Bitter Crossing (A Peyton Cote Novel)

by D. A. Keeley

  “Poker? No.”

  “Does the name Morris Picard mean anything to you?”

  “No.”

  “Jerry Reilly, Tyler Timms?”

  “No, neither.”

  “Where’d you get the dope?”

  He shook his head. “They came, took my car for two hours, brought it back, and told me to pick up the others at Smitty’s. It’s a bar in Youngsville.”

  “Where were you going?”

  “Boston.”

  “Tonight?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Have an address?”

  “I don’t. One of the others must.”

  “Seen Radke since?” she said.

  “No.”

  “You know who assaulted him?”

  “Huh?”

  “Those are all the questions I have for now.” She gathered the recorder. “I appreciate your cooperation.”

  “Will I get to go home?”

  “Mr. Shaley, I don’t control any of that.”

  “Wait. You said—”

  “I said I would tell the attorney that you cooperated in full. And I’ll do that. The rest of this is out of my hands.”

  “You should have told me that. You burned me.”

  “No. Your lapse in judgment did that to you.”

  When she closed the interview room door behind her, she paused to look through the window. Shaley was staring down at his cuffed hands.

  There was a message slip by her phone. The call had come after 3 a.m. from Elise.

  The “urgent” box was checked.

  THIRTEEN

  IT WAS FAST BECOMING a twenty-hour day.

  At 5:30 a.m. Tuesday, Peyton entered Gary’s Diner, the only place in the region that was open twenty-four hours. Elise was in a booth drinking coffee. She was pale. Her cheeks showed faint traces of mascara streaks.

  Peyton slid in across from her.

  “Thanks so much for coming, sis. Was your shift over, or did you leave early?”

  “Kind of both. It was almost over, and I might have stayed late, but you sounded upset on the phone.”

  “Sounds like you were working on something important,” Elise said, looking at her coffee mug. “Sorry to pull you away.”

  “Why aren’t we meeting at your house?”

  “My house? God, no. And not Mom’s either. I don’t want anyone to know—not yet—except you.”

  “My boss took your message. Told me you sounded upset.”

  Peyton had been shocked when Hewitt sent her home, saying, “Take care of family first. This job can be all-encompassing.” What did he know of putting family first? He woke at 3 a.m. to call the office and check on agents pulling mids.

  “You look ready for a fight,” Elise said.

  “Already had one.” Peyton glanced around. Aspirin had quieted her aching ankle, but the takedown of Darrel Shaley and the subsequent collision with the ground had left her shoulder stiff.

  “Tonight? Really?”

  She nodded.

  “Wow. Did you win?”

  “I won.”

  What was this about? She had a report to type, a meeting with DEA officials to prepare for, and needed at least six hours of sleep.

  The waiter approached. “Peyton Cote?” he said. “I heard you were back.”

  “Like a bad penny.” She stood and hugged him. “How are you, Pete?”

  “Just fine. Remember when we’d finish our late nights here?” Pete Dye motioned to Elise. “Remember that? Ten, sometimes fifteen of us, would pile in here?”

  “Drink and play darts at Tip of the Hat,” Peyton looked at Elise, who forced a smile. “Then we’d come here for pancakes.”

  “Then go home to sleep for a few hours before work,” he said. “And we’d do it all over again the next night.”

  “Our fifteenth reunion is coming up next year,” Peyton said. “That was a long time ago.”

  “Seems like a different lifetime,” Elise said softly, staring at her coffee.

  Peyton and Pete Dye both turned to look at her, their light moment shattered.

  “What can I get you?” he asked Peyton.

  “Decaf. You don’t brew Starbucks, do you?”

  “Seriously?”

  She shrugged and sat down again.

  “Cup of house-brand decaf coming right up.” He went to get it.

  She hadn’t seen Pete Dye in a decade and hadn’t really talked to him since college. Jeff had never liked him, so when she’d started dating Jeff, her friendship with Pete had withered. She looked at Pete’s white apron. He’d been an education major, but somehow he’d ended up relegated to menial labor.

  “Boy, is he glad to see you.” Elise raised her eyebrows.

  “We were in the same class from pre-K through high school,” Peyton said. “We were like brother and sister most of the time.”

  “Well,” Elise said, “nothing is the same anymore.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “Just what I said. Everything is different now. Nothing’s like it was.”

  “I was just thinking how nothing ever changes around here.”

  “No, not the place. Us. Or me, anyway. People change.”

  “Elise, why did you call?”

  “I need to tell you something,” Elise said and looked down. She stirred her coffee, her spoon clicking loudly against the cup as if her hand was trembling.

  Elise was three years younger than Peyton, but she noticed crow’s feet at the corners of her little sister’s eyes for the first time.

  Across the room, a group of college kids stood to leave. Two wore University of Maine at Fort Kent sweatshirts. The university was located an hour north. A handful of men, in both suits and farm attire, sat at the counter, drinking coffee, chatting about politics and reading newspapers.

  “Watch the moose, boys,” Pete Dye called to the college kids. “A guy hit one leaving here yesterday morning. Totaled his truck. Clipped it at the knees, it cleared the truck’s cabin, and demolished the bed.”

  One of the young men answered with a sense of reassurance that only youth can provide, and they left.

  Elise drank some coffee and said, “You saw how things were between me and Jonathan yesterday.”

  “Tense. Shit, Ellie. Don’t say what I think you’re about to.” Peyton knew about divorce, knew what it did to children.

  “Things aren’t going to work out between Jonathan and me.”

  “You’re sure?”

  Dye approached with a cup of decaf, smiling broadly. “Not Starbucks, but fresh-brewed. Cream? Sugar?”

  “Black is fine. Thanks.”

  He wiped his hands on a dishtowel, then slung the rag over his shoulder. His faded jeans looked too big, as if his nylon hiking belt held them up. “I saw the article in the paper. Was thinking of calling, asking you to talk to my tenth-grade class. I can’t seem to engage them. Thought maybe you could come in, talk about your work and the history of the Border Patrol.”

  She was staring at Elise, waiting for their conversation to resume.

  Elise forced a smile. “Can you believe Pete Dye, the boy who got sent to the office every other day by Mr. Picard, is now a history teacher? He works with Jonathan.”

  Peyton shook her head, and Pete Dye grinned. She remembered that crooked smile. Still looked like a carefree surfer. She always thought it was that smile, that care-free attitude that bothered Jeff so much. For a split-second, her mind drifted from Elise to the thought of missed opportunities.

  “Mo Picard must’ve beaten a few values into my head,” Dye said. “He’s my department chair now. Pay is so lucrative that I have this sweet gig on the side to pay for my history master’s. I work four to eight, then head to school.”

  “Every day?” Peyton said.

  “Not weekends,” he said. “Hey, remember Mahoney’s bio I class?”

  “He retired after he taught us.”

  Dye’s smile widened. “Don’t pin that on me.”

  “P
ete,” Elise said, smiling genuinely now, “you put Alka-Seltzer in the man’s fish tank. Killed all his fish!”

  The laughter felt good. Darrel Shaley’s predicament and her sister’s troubles were now at the edges of Peyton’s periphery.

  “Got to get back to work,” Dye said.

  When he was gone, Peyton turned to Elise. “Are you leaving Jonathan?”

  Elise was looking down; the same pose Darrel Shaley had held earlier. Maybe it’s me, Peyton thought. Is this the effect I have on people?

  “I have to leave him,” Elise said finally. “It’s not fair to him, not fair to me. I haven’t told him yet.”

  Peyton thought of the nights in El Paso when she’d kiss Tommy goodnight, then go to the living room to finally let down her false bravado and sob. You had to go through it to fully realize the pain, the fear of single motherhood, of believing you are—and forever will be—alone. She’d read somewhere that life offered emotions that couldn’t be verbalized. Divorce had explained that statement to her.

  “Divorce is a horrible thing, sis,” she said.

  “I know,” Elise said, “but I have to. For both of us.”

  “What about Max?”

  “I want him to know his mother was finally true to herself.”

  “What does that mean?” Peyton said. “Did Jonathan cheat on you?”

  “Yes, but that’s not why.”

  “Not why? What then?”

  “It’s me, Peyton.”

  Peyton held up a hand. “Jesus, Elise, it’s not your fault he’s a philandering shithead. Don’t blame yourself. He’s lucky to have you.”

  “Peyton, listen to me. It is me. I’m not the same person he married.” She stopped, took a long breath, and looked at Peyton—a penetrating gaze that said she was trying to gauge her sister’s reaction. “P, if I told you I was …” She stopped, elbows on the tabletop, forehead falling to her palms.

  “Elise, what is it?”

  Silence, head shaking back and forth.

  “Did he hurt you, Elise, physically?”

  Elise looked up, tears streaming now. “Stop it. It’s me. It really is.”

  Peyton waited.

  “If I told you”—Elise inhaled—“that I was gay, could you still—”

  “Oh my God—”

  Elise stood. “Maybe I should go.”

  “No! Elise, I’m your sister. Please sit down.”

  Elise sat.

  “I’m just … stunned … confused. I don’t under—I guess I just never … Are you sure?” Peyton was surprised to see Elise smile.

  “I wish you could see your face right now,” Elise said.

  “I’m trying to figure out how I never knew.”

  “Don’t feel bad. I always knew, and at the same time I guess I never knew. I thought that if I did the ‘right things’—went to the prom, dated, got married—it would change.”

  Peyton was quiet.

  “I’m sure now,” Elise said. “And I need to know where you stand on this.”

  “Beside you. I’m your sister.”

  “That’s it?”

  “What else is there?”

  Elise nodded and looked down. Peyton sipped her coffee. Her head was spinning. How hadn’t she known? When? Why? Then she saw Elise’s shoulders slump, watched her sister cover her eyes and sob, and forgot her own confusion.

  “I’m just so relieved,” Elise said.

  “What did you think I’d say?”

  “I just didn’t want to be an embarrassment.”

  “That’s ridiculous. I am shocked. Part of me feels like I’ve been duped. I was your maid of honor. Did you know back then?”

  “I always knew I was different, even when we were little.”

  “Why wait until now?”

  “I didn’t know what else to do. Then, in San Francisco, when Jonathan was cheating on me again, I couldn’t take it anymore. I asked him why. He said I was ‘frigid,’ that I always had been. I started thinking and, I guess, finally admitted it.”

  “Don’t blame yourself for his cheating, Elise. Don’t let him make you feel badly about that.”

  “He doesn’t know. Or if he does, he hasn’t told me. You’re the first person I’ve said it to.”

  Peyton finished her coffee. “When are you going to tell him?”

  “I don’t know. I know I have to, but I’m a little afraid. He’s got a temper.”

  Peyton remembered his glare as she left the diner. “I can be there with you. What about Mom? When will you tell her?”

  “How do you think she’ll handle it?”

  Peyton leaned her head back, retied her ponytail, and thought about her mother, who’d spent her entire life in this small, rural community. Lois Cote had been Lois Cyr, a French-Catholic girl raised in the Church who still attended Mass more than once a week.

  “I don’t know. She might surprise you,” Peyton said. “Hey, I’ll be right back.” She stood and went to the ladies’ room.

  The bathroom was empty. Looking in the mirror as she washed her hands, she barely recognized the woman looking back at her. She looked pale with rings beneath her eyes. She thought of Elise. Kenny Radke hadn’t considered the possibility that non-whites lived among them, let alone gays. Being gay in a rural community wouldn’t be easy and even more difficult for a single mother. Would she even be able to win custody of Max?

  She heard the bathroom door open.

  “Excuse me. You are the Border Patrol agent who found the baby?”

  Peyton looked up but said nothing for several moments, letting the memory course through her. When she was sure, she nodded.

  This time the young Spanish-speaking woman with the blood-stained T-shirt wasn’t dazed.

  FOURTEEN

  “YOU ARE THE BORDER Patrol agent who found the baby?” the young woman repeated with a heavy Spanish accent. Her voice echoed in the bathroom.

  Peyton dried her hands casually, watching the woman, no older than twenty, process her, putting Peyton’s face with the name, and realizing, as Peyton had, that they’d met before.

  How did she know who had found the baby? How did she know where to find Peyton?

  “Yes, I’m Peyton Cote. What’s your name?” Peyton turned to face her, took a step closer.

  The woman stepped back, keeping ten feet between them.

  Don’t spook her. Casually, she reached for another hand towel.

  “You found the baby? The baby is okay?”

  Peyton didn’t answer immediately. The girl’s torn blue jeans and cotton shirt had been replaced by fresh dungarees that drooped and a white T-shirt that read Hillside Farms. Had she worked the harvest for Fred Hillside? What had become of her chest wound? Medical attention would leave a paper trail.

  “How do you know about the baby? Is she yours?” The girl took another step back. Peyton wiped her hands, balled the paper towel, and said, “Can I buy you breakfast?”

  “No. Thank you, but no. I no hungry—I’m not hungry.”

  The girl looked over her shoulder. She was within arm’s reach of the door, but too far from Peyton. If she made a break, she’d be out the door before Peyton could reach her.

  “I’m having coffee,” Peyton said. “Why don’t you join me? I’m here with my sister.”

  “Where is the baby?”

  “Can I get your name?”

  Peyton tried for casual but knew she didn’t pull it off. She’d gone to a potato field to find a BC Bud transaction. Instead, she’d discovered a baby. A day later, she’d found this woman, bloody and stumbling, near where the baby had been located. Too many damned coincidences and questions to be asked for casual, especially with the girl standing in the same room.

  The girl’s eyes moved in quick bursts. Beyond the bathroom door, a bell jingled when the front door opened. The girl turned quickly—jittery, ready to bolt. Peyton knew that look: I’m talking to you, but I shouldn’t be.

  She couldn’t afford to lose her again.

  “The baby is i
n foster care, staying with a nice family. What’s your interest in her?”

  “I …” The girl paused. “I am worried for her.”

  “Why? Is she in danger?”

  “Where is she?”

  “I can’t disclose that information.” Peyton took a step closer. “What’s your name?”

  The girl ran.

  Peyton needed four steps to reach the bathroom door, which the girl threw in her face. She pushed the door open and closed in near the counter but got caught at the front door. Someone was entering. She had to turn sideways to bypass them.

  “Hey, Peyton.” He grabbed her arm. “I’m glad I ran into you.”

  Instinctively, her balled fist flashed up before she recognized the voice. “Not now,” she told her ex-husband and ran outside.

  But the interruption was enough.

  She stopped on the sidewalk and looked in both directions. The girl was gone. Twenty minutes later, she still couldn’t be found.

  If Peyton had located the girl, she might not have felt so bone-tired when she walked through the front door of her mother’s house Tuesday at 6:30 a.m.

  She hung her coat in the closet and untied her boots. Her mind raced. Elise’s announcement, Darrel Shaley’s sick wife, and she’d lost the same girl twice in twelve hours.

  The kitchen light was on. She heard Lois’s spirited-but-off-key rendition of “New York, New York.” Lois’s Edith Bunker falsetto brought a weary smile to her face, as she trudged to the kitchen, where the indoor/outdoor thermometer read 61/29.

  Lois raised the coffeepot. “You look exhausted. Go to bed. I’ll get Tommy up and wait for the bus with him.”

  “I’m fine,” Peyton said and watched as Lois turned back to the counter, poured a cup, carefully measured two spoonfuls of sugar, added one of cream, and stirred.

  Peyton had never known another soul who made coffee so meticulously. Then again, she’d spent her entire career in law enforcement, where strong coffee, regardless of taste, was considered a delicacy.

  “That apple crisp I smell?”

  Lois smiled. “That’s why I’ll miss you living here when you and Tommy get your own place—your healthy appetite.”

  “Thanks a lot, Mom.”

  “What did I say?” Lois was genuinely confused. “Hey, I’m making Tommy a good, old-fashioned farm breakfast.”