BACK AT the trailer, Mick threw himself onto the couch, fanning the wad of bills he’d located in one of Micah’s dresser drawers. “Lookit this, lil’ bro,” he said. He sounded drunk, but Tyler hadn’t seen him take any of the pills he’d carried off along with the money. “With this and the money you threw in, we’re gonna have a smooth trip.”
Tyler sank wearily into a cracked red leather easy chair. “To Mexico.”
“Yeah. Mexico.” Mick sat up straight, like he’d just gotten a shot of energy. “C’mere, I’ll show you.” He scooped a pile of magazines off the coffee table and pulled a black laptop computer from under the pile. The power cord to the computer was held onto the case by a web of duct tape. Mick patted the couch next to him. “Sit here.”
Reluctantly, Tyler sat down. Mick opened the computer, which came to life with a soft groaning squeak that didn’t bode well for the future of the device. The screen lit up and Mick pulled up the web browser. A few more keystrokes and the screen showed a beautiful emerald green ocean washing up onto a sandy beach. A low bluff rose behind the beach, surrounded by rustic-looking wooden homes amid lush vegetation. “It’s called San Pancho,” Mick said. “It’s on the Pacific Coast. Lots of Americans live there, ’cause it’s dirt cheap.” He used the touchpad and keyboard to call up another photo, this time showing a low building made of what looked like pink stucco, with a deep porch and tables visible from the outside. “There’s all kinds of bars and restaurants where we can find work if we need to. But mostly we can just hang out. Soak up the sun. Live like people oughta live.” His voice turned wistful. “Live clean for a change.”
Tyler shook his head. “And we’re supposed to get there how?”
“What, you think they don’t have roads in Mexico?” he pronounced it MEH-hee-co, with an exaggerated accent. “We drive, lil’ bro. We drive. And we make a little detour along the way to pick up Mama.”
“You don’t even know where she is, Mick. Or if she even wants to see us.”
“Oh, don’t I?” He manipulated touchpad and keys again until he’d called up Facebook. He accessed a group called ‘Birth Parents Seeking Children’. Post after post showed people of various ages looking into the camera—some hopefully, some anxiously, some holding up hand-lettered signs with the names and birth dates of their lost children. Almost all of the posts ended with some entreaty for help. Mick scrolled down and down until the faces and stories blurred. Finally, the screen came to rest on a black-and-white photograph that looked professionally done. The woman in the picture was seated in a large chair that looked like something from a Victorian library. She was dressed in a long flowing robe that fell in soft waves around her. There was an expression of defiance on her beautiful face, chin raised and thrust out, eyes pale and cool. A child was seated on her lap, looking up at her with a confused expression. She held the hand of an older boy who stood by the chair, who looked at the camera with an expression that was the twin of his mother’s. The photo was staged and dramatic, like an album cover. Tyler felt a stir of recognition. “That’s…us,” he whispered.
“Yeah,” Mick said. “And that’s our mama.” He scrolled down slightly so Tyler could read the wording of the post:
My children were taken from me unfairly by Social Services and a corrupt sheriff’s department in 2004 in North Carolina. They were adopted out to different families without my knowledge or consent. I was then run out of North Carolina by those same people. I need my boys now more than ever. Mick, the oldest, would be 20 now, and my little Keith, the one on my lap, would have just turned 18. They need each other, and I need them. If you know where they are, please contact Savannah by direct message. I’m in the Arabi area of New Orleans. Thank you.
“See?” Mick’s voice was choked with emotion. “She didn’t leave us, Keith. We were taken. They tore us apart.”
“That’s not my name,” Tyler whispered. He couldn’t take his eyes off the photo. The woman in the picture stirred up emotions that confused him. She was a stranger, or he thought she was. But vague, half-remembered shreds of feelings he couldn’t explain were stirring inside him.
Mick’s voice was low, insistent. “That’s the name she gave you, lil’ bro. The name those people took from you.”
Tyler closed his eyes and shook his head. “They’re my parents. They were good to me. They love me.”
“But they’re not your blood, Keith. Not like me. Not like Mama. And she needs us. Are you going to turn your back on your mother? Your blood?”
Tyler stood up and backed away from where Mick sat on the couch. “Stop. Just leave me alone.”
“Can’t do it,” Mick said. He began typing something on the keyboard of the laptop. “We’re in this too deep, lil’ bro. You owe her. And you owe me.”
“You? How the hell do I owe you? You kidnapped me!”
“You think anyone’s going to believe that? Now that you’re on video with a gun in your hand? Face it, you got no one to turn to but me. And we only got one way to go. To find our mama. And then down to Mexico.” Mick stood up. Tyler could see he had the gun in his hand again. “And we need to leave now. If that asshole Micah wakes up, he’s gonna come looking for us. And he won’t be alone.”
Lana came out of the bedroom. She was carrying a ragged and frayed backpack that made her look like a schoolgirl. “Can’t we wait till morning to go?” she complained. “I’m tired.”
“You can sleep while I drive, baby girl.” Mick sat down at the computer and began typing. Lana sank to the couch and watched him, chewing at her lower lip, her eyes uncertain. “Who’s gonna look after this place till we get back? Who’s gonna pay the rent?”
“We’re burnin’ that boat too, darlin’,” Mick said, his face intent on the screen.
“What?”
Mick ignored the question. He stood up and clicked to turn the computer off. “That’s it, then. We’re on the road. Go on out and get in the car. I got one last thing to do.” He picked up the gun. “You stay here, Keith.” Lana sighed like a disgusted teenager being packed off to school, then trudged out the door. Mick stood up and walked to the kitchen.
“What are you doing?” Tyler asked.
Mick didn’t answer. He opened the door of the stove and turned a knob. Then he reached down and did something Tyler couldn’t see. When he straightened up, he walked over to the coffee table and plucked a candle from out of the clutter. He pulled out his lighter, lit the candle, and placed it on the floor.
“Mick…” Tyler said, but he stopped when Mick straightened up.
“Now we can go.”
CHARLEYBOY WAS gone again. Savannah didn’t know where. That was happening more and more lately, and it scared her. When he was there, he was as attentive and loving as ever, at least as attentive and loving as he was during the recovery period between violent incidents. But the disappearances were getting longer and longer and closer together. She didn’t know if it had something to do with this mysterious “plan” she didn’t know anything about, or if the plan involved ditching her. The thoughts and fears ran round and round in her head, making sleep impossible. Not that she could get much sleep anyway tonight, since a street party had apparently arisen a couple of doors away. It seemed like a happy group, at least for now, with the shouts and screams mostly good-natured. Savannah got up from the bed and rubbed her eyes. There was a time when sounds like that would pull her out into the street, ready for fun. But that wasn’t the woman she was now. She sat down at the makeshift computer desk and woke up her aging computer. As was her habit, she opened Facebook first. The icon for the Messenger application let her know she had half a dozen private messages. She sighed. Like most women who put their actual faces up on their profile pages, she received dozens of messages a day, ranging through various degrees of creepiness all the way to outright obscenity. She opened the application. Marriage proposal from lonely Asian guy—delete. Offer to teach her to love anal sex—delete. Pitch from “really nice guy who’s seeking a soulmate”—delet
e. And so on. She looked up at the bar running across the top of the screen and saw she had a new friend request. She got several of those a day, too, most of which she also deleted. This time, though, what she saw made her draw in her breath.
Mick Jakes.
She paused for a moment, feeling her heart thumping in her chest. It could be a trick. A troll. Some kind of sick joke. She had tried to keep hope at bay for so long, and now, here it was. But hope could deceive. If you failed to keep it away, it could tear out your heart. But…she clicked on the name.
The eyes that looked out at her from the picture that came up on the dim and faded screen of the old computer could not have belonged to anyone else. Savannah’s eyes burned with tears. She put a hand to her mouth and stifled a sob. “My baby,” she whispered. She clicked to accept the request with her hand shaking so badly she could barely move the mouse. There was a new message blinking in the corner of the screen. She clicked on it.
Mama. We’re on our way to New Orleans. Will be in touch soon. Keith is with me.
She sat back, suddenly unable to breathe. It was him. It had to be him. It couldn’t be a trick. God couldn’t be that cruel. She leaned forward, hands shaking as she tried to type. After several attempts to compose something turned to gibberish, she decided to keep it simple.
Hurry. I love you both. She followed with the address. Her finger poised above the button for a moment, then she clicked send.
THEY’D LEFT shortly before dawn, with Lana already curled up asleep in a nest of blankets in the backseat. Mick had left the door to the trailer open as they pulled away. “Mick,” he’d said. “Why did you leave that candle burning? You could start a fire.” Suddenly, he realized that was exactly the plan. “Burning the boats,” he said softly.
Mick nodded, a tight, humorless grin on his face and a manic light in his eyes. “Now you’re gettin’ with the program, lil’ bro.”
“And the stove. You’re trying to blow the place up.” He shook his head. “Jesus, Mick, didn’t you think about how someone could get hurt?”
“No one’s going to get hurt. It’s gonna be okay.”
“You don’t…” Tyler gave up. It was useless. He slumped down in the seat and watched the road appearing at the edge of the headlights and disappearing under the car, the thick trees flashing by on either side. Before he knew it, he’d fallen into an exhausted sleep.
WYATT STOOD OUTSIDE the glass doors of the new sheriff’s department building and looked up. It was a slick, gleaming, two-story structure of white concrete and metal, so different from the leaky “historic” brick building where Wyatt had worked his tenure as sheriff. You could say what you liked about Henry, Wyatt thought, but the man could milk the county commissioners for money like nobody’s business. He took a deep breath and went inside.
The reception area was bright and airy, with tall, tinted windows allowing the natural light in to illuminate the waiting area. My god, Wyatt thought, is that a fern on the reception desk? He shook his head and approached the counter. At least one thing hadn’t changed. Freda Bufmeyer was still holding down the front, just as she’d done in the old building, although now she faced a pair of computer screens and a multi-line phone that flashed and beeped and rang with a polite chirring sound rather than the abrasive rapid-fire beeping of the old system. She clutched a headset in one hand, pressing the earpiece to her ear instead of trying to fit the band across her perfectly frosted and permed blonde hair. “Carter County Sheriff’s Department,” she said into the headset as Wyatt walked up to the desk, “How can I direct your call? Thanks, I’ll buzz him.” She reached out and touched the screen in front of her, softly, as if she was afraid she might break it. She pressed again, harder this time, then nodded and pulled the earpiece away.
Wyatt couldn’t help but grin. “Look at you, all high tech.”
She looked up and her plump, perfectly made-up face lit up in a bright smile. “Wyatt! Well, hey, shug!” She started to raise her ample frame from the swivel chair in which she sat, but was interrupted by the soft, insistent ring of the phone. She raised her index finger to tell him to wait and sat back down, headset held awkwardly against her ear. “Carter County Sheriff,” she said mechanically. When she had routed the call, she stood back up. “Come back here, handsome. Let me hug you.” He chuckled and obeyed. When they broke the hug, she sat back down, fanning herself theatrically as if overheated. He laughed out loud. It felt good to be back.
“So,” Freda said, settling back into her chair, “what brings you here?”
“I wanted to talk to whoever took the report about the disappearance of Tyler Welch.”
She didn’t bother to check her computer. “Right now, no one.”
“No one?”
She nodded. “I mean, there was a report, but the official line is he just left home. He’s eighteen, and, well, you saw on the news what happened over in Spencer.”
Another voice interrupted before he could answer. “Well, hey, Wyatt.”
Henry was standing at the end of the desk. He’d put on even more weight in the past months, and his belly bulged against the white dress shirt he wore. His tie was knotted loosely below the top shirt button he clearly couldn’t close. Wyatt pasted a smile on his face. “Hey, Henry.”
There was an awkward pause as Henry looked at him with barely concealed hostility. “Can I talk to you in my office for a minute?” he said finally.
“Sure.” Henry turned and walked away. Wyatt glanced at Freda, who rolled her eyes. “Asshole,” she mouthed at him.
Henry’s office was on the second floor, but they took the elevator. It was a short but tense and silent ride. Henry had a large corner office, with a huge plaque of the county seal hanging behind the massive oak desk where he settled his bulk. “So what’s this about, Wyatt?”
Wyatt took one of the chairs in front of the desk. He noticed that it was set lower than Henry’s, and one leg seemed a bit shorter than the other so that the chair was off balance. He’d read about that tactic in some magazine article and had always dismissed it as the kind of cheap trick a small and silly man would use. Nothing he was seeing so far was likely to change his mind. “Carl Welch stopped by the house. He was pretty upset.”
“I imagine he is. But this is a matter for the sheriff’s department.”
“He said you told him there was nothing to be done.”
Henry frowned. “I stand by that. There’s no evidence Tyler Welch was taken. And the video from that armed robbery—”
“Shows a kid scared out of his wits. I’ve seen it.”
Henry sighed. “Just stay out of this, Wyatt. Go home.”
The tone made Wyatt want to yank him across the desk, but he kept his composure as he stood up. “One more question before I leave,” he said. “You have any idea why a federal agent might be trying to find out about Tyler Welch and Mick Jakes’s adoption records?”
Henry looked completely baffled. “What are you talking about?”
Wyatt figured the befuddlement was real; Henry wasn’t that good an actor. “Never mind,” he said. “Have a good day, Henry.” Henry started to say something, but Wyatt was closing the door as he left and didn’t hear it.
Back in the lobby, he passed Freda’s desk on the way out. “Good to see you, Freda.”
She waved him over. “I’ll direct your call,” she said into the headset, and touched the screen. She looked up. “I swear, I’m never gonna get used to this dang thing.”
He smiled. “Looks like you’ve got it tamed.”
She shook her head. “I want my old phone back.”
“I remember you used to cuss that old system pretty bad.”
“At least with that one, I could bang on it when I got mad. This thing, I’m always scared I’ll break it.” She looked around, checking to see who was in earshot. “So, how’d it go with Henry?”
“Not much help there.”
She sighed. “Old No-Help Henry strikes again.”
“That what you cal
l him to his face?”
She raised an eyebrow. “With me three years from retirement? Do I look like a fool?”
“Never. I just wonder what you called me.”
“Well, you just keep wonderin’.” Her grin faded. “We miss you around here, Wyatt.”
He felt a lump in his throat. “I miss you, too. All of you.”
She leaned back slightly. “I bet if you were to run again…”
He put up a hand. “Put that out of your mind. And you help Henry. All of y’all. He’s the boss now. You may not like the man, but the department needs you to back him up.”
“I’ll try.” She looked around again. “So, I told you there was a report taken.”
“Uh-huh.” He leaned over the desk. “I don’t suppose I could get a copy.”
She started to answer, but was cut off by the ringing phone. As she picked up the headset, she nodded toward an envelope on the counter. “Carter County Sheriff’s Department, how may I direct your call?”
Wyatt glanced at it. It was a plain white envelope, with Wyatt penciled on it in Freda’s familiar sloppy hand. He smiled and picked it up.
“Uh-huh. Yes, ma’am.” Freda was still on her call, but she winked at him as he left.
IT WAS ALMOST dawn when Charleyboy slipped back into the house, but Savannah was still awake. Her thoughts had been racing around in her head since she’d gotten the message. She didn’t know how to tell him. She didn’t know if she should. She finally decided it would depend on his mood when he came in. And his sobriety, or lack of it.
She heard him in the bathroom, brushing his teeth. That was a good sign. When he was shitfaced, he didn’t bother. She’d learned to read signs like that, the way a farmer learns to read oncoming weather.
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