by Sue Russell
The youngest of three children himself, Troy grew up in west Tennessee and had always been especially close to his sister, Letha Prater, two and a half years his senior. His childhood nickname, Buddy, bequeathed him by his father when he was sickly from anaemia, had stuck, especially with Letha, who never stopped taking care of her little Buddy. He’d been verbally slow as a child for some mysterious reason, jumbling certain words, but Letha understood his language and translated for the teachers in their small country school. Besides loving Buddy, Letha liked him a lot, and as adults, gravitating along separate lines to new lives in Florida, they never stayed far apart for long.
At weekends, they whiled away many happy hours together rummaging in flea markets, watching all the colourful characters. They were mutual confidants. Buddy poured out his heart to Letha as to no one else, and she to him. She knew she could always count on him for an unsparingly honest opinion. For all the years Sharon had been married to Troy, even she sometimes asked Letha what was on her husband’s mind. Letha and Buddy had always fought between themselves, but their fierce family loyalty meant no one had better mess with Buddy or they’d have Letha’s wrath to contend with, and vice-versa.
When their Momma, then 79 and a recent survivor of triple-bypass surgery, had paid a visit from Tennessee that spring, Buddy refused to let her ride back on the bus, and drove her all the way in his pick-up. He fought his natural bent to do everything in a hurry, and Momma said he’d been real good and had even made a detour to put flowers on Grandma’s grave in Alabama.
Letha had been concerned about her brother of late. He’d been a bit down and worried about money. He’d expected to take a drop in his new line of work, but it was still disheartening and a struggle. And he was heartbroken over the loss of JC, one of his two black Chows, which had vanished into thin air. Every day he could, Troy stopped by the pound, just praying he’d be greeted by JC’s face and wagging tail. If Troy had had his way, he would have had two of every kind of animal that walked the planet.
No one else could tell it. No one else was there. And she’d say it happened this way. The guy in the sausage truck was going to kill her. Physically attacked her. She’d stripped her clothes off, trusting as ever, and the thanks she got was him pulling out a ten-dollar bill. This is all you fucking deserve, you fucking whore. Just threw the money down. Didn’t know she had a gun. Started the ugly name-calling. I’m gonna get a piece of ass off you, baby. You whore. Said he was gonna rape her.
Kicking and fighting in the woods, they were struggling, tumbling, falling down into the weeds. She pushed him away—or he was backing away—now, which was it? Anyway, she pulled out her gun. You bastard. You’re gonna rape me and shit. And she shot him right in the stomach. So she thought.
In fact, the first bullet coursing into the body of her bewildered victim hit the main artery to his heart, then ricocheted into his left lung, doing such massive damage there that it alone would prove fatal. He was only a little guy, but under threat like that, fear and fury pumping, he’d have fought for his life with every ounce of strength God delivered. If he’d had the chance. That first bullet shut down his options.
He didn’t say a word. No way to talk his way out of this. Just turned, ready to run. Get away from her. They were out in the middle of nowhere. No lifelines to cling to. No telephones to call for help. No kindness of strangers to save him. No transport for miles and miles. What could he possibly have done to harm her? She was the one with the gun. He’d turned and was going to run from her, though. For her, at that moment, that was enough.
So she shot him again. In the back.
The bullet pierced its way through his diaphragm, coming to a stop in front of his fifth lumbar vertebra. Wherever she was standing when she pulled the trigger, she certainly wasn’t looking into the eyes of the man whose life she was taking. Not possible, given the angle the bullet travelled. She shot him in the back.
Once she’d done it, he didn’t get very far. Two bullets. That was all it took to snuff out his vibrant, love-filled life. That was all it took to rob Sharon of a husband. Letha of her Buddy. His mother of her youngest son. Wanda and Vicky of their Daddy, ‘so precious’ to them, Troy’s grandchildren of their darling Grandaddy. Sharon’s daughters of their stepfather.
Just two bullets.
Not thinking of that, though, she did what she had to do. They were old, remember? Probably didn’t have anyone, anyway. Covering him up a little, making him blend in with the background, she draped some palm fronds across his body, camouflaging his blue Levis and the beige knit shirt that poignantly bore his name. Troy.
She’d say she wasn’t expecting him to have all that money in the thingamajiggy in his truck. Herman Evans, though, a man she’d lived with back in the early eighties, also drove a sausage truck way back then. He’d remember distinctly telling her about the cash box all delivery drivers carried. (Herman knew Troy Burress, too. Such a nice guy.) Expected or not, the money was there—$310; something like that? A lot, anyway.
She left Troy’s wedding ring on his finger, and the golden chain dangling around his neck.
When life had slipped away and he was no longer the man his loved ones knew, she drove off in his sausage truck and left him there. She was thinking. Stopping to throw out everything that might tie her to him. His gas credit card, his clipboard. Used to it by now. Kind of a ritual. She grabbed a pile of receipts and business cards, stuffing them into a dip in the pine needles near the foot of a tree. Still half-naked, she stopped again to finish getting dressed. Didn’t get a whole lot farther down the road before the damn truck just sputtered to a halt, out of gas. She didn’t know about the second tank, the switch she could have flicked to access it. Climbing down from his truck, she left it by the side of the road and walked clean away.
When Letha and Bob Prater’s telephone rang at around eleven the night of Monday 30 July, Bob answered it.
‘Troy ain’t home,’ came Sharon’s anxious voice.
‘Where is he?’
‘I don’t know. I wish I did know.’
Bob handed Letha the receiver and she went on the line with Sharon, soothing her, telling her not to worry. For all her assurances, when she hung up, Letha was very concerned. Sure, Buddy liked to go out and have a good time, but he simply wasn’t the flaky type who would just disappear without calling, knowing that Sharon was expecting him for dinner. On a normal night Buddy would have been home by seven, seven-thirty. Letha couldn’t quash a terrible feeling that something was very wrong.
Within a matter of minutes, she dialled Sharon back: ‘We’ll be there.’
‘OK. Will you stop and get me some cigarettes? I am really worried and nervous, and I’m afraid to leave the house.’
Feeling sick inside, Letha set off for Ocala. Seeing a sheriff’s car by the Starvin’ Marvin service station, she pulled over. She’d get Sharon’s cigarettes but, more important, find out if the officers knew anything about Buddy. They’d been given his description. That meant that the search was on.
Troy Burress had left his home at around 5.45 a.m. that morning, reporting to Gilchrist and heading off on his rounds by 6.20. Mid-week, his route took him farther afield into southern Florida and he regularly spent Tuesday and Wednesday nights in motels, driving back on Thursday. But on a Monday, he stayed closer to home.
On what they called the Daytona route, he serviced stores in the local Ocala area, then headed east to Ormond Beach. From there he’d go north-west to the Harris Grocery in Bunnell, then to the Seville Grocery, south-west of there. That Monday, he arrived in Seville between two and half-past. He didn’t make a sale, but he stayed and chatted for ten minutes or so before heading off to his next stop in Salt Springs.
Generally he took 17 South to SR 40 West to 19 North to get there, arriving between 2.30 and 3 p.m. So when he hadn’t turned up by five, he was missed. Jeff Mason of the Salt Springs Grocery even drove down to where 19 intersects with SR 40, but saw no sign of the 1983 Ford truck with its di
stinctive black cab, white refrigerator back and Gilchrist logo.
In the seven months he’d worked for Gilchrist, Troy had always been punctual and when he didn’t return between 4.30 and 5.30 p.m. as anticipated, the proprietor, Mrs Jonnie Mae Thompson, waited. At 6.10, she called the Salt Springs grocery store and learned that Troy had never made it there.
At seven, she headed home, leaving a note on the gate for Troy to call her son Michael immediately he got in. She returned to the office after 10 p.m. to find the note still there. Mrs Thompson’s eldest son put in a call to Sharon, who had heard nothing either. It was most unlike Troy not to call if there was a problem. Returning home, Mrs Thompson filled in her husband, who called the Marion County SO, the Volusia County SO and the Lakeland County SO. None had any record of an arrest or accident involving Troy. At 11.30, Mr Thompson and his eldest son began backtracking over Troy’s route.
Letha and Bob, driving the 30 miles from their home in Micanopy to Troy and Sharon’s home in Ocala, were worried sick. Letha’s mind was working overtime. Troy had visited her house just that Sunday and hadn’t been his usual cheerful self. He’d come by to pick up some pears from Letha’s trees for Sharon to make preserves, but he was irritable and seemed under a lot of stress. He’d had his grandson with him, so they couldn’t really have a heart to heart.
Letha knew he enjoyed living in Ocala, meeting the public on his rounds, and selling, but she also knew he had serious misgivings about the job. He’d complained to her about having to carry large sums of cash around. Some of the stores he serviced were frequented by some unsavoury characters. The whole thing made him nervous. He’d vowed to give the job a proper chance and stick it out for a year, but he was definitely down. He was worried about money, too, and depressed because some of those he’d helped in the past weren’t there for him now that he himself needed a little help. All these factors ran around in Letha’s head.
While the Thompsons were still out searching for Troy and the truck, Letha put in one of a number of calls she made that night to the Sheriff’s Office, and she didn’t like what she heard. Perhaps he’d just run off? Just upped and left and taken Gilchrist’s money? A grown person has every right to take off without notifying their husband or wife if they choose. With the majority of missing persons reports filed, that’s exactly what has happened. The police were treating it accordingly.
Driving a company vehicle, it was against the rules to stop and pick up a hitchhiker. For one thing, the insurance didn’t allow it. But might Troy have stopped for someone in trouble?
By 1.30 a.m., the Thompsons’ search had drawn a blank and they called Sharon again to tell her to file a missing person’s report which she did around 2 a.m. BOLOS were issued, but Troy wasn’t officially listed on the NCIC/FCIC computer as missing or endangered until eleven the next morning.
It was around 2 a.m. when Bob Prater and patrol Deputy Chesser of Marion County SO spotted Troy’s truck independently but almost simultaneously. It was parked southbound on the northbound side of CR 19 at its intersection with SR40 East. The truck was on Troy’s route, but pointed in the wrong direction. It was cold and covered with dew and there was condensation on the windows. It looked as if it had been there for some time.
At first sight, there was no visible sign of a struggle or of foul play. The ignition keys were missing, though, and the refrigerator cab was locked. For Troy Burress’s loved ones, the tension was almost unbearable as they waited for a locksmith to arrive. Bob had called Letha and Sharon to bring them up to date, and Letha didn’t wait long before calling the Sheriff’s Office back again. Had they found out if anyone was inside? She was told they were still waiting for the locksmith. Unable to bear it, Letha called back again. Had they unlocked the truck yet? The officer took pity on her. ‘I really can’t give out any information,’ she said, ‘but I will tell you this: your brother was not in the truck.’
Their immediate fears were allayed. Thank God. Troy was not inside—bound, gagged or any other way. But where was he?
Later, detectives searched the truck for any signs of a scratched message on the boxes or papers in the back. They even looked for words etched in the metal. Had he been transported in the back as a prisoner, he might have attempted to communicate the name or names of his attackers. There was nothing. But that came later. First, curiously, the Gilchrist folk were allowed to drive away the truck. That didn’t seem right to the family. Didn’t they have to check it for fingerprints before a host of other people put their hands all over it? It was a procedural error and procedural errors happen.
Speculating as to what had happened, the next logical assumption was that Buddy had been robbed since he was carrying company money and everything was gone from his truck. Letha knew with absolute conviction that whatever was troubling her brother, there was no way on this earth he would have left without confiding in her, without telling her she need not worry about him. Something bad must have happened.
Bob went out into the forest to search around the truck for any sign of Troy. Meanwhile, Letha and Sharon stayed at home awaiting a call from the sheriffs. The Praters spent the night with Sharon. No one slept a wink and Letha and Sharon were frantic by the next morning. While Bob popped home to feed their animals, Letha went to the sheriff’s office. The platitudes she heard—the investigators had Troy’s description and were doing all they could—did little to assuage her fears.
Finally convinced that Troy was unlikely to have done a flit, the search, utilising horses (and with Major Dan Henry in charge), began with a vengeance. It covered a four-mile radius from the truck, and that evening a helicopter dispatched from Volusia County scoured the area from the air.
Sharon didn’t want to let Letha out of her sight.
‘When you start to leave,’ she said, ‘I just can’t stand it, because I know that you’re my last link with him.’
‘I don’t have to go,’ Letha reassured her.
She spent three nights at Sharon’s place. She could easily have been a basket case herself, but somehow she found the strength to keep herself together. She kept busy talking to the local TV station and furnishing the local paper with a photograph of Buddy, driving it over herself so it would make the next edition.
‘How do you do it?’ Sharon asked. ‘I always thought I was a strong person, and I’m falling apart.’
‘I do it because I have to do it. I have to do it for him, and I will do it,’ Letha said, as if convincing herself as well as Sharon.
On the third night, Letha went to bed for the first time. She stayed there for just one hour.
The rest of that long week, Troy’s family went door to door and store to store, asking questions and putting up flyers. Trying to distract themselves with activity.
Troy’s daughter Vicky broke the news to her younger sister, Wanda, down in Boynton Beach. Wanda, the baby (although a mother herself), was the last one to find out about her dad and was desperately upset. She immediately telephoned Sharon who filled her in and suggested she sit tight in Boynton Beach, 274 miles away, and wait for news. Wanda had seen her dad regularly because his route brought him by each week and he stopped in for dinner with the family. Not long before that, Troy had taken Wanda’s elder daughter, Jennifer, who was eleven, back to Ocala with him to ride his horses.
By Wednesday, Wanda could bear it no longer. She had to be there. She and Gary made arrangements to leave the children with his parents, then drove to Ocala and joined Bob and Letha in their searches. They still prayed that if they found Troy in the woods he might be alive. Perhaps he was lying injured somewhere.
Sharon was enduring a different kind of pain; that of a woman whose husband has disappeared and who is not entirely convinced that he hasn’t just upped and left her. Their marriage had been under stress and rumours had it that Troy had a lady friend down south whom he’d see on his mid-week stopovers. Letha tried to reassure her sister-in-law. She knew it was nothing like that. Buddy would have said something. Sharon was still
not convinced. Letha understood. She might have felt the same in her shoes.
26
As the fractures in Ty’s relationship with Lee deepened, so, too, did Ty’s bond with Sandy. Sandy had had her share of man problems, contending with mates who didn’t treat her well. She’d survived a failed marriage, then weathered a tempestuous time with an erratic, moody boyfriend. And Ty had Lee … with everything that that deceptively simple phrase entailed. Ty and Sandy’s respective problems in affairs of the heart created an important area of common ground, forging and cementing their friendship. Running near parallel paths in their discontent, they lent comfort and support to one another. Sympathetic ears in the love wars.
Ty was increasingly unhappy at home and made no secret of it. Their sex life had withered into non-existence. Over the past months, Lee seemed to have lost all desire. True, she was having sex all day with her clients, but that didn’t console Ty.
Compounding Ty’s dissatisfaction was her annoyance at Lee’s stubborn unwillingness to entertain the idea of getting some kind of regular work. Instead of her periodic forays onto the highways, she could have got a decent job like Ty’s and brought in the same pay cheque. It would have made things easier and given them some kind of security. Lee, by whose unusual standards Ty was deemed ‘a workaholic’, had once worked (briefly) as a motel maid, but repeatedly moaned about how much she hated it. The managers were all assholes, she opined. It seemed she couldn’t get along with anybody. Or chose not to.