal doesn’t seem to take offense. “I didn’t have a choice, baby girl. Your daddy taught me how to pitch a baseball and shoot a BB gun and skin a rabbit with a Swiss Army knife. He bought me my first beer, and when the time came, my first pack of Trojan condoms. Up until that very night, I’d spent my entire life worshipping that man. What was I supposed to do?”

  “You were supposed to let justice take care of him.”

  Only, as I say the words, I realize that is exactly what Cal’s done. My father went to prison for murder despite having the Tennessee Tiger by his side. His appeals stalled after only one attempt. Cal’s defense wasn’t accidentally shoddy. He threw the most prominent, the most important case of his life on purpose.

  “You should have told us. Bo and Lexi and me. We deserved to know the truth.”

  “You think I don’t know that? But telling you kids was the one thing your father wouldn’t budge on. He cried and carried on like a mule in heat. So your father and I made a deal. He agreed to spend the rest of his life in prison for what he’d done, and I agreed to not tell the police or you kids what I knew.”

  Whoever said the worst thing about the wait is not knowing was right. For sixteen years I’d waited for the truth. Now that I know, something inside of me breaks open, lets go. Of the anger, the fear, the bitterness. I let go of it all.

  “What ever happened to the baby?”

  Cal shrugs. “Your father never knew about a baby until the letter.”

  I don’t believe him, not for a second.

  Cal must read the doubt on my expression, because he says, “Now that you know the truth, I don’t have any more reasons to lie. Your father didn’t know, and it didn’t come up in the autopsy, so I’ve always assumed nature cleaned up its own mess.” He reaches across the table, drapes a palm over my hand. “I know I should’ve told you, baby girl, and I’m sorrier than you’ll ever know. I just pray one day you kids’ll be able to move past all this tragedy and be happy.”

  I think about my siblings sleeping upstairs, clueless to the drama unfolding beneath them, and my heart gives a painful squeeze. They’ve just gotten their father back, and now they’re about to lose him all over again.

  “Somebody has to tell Bo and Lexi.”

  “I know.” Cal’s words come out on a sigh. “But I can’t tell them what I just told you. I’ve already said too much.”

  “Fine. Tell them Dad confessed to me. That’s all they need to know.”

  He drops his head in a nod, studies the table. “I’ll tell them in the morning.”

  “Tell them now.”

  Cal raises his head, and I hold his gaze, daring him to disagree. Finally, after a long moment, he winces, then nods.

  And then I think of someone else who deser
ves to know, and my heart flops around like one of those bluegill Bo used to fish out of the Holston River when we were little. I push back my chair and stand, looking around for wherever I left my keys. I find them on top of the microwave.

  “Where are you going?”

  “To town.” I stuff my feet into my boots, on the mat by the kitchen door. “Because there’s only one person on the planet who can tell Jake who murdered his mother, and that’s me.”

  37

  WHEN YOU’RE IN a hurry, one point seven miles can feel like a million, and the time it takes to drive there an eternity. Tonight, the trip to Roadkill feels almost instant, like I blink my eyes and I’m there, parked in front of Jake’s door two seconds later.

  If I were thinking straight, I might be surprised to see the lights are still on behind the thick etched windows, even more surprised to see a solitary Jake, hunched over a glass of amber liquid at his bar. Instead, I pocket my keys and breeze through the door like it isn’t rapidly approaching dawn.

  Jake looks up and I try to ignore the shiver rippling up my arms. The late hour and bourbon have slowed his reactions, and it takes a few seconds for his eyes to focus on whoever just walked through his door, a few more to recognize that it’s me. And then eyes so dark brown they’re almost black bore into mine with not pleasure to see me, but resignation.

  He thunks down his glass with a heavy arm. “If you’re coming to tell me we’re through, you don’t have to bother. I already got the message, at least three times now.”

  “That’s not why I’m here.” He blinks at me, and I catch a brief glimmer of hope before I shake my head. “That’s not why, either.”

  Jake gives me a disappointed nod, then returns to his bourbon and takes a long, slow pull. There’s only an inch or two left in the bottle on the bar next to him, and I wonder how much of that he’s drunk tonight. Judging by his glassy, red eyes and sloppy movements, I suspect most of it.

  “Are you drunk? Because I have something to say, and I need you to remember it in the morning.”

  He drains his glass with one hand, reaches for the bottle with the other. “Well then, you better hang on, ’cause I’m not nearly drunk enough.” He turns the bottle upside down over his glass until it’s empty, then drops it behind the bar where it falls to the rubber mat with a dull thunk.

  “Never mind.” I turn for the door. “I’ll come back tomorrow.”

  “No.” For someone with a bottle of bourbon in his system, Jake is fast. He’s off his stool and across the room faster than I can reach for the handle. “Don’t leave. Please. I’m listening.”

  I drop the handle, suck in a breath, force myself to meet his gaze. “I figured it out, Jake.”

  He tries to pull up that smile I love so much, but it doesn’t quite make it up his cheeks. “Seeing as my veins are currently filled with more booze than blood, you’re going to have to be a little more specific. Figured what out?”

  I look up at him and my heart whimpers. Why does he make me want to laugh instead of cry, why does he have to stand so close, and why do I want to jump in his arms and bury my face in his neck and forget the words I came here to say?

  The weight of the past few days hits me, and a sob bursts up my throat. Jake doesn’t hesitate. He pulls me into his arms and holds me upright while I fall apart, wiping my tears with his thumbs and murmuring comforting words into my curls. His gentleness breaks my heart even more, and it’s a long time before I can do anything other than lean into him and cry.

  “Is it your father? Did he...?”

  I shake my head into his chest, and then I shrug. “I don’t know. Maybe by now...” His arms tighten around me in response, and I know I have to tell him right this instant, before I lose whatever’s left of my nerve. I breathe deep, taking in as much as I can of his scent and his strength, untangle myself from his arms, step back far enough to look into his eyes and force myself to say the words. “Dean Sullivan didn’t kill Ella Mae.”

  “What? What are you talking about?”

  “He has an alibi, Jake. He couldn’t have murdered her.”

  Jake shakes his head, thrusts a hand through his hair. “Then what about all those things he told us? That he was sorry, that he didn’t mean to do it. What was that all about?”

  “Who knows? The man’s been a raging alcoholic for almost two decades now. He’s probably got all of twelve brain cells left in his pickled head.” Fresh tears well in my eyes, and my voice drops to barely a whisper. “But he’s not who killed Ella Mae.”

  Understanding flashes across his expression and then is wiped away, like he hears the message behind my words yet refuses to accept it as truth. I don’t blame him. Like Jake, I can almost see our life. I would find a job at a nearby nonprofit and plan Sunday-afternoon dinners with Bo and Lexi. At night, Jake and I would sneak upstairs with a pan of that night’s special and a bottle of Bordeaux to share in his bed. Afterward, we’d make love to the thumps of music and laughter coming from the bar beneath us. His love could heal my grief at my father’s betrayal, teach me to find peace in this place.

  If only Jake wasn’t Ella Mae’s son. If only Dean was Ella Mae’s killer. If only, if only, if only.

  Jake leads me to a bar stool, the very same bar stool where we started. He picks me up—literally wraps his hands around my waist and lifts me off the ground—and settles me onto it. He points to his glass, still half full, on the bar between us. When I don’t go to pick it up, he pushes it into my hand and waits until I down a good gulp.

  Jake gives the liquid courage time to hit my stomach, warm my blood, loosen my tongue. And then he says, “Start at the beginning.”

  “Allison Sullivan told Jeffrey that Dean was with her.” Bile swirls in my throat but I swallow it down, force myself to look him in the eyes. “From ten until after one the night Ella Mae was murdered. She remembers exactly, because that’s how long Dean beat and raped her.”

  Jake sobers in an instant. His body, his expression, the flicker of hope in his eyes, all go dead. He shakes his head and leans back. “Don’t say it.”

  “I have to. There have already been too many secrets.”

  “I mean it, Gia.” His face is so ferocious, I have to remind myself his rage is not directed at me. Not really. “Do not tell me his name.”

  “But I don’t have to say the name, do I?” I whisper, smiling sadly through my tears. “You’ve already figured it out.” When he doesn’t respond, I whisper, “He admitted it to me tonight. Cal confirmed it. Ray Andrews murdered Ella Mae.”

  I watch as every emotion I feared most competes on Jake’s face. Grief, disgust, hatred, despair. He snatches the glass from my hand and goes to lift it to his mouth, then reconsiders halfway there. Rearing back with a roar, he pitches the tumbler clear across the room, leaving a trail of liquid down his jeans and across the floor. The glass hits the far wall and explodes in a cloud of bourbon fumes and crystal shards. And then he swipes a hand down his chin, not quite looking at me.

  “It doesn’t matter.” His voice is desperate in a way that is more, I think, to convince himself than to sway me. “What’s done is done.”

  “Get real, Jake. I saw your face just now. I can’t spend the rest of my life wondering when you’ll decide you hate me more than you love me.”

  “I could never hate you.”

  “For a second or two, you just did,” I whisper, and my heart breaks in two when he doesn’t deny it.

  He shakes his head. “We can figure this out. We can get past this.”

  I push to a stand. “You were right, you know. Those millions of decisions we make every day—coffee or tea, buy or rent, love me or don’t?—in the end they’re all irrelevant. You could have told me the truth about who you were that very first second we met or the next day or the next, and maybe I would’ve gotten over it, maybe I wouldn’t have. It doesn�
��t matter, because all of our choices are irrelevant.”

  He grabs for me, but I step back and he swipes air. He tries again and ends up clutching a handful of my sweatshirt in his fist, tugging me toward him.

  “Don’t you see, Jake? Our fates had already been decided for us long before we met. Not by God or the universe or whatever higher power you choose to believe in, but by our parents. When your mother decided to sleep with the neighbor, and my father decided to kill her for it, you and I were destined to pay for something neither of us had a hand in.”

  “Gia...”

  I wait for whatever he’s about to say next, but it doesn’t come. Maybe because of the alcohol, maybe because he’s still trying to figure out what, exactly, there is left to say.

  Gently, I peel his fingers away from the fabric of my shirt and he lets me. Jake doesn’t reach for me again. His hands hang limp at his sides. When I turn and head for the door, when I step onto the sidewalk and into my car, no one stops me. When I gun the gas and head for home, no one chases me. Jake doesn’t follow.

  * * *

  By the time I push through the door at home, two things have happened. First of all, Dad has died, judging by the look of compassion Fannie gives me and the unabashed tears on Cal’s cheeks when I step into the living room.

  Cal’s also made good on his promise to tell the truth. I deduce this mainly from my siblings—Bo in a sobbing, crumpled heap at the foot of the couch and Lexi, who almost mows me down in her hurry to get out the door.

  “Where are you going?”

  She gives me a get-real look. “I told you so. All these years I knew with every ounce inside me he was guilty. I don’t know why I let you talk me into coming.”

  Bo lifts his head, blinks at me through bloodshot eyes. “So it’s true? He really did confess to killing Ella Mae?”