County Line

by Bill Cameron

  Bella looked through the windshield, straightened the wheel. “You’re being ridiculous.”

  “That day on the phone, were you actually talking to someone? Or was it all some kind of weird performance so you could sneak that ‘Jimmie’s the weak one’ line in on me?”

  “Of course.” She blew through her teeth. “I’m the master manipulator.”

  “It’s the only thing you’re any good at.”

  “Not good enough, apparently, if you’re on to me.”

  “It’s worse than you realize.”

  “I still don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  Ruby Jane stopped short. Bella rolled another ten feet before she managed to slam on the brakes. The front end of the Caprice bounced on creaky springs. Ruby Jane waited. After a moment, Bella threw the car into reverse and rolled back until she came even with Ruby Jane again. Her expression was annoyed, a little petulant.

  “I don’t know why you’re being this way.”

  “You gave me up to the cops.”

  “They had questions—”

  “You’re supposed to be my mother. I’d have been better off raised by hyenas.”

  “What do you want from me? Do you want me to stop drinking? Is that it?”

  “I want you to fall down a well.”

  “I gave birth to you. I love you. I don’t know why you’re so cruel.”

  Ruby Jane closed her eyes. Bella heard what she wanted to hear. But then Ruby Jane realized there was one piece of information which might pierce Bella’s carefully cultured indifference.

  “It didn’t go off the way you intended.”

  Bella’s face darkened and she blinked. “I don’t know what you mean.”

  “You know exactly what I mean. One of these days, this mess is going to come back and bite you on the ass.”

  The uncertainty in Bella’s eyes was unmistakable. Ruby Jane smiled.

  “I never wanted you. Either one of you!”

  “Now you tell me.” But Bella was already driving away.

  Ruby Jane didn’t care if she ever saw her again. She had a run to finish. North out of town on Farmersville-West Alex, left at Chicken Bristle. Three and a quarter miles. Then, what the fuck, right turn, north on County Line. Didn’t matter. Nothing was there. A couple of boxes and a revolver rusting under a few feet of mud and till. Four and a half miles to the hole, call it thirty-six minutes.

  The starlings chased her out of town.

  PART THREE

  May 2008

  Biddy

  - 42 -

  0.45% NaCl Solution for IV Injection

  When I open my eyes I see Chief Nash staring at me from a chair at the foot of the gurney.

  “You gonna die, Mister Kadash?”

  “One can only hope.”

  My left arm is in a sling. A thin sheet covers me ankles to armpits. My feet, sockless, are exposed. The IV in the back of my right hand is attached to what I can only guess is liquid nitrogen.

  “You do look a little worse for wear.”

  I wiggle my toes, and even manage to wiggle the fingers on my frozen hand. I ache all over, but everything seems to be in place. I’m in a tiny treatment room. Stark white light, plastic cabinets out of a catalog, wires and tubes and unrecognizable gear. I remember the ambulance, the emergency room. Talking to a nurse, maybe a doctor. It’s all a little hazy.

  “What happened, Chief?”

  “Hit-and-run, though how anyone managed to drive away from that catastrophe I have no idea. You and your irritable friend got rolled over. Maybe turned a little bit inside out too.”

  “Is Peter okay?”

  “More or less. They’re putting about fifty stitches in him.”

  “Christ.”

  “A fair summation.”

  Outside the closed door, I hear muffled voices and movement, sounds I remember from my patrol days when I’d spend hours in the emergency room waiting to take a statement, or for a suspect to get patched up for transport. Nash is patient, a half-frown on his face. His hands are folded in his lap, and his shoulders sag. He looks tired. There are lines around his eyes I don’t remember from our encounter outside the high school.

  “Chief, what time—?”

  “It’s late.”

  I try to work it out. It had been early afternoon when we came upon Ruby Jane. I have no memory from the moment of the collision until I awoke in the ambulance. An hour later? Two? I have no way of knowing the response times out there. I recall slanted sunlight when they rolled me from the ambulance into the hospital.

  I also remember lots of waiting. Waiting to be seen, waiting for my blood to be drawn. Waiting for x-rays. I remember a sensation like a knife blade in my shoulder, and lots of questions. “Does it hurt here?” Fuck, yes. Laughter. I guess an f-bomb counts for grand humor in acute trauma care.

  A gurney rolls past the door. Maybe the dinner cart. I’m hungry enough to eat hospital food, which is either a good sign or a really bad one. My left shoulder pulses against the resistance of what I guess is acetaminophen and codeine. I vaguely recall swallowing a pill.

  I wiggle my fingers again and draw a breath. “What can you tell me, Chief?”

  “It looks like you were stopped, based on the skid marks and strike angle. The other vehicle rammed you off-center in the rear and pushed your car across the ditch. You seem to have been thrown clear. Both you and your friend were unconscious when Jackson Township EMS arrived at the scene.”

  “How’d they know to come?”

  “Anonymous 911 call from an out-of-state cell phone.”

  I have Ruby Jane’s phone, but she could have picked up a pre-paid cell anywhere.

  “I don’t suppose you have any idea of who hit you.”

  I shake my head, regret it immediately. A wave of nausea threatens me. I close my eyes, and picture Ruby Jane at the side of the road, the faraway look on her face, her fingers in knots. When I open my eyes, Nash is staring at me. “You haven’t mentioned anyone aside from me and Peter.”

  “No one else was hurt.” He pauses, then nods, more to himself than me. “You found Ruby out there.”

  “Yeah.”

  “A woman at the scene told EMS she came upon the wreck while she was out on a run. She left before I arrived.”

  I see the dark look on Nash’s face. “I’m sure she had a good reason for leaving.”

  “I’m still going to have to talk to her.” There’s a strange note in his voice, doubt mixed with anticipation. He rubs his thumbs against his temples. “Not even Ruby Jane Whittaker gets to leave the scene of a hit-and-run.”

  Makes me wonder how well he knew her back in her Farmersville days. “She was standing at the side of the road. She wasn’t involved.”

  “That’s not your call to make, Mister Kadash.”

  He’s right, but a slow burn forms in the back of my neck anyway. I fix on the bag of fluid dribbling into my arm. 0.45% NaCl Solution for IV Injection. Rammed by a pickup and all I rate is half-normal saline. Maybe my blood pressure was high on admission. I feel it rising now.

  “She’s a witness at the very least.”

  “I get it.”

  “Why don’t you tell me what you remember.”

  I opt for the Readers Digest version: we see Ruby Jane at the roadside and stop. An instant later we’re upside down in a ditch.

  Nash isn’t satisfied. “Why do you think Ruby left?”

  “I don’t know why she was there in the first place.”

  “What did she say?”

  “We’d barely gotten to ‘long time, no see.’”

  He regards me for a long moment, then shakes his head. “Christ, if you weren’t so ugly, I’d think you two were twins.” A wry smile dances on his lips, but then he finds his frown again. “You come across her again, try and stay conscious long enough to have her call me.”

  “She’s her own boss, Chief.”

  “Tell me about it.” He stands up. “I’ll need your statement tomorrow.” He se
ts a business card on the counter next to my gurney and walks out.

  I’d like to get my clothes, or what’s left of them, and find Pete. I’d also like to believe I’ll find Ruby Jane at Mrs. Parmelee’s. But a moment or an hour later, someone is saying my name. I open my eyes to see a woman standing next to the gurney. She’s wearing pale blue scrubs, has my chart in her hand.

  She offers me a quick smile. “I’m Doctor Lindoff. How are you feeling?”

  “Like I’ve been in a car wreck.”

  “I understand it was a hit-and-run.”

  “It was definitely a hit.”

  “Are you able to sit up?”

  My shoulder throbs, but I manage to get myself upright. She gives me the once-over, as impersonal as they always are. She listens to my chest, looks in my eyes and ears. I follow her fingers with my eyes, twitch when she taps my joints. She presses my belly, and draws a squawk out of me when she palpates the base of my neck above my collarbone.

  “What’s wrong with my shoulder?”

  “Your clavicle is bruised. I’m more concerned about your head.”

  I raise my free hand to my forehead. “Where am I, doc?”

  “You don’t remember?” There’s concern in her tone.

  “I’m joking. In the hospital, obviously.”

  “Do you know which hospital?”

  “It says Good Samaritan on your name tag, but that’s all I got.” The doctor watches me with wary eyes. “I’m not from around here. I flew in to Cincinnati yesterday, or the day before, depending on what time it is.”

  “You’re in Dayton.” She makes a note on the chart. “Where are you from?”

  “Oregon.” She looks up, her lips a line. “Listen, I’m a little beat up, but my noggin is fine.”

  “Perhaps. Your films are clear, but I’ve ordered a neuro consult. I’m admitting you for observation overnight. If everything checks out, you may be released in the morning.”

  I have no intention of staying overnight, but there’s no point in getting into that argument. “What about my friend, Peter McKrall? He’d have come in with me.”

  “He’s not my patient, but I’ll see what I can find out.”

  I ease back against the pillow. “Thanks.” Pete may want nothing to do with me after the scene out on Preble County Line Road, but I need to know he’s okay.

  She leaves the door open behind her. I can see the nurse’s station, hear an incessant cough and a child crying quietly. A woman in scrubs pauses to punch something into her Blackberry. My feet are cold. I blink, and when I focus on the doorway again, Ruby Jane is there.

  “I don’t know why you came, Skin.”

  My heart does a little flip-flop. She comes in and closes the door, takes a seat. Her eyes are far away. She offers me a quick smile, free of dimples.

  “I was worried. No one knew what was going on.”

  “I’m fine.”

  “Are you really?”

  “You’re the one in the hospital bed.”

  “You know what I mean.”

  Ruby Jane leans back in the chair and stares at the ceiling above my head. I don’t know if she’s angry with me or thinking about something else. I resist the sudden urge to scratch.

  “RJ, what’s going on?”

  “We have something in common.” Her fingertips drum the tops of her thighs. “We’ve both been gut shot. How many couples can say that?”

  “Are we a couple?”

  “A couple of something.”

  “Tell me what’s going on. Please.”

  “It’s complicated.”

  “I can help.”

  “It’s something I need to take care of on my own.”

  I draw a breath. The air tastes of chemicals. “Whoever was driving that pickup might have killed us.”

  She looks down at her hands. “It wasn’t supposed to be like this.” Another dimpleless smile. “I was supposed to be home before you got back from the beach.”

  “Sweetie, we’re way past what was supposed to happen.”

  Whatever she set out to accomplish, dead bodies and hit-and-runs can’t be part of it. I need to tell her about Chase Fairweather, and about Jimmie. But she looks so tired and vulnerable, nothing like the Ruby Jane I know, or think I know. She’s crossed the country to find something, or to reconnect with her past. I don’t know. I want her to let me help. But she’s a woman encased in iron.

  After a while, she glances at me. “They put your things in a plastic bag.” She ducks her head, embarrassed. “I went through it earlier while you were asleep.”

  “That’s okay.”

  She reaches into her jacket pocket, retrieves the photo of her and Jimmie as kids. “Where did you get this?”

  I lick my lips, my tongue dry, and wish we were a thousand miles and years away. “That’s complicated.”

  “I last saw this picture on my grandmother’s bedroom mirror.”

  “Was it lost?”

  “Stolen, I assume. Where did you find it?”

  “There was a man in your apartment.”

  She looks away, unsurprised. “I told him to leave. He’s not welcome there.”

  “He didn’t listen.”

  Her chin rises. “Wait. Did you say in my apartment?”

  “He broke in. He was eating your soup.”

  “Did you talk to him?”

  I shake my head.

  “Where is he now?”

  I hesitate for so long she answers for me: “He’s dead.”

  “You’re not surprised.”

  “I’m not sure what I feel. I guess I’m supposed to be upset, but I don’t know.”

  “He died in your bath tub.”

  “Oh. That upsets me.”

  “Who is he, Ruby Jane?”

  “Someone who wasn’t supposed to ever come back.”

  I think of what Mrs. Parmelee told me in her living room under the Cézanne print. “Your father?”

  The shadow in her eyes is answer enough. Too many people have died.

  “There’s something else.”

  “What?”

  “Jimmie …” I can’t finish the thought.

  “What about Jimmie?”

  I chase the right words, but I don’t need them. She sees it in my troubled gaze.

  “I’m lucky, I guess.” Tears gather in her eyes. “I keep getting to not see people die.”

  “Ruby Jane, I’m sorry.”

  She stands and paces a short arc. She’s struggling against her tears, a losing battle. “How’d it happen?”

  “A hit-and-run.”

  “Just like you and Pete.”

  “Close enough, yeah.”

  “Why?”

  “He was in trouble. Pete said he was almost broke. He sold his interest in Uncommon Cup.”

  “Jimmie was always hanging by a thread. Even when the money was pouring out of his ears, it was contingent on things beyond his control. But he took care of me. I wouldn’t have been able to make Uncommon Cup happen without his help.”

  “Something funny was going on. Have you ever heard the name Biddy Denlinger?”

  Her face goes blank. She hesitates a brief, indecisive moment, then reaches for the doorknob. I sit up, wince as a sharp pain stabs from shoulder to belly. “Ruby Jane, please. It’s not safe.”

  “It’ll be okay, Skin. Go home. I’ll be there soon.”

  “Let me help you. Whatever’s going on, you don’t have to deal with it alone.”

  “This I do.” Her words die in the empty doorway.

  The plastic bag holding my pants and shoes is hanging on a hook next to the bed. They must have cut my shirt off in the ER. I’m stuck in a hospital gown printed with rainbows and unicorns. I yank out the IV, ignore the drop of blood welling up on the back of my hand. I manage to pull my pants on one-handed and slip into my shoes, the laces loose. I stuff the tail of my unicorn gown into my pants, but I can feel it billow behind me. My arm is killing me, my head swimming. Anyone who pays more than a second’s at
tention will assume I broke out of a lunatic asylum. But no one notices as I hobble out of the room and down the broad corridor.

  Outside, the night is cool. I have no sense of where I am, but the sounds and scents are urban. I follow signs to the parking garage, brick-faced recent construction with bright-colored metal scrollwork—some hospital architect’s idea of warm and fuzzy. I trot along the sidewalk toward the street. A couple of unfamiliar cars go by on the hospital drive. Passing one of the exits I find myself bathed in headlights and turn. Ruby Jane, behind the wheel of her old beater Toyota, stops short. Her face reveals nothing and for a moment we stare at each other. Then she closes her eyes and her shoulders rise and fall. When she opens her eyes again, she looks exhausted. I move around to the passenger side but she shakes her head and pulls away. I run after her, gasping with pain, and reach the street in time to see her turn onto a major arterial. Salem Avenue.

  An instant later, she’s gone.

  - 43 -

  Here’s to Health!

  No one is happy I yanked out my IV. Doctor Lindoff suggests I might prefer the first aid aisle at Kroger’s. I try a helpless shrug, made more ridiculous by rainbows-and-unicorns. Finally, after many dark looks and a condescending lecture, one of the nurses finds me a bed and sets a fresh IV. I’m in an open ward with polyester privacy supplied by wraparound curtains and my own miniature TV on an adjustable armature. The bed is wider and more comfortable than the gurney, but the ward is noisier than the treatment room. My arm remains a loaf of semi-thawed meat. My shoulder and head ache. Every time I doze off a nurse wakes me to check my vitals and shine a pen light in my eyes. Others nearby murmur and moan, cough and hack, or call for more pain meds. During each inspection tour, the nurse lifts my gown to examine the ribbons of bruising on my chest and punish me with her stethoscope. Her third or fourth time through, she clucks to herself. “Quite a scar there, mister.”

  “I got shot.”

  I don’t think she realized I’m awake. “How did it happen?”

  My thoughts are fluid and loose, and I almost unload the whole sordid tale. But when she adjusts my sling, a stab of pain in my shoulder provides a moment of clarity. “I used to be a cop.” Unimpressed, she says she’s sure the doctor will release me in the morning.