The Unremembered Girl: A Novel

by Eliza Maxwell

  “I can’t wait, Ms. Watson. I’m putting you and Jonah at risk, and I won’t do it anymore. I can’t sleep at night knowing he’s here.”

  “Just give it a few more days,” she pleaded.

  Henry shook his head.

  “I need it over with. Please, just look after Eve for me while I’m gone. Please?”

  She looked like she was going to argue, but when she opened her mouth to speak, the familiar sound of the bell ringing across the other side of the swamp interrupted her.

  Helen Sue and Henry both turned and stared.

  “Looks like we’ve got company. Henry, you take the boat on over and pick up whoever that is. And for goodness’ sake, leave that barrel be. Nobody’s going to give it a thought unless they see you messing around with it.”

  Cursing under his breath, Henry didn’t have a choice. Taking up the pole and the flashlight, he nodded to Ms. Watson, who nodded gravely in return.

  “Go on, then,” she said.

  So Henry did.

  As he poled his way through the water, his mind skipped ahead, wondering what fresh problems awaited them on the other bank.

  He saw the brown-and-white SUV first and assumed it was Del, but when the voice came out of the darkness and said, “Hey there, Henry. Didn’t expect to see you here,” Henry realized he’d jumped to conclusions.

  “Brady,” Henry greeted him. He tried to keep his voice calm and collected. “This whole thing with Livingston has upset Eve. We came by to visit for a while, get a sense of normal back.” Henry heard his words and knew they didn’t make much sense. The tilt of Brady’s brow and the scrutiny in his face said they didn’t make much sense to him either.

  “Normal, huh? I don’t know how much of that you’re gonna find out here with Aunt Helen and Jonah, but to each his own, I suppose.”

  Henry breathed a sigh as Brady let it go and stepped into the boat.

  “What brings you by?” Henry asked, trying to shift the focus off of his own questionable motives.

  “Del filled me in on the visit from Eve’s uncle.” Brady shook his head. “I told him this is a job for the state boys. If those folks out there are really smuggling people across the border, this is bigger than we can handle. But he’s got his heels dug in, Henry. I think this thing with his dad has really messed up his head.”

  Henry didn’t know what to say to that, but Brady didn’t seem to expect an answer.

  “But then Del’s been acting odd for a while now. Have you noticed?” he continued.

  Henry was grateful for the shadows that hid his face, and he kept his eyes on the marsh gliding around the boat.

  “Maybe. I just chalked it up to the stress about Alice and the IVF treatments.”

  “Hmm,” Brady murmured. “Yeah, I get that. But I don’t know. I can’t help thinking there’s more going on than I can get a handle on.”

  “You think Del has something to do with all this?” Henry asked, truly taken aback. “I know he and Livingston didn’t always see eye to eye, but Brady, that’s crazy.”

  “No, man. I know. I just feel like there’s something he’s not saying. I’ve known Del a long time, and I can tell when he’s got something heavy on his mind.”

  “Well, you’d probably know better than me. He’s my brother, but that’s the way he’s always treated me. Like a kid brother. Not exactly a friend, not exactly not. You see what I’m saying?”

  “Yeah. Yeah, I do. But I’m worried about him. Just do me a favor, Henry. You’ll let me know if there’s anything . . . I don’t know. Anything weird that I should know. Will you do that?”

  Henry was touched by the concern and worry he could hear in Brady’s voice. He could see the ripples of what they’d done spreading faster and farther than he’d ever imagined. The lies were like stones dropping in his stomach, weighing him down.

  “Sure, Brady,” Henry lied.

  “Anyway, I thought I’d have a word with Jonah about what he saw in town the other day.”

  “You mean the run-in with Eve’s uncle?” Henry asked.

  “I asked around town, trying to get a handle on what went down. Tinker told me he’d caught the tail end of it. Said Jonah might be able to tell me more, that he’d been watching too.”

  Small towns have a lot of eyes. Something Henry knew he would do well not to forget.

  “I don’t know how much you’re gonna get out of Jonah, man.”

  Brady chuckled. “Believe me, I know. But sometimes he sees more than he realizes.”

  They could just make out the Watson house in the distance, and Henry could see figures outlined on the porch.

  “I hate what happened to my brother, Henry,” Brady said quietly. “I live with that every day of my life.”

  Henry had never heard Brady talk about that day so long ago. He only knew the vaguest details about the accident that had left Jonah with a mind that didn’t get any older.

  “Mari and me, we were to blame, you know. We just wanted to spend some time alone. We were seventeen. In love. Or we thought we were. What the hell does a seventeen-year-old know about love? But it was exciting as hell. The sneaking around so her dad didn’t find out. Mari liked it. Hell, Mari loved it. Looking back, I think maybe she loved the sneaking around more than she loved me.”

  Brady looked up at Henry, seeming embarrassed at the truths he’d let slip out. “I’m sorry, you don’t want to hear this.”

  “It’s fine,” Henry said. “Nobody talks about her. Not really. And I think about her a lot.”

  “I forget sometimes that you lost her too. She loved you, you know. Maybe more than Del, and he was her twin. Hell, maybe more than anybody. She used to say you were an old soul, like she was.”

  Henry knew the love he’d had for Mari, that he still had, but he’d never heard anyone put into words that it had been returned. It was something he’d never known if he’d imagined, made up in his head because he wanted so badly for it to be true, or if their bond had been real.

  “Thank you,” Henry whispered. “Thank you for that, Brady.”

  “Water under the bridge now.” Brady shrugged, then looked up toward the house where his brother lived. “I’ve wished a million times I could go back to that day, make things different. Jonah was being a pest, following us around. We started tossing things into the river, telling him to go get them, just to get him out of our hair for a little while. But he wouldn’t stay gone long enough, so we started throwing things farther. Mari made that last throw, and she looked like a goddess under the afternoon sun. I watched her wind up and fling that rock like she was standing on a baseball mound, her lip caught between her teeth. How she laughed when Jonah went racing after it like a dopey golden retriever. God, she was beautiful.”

  Brady shook his head.

  “I couldn’t keep my hands off her. And she loved that too. Loved the power she had over me. Over everybody.”

  He turned and looked Henry in the eye, and Henry saw a depth to Brady that he’d never suspected.

  “That’s what we were doing when Jonah got tangled up under the water and couldn’t make it up. We were kissing, celebrating in it. In the knowledge that we shouldn’t be. Her dad, he’d have lost it if he’d known about us. But that just added to the excitement, you know.”

  Henry watched the emotions play over Brady’s face, the sorrow and the love and the guilt.

  “Jonah was blue by the time we got him out of the water. He wasn’t breathing. I left her there, doing CPR. I don’t even know if she knew how to do CPR, Henry. She’d probably only seen it done in the movies. And I left her there with my little brother while I ran off to get help.”

  The boat bobbed toward the side of the pier while the two men walked through the past.

  “When I got back, Jonah was breathing, but he was unconscious. He stayed in a coma for three weeks. It’s a miracle he lived at all. Mari did that. She saved his life.”

  Brady looked away from Henry’s eyes, staring off into the swamp.

&nbs
p; “But when he woke up, he was never the same.” Brady sighed. “And neither was she.”

  CHAPTER FIFTY

  Jonah didn’t have a lot to add to what Brady already knew, but he dutifully repeated what he’d seen, all the same.

  “Mr. Doucet, he didn’t treat the man very good. He was never gonna make a friend, treating folks that way.”

  Brady nodded, snapping his little black notebook closed with a sigh.

  “You’re right about that, Jonah,” he said to his brother.

  “So did I do good?” Jonah asked happily, looking back and forth between the faces turned in his direction.

  “You did real good. Real good, Jonah,” Ms. Watson told her nephew, patting his hand.

  Brady rose and tucked the notebook into his pocket.

  “I’ll get out of your hair, Aunt Helen. I’m sorry to bother you so late. This thing has got us all twisted up.”

  “It’s not a problem, Brady. You’re welcome here anytime at all. You know that.”

  “Thank you, Aunt Helen,” Brady said, leaning over to kiss the cheek of the woman who’d been a surrogate mother to him.

  “Jonah misses you,” she said, with a tilt to her head. “I miss you too, come to that.”

  He gave her a sad smile.

  “When this mess is over, I’ll come out and spend some time. I promise. Jonah, you and me. We’ll go out fishing. Maybe catch a gator or two. What do you think?”

  Jonah’s face lit up and Henry had to smile.

  “That’d be real good, Brady. There’s a couple I been watching down at the south end of the slough.”

  “I know you know what you’re doing, Jonah,” Brady said. “But remember to be careful out there on your own, okay?”

  Jonah waved him off. “Oh, I know that, Brady.”

  “Especially with Ol’ Brutal. That big guy’s ancient, and he’s not scared of anybody, including you.”

  Jonah nodded. “I steer clear of Brutal,” he said. “Like Aunt Helen says, we got us a understanding. I just toss him a good meal every now and then, and he leaves us be.”

  Brady nodded and moved toward the door. Jonah followed.

  “Matter of fact, I bet that old boy’s not gonna be needing another meal for at least a month or more, not after today.”

  “Oh yeah?” Brady asked, the distraction in his voice giving away the fact that his mind was already on other things.

  “Yeah. I fed him a meal this afternoon like he ain’t never seen. Emptied out the whole bait barrel for him.”

  Henry’s stomach dropped to the floor, and stayed there writhing. He couldn’t seem to catch his breath. His wide eyes slammed into Helen Sue’s behind the brothers’ backs. He glanced back at Eve, who sat characteristically silent on the sofa, but her face was serene.

  “That’s good, Jonah. That’s real good. Keep him happy, and he’ll mind his business,” Brady said.

  “I’ll take you on over back to your truck,” Jonah said as they walked out onto the porch.

  “That’s okay, Jonah, I can take him back,” Henry interjected. He didn’t know if Jonah had anything else to say about what he’d been feeding that giant gator that afternoon, but Henry didn’t want to take the chance.

  “Okay, then,” Jonah said, acquiescing. “I’ll just play checkers with Eve, then. See ya later, Brady.”

  “You take care, Jonah. Aunt Helen.” Brady leaned over and gave his aunt another peck on the cheek, and she mumbled her good-byes as she tried to organize her face in an expression that didn’t give away her shock.

  Brady was quiet on the return trip across the swamp. Contemplative. Henry was grateful for the silence.

  “You watch yourself, Henry,” Brady said before he stepped out of the pirogue. “There’s something going on out here in these woods. Something bad, and I can’t seem to catch hold of it. Things people aren’t saying.”

  “I’ll do that, Brady,” Henry replied.

  “Be sure you do. You’ve got that girl back there to protect now, and a baby on the way. Bad things can happen in a flash, Henry. Bad things that can’t be made right.”

  CHAPTER FIFTY-ONE

  Del had been watching, waiting.

  He was patient.

  And his patience had paid off. He stared at the man across the tiny table in the tiny room. It could loosely be called an interrogation room, though its most common use was someplace for Gladys to eat her lunch. But today, it had been commandeered for its intended purpose.

  Del knew this was the guy. The two missing fingers gave him away. Del thought he recognized him anyway, with his ferret features partially hidden by a bushy mustache. He’d never dealt directly with the man—he was a lackey, a gofer boy—but Del thought he remembered him hanging around the fringes of the operation. Of course, he’d had all ten of his fingers then.

  “I told you, I don’t know anything about that crazy old man. I just asked him if he’d seen my niece, that was all!”

  “What made you think he knew anything about that? The men you work for sent you, didn’t they?”

  “No! No, I told you already, I haven’t had anything to do with those guys since they decided I didn’t need all my fingers. I was just trying to do the right thing, man. That girl’s in trouble, and I wanted to get her gone from around here!”

  “So you’re being a Good Samaritan, are you? You sticking with that story?”

  “I’m telling you, man. I don’t know nothing about nothing!”

  “Why’d they take your fingers, Gus?” Brady asked in a calmer voice than did Del, who was standing with his palms down on the table in front of him.

  “Because of the girl,” Gus spit out, disgusted. “I brought her to them, and they thought I should have warned them she was dangerous. That’s all.”

  “Then they just let you go? Let you take a few days off to warn her? Give you the chance to snatch her out of here before they came back to get her?”

  Gus’s eyes rolled around in his head, his gaze looking for someplace to land other than on the two men in uniform sitting in front of him.

  “I . . . I guess so. Man, I don’t know what they were thinking. I hadn’t really done nothing, you know. I guess they figured I’d paid enough.”

  “How’d you know to ask the old man about the girl?” Del demanded, pulling Gus back to the topic he wanted answers to the most.

  “I was down at the beer joint. Just hanging out, trying to decide what to do next. I asked around. That’s all. I mean, I could have just left her here, let her deal with them on her own. Hell, I should have. That’s what I get for having a soft heart, though.”

  “Yeah, you seem like a real humanitarian, Gus,” Brady said.

  Gus’s brows drew together. “I don’t know what that means.”

  “Always putting other people’s needs in front of your own.”

  The slimy little man’s eyes lit up with understanding. “That’s right! That’s what I am, a hu-mani . . . whatever that word was you said. I was thinking of the girl. I should have been gone days ago, but I couldn’t just leave the girl on her own.”

  “Tell me about the smuggling. What do you know about the operation?”

  “Nothing, I’m telling you,” Gus said with a frustrated sigh. “I just run errands, do what I’m told to do. Take this truck here, pick up that person there. Stuff like that. I’m just as surprised as you are to find out what they’ve been up to.”

  Gus sent a sidelong glance at Brady. Del wasn’t kidding himself; he knew Gus was aware that he’d known all along what they were up to—the gist of it, at least—but if Gus wanted to put on a show for Brady’s benefit, he’d play along. Del had more important questions on his mind.

  “I bet it pissed you off when the old man knocked the crap out of you in front of the whole damn town, didn’t it?”

  “I didn’t do anything!” Gus yelled back at Del. “I told you already. I hooked up with a woman, Janine, down at the bar. We’ve been partying ever since. She’s been with me the whole tim
e, man. I couldn’t get rid of her if I’d wanted to, once she saw I had a little money in my pocket. I’ve got an alibi, I’m telling you. Just ask her!”

  “An alibi for what, Gus?” Brady asked mildly.

  Word had spread around town that Livingston had disappeared into the wind. Not many folks seemed sorry to see him go, but Del and Brady had managed to keep the macabre discovery at the shack a well-guarded secret.

  Gus wouldn’t know how important an alibi would be, unless he’d been involved in whatever had taken place. Del was convinced he knew more than he was saying.

  “For whatever it is you’re trying to pin on me!” Gus cried. “Whatever it is, I didn’t do nothing!”

  “And where’d you get a little money, Gus?” Brady asked, cleaning his nails with a pocketknife.

  “Ah, man, come on. I told you everything I know, which is nothing. You got no call to hold me here. I know my rights!”

  Brady sighed and pushed back from his chair. “Can I talk to you outside?” he said to his partner and friend.

  Del followed Brady out of the room, shutting the door on the now satisfied-looking Gus, who’d leaned back in his chair and crossed his arms.

  “He’s right. We can’t hold him,” Brady said, shaking his head at Del, who was still staring at Gus through the window to the small room. “We’ve got nothing, and the hooker that was with him has got him alibied anyway. She’s out front, waiting till we let him out. She’s sticking to her story, and there’s a whole lot of nothing we can do about it.”

  “He knows something,” Del said, jabbing a finger at the closed door. “You know it, and I know it.”

  “What I know doesn’t make a bit of difference. We’ve got nothing. Now cut him loose.”

  Del looked like he was going to argue.

  “Cut him loose, or I will,” Brady said, turning to walk back to his desk.

  Del opened the door so hard that it slammed against the wall with a bang. He advanced on Gus, and leaned across the table to force the man to meet his eyes. He whispered to him in a low, violent voice, “It’s not gonna matter, Gus. You don’t have to say anything at all. Because I’m going to put the word out that you sang like a bird. And when it gets back to your buddies that you flipped on them, because it will, where do you think it’ll be safe to run to? You won’t be able to go back home, that’s for sure.”