Diana Anderson - Entering Southern Country 01 - Famous in a Small Town

by Diana Anderson

  She turned away from him again. “No, you don’t,” she said over her shoulder. Her eyes glistened with tears.

  “I swore to you years ago, that nothing happened between your mother and me.”

  “I know. I guess I’ve always known.” A tear trickled down her cheek.

  He placed his hands on her shoulders and turned her back toward him. He cupped her face again and swiped a tear away with his thumb. He leaned down to kiss her. She jerked away. She wiped away another tear that streamed down her face as she stepped back.

  “You don’t want to do that,” she said.

  Confusion spread across his face.

  “Finish the book.” She turned, hurried across the room, and flew up the stairs.

  46

  Well, what was that all about? Callie stood in the kitchen doorway. What book were they talking about?

  Callie walked over and peered through the curtains on the window by the front door and watched Cal drive away.

  “Book? Must be a mystery. I do love a mystery.” She tapped her index finger on her chin and then raised her eyebrows. She turned and headed for the stairs. She climbed them and then headed toward Raven’s room.

  “Agnes?” Callie stood outside Raven’s closed bedroom door. When Raven didn’t respond, she knocked. “Agnes?”

  “Go away!”

  “This is my house. I have access to any room in this house. I will not go away. Now open this door.” Callie waited a few seconds and then knocked harder. “Agnes?”

  Callie grabbed the doorknob and was surprised that it turned. She opened the door, stood in the doorway, and looked inside. Raven was stretched across her bed on her stomach.

  “What are you doing?”

  “I told you to go away.”

  “Well, I didn’t, and I’m not going to either. This is my home. If there is a problem in this house, I need to know about it. I’m fed up with all of these secrets.”

  Raven sat up and with anger in her eyes, she looked at her mother. “You’re the only problem in this house, Mother. You and your insatiable need for sex.”

  A small crease formed between Callie’s brows. “There’s nothing wrong with sex.”

  “With every Tom, Dick, and Harry that comes along?”

  Callie fisted her hands on her hips. “I’m not a whore. And I resent you implying that I am.”

  “I’m not implying anything. I’m stating a fact. You are a whore.”

  “How dare you talk to me like that!” Callie rushed across the room and backhanded Raven across her face.

  Raven fell backwards onto the bed. She touched her lip and blinked several times. She looked down at her fingers. Blood covered her fingertips. She looked up at her mother. “There was a time when I didn’t have to say a word to get a response like that from you or Virgil.”

  “He’s your father or was your father. A child shouldn’t call their parents by their first names.”

  Raven sat up and continued to watch her mother. “You’ve lied so much, you can’t even remember the lies you’ve told, or who you’ve told them to, and if you ever told the truth, you wouldn’t remember that either.”

  Callie drew back her hand. When she came down with it, Raven grabbed her wrist before she could make contact.

  “Don’t you ever lay a hand on me again.” Raven’s eyes had darkened and pierced through Callie’s.

  Callie yanked her wrist free. She backed away and then pointed her index finger at her. “I want you out of my house immediately, or I’m calling the law and having you forcefully removed.”

  Callie marched out of the room. She left the door open behind her. She fumed all the way down the stairs and into the den. She walked over to the bar, poured a shot of bourbon, and downed it.

  “So much for finding out anything.”

  The doorbell rang.

  “You want me to get that?” Maggie called out from the kitchen.

  “Not if you’re going to bring that damned dog in here with you, I don’t.”

  “Pardon me?”

  “Never mind, I’ll get it.” Callie set the glass down, strolled over to the door, and peered through the side glass. Several pairs of eyes peered back at her. “What the hell!”

  She opened the door and microphones were shoved in her face. She took a step backwards and eyed the men and women gathered on the front porch with cameras, movie cameras, notepads, and microphones.

  “Mrs. Wallace? Is your daughter at home?” one man asked.

  “Mrs. Wallace? Mrs. Wallace? Is it true that the book is actually an autobiography of your daughter’s life while she lived here in Cypress, or is it a work of fiction?”

  “Mrs. Wallace, what’s it like to have a famous author for a daughter?”

  “What on earth are y’all talking about?” Callie asked.

  “Your daughter is living here in this house, right?”

  “My daughter an author?” Callie scanned the crowd. “You must have the wrong address. My daughter doesn’t do anything but take in stray dogs and cause me trouble.”

  A woman reached out and shoved a hardback copy of a book in Callie’s face. “Is Raven Sawyer your daughter?”

  Callie leaned back away from the book to focus. “I have no idea …” She eyed the cover and then snatched it out of the woman’s hands. Her eyes scanned every word on the front.

  “Well, is Raven Sawyer, the author of this book, your daughter?”

  She flipped it over and read the short author’s biography on the back. “Why … yes. Yes, she is.”

  “Would you mind posing with your daughter’s book for the front cover of our headline tomorrow?”

  “Headline?” She looked up and out over the crowd for a moment. She held the book up, tilted her head toward it, and plastered a smile on her face.

  The woman reached out, took the book, and flipped it around so the front cover faced the camera. Callie blinked several times when she realized her mistake, but she’d kept her smile.

  47

  Cal was relieved that the reporters were gone when he arrived back at headquarters. He entered the lobby of the sheriff’s department. Justin was seated at his desk with a paperback book in his hand, staring across the room.

  “Did you question everyone at the Inn?” Cal asked.

  Justin looked at him. He sniffed, wiped his nose with the back of his hand, and cleared his throat. “Yes, sir. Nobody saw a thing. The security cameras were off. So we’ve got nothing there. I doubt the security cameras worked anyway. They looked fake to me.”

  Cal eyed him. “Have you been crying?”

  Justin gave his head a quick shake. “Nooo, sir.”

  Cal walked over and snatched the book out of his hand. He looked at the cover of Shattered Lives and then at Justin.

  “You read this?” Cal asked.

  Justin looked away, his face turned beet red. He cleared his throat again. “Yes, sir, I … I’m embarrassed to say that I did.”

  “All of it?”

  Justin nodded.

  Cal handed the book back to him. He glanced around the room and ran a hand over the back of his neck. He was ready for this day to end. He heard a sniff, and he looked back at Justin.

  “It’s got a real sad ending,” Justin said as he looked down at the novel that was still in his hand.

  Cal watched him.

  Justin continued, “And just knowing it’s really a true story …” His head jerked up. He gaped at Cal. “Well, what do I know about such things whether it’s truth or fiction? A good officer of the law weighs the evidence, right?” He gave a nervous chuckle. “Don’t mind me, boss.” He laid the book down, pushed himself away from his desk, and stood up. “I think I’ll go make some coffee.”

  Cal watched him walk out of the room and head down the hallway. He took his hat off, headed toward his office, and closed the door behind him. He walked over to his desk and tossed his hat down. He eyed the paperback, and then sat down, and picked it up. After a moment of hesitation, he opened
it where he’d left off and began to read.

  48

  Ted had called the sheriff’s department and had been told that Raven was home. He had been relieved to hear that and had decided to finish his work day. After seeing his last patient of the day, he left his office and headed home.

  He pulled into the entrance of his driveway, but had to wait until several people moved out of his way. He rolled down his window.

  Before he could ask anything, one of the reporters stuck a microphone in his face and asked, “Dr. Wallace? Can you tell us why Raven Sawyer was arrested last night?”

  He eyed the man a moment, shoved the microphone away, and rolled up his window. He drove up to his house, got out, and hurried inside. He stood in the foyer a moment and tried to take in what had just happened.

  He noticed that the dog didn’t come to greet him as usual. He walked into the den and glanced around the room. He headed for the kitchen to look out on the patio. He found Maggie sitting on a barstool and preparing a salad.

  “Hello, Maggie,” he said and walked to the patio door. He looked out.

  Callie was reclining on a chaise lounge with a tall drink in her hand.

  “Hello,” Maggie replied.

  “Is Raven in her room?” He looked back at Maggie.

  Maggie shook her head. “No, sir. She’s gone.”

  “Oh, when will she be back?”

  Maggie shrugged her shoulders. “I doubt Miss Raven will be back.”

  “What? What are you talking about?”

  “Sir, you know I don’t like to get into y’all’s personal business.” She clenched her teeth and tore a hunk of lettuce apart. “I try to mind my own, and lately I can’t seem to do that privately.”

  “Maggie, I’m asking you to please tell me where she went?”

  Maggie tossed the lettuce in the bowl, picked up a dishtowel, and wiped her hands. “She didn’t say where she was going.”

  “Why did she leave?”

  Without saying a word, Maggie cut her eyes toward the patio and nodded her head in that direction.

  He turned, opened the patio door, and stepped out. He walked over to where Callie was seated and stood beside her.

  She sipped her drink through a long straw. She looked up at him and batted her eyelashes. “Why, Ted, when did you get home?”

  “Where’s Raven?”

  “Aren’t you going to give me a kiss hello?”

  He put his hands on his hips and stared down at her. “I asked you a question.”

  She looked away and shrugged. “Who knows where she went off to? I’m just glad that she took the dog with her. Why, she didn’t even tell her momma goodbye.” She poked out her bottom lip.

  He turned on his heel and walked away.

  “Where are you going?” she called out.

  He didn’t respond but went back inside, through the house, and out the front door. He got back into his car and drove away.

  49

  Janie set a plate with a hamburger and French fries on it in front of Cal and then sat down in the booth across from him.

  “I told you, Mom, I’m not hungry.” He slid the plate aside.

  “Son, you’ve got to eat something.”

  He shook his head. “I don’t have an appetite.”

  “What’s going on? You come in here all down in the mouth and didn’t say a word of hello to anyone who’d greeted you. That’s not like you, Cal.”

  “I just wanted to sit here, and drink a decent cup of coffee, and be left alone.”

  “Well, if you really wanted to be left alone, you’d have gone on home instead of coming in here. Now tell me, what’s going on?”

  He stared down into his coffee cup. His jaw muscles worked. “That book.”

  “What book?”

  He looked up at her. “The one you gave me to read.”

  “Oh, that book. Did you read it?” She folded her arms on the table.

  “Yeah.” He looked back down at his cup again.

  “All of it?”

  He nodded.

  “What’d you think? Truth or fiction?” She leaned in closer to him.

  “For the most part truth, but …”

  “I know. The rest is kind of hard to swallow, huh?”

  “You got that right.”

  “Have you asked her if it’s all true?”

  He shook his head. “I don’t know how to ask her that. I know the ending isn’t true.”

  “The part where she gets killed and the killer hides her body?”

  “Yeah, that part.”

  “Well, if the other is true, it’s nothing to be ashamed about. You’re only accountable for what you know, not what you don’t know.” She studied him a moment. “Cal?”

  He looked up at her.

  “She has the sorriest mother that ever lived, and you know it. Now, the day Agnes, I mean Raven, left here … what … six years ago? She knew then. The book says so. I’d imagine how she felt then, is how you’re feeling right now.” She thought a moment. “And she’s probably feeling it all over again being back here. I mean, why’d she come back? She should have let the dead bury the dead.”

  “She had to come back. She probably felt that if she didn’t go on pretending that Virgil was her real father someone might get suspicious and find out. When she arrived, she probably thought that she would have a quick funeral for him and then get the heck out of town before anyone ever knew she had even been here.” He glanced around the diner. A few heads were turning and looking their way every now and then. “And now, it’s like a nuclear bomb went off around here. Won’t be long and the fallout will have spread around the entire globe. No wonder she was so upset after she was released from jail and reporters were there waiting to ask her questions.”

  “Jail? Reporters?”

  He looked back at her. “Yeah, I arrested her last night.”

  One eyebrow shot up. “What for?”

  “I told her I didn’t want her to leave town after the funeral, but she’d said that she was going to anyway.” He looked down at the table.

  “You can’t do that … can you?”

  “Under the circumstances I can, but I can’t tell you why.”

  “Is this sheriff business or Cal business?”

  “Both. Nobody would have ever known that this book was a true story if she’d never come back here. Nobody even knew that she was the author until a local put two and two together and leaked it to the news media. Most folks around here probably wouldn’t have recognized her picture if it had been on the back cover. She’s changed a lot.”

  “Do you think that this, along with being thrown in jail, will ruin her?”

  “I doubt it. Folks these days love this kind of stuff. If anything, they’ll want even more.”

  “What about you? What will this do to you and your future?”

  He shook his head. “I don’t know. Depends on how the voters feel at the next election.”

  He downed the rest of his coffee, slid out of the booth, leaned over, and kissed her on her cheek. “I’ll probably see you tomorrow.”

  He reached for his hat on the table. She latched onto his hand and looked up at him.

  “Are you going be okay?”

  He looked down at her. His mouth formed a fake smile. With a slight shrug of his shoulders, he pulled his hand back, and walked away. He stepped out onto the sidewalk and flinched at the flash of lightning and the immediate clap of thunder. Large drops of rain began to pelt him and the pavement. He hurried to his squad car and got inside.

  50

  Crickets chirped in the wake of the storm as she walked down the sidewalk. She adjusted the hood on her sweatshirt jacket that was drenched. Lightning flashed in the east and a low rumble echoed off the duplexes. The stars peeked through the clouds. Steam rose on the hot sidewalk and the street. The corner streetlights reflected off the hot, wet pavement.

  The area was quiet. Not a light shone through any of the windows of the duplexes. She kept a steady
pace as she walked but watched for any form of movement. She’d left on her mission at three o’clock that morning. She wasn’t afraid of storms or the dark, but felt comfort in them. No one saw you in the dark, and no one cared for you if you were in a storm. She had learned at a young age to take care of herself. She put no trust in anyone, let alone a man.

  She cut across a small, front yard and went around the side between two duplexes. Her pace slowed as she stepped into the shadows. She paused and waited for her eyes to adjust to the darkness. When she could see well enough, she walked on around to the back.

  The air-conditioner unit cycled on. She made her way to the small patio and stopped. She reached into the pocket of her jacket and pulled out a penlight. She clicked it on and scanned the patio. The light shone on a rectangular planter. The plant had long been neglected and was dead and brittle. She turned off the penlight, knelt down, and shoveled with her fingers in the potting soil. Satisfied that the hole was deep and wide enough, she reached into her jacket pocket, took out a cloth wrapped package, and placed it inside the hole. She took handfuls of soil and covered it. She stood up, brushed her hands together, and walked back in the direction from where she’d come.

  She rounded the corner of the duplex and walked out of the shadows. She stopped and stepped back into the darkness when she saw headlights of a car. A police cruiser went by and headed down the street. She peered around the edge of the house and watched it make a left on the next street and then disappear behind some more duplexes.

  51

  Callie walked from her parked car, across the cemetery lawn, and stood beside Ted. “Why did you leave me to drive myself this morning?”

  “I didn’t leave you this morning. I left you last night.” He said as he looked around the small gathering and tried to find Raven.

  “It’s so freakin’ sultry out here.” Callie held a single red rose in one hand and with the other she fanned herself with a memorial pamphlet. She wore a black, tight fitted, short dress, and matching stilettos. “I wish there was some concrete to stand on out here. My heels keep sinking into the ground.” She looked down at her feet.